What Gift Do You Want? / 56,000 Hostages!

When Heiji Hattori saw Jiang Hang off, a helpless expression appeared on his face.

Similarly, Shizuka Sakaki and the others also looked somewhat disappointed at this moment.

The reason for their disappointment is even simpler.

Jiang Hang and Heiji Hattori had been searching for the culprit all over Osaka these past few days, but they still couldn't find him.

This case is also the first one that Jiang Hang has failed to fully resolve since they met.

Although Jiang Hang only started investigating halfway through the case, and was also the first to figure out the culprit's identity, Yusuke Sakata's escape had nothing to do with Jiang Hang, the sudden appearance of a crack in this invincible figure still made Shizuka Sakaki and the others feel quite regretful.

Seeing Jiang Hang's forced smile Heiji Hattori, Shizuka Sakaki and the others made a firm decision in their hearts: they would never forget this case, and they would work even harder to improve themselves after returning to Tokyo so that they could be of more help to Jiang Hang in the future.

Of course, they didn't know that Yusuke Sakata, whom they were so concerned about, had been secretly sent back to Tokyo by Jiang Hang overnight after the police tightened their investigation.

Chapter 396: Chapter 392: What gift do you want?

Jiang Hang had only been away from Tokyo for less than a week, but when he returned, he couldn't help but feel as if he had been in another Tokyo.

They had planned to go on a trip to relax, but then a series of murders happened in Kyoto, and then another in Osaka.

In total, he only had a little over a day to relax and rest. The rest of the time was spent either searching for clues and traveling, or thinking about what kind of lie he could use to deceive everyone.

Although he gets an extra reward for solving cases outside of Tokyo, as a homebody, he still prefers to stay in his own territory.

The thought of having to make regular trips to other places to complete challenging cases in different locations gave Jiang Hang a headache.

He even wondered to himself if he should try to negotiate with his own system again, asking them to change the monthly challenge to a quarterly one.

Of course, the Assassin System, which already knew Jiang Hang's personality, was prepared to win without lifting a finger, but it still wasn't going to let its host live too comfortably.

Since you're planning to "rebuild" the Japan Brotherhood, shouldn't you be traveling all over Japan looking for members who can join the organization?

So when Jiang Hang had this idea, a new prompt from the system appeared in his mind.

The challenge mission will remain unchanged. Jiang Hang needs to complete at least one mission outside the city each month; otherwise, the rewards he receives for completing missions will be reduced the following month.

Meanwhile, to increase Jiang Hang's enthusiasm, he can receive an extra high-quality reward for every six consecutive months, or six times, of challenge tasks.

Since the system had already made this statement, Jiang Hang naturally had no choice but to temporarily suppress his otaku tendencies.

It's just that we have to go out once a month. From now on, let Shizuka and the others choose one out-of-town commission each month.

As for the content of the commission, the simpler it seems, the better. Ideally, it should be resolved on the same day and you can go home the next day, just like a short trip once a month.

After leaving the airport, Jiang Hang did not return directly to the office, but instead took the Miyano Sisters to Professor Agasa's house.

As for Shizuka and the other girls, Jiang Hang gave them a break.

After all, Shizuka and the others had worked quite hard these past few days to find Yusuke Sakata's whereabouts. Jiang Hang told them to go home and rest for a day, so they wouldn't waste too much energy on Yusuke Sakata's case.

As for his trip to Professor Agasa's house, besides escorting Miyano Shiho and the others home, he also planned to retrieve the Animus.

After all, after Jiang Hang obtained the Animus device, he handed it over to Professor Agasa, wanting to see if Professor Agasa could figure out the principle of the device and recreate it in a short time.

However, now that the Animus has a new use, it's no longer possible for Professor Agasa to continue his research.

Moreover, the night before leaving Tokyo, Jiang Hang had temporarily left his golden eagle with Professor Agasa, so now he could bring it back with him.

When they arrived at Professor Agasa 'Professor Agasa house, his life was not much different from usual. He simply researched things at home and occasionally caused some explosions due to operational errors.

Fortunately, Professor Agasa was quite careful when dealing with such a groundbreaking product as the Animus. At least when Jiang Hang arrived, his Animus device appeared to be intact.

