While everyone's attention was focused on the bus roof, Fujino's gaze was fixed on the two robbers and the fat woman.
With the enhancement of his perception, some hard-to-notice details were crystal clear. He double-checked that the skinny robber's gun safety was off
Handling this relatively safe target was part of his plan. If the gun had accidentally gone off during the struggle later, he'd probably get cyberbullied by the media the next day...
Confirming there was no risk of social death, Fujino turned his attention to the fat robber and the fat woman. He would leave these two for Kuro to handle. Even if a gun accidentally went off, Kuro wouldn't die, and even if someone got injured, the public wouldn't hassle the man wearing a black mask. He had to be a little careful when dealing with the fat woman. That detonator was set on the watch on her wrist. If he touched it carelessly, the bomb would activate.
"It's time..." Withdrawing his gaze and finalizing his action plan, Fujino murmured to himself.
Just then, Kuro on the bus roof responded, moving into action. After using a sleeve blade to cut an X-shaped hole in the metal roof, he retracted the blade and then kicked at the opening.
"Crunch!"
With a crisp metallic sound, Kuro, who had been waiting, leaped into the bus. The passengers, whose attention had just been drawn by the torn opening, all saw Kuro descend from above. However, because the bus body was long, the passengers in the back only saw a white figure, a black shadow, entering.
But Vermouth, standing a bit closer to the front, could clearly see Kuro.
"..."
Staring at the black shadow, Vermouth felt like this guy looked familiar. Uh... wasn't this the same guy who took care of Pisco at the hotel that night? The clever old auntie quickly recognized him. In her mind, she couldn't help but recall the secret from that night at the hotel that couldn't be told.
Mid-air.
During his descent, Kuro's gaze narrowed, quickly locking onto the fat robber below him. The fat robber also noticed Kuro at this moment, realizing the figure was falling right onto him. Instinctively, he wanted to raise his gun to shoot. But the gun in his hand was currently pointed at the fat woman, his accomplice. If he forcibly turned the gun now, with one wrong move, he could very likely shoot and kill the fat woman... Of course, he didn't have time to react anyway. His body couldn't keep up with his mind.
Kuro instantly shifted his body one step to the side. In one fluid motion, he pulled out a taser from his spatial pocket. The black taser sparked with a bright electric light. Using the momentum of his fall, he brought it down hard on the fat robber's crown.
"Zap!"
With a crisp sound, the fat robber felt his head go numb, then he just collapsed onto the ground, sleeping extraordinarily soundly. Kuro landed almost simultaneously, kicking the gun that had fallen from his hand to the side.
"Damn it!"
At this point, the skinny robber reacted. He turned his handgun towards Kuro. But when he pulled the trigger, his finger just wouldn't move it.
"Nani?!" The skinny robber noticed this and was momentarily stunned. The trigger wouldn't pull? Had it jammed at this moment?
Before he could even recover, Fujino, who was behind him, had already moved silently. Rushing forward, he grabbed the robber's neck from the side. Although a side takedown is usually quite strenuous, with the boost from Fujino's almost beast-like system, the robber was slammed to the ground instantly, his neck tightly gripped, only able to let out muffled sounds.
The planned action went exceptionally smoothly. From Kuro's dramatic airborne entrance to both men being subdued, only five seconds had passed in total.
And at this moment, the passengers still hadn't fully understood what had happened.
Conan, along with Jodie and Akai Shuichi behind him, clearly saw the incredible cooperative maneuvers of the two.
*This guy, is he here too?!* Conan stared at the person who had once claimed to be the 'world's greatest detective' in front of him, his expression exceptionally strange. Actually, he had already planned his response – as soon as the bus exited the tunnel, he would use his lipstick phone to signal the driver to stop, then while they were all thrown off balance by the bus's inertia, he would rush up to subdue them. But it seemed his plan had been hijacked before it even started, making him start to question life.
But who could have possibly imagined that a large white figure would cut open the bus roof and do a dramatic strong-man descent from the sky...? Is this something a person can do? In short, it wasn't doing human things.
