"This..." Editor Tomonaga looked at the Picture Book sample with several pages torn out, clearly troubled. Ashamed, he said,
"Actually, not long after this proof came out five years ago, the news about Imai and his wanted-criminal brother spread online. I was swamped dealing with all that, and I never got the chance to read this Picture Book carefully."
Amuro Tooru was listening in and was about to say something when several young officers near the bus stop suddenly cried out.
"Mr. Jiang Xia, we found it!" They warily surrounded a trash can and pointed at a dark green shoulder bag inside. "There's a Time Bomb in this bag!"
Jiang Xia looked over, and Amuro Tooru frowned as he looked in the same direction. Through the zipper that had just been opened, an electronic screen with a flashing countdown appeared before them.
The number displayed on it was "60:00:00."
Jiang Xia glanced at the phone that had been mailed together with the sample, scrolled up, and revealed an earlier text message: [There are 60 minutes until the next Sand Castle.]
Sato Miwako froze when she saw those words. "Is the bomb malfunctioning? Why isn't the countdown moving?"
—According to the bomber's warning, this bomb was supposed to explode one hour after Jiang Xia received that text message.
But they had spent at least ten or twenty minutes on the road, yet the bomb's countdown was somehow still at sixty?
"No matter what, a broken bomb is a good thing!" Inspector Megure cleared his throat and said to his subordinates,
"But in the worst-case scenario, maybe only the display is broken, while the countdown is still running. In any case, stay away from the bomb—Takagi, Chiba, put up two cordons. Don't let any civilians come near, and you two shouldn't stand