Chapter 3 I am just an innocent and harmless college student
System: [This is also one of the host's main tasks.]
"Huh? Another main mission? How many main missions do I have left?"
At this moment, a line of text appeared on the system interface in front of him, indicating that the system was too tired to read and that he should read it himself.
Cheng You: This is such an irresponsible system! I want to complain! Bad review! :-|
【Task:
1. Locate the potential criminals in Beika Town and correct their mindset. Main objective: The person who is about to become a powerful member of the brewery and turn the tide between Red and Black—must not be allowed to join the brewery.
2. Main Task Two: Identify the suspected outsider Grim Reaper who brought disaster to Beika Town, resolve the incident, and restore Beika Town to normalcy.
Cheng You, hands in his pockets, said, "Isn't the one who cursed Beika Town Conan the Grim Reaper? Does this mean the mission is complete?"
The system angrily retorted: [Bullshit! The Grim Reaper in this world isn't Conan! And pay attention to your other missions!]
Cheng You pursed his lips: "It's alright. As long as we don't touch the main plot and spend more time with Conan, it shouldn't be too dangerous."
System: [Don't interrupt the system!]
[3. Main Task Three: Rescue. For example, the police academy group, Curaçao. The person being rescued cannot be involved in too many main storylines. Secondly, you only have one chance to rescue; if the rescue fails, there will be no second chance. Specific rules will be explained to the host again when entering the rewind mission.]
Rescuing them isn't because I, the System, am kind-hearted; it's simply because they have a significant impact on the mission's progress. Don't try to sway the System's decision.
Cheng You's dark eyes flickered slightly, containing a hint of anticipation: "Three main tasks, that sounds really good. Ah, but this second one..." refers to the brewery? That can't be right, it probably refers to a force that didn't exist in the original manga and changed the rules here, like Yagami Uesugi who could single-handedly change the red and black situation.
"So this time rewind is the countdown to my upcoming rescue of them?" Cheng asked.
System: [That's right, this time the journey back seven years is taking longer to load, so please prepare well. After all, this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity; once missed, it can never be regained.]
Upon learning from the system that this regression occurred seven years ago, Cheng You guessed that this was the time of Kenji Hagiwara's death.
This is something we should do to plan our future goals and plans. Cheng's eyes flickered, and he pondered in silence, his expression serious.
His thoughts were in turmoil, but he quickly regained his lazy, smiling demeanor and stared at the location of Yagami Shangcan on the system interface. It was less than a kilometer away, but the Nishino district had many narrow alleys, and although the straight-line distance was indeed short, there were still many twists and turns.
Nishino Ward is known for its intricate, dilapidated alleyways, broken surveillance cameras, and long-neglected buildings, making it a frequent site of illegal transactions and assassinations. The alleys are like a maze, winding and branching out in all directions. Any novice unfamiliar with the area who wanders in will surely meet their demise.
The alley was narrow and dark, with tall, dilapidated stone walls on both sides. The alley meandered, sometimes converging and sometimes diverging, seemingly endless in the darkness, making it easy to lose one's way.
Nighttime here is even more dangerous. The darkness, like a thick curtain, shrouds the area in an eerie and terrifying atmosphere. The streetlights cast a dim, yellowish glow, their light flickering and uncertain. The occasional hiss of a wild cat or the mournful cry of a crow makes one feel as if something is following behind, waiting for the right moment to launch a cruel hunt.
Illegal transactions take place quietly in this corner. In the darkness, shadowy figures whisper and converse, engaging in clandestine activities. If an agreement isn't reached, they'll immediately draw their weapons and shoot each other without hesitation.
It seemed that several people on a mission spotted Cheng You, a clean-cut college student with a silly grin on his face. Some of them whispered with ill intent. They spoke softly, but Cheng You could clearly hear their thoughts within a hundred-meter radius: they wanted to use him as a guinea pig for their recruitment interview.
Cheng glared at the other man with dangerously dark eyes. The assassin paused, seemingly feeling a pang of fear, but seeing how innocent the other man was, he suddenly felt an itch to take action.
"Hey, kid." The assassin looked at him arrogantly, a long knife in his hand. [Becoming a stepping stone on my road to success is your honor.]
Upon seeing the knife in the other party's hand, Cheng You's first reaction was that it was nothing special; an organization without even a gun was definitely not as interesting as a distillery.
He had no intention of lingering, only raising his eyes to look at the other party with a slight warning, but the assassin man took this warning as a dying struggle of a little white rabbit, and he approached Cheng You step by step.
A deep smile suddenly bloomed on Cheng You's face. He gently raised his hand, and a cold glint flashed in his eyes.
"Ah—" A sudden scream startled the crows on the eaves, and they took flight.
A fresh, pungent smell of blood filled the air, overpowering the stench of rotting flesh.
The assassin, clutching his forearm where the flesh had been slashed, knelt on the ground, his face contorted in rage. He hadn't even seen his opponent make a move! A gleaming scalpel had already sliced through his flesh! This force?! Where was the innocent rabbit he was promised?!
Cheng stood in front of the man, looking down at him with a nonchalant smile: "Wow, you're so easy to hit." Then her expression turned serious, and she said in a stern tone, "Get lost."
"I...I understand." The assassin was clearly still too inexperienced. One of the organization members behind him shook his head and left, saying earnestly, "Sigh, when you come to the Nishino District, the worst thing you can do is judge a book by its cover."
Cheng ignored the other disturbances and glanced at the system interface again before slowly walking towards his target.