Upon seeing Jiang Hang and his group return, Professor Agasa excitedly began to chatter on about his various experiments with the Animus over the past few days.

"I tried accessing my memories from my youth these past few days, and the results were quite amazing. Many things that I had completely forgotten were now recalled thanks to this machine's capabilities. I can even move around freely in the past world to some extent. The functions of this device are truly astonishing!"

"However, there might be something wrong with my operation. So far, the only memories I can fully access are my own. I tried to trace my parents' memories through my DNA. Although I could access some, the content was very vague and fragmented, making it impossible to get a complete experience. Memories from earlier periods were completely unaccessible."

Even so, the capabilities of this instrument were already enough to amaze Professor Agasa.

Professor Agasa even dared to confidently assure Jiang Hang that if the Pioneer Foundation behind Jiang Hang were to actually put this device up for sale, it wouldn't be long before the world's richest person would have to change.

In Professor Agasa's view, both the operating system and the functions of the Animus itself are far beyond the reach of this era. The more he studies this device, the more he feels the shallowness of his own abilities. To this day, Professor Agasa still hasn't figured out how this device reads the memories of itself and even its ancestors from the DNA of the human body.

Is it really as Jiang Hang said, that humans can record and preserve all the memories of themselves and their ancestors in their DNA?

Although Professor Agasa himself has invented many inventions that can be described as cutting-edge technology, compared with this device, Professor Agasa truly feels that his previous inventions are not worth mentioning at all.

Listening to Professor Agasa marveling at the wonders of the human body, Jiang Hang couldn't help but twitch his lips.

He seemed to have mentioned to Professor Agasa before that this device was currently only a test version, and the memory reading function might not be very safe. It would be best to use it to test the virtual reality function first.

Unexpectedly, Professor Agasa, that guy with thick eyebrows and big eyes, who had confidently stated that he would carefully study it, ended up using the memory-reading function after only a week away. It seems he stayed in the memory space for quite a while.

However, Jiang Hang wouldn't question Professor Agasa about such a matter; instead, he was somewhat worried about whether Professor Agasa's body would experience any adverse reactions.

After all, if this first-generation device is used for too long, it may cause Bleeding Effect and hallucinations in reality.

While it allows one to master the abilities of their ancestors more quickly, it also places a significant burden on one's mental well-being. In the Assassin's Creed universe, there are indeed cases where people have suffered mental breakdowns and ultimately brain death due to this Bleeding Effect.

When Jiang Hang first got his hands on the Animus, he spent a long time studying it and even personally experienced the Bleeding Effect, although his symptoms were relatively mild.

Therefore, Jiang Hang, who values his life, is now quite cautious about using Animus, using it for a maximum of two hours at a time, twice a day, and with at least an 8-hour interval between uses.

Judging from Professor Agasa's current appearance, he doesn't seem to have experienced any Bleeding Effect yet. This makes Jiang Hang wonder again if his easy occurrence of Bleeding Effect is a restriction specially created by the system to prevent him from becoming too addicted to the Animus and refusing to go out and take on commissions.

Of course, even if the system itself did this, it would never admit it.

In short, after carefully questioning Professor Agasa and confirming that the other party had indeed not experienced any hallucinations in reality, Jiang Hang finally felt relieved.

"Originally, I planned to have you continue your research to see if there were any areas for improvement, but the Foundation contacted me and said that a user recently experienced severe side effects. They asked me to stop testing the instrument for now and wait until the Foundation finds a way to improve it before putting it into use again."

Jiang Hang did not tell Professor Agasa about the Brotherhood. After all, Professor Agasa was obviously closer to Conan's side. If he told Professor Agasa about the Brotherhood and the legendary assassin Altair now, and Professor Agasa then told Conan would inevitably think something.

Besides, Yusuke Sakata is not suitable to be trained under Professor Agasa, as Conan, with his keen intuition, would easily notice the problem.

Therefore, Animus Jiang Hang will definitely have to be moved to another location.

As for where to relocate, Jiang Hang currently has two ideas.

One is the underground warehouse of the Beika Art Museum, and the other is the abandoned second photography studio of Eito Studios.

Both of these places could be transformed into secret training bases for the Brotherhood in the future.

The second studio is used to practice basic skills. It's quite normal for stunt performers to appear in a studio like Eito Studios, which shoots special effects works.

