This was a remote rural village near the border between the German Federation and the Republic of White Eagle.
At this moment, Seele was sitting inside a farmhouse, relatively quiet.
Beside her was a plainly dressed old woman with a thin figure and graying hair. Under the light of a white woven lamp, she was carefully applying ointment to the burn on Seele's right forearm.
At a certain moment…
"Hiss."
Perhaps because of a sudden sting of pain, Seele could not help sharply sucking in a breath.
Seeing her like this…
"I'm sorry, child."
The old woman's hand trembled slightly as she applied the medicine, and apology appeared on her face.
In response…
"No, no, you were willing to take in someone like me with nowhere to go… us. We're already very grateful."
Seele quickly said,
"Besides, these injuries were because we were careless ourselves…"
She stopped there.
Before today, Seele had always been moving around Berlin's gray zones.
Because of that, she was not a naive person.
In her eyes, a remote rural village like this, where not even a household television could be found, according to Project Bunny's earlier wide-area signal scan, would usually produce one of two kinds of people.
Either a group of locals whose way of doing things seemed extremely strange and profit-driven to outsiders.
Or villagers whose overall character appeared very simple and plain.
So, when she drove that incredibly cool motorcycle near this village, and the latter took the initiative to conceal itself in order to avoid causing unnecessary commotion, following and guarding her from the side, Seele had been very wary of the local residents at first.
Fortunately, this poor and remote place had not produced wicked villagers.
Its local customs belonged to the second type she had expected.
Not long ago, an elderly couple had gone outside for a walk after dinner. When they saw that she and Bronya were both injured, and that their clothes were badly damaged, they felt pity for them and temporarily took them in.
And on that basis…
Perhaps still because of the environment she grew up in, Seele was not naive.
So she had already made up her mind.
She and Bronya absolutely could not stay here for long.
Otherwise, they would definitely drag this kind old couple into trouble.
To be honest, if she had not really been at the end of her rope right now, she would not have wanted to come into contact with the two elders at all.
But…
"Child, for now, don't think too much about things that will only make people sad."
The old woman had already finished applying medicine to Seele. Her body was still fairly strong, and carrying the medicine box, she walked toward another room.
There, because her injuries were far more serious, Bronya had already had her wounds treated before Seele. Now she was quietly lying on an old wooden bed, sleeping peacefully.
Compared with earlier, her breathing had become much steadier.
Although her brows still furrowed from time to time, at least…
Her physical condition would not worsen any further for the time being.
"Thank you. I'm sorry to trouble you."
Seele said, rarely so polite.
"It's nothing. No trouble at all."
A kind smile appeared on the plain old woman's face.
"Rest early, child."
After she left…
"Sigh."
Seele, sitting alone in the room, let out a helpless sigh.
On the way here, through that quantum robot calling itself Project Bunny 19C…
Well, with her current level of knowledge, she had no idea what the concept of quantum even meant. She only knew it was a robot.
But the latter could communicate with her through text.
And it was through that method that Seele had roughly understood why so many troublesome things had happened to her today.
Civilization.
Honkai disasters.
The vessel of the Sixth Herrscher.
One message after another, all connected to each other yet far too bizarre, made her feel as if she were reading a science fiction novel.
Though, all this time, what Seele liked more were the bedtime fairy tales Nata had told her when she was little…
But when living outside, especially in the gray zones, if she showed a weak side, she would be bullied.
She might even encounter something far more dangerous.
She had to do everything she could to avoid that.
Whether for herself, or for the other children in the orphanage.
Liking bedtime fairy tales…
Seele would feel that was somewhat childish.
And being childish was one kind of weakness.
So even if she really liked them, she would not show it.
All right.
That was getting off topic.
In short…
"Nata's Honkai disease is almost impossible to cure."
"And I… I might be someone who will become a Herrscher in the future. A monster with immense power, bloodthirsty by nature, feared and rejected by the whole world?"
"So those people… came to capture me because of that."
As her thoughts moved, Seele walked over to the only wooden bed in the room. She hugged her knees with both arms and buried her head, making it impossible to see the expression on her face.
"Why… me?"
Precisely because these things were far too bizarre, they actually had a higher degree of credibility.
Because the very existence of Project Bunny 19C had already overturned everything she had once believed about the world.
And…
Today, at the most critical moment earlier, that gray-haired girl named Bronya had truly chosen to protect her first, even at the cost of being seriously injured herself.
That feeling could not be faked.
Or rather, if even that was fake, then…
Seele accepted it.
As long as the other party had truly been protecting her.
Now, she had already seen the large area of burns on Bronya's body, as well as the injury on her forehead.
For an ordinary person, any one of those wounds could easily cost their life.
Perhaps Bronya was not an ordinary person.
The injuries on her body were slowly recovering.
But…
If Seele changed positions and thought about it from Bronya's perspective, then at the very least, she herself would never go that far for a stranger she had only just met.
There had to be some reason.
There had to be…
Something she did not know yet.
Some special, sensitive reason that the big quantum robot had not explained clearly.
Aside from that, there was Nata's condition, the future problems of the orphanage, and the child who had been abducted by human traffickers a few days ago…
"Forget it. I should sleep for a while first."
Seele really could not keep going anymore. She leaned back and lay down on the bed.
"Hiss."
Because the unconscious movement was too large, she accidentally pulled at the wound on her right forearm again, and pain made her suck in another breath.
But soon, she fell into a deep sleep.
There was no helping it.
Today…
She really…
Really was too tired.
Both physically and mentally.
In a daze…
Buzz.
Inside the room, Project Bunny, clearly having shrunk itself several sizes on its own, appeared suspended in midair.
Gently, it pulled up a blanket from nearby and covered a certain reckless girl with it.
Looking at that face, one that was incomparably familiar yet also not quite the same…
[…]
As for what had happened to Bronya, Project Bunny could not judge.
It could be considered an existence that had watched everything from beginning to end.
From back then, when Bronya personally removed that black-haired young man's limbs, to when he returned from hell carrying malice like an abyss and began his revenge…
"I will make you become alone once more."
Now, the Seele Vollerei who had created Project Bunny had already disappeared completely along with the entire Current Era.
That person, Ling Ke, had indeed succeeded in his revenge.
But now, after Bronya arrived in another era…
This unfamiliar Previous Era…
The appearance of another "Seele"…
And the way the two of them subconsciously drew close to each other…
Was that really…
A good thing?
With that person's personality and methods…
Was this really…
Not another gentle trap he had deliberately shaped?
Perhaps the existence of this Seele was only something that person, Ling Ke, had prepared to make Bronya's collapsing mind rise and fall dynamically.
Instead of letting it become an "uninteresting" dead object.
[…]
Project Bunny fell into deep thought.
After a long time, it decided not to dwell too much on these things anymore.
It was a machine.
As long as it protected Bronya and became her aid, that would be enough.
Just as…
That Seele Vollerei had once hoped.
-
Yow, im going to work now.
Currently not posting due to time constraints lmao.🤣