Chapter 3

The amnesiac young girl who calls herself "Eri" is very strange.

This is the conclusion Yosano Akiko came to after observing her in the Armed Detective Agency's office one night.

The white-haired young girl who was brought back by Kunikida Doppo has not said anything else since she uttered a shocking sentence. There is no natural sense of curiosity like a child, nor is there any confusion caused by amnesia.

She just sat quietly on the sofa in the reception area, holding the lollipop that Edogawa Ranpo gave her before leaving the house.

Looks very calm.

Looking at it from Yosano Akiko's point of view, the white-haired little girl who was carefully groomed by her had a beautiful appearance. Even if she has not yet grown, you can still see her carefully crafted eyebrows and pure white hair. The contrast with the blood-red pupils is astonishing, and even the slightly cold posture due to the expressionless face becomes less important because of these eyes.

It's just that all this adds to the girl's sense of inhumanity.

...a sense of inhumanity.

Yosano Akiko suddenly thought of her nightmare.

Isn't there an inhuman presence around a certain leader who is currently in charge of the largest underground force in Yokohama and in charge of the city's "dark night"?

She has blond hair and blue eyes, wears a beautiful little red dress, loves all sweets and cakes, and looks like an incomparably cute little exotic girl. In fact, she is the humanoid superpower of a certain mafia leader. She is not even a normal life form. It can only be said to be the bad taste of a mafia leader who controls young girls.

Could it be that this child is also...

Many lists of people with similar powers flashed through Yosano Akiko's mind, but after going through them in her mind, she found that she could not correspond to them.

Either this child is a superpower created by a new superpower user, or... she is really just an ordinary human with amnesia.

Noticing that Yosano Akiko stared at her for a long time, Eri turned her head to look at her, her bright red eyes staring straight at herself, which made the young female social doctor take the initiative to look away uncomfortably. Then he forced himself to turn his eyes back.

"Eri-chan, do you still remember how you met that man-eating tiger?"

Not sure whether the white-haired girl in front of her might be a derivative of the young psychic who could turn into a tiger, she tried it with Akiko Yosano to interact with her.

"A dark alley in the middle of the night..."

After hearing Yosano Akiko's question, the white-haired girl thought for a while and quickly answered.

"At that time, I was woken up by other people's voices. I heard someone screaming about tigers. Then I woke up and turned around and saw Dun." The

huge white tiger had a body in the moonlight . The fur with a light silver glow looked very majestic, but the abdomen looked a little shriveled, and traces of ribs could even be seen under the fur.

This is a hungry tiger.

The white-haired girl knew this very clearly.

But she looked at the white tiger's purple-gold eyes, watching the tiger constantly grinding its claws on the ground because of hunger, and she knew very well that it would not hurt her.

She just sat quietly against the corner, watching the huge white tiger dig at the ground for a while, then roar randomly, take a few bites on the turf, and then run away far away, as if she didn't even realize that she was in front of it. There are enough rations to fill the stomach.

"What happened next? It ran away after seeing you?" After hearing the white-haired young girl telling her about her first meeting with the man-eating tiger, Yosano Akiko continued to ask with interest as if she was listening to an interesting story.

"Well, Atsushi is very timid."

Mingming and Nakajima Atsushi had only known each other for less than 12 hours, but the young white-haired girl mentioned him as if he had been his friend for many years.

"He is a good boy."

Yosano Akiko noticed that when the white-haired girl mentioned Atsushi Nakajima, there were subtle emotional fluctuations on her expressionless face, and her eyelids that seemed to be drooping due to exhaustion trembled. , a pair of eyes bent in an arc, seeming to show a "smile".

"More like a robot."

Yosano Akiko looked at her and couldn't help but have such an idea in her heart.

In the end, Atsushi Nakajima not only was not arrested by Kunikida Doppo and others, he was even brought back properly. However, instead of being placed in the office like a white-haired young girl, he was taken to the dormitory of the Armed Detective Agency.

Due to Dazai Osamu's instruction.

Eri was taken to her rented apartment by Yosano Akiko and stayed there for one night.

The next day, Yosano Akiko took her to watch a famous scene of a hot-blooded young man risking his life to fight a bomb.

"This is the detective agency's secret entrance examination~"

Although Kunikida Doppo criticized him for being clueless and ignorant of the importance, the members of the armed detective agency expressed their approval for his willingness to sacrifice his life for others.

So the action of catching the man-eating tiger became an assessment to recruit new people into the company, and even because the new people came with their own entrustment, their first job was also secured.

"Eri?"

After solving the problem of the white-haired boy Atsushi Nakajima, now it's the white-haired young girl's turn.

To be honest, compared to Atsushi Nakajima, who was born an orphan but had a trace of innocence all the way up, the white-haired girl had a bigger problem.

To be honest, Eri doesn't look like an abandoned child.

In addition to her hair that looked slightly dirty and gray due to long-term neglect, both her delicate face and body that was much healthier than Atsushi Nakajima showed that she had been well cared for.

