Chapter 340: The Life-Betting Love Broadcast 1
Toru Amuro stepped out of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department, the heavy glass doors sliding shut behind him. The crisp air did nothing to clear the suffocating weight pressing down on his chest. He had just received the news. Wataru Date, their dependable class leader from the police academy, was dead. A sudden car accident a year ago had claimed his life, leaving Amuro completely in the dark until today. Out of his four closest friends from those academy days, only Jinpei Matsuda was left alive.
His jaw tightened as a complicated wave of emotion washed over him. If it had not been for Cointreau's sudden intervention, he would have lost Matsuda as well. He would have been left entirely alone, becoming the exact miserable loner Cointreau had once mockingly predicted.
Amuro replayed the rescue scene Matsuda had described to him earlier. A blonde man had materialized out of thin air high in the sky, plunging straight into the heart of a massive explosion. He had fallen from a terrifying height, yet he had shielded Matsuda so perfectly that the detective walked away without a single scratch. Recalling Cointreau's casual, almost bored tone when discussing the incident, Amuro felt a chill creep down his neck. The man had treated a lethal explosion like a minor inconvenience. Just how deep did Cointreau's terrifying power run?
Pushing the grim thoughts aside, Amuro walked down the street. A few steps away from the station entrance, a familiar cluster of small figures caught his eye. Three of them were the usual members of the Detective Boys, the energetic kids who constantly trailed after Conan Edogawa, the brilliant boy living at Kogoro Mouri's detective agency. Standing beside them was a little girl in a bright red coat. It was Klee, the energetic younger sister under Kaeya's care. Amuro remembered her clearly; she had been kidnapped a while back, and he had personally assisted her brother in tracking her down.
He recalled a passing comment Mouri had made yesterday. The Detective Boys were scheduled to visit the police headquarters today to participate in a promotional video for a new crime prevention brochure.
'Should I greet them?' Amuro wondered, pausing on the sidewalk. Before he could decide, a young voice called out from behind him.
"Mr. Amuro?"
Amuro turned to see Conan jogging up the pavement, adjusting his oversized glasses with a look of mild surprise. The boy quickly closed the distance to join his friends.
"Ah, Conan. What a coincidence running into you all here," Amuro said, his signature polite smile easily sliding into place. He offered a brief, sanitized explanation for his visit to the police station, keeping the tragic details of Date's passing to himself.
In return, Conan explained their current lineup. Ai Haibara, the usually quiet girl of their group, had caught a nasty cold and stayed home in bed. Klee had eagerly volunteered to fill in for the filming.
Amuro shifted his gaze to the girl in red, crouching down slightly to match her eye level. "And Klee, it has been a long time."
He maintained a perfectly calm demeanor, entirely unconcerned that the child might accidentally reveal his darker affiliations. From what he had observed during the kidnapping incident, Kaeya was fiercely protective of her. There was no way a man like that would expose his innocent sister to the dangerous, blood-soaked side of their world.
Klee tilted her head, her bright eyes blinking as she studied his face. "Um..." She tapped her chin in deep thought before a massive grin broke across her face. "You are... Brother Amuro!"
Conan whipped his head around, his sharp eyes darting between the two. "Klee, you and Mr. Amuro have met before?"
"Mm-hmm!" Klee nodded vigorously, her pigtails bouncing with the motion. "Brother Kaeya took Klee to see a really cool magic show with Brother Amuro once!"
Amuro smoothly stepped in to fill the silence. "I met Mr. Kaeya while working a part-time shift at a hotel. He happened to have an extra ticket for the performance and kindly invited me to tag along."
Conan frowned slightly, processing the information. He failed to connect the magic show Klee mentioned to the specific dangerous performance he and Klee had attended. During that chaotic event, he had only spotted Kaeya and Alhaitham in the audience. He had completely missed Amuro, who must have been perfectly concealed by the theater's heavy shadows. Still, the revelation that Amuro was acquainted with a mysterious figure like Kaeya planted a fresh seed of suspicion in the young detective's mind.
