Ichijō Mirai opened the pod and set an alarm for ten minutes.
When the alarm went off, he had just finished cleaning up, and after stopping the alarm with a tap of his hand, he walked slowly down the stairs.
At 6:00 p.m., the orange sun had already dropped below the horizon, leaving only a few hazy rays to color the sky, which was still bright enough that the streetlights were not lit.
It wasn't the kind of time that working people could wish for after work, but it was the kind of time that high school students could do whatever they wanted.
So Suzuki Sonoko was there.
Ichijō Mirai was halfway downstairs when he saw Suzuki Sonoko sitting by the window.
She was talking to Mouri Ran with her cheeks propped up, and as she did so, she couldn't help dropping her head, shifted from sitting with her face propped up to sitting with her head propped up on the table, and tapped her forehead on the tabletop again and again, making a rabbit teacup next to her quiver lightly.
Needless to say, an aura of loss came over her, so thick that it almost formed two blonde rabbit ears hanging up in her hair, which had been lightened by the dessert store's color-correcting lights.
But soon, as if sensing something, the disoriented blonde bunny suddenly straightened up and turned her head to meet Ichijō Mirai's eyes.
In the next moment, Suzuki Sonoko's spirit lifted, and her rabbit ears stood up as if they were there, almost forming a big, fluffy tail that waved happily behind her.
She didn't look much like a lost rabbit, but rather like a golden retriever happily nibbling at flowers and grass on the road.
Her eyes were bright, her smile wide, "Good afternoon, Mr. Mirai! What a coincidence!"
Ichijō Mirai: "?"
'What a coincidence'?
This seems to be his dessert store, so it's not a coincidence, is it?
But he doesn't show up often, and lately he's been on hostage quests, so the probability of him refreshing on the first floor of a dessert store is almost nil, so it's okay to use the phrase 'what a coincidence'.
He scanned the dessert store, which had few customers, and nodded without changing his expression, "What a coincidence."
Suzuki Sonoko reacted with an afterthought, her bright smile and cheerfully waving hand froze, and she was so embarrassed that she almost dove under the table on the spot, "Ah no, I mean, yes..."
Her eyes darted around, stuttering, "Yes."
Ichijō Mirai made his way to the first floor, and as a courtesy, he paused, and instead of going into the kitchen right away, he took a few steps toward the counter, plopped himself down on the counter in the process, and spoke to Suzuki Sonoko across two or three tables, "Huh? No need to explain, I understand what you mean, it's just a polite social phrase."
It's just the shyness of a girl who meets someone she's attracted to.
Of course, it was impossible to say, Ichijō Mirai avoided the ambiguity, he looked at Suzuki Sonoko again, and as he got closer, he realized something: Suzuki Sonoko was wearing make-up.
To be precise, she was wearing makeup and removing it.
The makeup she wore was probably more colorful, so when she took it off, she was a bit distracted and casual, so there was still a very light scarlet on her lips, which was left behind by wiping it off with a tissue paper for a few seconds, and then wiping it off with her finger for a second time.
Ichijō Mirai also applied purple star eyeshadow to her eyes, but after applying it with her finger, Ichijō Mirai was only able to make out a few glimmers above the center of Suzuki Sonoko's eyes and a faint purple mark at the end of the eyes.
The purple marks were so faint and unnoticeable, spreading about half a knuckle's length from the end of her eyes, that a normal person would have had to lift Suzuki Sonoko's cheek for a moment to recognize them.
Just as her hair sometimes has a broken and messy beauty, this kind of make-up and wipe marks have more of an indefinable flavor than a nice full make-up.
Not only her cheeks, but also her hairstyle today has changed slightly, although it's still a short brown hair that reaches her chin, but it's fluffy and shiny, and her forehead is fair and clean, so it looks like it's been taken care of.
Very...
It's so unobtrusive, so subdued, that there's hardly any trace of formality.
It was almost as if the guests at the party were all wearing the same suit and dress, but every inch had been scrutinized by the dresser.
Ichijō Mirai's judgment: Suzuki Sonoko took today's meeting very seriously.
He controlled his pupils in confusion.
But Suzuki Sonoko didn't put that much emphasis on dressing up at the previous Valentine's Day party, did she?
Normally, with the double buffs of 'first invitation' and 'Valentine's Day', shouldn't Suzuki Sonoko be the most serious about dressing up? Why is she so serious again?