As for the Beika Art Museum, it can serve as a testing ground. Jiang Hang's current security requirements for the Beika Art Museum are that even if he is not present, the person must be qualified to fight against an opponent of the level of Kaito Kid.

All those who have completed assassin training can use stealing designated items from the Beika Art Museum as their "graduation test".

Jiang Hang has already made arrangements for the future development of the Brotherhood, while Professor Agasa, upon hearing that Jiang Hang plans to take away the Animus for improvement, couldn't help but show a hint of regret on his face.

After all, both the technology inside the instrument and the long-lost vitality he felt in his youth in his past memories were things he found hard to part with.

Seeing that Professor Agasa was almost becoming the world's number one loyal fan of the Animus, Jiang Hang comforted him for a while and said that as long as the Foundation resolved the potential side effects of the Animus and increased production, he would definitely send Professor Agasa an Animus 2.0.

Of course, it's really hard to say when that "at that time" will actually happen.

Unless the system sends him three or five devices like those from the later Assassin's Creed that use cloud technology to avoid the Bleeding Effect on users, and can even be used commercially, Jiang Hang will not feel comfortable giving this thing out to too many people as long as the Animus can still cause the Bleeding Effect.

Professor Agasa also knew that technological improvements were not something that could be achieved overnight, and that it might be several years before they saw the improved Animus again.

However, Professor Agasa's character is undoubtedly impeccable. Even though he was still thinking about using the device to experience the vitality of his youth, since Jiang Hang needed it now, he immediately put the Animus away so that Jiang Hang could take it with him. He didn't even ask Jiang Hang to experience the Animus one last time.

After explaining the Animus situation to Professor Agasa, Jiang Hang followed Miyano Shiho to her laboratory and Miyano Shiho.

"Keep an eye on Professor Agasa these next few days. Although he hasn't experienced many side effects from using Animus, it's not a good thing for him to dwell on his past."

Animus can make people feel like they've returned to their youth by reading their memories of their younger days. In a sense, Animus can be considered a time machine.

The idea of staying young forever may not be very appealing to young people, since they are already in the prime of their lives and believe they have plenty of time to squander.

However, as bodily functions decline with age, when you start to pant after just a few steps of jogging and have to get up several times a night, the allure of staying young becomes stronger and stronger.

The founder of the Black Organization, Karasuma Renya, was over ninety years old when he was unwilling to die. So, he made a tough decision to disband the Karasuma Group, the culmination of his life's work, and go underground to conduct various human experiments in an attempt to extend human lifespan.

That's why APTX4869 became a project he valued immensely.

Of course, Professor Agasa's personality wouldn't lead him to do anything extreme. He knew that the Animus only brought illusions, and he hadn't used the Animus for long enough to develop symptoms of psychological addiction.

Therefore, he will only be depressed for a day or two at most. As long as he cooks more of his favorite dishes during these days, he will probably recover his spirits soon once he gradually forgets about Animus.

Just as Jiang Hang finished reminding Miyano Shiho and was about to leave, Miyano Shiho suddenly called out to him.

"Does that mystery gift you mentioned before still count?"

Jiang Hang was stunned for a moment before he remembered that a few days ago in Kyoto, he had indeed said that whoever found the Buddha statue would receive a mysterious gift from him.

With cases piling up these past few days, and Miyano Shiho not mentioning it, Jiang Hang had almost forgotten about it.

He scratched the back of his head somewhat awkwardly and asked Miyano Shiho, "Of course I mean what I say, but is there anything you particularly want right now?"

"Can you extract my parents' memories from my DNA?"

Chapter 397: Chapter 393: Fifty-six thousand hostages!

Hearing Miyano Shiho's words, Jiang Hang paused for a moment before nodding uncertainly.

"Normally there should be no problem. If DNA is extracted from you, then at least your mother's memories before she became pregnant with you can be extracted. If you have DNA samples left by your parents, you should be able to obtain even more detailed memories."

"However, you just heard what Professor Agasa said. He used his own DNA to conduct experiments, and his memories of his parents' generation were already very vague and fragmented. I can't guarantee that I can extract too many useful memories from your DNA."

Miyano Shiho shook her head slightly, indicating that she didn't care about such things.

