The Core of Being Universally Adored

"No, thank you. We have scarves." Sherlock and Watson had just reached the car.

Seeing this, Watson quickly signaled to Sherlock. The great detective understood at once and swiftly pulled off his scarf and wrapped it around Sitangna.

The blue checked cashmere scarf covered Sitangna's head and ears, leaving only her big eyes visible.

"This is William Blake, a senior colleague on my project team," Sitangna said, tugging at the scarf until she finally freed her mouth.

"These two are my flatmates and friends, Sherlock Holmes and John Watson." With things as they were and neither party willing to leave, Sitangna had no choice but to introduce them.

"What? You live in a flat with two grown men? Isn't that a little dangerous? I have a spare place I could rent you. I'd give you a good rate-"

"Stop. Compared with two upright, kind, exceptionally gifted and elegant gentlemen-and by exceptionally gifted, I mean me specifically-" Sherlock's scrutinizing gaze had already scanned the other man from head to toe. "You're the more dangerous one, aren't you, Mr. William?"

"You deliberately parted your hair seven to three and applied a limited-edition pomade. I imagine the person you're about to meet must be a woman, and an important one to you."

"Your entirely bespoke outfit makes you look noble and elegant, and its main colors are understated without being dull."

"So the person you're meeting could be your mother or a sister, but more likely, it's your fiancée. Why not a girlfriend?" Sherlock turned up his collar. It really was a little cold without his scarf.

"That outfit is too formal for a girlfriend and too distant for your mother, but just right for a fiancée. And the two of you must have been childhood sweethearts."

"Judging by the outline and creases at the corner of your trouser pocket, there should be a velvet box in there. As for its size, I'd guess it contains a bracelet. You won't even let a gift for her leave your person. It's so romantic I could faint."

Sherlock's antics earned him a punch each from Watson and Sitangna. They were still out on the street. How did he find the energy to be so dramatic every day?

William, meanwhile, looked stiff with surprise. Sitangna seized Sherlock's arm and twisted it hard, apologizing to her senior through gritted teeth. Nobody wanted to have their personal information casually exposed on the street.

William offered no further explanation. Before leaving, he merely told Sitangna to call him if she needed anything. Not wanting him to worry, she politely accepted his offer.

"Call me if you need anything~" Sherlock and the others headed for the bakery, and he was still mocking Sitangna's senior along the way.

"He was only being kind. Could you not be so hostile?" Sitangna hadn't expected Sherlock to be so rude. Furious, she pinched his lower back again.

It wasn't that she was deliberately flirting or trying to find an excuse for physical contact. Some people were just so obnoxious that she couldn't resist hitting them.

"British men don't casually give their personal clothing to women outside their family. His scarf might even have his spit on it," Sherlock said in his defense. "He obviously wants to pick you up."

"No way. Doesn't he have a fiancée?" Sitangna recalled the look on Lilian's face when she left, and she seemed to have an epiphany.

"Having a fiancée doesn't stop a scumbag from picking up girls." Watson's insight made Sitangna go, "Ew."

"Also, could you pinch somewhere else? The bruise there hasn't gone away yet." Sherlock brushed her hand off and darted behind Watson.

Sitangna looked shocked and gave him a sarcastic answer of her own. "So you do know what pain is. I thought your skin was too thick for you to feel anything."

Caught between them, Watson hugged the two large boxes of cereal rings he'd chosen and sighed. He was used to it. He really was.

"I was going to tell him straight out that the landlady was my aunt. He definitely wouldn't have worried after hearing that. What did you need to go on and on for?"

Sitangna's words made Sherlock's expression freeze. Right, he could have just said the landlady was her relative. Why had he suddenly spouted so much nonsense?

The wind and snow grew stronger in the streets. After buying their ingredients, the three hurried home, and seeing that the men had nothing to do, Sitangna promptly roped them into making cake.

"Cream cheese, sugar, two eggs, heavy cream..." Emily wanted lemon Basque cheesecake, so they had to make the cake base a day in advance.

"Is the lime juice ready, Sherlock?" "Nearly."

"John, could you get me the cake flour?"

"Here, and a sieve too." Watson appeared in front of Sitangna with flour all over his face.

"What happened to you? Did you fall into a bag of flour?" Sitangna strained the cheese batter, then poured it into the mold.

