Detective Conan: Knifeman? I'm a good citizen of Beihua

"Shirakawa——"

"Shirakawa——"

"Shirakawa Aoi!"

Well--

Who is calling me?

Shirakawa Akane coughed a few times uncomfortably, then opened his eyes with difficulty and saw Amuro Toru's anxious face first.

Um? Toru Amuro?

When those gray-purple eyes stared at him, it seemed as if they were hiding an unforgettable past, unable to conceal such painful emotions. They were vaguely water-colored, but like tiny starlight, they flashed away.

Why did he look so sad?

"Cough-cough-"

Baichuan Qiu blinked his eyes, and his vision became blurry again. He couldn't help but turn over with difficulty, coughing continuously and even dry heaving a few times.

"It's okay, it's okay!"

Enomoto Azusa's cheers of relief were heard, and Amuro Toru hurriedly supported Shirakawa Akane so that he could cough out the water in his lungs better.

"How do you feel now?" Amuro asked in a low, hoarse voice, with a tremor still in his voice.

When he saw the white-haired young man lying motionless in the water, Toru Amuro's heart suddenly sank to the bottom.

The pain of his friend dying in front of him but being unable to do anything about it surged into his heart.

Three years ago, the explosion took away his friend, and three years later, the sound of rushing water drowned another friend of his.

Amuro Toru dragged Shirakawa Akira up the stairs with almost trembling hands, then felt the other's pulse and began to perform cardiopulmonary resuscitation on him without hesitation.

Those light golden eyes finally opened. Although still a little fragile, they had regained their original spirit and looked at him gently and harmlessly: "I'm fine, thank you, Amuro-kun."

Amuro Toru looked at him, and the stone in his heart finally fell.

Finally, this time, he caught up.

Gray-purple eyes concealed an indescribable feeling of joy or melancholy, and the blonde clerk put on a perfectly composed smile. "That's great, Manager. I'm glad you're okay."

"Manager, what's going on?" Enomoto Azusa asked Shirakawa Akane worriedly, with tears on her cheeks. It was obvious that she was scared just now.

Baichuan Qiu leaned on Amuro Toru and tried to support himself. He touched his still numb legs and said softly, "Just now I saw a water pipe leaking, so I wanted to go down and turn off the valve, but for some reason, there was an electric leak in the water, and my body suddenly stopped responding."

"Luckily you arrived in time, otherwise—ahem."

Baichuan Qiu started coughing again, but his voice had become hoarse and unpleasant.

"Electric leakage?" Enomoto Azusa exclaimed, groping Shirakawa Akane up and down, "Then let's rush you to the hospital!"

Amuro Toru stared at the puddle of water, a cold look flashing in his eyes. "Something's not right. When I was rescuing the store manager just now, I also went into the water. I even came into direct contact with the water and the store manager, but I didn't feel any electric shock!"

Azusa Enomoto was puzzled: "Huh?"

"This wasn't an accident at all!" Amuro Toru's voice was cold, his face gloomy, "It was a carefully planned murder!"

The target of the murder was none other than his good friend - Shirakawa Akane!

-

Hearing the noise, Kogoro Mouri hurried down with Conan and Ran Mouri. The scene was already full of police officers.

"what happened?"

Kogoro Mouri was the first to look at Shirakawa Akane, whose face was pale on the recliner, and was shocked.

Amuro Toru solemnly recounted the events to Maori Kogoro and the others, and then expressed his own judgment: "This must be a murder targeting the store manager!"

After listening to Toru Amuro's story, Maori and his group also frowned.

There was electricity when Bai Chuanqiu stepped on it, but it went out after that... This shows that someone deliberately leaked electricity in an attempt to murder Bai Chuanqiu! After Bai Chuanqiu fell, the murderer immediately took away the power supply, leaving Bai Chuanqiu to "drown" under the water pipe.

If it weren't for Amuro Toru and the others arriving in time, tragedy might have happened! It might even be more like an accident!

Mao Lilan looked at Shirakawa Qiu worriedly, feeling that Mr. Shirakawa was not in a good condition: "Mr. Shirakawa is like this now, why don't you go to the hospital for a check-up first?"

Maori Kogoro also urged urgently: "That's right, don't think you are in good condition now, there may be something wrong inside! Go to the hospital quickly and check everywhere!"

After all, it is contact with overcurrent, even if it is not high voltage, it will cause some damage to the body.

Baichuanqiu smiled at everyone and said soothingly, "I'm actually feeling fine. I just choked on the water. Now that something like this has happened, I want to know who the guy who murdered me is! Don't worry, I'll just sit here for a while and see if there are any clues."

Amuro Toru was helpless.

Sometimes Baichuan Qiu gets stubborn and he has no way to stop her.

At this time, Megure Jusan also came over.

Toru Amuro took a quick look and was glad that Jinpei Matsuda didn't follow him this time.

Of course, Toru Amuro knew that Jinpei Matsuda was transferred to the First Investigation Division. He also specifically told Yuya Kazami that if he and Jinpei Matsuda appeared in the case at the same time, the public security department would immediately intervene and send Jinpei Matsuda elsewhere.

Fortunately, because of his good reasoning ability, Jinpei Matsuda was fully capable of handling a case on his own, so Megure Juzo confidently sent him to handle other cases. He never ran into Toru Amuro, and the public security had no chance to take action.

But given Matsuda's personality, that guy would definitely rush over without stopping once he knew about this.

"Oh, by the way, Officer Megure."

At this moment, Shirakawa Akane suddenly called out to Megure Jusan.

Megure Jusan looked at him in confusion.

"Please don't tell Matsuda about this for now. If he finds out, he'll definitely rush over and might even delay the work at hand."

Shirakawa Akane earnestly requested Megure Jusan.

He had done this on purpose, and Shirakawa Akira didn't want Matsuda Jinpei to worry about it.

Megure Jusan looked at Shirakawa Qiu, a little surprised: "Do you know each other?"

Shirakawa Qiu explained: "We were classmates in the police academy."

Amuro Toru's eyes flashed.

Megure Jusan understood: "I see, then you, Hagiwara, and Date are all classmates."

Baichuan Qiu smiled bitterly: "It used to be."

Not anymore.

The white-haired young man lowered his eyes, concealing his complicated emotions.

Megure Juzo roughly understood the relationship and said he understood without saying anything more. He turned around and took the police officers and detectives to investigate the crime scene. Enomoto Azusa and Mouri Ran stayed to look after Shirakawa Akane.

Now the water valve has been closed, and the flood that was originally pouring out has finally stopped. However, it was closed too late, and a large amount of water had already accumulated on the ground at the scene, slowly flowing down the drainage ditch next to it.

To be on the safe side, the police officers who stepped into the puddles wore insulating rain boots and bent over to search back and forth, trying to find any suspicious power sources nearby.

Megure Jusan was the first to ask the police officer who was checking the water pipe: "How is it? Did you find anything?"

The police officer replied: "There are no signs of strong damage to the water pipe. It is a natural break caused by rust, but -"

The officer paused, then frowned. "We found a large amount of strong alkaline substances attached to the water pipes, which is likely to accelerate rust and breakage. Based on the ingredients above, we speculate that it is a strong sewer unclogging agent or something like that."

Some strong drain cleaners contain potassium hydroxide, which is highly corrosive to metal materials. If pipes are already aging and worn out, and are exposed to these substances for a long time or in high concentrations, they can corrode, thin, or even perforate, accelerating their breakage.

To sum up, judging from various circumstances, the water pipe break should also be man-made.