What's going on? Why did I suddenly walk into a burger joint...?
Aki Hayakawa looked at the cigarette that had just fallen on the floor and been handed back to him by a passerby, feeling somewhat bewildered.
He clearly intended to go to the supermarket to buy groceries, then head back to cook for Denji and Power. Why did he inexplicably turn into here?
Was the old problem acting up again...? Resignedly tapping his forehead, Aki decided to just go with the flow and buy a few burgers here to take back for Denji and Power. Anyway, those two weren't picky eaters; they'd eat anything.
Lately, he often felt himself zoning out, occasionally performing strange actions. Like when cooking at home, he'd inexplicably make an extra portion. When lighting a cigarette, he'd unconsciously extinguish it...
Perhaps he accidentally injured his head during a mission sometime ago and was experiencing aftereffects now. But overall, this situation hadn't affected his life, so Aki didn't pay it much mind.
Casually sitting down at a nearby table, Aki waved for the waitress. But when the girl in the apron and uniform approached and saw Aki's face, both were startled.
"Ha-Hayakawa-kun!?"
Perhaps seeing her former senior from her previous job reminded Kobeni of her terrifying past work life. The moment she saw Aki, she was visibly startled. Immediately, her left foot collided squarely with her right, tripping her entire body to the ground.
The burger meal on the tray she held went flying straight out, heading directly towards the young man sitting at the table, waiting for his meal.
Needless to say, the unlucky fellow sitting there was naturally Li Bei. He already knew Kobeni's bad luck and personality, so he wasn't surprised by this turn of events.
With his current strength, unmatched anywhere on this Blue Earth, facing Kobeni's flung coke and burger, if he wished, there was no possibility of them touching his body.
So, facing such things that would dirty him, how would Li Bei handle it? Use speed completely imperceptible to Kobeni and Aki to help her up and return the items, or pretend to coincidentally dodge them, hiding his strength?
The answer was neither. He simply continued sitting there, looking at his phone, without even lifting his head, as if completely unaware of the burger and coke hurtling towards his head!
And this was precisely the situation he wanted.
Li Bei himself didn't believe in things like fate. But if matters related to his peaceful life were involved, then he would maintain [Respect] towards all things—including ethereal concepts like fate.
Indeed, with his strength, both changing the current situation and pretending to dodge were extremely easy. He was confident he could make it so Aki and Kobeni wouldn't notice any trace of his intervention.
But his intuition strongly told him that, with another world suddenly colliding with Blue Earth, encountering old acquaintances from Chainsaw Man right now was definitely no coincidence. This was likely fate subtly influencing things.
Since worlds could merge due to gravitational attraction, there was no reason people wouldn't. Li Bei now suspected that precisely because of Unit Two's existence, those who formed bonds with Xiangzi would likely appear around him one after another, because this was the gravity of bonds! And this gravity would pull their connections together until they truly reunited!
Intuition told Li Bei that if he took any abnormal action here, this gravity of bonds would make Aki and Kobeni sense something strange, ultimately leading them to suspect him.
If Li Bei put the flying burger and coke back in place, Aki and Kobeni would immediately notice the abnormality. And if he pretended to coincidentally dodge, they might suspect if such a perfectly timed event had some hidden meaning.
Ultimately, suspicion would fall upon the only other customer in the entire restaurant besides them—that is, Li Bei himself!
Although this was merely baseless intuition, Li Bei firmly believed it. The intuition of the strong is often the correct answer. Even Jing Yuan could rely on intuition to recall the Express crew's threat to the Xianzhou despite not remembering the events. His intuition now would only be more accurate.
And this situation, Li Bei absolutely could not accept!
Why did he minimize summoning his incarnations, even letting the pitiful Unit One bear so much pressure? Of course, it wasn't because he himself was a devil who enjoyed persecuting Li Hua for fun, but a choice made after careful consideration.
And the reason was that the incarnations might attract too much trouble from their respective worlds.
Using the previous Kevin incident as an example: Li Hua struggled greatly to handle it. But if he had directly summoned Unit Three back then, Li herself handling the matter would likely have been much simpler.
Then the Otto trio would revolve around Li Hua, while Kevin, Elysia, and the others revolved around Lee. Everyone coexisting peacefully, sounded wonderful—but the problem was, what happened after?
Once the incarnations appeared, people from their original worlds, upon learning the news, would surely try everything to find her, eventually flocking around her daily. Under such circumstances, Li Bei couldn't simply retract the incarnations.
Otherwise, with the most important person suddenly disappearing, the lunatics experiencing gain then loss would likely teach Blue Earth a lesson on the spot.
But if these incarnations remained in the outside world long-term, another problem arose—incarnations were ultimately incarnations; they inevitably maintained some connection with the main body. The system might help him physically sever tracking possibilities, but that didn't mean complete safety. After all, all incarnations were Li Bei.
They might have differences, but there must be some aspect similar to Li Bei himself.
If multiple incarnations existed simultaneously, one couldn't rule out the possibility of someone deducing Li Bei's image through the commonalities in their subtle actions.
Therefore, the appearance of each incarnation represented a slightly increased possibility of Li Bei being exposed in this world. And the ensuing troubles, just thinking about them gave Li Bei a splitting headache—so even if the chance was only one in billions, he couldn't accept it!
He went through so much effort before just to increase his own safety. If he attracted Aki and the others' attention here now, they might very possibly skip the initial step of investigating the incarnations and start tracking him directly. Thinking of that situation, Li Bei felt suffocated.
Needless to say, that would definitely be a situation troublesome to death.
Although even if they suspected him, they wouldn't necessarily connect him to the Xiangzi they interacted with, let alone the other incarnations—but who could say for sure about such things?
After all, Li Bei already understood he was an unlucky fellow. Things he didn't want to happen always ended up happening for various reasons; the number of bizarre entities around Li Hua was proof enough. Therefore, while the situation was still in his hands, Li Bei had to be absolutely thorough, leaving no chance for God to roll the dice and worsen the situation.
For this reason, he would rather sit here like an ordinary person and get drenched in coke than expose even a sliver of his special abilities!
Sigh, I'm still too soft-hearted. Otherwise, directly transforming into Great Chairman Aki would likely make things much easier...