Model worker and his little darling

"Haha, Pingqing, I knew you'd remember this. This place has the best food."

"Uncle, you've been upgraded? You're now in a private room."

Upon hearing this, the uncle put down his chopsticks. "There was a murder in that ward, so the hospital arranged a private room for me and Mr. Sekiguchi."

Pingqing nodded and asked curiously, "How's Inspector Megure's investigation going with yesterday's matter?"

"The robbery gang members are all dead, and the money is gone. We can only assume they were double-crossed. As for the criminals, I doubt we'll ever find them."

As they were talking, Inspector Megure walked in with Takagi, and Hirai noticed that they both had dark circles under their eyes.

Indeed, the entire robbery gang was wiped out at once. Superintendent Matsumoto must have put a lot of pressure on Inspector Megure, and the outside media were also reporting on this extensively.

Metropolitan Police Department, incompetent, paycheck thieves...

"Inspector Megure, are there any new leads?"

Inspector Megure gestured to Takagi, who then began to recount the clues they had found.

"Brother Mori, Brother Taira, what are your thoughts?"

Pingqing looked at the sky outside. The sun had disappeared, and there was a vague feeling that it was going to rain.

"Officer, so many people died at the same time. There might be more than one killer. It must have been premeditated. Could it be another small gang that has a grudge against this criminal gang?"

"We've considered the situation you described, but we haven't found any clues. Hey, Mori, how come you were asleep yesterday?"

Uncle Mori scratched his head. "I don't know either. I just fell asleep yesterday because I was tired from talking."

After discussing for a long time without coming up with anything more useful, Inspector Megure left.

Soon, Yoko Okino came to visit the uncle with gifts, and Tooru Amuro came with her.

"Miss Yoko, it's such an honor for me to come see you, hehehe."

After greeting the older man, Amuro Tooru chatted with Hirai Kiyoshi for a bit. Amuro Tooru had met Hirai Kiyoshi a few times when he brought Ran and the others to the film set, and he had a fairly good impression of him.

After a while, Amuro Tooru made an excuse to leave.

He also learned about the heinous murder and came to the hospital hoping to find some clues, because he discovered that it was the organization that was behind it.

Pingqing watched Touko's retreating figure, wondering what he should do for him.

"Alright, Mr. Mori, I'll be going now. I'll come see you again when I have time." With that, Yoko Okino prepared to leave.

"Ah—, my leg."

Hearing the noise, Pingqing immediately ran over and saw the uncle lying on the ground, complaining of leg pain.

After taking the uncle to the examination room, Pingqing realized that the uncle had forgotten that he was a lame goose. He wanted to see his idol off when she was about to leave, and that's how he ended up injuring both of his legs.

Fortunately, the other leg was just sprained, but I still need to rest.

When Ran and Conan arrived at the hospital from school in the pouring rain, the old man was looking downcast at his immobile leg.

Seeing that her father's injuries had worsened, Xiaolan asked worriedly, "Dad, what happened to you?"

Pingqing offered an explanation, and both of them were speechless.

At that moment, Hirai received a call from Gin. He glanced at Conan, thinking how exciting this was, and then quietly went outside to answer the call.

"Are you with Kogoro Mouri now?"

"Ah."

"An old man stole the disk containing Mika Construction's accounting books. Our people found out that he probably gave the disk to someone else on the bus. The words 'Shetaku' and 'Ran Mouri' were left on the bus window. Please check it out."

After listening to Pingqing, he hung up the phone immediately. Why are there so many things going on these past two days?

As I entered the ward, Xiaolan was also talking about the old man.

“Dad, I met an old man on the bus. He said he had something to tell you. I fell asleep on the bus, and when I woke up he was gone. Sonoko said I was dreaming, but I feel like I’ve seen that old man before.”

Pingqing walked behind Xiaolan, glanced at the bag placed to the side, and felt inside her bag. Sure enough, there was a disk. He quietly took it and then began to listen to the story.

"Sister Xiaolan, did that old man say he wanted to ask Uncle for something?"

Xiaolan shook her head.

"Xiao Lan, I think you're just confused from sleeping too much."

"Dad, I think something might have happened to the old man."

Seeing that Xiaolan was still worried, Pingqing said, "Why don't we go and check? Didn't you say the old man would get off at Muromachi Hospital? We can just ask him."

“Sonoko and I have already been there, and there is no Mr. Shitara on either the hospital admission list or the visitor list.”

Seeing Ran's worried expression, Conan comforted her, "Ran-neechan, since you're so worried, let's investigate. With Hirai-nii-san there, we should be able to find out soon."

Seeing Xiaolan's expectant gaze, Pingqing nodded.

Then he glared at Conan, who scratched his head and chuckled. If it were just him and Ran investigating, his uncle definitely wouldn't agree, but if he brought Hirai along, his uncle would agree.

The main reason is that he also believes the old man Xiaolan mentioned exists, and that something very likely has happened to him.

What kind of trouble did he cause? He was just out delivering food to the old man, but he ended up taking the old man to the examination room again, and then he got another assignment to investigate the missing elderly man.

"Oh, you've all left, what am I going to do?"

"Dad, you should rest well. We'll come see you again tomorrow."

The three of them got into a taxi heading to the bus stop. Conan originally wanted to bring Sonoko along, but Sonoko had already taken a bath and didn't really want to go out, so they decided against it.

On the bus, Conan noticed a car following behind, but it disappeared in the blink of an eye.

The three arrived at the bus stop. The driver was the same one, but the bus had broken down and was being repaired.

"Ah, I just remembered something. A man just came up to me and asked me where the girl with the surname Maoli was getting off. He was a man wearing a trench coat and sunglasses."

Xiao Lan was startled upon hearing this. "I remember that man. He was sitting in the very front seat."

Ping Qing let out a sigh of relief. "Let's go check on the car Xiao Lan was in first."

When the three of them arrived, the car was being washed. Conan ran over and breathed on the car window, and words written by Ran and the old man appeared.

Xiao Lan breathed a sigh of relief; she was indeed not dreaming.

"Was Mr. Shiraku kidnapped by that man in the trench coat? Let's call the police!"

However, Conan refuted Ran's guess, saying, "That person is asking about Ran's whereabouts, which means his target is Ran."

As soon as the three got off the bus, a man in a trench coat and sunglasses appeared next to them, putting on gloves and looking around warily.

Suddenly, the man rushed towards Xiaolan.

Pingqing kicked him to the ground. Tsk tsk, he doesn't look like a good person at all.

Seeing the man get up and try to run away, Pingqing went over and kicked him twice more.

"Brother Pingqing, this person should be in cahoots with the person Sister Xiaolan saw. Sister Xiaolan, let's call the police first."

Under a barrage of threats and inducements from Hirai and Conan, the man finally revealed their purpose: the disk in Ran's bag. The old man had also been kidnapped by them.

Xiaolan searched through the bag, but there was no disk inside.

Now it was the man's turn to be dumbfounded: where did the hard drive go?

Soon, Inspector Megure arrived and led them to the place the man had mentioned, where they rescued the elderly Shitara.