Slacker Assassin's Multiverse Daily

He unlocked the door with the key, then casually grabbed Conan, who had been ready to slip inside at the first opportunity to investigate.

"The suspect is still in the room. What do you think you're doing, going in like that?"

Conan had wanted to point out the traces left all around the suspect's doorway to tell Jiang Hang that she wasn't home.

However, before he could say anything, Jiang Hang covered his mouth.

Conan was really far too confident. He had never considered that the appearance of someone not being home might itself be a disguise deliberately arranged by that person.

Of course, Jiang Hang was so certain because, through Eagle Vision, he could see that the woman had been hiding in her room the entire time. She was even holding a miniature pistol.

But judging from the way she was currently hiding, there really was someone pulling the strings behind her. Otherwise, she would not have needed to be so cautious.

Jiang Hang took his Sword Cane from the case and prepared for battle.

"Miss Masami Hirota, I know you're hiding in the room. Come out. I'm a detective, not someone here to kill you," Jiang Hang called directly into the room.

After a while, Masami Hirota slowly emerged from her bedroom doorway under Conan's astonished gaze.

She was a striking beauty, with a gentle appearance and black hair that nearly reached her waist. However, a faint sorrow and helplessness lingered on her face.

Her gaze first fell on Conan, whom Jiang Hang was holding, before turning to Jiang Hang.

Jiang Hang noticed that she had been hiding a pistol behind her back when she came out, but after seeing that it was Jiang Hang and Conan, she put the gun away.

"You're the famous 'Eagle-Eyed Detective,' aren't you? I never expected you to find me before the organization did... Your reputation truly isn't undeserved." A somewhat helpless smile appeared on Masami Hirota's face.

No, this had absolutely nothing to do with me. I just wanted to tag along on one of Conan's cases.

Jiang Hang grumbled inwardly, but there was no need to explain that now.

"It seems the one-billion-yen robbery really was connected to you. Otherwise, you wouldn't be hiding here..." Seeing that she had no intention of resisting, Jiang Hang continued questioning her. "The organization... other than the two people who are already dead, who else is in your organization? What position do you hold in it? Did they plan this robbery as well?"

Jiang Hang had asked quite a few questions. Masami Hirota hesitated for a moment, then shook her head.

"Robbing the bank was a task assigned to me by the organization. From gathering people to carrying out the robbery, I planned everything myself. I just never expected them to be silenced by the organization..."

"I'm only the lowest-ranking kind of peripheral member in that organization. It's extremely dangerous—a highly mysterious transnational criminal organization. In Japan, it possesses unimaginable influence. If you learn about it, you'll be dragged into danger as well... As for that organization, all I can tell you is that its representative color is 'black.'"

Masami Hirota was unwilling to say anything more about the mysterious organization. Instead, she held out her hands as though she had given up. "Turn me over to the police. Otherwise, it'll be too late once they come looking for me."

At that moment, she failed to notice that both Jiang Hang and Conan had shocked expressions on their faces.

A black organization... The instant Conan heard those words from Masami Hirota, he naturally thought of the men in black who had shrunk his body.

Mysterious, powerful, criminal organization, black... Everything fit!

Could the black organization Masami Hirota belonged to be connected to the men in black who had turned him into this state!?

But... what was he supposed to do now?

Conan fell into a dilemma.

Jiang Hang was dumbfounded too.

Holy crap, based on her description, wasn't this black organization The Black Organization? I only tagged along on a case—how did I suddenly get dragged into Conan's main plotline?

Come to think of it, he really did not know much about Conan's main storyline. Most of what he knew came from whatever episodes he happened to watch on TV as a child, and he had no impression of this one at all.

Originally, Jiang Hang had thought that if Masami Hirota had been backed by some bank-robbing gang, he would simply contact his useful tool, Officer Takagi. Then he could go along and sweep through them all, resolving the whole matter.

After that, those who needed to be arrested would be arrested, and those who needed to be sentenced would be sentenced.

After all, Masami Hirota had admitted that she had planned and carried out the one-billion-yen robbery. He would not let her go merely because she was a fairly pretty woman.

But now that he knew the organization was The Black Organization, Jiang Hang abandoned that idea.

The Black Organization might be full of traitors and undercover agents in everyday life, but its power was genuinely immense. Strafing Tokyo Tower from a helicopter was not something just any organization would dare to do.

Even if he handed Masami Hirota over to the police, once The Black Organization found out, they might dare to directly hijack the police car, kill Masami Hirota, and leave leisurely afterward. That was exactly the kind of thing Gin would do.

So how should he deal with Masami Hirota now?

Should he hand her over to the police and wash his hands of it, or have an "intimate encounter" with The Black Organization?

He glanced at Conan beside him, who was already barely able to hold himself back. Jiang Hang knew that when it came to The Black Organization, there was no way he could stop Conan.

Besides, a living peripheral member of The Black Organization was definitely more valuable than a dead bank robber.

More importantly, whether as a detective or an assassin, if his choice as the former led to her death, Jiang Hang did not think he would be able to live with himself.