"Damn it!" The skinny robber, pinned down by Fujino, was still struggling. He raised the handgun in his hand, pointing it at the passengers in the back row. "Let go of me, quick, or I'll start killing people!"
"Killing people?" Fujino glanced at the handgun in his hand with the safety on [confirming Vermouth's action], and taunted, "Your safety's not even off, who are you going to kill?"
"Huh?" The robber pressed beneath him was also stunned, staring blankly at the handgun in his hand with the safety off. He remembered turning the safety off before getting on the bus. As a robber, this kind of thing was common sense... Something wasn't right! His brain raced, and he quickly realized something was off. "It was that woman..."
But before he could finish, Vermouth (as Araide) clearly didn't want to listen anymore and kicked the robber's wrist with a foot.
"Ah!!"
Accompanied by the robber's scream, the handgun flew out of his hand and was kicked aside. Vermouth's kick was powerful; she had broken his wrist. She had actually noticed that the gun's safety was off. But... she didn't want to listen to this guy who had hit 'Conan' talking nonsense.
*Taking revenge for personal reasons, huh...* Fujino gave Vermouth a deadpan look, inwardly complaining.
Vermouth, disguised as Araide, noticed Fujino looking at her and showed a bright, cheerful big-boy smile.
Fujino: "..."
Normally, that smile would have been very warm and healing. But seeing it on Araide Tomoaki's face... *Old auntie, stop smiling, that gay vibe is just gross.* Fujino showed a look of disgust.
"???" Vermouth was slightly taken aback. After realizing that her 'neighboring big brother' look didn't work on this detective, she reluctantly withdrew the smile and turned to look closely at the appearance of the guy she had encountered before.
But when she looked curiously at his face, she completely froze.
"BATMAN?" Vermouth's eyebrow subtly twitched, finding it hard to believe what she was seeing. So strange... Let's look again. It really is BATMAN! The sight of the white-robed figure dragging the old man the last time was already unforgettable. She hadn't expected this guy to put on a black mask and become Batman this time. What kind of strange cosplay was this?
The old auntie's thoughts raced, finally falling silent. This place, Japan, was getting harder and harder to understand; there were simply too many weirdos.
Kuro wasn't idle. After taking down one person, he turned and threw a punch hard into the fat woman's stomach.
"Puff—" This punch, with the force of at least two and a half years [of training/practice], sent the fat woman staggering back two or three steps, her face turning pale. Right now, she was a bit bewildered. If he was brutally beating her accomplice, she could still understand. But why did this guy have to punch her too? She clearly looked like a passenger... Had this guy gone crazy and was beating even the passengers?
Kuro didn't give her much time to think. After the punch, he rushed forward and grabbed her wrist with his left hand. Raising his right hand, he made a slight motion over her wrist, and the watch-shaped detonator was collected into his system space.
With the detonator gone, those bombs were no longer a threat. Kuro let go, grabbed the fat woman by the collar with his left hand, and gave her an over-the-shoulder throw, slamming the back of her head onto the ground.
"Driver, stop after we get out of the tunnel. The police are following," Kuro Fujino [The narrative temporarily uses "Kuro Fujino" here to refer to the shadow, potentially linking it back to the original self or indicating it's his construct] checked that the fat woman was unconscious, stood up, and instructed the driver.
"Okay, Mr. Batman!" The driver turned around, looking at Kuro Fujino excitedly, and quickly started the bus.
"Conan, we're saved!" Ayumi immediately recognized the large white bat and shouted excitedly, "It's the Beika Batman!"
"It really is him!"
"He actually came to save us?! Just as expected of the Beika Savior!"
"That's great!"
The passengers in the bus burst into commotion. Fujino was stunned by the noise. He looked up and saw everyone in the bus looking at him with expectant eyes. Unlike the feeling of watching superheroes in movies, this genuine outpouring of emotion was even harder to describe. Speaking of which, this was the first time he had used the Beika Batman identity to 'act like a knight-errant delivering justice' openly in front of so many ordinary people... He hadn't expected the reaction to be so enthusiastic.