Moreover, other than losing her memory, there might be many other unspeakable reasons for the white-haired girl to appear in this chaotic city.

For example...

Excluding Yosano Akiko's inhuman speculation, as an old rival of Port Mafia, members of the Armed Detective Agency who had no confidence in the moral integrity of a certain young girl even made a rather outrageous decision. Think about it carefully. A pretty reliable inference.

For example, the statement "I collected the gifts because I heard that the leader of the Port Mafia is a child molester" was actually recognized by most members of the Armed Detective Agency.

Those who are familiar with the inside story will naturally know that the leader of Port Mafia is not a simple manipulator of young girls, nor does he like all girls. However, it cannot be tolerated that most people do not know the inside story. Coupled with the other party's status in Yokohama, many people will definitely want to vote for him. To obtain benefits.

To be fair, the white-haired girl is really good-looking. Coupled with her rare pair of blood-colored eyes and her body that looks more like a mechanical creation, those who like her will definitely fall in love with her.

Maybe it was because of Eri's face that someone noticed her and wanted to get her into the port mafia and deliver her to the leader. It was also possible that some kind of drug was used to destroy her memory.

Children are easier to raise after losing their memory.

"Coupled with the child's request to Kunikida last night, it's hard for me not to make this kind of inference."

Dazai Osamu was talking about the white-haired young girl's sudden request for a relationship with Kunikida Doppo last night. This kind of The request sounded outrageous at first, but it would make sense if she was specially trained to look like that as a gift to someone.

"Dazai's speculation is not unreasonable."

After hearing the black-haired young man's speculation, everyone present was silent for a few breaths and nodded, especially the president of the armed detective agency who was an old acquaintance of a certain Port Mafia leader.

The middle-aged man, who also had silver hair, was silent for a few seconds after listening to Dazai Osamu's speculation. He looked at Yosano Akiko with a deep expression, "Have you had any examinations done?"

He asked Yosano Akiko if she had done it for the white-haired girl. Checking to see if there were any signs of drugging on the child, the beautiful social doctor slowly shook his head.

She had done a preliminary check on Eri when she was taking care of her last night, and did not see any signs of drugging on her body. "Of course, it cannot be ruled out that the child has been stimulated by other things, but without further investigation, Before careful examination, I cannot make an accurate judgment."

As the search for the origin of the white-haired girl reached an impasse, everyone present was silent for a few seconds, and they all turned their attention to the only detective they could count on at the moment, who was also a member of the Armed Detective Agency. The only detective

- Edogawa Ranpo.

The famous detective who had high hopes from everyone was sitting at his desk playing crossword puzzles with his feet up. He did not participate in the discussion of the detective agency at all, and even seemed to be very disdainful to participate.

The night before, he had told the little girl with a serious face that he had something to say when he came back, but today after Atsushi Nakajima passed the entrance test, he was silent at all.

"Ranpo."

The famous detective Edogawa Ranpo of the Armed Detective Agency, the only president who obeyed orders, Fukuzawa Yukichi, spoke. The famous detective who originally planned to stay out of the matter could only put down the pencil and newspaper in his hand with a bored look on his face, and squinted. He stared at the white-haired young girl surrounded by everyone.

"The child...well...how should I put it, don't worry about her."

Edogawa Ranpo frowned more and more as he spoke, as if he didn't know how to explain it.

He jumped off the desk heavily, walked up to the white-haired girl aggressively, dug into his pocket, took out a lollipop, tore off the wrapping paper and stuffed it into the little girl's mouth.

"She will get better on her own."

The young detective looked at those beautiful eyes carefully for a few seconds before making his own judgment.

"Compared to that, I have to grab today's limited-edition strawberry daifuku as early as possible. The famous detective doesn't want to be intercepted for three days in a row!" He said this and suddenly bent down and looked up and down as if he had discovered something. A white-haired young girl said,

"By the way! Why didn't the famous detective think of that!"

He stretched out his index finger and pointed at the white-haired young girl holding a lollipop with a cute expression on his face, "That's you!"

"You are the variable. "

...Huh?"

Eri, who had no idea what Edogawa Ranpo was talking about, took out a strawberry-flavored lollipop and made a questioning sound.

"Sorry, sorry, I heard some noise inside and knocked on the door and came in -"

Before anyone could ask, the door of the Armed Detective Agency was pushed open, and then a white head poked in.

"I heard that this is a very famous detective agency, so I plan to come here for a commission..."

Before the visitor could finish his words, he took advantage of his height that was higher than that of an ordinary man and glanced at the white-haired young girl who was surrounded by people. The eyes behind the sunglasses lit up, and he opened the door and walked towards the other party.

"Oh, I really didn't expect that I actually found my target first~"

He said this and walked towards the young girl with open arms in an exaggerated way, as if he wanted to hug her.

"Eri-chan," he walked to stand in front of the young girl. He bent down, pushed up half of his sunglasses with his hands, revealing a pair of red eyes of the same style, and winked at her playfully.

"Call Papa!"