And...
Suzuki Sonoko is different today.
She's particularly lively today, with a smile that's so bright that if you ignore her brief moment of being a downtrodden rabbit, she's almost twice as cheerful as she's always been after a string of good lucks.
Ichijō Mirai looked around and wondered: had something happened during his time in the jam that he didn't know about?
"No."
It's not a polite social phrase.
Suzuki Sonoko wanted to say so, but against Ichijō Mirai's measuring gaze, she involuntarily lowered her heated face, scratched her fingers unconsciously on the tabletop a few times, and actually let out an uncontested concurrence, "Uh... uh, yes."
At the same time, she screamed out in her mind, "Damn it!
There it is again!
It's too much of a crime to keep staring at people with curved red eyes, isn't it?
Every time those slightly darker red eyes stared at her, Suzuki Sonoko became speechless, almost dizzy with heat, and could only tilt her face up with her tail wagging, letting Ichijō Mirai lead her by the nose.
She lowered her eyes to avoid meeting Ichijō Mirai's and tried to struggle a bit, "That, Mirai-san,"
"It's after six."
It came out fluently, yay!
Suzuki Sonoko's nails circled the tabletop as she dropped her face and finished her conversation in one breath, "Are you coming down for dinner? That's rare."
It was going well, no stuttering, and she was as cheerful as a balloon that was gradually swelling up, almost blurting out 'Almost 105 hours, 32 minutes, 18 seconds, you finally came downstairs for once,' or something more or less subtle, revealing that not only did she come to cheerfully squat Ichijō Mirai every day on time, but she also sent someone to squat her.
But before he could do anything about it, he suddenly reacted, and hastily changed his words to the least problematic compliment, "I actually ate in person, Mirai-san is amazing!"
...
Huh?
Is it possible for a human to not eat in person?
Ichijō Mirai paused for a few seconds and smiled without changing his expression, "What an over-the-top joke."
"I'm sorry, I heard from my aunt that you two have been looking for me. I've been a bit busy lately, so..." without waiting for Suzuki Sonoko to speak, he defined her words into the category of friendship 'because I've been looking for the detective a lot lately, but I couldn't find him, so I couldn't help but flirt with him when I finally met him', and shrugged his shoulders helplessly as he smiled once again, "but you seem to be in a good mood?"
"Did anything interesting happen while I was away?"
Suzuki Sonoko:"…"
She was really about to faint from her own stupidity. She wanted to cover her face and crawl under the table to wail, but Ichijō Mirai was asking her, so she had to answer: "Recently,"
"Yeah, yes, haha, because Ran encountered a good thing, I was very happy hahaha."
Mouri Ran encountered a good thing?
Ichijō Mirai moved his eyes to look at Mouri Ran.
Contrary to Suzuki Sonoko, Mouri Ran was smiling with curled eyes when Suzuki Sonoko hung her head at first, but as the conversation went on, she slowly lowered her head, covered her face, and slumped almost silently onto the table, the strands of soft hair on her head that had been picked up to make her hairstyle fluffy shaking as well, looking like a melancholy mushroom that wanted to burrow into a crack in the ground.
At the sound of her name, she quickly looked up and sat up straight, taking a deep breath and putting on a firm, supportive smile, "Well, something good happened to me."
It's like she's about to die a hero's death.
Given Suzuki Sonoko's fantastic performance just now, she could have been killed on the spot by that firm answer.
Ichijō Mirai inexplicably felt the sadness of a wingman who was willing to die in order to cover for his friend, and he said: "..."
"It has something to do with Mirai-san as well," Suzuki Sonoko turned her head to Mouri Ran, staring earnestly at her friend's death-defying face, finally playing it normal after she didn't look at Ichijō Mirai and didn't get any attention, "Didn't Mirai-san like Conan a lot?"
"He's so smart and cute, I actually like him too!"
"Recently," She said, "one of the detectives complimented him on his intelligence and said he wanted to teach him to be a detective!"
Huh?
If there were things Ichijō Mirai was more concerned about in reality, Conan was certainly one of them.
He thought for a moment, propped his elbow on the counter, and instead of looking at Suzuki Sonoko, who was staring at a certain place as if she was thinking, he looked at the wall at one end of the dessert hall, "Isn't that detective Mouri-san?"
