Vivi hesitated between “leaving immediately” and “waiting for Winston to be beaten up before letting him drive her back.” In the end, she decided to wait for Winston to finish being beaten and then have him drive her home. This also gave her an opportunity to verify the power of the rose.

According to the instructions, the rose would make NPCs loyal to her, but with Vivi having multiple identities, the object of their loyalty should correspond to the relevant identity. Penguin’s former followers correspond to Mr. C, and SWAT’s current leader Winston either corresponds to Bella or Mayor Anna. The rose is a one-time use item, but she believes that items with similar effects will eventually appear in the coin shop.

The 【Coin Shop】 is a store that constantly refreshes various city utilities and everyday goods. The 【Diamond Pool】, as per the hints, refreshes large city structures like “Wind Turbines,” new glasses, and clothes similar to the previous dress she got. But she suspects, given the game developers’ tendencies, they might only provide blueprints or fragments, and she’d have to handle everything herself.

Thinking of this, she expanded the game map—

She usually keeps the map open to about three streets around her, as she doesn’t need more, so she rarely opens the entire city map. Now, there are more red dots on the map than before. Some of these are people who originally disliked the Mayor, and others started disliking her after she touched the East End, like Black Mask’s and Penguin’s men (yes, they despise the Mayor). The system also includes people hostile to C and Bella as her enemies.

Vivi couldn’t find Batman, but she suspected Batman might also be a red name now. There are too many red names, and she doesn’t have enough aliases to cover them all. Besides the conspicuous red names, there are other noticeable markers—

Like [Speed Limit 80][Speed Limit 60][Speed Limit 40], [Leaf Garbage Can][Color-Changing Traffic Light][Stray Animal Shelter][Love Bench][Flying Object Monitor][Self-Cleaning Water Pipe][Colorful Street Trees]…

These, of course, are all items Vivi bought from the coin shop. She bought out the entire shop over these 24 days, and naturally, there were many other goods that could be used personally or placed throughout the city as public amenities.

For example, the rescue box, which has a constant temperature function, can attract homeless cats, dogs, and rats desiring a home and simultaneously attract humans wanting pets—adopt, don’t shop. This reduced the number of stray animals on the streets, thus cleaning up the streets.

Vivi placed it in the old town square and occasionally visited it on her walks to work. The Love Bench is a tool to help singles find love, the Color-Changing Traffic Light makes people unconsciously sing while waiting at the intersection (what’s the point of that?), the Flying Object Monitor reports the Batplane taking off at least three times a day (then Vivi turned off the alert sound), the Self-Cleaning Water Pipe provides drinkable water, so she placed it in the East End, where it often attracted homeless people… In addition to many other wonderful public goods, she kept few for herself.

Every time Vivi opens the map and sees the icons of the items she placed, she feels a strange sense of satisfaction. She feels she is indeed changing the city, albeit just a tiny bit.

—But this tiny bit often attracts attention from others.

Like the people in Crime Alley complaining on the city hall’s suggestion board, saying things like “Who will manage the light pollution caused by that tree?” Vivi isn’t angry at all; she just had the administrator mute that person’s account.

Winston, bruised and staggering, came out and brightened up seeing Vivi still there. Approaching somewhat uneasily, he touched the car door and said, “Is this really my car?”

Vivi: “?” Did eating the rose damage his brain?

It turns out that after getting in the car, Winston explained the reason:

He felt his brain was foggy and probably not fit to drive.

He wasn’t the current Winston, but the Winston from ten years ago, who had just become a special agent and was suddenly taken away by the people of the Court of Owls. After agreeing to join them, he became the current Winston.

Let’s call him “Wen.”

Wen said, “But I’m not the current me, but the me from ten years ago, who hadn’t agreed to them yet. I just… I retain the memories of these ten years.”

His face showed a freshness that Winston could never have: “I definitely won’t agree to them again. These ten years of memories show that I’ve done many wrong things and have long regretted them.”

“Why do you trust me,” Vivi thought for a moment, “and why do you think I would trust you?”

Remember, the previous Winston had just threatened “Bella Bettywen” with his life to join the Court of Owls.

She guessed the item had an effect but still showed her wariness.

“You are a righteous officer,” Wen said with complicated emotions, “and I will prove it with actions, Miss Bettywen.”

“As to why you… ” Wen’s expression became somewhat shy, like a true young boy.

Vivi’s expression gradually became curious: Wait, this doesn’t seem like a dating simulation game…

Wen said, “Because you remind me of my mother, very kind-hearted. She was an ordinary woman from Istanbul, and your hair color and the way you look at me are very similar…”

Vivi’s expression became increasingly peculiar: Wait, this isn’t a dating sim, right?

Wen said, “You have the same hair color and the way you look at me is very similar to hers…”

The black-haired Vivi thought: This really doesn’t resemble anything at all, does it?

