21 | Exclusive from Jinjiang Literature City · 21

The Grand Master of the Soft Bread Cult.

Despite their bickering, Matsuda Jinpei didn't forget his business.

He sat on the far right with his legs crossed: "Tell me, what's the deal with me dying?"

Lai Chuan Huang Quan stood with her hands on her hips, blocking the TV, and raised her chin: "Before that, let me introduce myself."

She raised a hand and patted her chest: "I, Lai Chuan Huang Quan, am an employee of the Time and Space Administration. I was entrusted to come to this world to complete a relief mission."

Matsuda Jinpei: "Who entrusted you with this?"

As soon as she finished speaking, Lai Chuan Huang Quan visibly stopped in her tracks. She froze on the spot, and the air seemed to freeze.

Matsuda Jinpei: ?

“I don’t know,” Lai Chuan Huang Quan touched his nose and looked away. “I’m only responsible for fulfilling the wish. As for who made the wish and what price they paid, that’s not within my scope of work.”

"But if nothing unexpected happens, it must be someone who loves you very much, such as your blood relatives."

"Family...?"

Matsuda Jinpei looked up at the pale ceiling, slowly savoring the word "family." His father, who loved to drink, would never do anything like praying to ghosts or spirits because of his death.

Kenji Hagiwara rested his hand on the back of his head and suddenly thought of his older sister, a popular policewoman from Kanagawa. Or perhaps his beautiful mother, who was nearing the end of her life.

Kenji Hagiwara didn't think it would be Jinpei Matsuda. Based on his understanding of Jinpei Matsuda, he believed that Jinpei Matsuda preferred to grasp the light with his own hands rather than the ethereal smoke at the foot of the Buddha.

Kenji Hagiwara's expression darkened, his brows furrowing with seriousness: "Softie, what is the price for making a wish to the Time and Space Administration?"

"I don't know. Maybe it's a unique treasure in the world, or maybe it's working for the Bureau."

Lai Chuan Huang Quan sat directly on the coffee table in front of the two of them, tearing open the packaging of the bear-shaped cookies that Hagiwara Kenji had brought with a ripping sound: "However, in the ordinary 21st century, we probably won't be able to hand over anything that the Bureau will find interesting."

"And you?" Kenji Hagiwara suddenly asked, "What is your wish, soft bread?"

"I?"

Lai Chuan Huang Quan paused for a moment, then lowered her gaze and began to carefully peruse her past memories. Chapter after chapter, page after page.

The first memory begins in a vertical cylindrical container filled with a transparent liquid. She opens her eyes inside the container, her long hair flowing like seaweed. Around her are rows of "people" like her, also contained in containers. They are all wearing large white robes to cover their bodies, curled up in the liquid like unborn babies.

Separated by the liquid and glass, Lai Chuan Huang Quan and the man standing outside the glass container made eye contact. Suddenly, the liquid was pulled away from her feet, the buoyancy disappeared, and Lai Chuan Huang Quan, as the liquid level dropped, gradually went from floating to sitting on the ground with her knees drawn up. Her brain was flooded with a large amount of theoretical knowledge, and a jumble of sounds echoed in her mind, like hundreds of ducks quacking around her.

The cylindrical glass dome trapping Raikawa Yomi began to descend, revealing a man in a white suit, hands behind his back, with a stern expression: "Raikawa Yomi, from today onwards you will officially become a Class D employee of the Time and Space Administration. I am your administrator. Now, get up and come with me."

“Hmm,” pulling her thoughts away from the backflow of memories, Lai Chuan Huang Quan stuffed a bear-shaped biscuit into her mouth: “Maybe I was originally a member of the Bureau. I’ve been with the Time and Space Bureau ever since I can remember. I shouldn’t be a worker who signed a contract with the Bureau to fulfill wishes.”

As soon as he finished speaking, Lai Chuan Huang Quan clenched his left fist and tapped his right palm, suddenly realizing, "Then I've lost out big time! Everyone else works to fulfill their dreams, but I'm working for nothing!"

Lai Chuan Huang Quan grew increasingly angry as he spoke: "This is blatant exploitation! Even bloodsucking capitalists in the 21st century know they have to pay their workers wages! Bah, you heartless management bureau!"

Matsuda Jinpei: "..."

Hagihara Kenji: "..."

