Honkai: Man(Sludge) From Future

For now, Noldrei couldn't be bothered with whatever might make Bronya sad later.

Following Dr. Einstein's advice, Noldrei first made a trip to Academy City to discipline Tesla.

Afterward, he followed Kevin to a location in North Africa.

There, lay an abandoned World Serpent sacrificial ground.

Unlike the well-preserved Previous Era ruins they were used to—which required significant energy to maintain and could be detected by Tesla's electronic scans—this sacrificial ground truly looked like an ancient ritual site.

From above, it appeared as nothing more than a dilapidated historical relic from a bygone civilization, with nothing noteworthy about it.

"I never thought it would fall into such disrepair. It seems SU never came back to deal with this place either."

Perhaps in contrast to the ruin Kevin saw, Noldrei actually found the place quite nice. Compared to the extreme environments of various planets in the cosmos, this place was teeming with vibrant life, a world of thriving competition.

Kevin quickly led the way to World Serpent's temporary headquarters, where they were greeted by...

Gray Serpent!

"Well, well? Isn't this the little fellow who tried and failed to kill my Crown Princess? It seems you really are a talent left over from the Previous Era. I knew there had to be some extremist organization to counter us. Since the current nations can't win, it could only be members of some ancient organization. At the very least, an organization that grew up fighting the Honkai. See... I was right. This blend of machinery and human molecules is something only a sufficiently advanced civilization could achieve."

Noldrei was quite pleased and didn't seem to hold a grudge against this guy for putting two bullets in his Crown Princess.

He stepped forward and patted Gray Serpent on the shoulder, asking curiously, "Why are you wearing a hood and holding an umbrella? And with that steel body of yours, given your rust-proofing technology, holding an umbrella isn't just pointless, it's completely useless. The humidity in the air is probably more corrosive."

"Still, your aim with those two shots wasn't great. Did one of your other organic lifeform companions help you? I heard from Sirin and little Bronya that the damage from that firearm was similar to an attack from the Herrscher of Thunder. Could it be a Divine Key left behind by the Previous Era?"

Gray Serpent remained silent, as if he were a robot that couldn't speak, requiring a specific program to activate.

He just felt like a clown. He was welcoming his Lord, but his Lord was on the other side.

What could be more clownish than this? The Stigma Project, all of it was a lie.

The continuation of human civilization, defeating the Honkai, all of it was a lie.

When facing his opponents, Gray Serpent liked to use metaphors and fables to convey his points, but he had never been so speechless in his life.

He thought he was the one backdooring the enemy base, but it turned out Noldrei was the real one doing the backdooring.

"My Lord."

Though his heart was a river of sorrow flowing upstream, Gray Serpent still dutifully presented himself before Kevin.

Kevin nodded. "Alright, Gray Serpent. Take him to the Elysian Realm."

Gray Serpent found it unbelievable. Take someone like Noldrei to the Elysian Realm? Wouldn't he turn it into a Hellish Realm?

"Yes."

Gray Serpent didn't waste words. He led Noldrei and began to descend underground.

It was no wonder Tesla rarely found ruins like this. Even Noldrei himself had no idea how far they had gone underground.

"That is the Golden Courtyard, a place where memories are preserved as data. You can think of it as a special, artificially expanded Stigma. There, you can see the memory imprints of the Flame-Chasers from the Previous Era. You can ask them for some of the information you want to know."

Gray Serpent didn't want to chat too much with Noldrei, but Kevin had instructed him to tell Noldrei everything he needed to know.

In fact, Noldrei had already figured out what that place was. An imaginary construct space without a physical form. No wonder electronic scans couldn't pick it up.

"The Matrix, right? I know. It's just using memory and a CPU to replace the functions of a human brain, isn't that it?"

Gray Serpent was silent for a moment before replying, "It's not wrong for you to understand it that way."

"Then why not install an automatic action function on the computer? I mean, why not install a connection to an operating system and link the thought processes generated by the memories to reality? That way, the memories inside would gain steel bodies and become active as people in this world again, wouldn't they?"

Noldrei's words left Gray Serpent speechless. He hadn't expected Noldrei to think of them as 'people.'

Theoretically, they were indeed people, possessing everything a person should have. They just lacked physical bodies and were merely copies of the original Flame-Chasers' memories.

And the beings inside weren't necessarily exact replicas of the originals.

"Oh, right, right. I was thinking too simply. There must have been internal conflicts among your original Flame-Chasers, which is why they were all gathered together and couldn't move freely."

Noldrei said with certainty, "Otherwise, even if they were released, a group of people with different agendas would surely cause a huge mess. So, you just neutered the memory imprints' operating systems."

Gray Serpent wanted to say that he was completely wrong, but then he thought about the personalities of the figures inside. He started to feel that Noldrei actually had a point. Perhaps the creators of the Elysian Realm did have such thoughts.

That was truly malicious...

"I hope you won't say these things in front of them. I think they would most likely fight you just to prove you wrong."

"Wow, fighting over something like that? They really are a bunch of primitives!"

Noldrei became even more certain of their internal discord.

Gray Serpent didn't know what to say. It sounded like Noldrei was making more and more sense.

"It's just ahead. Once you enter, the data space will activate. You'll understand what kind of place you've entered then. I won't be going in with you. Perhaps... someone else can help you."

"Alright." Noldrei patted Gray Serpent on the shoulder encouragingly. "I saw your attack on my Crown Princess last time was very effective. I'll have to trouble you to attack her again. She goes about her day without a shred of crisis awareness, and I'm a little worried about her growth. So, I'll have to ask you to launch a few more surprise attacks on her to teach her a lesson."

"Your Crown Princess is truly unfortunate, then." Gray Serpent didn't say whether he accepted the task or not. In any case, he would absolutely not play the clown a second time.

Noldrei pushed open the gates to the Elysian Realm.

What appeared before the Flame-Chasers was...

A large, pixelated, slender, swimming fish that could not be informationally resolved within the Golden Courtyard.

"Eh?! Did my controlled genetic information image make a mistake?"

Noldrei showed a rare expression of pleasant surprise.

However, the voice that drifted into the ears of the Flame-Chasers had turned into a garbled mess of electric baton static.