After pondering for a while, Jiang Hang suddenly came up with an exceptionally bold idea.

He looked at Masami Hirota and laid his cards on the table. "If I remember correctly, the main members of that organization all use alcohol names as codenames, right?"

His words made both Masami Hirota and Conan let out soft cries almost simultaneously.

Conan immediately hid his surprise, but the look he gave Jiang Hang became especially strange.

He knew that the people who had turned him into this state were codenamed "Gin" and "Vodka," but he had not expected everyone in their organization to use alcohol names as codenames.

But how did Jiang Hang know that?

Masami Hirota, on the other hand, simply widened her eyes and took several steps back. "Y-You... how do you know that? Could it be that you're also...?"

"Of course not. I have nothing to do with The Black Organization. I merely happened to hear rumors about it from my family..."

Jiang Hang opened his case while giving instructions to both Conan and Masami Hirota.

"Go arrange this room. Make it into the kind of murder scene that ordinary people would have a hard time discovering."

As he spoke, Jiang Hang looked through the contents of his case, flexed his fingers, then turned to Masami Hirota, who had yet to process what was happening, and asked with an exceptionally serious expression.

"Masami Hirota, do you want to live?"

Thoughts on Going Premium~

The story would be going premium tomorrow, and updates would still be at noon.

When I uploaded this book on February 7th, it took me five seconds to come up with this cheesy title. I never could have imagined that so many bros would be reading my book now.

Ten days ago, I took this book—which had reached eighty thousand words without getting signed and had just passed 1,900 bookmarks—to an editor to get a contract. Back then, I never imagined those 1,900 bookmarks would become over 50,000 in just ten days, and that it would be going premium tomorrow.

Honestly, it all felt like a dream.

Ever since last week, I'd even been thinking in my sleep about how to write the rest of this book in a way that would keep people reading. As a result, I hadn't slept well these past few days. (Beware the balding author.)

Ahem, that was enough of that. Let's talk about the book instead.

The reason this book came into being was simple. I'd been cooped up at home for more than ten days, got bored, played a little Assassin's Creed Odyssey, then watched a few episodes of Conan, so I started writing.

Then I happened to see news about the Shirobako movie, so I added Shirobako into it as well.

That was how this novel ended up like this—Koharu Yoshino was an accident. I genuinely hadn't planned to write her at first; I was just casually making a joke. But as I kept writing, "I came up with a new idea," and it became what it was now.

But don't worry. Every character in the book would gradually grow. Anyone on good terms with the protagonist would eventually become a pillar of their respective industry.

Anyway, I didn't think there was much else to say about this book, so I'll just answer a few questions.

① Q: Who is the female lead? Is it a single heroine or multiple heroines?

A: I don't know. From the moment I started writing until now, I haven't considered the question of a female lead. You can tell that I haven't written anything about Koharu Yoshino or Shizuka Sakaki having romantic feelings for the protagonist. After all, they'd known each other for less than a month. Compared to love at first sight, I preferred something that developed naturally.

Besides, for the current protagonist, it was still too early to talk about a female lead.

But I could rule out some characters who definitely would not become the female lead.

The Miyano Sisters would not be the female leads, and Chihiro Ayasato would not be one either. Of the five Shirobako girls, at least three could be ruled out. I couldn't say more than that for now.

② Q: There are so few assassin elements in this book, so why did you choose this title?

A: Because I came up with this title in five seconds. I didn't think that much about it when I started writing, and personally, when "assassin" and "creed" are put together, I thought "creed" was more important.

Especially in a world full of famous detectives, the protagonist should keep his head down and develop properly. Otherwise, he might kill someone one day and get caught red-handed by some detective the next. The protagonist didn't want to become the enemy of the world.

③ Q: What other anime characters will appear in the future?

A: I'll only write ones that fit. Things like Oregairu and Saekano have already been written about too much in this kind of story, and everyone has seen all sorts of familiar formulas. I thought about it, but for now I couldn't find a suitable entry point, so I simply wouldn't write them.

But for certain characters, or when their parents had jobs like being police officers, it would be fine to write them in when they interacted with the protagonist.

④ Q: The specific settings of the protagonist's Eagle Eye.

A: Most ordinary people and objects are grayish-white. Blue represents all kinds of clues, important items are gold, and important plot characters are red. Other colors might appear in the future—I know many people will complain that red is the color of enemies, but to the Assassin System, those important plot characters were also important "assassination targets." Of course, the Assassin System had now switched careers and become the Detective System, so there was no need to worry about that anymore.

⑤ Q: Will skills from Watch Dogs and Agent 47 be added? What about abilities and Noble Phantasms from Type-Moon?

A: Skills from Watch Dogs and the bald assassin would be added, but the protagonist's skills were temporarily saturated, so they wouldn't be added anytime soon.

As for Type-Moon stuff, I'd choose some useful passive abilities. Noble Phantasms were a bit too overpowered for this world, though. They were the sort of thing that definitely wouldn't appear until the end of the book.