"Ask the guy next to you. He deliberately made me sneeze." Watson viciously tried to step on Sherlock's foot, but missed, making him even angrier.

Holding the remaining lime juice, Sherlock dodged around Sitangna to evade Watson's attacks.

"All right, stop fooling around. Sherlock, put the batter in the oven, top and bottom heat at 220 degrees, and set the timer for twenty minutes."

Sitangna still wasn't quite comfortable using the oven, but more importantly, standing with her hands on her hips and directing others was fun too.

"The cheese batter follows the same steps. Don't run off, Sherlock, there's another portion of lime juice!"

Sure enough, the remaining lime juice was accidentally spilled while Sherlock and Watson were fooling around. She shot Sherlock an angry look and marched him off to make another batch.

"Stir, stir, stir, I'm stirring away. I can't stir anymore, Nana." Watson showed her the results of his work.

"Add half a bowl of milk and keep stirring." Twenty minutes later, the oven finished its work. Sherlock put on oven gloves and took the cake out, and Watson picked up the batter, ready to pour.

"Not yet. We have to wait for the base to cool before pouring this batter in..."

The kitchen had been noisy ever since they came back. Mrs. Hudson had a headache, so she went upstairs to tidy their rooms and enjoy some peace and quiet. She wouldn't go into the two grown men's rooms; they could tidy those themselves. At most, she would tidy the sitting room for Sherlock and Watson.

She had asked Sitangna's permission to tidy her room, though, and was now folding the young woman's clothes. Looking at the garments hanging here and tossed there all over the room, Mrs. Hudson could only sigh.

"Why don't kids these days like folding their clothes? All three of their bedrooms are exactly alike!"

"Oh, isn't this Sherlock's coat? Why is it hanging here..." Sitangna liked hanging clothes rather than folding them, so she hung up everything she could.

It was also the only garment hanging on the freestanding coat rack, with Sherlock's scarf wrapped around it. If the light hadn't been on, it would have looked at first glance as though Sherlock were standing there. Even the rack was about the same height as him.

"...Why is the scarf here too? My goodness, have I discovered something?" Mrs. Hudson crept over to the coat rack and sniffed the collar and scarf. Wow, they both smelled of Sitangna's perfume.

"Have those two been dating behind our backs?" She suddenly felt like causing mischief.

The old lady was still young at heart. She carried the fully dressed Mr. Coat back to Sherlock's room and hung him up, wondering how Nana would react when she discovered the clothes were gone.

The truth was that Sitangna's own coat had gotten soaked outside a few days earlier, and Sherlock had lent her his because he was afraid she would catch a cold. She had bought a new one in the past two days, but a button had fallen off Sherlock's, so she planned to sew it back on before returning it.

The scarf was from today. It had gotten a little wet in the wind and snow outside, so Sitangna had dried it as soon as she got back. Planning to return it with the coat, she had casually wrapped it around the coat on the rack.

She could also treat it as a Sherlock dummy and give it a couple of punches. She had even planned to invite Watson over later to box the fake Sherlock with her.

"Auntie, come down for dinner!" Sitangna had made spaghetti bolognese today. Watson had specifically requested it, and it counted as payment for his labor.

"Oh ho ho, I'm coming." Mrs. Hudson toddled downstairs like a child, unable to stop smiling.

"What happened, Mrs. Hudson? You're so happy." Watson had gotten the delicious spaghetti bolognese he wanted, so he was happy too.

"Secret, hehehe." Mrs. Hudson picked up the fork neatly laid out beside her. Things had been much easier for her since the thoughtful, considerate Nana had arrived.

"She's been up to mischief." Sherlock was about to say more when Mrs. Hudson stopped him with a look. He shrugged at Watson, then shut his mouth and obediently ate his dinner.

It was Sherlock's turn to wash the dishes tonight, a very rare occurrence and the result of a compromise after the other three had verbally ganged up on him. He felt his temper had grown increasingly mild lately.

Christmas was only a few days away. Just as Sherlock finished washing the dishes, he received a call from the shop: the supplies for his custom order had arrived, and they wanted to know when he was free to come in.

"Tomorrow." "All right, we've booked a crafting assistant for you in advance."

Tonight was another peaceful night. Britain's festive season was almost upon them, with Christmas and New Year packed into a single week. Colorful lights hung from railings and treetops all over the streets, creating a festive atmosphere well before the holidays arrived.

