Gojo Satoru held a pure black long-handled umbrella, walking slowly on the path outside the cemetery. Although a single teleportation could easily get him home, the feeling of strolling in the fine rain occasionally was also quite nice. He lifted his head slightly, the pale blue eyes behind his sunglasses reflecting the sky that had already begun to clear up gradually.
"Participating in my own funeral... this experience is truly novel."
In fact, he had been watching everything from the shadows all along, and had also heard everyone's conversation completely clearly. It was just that to reduce the risk of exposing his identity, he originally had no intention of showing up, but wanted to wait until everyone left before entering the cemetery alone to offer a bouquet of fresh flowers to the tombstone of Kuno Nozomu. In a certain sense, it was also a ritual to bury another self with his own hands.
However, when Gojo Satoru saw Hagiwara holding that fortune paper modified by his own hands, closing his eyes and praying devoutly, he still couldn't resist appearing beside the other party.
"Really, clearly being such a rational person usually, to actually make a wish to a god..."
Heaven knew how much he wanted to give Hagiwara a warm embrace for a moment just now, and directly speak to tell the other party—
"Don't be sad, Little Hagiwara, your wish, I have heard it well."
"Don't talk about meeting one more time, meeting how many more times is all okay."
"Because... I am right here."
Pity, he couldn't do this. Since he had already decided to split the identity of the main body and the vest completely, he should put these words in his heart forever.
In the end, he could only play a mysterious friend of Kuno Nozomu, leaving an ambiguous comfort, and then turning around to leave.
"But..." The system complained: "Just looking at Host's performance just now, to people who don't know your identity, you are completely a riddle man, who knows it's comfort!"
"Tongzi, this is where you are wrong." Gojo Satoru talked with it earnestly in his brain: "I ask you, is the whole Conan world very small?"
"Hmm..." The system thought for a bit, answering as if counting family treasures: "According to the fact that the protagonist group and plot characters can always meet by chance, multiple important characters have relative relationships between each other, and the occurrence frequency of cases and Inspector Megure's appearance frequency... it should count as quite small, right."
"Right?" Gojo Satoru agreed deeply: "So, the probability of me walking on the street and meeting Hagiwara and them in the future one day is maybe extraordinarily high."
Compared to adding suspicion in vain when the time comes, it was better to bury a foreshadowing for future meetings now, and it could also add a bit of unfathomable mystery color to the main body, letting the police academy group distinguish the early deceased old friend from him, the riddle man, as a matter of course, and dropping the vest would then have nowhere to speak of.
What? You ask me why my personality is so similar to Kuno Nozomu? We two are friends, mutual influence between friends is very normal, isn't it?
"But, speaking of which..." Recalling Hagiwara's confession before the tombstone, he sighed softly: "Now Little Hagiwara wants to go to the First Investigation Division, and Little Matsuda stays in the EOD squad instead. This kind of development is not quite the same as the original work."
He had to admit he had some negligence. When formulating the exit plan at the beginning, he calculated almost all possibilities, but just didn't think carefully... about how Hagiwara would choose after things happened.
The system responded: "Indeed. According to the original trajectory, Hagiwara Kenji should die in the bombing case on November seventh, and Matsuda Jinpei transferred to the First Investigation Division to help him avenge, yet sacrificed four years later to protect the lives of the citizens..."
Gojo Satoru listened to those plots already engraved in his heart, and suddenly spoke up: "Since Little Hagiwara intends to leave the EOD squad, it explains that the destined trajectory can be changed, right?"
"Host's meaning... is wanting to pick up the bento of the police academy group?"
"Right." He answered as a matter of course: "Otherwise, why do you think I just returned to the main body and then packed those few bomb culprits who would originally kill Little Hagiwara and their crime evidence to throw at the police station door?"
With the system's search bar around, it was very easy for him to lock onto the criminals who appeared in the original plots, achieving precise strikes from the root. Of course, he wasn't some savior, if not out of special reasons, he wouldn't run to sanction those fellows who hadn't implemented crimes for no reason. After all, if all criminals entered prison early, the anime name of Conan would probably have to be changed to "The Boring Routine of Teitan Elementary Students."
