Honkai: Man(Sludge) From Future

Academy City was broken!

That was Hachiman Hikigaya's most direct feeling. He had recently busted an organized crime ring.

Because Academy City hadn't followed up on this sort of thing—or rather, because the students were so damn smart—it was impossible to manage their creative spirit.

"This thing..."

Hachiman held up the seemingly exquisite—and indeed, it was—pistol.

Unlike traditional firearms that used gunpowder, this was a typical electro-shock incendiary pistol. Thanks to Anti-Entropy's excellent battery technology, a few simple tweaks could bypass the battery's overcurrent protection, maximizing its output.

He raised the pistol towards the iron coat rack in front of him, hesitated for two minutes, then aimed at the metal cup on the table and pulled the trigger.

With a crackle of electromagnetic force, a projectile shot out and pierced straight through the metal cup.

"Idiot! The stopping power is pretty strong. It would be no problem to put a hole in a normal person's head."

Hachiman was very familiar with the quality of this metal cup. He had once seen a case where someone's head was bashed in with one. The key takeaway from that case was that the cup's quality was so good that while the head had a hole in it, the cup only had a small dent.

"Amazing. The students of Academy City can produce their own firearms now. This thing actually looks the part..."

Ayanokoji Kiyotaka looked at the report in his hand, his face expressionless.

The pistol was a modified model gun bought online. The rest were custom-made small parts, and because the design was different from a standard pistol and they were ordered from different manufacturers in batches, the buyer's true intentions were never revealed.

Then, this group of rich and powerful bros had a brilliant idea: they rented a whole floor, redesigned the space, and set up a real-life CS game field.

That's right, the kind of real-life gun battlefield where you could get your head blown out.

You wouldn't die, of course. They'd just carry you down to their private hospital, and with Academy City's advanced medicine, you'd be patched up in no time.

Even Ayanokoji Kiyotaka had to exclaim at what kind of talent these people were.

"I knew it, it's that Kengan Association gang again! These people just love setting up these over-the-top private arenas. It's one thing for them to fight to the death in the Kengan arena, but why are they upgrading their weapons and coming up with new games now that they're out?"

Hachiman admitted he had underestimated his classmates' needs. He was both envious and jealous of how much fun they were having; he even wanted to join in himself. But unfortunately, his body and consciousness were a bit too strong. If he went in, it wouldn't be a fair match; it would be like dynamiting a fish pond.

Ayanokoji said with a hint of melancholy, "They even have female companions as rewards. These people have... absolutely no legal awareness."

"What can I do about it? Am I supposed to make those Kengan Association students behave? And you've seen it yourself, people are setting up stalls on the street selling matching wombs. Can I stop people from swapping wombs for fun? They're not worried about breaking themselves at all!"

Hachiman sometimes felt he was too conservative. He had never expected modern people to accept new things at such a bizarrely fast pace. He heard that the companies selling adult films outside had new tricks up their sleeves, planning to give the outside world a taste of Academy City's... shock value.

He just pitied those actresses. They probably wouldn't even have time to rest now. Sick leave? Illness? The company bosses wouldn't care. If you broke, they'd just replace you with another one.

Even actresses were being ground down by the competition now. He heard there was a lawsuit going on outside about facial patent rights.

The only thing Brother Hachi didn't quite understand was whether this patent right applied to the face before or after makeup.

If it was before makeup, then if someone with a slightly different face used makeup to look exactly the same, would that count as facial patent infringement? And did the ownership of this patent belong to the parents who created the face, or to the individual?

Right now, Hachiman Hikigaya had no way to deal with the chaos in Academy City. All he could do was suppress as much of it as he could.

Before, all he had to do was rush to the location given by his boss, Bronya, and make the arrest. Now, Hachiman had to find these hidden people himself.

'This job really isn't for ordinary people.'

If Hachiman knew that Bronya's fast arrest rate was all thanks to hacking and network technology, who knows how he would feel.

After all, the criminals causing trouble in Academy City had some intelligence too; they knew not to commit crimes right under the surveillance cameras.

Not to mention the invisible wind that had been blowing through Academy City recently...

Because of the dreams. But Hachiman didn't think that feeling was a "dream" at all.

Rather than a dream, it was more like the illusion of facing a Stigma. It seemed some entity was there,肆意ly toying with people's consciousness, with their perception.

The other party didn't seem to have any... "malicious intent"?

It just expressed its desire for Herrschers, asking everyone to obediently hand them over, and in return, you'd be given good food and drink.

But Hachiman thought this whole thing was a joke.

Fight a Herrscher? My god, what a joke! Did they think everyone was one of those Valkyries?

After all, the Valkyries had indeed fought Herrschers. The story of the Second Herrscher being turned into a petri dish was still written in the history books. Even the sacrifice of the saint of the Shariac family was described in detail.

The current situation was that although people were having these dreams, they couldn't do anything about the Herrschers.

Who could beat a Herrscher?

Why don't you watch the battle footage of last year's Herrscher before you start talking nonsense about offering Herrschers to an eldritch god?

Besides everyone dreaming a lot more, nothing much seemed to have changed. Academy City was already full of strange things, so people quickly dismissed some of the bizarre dreams.

The eldritch god didn't give them any benefits, no genetic information. Who cared if it wanted a Herrscher?

Anyway, we can't beat a Herrscher. If you want one yourself, come and get it. Let the Herrschers deal with it first.

No one would charge into battle for an eldritch god, unless that person truly had nothing, or... they already had everything and still weren't satisfied.

Sirin hugged her blanket at home and frowned. She was actually starting to wish Noldrei would come back soon.

Without Noldrei, even playing games was boring.

Now when she went out on the street, she felt like everyone was looking at her like a piece of meat, even though she knew they had no idea about her Herrscher identity.

When you recognize your own identity, you also roughly recognize what choices others will make when they learn your identity.

This was an ability only humans possessed.