Disclaimer: Detective Conan is not mine. This fanfic is a translation.
Enjoy Reading!
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After finishing morning training and breakfast, it was time for the academic classes. Simply put, they had to study The Six Codes of Law, theoretical legal knowledge that every law enforcement officer must learn as a state authority.
The dry and tedious material made the already sleepy Ritsu nod off repeatedly, his head bobbing up and down like a pecking chicken.
Sitting to his right, Morofushi covered his mouth to keep himself from laughing.
Fortunately, Date, who sat in front of Ritsu, was tall enough to block the professor's line of sight. Otherwise, the instructor teaching the theory class would have caught him for sure.
When the bell rang for the end of class, Ritsu woke from his light nap.
That quick sleep had actually felt pretty refreshing.
"Do you want to look at my notes?" Morofushi asked.
"No need. I've already memorized everything in there."
"As expected of the top student," Morofushi said with a smile, helping him pick up his books. "Let's go. Zero ditched us and went to the cafeteria with Matsuda to save seats."
"Alright."
The cafeteria was clearly even livelier than yesterday.
Carrying his tray, Ritsu looked over the main dishes for the day. To his surprise, there was actually something that wasn't deep-fried.
He decisively chose the hamburger steak covered in brown sauce.
Ritsu sat down next to Rei and overheard him talking with Jinpei.
"What kind of change of heart did you go through?" Rei asked. "If I remember correctly, you used to hate the police."
Rei took a sip of seaweed miso soup and smiled.
"Don't tell me you're a tsundere?"
"I am NOT!!!"
The more heated the denial, the more obvious it was.
Realizing he had shouted too loudly, Jinpei coughed awkwardly before continuing with a grin.
"Even now, I still think the same."
"Police… are all bastards."
"…?"
Making such a statement about the police clearly meant there was some backstory behind it.
Ritsu and Rei exchanged a glance. They silently decided that instead of using their thirty-minute lunch break to nap, they should visit the computer room.
"Um, Sasajima-kun… can I sit next to you?" a girl asked.
"No."
"Oh… alright."
Across the table, Morofushi looked surprised.
It was rare to see Ritsu reject someone so bluntly. Even back in school, when girls confessed to him and he wasn't interested, he would politely explain that he only wanted to focus on studying instead of rejecting them outright.
Date set down his tray and gave Ritsu a thumbs-up with a grin.
Looks like what he said yesterday hadn't been wasted.
Ritsu nodded slightly in return, silently expressing his thanks.
During the lunch break, Ritsu and Rei went to the computer room.
They turned on one of the academy computers and began searching for information about Matsuda Jinpei.
The surname Matsuda was common, but the number connected to boxing and police was much smaller.
"Found it," Rei said.
He shifted aside so Ritsu could see the screen.
Displayed on the monitor was an old newspaper article.
Professional boxer Matsuda Jōtarō arrested on suspicion of murder.
"So that's why he hates the police?" Rei asked.
Ritsu shook his head after checking the article he had found.
"I don't think so. Look at this one."
The article Ritsu found told a completely different story.
That night, Jōtarō, a professional boxer, had just finished training at the gym and was heading home when he saw two people arguing near the scene of the later crime.
Because he had an upcoming title match, he didn't want to get involved and simply left.
But the next day, one of those two people was found dead at that location.
After hearing witness testimony, the police learned that Jōtarō had passed by the scene that night.
The victim had also been a former boxer who happened to have had conflicts with Jōtarō.
The officer in charge of the case immediately treated him as the prime suspect and arrested him.
Although Jōtarō insisted he was innocent, the investigation eventually discovered the real killer.
His name was cleared, but his scheduled title match was canceled, and he disappeared from the professional boxing world afterward.
Seeing this, Rei frowned.
"That really was negligence from the police handling the case. No wonder he'd resent them."
"It's not just that," someone said.
Both Ritsu and Rei turned around.
At some point, Hagiwara had appeared behind them.
Gone was his usual carefree attitude; his expression was serious.
"After that incident, Jinpei's father couldn't get anything to go right," Hagiwara said quietly. "After giving up boxing… he basically just stayed home drinking every day."
"Watching the father he admired turn into a drunk… it hurt Jinpei a lot."
Ritsu closed the webpage.
"But then why did he become a police officer?"
"I don't know," Hagiwara replied. "Jinpei never told me. Maybe it's really just like what he said during the interview."
"Interview?"
"Yep. If you want to know, just ask him yourself!" Hagiwara said cheerfully. "I've got to return some notes to Miharu-chan."
"…."
A moment ago he had been serious and now he was instantly back to his usual self.
Hagiwara was truly hard to understand.
Ritsu turned to Rei.
"So? Should we ask him?"
"Of course," Rei said. "We're going to be a team from now on. Any problems between us should be cleared up."
He glanced at the time displayed in the corner of the computer screen.
"Lunch break is almost over. Let's find a chance to talk to him later. We can't be late for Onizuka Class's first handgun training."
"Alright."
'You're the one being nosy,' Ritsu thought, 'so why frame it as a team issue?'
Still, he was curious about Jinpei's reason too.
After lunch break came handgun training for Onizuka's class.
Several classes were training at the same time. The range was large enough, with twenty shooting targets lined up.
"The gun you're holding is the SAKURA," Instructor Onizuka said seriously while holding up a revolver. "It's the official five-shot revolver used by Japanese police."
"I'll demonstrate the shooting stance first. Watch carefully, you'll only see it once!"
Onizuka's shooting skills were quite good.
From ten meters away, he easily fired all five shots into the inner ring marked with the number 10.
"Alright! The shooting test has four rounds, five bullets each! Your best two rounds will count toward your final score."
"Anything under 70 points is a fail!"
Looking at the students staring with admiration and envy, Onizuka raised his voice again.
"The five students with the lowest scores will be punished with twenty sets of burpees and push-ups!"
"What?! Twenty sets?!"
"Man… we'd better take this seriously."
Ritsu picked up the revolver on the table.
His eyes fixed on the target ten meters away.
There were ten numbered rings on the target but in his eyes, there was only the tiny red center.
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!
He fired continuously.
But in the final round, one of the bullets missed the red center.
He frowned slightly and clicked his tongue.
"Sasajima, your shooting is very good," Onizuka said. "But one of your seniors once hit the exact center twenty times in a row during his first ten-meter shooting test."
Hagiwara whistled in admiration.
"Wow, that impressive? I thought little Sasajima might break the record!"
Date laughed.
"Then that senior must be an ace detective in the First Investigation Division now, right?"
Onizuka recalled the person and coughed awkwardly.
"Uh… well… actually he already resigned. He opened a detective agency in Beika Town."
"What?!"
Date couldn't understand it at all.
With such incredible shooting talent, why become a private detective, essentially competing with the police for cases?
Ritsu lowered the revolver and adjusted his cap seriously.
"If I can't break the 10-meter pistol record, then I'll break the 50-meter and 80-meter ones."
Onizuka smirked slightly.
"Heh. Then I'll be looking forward to it."
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