"I understand. After I transport the Animus away, I will take you there to extract your memories. I will also invite your sister along, so that the memories extracted from the two of you can be combined. Even if the memories are incomplete, they can complement each other a little."

Having gotten the answer she wanted, Miyano Shiho made no further comment. In any case, she wasn't in a hurry and could wait a few days.

Keeping this in mind, Jiang Hang said goodbye to Professor Agasa after leaving Miyano Shiho's laboratory, and then called over his Altair, which was resting in the yard, to take it home.

Having not seen its owner for a week, Altair seemed slightly annoyed with Jiang Hang. It perched on Jiang Hang's arm and gently pecked at Jiang Hang 'Jiang Hang head with its beak, even plucking a few strands of hair from his head.

Although Jiang Hang is still young and his hair is still thick enough, he dares not let Altair peck him anymore. If he continues to peck at him like that, he will face a midlife crisis in a few years.

It's unclear whether the Assassin bloodline has the ability to regenerate hair, but considering Cassandra's hair volume remained strong throughout the game, from pre-Christian era to the modern era, the Isu's technology in the Assassin's Creed universe should be able to solve this problem.

In short, after communicating with Altair, Jiang Hang had it fly back to the agency to wait for him to return.

It has to be said that after several cases and the last time it was promoted on television, the name of the Pioneer Detective Agency has spread throughout Japan.

Nowadays, the firm receives commissions from all over the country almost every day.

We haven't been open for a week, and we've already accumulated about ten cases.

Carrying this bundle of letters of commission back to the office, even though Shizuka Sakaki and the others had gone home to rest today, these were still invitations from clients all over the country, so they still had to take a look.

Most of the cases were taken a look by Jiang Hang, and after confirming that they were not important, he temporarily put them aside.

The only request came from Tottori Prefecture. Not only was the letter of request unusually cryptic, it simply invited him to come to the address on the letter next Saturday, and the details of the request would be discussed in detail upon arrival. It was also quite cliché, as it didn't care whether Jiang Hang was willing to accept the request or not, and directly included a commission fee of 500,000 yen in the letter of request.

Jiang Hang's eyelids twitched involuntarily as he looked at the 500,000 yen in the letter of authorization.

According to general practice, such commissions that require upfront payment are almost always destined to cause serious problems.

Sometimes in mystery stories, there's a plot like this: the detective didn't want to take the case, but because the client sent the money ahead of time without any explanation, the detective had to travel a long way to the client's address to return the money. However, shortly after arriving, a series of murders occurred, forcing the detective to stay and look for clues about the killer.

Thinking of this, Jiang Hang went to investigate the address on the letter of authorization. Sure enough, it was another desolate mountain wilderness, far from any village or shop. It would probably take half a day to drive from the station in Tottori Prefecture to get to the other party's house.

Although this has not happened yet, Jiang Hang felt that there was at least a 70% or 80% chance that it would happen.

"Forget it, since the commission is for next week anyway, let's see if we can find the client's contact information in advance and find out the specific details of the commission. If not, we can just make another trip then."

Although the case looked complicated, Jiang Hang felt he still had to go if a murder might actually occur.

Jiang Hang placed the commission letter on his desk, intending to have Shizuka Sakaki and the others investigate it the next day, before continuing to look at the remaining commission letters.

The remaining letters of authorization were unremarkable, but several invitations were mixed in with them.

Invitations to some charity galas, and also invitations to memorial services for a certain deceased famous director.

Receiving these invitations wasn't too surprising for Jiang Hang. After all, he owned an art museum, two film and television companies, and a small cinema. He was also a well-known detective, so there were bound to be many people who wanted to get to know him through such occasions.

Jiang Hang immediately threw these invitations into the trash can.

He had no interest in these Nishimoto and had no intention of associating with the so-called high society.

Rather than attending these pointless gatherings, Jiang Hang would much rather resolve one more case.

After finishing up the week's work at the agency, Jiang Hang planned to relax for a while and then meet with Yusuke Sakata that evening.

Now, Yusuke Sakata has been arranged to learn disguise and camouflage techniques at the Beika Art Museum. I wonder if Yusuke Sakata is getting used to living in Tokyo.

No sooner had he opened the game than Conan called. Upon seeing the caller's information, Jiang Hang immediately perked up.