Amuro lacked the energy to play mind games with the perceptive boy today. His heart was still heavy with grief. After exchanging a few more pleasantries with the children, he offered a polite wave and walked away, disappearing down the bustling street.
With Amuro gone, Conan turned his attention back to his friends. He immediately noticed Ayumi clutching a strange, unmarked cardboard box against her chest. He pointed at it, asking where she had gotten it.
Ayumi explained that a strange older man had approached them just moments ago. He had handed her the box with strict instructions to deliver it directly to Officer Takagi's girlfriend. The man had also passed along a very specific message.
"He said this is fresh food, and she needs to open it and look at it right away," Ayumi recited carefully. "He told us that if she waits until tomorrow or the day after, it might go bad and become completely unusable."
Conan nodded, accepting the explanation without much thought. It sounded like a simple, albeit slightly eccentric, delivery from a relative or friend.
The group soon arrived at the towering headquarters of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department. They borrowed a phone at the front desk to call Miwako Sato and notify her of their arrival.
Upstairs in the bustling precinct, Sato had been staring at her desk in quiet frustration. She was deeply puzzled as to why Takagi had failed to show up for his shift today. It was highly uncharacteristic of him, especially with Date's death anniversary looming just a few days away. The three of them, including Matsuda, had already made concrete plans to visit the cemetery together.
When the phone rang with the Detective Boys on the line, she pushed her worries aside and headed down to the lobby.
Greeting the children with a warm smile, Sato knelt down as Ayumi proudly presented the cardboard box.
Ayumi relayed the strange man's message, claiming it was fresh food meant for Takagi's girlfriend. Amused and slightly touched by the thought of a surprise gift, Sato carefully broke the seal and opened the flaps. She peered inside, expecting to find baked goods or fruit.
Instead, a sleek electronic tablet rested at the bottom of the box.
Sato frowned in confusion. She reached in and tapped the screen. The device instantly lit up, casting a harsh blue glow across her face. Her breath hitched. Her eyes widened in absolute horror.
Wataru Takagi, who had been missing since the previous evening, was displayed in high definition on the screen.
He was lying flat on his back atop a dangerously narrow wooden plank. Thick, rough ropes bound his wrists and ankles tightly together. A thick layer of silver duct tape was plastered across his mouth, muffling his ragged breathing. Most terrifying of all was the thick rope noose secured tightly around his neck, the other end stretching up into the darkness above. The plank was so narrow that even the slightest shift in his weight would send him plummeting over the edge. One wrong move, one desperate struggle, and the noose would instantly snap his neck.
The live video feed flickered. The camera angle abruptly switched to a bird's-eye view directly above him, then cut to a harsh profile shot from the right, and finally to a dizzying angle from below. The automated system randomly cycled through the different cameras, providing a complete, agonizing view of Takagi's deadly predicament.
All plans for the Crime Prevention Brochure were instantly abandoned. The lobby erupted into chaos as Sato shouted for backup. Within minutes, the entire Violent Crimes Division sprang into high-alert action. Detectives swarmed around Sato's desk, their faces grim as they stared down at the tablet, desperately analyzing the live feed for any recognizable landmarks or clues.
Matsuda pushed his way through the crowd, his usual laid-back demeanor replaced by cold, sharp focus. He snatched the tablet from the desk and carefully inspected the casing. His dark brows knitted together in deep frustration.
"The charging ports and physical buttons have all been completely destroyed," Matsuda announced, his voice tight. He pointed to the mangled edges of the device. "It cannot be charged, and the internal software has been locked down. The only functioning feature left is the screen display for this live broadcast."
He set the tablet back down with extreme care. "Whoever sent this is a professional. If we try to pry the casing apart to trace the signal source, we risk triggering a fail-safe. One wrong move, and we lose the feed entirely. We are completely at their mercy."
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