2-22 Mihua Town.
A scientist lives here.
This was the fifth time this month Tsuneo had come to repair his blown-up courtyard wall.
If he didn't know him well enough, he would have thought Dr. Agasa was deliberately providing him with work.
"Tsuneo, have some water." Dr. Agasa, wearing a white lab coat and sporting a large belly, handed water to Tsuneo, who was mixing cement.
"Thank you, Dr. Agasa." He twisted open the bottle cap and gulped down half the bottle.
Tsuneo turned his head and saw a small figure in a blue suit slowly approaching.
As he walked, his face showed a contemplative expression unsuited for his age.
This elementary school student seemed to be pondering matters of national importance.
"Kudo?"
Hearing the familiar surname, Conan immediately reacted, his eyes behind the round-rimmed glasses blinking helplessly, then returning to the innocent expression of a child.
Damn it, I'm wearing glasses, how did this guy still recognize me!
"Haha, he's not a Kudo; he's a child from my relatives." Dr. Agasa reacted quickly, scratching his head as he lied, then quickly turned and walked in front of Tsuneo, blocking his view.
"Hehe." Tsuneo smiled expressionlessly, reached out to place the remaining half bottle of water on the wall, and continued mixing the cement with his shovel.
Shinichi must have just been given APTX4869, because he had seen him wandering around the street holding the back of his head just two days ago.
"Conan, let's go inside quickly." Dr. Agasa gave another awkward laugh, then turned and urged the little guy behind him to hide.
"En en!" Conan nodded, hiding behind Dr. Agasa's backside, and the old man and the young boy sneaked into the house.
"I want to be like the wind crossing the seven seas, painting my dreams in the azure future; every time I desperately look back, your eager figure is waiting."
Tsuneo hummed a song and began laying bricks to build the wall.
He still remembered a few lines from 'The Wind Crossing the Seven Seas'; after learning Japanese, he sang it more smoothly.
The world of Conan finally began to operate; to celebrate, he had to sing a few lines.
Tsuneo had arrived in Mihua Town over two years ago. His rented apartment was not far from Dr. Agasa's place. Because he was diligent and hardworking, and also handsome and pleasant to look at, he gradually took on all the repair work on this street.
Besides unclogging sewers, repairing faucets, replacing tile floors, and mending courtyard walls, under Dr. Agasa's guidance, he also took on many orders for repairing household appliances.
When he first transmigrated, he relied on a translation guidebook to get by. Later, during a case, he unexpectedly met the Kudo couple and Dr. Agasa, who provided a lot of help, and he gradually mastered Japanese, which made his life much easier.
The golden finger that all transmigrators possess...
He also had one; whether it was strong or weak, it was hard to say yet.
But for Tsuneo, a martial arts enthusiast, it was perfectly suited.
Through proper exercise and diet, his physical fitness could continuously improve, and the speed of this improvement was terrifying.
After resuming his training, in just over a year, his current 'weakling' strength was probably even better than Mouri Ran's by a few points.
A shake of the shoulder could topple the sky, a stomp of the foot could shake the nine provinces!
Extraordinary physical fitness, combined with the explosive Eight Extremities Fist, meant he dared to challenge even masters two levels stronger.
But whether this improvement would eventually reach its limit, Tsuneo did not yet know.
...
"Shinichi, I feel like you've been exposed." Dr. Agasa looked through the window at the young man busy repairing the courtyard wall, his face full of helplessness.
Both he, the Kudo couple, and Shinichi were very familiar with Tsuneo.
But it was too strange; even if they looked exactly alike, no one would assume a high school student and a seven-year-old child were the same person, right?
What was with that knowing smile?
"This guy is much smarter than I thought." Conan rested his hands on the windowsill, looking at Tsuneo, his expression grim.
Two days ago, he and Dr. Agasa had decided that no one should know about this, to avoid dragging others into danger.
That initial "Kudo?" when they first met didn't sound like a question at all; it was more like a casual greeting between acquaintances.
Tsuneo lived nearby, and he wasn't sure if he had revealed any flaws when he came to Dr. Agasa's house these past two days.
"Should we tell him?" Dr. Agasa pushed up his glasses and looked down at Conan.
"If we don't, this guy definitely won't give up." Conan rolled his dead fish eyes, looking speechlessly at the person busy working outside the window.
He remembered clearly: once, when his family of three went out for dinner, they happened to run into Tsuneo and invited him along. Before they even entered the restaurant, they encountered a robbery. This guy chased the robber for over an hour.
It was said that the robber was some kind of long-distance running champion, and he was eventually chased until he foamed at the mouth...
Besides this tenacity, Tsuneo's curiosity and thirst for knowledge were also very strong, second only to himself, the Detective.
"This is the butterfly-shaped voice changer I just developed." Dr. Agasa pulled out a red bow tie from his pocket.
"Voice changer?"
Under Dr. Agasa's guidance, Conan adjusted the buttons, changing into various voices.
...
Over an hour later.
Tsuneo had finished building the courtyard wall, tidied everything up, and entered the house with his tool bag on his back.
"Dr. Agasa, painting will have to wait until tomorrow."
After Tsuneo finished speaking, he smiled and stared at Conan.
"Oh, good, good!" Dr. Agasa quickly stepped forward, stuffing a ten-thousand-yen bill into Tsuneo's pocket, mumbling incoherently, and tried to usher him out.
But his arm around Tsuneo's arm was like hugging a big tree; he couldn't move him at all.
Dr. Agasa looked at Conan, "I still have some work to finish, you two chat!" After saying that, the old man, wearing slippers, sprinted back to his laboratory.
What a joke, this kid Tsuneo could even break a tree; although his own waist was thicker than a tree, it was still made of flesh!
Shinichi, some things you have to learn to face on your own.
Facing the formidable Tsuneo, Conan could only take off his glasses, revealing his characteristic intelligent gaze.
"You guessed correctly, I am Shinichi."
"Aren't you Conan?" Tsuneo smiled, put down his tool bag, sat on the sofa, and listened to the other party narrate the events of the past two days.
The direction of the story had not changed.
This brave high school student was knocked down by Gin, who was wearing a black trench coat, and fed the A-drug.
After shrinking, he ran all the way to Dr. Agasa's house. After going home and changing clothes, his childhood friend Mouri Ran came looking for him, and he haphazardly came up with the name Edogawa Conan.
At Dr. Agasa's suggestion, he successfully moved into the home of the Detective, Mouri Kogoro.
"It seems I should congratulate you; you're closer to your crush now," Tsuneo said, rolling up the little Detective's sleeve and seeing the purplish bruises on his arm.
"You must keep my secret. The Organization behind those two Black-Clothed Men is very dangerous. If the matter leaks out, they will definitely kill to silence us," Conan warned seriously.
"Alright, alright, I know." Tsuneo responded perfunctorily.
It was laughable; he didn't know if he was influenced by him or Sherlock Holmes when he was a child in his previous life, but for a long time, he wanted to be a Detective.
Now, they were sitting face to face, discussing the Gin's Organization.
"I'm going to help Mrs. Kitagawa unclog her sewer in a bit, and I have to fix a TV tonight, so I won't stay with you, Detective." After explaining everything, Tsuneo picked up his tool bag and turned to leave.
"Why is Mrs. Kitagawa's sewer always clogged?" Conan asked with a frown.
"Children shouldn't ask too many questions."