Early morning.
The location was the border region of the White Eagle Republic.
This was a rather damp mountain forest.
At the moment, the local area was in its rainy season.
At a certain moment…
"Crack."
Seele supported herself with her left hand against a large tree. As she passed a steep patch of muddy ground, she stepped on a long, thin branch and snapped it.
Behind her, Project Bunny, maintaining its quantum robot form, was floating in midair.
One huge mechanical arm carried all sorts of bags and bundles. The other mechanical arm held the sleeping Bronya protectively against itself.
The gray-haired girl was still wrapped in a thin blanket.
The large burn wound on her right arm had also been wrapped in clean, medicated bandages.
Two girls and one intelligent machine continued forward like this for about another ten minutes.
Finally…
"This place should do."
Seele raised a hand and wiped the sweat from her forehead. She stopped in an area where the ground was relatively flat.
At first glance, the place was about the size of a basketball court.
"Project Bunny, you confirmed this place is hidden enough, right? At least within fifty kilometers, there are no signs of anyone living nearby?"
Seele turned back toward the blue-and-white quantum robot and asked.
[Right!]
Project Bunny answered in a short electronic voice.
At the same time, as if to make the information it reported more convincing, a ring of light projected from the position of its right eye and finally formed a translucent screen in front of it.
Seele moved closer and looked.
The screen displayed a terrain map. The three green dots at the center clearly corresponded to their side: two people and one intelligent machine.
As the displayed range of the map widened, several red dots appeared around them.
Project Bunny used double-headed arrows to mark the distance between their side and each red dot. Even the closest was more than fifty-three kilometers away.
"Good."
Seele let out a breath of relief.
It was not hard to see that she had already mentally prepared herself to live as a "forest ranger" for a while in this place where people were rarely seen.
There was no helping it.
After leaving Berlin, Seele had actually been worried about the orphanage the entire time.
Worried about Nata and the children.
But now, setting aside the fact that she was already barely able to protect herself, the simple fact that she had learned she also had Honkai sickness meant she could no longer carelessly approach other people.
Only Bronya…
According to Project Bunny, Bronya's Honkai resistance was very high, so Seele did not need to worry about infecting her with Honkai sickness.
"Maybe you're the one who got me sick in the first place."
Seele came to Bronya's side, lifted a hand, and brushed the hair at Bronya's forehead as she muttered this.
But there was no blame in her tone.
It sounded almost like she was pouting for attention.
Project Bunny watched all this very quietly and made no movement.
However…
"You don't have a recording function, right?"
Seele raised her head and glared at it.
"You can't tell her about what just happened."
"Remember. This is our secret."
Project Bunny continued playing dumb AI.
Now, Seele no longer called it things like "big robot" or "metal lump."
Truly something worth celebrating.
But the days to come…
"First, let's build a wooden cabin here."
Seele turned and looked at the small open space around them, hands on her hips.
Then…
There was no "then."
She had never learned anything about this before.
If she could build a dangerous shack from scratch, that would already count as performing above expectations.
However, she was not in a hurry.
She did not understand, but there was someone who did.
"I'll leave this matter to you, all-purpose Project Bunny."
Seele crooked a finger at the quantum robot beside her.
"Bronya will be under my care for now."
[…]
It could only be said that it was a good thing Project Bunny at this time did not yet have the same highly humanized language module as the future ELF: Project Bunny.
Otherwise, no matter what, it would have had to mutter quietly: You, Seele, order robots around even more than Bronya does.
Hiss.
Speaking of which, did all ELFs have the potential to become top-tier pack mules?
After all, in the original historical track of the Previous Era, ELFs were created by Dr. Einstein of Mu Continent for the sake of…
Ahem.
No more digressions.
In short, since Seele had already stated her request, and Project Bunny had no intention of objecting, it gently placed the still-unconscious Bronya into Seele's arms.
Then, through covert and highly advanced hacking methods, it silently slipped into the global network and began searching the internet for information related to "building a wooden cabin."
Thankfully, Project Bunny's ability in this area, while not comparable to the few super geniuses of the current era, still surpassed the vast majority of elites working in related industries.