The atmosphere, so serious it gave one the illusion of thin air, suddenly became subtle. Lai Chuan Huang Quan blinked and looked at the two people on the opposite sofa: "Why do you two look like you want to say something but can't? Did I say something wrong?"

Kenji Hagiwara rubbed his temples a couple of times and sighed, "I just suddenly understand your..." He swallowed the word "reckless" back, paused for a moment, and continued, "...how did you develop this free-spirited and unrestrained style of doing tasks?"

—Anyway, there's no reward, as long as I get it done, it doesn't matter how I do it.

The expressions on the two SWAT aces' faces were so subtle that Raikawa Yomi didn't even need to think to realize something was wrong. She frowned and scrutinized the two in front of her: "But I feel like you're talking about me behind my back."

Matsuda Jinpei responded with a cold snort. He crossed his arms and lay back on the sofa, mocking, "Yeah, I was just saying you're brainless."

"..."

Lai Chuan Huang Quan's lips twitched, and he once again had the urge to put a sack over Matsuda Jinpei and beat him up.

"Jinpei, stop bullying Softie," Kenji Hagiwara elbowed Jinpei Matsuda. "Let's get back to business. Softie, what's your mission this time? And what's the story behind Jinpei's death?"

“Literally,” Yomi Laichuan said slowly, “I received a list with four names on it, and my mission is to ensure that all four of them survive.”

"These four people are you, you bastard officer, you idiot curly-haired guy, you, you, and you, you, and you, you, are all going to die around the same time, about four years from now."

As soon as he finished speaking, the already cramped room fell into a deathly silence, an eerie stillness permeating the space between Matsuda Jinpei and Hagiwara Kenji.

If someone had rushed up to them and said, "Hey, you're about to die," they would have thought the person was crazy. But since it was Yomi Yorikawa who made that statement, everything changed.

Both Kenji Hagiwara and Jinpei Matsuda had witnessed Yomi Yorikawa's strange abilities. After the bombing, they confirmed that the box contained a remote control that had been activated. If it weren't for Yomi Yorikawa's seemingly absurd intrusion, Kenji Hagiwara would have truly died.

The air seemed to be covered with a layer of frost, and with each breath, it pierced the lungs of the two snipers, causing sharp pain.

Of the five, only Rei Furuya wasn't on the list of those in need of aid. A cherry blossom, blooming and fading so quickly, leaving only a remnant swaying in the wind, struggling to stay afloat.

Even before leaving the police academy, they had already prepared for their sacrifice. But when they actually knew they were about to die, and that their important comrades would one by one turn into a handful of ashes in a small box, they still felt a pang of fear and an empty sense of lingering dread.

Yomi Laichuan held the foil wrapper of the biscuit, her gaze shifting back and forth between Hagiwara and Matsuda. After a moment's hesitation, she broke the last bear-shaped biscuit in half and put it into each of their mouths.

"Don't worry!" She clenched her fist, raised her arm, and struck a pose that muscular men often use to show off their biceps: "I'm here to save you guys, and I'm pretty strong!"

His exaggerated, comical performance dispelled the gloom that had been hanging over his heart. Hagiwara Kenji stared at Yomi Yorikawa for a long time before finally relaxing his back, which had been straight since earlier.

He nestled into the sofa, a faint smile playing on his lips: "Yes, yes, I'll leave everything to you, Master Soft Bread."

“However,” Raikawa Yomi held up a finger, “you can’t tell anyone else about this. If too many people know, I’ll be punished by the administrator.”

Hagiwara feigned surprise, looked around, cupped his hand to his mouth, and whispered, "Soft Bread, are you sure it's okay for you to tell us all this?"

"It's okay, as long as the number of people is kept within the allowed range, and I trust you."

—Most importantly, I'm really bad at playing 1v1 battles of wits with undercover agents, and I need your help.

But Yomi Yorikawa would never say those words aloud. I bet a whole case of snacks Officer Hagiwara bought her, and Matsuda Jinpei would definitely mock her as an idiot.

Hagiwara smiled and said, "Okay, this will become a secret known only to the three of us in the whole world. A three-person team... how about we give it a cool name, like the Soft Bread Cult?"

Lai Chuan Huang Quan: "Soft Bread Cult is such a weird name. What's so cool about it? I don't want it."

Matsuda Jinpei: "Hey Hagi, don't drag me into this weird cult without my permission. I'll become stupid if I partner with this woman."

The two spoke in unison.