⑥ Q: How long will this book be? Will it become an infinite-world story?

A: This book probably wouldn't be too long. According to my plan, I'd stretch Conan's timeline to one to three years, then pick suitable cases to write in. In any case, the Conan storyline should end before Ran and the others graduated high school.

So by then, the main storyline of this book would more or less be over. If I kept writing after that, it would be other side stories. If everyone still wanted to read them, I could probably write a few hundred thousand more words about the protagonist solving cases while working on anime and games, but that would be a long time from now. (P.S. If the protagonist developed a romance route, it would probably be after the main story ended too.)

In any case, I wouldn't write an infinite-world story.

⑦ Q: Why aren't you opening a reward campaign for bonus chapters even though the book is going premium?

A: Because I write very slowly. Even now, I haven't managed to build up many saved chapters. One hundred and sixty thousand words in twenty days, bros, please spare me.

I only had three saved chapters right now. Anyway, on the first day of going premium, I'd try to start with six chapters, and after that I'd reliably update at least three chapters a day.

I was genuinely afraid I wouldn't be able to pay off any reward campaign. It would be awkward if I failed to meet the goals and had to back out, so in order to live up to the votes you gave me, I wouldn't open that sort of campaign.

But if the first-day subscriptions reached n thousand, I'd add n+1 bonus chapters. I thought I could manage that kind of bonus update if I worked hard enough.

For example, if there were 5,000 first-day subscriptions, then over the following days, on top of my regular daily updates, I'd grind out six extra chapters, and so on.

Ahem, I'll stop here. The book goes premium at noon tomorrow. I'll put out three chapters first, then upload however much more I can write afterward.

Gentlemen, remember to come hang out then~

Disguise (Please Subscribe~)

Masami Hirota nodded almost without hesitation.

She knew the Black Organization's style as well. She simply still held onto a sliver of hope.

"But set up... a murder scene?" Masami Hirota still hadn't processed Jiang Hang's words. "You mean setting up a murder scene for me?"

"No." Jiang Hang shook a finger at her, then pointed at himself before pointing at her. "A murder scene where 'I kill you.'"

He searched through his case for suitable items as he continued speaking. "You should know the style of that organization, the Black Organization. If you don't die, they'll never stop hunting you. If you hand yourself over to the police, your ending is basically set in stone."

Although Jiang Hang was a positive-minded detective who called the police whenever anything happened, when the Black Organization was involved, the police in this world really weren't reliable enough.

"Of course, I don't know what your organization's real name is. 'The Black Organization' is merely a name I'm personally used to calling it."

"In any case, as a detective, making the truth public is naturally what we have to do. But before that, you need to stay alive. So, in order for you to live long enough to stand trial, you must 'die' here—and you must 'die at my hands.'"

As he spoke, Jiang Hang picked up some cosmetic materials and began applying them to his face. In what seemed like the blink of an eye, he had completely transformed into someone else before Masami Hirota and Conan's eyes.

If Jiang Hang had just been a young Asian man in his early twenties, then in Masami Hirota's eyes, he had now become a scruffy middle-aged Caucasian man of around thirty.

"What are you...?" Masami Hirota had never seen such an astonishing disguise technique before, and she could not help letting out a soft cry.

Conan was doing somewhat better. His mother, Yukiko Kudo, possessed similar disguise skills, and he had already begun to understand what Jiang Hang intended to do next.

Without needing Jiang Hang to explain anything, he had already started considering how they could deceive the people from the Black Organization.

Jiang Hang might know more intelligence about the Black Organization. Conan made a mental note of that.

After hesitating for quite a while, Masami Hirota seemed to think of something. Her expression immediately hardened with resolve, and she began asking Jiang Hang what she needed to do.

"Give me some of your blood." Jiang Hang glanced at her again. "Of course, not much. A normal amount will be enough. It's also for a more convincing disguise."

Amid Masami Hirota's stunned silence, Jiang Hang continued, "Also, tell me everything about yourself—why you joined the Black Organization, every detail of this mission, and any codes or passwords you might have. Tell me all of it... though it would be best if you kept it brief. Time is precious."

"Everything...?" Masami Hirota looked at Jiang Hang, whose hands had yet to stop moving as though he were making something. In the end, she honestly told him everything about herself.

When Jiang Hang heard Masami Hirota say that her real name was not Masami Hirota, but Miyano Akemi, his hands paused for an instant.

Could there really be such a coincidence?

To be honest, he had little impression of the name Miyano Akemi. But he did know that the original name of another popular character from Conan, Ai Haibara, was Miyano Shiho.

He also knew that after her sister's death, she had resisted the Black Organization and swallowed the same poison Conan had taken, ultimately shrinking into Ai Haibara.

If he was not mistaken, this Miyano Akemi was most likely Ai Haibara's older sister.

Sure enough, as Miyano Akemi continued her explanation, he heard about her younger sister, Miyano Shiho, confirming Jiang Hang's guess.