Detective Conan: The System Takes Me to Zero's World

Chapter 332 Tracking Rum: From surveillance failure to new clues in the case

The two men walked towards the old man.

Kudo Yuki smiled and inquired, "Hello, excuse me, we would like to inquire about the surveillance situation of the property management office of this building 17 years ago. Was there any abnormality in the surveillance at that time?"

The old man put down the documents, leaned back in his chair and recalled: “I worked here 17 years ago, and there were indeed abnormalities in the surveillance.

For a while, the screen in the monitoring room was always flickering or even black. The maintenance personnel checked it many times, and the problem reappeared soon after it was restored to normal. Everyone guessed that it was electromagnetic interference, but the investigation was fruitless. Later, the fault disappeared inexplicably. "

James leaned forward slightly, his eyes full of inquiry, and then asked: "Do you remember which areas the problematic surveillance cameras are located in?"

The old man raised his hand and scratched the back of his already graying head, with a hint of apology on his face: "I'm not sure, my main responsibility is not monitoring.

I remember that the director of the monitoring room was very anxious and told everyone to pay more attention. The director is still working here now. Look, it's that office." As he said this, he stretched out his dry finger and pointed to the half-open office door not far away.

James and Kudo Yuki looked at each other, then sincerely thanked the old man and walked towards the office side by side.

Kudo Yuki raised her hand and knocked lightly on the door with her knuckles. Soon a slightly hoarse voice came from inside the room: "Come in."

The two opened the door and saw a middle-aged man wearing black-framed glasses and with a weathered face sitting behind the table. When the man saw them, a trace of confusion flashed across his eyes and he subconsciously asked, "Who are you?"

James hurriedly stepped forward, bowed slightly, and politely and concisely stated his purpose: "Hello, we are investigating an old incident from 17 years ago. I heard that you were the director of the monitoring room at that time, so I wanted to ask you about it. Do you still remember the situation when the monitoring was always flashing snow and black screen?"

The director's eyebrows knitted together when he heard this, his tone full of fatigue and helplessness, he smiled bitterly and sighed: "How could I not remember, that failure tortured me so much.

The maintenance personnel checked it over and over again, and each time they found a different cause. I thought it was fixed, but it broke again two days later. I suspected from the bottom of my heart that someone was deliberately making trouble, but there were so many people coming and going in this building that it was impossible to check them one by one.

When the fault occurred, there was a faint flickering light on the surveillance screen. Anyone with a discerning eye could tell that it was caused by interference from electronic equipment. The timing was so strange that it looked like someone deliberately didn’t want the surveillance to record anything.”

James pressed on, asking, "Have you found the source of the interference?"

"We searched everywhere we could think of, every possible area, but we found nothing. The source of the interference was like a ghost, appearing out of nowhere and disappearing inexplicably.

Later, the problem disappeared on its own, and everyone was tired of the trouble, so they just thought it was a device failure and didn’t investigate further.”

Kudo Yuki looked at the director with a burning gaze, and asked, "Do you remember which areas the faulty surveillance covered?"

The director fell into deep thought. After a moment, he slowly recalled: "The floor where Ms. Amanda and Mr. Hiroshi Haneda live and the surrounding areas are all within the affected area."

Kudo Yuki then asked the next question: "We found 7 hard drives in the warehouse, two of which were main hard drives, and the remaining hard drives had a small capacity and only contained one surveillance video. What's going on?"

When talking about the hard drive found in the warehouse, the director pushed his glasses subconsciously and explained: "The monitoring malfunctions were too frequent, so we had to replace the hard drive. We had no place to dispose of the replaced hard drive, so we threw it in the warehouse. Later, the malfunction was gone, so we didn't bother to check it anymore."

Kudo Yuki thought to herself: [The problem with the surveillance is obviously a common practice of Rum, which is to facilitate their implementation of the plan without being discovered.]

"Thank you for the information you provided. It is really helpful to us." James thanked the director politely.

After saying goodbye to the director, James and Kudo Yuki walked out of the property management office.

The sky seemed to be splashed with orange-red paint by the painter Nature. The afterglow gently fell on the earth, giving the surrounding buildings and streets a hazy color.

They returned to the car, both thinking about the clues they had just obtained, wondering how to find new breakthroughs in this complicated case.

Kudo Yuki's eyes fell on the two photos placed in the car, and she concentrated on saying, "James, let's check the remaining two locations tomorrow. It's getting late, could you please take me to my doorstep?"

