Chapter 69 Childhood Snow Mochi and Dirty Buns
"..."
Kitagawa Ryusei remained silent. He suddenly realized that today was the first time Furuya Rei had seen him use his superpower.
He instinctively raised his hand to touch the young man's face, which was so close to his own, but after struggling for a while, he couldn't reach out. Only then did he realize that the guy had been tied up very tightly.
So Kitagawa Ryusei had no choice but to settle for second best, using a coaxing tone for a child: "So you were scared after all, weren't you..."
He said with utmost seriousness, "It's all just rustling around, nothing to scare you."
The emotions she had been building up all night instantly crumbled, and Rei Furuya couldn't help but burst into laughter, though she emphasized, "Ryuu, it's you who's shrunk, not me."
Kitagawa Ryusei, unconcerned, said, "But Zero, you really are more like a child."
Fortunately, the other person showed some improvement this time; they didn't secretly dwell on it and even knew to share their worries with him.
He thought for a moment and answered Furuya Rei's question: "You know my biggest secret: no one in this world can kill me, so you don't need to worry about my safety at all."
“As for worrying about me leaving,” Kitagawa Ryusei said, sighing first, his tone becoming increasingly serious, “where else can I go if you’re here?”
"..."
This statement was so bold and direct that both the speaker and the listener fell silent for a moment.
Kitagawa Ryusei fell silent because he was embarrassed by his own sentimentality, while Furuya Rei circled back to the very first question.
"We always treat Ryusei's character as a protagonist who saves the world. You said you came here because of your special ability, are you sure you won't fly away after everything is over?"
After all, only a handful of people in this world are involved with the young man in front of him. Kitagawa Ryusei's ideas and abilities are full of the shadow of another world.
Furuya Rei refused to look away from him, his expression slowly hardening as he stopped joking and waited for Kitagawa Ryusei to give him an answer.
At this point, any promises made would be meaningless, a fact that Kitagawa Ryusei understood all too well after making countless deals with the mafia.
He paused briefly, then suddenly spoke: "I said I came here using my special ability, but I don't think I told Zero in detail how or why I came..."
Not receiving the assurance he wanted, but noticing Kitagawa Ryusei's overly serious expression, Furuya Rei's heart stirred slightly. He took off his slippers, got into bed, crossed his legs, and pretended to listen attentively: "Go on."
Kitagawa Ryusei pondered where to begin, even though it was a child's voice, it carried a peaceful yet powerful quality that resonated with the speaker's character in the quiet night.
"If logical contradictions arise between superpowers in our world, they will create singularities with immeasurable energy. The Trayastrimsa Heaven is a spatial superpower, and also a belief. This is the biggest difference between it and other superpowers—it is based on idealism."
The concept of removing debuffs is inherently highly subjective.
For example, if Kitagawa Ryusei doesn't admit that shrinking has a negative impact on him, should his superpower allow him to return to his original size?
"So as long as I can maintain a 'death' state, it is very likely that it will conflict with the 'immortality' of the superpower, creating a singularity."
He paused for a moment before continuing, "After becoming a Mafia junior officer, I have been trying to research in this direction, and I have found two methods to generate singularities."
"Deceiving your superpowers, deceiving yourself."
Upon hearing the phrase "continuous death," Furuya Rei's fingers suddenly clenched, creating a crease in the bedsheet beneath his palm.
But he didn't interrupt; he just listened quietly.
Kitagawa Ryusei remained calm as he briefly summarized the somewhat bloody past: "The method of deceiving those with supernatural abilities is quite simple; all you need to do is trigger the ability repeatedly within a short period of time. We discovered this in the enemy's interrogation room, and in the end, most of their organization was destroyed by the singularity."
He changed the subject, speaking slowly and deliberately: "But I was able to get here because I successfully deceived myself."
Rei Furuya was puzzled: "...You lied to yourself?"
Kitagawa Ryusei explained, "I spent half a year hiding in the supernatural space, successfully convincing myself that the me outside was already dead..."
Rukaku was stunned, her brain almost not processing what was happening: "...Huh?"
"It means exactly what it says."
