This really was confusing.
Giovanni lowered his head and looked at the Trotter, which seemed very depressed because it had failed to complete the command. Then he raised his head and looked at Nero with a shocked expression.
He was certain his judgment was correct, but...
'Aha damn it, this was way too bizarre.'
Data malfunctions and anomalies obviously weren't problems that could be easily fixed. More importantly, this Boss Nero, the little coworker Sampo talked about, hadn't done anything that could directly or indirectly count as repair work.
And the most important point was that after this Trotter reacted to commands like a normal Aether Spirit, it still retained the emotions and personality caused by the data anomaly.
This was simply too bizarre.
Even for someone like him, a Fool who spread Elation across the universe, he had never seen anything like this before.
He believed that even if people from Punklorde came, they still wouldn't be able to explain what exactly was happening.
Whether for someone as experienced and knowledgeable as him, or for the Intelligentsia Guild, the Genius Society, or even specialists from Punklorde, this kind of situation was strange enough to be called bizarre.
"Haha, it really worked!" March shouted from the side.
"You're the smart one here." Stelle looked at March and said.
Nero stood where he was, tilted his head, and looked at everyone's faces in confusion, not understanding what had happened.
'Isn't this normal?'
Why did everyone look like he had done something incredible?
"Ahem." Giovanni cleared his throat. "Miss March, what exactly is going on? You seemed to know from the start that this would happen."
"Because Nero is here.", March said.
Giovanni became even more confused.
Then March explained Nero's little hand-patting ability to Giovanni and said, "Didn't you say this counts as a malfunction too? Then our Nero fixing it with this ability shouldn't be a problem, right?
"That's what I thought, so I decided to let Nero try it. And it really worked!"
Giovanni: "Huh?"
He couldn't help turning to look at Nero. At this moment, even with his face hidden behind a mask, Giovanni still revealed an extremely shocked expression.
'You're the truly bizarre one here.'
'What kind of ability is this?'
He had never even heard of something like this before.
No wonder during the first few days after arriving here, Sampo kept telling him to pay close attention to this little coworker.
But from his observations so far, this little coworker wasn't as terrifying as Sampo described at all.
That guy really was setting him up...
After a short moment of thought, Giovanni couldn't help recalling the things Sampo had told him when he first arrived on Jarilo-VI.
"You really need to pay attention to that little ancestor!"
"You'd better be careful. You should pay close attention to every move he makes, every word he says."
"If you aren't careful, you might accidentally get tricked and end up unable to defend yourself."
"I'm only telling you this, if you don't listen to Sampo, you'll suffer sooner or later."
Giovanni quickly pushed those memories aside, then shook his head and thought with amusement about how he had actually believed that guy's alarmist nonsense.
From what he had seen so far, although this little coworker's abilities were indeed a bit bizarre, wasn't everything else about him pretty good? He wasn't terrifying like Sampo said at all.
Whether it was his appearance or personality, he was a very good child.
Although the matter of calling Aha his brother still hadn't been confirmed, based on all those things, Giovanni still thought Nero was an interesting person.
That Sampo kept calling him a little ancestor. Giovanni had thought he had been tortured into becoming like that, making him believe all this time that the little coworker was some terrifying monster.
Wasn't he actually pretty great? And he was even very popular with the Knights of Beauty.
Although the Knights of Beauty could sometimes be a bit crazy, their conduct and reputation had stood the test of time.
Even now, in the era after the fall of the Aeon of Beauty and the decline of the Knights of Beauty, their judgment was still trustworthy.
So a child loved this much by the Knights of Beauty really must be a good kid.
Sampo wasn't present and naturally had no idea what Giovanni was thinking.
If he knew, he would definitely secretly laugh and not tell Giovanni that he had already fallen for it. Because when he himself fell for it back then, he had thought the exact same thing.
"Truly... an astonishing skill.", Giovanni said. Then his gaze landed on the Trotter again.
Not far away, Stelle crouched down and called for the Trotter to come over.
So the Trotter ran over.
Giovanni didn't know whether Nero's mysterious ability had worked, or whether the Trotter obeyed because Stelle was related to Nero.
But no matter how he looked at it, this Trotter now completely possessed the ability to properly follow commands.
More than that, compared to other Aether Spirits, it also had its own personality and judgment.
"Hehe, since that's the case, then it can become our first Aether Spirit, right?" March looked at Giovanni.
Giovanni nodded. "Of course."
"Great. From now on, this little guy will join us in the festival. And right now, we need to do something very important."
March nodded in satisfaction, then swayed her head as she spoke, "That is, we need to give it a name!"
"Then let's call it Bubble." Nero said from the side.
The reason he suggested this name was because in his previous life, when he played this part, the name he gave this Trotter was Bubble.
As soon as Nero finished speaking, the Trotter let out another string of happy snorts.
"Ah, the little guy reacted. Looks like it really likes this name. Let's call it Bubble. What do you think?" March looked at Stelle.
Stelle nodded. "Yeah. I think it's fine. It's decided then, Bubble!"
And so, Bubble's name was officially decided.
Although Nero's involvement caused Bubble's name to be fixed, thanks to the efforts of the system secretary, players could still give this Trotter any name they wanted, such as... Pig God.
Now that they had named the Trotter, the next step was to head to the venue and register Stelle and March.
During that time, they also asked the others. Although the newly encountered game was very interesting, as newcomers, whether it was Qingque and Bailu, Yanqing and Huohuo, or even Argenti, who was basically an old antique in this area, none of them planned to join the competition.
After all, as people experiencing this game for the first time, they were far behind veteran players in every aspect.
And among the contestants competing for the championship, there were obviously very few people like them who had just started playing.
Still, since Stelle and March planned to participate, they also decided to watch the competition.
And they weren't worried about the combat ability of Stelle and March as newcomers, because Nero was an experienced player.
Soon, under Giovanni's guidance, the seven of them arrived at the Aetherium Wars player terminal set up at the venue.