Let me explain how your messages get processed. OpenClaw uses a lane queue system. By default, each agent processes messages serially. One message in, one response out, then the next message. Why? This prevents race conditions where messages trigger conflicting actions.
For low-risk operations (like read-only lookups), you can mark specific tools as parallel-safe. The Gateway then processes those tool calls concurrently while keeping everything else serial. Be conservative here. If you mark a tool as parallel-safe when it has side effects, you'll get corrupted state that's painful to debug.