Originally, she didn't think much of it, but when she faced the face of the blond young man, Kitagawa Ryusei felt a little embarrassed to say it: "Anyway, I just feel that there's no point in staying in that world. Everyone has their own things to do, so it doesn't matter whether I'm there or not."
His gaze shifted, and his speech quickened: "I was originally planning to just sleep and die, but who knows which spacetime the singularity connects to, a voice was crying in my ear, so pitiful and heartbreaking."
At that moment, Kitagawa Ryusei was just in a daze, and had just felt like he was alive again when he was kicked, shoved, and thrown into an unfamiliar place by a supernatural ability.
"Although I don't want to hear that the 'lovable' person you mentioned is someone else,"
She vaguely sensed that his tone was mocking her, but Furuya Rei was still suspicious: "But I don't think I should cry."
Besides, she cried so miserably.
"I also hope zero never will."
At this moment, Kitagawa Ryusei finally broke free from the covers and knelt down facing Furuya Rei, his expression serious: "So, I gave up everything in that world to have the chance to meet you. Do you still think I would leave, Rei?"
If you abandon yourself, aren't you abandoning everything?
The person in front of him was a small, delicate bundle, as pink and tender as a mochi fresh out of the refrigerator, yet Furuya Rei could see in him the calm, composed, and witty young man he always was.
“I believe you,” he whispered.
The original Furuya Rei was always worried that he was not good enough to compete with the other world in Kitagawa Ryusei's heart, and was torn about the question of "who to save first if I and your former employer fell into the water".
But now, he was thinking that anything, whether it was himself or something else, would be good as long as it gave Kitagawa Ryusei more to hold onto.
But he doesn't regret bringing up the topic.
Finally relieved, Furuya Rei let out a long sigh of relief and took the initiative to start a new topic: "Ryusei, do you want to know what I was like when I was a child?"
The face in front of him looked to be in his early twenties. Kitagawa Ryusei, under the blond youth's gaze that seemed to say "ask quickly, ask quickly," pondered for a moment.
He easily conceived of a miniature version of Furuya Rei, who was 1.1 meters tall, had a 50/50 body proportion, and delicate features.
Without blinking, he made a reasonable guess: "I'm guessing...it looks like a dirty bun?"
"..."
The words he was about to say all caught in his throat. Furuya Rei choked, a black line appearing on his forehead: "Ryusei, you're going to lose me easily if you keep doing this."
Even if Kitagawa Ryusei wasn't curious, he would still tell him.
Rei Furuya thought for a moment and then began to explain: "Because my parents weren't around, I had to live alone in a large, empty house when I was little. Like most ordinary kids, I couldn't stay still and would run around the yard all day."
Because of his hair and skin color, he was the most conspicuous kid on the street, and he was often bullied by his peers.
Even if the opponent outnumbers him, Kofuya can take down many of them by picking up a mop handle and swinging his fists; he's not afraid of taking on ten opponents at once.
Moreover, if he gets his clothes dirty from fighting, he doesn't have to worry about being scolded by his parents when he gets home. He just needs to sit on a small stool in the yard and wash them clean without being noticed by the housekeeper...
Those guys suffered too many losses, and over time they stopped causing trouble for him and instead banded together to isolate him.
Koyuu didn't care at all; she still went to school alone, ate alone, and did her homework alone while lying on the carpet, biting the end of her pencil.
He didn't have a close friend until he met Komoribushi, who had moved to Tokyo.
"He really is a good boy," Kitagawa Ryusei sighed, hugging his pillow and resting his chin on his hand, imagining the tiny Furuya Rei obediently carrying water to wash clothes, perhaps even looking helpless because he was too weak to wring them dry.
I want to steal it.
Before he could express his opinion, Kitagawa Ryusei looked up and saw Furuya Rei with bright eyes, expecting him to say something as well.
He chuckled to himself, "I wasn't nearly as cute as Zero when I was a kid..."
Rei Furuya stared at that face without saying a word, his silence a testament to his disbelief.
Having confirmed that this guy was serious, and knowing he wouldn't be able to leave until he said something, Kitagawa Ryusei tried his best to recall his unremarkable childhood.
He recalled with difficulty: "...My parents, it seems, were there at the beginning. I remember they were always out early and back late, probably part of the mafia... Don't look like that, the mafia organization provided a lot of jobs in Yokohama at that time."
