Ke Xue World: The Confrontation between Black and Red

With the help of the night vision capabilities of high-tech glasses, Conan carefully poked his head out from the crack of the door and looked at the man in the hotel staff uniform pushing a food cart walking on the carpet in the distance.

I immediately concluded that the other party was not a real hotel staff.

The induction floor lights installed on both sides of the corridor illuminated the man's lower body much brighter than his upper body. Therefore, Conan noticed at a glance that the man was wearing a pair of hard-soled tactical boots.

Walking to the corner of the corridor, the man turned the corner pushing the food cart.

The sound of the dining car's wheels was dampened a lot by the softness of the carpet, but when it turned a corner, the light and shadow cast by the floor lamp on the white cloth of the dining car was reflected.

Conan, who was already wearing standard sneakers, tiptoed out through the crack in the door and confirmed that the cat was behind a large vertical potted plant that was placed in a regular pattern on both sides of the corridor.

In the area covered by the white cloth on the dining car, there is an object that is not large in size, but it is definitely not a plate.

While Conan was thinking about what it might be, he followed the sound of the rollers, walked lightly to the corner where the man disappeared, and looked over.

The man was still pushing the food cart and walking slowly in the corridor. The warm yellow ceiling lights in the corridor lengthened and shortened the man's figure, and the floor lights lit up and went out as the man walked.

At the end of the corridor is the public lounge area on the ninth floor.

In a corner of the rest area is an employee-only elevator that leads to other floors.

The man with a clear goal in mind did not even stop in the public rest area and walked straight towards the employee elevator.

The sound of footsteps on the smooth floor tiles was almost masked by the sound of the food cart's rolling wheels.

Conan hid behind the sofa in the rest area and watched the man pushing the food cart to stop at the employee elevator entrance, swiping his employee card to open the elevator, waiting for the elevator to arrive and pushing the food cart in, the elevator door slowly closing, and a series of events happened.

I always feel like something is not quite right.

At this time,

A sound of breaking air suddenly came from behind him.

"call out!"

Before Conan could react, Mao Lilan, who had been following him all the time, quickly hugged him and rolled on the ground.

The sharp tip of the arrow grazed the ahoge on his head and went straight through the leather sofa that Conan used to hide his figure when he was avoiding the man in the dining car.

Then it was nailed firmly to the wooden low table in front of the sofa.

Tonight is actually a good day for moon watching.

It is a rare sight to see a full moon hanging high in the sky, without any cloud or fog blocking it.

The cold moonlight shines through the floor-to-ceiling windows of the rest area, illuminating the black-feathered short arrow that was embedded in the wooden table, making its details clear.

Conan, who was closer, could see a complex pattern engraved on the metal arrow, which reflected the cold light unique to cold weapons under the moonlight.

“Swoosh!” “Swoosh!”

Two more sounds of breaking through the air came.

Conan, who was held by Ran Mouri and dodged again, looked up at the source of the sound, and saw a man with a figure and dress very similar to the man on the dining car, rushing towards them quickly from the other end of the corridor.

At this time, Conan, who heard the man's footsteps clearly, looked suddenly at the man's feet. When he saw that the shoes on the man's feet were the pair of tactical boots he had seen before.

He finally realized why he had always felt something was wrong.

He ignored the footsteps.

Wearing hard-soled tactical boots and walking on the smooth floor tiles, there should be no sound at all, even if there is interference and cover-up from the sound of the food cart's rolling wheels.

Therefore,

The man who had just pushed the food cart into the elevator was not the man he had spotted at first.

The man in front of them who was shooting them in the back was the one they saw at the beginning, the one who pushed the food cart past their door.

After turning the corridor past their door, the dining cart was actually taken over by another man whose figure and dress were almost exactly the same as his.

The original man appeared behind them.

As for the way to avoid their sight, the man went into one of the rooms in the corridor before they reached the corner.

Perhaps he used a spare room card, or perhaps the man and his accomplice were residents of one of the top suites in that corridor.

While he was thinking, the man had already walked from the dim corridor to the public lounge area illuminated by the moonlight.

In the quiet and spacious space, dark brown hard tactical boots made crisp and fast-paced "click" sounds as they stepped on the floor tiles that had been dragged by hotel staff until they were so smooth that you could almost see a person's face.

It is extremely oppressive and can make people subconsciously speed up their heartbeats.