Kenji Hagiwara shrugged nonchalantly and said, "What does it matter? Besides, if nothing unexpected happens, we'll be visiting Soft Bread quite often for the next while. I'd be happy to be a loyal follower of Soft Bread, you know."

Matsuda Jinpei glanced at Hagiwara Kenji but remained silent. He didn't want to rely on something as vague as the "Time and Space Administration" to avoid death.

Knowing the time and cause of death, he would resolve everything with his own hands.

Kenji Hagiwara is the same.

He always seemed confident and in control, as if everything was under his command. Even a raging flood couldn't shake the calm and composed smile on his face.

They were all willing to gamble with their lives, holding the unknown and their fate in their own hands, seeking a chance at survival and a future. But what if this gamble involved the lives of their most important contemporaries…

Matsuda Jinpei slowly exhaled, then looked at Raikawa Yomi again, extending his hand to shake hers: "Understood, leader of the Soft Bread Cult. Although you don't seem very reliable, I hope you'll take good care of me in the future."

Yomi Laichuan: "...?"

The fist hardened.

Lai Chuan Huang Quan glared angrily at Matsuda Jinpei, then relaxed and said, "Fine, I'll show you what I'm capable of."

Lai Chuan Huang Quan stood up and snapped his fingers, instantly distorting and warping the world around them. They remained motionless in the room, but the scene before them was so realistic it was like being in a VR game. The distorted visual space stimulated their brains, sending out dizzying signals. After a brief period of weightlessness, they found themselves in a futuristic, interstellar universe.

Before Kenji Hagiwara and the other could stand up and explore further, Yomi Yorikawa snapped her fingers again. Upon receiving the signal, the scenery moved rapidly, leaving only a few afterimages. In an instant, the scene before them transformed into a magnificent Western fantasy world.

With a snap of the fingers, the scene shifts. From the Middle Ages to the apocalypse, from the Milky Way to the edge of the universe, worlds that should only exist in human imagination appear rapidly one by one.

The scene that Kenji Hagiwara and his team saw was more dazzling than any special effects blockbuster, a technology that modern human technology could not achieve.

In the constantly flashing scenes, Kenji Hagiwara and his companion keenly spotted Yomi Raikawa.

Lai Chuan Huang Quan, dressed in black military attire, walked among the ruins, her coarse linen cloak rustling in the wind, her black hair flying wildly. She carried a chipped scimitar and cleanly chopped off a zombie's head.

The constantly changing scene in their field of vision disappeared, and Kenji Hagiwara remained seated on the sofa. He propped his elbow on the sofa, tilted his head, and rested his chin on his hand, lost in thought. It was Matsuda Jinpei, who was never one to mince words, who spoke first: "That scene just now, Raikawa, you weren't showing us a sci-fi movie, were you?"

Lai Chuan Huang Quan, hands on hips and looking proud, said, "It's understandable that people might think it's a science fiction movie, after all, our Time and Space Administration governs the highest technology."

“You’ve misunderstood,” Matsuda Jinpei said nonchalantly. “I was referring to the scene where you chopped off the monster’s head with a single stroke; that’s from a science fiction movie.”

Yomi Laichuan: "...?"

Lai Chuan Huang Quan leaped up from the table: "What do you mean, you curly-haired idiot! I'll fight you to the death! ... Damn it, second-year graduate student, put me down! Don't always protect that curly-haired idiot, I'm going to fight him to the death today!"

Once again, Raikawa Yomi was lifted high into the air. Hagiwara Kenji stood in front of the sofa, frowning and smiling, his head spinning. The girl he had his eye on and his best friend were both children with the mental age of three and a half years old. How could he get them to graduate from kindergarten as soon as possible?

"Alright, alright, softie, calm down. I'll take you out for something delicious tonight. Sashimi, sushi..." Kenji Hagiwara rattled off a list of dishes, and the woman who had been so aggressive earlier was gradually calmed down. Kenji Hagiwara smiled, his eyes crinkling into crescents, "Let's try them all, and we'll use Jinpei's money."

Lai Chuan Huang Quan's almond-shaped eyes lit up instantly: "!!!"

Matsuda Jinpei: "...?"

You bastard, Hagi, stop this already! :)

[Author's Note]

Starting August 25th, updates will be posted daily at 8:00 PM. If a chapter is late, a red envelope (cash gift) will be given out in the comments section. Three late updates will result in an extra chapter.

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