And teaching Conan...
With all due respect to Ichijō Mirai, he felt that teaching Conan would probably require an experienced detective.
Otherwise, with most of the detectives in Neon only having their cheating skills lit up, it wouldn't be Conan being taught by the detectives, it would be Conan teaching the detectives.
"No," Suzuki Sonoko glanced at Ichijō Mirai, her eyes shifting slowly and uncontrollably to the counter and a finger peeking out from the side of the counter, "it's a blonde, brunette detective with a little bit of everything on the side."
Billion Dot, just Billion Dot, just Billion Dot who can meet Suzuki Sonoko four times in three days, at different times and in different occasions, just Billion Dot Dot Dot.
The first time we met was at a ramen restaurant near a dessert store, where Suzuki Sonoko was talking to Mouri Ran about Ichijō Mirai with her cheeks pressed up, oblivious to the blonde-haired, brunette-skinned waiter who brought her food unnoticed.
The second time we met was at a party, Suzuki Sonoko was holding a juice glass and talking to Mouri Ran about Ichijō Mirai, not paying much attention to the blonde waiter who passed by unnoticed.
The third time we met was at a ski resort, and Suzuki Sonoko was somewhat glumly declaring to Mouri Ran that she had failed to check out the location and that the ski resort was not a good place to go on a date, when she finally noticed the brunette staff member who stood out in the whiteout.
She stares blankly over at him, feeling a certain familiarity, and realizing with a second thought that she has finally run into him a little too often lately, so it's no wonder she noticed him looking at her when she felt familiar with him.
The staff asked, "Do you recognize me?"
It's like the bold statement of a wanted criminal.
Coupled with the frequency of her recent encounters, Suzuki Sonoko shook her head at the blonde-haired, brunette-skinned psychopath, firmly denied that she recognized him, pretended to be unconcerned, and went on to brag to Mouri Ran about how brave her brother had been when he had saved her life.
The point is: she knows the police officer, and her relationship with him is such that the criminal will be targeted by the police if he dares to lay his hands on her!
Staff: "...Oh."
The fourth meeting is at the cafe downstairs of Detective Mouri's office.
Suzuki Sonoko in the eyes flashing heart to Mouri Ran said his impressive kidnapping case, said he and the first love of the big brother of the encounter clear memory, even a second of the memories of the relationship have not forgotten, are like a picture of a frame in the mind, remember that gentle police officer big brother with a hug to comfort their appearance.
As she was talking, she realized that someone was lingering at the table, and when she looked up, she saw the blonde and brunette waitress again, who seemed to be forced to smile.
This time, instead of asking Suzuki Sonoko if she recognized him, the blonde waiter explained who he was: a detective.
According to him, he is a young and famous detective who has solved many cases, and even recognized a criminal on the street and made a prompt decision to bring the criminal to the police station on the spot, and after hearing about Detective Mouri's reputation and wanting to have a duel, he has traveled all the way to Tokyo, and he is currently in a period of staking out a position in the 'know your enemy and know yourself and you will win a hundred battles' period.
This explains the recent high frequency of encounters.
Suzuki Sonoko was a bit skeptical.
But the blonde and brunette detective proved himself to be a real winner over Mouri Korogō in terms of deciphering codes and other essential detective skills.
Though he was soon defeated by Mouri Korogō's sleeper hit by five minutes in the case...
But it shows that the blonde-haired, brown-skinned detective who calls himself 'Amuro Tōru' is really a detective.
A great detective who beat Mouri Korogō in many ways, and who solved the case only five minutes later than Mouri Korogō in the real world!
It was this excellent detective who thought Conan was smart and a good detective.
Though Conan crawls around like a cat when he arrives at the crime scene, Amuro Tōru, who has a lot of experience in dealing with cats, is very good at calming high blood pressure and mediating with himself, and bravely takes on the nightmare task of 'teaching a lively child'.
Suzuki Sonoko says, with a little bit of respect, "That's really great, that's really self-sacrificing."
"Although Conan isn't the toughest high school student, he's an energetic one who only needs to sleep for five hours a day, and he can be refreshed, even in a dog hole!"
After saying that, he reacted and hastily added, "But he's super cute, and he's loved by cute people!"
Ichijō Mirai:"..."
He thought quietly: What kind of play without restraint is this blond classmate who doesn't want to reveal his real name developing?