But what the man didn't know was that he was facing the best female karate fighter in the Kanto region, Ran Mouri, who had bright eyes and a firm belief in protecting her lover and would never back down.

Putting Conan aside, facing the man who raised his hand to attack her, Mouri Ran, who was already furious because of the short arrow attack just now, not only did not retreat, but took the initiative to step forward.

He came up with a left sweep and a right hook, deflecting the man's attack while punching him in the face.

The man didn't expect that the teenage girl in front of him would actually be a powerful martial arts master. He was caught off guard and could only turn his head to the side.

But he was still hit on the side of the face by Mao Lilan's powerful punch.

Soon, he felt a burning pain on his face.

However, the furious Mao Lilan had no intention of stopping there. Seeing that her attack only injured the side of the man's face, she quickly launched a second round of attack.

However, the man, who had already realized that Mao Li Ran was very skilled and was on guard, was not hurt by her this time.

In just a few dozen seconds, both sides had a clear understanding of each other's strength through several encounters.

Conan, who was hiding aside, was shocked by the strength shown by the man. He quietly moved towards the place where the metal arrow fell and secretly picked up a metal arrow that fell near him.

"Conan, watch your back."

She blocked the whip-kick that was coming towards her head from the man in short boots, and when she turned her head, she saw a figure approaching Conan from behind with light movements, and she suddenly shouted loudly to Mouri Ran.

Conan, who had just got the short arrow in his hand, rolled on the ground when he heard the sound. When he looked up, he saw a man wearing a hotel staff uniform, a white mask on his face, and a pair of black shoes with soft soles and soft surfaces on his feet, only two steps away from him.

The man held a short knife in his hand that gleamed coldly in the moonlight, and looked at Conan with cold eyes.

This is the man who just pushed the food cart into the elevator.

Conan instantly recognized the man's identity.

Immediately, I felt a sense of fear.

He really didn't notice anyone behind him and didn't hear any footsteps.

If Xiaolan hadn't discovered it, Conan had no doubt that he would be caught by the knife-wielding man in the next second.

Seeing that he had been discovered by the target before he could make a move, the man with the knife was not angry at all. He just gave the man in short boots a cold look.

Ran Mouri, who was rushing towards Conan, immediately felt a cold wind blowing from her side.

The attack of the man in short boots was much more fierce than before. While attacking, he also consciously stopped Mouri Ran from getting closer to Conan.

But Ran Mouri did not give up the idea of ​​going to Conan.

Especially when he saw the knife-wielding man approaching Conan with the knife raised mercilessly, and nimbly dodged the football that Conan shot from his belt.

He would rather get hurt than rush towards Conan.

Conan, who missed two goals in a row, looked at Xiaolan, whose chin was bruised by a punch from the man in short boots. While circling around the public rest area and the man with a knife, he kept thinking about how to break the current situation.

At the moment, apart from the football, the only offensive weapon he has is the anesthetic needle in his watch.

But the man with the knife was very agile and it was unlikely that his anesthetic needle would hit the other person.

The most important thing is that Conan remembered that the man in short boots had used short arrows, an offensive weapon, against them not long ago.

Although the man in short boots did not use short arrows to attack in the previous fight, it does not mean that he will not use it unexpectedly in the next time.

If Conan had to choose, he would naturally want to use the anesthetic needle on the man in short boots.

At this moment, a familiar sound of breaking through the air came from behind again.

Conan, who had been keeping his ears erect, rolled to the side skillfully, then quickly got up and continued running, using his advantage as a child to squeeze into the gaps between the irregularly placed sofas, tables and chairs, and the bar booths.

This is to create some distance between him and the man with the knife.

Conan did not turn around to observe what the hidden weapon was that was flying towards him, but Mao Li Ran saw it clearly.

It was a cross shuriken (dart) that flashed coldly like a metal arrow, but with a faint green light.

Ran Mao Li had a bad feeling and became more and more eager to get closer to Conan.

But then, a short arrow suddenly shot towards Mao Lilan's chest.

At that time, Mao Lilan had just created a little distance between herself and the man in short boots. After being punched on the shoulder, she wanted to take advantage of the situation to get closer to Conan, but she was surprised when a short arrow shot out from the sleeve of the man in short boots.

Mao Lilan, who had never expected that the man in short boots would use a dirty trick at this time, was caught off guard. By the time she reacted, she could only raise her hand subconsciously.