"True, but..."
"What? Is there any problem?"
"That... is about the topic of picking up bentos." Listening to the system's hesitating tone, Gojo Satoru raised an eyebrow: "You wouldn't want to say that according to some strange regulation, I can't save those few, right?"
He remembered very clearly, when the system found him to draw a big pie at the beginning, what it said was "as long as it doesn't violate the basic character design of the acting target, you can move freely in the world"—which was to say, it should default that he could change the fate of the plot characters.
The system coughed: "As long as you can gain enough popularity value and impression value, Host wanting to save whoever is of course no problem... but, the Space-Time Administration also indeed has some limitations."
"Limitations?"
"Correct, among different manga planes, many characters all carry key plot nodes, which also means even if Host theoretically can move freely, there is a part of the plot that is best not to interfere with." The system explained: "For example, in the Conan world, if Host wants to prevent Kudo Shinichi from turning small, not let 'Sleeping Kogoro' appear, or kill an important character like the boss in advance, it will cause the world to collapse, the acting mission will also follow to fail, and in the end you are very likely forced to stay in the collapsed world, unable to detach forever."
"Hiss... so serious?"
Gojo Satoru didn't want to know what himself staying in the collapsed world forever would turn into. Luckily, regarding those examples the system raised, he also indeed didn't have much interest to implement them.
"With Host's current action trajectory, as long as you don't destroy these nodes, it naturally won't cause such serious consequences." The system sent out a sizzling electronic sound: "Fortunately, the deaths of Hagiwara Kenji, Matsuda Jinpei, and Date Wataru are not within these nodes, so Host wanting to save them is completely no problem."
At this time, Gojo Satoru realized a point keenly. "Then... how about Little Hiro?"
The system said carefully: "Since his death involves the plot line of the black side, it is judged as a 'key node' by the reviewer of this plane, so..." The remaining words, it didn't say further down.
Gojo Satoru also followed to stop his steps, keeping silent for a while. Just when the system wanted to speak to comfort the host, it heard a sentence: "Rules are made by people, then, there must be loopholes to crawl through."
"Eh?"
"The one involving the black side is Scotland, what does it matter to Morofushi Hiromitsu?" Gojo Satoru turned the umbrella handle, the rain drops on the umbrella surface splashing in all directions: "As long as after Scotland finishes his role, we don't let those manga readers know Morofushi Hiromitsu is actually still alive, wouldn't it be equivalent to 'death'?"
The system blanked for a bit: "Makes sense!"
For Gojo Satoru, wanting to find a way to let Scotland fake his death wasn't difficult, what was difficult instead was how to explain after saving the other party.
"In short, talk about it when the time comes..." Anyway, he would never watch Little Hiro die with open eyes.
Right after, Gojo Satoru thought of another important question.
"Speaking of which, since I changed Little Hagiwara's death plot, plus he now intends to join the First Investigation Division... will some new death flags pop up in the future due to the butterfly effect?" Even if he threw the bomb culprit to the police station this time, how about next time, and the time after next? How many frantic criminals would appear again? Would they meet a crisis hard to escape from on some day in the future, when he didn't notice?
"This... is indeed possible." Hearing his question, the system also followed to sink into thought.
Just when Gojo Satoru was thinking whether to do some measures to ensure everything was safe, it suddenly played a burst of joyful BGM, speaking with a quite excited tone: "Ding! Detected Host's popularity value broke through one hundred million, congratulations Host, joy to Host!"
Ever since receiving the bento, Kuno Nozomu's character popularity rose continuously, and breaking through to this number was a matter of time sooner or later.
Gojo Satoru rubbed his chin, saying with emotion: "It is faster than I imagined instead... seems the readers truly eat this trick very much."
"Right, Host, do you want to see the big gift pack reward of 'one hundred million popularity value'? Maybe it can solve your current trouble!"
"Oh? Gift pack?" If the system didn't mention it, Gojo Satoru almost forgot this matter completely. Being said so by it, a few shares of expectation also couldn't help rising in his heart. "Hope it's not some useless reward..."