The system was shocked, the system was terrified, the system dared not speak, the system hesitated to speak, the system was restless.
[Host...you...]
Cheng You put away the gloom on his face and in a second, he put on a bright and cheerful smile and said with a grin, "What? What happened to me?" It was as if everything just now was a hallucination of the system, but the fresh smell of blood in the air proved that everything had really happened.
Although the system can't smell anything, it absolutely cannot hallucinate. Its carefully chosen obedient, innocent host turns out to be—a wolf in sheep's clothing!! But this is too cunning!! Such poor judgment! Such a terrible mistake!!
[Um, I think... Host, you...]
"Why don't you call yourself System Master anymore?" Cheng You raised an eyebrow and smiled.
The system remained silent, lost in thought.
"Ah, don't worry, your host is really just an innocent and harmless college student. I was just bluffing to ensure my safety. That's called being a sheep in wolf's clothing, haha."
[Really? That seems unlikely.] The system was somewhat convinced.
"Really, you must know me well if you chose me as your host, haha, how could I possibly have that kind of ability? I feel like it was the organization that interviewed that person who framed me. Damn it, they ruined the system's impression of me. Yeah! That's it!"
The system fell into thought. Indeed, it had spent a long time selecting a host, specifically looking for one with outstanding abilities and obedient behavior. Yes, the host must be white; how could he possibly be black, hahaha.
The mission objective lies at the end of this road, but Yagami is still on his way, presumably because he hasn't found a suitable organization yet.
At this point, they stopped chatting and focused solely on tracking, maintaining a safe distance of one alleyway between them.
At this point, the red marker on the map had stopped, indicating that they had found an organization and were having a conversation, though it's unclear whether it was the distillery.
After Ye Shen's failed negotiations with a certain organization and his continued movement, Cheng You began to prepare. He first crumpled his clothes, then casually scratched his carefully styled hair, and smeared some dust from a dilapidated wall on his face. Although he was quite disgusted, it was all for the sake of success. After adjusting his expression to be flustered, he hurriedly ran in that direction.
As he approached his target, Cheng deliberately made a very obvious backward glance, as if he were evading his pursuers.
Then, in the instant he turned his head, he bumped into someone with a "thump".
Damn, that really hurts, my face really hurts, I'm going to knock my teeth out, why does this person have so many metal objects on him?
Cheng felt as if his teeth had hit the zipper or other metal decorations on the other person's clothes, and he felt as if his teeth were about to fall out from the pain, but he still endured it and began his performance.
"I'm sorry, please don't kill me." He retreated immediately like a frightened deer, looked up, and froze for a moment.
"Mr. Night... Mr. Night God?"
The all-black-clad Yagami looked at him coldly. "What are you doing here?" He raised his hand, grabbed the person in the way by the neck, and casually tossed him aside.
[Tsk, there are so many small fry here.]
Seeing this, Cheng You feigned surprise, after all, his current persona was that of an innocent little rabbit who had wandered into this place by mistake.
Cheng wasn't surprised for long before moving on to the next act, quickly answering the question with a panicked expression and a trembling voice. "It's just... I saw you come here... they all say it's dangerous here, I've heard the rumors too... so I... I... I came to check it out, I can't... let my roommate be in danger..."
"Oh." Yagami Kamisama's expression remained unchanged.
[No organization has satisfied me... and none of them are willing to offer me a reasonable price. This is really troublesome.]
Cheng You looked at Yashin with a forced smile: "Let's leave quickly, this place is too dangerous."
"..." The other person's expression was calm and composed, but in his heart he was ranting about the organization that refused his request to settle his wages on time.
"Let's go." Yagami, feeling relieved after venting his frustrations, finally agreed to leave. "Who was chasing you?"
"I don't know, they were all dressed in black..."
Just as the two turned to leave, a voice came from the alley behind them. Cheng You felt that the voice was very familiar. After listening carefully, he was shocked! He was absolutely certain that it was Gin and Vodka.
Wow, here it comes.
The place was dimly lit, and Cheng You had gotten himself all dusty and dirty. Moreover, the Night God in front of him was dressed entirely in black, and even had a black baseball cap that covered half of his face in this environment.
"Big brother, about that thing about the research institute lately..."
"That mission was actually assigned to..."
"I remember there was a transaction a few days later at that amusement park, it was with..."
Vodka did all the talking, while Gin would occasionally give a simple "hmm".
As they emerged from the alley, they looked up and saw two people standing at the end of the alley.
Yagami Kamishin naturally overheard their conversation and was considering whether or not to go for the interview.
This organization seems promising; the members are all quite good-looking. That muscular member must be well-paid to maintain such a robust physique. The long-haired member has great hair and doesn't seem to think much; he's probably a regular slacker. Since the benefits are good, it's definitely worth my serious consideration.
Cheng You: Haha, Gin, slacking off? That's an insult to the distillery's only true workaholic! (covers face and smirks)
"Hey—" Yagami finally spoke.
A note from the author:
Cheng You has a bright future.
In the early stages, the system's little fire faced what it considered to be a naive and innocent host.
【Oh~ my little host, let the system help you.】
The system, Xiao Huo, later discovered the host's true nature.
【Host, the system is willing to serve you.】
My upcoming novel, "Raising a Child in a Horror Dungeon in Beika Town," is available for pre-order on my column.
Upon entering the Infinite Flow dungeon, the dungeon boss turns out to be a former friend who died. Can they return?
In the dungeon, he occasionally turns into a child. Can the people around him still believe him?
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