Chapter 18: The System’s Important Reminder

"Ding. The Host need not feel too regretful. There is still a turning point in this matter. Suzuki Misaki’s current marriage is not stable and is expected to face breakdown within a year. The Host still has a chance!"

When Kitahara Chiki was secretly feeling regret, the system suddenly offered a proactive hint, which surprised him quite a bit:

"System bro, how do you know that?"

"The system is omniscient!"

"You mean she’ll divorce within a year? What’s the reason?"

"Suzuki Misaki cares too much about her career and isn’t attentive enough to her family, causing her husband great dissatisfaction. The two also have irreconcilable differences regarding having children."

"Alright, let’s set that issue aside for now. System bro, help me assess—if I confess to Hayami Rina now, would she accept me?"

Kitahara asked for advice.

He didn’t discuss the Suzuki Misaki matter further—that could be researched later. The immediate issue of Hayami Rina was the priority.

He had been constantly considering the question of confessing to Hayami Rina, but had concerns. He was afraid that if she rejected him and favorability dropped as a result, it would backfire.

A single mother and widow like Hayami Rina, having experienced the pain of losing her husband, would likely view matters of the heart with much more caution.

Whether it was lingering attachment to past feelings, fear of being mocked or misunderstood, or concern about whether her child could accept it—

All of these would make her hesitate when making decisions.

Kitahara Chiki was worried about these very issues, which was why he couldn’t make up his mind.

Because once she rejected him and a rift formed as a result, it would take a great deal of effort to ease that awkwardness afterward.

But he still hoped that once the confession succeeded and Hayami Rina accepted him, agreeing to be his real girlfriend—

Then her favorability toward him would surely rise sharply. And afterward, he could justifiably spend money on her and get cashback.

This made him very conflicted.

"Currently Hayami Rina’s favorability toward the Host is 79 points. At this value, the success rate of a confession is very high. But it is still recommended that the Host raise favorability above 80 points to further increase the success rate.

At the same time, the Host needs to pay attention to the timing of the confession, and once the confession succeeds, how the Host should handle it when Hayami Rina needs to fulfill her obligations as a girlfriend.

After all, the Host’s body is currently unwell. Whether Hayami Rina can be satisfied will affect the subsequent increase in favorability.

It might even cause it to decrease!"

The system’s answer made Kitahara Chiki’s heart tighten.

This latter reminder was too important—he had nearly overlooked it.

Yes, after a successful confession, the two would be in a proper dating relationship. Hayami Rina would definitely have some intimate physical contact with him in daily life.

And he definitely wouldn’t be able to resist the temptation of such a voluptuous lady.

Never mind Hayami Rina taking the initiative—even if she didn’t, he would want to actively press himself against her.

The consequences of that were self-evident.

She would definitely be disappointed, despondent, and disheartened, feeling despair toward life.

At that point, favorability would surely plummet. Kitahara couldn’t bear such consequences.

"System bro, thank you. Is there anything else you need to remind me of?"

Kitahara Chiki sincerely thanked the system. He had only been thinking about the benefits of a successful confession and some surface-level issues—he hadn’t considered the deeper things thoroughly.

Fortunately, he had received the system’s reminder. Otherwise, the consequences would have been truly serious.

"None." The system said coldly.

"Uh... alright. Thank you for your hard work, old man. Rest for now!"

...

"Mm, even so, I still have to confess. The favorability after a successful confession is too tempting—I can’t refuse it.

The only thing to be careful about is that after success, I still need to keep my distance from Hayami Rina and not get too intimate."

"And once the confession succeeds, I need to immediately start the buy-buy-buy campaign for her, using money to capture her, striving to raise favorability to 90 points as soon as possible and solve my unspeakable pain!"

"At that point, I can truly unleash my patriotic genes, satisfy her in that aspect, and continue gaining her favorability!"

"With both material and spiritual life satisfied, Hayami Rina’s favorability maxing out will be just around the corner!"

Kitahara Chiki calculated in his heart, slowly settling on a plan. He felt this plan was fairly reliable.

The future looked promising!

Then, he pulled his thoughts back and continued his writing endeavor.

At noon, Kitahara still ate a simple meal at Hayami Rina’s home. To protect her self-esteem, he ate even ordinary food with a seemingly very satisfied expression.

Although favorability still hadn’t increased, Kitahara could feel that Hayami Rina’s mood was quite good.

Perhaps she felt she had received acknowledgment and had given something in return.

After the meal, Kitahara went back to take a nap. When he woke up, he saw that the weather outside had improved considerably. He decided to go out and buy some things.

Before that, he first withdrew the cashback he had previously earned from the system.

The several hundred thousand yen from the day before yesterday had already been withdrawn. Yesterday he had spent just over a hundred thousand yen, with 4x cashback, and the cashback amount had reached an astonishing four hundred thousand yen plus.

After the withdrawal succeeded, looking at the stack of "Fukuzawa Yukichi" bills before him, Kitahara was overjoyed.

Not bad at all!

Money really is a good thing!

This much money was already equivalent to an ordinary employee’s income for over a month, and was nearly half of the inheritance the original owner had left behind.

Earning someone’s monthly salary in just one day—Kitahara felt that in this life, he really didn’t need to worry about money anymore.

Moreover, this was just some ingredients—he hadn’t even bought anything valuable yet. If he bought things like bags, cars, houses, he’d earn even more.

It was almost terrifying.

But when the amount was small, it was fine. If the amount became truly astonishing, reaching tens of millions or hundreds of millions of yen, would money of such unknown origin really be okay?

"System bro, where did you get this money from? There won’t be any risk, right?" Kitahara asked.

"The Host can use it with peace of mind. The sources of the money are all forgotten or missing funds from this country. There is absolutely no problem. Through this system’s interference from a higher-dimensional level, others will not suspect the Host of having too much money either—they will only think it’s normal."

As expected of the system. Kitahara felt reassured now. A country has so much missing money—he estimated that in this little Japan, at least tens or hundreds of billions of yen go missing every year.

His bit of money really was nothing.

The system being able to keep others from suspecting him was also quite thoughtful. At least he didn’t need to hide it and didn’t need to worry about being investigated.

Awesome!

After tidying up a bit, Kitahara took an umbrella and went out. This time, besides continuing to buy some ingredients, he also planned to buy some decent clothes.

He was about to go out for fun soon. The original owner didn’t care much about appearance, and Kitahara looked down on the previous clothes a bit. He decided to buy some good ones.

At the same time, he also planned to buy some for Hayami Rina and Aya.