Honkai: Man(Sludge) From Future

No. 03 took Kiana to the home of an elderly man in the suburbs.

There, Kiana saw a makeshift cross tombstone in the yard.

"This is an old man from the suburbs of Nagazora City. Cruel fate befell him. The local street management, in collaboration with the insurance company, beat him to death."

"They split the spoils fifty-fifty, and even found friends in the judicial system to make it all legal."

"Actually, this old man wasn't bad. It's just that when he first saw me, he started kneeling and begging me to destroy the world in exchange for his suicide."

"What a joke. Did he think that I would need his decaying flesh to destroy the world?"

"Of course, I righteously rejected him. But I didn't expect him to be beaten to death by the locals soon after I left."

No. 03 put on a show of a regretful expression.

poop-sludge Kiana curled up on the living room table, since she didn't have a specific form right now. Her appearance was more like a strange, transparent jelly, with her still-immature brain, eyes, and a newly created mouth floating within it.

The girl had been dealt such a huge blow, so not going completely insane could be considered a testament to her incredibly thick skin.

She was silent for a while before asking, "And then what happened?"

"Then? Then I just found a chance to kill those people. No big deal." No. 03 moved his still-unfamiliar arms and said matter-of-factly, "I remember the living habits of you primitive humans. We researched it in history. Killing them at this time is a very righteous act. Don't worry, I didn't leave any loose ends."

"That's a huge problem!" Kiana's body shuddered like a jelly.

She didn't know how to respond. The guy in front of her, who looked like an eldritch horror, claimed to be from the future, and looked human, had no empathy for the current people of Earth.

Come to think of it, if she traveled back to ancient times and lived with the Primitive unga bunga people, and one day a conflict arose where she killed one of them, she probably wouldn't feel much emotion either. It's not like Kiana hadn't dealt with enemies infected by Honkai before.

She was just a bit of a simpleton, but that didn't mean she would become a coward when it was time to act.

"If everyone killed people so carelessly, would this society even work?"

Kiana criticized the monster in front of her. If it wasn't because she couldn't win and was being held captive, she wouldn't have followed this strange being at all.

She regretted it now. She regretted not attacking him as soon as she saw him.

No. 03 frowned at her and said, "Of course, we change their memories. What is there to think about? Can't you do it too?"

Kiana shook her newly acquired body. She felt that No. 03, this future human, was a bit creepy.

She had this feeling ever since the first time they met.

"How... How did you kill them? Also, what do you mean by changing memories?"

Kiana suspected that her own memories had been tampered with, but no matter how hard she tried to recall them, she couldn't sense anything amiss, except for some parts that she just couldn't remember.

Since her memory had so many issues, Kiana couldn't tell if her memory had really been altered.

"It's not so much that I changed their memories, but rather that I enhanced the painful parts of their memories, leading them to hate their superiors and leaders. I kept increasing the hatred and despair in their hearts. They were quickly killed by their own people for crimes like murder."

No. 03 explained his solution, which he viewed as similar to tossing some bananas to monkeys in a zoo.

"Uh..."

Whether it was because No. 03's words were too cold-blooded, or because her own emotional system hadn't been re-established, Kiana's cerebral cortex could only register the stimulation, and wasn't able to generate any corresponding emotions.

"I have a feeling that something is not right?! You still say you are not an eldritch horror?!"

No. 03 thought for a moment, then turned around and rummaged through one of the rooms, finding a book.

He casually tossed the book onto the table. The cover clearly read "The Call of Cthulhu."

"The old man was also a fan of books. I can also browse similar literature quickly. The eldritch horror you mentioned is probably similar to this, or... a futuristic fantasy novel?"

No. 03 looked a bit confused. He hadn't been able to fully analyze the purpose of these books yet.

"...."

This was just too sci-fi. An "eldritch horror" was confused by a fantasy novel written by humans.

Could it actually be a moron?!

A spark of amazing insight lit up in Kiana's mind. If No. 03 found out, he would probably regret not giving her a better CPU brain.

Now her current state was like a caveman operating a nuclear base, and she might unleash radiation in any direction.

"I'm thinking about whether this book is a fantasy about the future of humanity, or just the author's simple self-imagination at the time. But I can probably reconstruct the primitive societal environment back then."

"That would be a place where humans thought they had created a great civilization, but in reality, this so-called civilization seemed to show a great disdain towards themselves. In the process of searching for the cause of this..."

"They felt a kind of unprecedented coldness enveloping them."

"This book isn't about eldritch horrors, but rather about the people that humans don't recognize themselves to be."

No. 03 had seen it, he really had.

Despite occupying the body of a human from 130,000 years in the future, the person within this body had revealed a surprising talent for art.

She used this body to make a ( °ー°〃) expression.

"This is the most advanced body of future humans, and you're just using it to make such a stupid face?! If you used it to fire a laser beam and draw on the wall, I could at least think you were trying to use this body."

No. 03 was mocking her with all his might. If it wasn't for her insistence, he wouldn't have tried learning how to use the body of a primitive human again.

This made him feel a rare sense of annoyance.

Few people would be willing to fight with a homeless person for a bedsheet under a bridge.

In No. 03's mind, the "poop-sludge" was the strongest and most outstanding form of existence in the world.

Kiana naturally didn't know this future human's thoughts. She quickly adapted to this body and skillfully made various emoji faces.

"┻━┻︵╰(‵□′)╯︵┻━┻"

"Then you should change this lady back! Isn't it you who turned me into this! This lady likes to be a primitive human you talked about, just likes to be a monkey in the forest!"

No. 03 was greatly surprised. This reminded him of the original owner of this house.

When he saw him, the original owner directly knelt down to worship him, this future human, as a god.

"This lady still needs to investigate the Honkai! How can I investigate in this state?!"

"Oh... right, do you know what Honkai is? Did the Honkai disappear in 130,000 years?"

As if just remembering it, Kiana was wondering whether the so-called Honkai existed in the future world.

Even if he was a real eldritch horror, was there Honkai on the alien planet?

Thinking like this, she subconsciously started to ponder (????????`).