James seemed to have just escaped from a whirlpool of thoughts, and quickly nodded and said, "Of course, I did get a lot of clues today, so I have to go back and sort out my thoughts."

The car started and drove smoothly along the street.

James muttered to himself while driving: "Judging from the monitoring failure today, it is very likely that the organization is behind this. I guess they have been planning this for a long time just to ensure that their plan can be implemented smoothly."

Kudo Yuki gave the answer: "Well, Rum is the only one in the organization who is used to using this kind of interference with surveillance to deceive others. But being able to see his appearance 17 years ago from the previous surveillance video is also an unexpected gain, so it's not a wasted trip."

Before we knew it, the car had arrived at Kudo Yuki's house.

Kudo Yuki unbuckled her seat belt, turned her head to look at James, and reminded him again: "I hope that the two locations tomorrow can provide us with some new and useful clues. It feels like we are getting closer and closer to the truth."

James' eyes were full of thought. "Yes, as long as we follow these clues and dig deeper, we will eventually find out the truth. Go back and have a good rest. I will pick you up tomorrow and we will go to see the remaining two places together."

"Okay, see you tomorrow." Kudo Yuki pushed open the car door, got out, waved to James, turned and walked towards the house.

James watched Kudo Yuki's back disappear behind the door before driving away.

When Kudo Yuki walked into the house, she saw the snacks prepared by Yukiko on the table before she left. She walked straight to the living room, her stomach growled at the right time, so she picked up some snacks to taste.

While eating, Kudo Yuki was still reviewing the clues of the day's investigation in her mind.

Suddenly, Toru Amuro called via video.

Kudo Yuki quickly put down the snacks in her hand, took a tissue to wipe her hands, clicked the connect button, and Amuro Toru's handsome yet slightly tired face immediately appeared on the screen.

"Zero, you didn't sleep well again! How can your body bear this?"

"The mission is difficult and the affairs are complicated. I really can't spare time to rest. How is your progress? Is your investigation of clues going smoothly today?"

"It went quite smoothly. I'll tell you in detail when I get back. By the way, what orders did you receive this morning that made you so busy?"

"Xiaoxue, the new member who you asked me to keep an eye on before and who has no name yet is in a worrying condition. His spine was pierced by a bullet, and Karasuma Renya directly ordered him to be used as an experimental subject, and the operation was carried out in secret. I also heard this news by chance. I guess the organization decided that he had lost his usefulness and abandoned him."

"According to my understanding of the old man, once the pawns in the organization are no longer useful, they will be abandoned and used as experimental subjects to squeeze out their last value. This new member was most likely shot and paralyzed by Wakasa Rumi, and failed his first mission, not completing what Rum had asked him to do. I guess Rum wanted to recruit him, but the old man punished him for paralysis."

"I thought so too. The struggles and tactics within the organization have become more complex and ruthless. It seems that Rum has been acting more and more anxiously recently. Now the entire organization is like the calm before the storm, which makes people feel uneasy."

"The experience of this new member is a reminder for us. The old man suspects that Rum has other intentions. Rum is eager to hunt down Wakasa Rumi and will become more and more unscrupulous. I don't know who the next target of the old man will be."

"The situation within the organization is becoming increasingly unpredictable. You are looking for clues in the United States. If you encounter any danger, don't act recklessly."

At this time, Zhu Fujingguang's figure appeared in the video screen, and he nodded slightly to Kudo Yuki.

Seeing this, Kudo Yuki smiled and said earnestly, "Don't worry, James will investigate with me. You are free now, take the time to rest.

Hiro, help me supervise Zero to get two hours of sleep, and be sure to strictly enforce it. When I come back, if this matter is done, I will arrange for you to investigate other clues, and then you won't have to worry about the text materials in the secret weapon base. "

Zhu Fu Jingguang responded with a smile: "Don't worry, Xiaoxue, I will urge him to have a good rest. You should also pay special attention to safety when investigating in the United States."

Amuro Toru shrugged helplessly and said with a wry smile: "You two, I'm not a child. You specially asked someone to supervise me when I sleep. Okay, I'll listen to you this time."

After hanging up the video call, Kudo Yuki sat on the sofa in the living room, looking at the remaining snacks, and then closed the lid of the snacks. She gathered her thoughts little by little. She got up and went to the bathroom. After a simple wash, she returned to the bedroom. As soon as she touched the bed, she felt tired. She fell asleep quickly.

After a short rest, the sunlight gently shone on Kudo Yuki's face. She slowly opened her eyes, stretched, got up, washed, dressed, and had a simple breakfast. Then, she received a call from James, informing her that he was waiting outside the door.