She called a stop: “That’s enough!”

Wen chuckled: “But the point is, you truly are an excellent officer. I, the former me, disrupted your operation—I am very sorry for that.”

He even referred to Winston as “the former me” to distinguish himself from the present… in the eyes of a psychologist, this is definitely a severe case of mental disorder.

“I won’t leave the Court of Owls yet, as they execute anyone who attempts to leave,” Wen mused for a moment. “I will gather their information and crimes and pass it to you when the opportunity arises. Among the entire police force, I think you have the heart and the capability to act…”

Vivi said: “You can send it to the official email of the city government using a code. We’ll agree on a password, and the contents of the email will be forwarded to me. Don’t worry, I will take down the Court of Owls.”

Wen looked exceedingly happy, saying: “Among these criminals, I am included too. If I’m not killed by the Court by then, please let me enter prison to serve my sentence!”

Vivi felt that the Wen from ten years ago had a severe case of moral cleanliness and comforted him: “Maybe by that time, Gotham will have the death penalty, right?”

Wen predictably responded: “That would be great!” He seemed to have finally found a way to clean up the trash, but he needed to endure for now.

—However, that trash was himself.

Is this what they call “dying a worthy death”?

Wen drove Vivi back to Bella’s home. On their way, they even encountered Batman, but the encounter was only a brief overlap of two points on the map from twenty meters apart.

Gotham is indeed a marvelous city, shrouded in countless sins in the darkness, yet there are people who selflessly want to save her.

—Not counting Vivi, she’s just playing a game.

“By the way…” she pondered as she went upstairs. “It’s been a long time since I’ve interrupted an NPC’s speech to urge them to move the plot along.”

It’s all because NPCs in Gotham are too realistic, sometimes even Vivi gets immersed in it.

Bella’s home was empty, even the trash can was bare, as Vivi doesn’t eat, drink, or sleep. Returning here now, she suddenly didn’t know what to do—the house was already “renovated.”

At this moment, her AI suddenly sent her a new video file.

Vivi’s AI is one of the extremely valuable items she bought. When she’s not at City Hall, it’s responsible for cleaning, repairing windows and walls, and scanning and sending important decision-making documents to her panel. It also helped her compile analysis tables, ranked everyone’s work efficiency, slightly adjusted some people’s work, and made the personnel structure of City Hall more reasonable… allowing Vivi to smoothly handle the Mayor’s work even when not at City Hall.

—Since the East End plan started, underground renovations in other districts were also in progress, though with less resistance than in the East End. The Mayor had many more documents to sign.

She lay on the bed in a comfortable position, casually hugging the [Human-shaped Standee] by the bedhead, and opened the screen recording.

The start of the recording was about cats, with a background indicating it was near the alley where Vivi died for the second time.

Strangely, the leading cat was a black cat—Do cats exhibit such queue-like behavior?

[Just causing trouble!] The black cat meowed twice, [You guys, go distract the others, and I, will sneak into the Mayor’s office.]

This video didn’t have any special effects?

Vivi continued to watch—

The other cats, although still following her, meowed back and forth with sentences like [I’m so tired][Is there really a cat bar?][Selina, don’t lie!][My mommy is calling me home for dinner] and so on.

Vivi: “…Pfft.”

Occasionally a cat would get distracted. The cat named Selina called several times, but after all, they are cats…

So when they finally climbed the steps, the group of twenty-something cats dwindled to just four or five.

City Hall didn’t prohibit cats from entering. The other cats dispersed; some went to catch bugs, some simply fell asleep on the spot, and some directly started begging passersby girls for food… But the strong Selina, the brave Selina, was determined and reached the Mayor’s office lounge window.

—But couldn’t open it.

The considerate AI always kept the windows closed. The video ended, and in the beginning of the second video, the cat was let in.

Apparently, the AI noticed the cat was dirty and kept scratching at the window, even finding a way to hit the window with its body weight. If this continued, the Mayor would suffer unwarranted expenses, so the AI controlled the window to open.

The black cat Selina, in the midst of pouncing into the room, directly crashed onto the carpet, dazed. When she got up, she discovered a silver ordinary cleaning robot moving slowly.

Vivi already guessed this was Selina Kyle turned into a black cat, and she could understand her speech, naturally thanks to the rescue sign in her house.

Catwoman is still relentless… when she returns to the East End, she’ll find her house has been robbed.

Vivi continued watching, expecting the other party to look for her, and if not, go about wreaking havoc.

Unexpectedly, in the video, the black cat licked her paws and suddenly pounced forward—

She accurately climbed onto the cleaning robot’s back and elegantly squatted down.

Vivi: “…Pfft.”

She marked these two videos as [Catwoman’s Black History.avi] and saved them.

Just then, she heard unusual noises from the living room.

She took out her gun from her waist and opened the map—

A red dot stood still outside the bedroom door.