Actually, what Fujino didn't know was that to the public, the Beika Batman had already become a legend, a belief. As for what the authorities said about him being an illegal element or a criminal, they didn't believe it. *When the crime rate was high, you didn't do anything, but now someone willing to actually get things done appears, and you start trying to push them out? What kind of nonsense is that?* If the police were useful, would Beika still be this chaotic? One must know that in Beika, not only were murders, bombings, and bank robberies rampant, but small cases were also constantly happening. Robberies, car thefts, molesting, a whole bunch of them. Police manpower was severely insufficient, and punitive measures were very weak. If the punitive measures were sufficient, things like the Nishitani Miho incident wouldn't have happened. With insufficient punitive measures and insufficient police manpower, criminals always held onto a侥幸心理 [jiao xing xin li - 'lucky psychology,' hoping not to get caught], always thinking they wouldn't be caught. The police's cases kept increasing, and police manpower became severely insufficient, resulting in Beika's crime becoming a dead logic loop.
It used to be like that, but ever since the Beika Batman appeared, the crime rate had gradually started to decrease. After all, criminals constantly had to worry about whether they would be caught and then beaten into disability. Especially after rumors spread that the Beika Batman had killed a drug dealer, those criminals had to worry about their heads. No one wanted to lose their life because of crime, right? Now, people in Beika can go out at night without worrying about being robbed or anything. In the eyes of Beika residents, risking his life for the peace of Beika was truly like a righteous official [青天大老爷 - a just and honest magistrate]!
Of course, with the crime rate decreasing, Fujino's opportunities to supplement his income also decreased. So, after realizing he couldn't run into any criminals by going out one night, Fujino also didn't frequently go out as Batman anymore. Meeting the Beika Batman was now quite rare.
Jodie and Akai Shuichi, being outsiders, clearly didn't know what the Beika Batman represented to the people of Beika. They were just curious why he was called Batman and why it had to be prefixed with Beika, such an abstract name.
Fujino felt a bit uncomfortable in this situation. After recalling what a superhero should do at such a time, he turned around and said solemnly, "You are safe."
And after seeing that face (the mask), Jodie and Akai Shuichi finally understood why he was called the Beika Batman. He was indeed wearing a BATMAN mask. This is Beika, he's wearing a Batman mask, so calling him the Beika Batman... is actually problematic! A weirdo cosplaying as Batman to deliver justice is a big problem, okay?! Looking at Kuro, wearing the Batman mask and white robe, they both also found it hard to keep a straight face. They seriously suspected this guy was a fellow countryman from Florida in the US.
Kuro Fujino didn't pay much attention to all that. He had originally planned to leave after saying that one line. But after thinking about it, he turned back, leaned towards Araide Tomoaki's ear, and said, "Hey, Miss, we meet again... Haven't seen you in a while, how did you turn into a guy...?"
After saying this, he left through the large hole in the bus roof he had just made.
Only Vermouth was left standing there, completely flustered by herself.
"My disguise... was seen through?" Vermouth looked up at the large hole in the roof, finding it hard to believe. But that sentence just now clearly confirmed that the BATMAN had seen through her identity.
But how did he see through it? Whether it was appearance or actions, her disguise should have been spot-on. Even if the real Araide Tomoaki was brought in, most people shouldn't be able to tell.
Vermouth was curious. If someone close to her had seen through her, she wouldn't think anything of it. After all, a disguise wouldn't stand up to scrutiny over a long time. But this person, whom she had only met once, could see through her identity at a glance... That was a big problem.
Vermouth fell into deep thought. This undoubtedly involved her core skill. If it could be seen through so easily, her disguise technique would be completely ruined.
Where did it go wrong...? Was it her body scent?
She racked her brain but couldn't figure out a reason. Although someone at her level of composure usually took everything in stride, if she couldn't figure this out, she felt like something was crawling on her. If she couldn't figure it out, she probably wouldn't be able to sleep tonight.
(End of this chapter)