Once out of water, fish flopped their bodies back and forth. Their eyes looked almost lifeless, their bodies were slick, and there was something snakelike and unsettling about them. Plenty of people did not dare touch fish directly at all, much less hold one barehanded.
Kid was even worse than an ordinary person. A dead fish brought over by his childhood friend—or even one already cooked and set down in front of him—could turn his face green. He had to force himself to suppress the instinctive reaction.
So having a live one shoved directly into his hands hit him unimaginably hard.
With Conan already staring at him suspiciously, Kid let out a full-throated yelp. He flung the fish away as though it were burning his hand, sending it straight into the face of the bespectacled brat who had been pestering him. The fish slapped Conan twice, even knocking his glasses off.
If that had been all, Kid might still have managed to keep acting despite Conan's suspicions. Unfortunately, while panicking, he kept firing playing cards at Conan in an attempt to drive him and the fish away. Of course, they were nowhere near as powerful as the cards from his card gun and could not actually hurt anyone.
"It's Kid!"
"You bastard! Where did you hide Ran?!"
Realizing things had gone wrong, Kid had no time to keep freaking out over the fish. He immediately triggered the smoke bomb he had disguised in advance as a fake Black Star.
It was not just the one he was wearing. A whole collection of smoke bombs that had appeared from nowhere rolled around the guests' feet and exploded at the same time.
"Yimi, hurry over to Aunt Tomoko!" Kid had shouted that in a disguised voice, imitating Tomoko.
Had this little girl figured him out and deliberately thrown the fish at him?
It had been the same before. Even with the flash bomb covering his escape, this little girl had been the first among all those officers to recover, and she had exposed his disguise at a glance. Could it be that Akako had not been trying to scare him? Were there really things like angels in this world?
Still, his little trick worked to some extent this time. The choking misfortune from the colored smoke bombs had indeed been transferred away, but the smoke still blanketed the entire venue and blocked everyone's view.
Hearing Aunt Tomoko's voice, Yimi instinctively took two steps in that direction and entered the area where Kid could see her. Kid was surprised, but also relieved.
Forget angels. Even if they really existed, this one was still just a somewhat unusual little girl. Akako was a witch too, and she was ultimately only a somewhat unusual girl Kid had defeated before.
Kid wrapped a handkerchief around his hand and reached for the jewel on Yimi's collar. If the situation had not been urgent, he probably would have stolen from a little girl in a more stylish way that preserved her childish sense of wonder.
Smack!
Yimi swatted his grabby hand away.
"..."
Kid used a magician's standard technique: draw Yimi's attention with his left hand and steal with his right.
That hand got slapped away too. Yimi's attention was focused entirely on the pearl Aunt Tomoko had asked her to protect.
"Damn it!"
Seeing the smoke beginning to clear, Kid did not dare linger any longer and could only retreat in frustration.
"Damn! He got away?"
"Search the ship! He has nowhere to escape!"
"Yimi!" Tomoko hurried over, crouched in front of Yimi, and only relaxed after seeing the genuine pearl still pinned to her chest.
Sonoko stared with dead-fish eyes. For a moment, her whole demeanor almost approached Kogoro's. "Mom, I'm going to get jealous."
Kid should no longer be at the scene. To prevent him from disguising himself as someone else, everyone had already arranged passwords with the people around them.
Conan stared at Yimi for a while.
Had this brat noticed Kid and deliberately put the fish in his hands?
Yimi really had not realized that Ran was Kid in disguise. At the time, her sense of smell had been completely overwhelmed by the fishy smell on her hands.
Conan pulled his attention away from Yimi. This was not the time to focus on that. Finding the real Ran was what mattered most.
He ran outside, thinking back. The only time he had been separated from Ran after boarding was the brief moment when she went to the bathroom, and even then he had been standing outside the women's restroom the entire time.
Damn Kid. He had even gone into the women's restroom to impersonate Ran? The bug had picked up people calling him "Young Master," so he was clearly a man. Shameless bastard.
If only Conan had put a bug on Ran too. But with so many people around, he could hardly take out his equipment and listen to it openly.
Thinking that, Conan charged straight into the women's restroom. As expected, he found a stall whose door would not open no matter what he did. After climbing up, he saw Ran unconscious inside.