Kudo Xue went out and got in the car. James handed her a cup of hot coffee and said with a smile: "Drink something hot in the morning to refresh yourself. You don't know what you will encounter today."

"Thank you, James." Kudo Yuki took the coffee and took a sip. The warm liquid flowed down her throat, making her feel much more energetic instantly.

The car started and drove towards the fourth location, which was the section of road where the traffic accident occurred near Juke Hotel.

Soon, they arrived at the location of the traffic video. There was a lot of traffic here, and the road was a little noisy.

Kudo Yuki got out of the car first as instructed by the system, observing the surrounding environment, the scene of the accident that she had previously learned about constantly emerging in her mind.

James then got out of the car, clutching the photo tightly, his eyes quickly switching between the photo and the surrounding environment, searching back and forth for traces of the camera, muttering in a low voice: "The camera should be nearby, but the environment has changed so much that it's hard to find."

As he spoke, he sometimes squatted down to check the roadside facilities, and sometimes looked up at the tall buildings.

Kudo Yuki walked to a telephone pole on the side of the road and found some traces of suspected camera lines on the ground. She looked in the direction of the traces and saw an inconspicuous camera in the corner of the office building opposite the Juke Hotel, facing the section of the road where the accident occurred.

"James, there." Kudo Yuki shouted.

James walked over quickly, looked in the direction she pointed, and praised: "Good job, Kudo Yuki, let's go over and see if we can get any useful footage."

The two men crossed the street, walked into the office building, and after explaining their purpose to the staff, they were taken to the monitoring room.

In the monitoring room, the screen flickered.

The staff operated the computer to retrieve the video footage of the accident period.

In the video, vehicles were driving normally on the road before the accident. Kudo Yuki keenly discovered that a few minutes before the accident, a black car slowly stopped downstairs of Juke Hotel, followed by several other black cars that stopped in the parking lot one after another.

The door of the first car to arrive opened, and two men in black got out. The man in black who was driving shook the car key fob, as if sending some kind of signal, and a group of men instantly emerged from the darkness and followed them into the hotel.

Kudo Yuki's pupils suddenly shrank and her eyes were fixed on the car key chain. Almost subconsciously, she took out her cell phone and took a precise picture with a "click".

She opened the photo album and slid her fingers rapidly across the screen. When the pattern of Rum's exclusive code name came clearly into her sight, her heart was shocked. She finally found the key clue!

Kudo Yuki handed the screenshot to James and lowered her voice deliberately: "This is Rum's unique keychain pattern. This car is very likely his. It has been 17 years since the Haneda Hiroshi case, so the car must have been changed, but this proves that our investigation direction is correct. This clue is too important."

James was startled at first, but then he calmed down, nodded quietly, and stared at the surveillance video in thought. Seeing that the staff didn't pay attention to this side, he secretly breathed a sigh of relief.

In the surveillance video, Rum was making a phone call in the car after he and his men came out of the Juke Hotel. A shogi chess record was blown onto the car window, and he immediately took his men back into the hotel.

At the same time, Kuroda Bei rescued the unconscious Asaka from the trunk, put her in the passenger seat, fastened her seat belt, and drove away. As soon as he turned on the headlights, he was followed by Rum's men, a car accelerated and hit him, and someone pointed a gun.

Kuroda Bei stepped on the accelerator, the engine roared, and the tires rubbed against the ground, giving off a pungent burning smell, as he tried to escape.

At this moment, a small truck came running in from the side like a wild horse. With a loud bang, the two vehicles collided violently, the metal twisted and deformed, and the sparks instantly ignited the leaking fuel. Flames shot up into the sky, and thick smoke billowed up like a giant black dragon.

The out-of-control vehicle slid wildly under the huge impact force, knocking over roadside trash cans and warning signs along the way.

The passers-by around were first stunned by the sudden loud noise, and then burst into terrified screams. Some people ran around in panic, while others took out their mobile phones and tremblingly called for help. The scene was in chaos.

Seeing that there were many people watching, Rum evacuated decisively. After receiving the order, his men drove away quickly.

Asaka wakes up and quietly slips away while everyone is attracted by the smoking truck.

When the fire truck and rescue vehicle arrived, Kuroda was already in a deep coma. After the rescuers simply bandaged his wounds, he woke up briefly and weakly asked about Asaka's whereabouts. After learning that she had escaped, he fell into a coma again.

To be continued...