So, for the time being, there was no need to worry that its signal would be traced backward, exposing the location of Seele, Bronya, and Project Bunny.
And so…
"Clang, clatter, clang."
The several-meter-tall quantum robot began proving that enough brute force could work miracles.
It felled trees, leveled soil, laid the foundation, then used techniques including mortise-and-tenon joinery to craft all sorts of precise wooden components from scratch.
Steadily and slowly, it built a small wooden cabin large enough for two people to live in.
From start to finish, it only took half a day.
By the time Project Bunny threw the luggage and bundles Seele and Bronya had brought inside, it was not even evening yet.
Seele had long since carried Bronya far away from the site.
There had been quite a lot of noise here. Even though the nearest frontier town was dozens of kilometers away and the sound of building the house was unlikely to be discovered, she had no desire to stay too close and eat a mouthful of sawdust and ash.
In short, by the time Project Bunny had brute-forced a wooden cabin into existence, Seele had already eaten some of the dry rations prepared by that kind old woman.
She had even used a small pot the old woman had given her to cook a bowl of thin porridge for Bronya.
Speaking of which, Seele had only learned back at the orphanage, when she had been responsible for taking care of Nata, that an unconscious patient could also drink liquid food.
It was a kind of bodily instinct.
She had not expected that the experience she had accumulated in this area would now happen to come in handy.
And so, when evening arrived…
"Phew."
Seele let out a long breath.
"We finally have a place to stay."
She stood at the doorway of the wooden cabin and looked outside.
Especially up at the sky.
"Good thing our luck was decent. It's clearly the rainy season, but we didn't get rained on along the way."
"Otherwise, things would have been terrible."
She muttered this to herself.
Speaking of which…
Because the newly built wooden cabin had not used any chemical substances, its long-term quality certainly could not be guaranteed.
But at the very least, it was environmentally friendly.
They could move in directly.
At this moment, Bronya was lying on a wooden bed. Underneath her was a blanket Seele had "collected" along the way.
Yes.
Before coming here, Seele had already prepared herself to temporarily avoid the world.
So she…
To put it bluntly, her hands had not exactly been clean. Along the way, she had helped herself to quite a few necessary supplies.
Among them were food, medicine, clothing, and all kinds of daily-use tools.
That was why, earlier, Project Bunny had not only needed to hold Bronya, but also had its other mechanical arm covered in bags and bundles.
To be honest, Seele knew that taking things without asking was wrong.
If this had been before, when she had usually mixed in Berlin's gray zones and had even worked as a pickpocket, she probably would have felt rather pleased with herself and sighed that her petty-theft skills had improved again.
But after meeting that kind and simple elderly couple…
"I'll definitely pay all of this back several times over."
Seele remembered every person she had caused a small loss to.
In the future, she would definitely find a chance to repay this…
A debt, even if it had not been earned in any honorable way.
Just then…
"Mm…"
Inside the wooden cabin behind her, Bronya, who was lying on the wooden bed, began to stir slightly.
Seele quickly turned her head back.
And under her deeply expectant gaze…
"This place… is…"
The weak Bronya slowly opened her eyes.
After realizing her surroundings were unfamiliar, her first reaction was to force herself to sit up.
This was clearly the conditioned reflex of a child soldier.
Fortunately, Seele closed the distance in a few steps and pressed Bronya back down onto the wooden bed.
"Even if you're awake, lie there obediently for me, you big sleepyhead."
After Seele straightened up, she crossed her arms over her chest and deliberately made her tone sound cold again.
The bright look in her eyes vanished as if it had never been there, completely withdrawn.
"Listen carefully. You were badly injured because you protected me earlier, so I've taken care of you until now. That makes us even."
"Next, I have a lot of questions to ask you…"
She looked straight at Bronya, their eyes meeting.
"You are going to answer honestly. Understand?"
Facing this situation…
To be honest, Bronya was a little confused right now.
But after hesitating for a few seconds, she still slowly nodded.
"All right."
"Bronya will cooperate with you."
-
This is my final gift.
Tired asf going to sleep now.