In the beginning, there were two tall figures in her memory, which were labeled as "safe" in Kitagawa Ryusei's subconscious, and the whole memory was filled with a sense of security that she would not go hungry and did not have to worry.
Those two people never returned.
The tiny Kitagawa Ryusei stayed in the cheap little house for several days, secretly peeking out from the crack in the security window by lifting a corner of the curtain. At the slightest sound, she would run to the door and look up to wait.
Instead of his parents returning late, he was met by human traffickers who were searching for orphans.
As Kitagawa Ryusei spoke, he reached out and touched his face, patting and pinching it, and found that it did feel quite nice: "Back then, they said I could sell very well and that the money I made could buy a whole room full of bread."
Kitagawa was young but not stupid. Although he hadn't yet developed the shrewdness of the Yokohama orphans, he knew these people had ill intentions.
He can remember it so clearly because he was too young at the time and was really a little shocked by a room full of bread.
Kitagawa Ryusei summarized the rather uninteresting story of how he escaped from human traffickers in one sentence: "After that, I stayed in Leibo Street. There were many children there, and many people looking for children to work for."
Occasionally, he might encounter a kind older child or mentor who could teach him some survival skills. For example, it's best to only rummage through the top third of the trash can, as the bottom is too polluted and eating it can make you sick; if you get sick on Leibo Street, you can only wait to die.
Whether it was luck or not, Xiao Beichuan was doing quite well there.
Later, he was discovered by the Port Mafia's field operations force and was taken back as a treasure, a healing ability user. Although the result was not satisfactory, he was fortunate enough to have a stable job and stayed in the Port Mafia's field operations force after receiving unified training.
Rei Furuya asked, puzzled, "Why were they disappointed?"
Is Kitagawa Ryusei's superpower something that sounds like a bug, or is such a superpower actually quite common?
Kitagawa Ryusei answered him fluently: "Because it cannot bring more benefits to the port Mafia."
From the leader to the logistics staff, everyone in the Port Mafia exists solely for the organization's survival and interests. No matter how outstanding an individual is, they will not be recognized if they deviate from this principle.
【Trāyastriṃśa】 has limited scope of use, and its triggering conditions are harsh and uncontrollable. Therefore, the leader would rather have Kitagawa Ryūsei as his assistant than go to the medical department, or fly to all corners of the world to do business.
“I think I can understand why you guys are able to dominate this area.” Furuya Rei said, speechless.
The absolute belief in prioritizing organizational interests, absolute obedience to the leader, and even a terrifying cohesion unimaginable in any criminal organization—even now, Kitagawa Ryusei doesn't think there's anything wrong with his ideology.
But he couldn't help but retort: "Ryusei is very good... No matter what you think, in my eyes even if Ryusei doesn't have any special abilities, he is still the most special and priceless one."
The young man's serious and earnest gaze made those who were being looked at by him unable to resist giving in first.
Kitagawa Ryusei remained silent, pulled the blanket over himself, and covered his head completely.
He muttered under the covers, "It's not like we've only been together for a short time. Who are you trying to flirt with by talking so sweetly..."
According to the rules of romantic relationships, Rei Furuya should firmly state at this point that she is flirting with her boyfriend.
But when he looked down, all he could see was a small bulge protruding from the blanket.
The words that were on the tip of my tongue inexplicably wouldn't come out.
Perhaps he doesn't need to say anything more.
The two let the quiet settle in the room.
The room remained silent for a long time, with only the faint sound of wind rustling through the branches outside the window.
Rei Furuya patted the corn puffed up in the blanket, turned around and unbuttoned his suit jacket, intending to change into pajamas before resting.
Suddenly, he lowered his eyes, stopped what he was doing, and said in a way that sounded abrupt in the quiet bedroom: "If we were in the same world, I would have taken a shovel to Yokohama when I was very young and dug you out."
"..."
The rustling sound of fabric came from behind me. It was Kitagawa Ryusei who had lifted the covers and climbed out. Following his words, my thoughts drifted away.
The voice was clear and pleasant to the ear, but the young man's voice sounded full of distress and helplessness.
"Then I'll just have to give up a whole room full of bread and go home with a little dirty bun."
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