"Ran-onee-san! Ran-onee-san!"
She was merely unconscious.
Conan simply jumped inside, opened the door from within, and pulled Ran out in as comfortable a position as he could manage.
"Uncle! Ran-onee-san is here!"
"Ran!" Mouri Kogoro hurried over to support his daughter. If Kid had not been wearing his daughter's face earlier, Kogoro would already have charged over and thrown him with an over-the-shoulder toss.
Yeah. Damn Kaitou Kid. You're really unlucky to expose yourself now. We're out at sea, so there's nowhere for you to run. I'm coming over to drop you with one needle right now.
Conan's mind raced with pent-up irritation, but a flash of light outside the window caught the corner of his eye. Realizing something was wrong, he hurried over and looked outside.
He saw the neon glow of the big city on the opposite shore.
They were almost back at the dock? That was bad.
The people aboard this ship were all important figures. That was precisely why the police had failed when they initially tried to stop the party.
Nobody was going to risk offending everyone and damaging their own reputation by forcing the ship to anchor offshore until Kid was found, refusing to let anyone go home.
"Shinichi..."
While Conan was thinking, Yimi bent down and touched Ran, transferring away the misfortune that had left her unconscious.
"Ran, want some water?" Sonoko promptly brought over a drink, while also casting Ran an envious look.
After all, Kid had impersonated Ran, which meant she had been in very close contact with him.
"That Shinichi ran outside." Yimi pointed toward the window. Nobody understood what she meant except Conan and Ran.
Having awakened through the transfer of misfortune, Ran regained full awareness extremely quickly. She immediately got up and ran out of the venue, then looked left and right across the deck for a white figure—or the figure she remembered.
"You were the first one out?" Kid stood at the bow as though he were waiting for something.
In truth, he still had not recovered from the fish.
While preparing the disguise, he had already realized that this girl was the one who had grabbed him on the street that day and accused him of trying to steal a pearl.
Ran reached a hand toward him. "Are you Shinichi?"
"Shinichi?" Kid rubbed his chin and looked upward in thought. "Sorry, but I don't know anyone like that."
He looked behind Ran. Everyone worried about her had already followed her outside, including Tomoko and two guards who had come out after Yimi.
"Even a charming magician can find himself at a loss before a pure little angel. I really have been defeated by you this time." With that, he declared his operation over, jumped back over the bow railing onto the deck, and landed directly in front of Yimi, crouching down.
He produced a flower in his hand and offered it to Yimi. "Consider this your reward for making me reveal myself. Take good care of it."
But hopefully they would not meet again next time.
Kid was actually using this chance to examine the pearl on Yimi's chest under the moonlight.
It was not the one he was looking for.
"Damn you! Are you going to take a child hostage to escape, Kid?!" an officer demanded angrily.
"I'd never do something so tasteless. Magic should be popular with children, right? But even the finest magician can overuse the same trick. See ya~"
He tossed another flash bomb, then used the opportunity to flip directly over the bow.
"That trick again?!"
"A flower from Kid-sama..."
Once their vision recovered, Sonoko's envious gaze shifted from Ran to Yimi. She felt that this little girl was lucky enough to be having a dreamlike, wonderful childhood.
"Mmph?"
Yimi held the flower under her nose, sniffed it, then opened her mouth and chewed it up before swallowing it right in front of Sonoko.
"..."
"Congratulations, Host, on unlocking the achievement [Chainsaw Man]. Reward: 5% portal energy."
There were lots of flowers in SAO that could be made into sweet seasonings, but the flowers in this world did not seem to taste nearly as good.
What a strange person. He was a heartbreaker who had come to steal things, yet he still gave her a present. Fine, she would not catch him for now.
"Ran-onee-san..." Conan walked over and grabbed the hem of Ran's clothes.
"I'm fine, Conan." Ran smiled as she gazed into the distance. "After talking like this, I can really tell. He is different from Shinichi after all."
* * *
Ran had gotten over it, but the expression on Kid's face as he escaped had turned sour.
He had known something felt off. First Ran had grabbed him on the street with a resentful look, then an angelic little girl had called him a heartbreaker and thrown a fish at him.
"Shinichi"... So that's the guy who's been impersonating me and causing trouble?!