The man in short boots had been fighting for a long time just for this moment, and after killing Mao Li Ran in one fell swoop, he couldn't help but show satisfaction on his face covered by the white mask.

He had already envisioned the scene where the short arrow pierced through Mao Lilan's arm, then pierced through her chest, leaving beautiful blood flowers on her clothes, and finally she fell to the ground and died.

Unlike the long-feather arrow assassination that Conan encountered in Dazaifu Tenmangu Shrine, the metal short arrows used by the man in short boots had poison on the tip.

The same is true for the cross shuriken used by the knife-wielding man.

However, the man in short boots did not expect that the arrow that was sure to hit the target would be deflected by a modern anesthetic needle and a slipper thrown from a distance.

Under the influence of external force, the poisonous arrow tip deviated sixty or seventy degrees from its original direction, and in the end it didn't even touch the edge of Mao Lilan's clothes.

"dad."

Maori Ran looked at Maori Kogoro with excitement, who appeared not far behind the man in short boots, with one bare foot on the ground, the other foot in a slipper, messy hair, and wearing a hotel bathrobe, and shouted happily.

Realizing that there was someone behind him, the man in short boots turned around and saw a middle-aged man wearing only one slipper and looking murderous rushing towards him.

"Whoo~"

Seeing the short arrow shot by the man in short boots at Xiaolan being knocked away, Conan, who still had his hand on the watch dial, breathed a sigh of relief.

The next second, there was another sound of breaking air.

"Shh!"

Taking advantage of this opportunity, the knife-wielding man quickly approached Conan and threw another cross shuriken.

But in the next second, a fruit plate flew across the sky and knocked the shuriken away.

At the same time, a tall and strong dark-skinned young man with short black hair, side-swept bangs and a scar on the corner of his eyebrow appeared in front of the knife-wielding man with a bad look on his face.

On the side, Hattori Heiji, who had just thrown out a fruit plate and knocked the cross shuriken away, looked at the cross shuriken that fell on the ground, carefully found a piece of cloth to wrap it up, and took a closer look.

Then I smelled a very faint but very pungent smell.

Hattori Heiji's expression suddenly changed, and he quickly shouted to Maori Kogoro and Kyogoku Makoto, who were already fighting with the man in short boots and the man with a knife:

"Everyone be careful, their weapons are coated with poison, don't get scratched."

When Kogoro Mouri heard this, his already ugly face immediately turned as if a demon had come into the world. He looked at the man in short boots with eyes that seemed to wish he could skin him alive.

He remembered clearly that this man had just shot an arrow at Xiaolan, and the arrow was poisoned, so this man was aiming to kill Xiaolan.

Suddenly, the atmosphere in the entire rest area changed.

Afterwards, the man in short boots, who had endured the old father's angry attack and almost had his head broken, and the man with a knife, who was half-crippled by Kyogoku Makoto and trembled all over when he took a breath, looked at each other and decided that they must retreat immediately.

What task is there to complete? The goal has already been achieved, there is no need to complete it.

The mission tonight was completed very successfully, and that's all we need to do.

If they continue to finish, they will definitely die here.

Anyway, as long as they don't say anything, this is a mission that was completed perfectly.

After just two seconds of eye contact and rapid communication through their minds, the man in short boots and the man with a knife simultaneously took out two smoke bombs from their pockets.

Then he disappeared from the sight of Conan and others.

When the smoke cleared, all that was left was the mess in the public lounge area and several people with different expressions.

"Ding ~"

It seemed like more than ten seconds had passed, but it also seemed like several minutes had passed.

Suddenly, a familiar voice was heard in the quiet space.

Everyone's eyes subconsciously looked towards the elevator entrance.

As the elevator door opened, a group of hotel managers, led by the hotel manager, walked out.

"What kind of malfunction is this? Isn't this good enough?"

He was woken up by his employees in the middle of the night and learned that the hotel elevator was out of order and there was a crackling noise upstairs. The person in charge of the hotel, who seemed to be haunted, turned his head and angrily cursed the hotel manager beside him.

Then I noticed that the people behind me suddenly stopped in unison, and then they all stared into the distance with their eyes wide open, as if they had seen a ghost.

"What's the big deal—"

The hotel manager turned his head away with an angry and disgusted look on his face.

The next second, he closed his eyes and fell to the ground.