He called out the transparent panel, and surely saw the option of [Reward Collection] flashing brightly. Unexpectedly, some good stuff really came this time.
[Please Host choose one out of the three following skills:]
Midas Touch (can turn any item into gold)
Death Prediction (can predict the death risk of a designated target within twenty-four hours in advance)
Skillful Divine Chef (any dish you make will be delicious to an unbelievable degree)
Seeing the skill of "Midas Touch," Gojo Satoru's eyes lit up. If he had this kind of capability devoid of human nature, let alone Karasuma Renya's gold villa, he could build a gold amusement park in minutes, and also didn't need to worry about the Gojo family lacking money anymore, even giving employees year-end bonuses didn't need to be anxious, just throwing gold bricks directly was fine.
"The skill is indeed not bad, but..." He couldn't help complaining: "Choosing one out of three to find the culprit is one thing, why do cheat abilities also need to choose one out of three? Can't I just want them all?"
"Dear, giving you a polite reply here, choosing one out of three is already the maximum discount effort, you can't want them all~"
After having an ineffective argument with the system that transformed into a Taobao customer service, Gojo Satoru felt quite regretful.
"Midas Touch is indeed very tempting... but Death Prediction is better." After all, what he needed most currently was precisely this. Even without the skill, Gojo Satoru had the ability to let the family develop into a big financial group, it just needed to spend more time. Compared with the safety of Hagiwara and them, those were all insignificant small matters.
As for the skill of "Skillful Divine Chef," Gojo Satoru didn't consider it at all from the start. Not to mention he himself carried excellent cooking skills, why did he need to be so good at making food? Participating in the world's number one chef assembly? Although he was indeed a bit curious about what a dish "delicious to an unbelievable degree" would look like. Better to give this skill to Calvados, maybe it could truly move Belmot's stomach and successfully bring the beautiful woman home.
"Okay, Host confirms selecting 'Death Prediction'?"
"Confirm."
"Ding! 'Death Prediction' skill has been activated!"
The system explained: "Host can record the appearance and name of the designated target in the skill panel, if the target has a death risk within twenty-four hours, the skill panel will send out an automatic reminder. At the same time, if it is a target not recorded in the panel, Host can actively recite to use the skill, checking whether the other party has a death risk within twenty-four hours."
"OK~" Gojo Satoru nodded with satisfaction: "This way it can ensure they won't receive bentos casually." With the automatic reminder, even if some risk appeared, he could also rush over to save people at any time.
After recording Hagiwara and others' names on the system panel, Gojo Satoru thought for a bit, and also added Gin and several subordinates who were loyal to himself into it. Although he didn't think the role model would have a death risk before the grand finale, it was better to grow an extra eye.
"Right, will there be a gift pack to draw skills next time? If there is, when is it again?"
The system answered: "The second gift pack is distributed when the popularity value reaches five hundred million. As for whether there are any afterward, I am temporarily not too clear yet."
Hearing the number of five hundred million, Gojo Satoru knew that he temporarily didn't need to consider whether to choose "Midas Touch" next time. Relying on just one vest of Kuno Nozomu, wanting to reach five hundred million popularity value was really not quite realistic. Waiting to collect the second gift pack was estimated to be a matter of a very long time later.
"Don't know what skills will be drawn afterward... it's simply like opening a blind box." Gojo Satoru's brain flitted across some strange cheat abilities in novels, and he couldn't help shaking his head.
The system said seriously: "No matter how, the effect won't be too heaven-defying, Host better lower the expectation value appropriately—for example, drawing a skill similar to 'Incubus Incarnation,' letting plot characters fall in love with you at first meeting and filling the impression value, that kind of situation doesn't exist."
"Ha?" Gojo Satoru covered his chest with exaggeration: "Am I not charming enough now?"
"...Host is truly more and more narcissistic!" The system began to suspect whether its own host was this kind of virtue before accepting the acting mission, a pity it already had no way to verify it now. It shook its head helplessly (if it had a head), and then spoke to say: "Actually, besides this skill, there is also a reward presented additionally, does Host want to check it immediately?"