So the project team Sitangna belonged to sent out another meeting invitation. This time, they were going to the college area of the University of Cambridge, about eighty kilometers from central London. It was snowing now, making travel inconvenient.

The team leader therefore encouraged everyone to try to settle everything for the first phase of the project during the three days of meetings ahead, so they could happily enjoy Christmas and New Year and start the next phase as soon as the holidays were over.

Sitangna lay under her covers, gazing glumly at the progress bar on her panel, which was already one-third full. She had been in the Sherlock world for over a month, and had a month and a half left for her mission.

The mission withdrawal time wasn't actually fixed. Instead, the system used data analysis to monitor the protagonist's mental state. If the time came and the world's protagonist still hadn't noticed anything amiss, it could be put off a little longer.

[The completion scores for the side quests are all really high. Looks like we'll get more reward points when we settle up.]

Candy floated happily around in front of Sitangna. The lights were already off, and she twinkled like a star.

"But I have to leave for the university tomorrow afternoon, and Sherlock and the others are about to take on a new case. It's so frustrating that I can't tag along and make progress."

Not only was she unable to do her mission, she also had to work herself to the bone for another project team. She had, admittedly, received the generated memories of her background character and mastered all the skills originally assigned to the character.

But please forgive her: she was a humanities student with a serious bias toward her own subjects, and she really couldn't muster any interest in a science research project. Looking at those numbers gave her a headache, and this time there would even be big-data calculations. Damn, she'd rather take a few more looks at Sherlock.

Some cases in this world had changed because of the butterfly effect, but as long as Sitangna didn't get involved, the worldline would slowly move back toward that of the original series.

Judging by the current point in time, Candy had detected that the Hound case had been moved up. In other words, Sitangna was destined to miss this side quest.

"In future worlds, could you change my main occupation to something like a freelancer? Let me work when I need to, instead of making me passively accept work, okay?" Sitangna lay there making her wish.

"Look, my actual job is seriously holding up my mission progress. This is a major case that got a whole episode to itself in the original series. If I could go with them, the progress bar would surely be over halfway once we finished."

Sitangna chattered away to Candy, her mind full of thoughts about whether she could use Candy's partial god mode to cancel the project meeting and so on. Even if she couldn't cancel it outright, delaying it for two days would do.

[You're thinking of the mission too simply, Nana.] Candy stopped bouncing and hovered in front of Sitangna's eyes. The atmosphere in the room grew much more serious.

[The heaven's chosen we select for mission worlds wouldn't fall in love with a pretty ornament, a dodder vine, or an empty shell without a soul.]

[The big shots on the conquest rankings aren't all handsome men and beautiful women either, at least not from the start. Body-shaping cards only recently began being handed out as gifts to newcomers.]

[Most of the original mission takers were ordinary-looking men and women. There were a few exceptionally gifted beauties among them, but they too carved a path for themselves in the mission worlds through the charm of their own personalities.]

[Personality is more important than appearances, Nana.]

[When the character you inhabit has a spirit of their own and social responsibilities of their own-in short, when you have your own things to do, you know who you are, you give the character life and vitality, and you become more compatible with the character,]

[The laws of the world will naturally draw close to you, and the protagonist's gaze will follow his heart and discover you. He'll unconsciously want to get to know you. Then comes salvation and liberation; the outcome lies with both you and him.]

[That is the spiritual core of an ordinary person's evolution into someone universally adored.]

Sitangna was speechless. What Candy had said touched on things she had never considered before. Now that Candy had pointed them out, she seemed to understand why missions of this kind had to be carried out by real people.

"That does seem to be true. We may be born ordinary, but everyone has a soul that's distinct in its own way. That's what you mean by the charm of one's personality, isn't it? And it's also the main purpose of a conquest mission, right?"

She had specifically asked Candy before why, when system beings already had humanlike minds and possessed advanced techniques for creating human bodies, they couldn't carry out the missions themselves.

Candy's answer at the time had been much the same. Their mission targets were worlds derived from humans, and the characters to be conquered were still human. No matter how powerful the main system's functions were, they couldn't surpass flesh, blood, and souls.

Moreover, mission worlds had no affection values.

Unlike in a real game, the system could only estimate the current stage based on emotional fluctuations and use that to establish a standard for mission completion.

In fact, this alone showed how far ahead the mission system was in exploring and learning about human emotions: love could not be assigned a value.