Chapter 33: Temporary Residence

"I thought Dad would laugh like big sister did... Miss did the same..." Seeing Siegfried's shocked expression indeed made her father less sad, but the expression he showed didn't match her expectations.

"Ah... Ahahaha... So that's how it is, hahaha..."

He laughed!

The girl also smiled on her face.

However, such a scene completely dispelled Siegfried's suspicions of the two.

Bronie was never likely to be a Valkyrie in the first place, and such a thing actually happened while she was with the girl.

If it were Valkyries from Schicksal, would they tolerate a clone implanted with the core of a Herrscher living in the town?

Their hatred for Honkai was instilled in them by Otto all the way.

The trauma caused by the Second Honkai Eruption on humanity was too much.

But would Siegfried would be nicer to then?

No, even if it was to protect them and prevent them from getting too close to the girl, Siegfried would never be nicer to them.

He thought he was ruthless enough.

But he didn't expect Cioara to decide to stay in this town for a while and open a bar.

As for alcohol, it was very popular in Russia, which Siegfried also knew.

And this town just happened to not have a bar!

There was no other reason than the town being too remote, with few residents and not much profit being generated.

But are Cioara and Bronie the kind of people who lack money?

To avoid any signs of the so-called clone Herrscher going out of control, Cioara had no intention of leaving the town and instead began to observe the girl's situation up close.

If there were indeed signs of loss of control, she would definitely eliminate her no matter what!

However, Bronie also said that the girl's existence was Otto's experiment in creating artificial Herrschers. He believed that Herrschers with humanity could be enemies or friends of humans.

The miracle of the First Herrscher may be difficult to replicate, but it's not impossible.

At least for Otto, it was true.

If all the Herrschers' powers were concentrated, would it be possible to truly defeat the Honkai?

Otto had this thought.

But Cioara felt that this was all nonsense, after all, anyone who had been to the Elysian Realm knew how much suffering the previous era had endured before understanding that Herrschers could never stand on the side of humanity.

But in the end, Cioara chose to believe Bronie.

After all, it was Bronie who said it.

If it were someone else, Cioara would definitely not listen, and would have tried to eliminate the girl in her crib.

Setting up a new shop in the town was actually quite troublesome.

But as the saying goes, money speaks louder, and during the construction of the island, Cioara also set aside some money for emergencies. The two games sold by Bronie also made quite a bit of money, and after taxes, building a house after that was more than enough.

Of course, the main reason was that the cost of making games was indeed relatively low. Almost all the profits went to Bronie's bank account. With this money, building a house in the town was easy.

After that, Cioara's chain brand bar opened in the town.

The expected time for decorating and building the bar was about three months.

Yes, this was considered relatively fast.

Even with money, the local conditions had to be taken into account.

In this remote small town, coupled with harsh weather conditions, the money spent was much more than Cioara had anticipated.

However, during this period, Bronie temporarily stayed in the town and devoted all her energy to making the game.

It should be noted that the text volume required for the Civilization game was so huge that it was astronomical.

Especially because Bronie wanted the sims in the Elysian Realm t to understand the current trajectory of civilization's development, so she needed to organize all sizes of history books and encyclopedias and integrate them all into the game, along with text and images.

Both education and entertainment had to be grasped.

So her workload was definitely much greater than the previous two games!

Therefore, Bronie had to gather all the game rules into one text, and then hand over the general framework of the game to the newly established company to complete.

However, with her own AI assistant to help with programming, bugs, and the like shouldn't occur too often.

And during the time of bar construction, Bronie would occasionally come to play with K423 when Siegfried wasn't home. She would give K423 extra meals to prevent malnutrition. It's not good to wait until she's hungry and disoriented, then suddenly Sirin appears, and suddenly the whole town is destroyed again.

Cioara was also busy because of house renovations. And Bronie, while Siegfried was out fighting Honkai beasts, sneaked into K423's little house.

"Big sister!" Seeing Bronie sneak over, the girl was very happy.

But to this day, she still doesn't know her own name. Nor does she know Siegfried's name. Therefore, she hasn't realized the importance of names yet.

After seeing Bronie, she didn't even ask for Bronie's name, but simply called her big sister.

Bronie didn't mind; after all, they could meet again in the future, and it wouldn't hurt to exchange names when she got her own name.

The main thing was to give K423 a less terrible childhood.

"Did you have a good meal today? Don't purposely wait for me to bring food like last time!"

"No, I ate well! What are we going to play today?"

With Siegfried going out to fight Honkai beasts every day, K423 had much less company. Although K423 was very well-behaved and didn't cry or make a fuss, Bronie felt sorry for her!

So whenever she had the chance, Bronie would come to see K423.

"This time, I'll let you experience the game I made!"

"Game?"

"Exactly! This is a computer!" Bronie took out a laptop, the configuration of which, needless to say, was more than enough to play Undertale or Spiritfarer.

However, K423 looked bewildered, as if she had never seen a computer before, or even heard of what a game was.

She suddenly realized that the other party was still a child who didn't know anything!

"Computer..."

"This is the crystallization of human civilization's wisdom, an important tool for future information processing and communication. But you will understand it slowly in the future. Let me show you now!"

Opening the computer, a familiar operating interface appeared. "Wow!"

Seeing something she had never seen before, K423 exclaimed. K423 had never operated a computer before, but a child's learning ability was strong, especially now that the girl's physical age was about eight years old. At this age, the efficiency of learning was high.

From simple mouse operation to later game controller operation, although a bit clumsy at first, she quickly got the hang of it.

But then there was a very bad problem. The girl couldn't read! But thinking about it, it was normal.

Was it too much to expect Siegfried to teach her how to read? And she doesn't know how the future Kiana managed to live a wandering life alone, and even managed to go in Senba Academy.

Fortunately, Bronie was patient. Putting the girl on her lap, she opened the game behind the girl and said, "Long, long ago..."

The story of Undertale unfolded. The special nature of being able to interact with characters inside the game brought a very different childhood to K423. But...

"Name?"

"A name is something you call each other, something unique that your family gives you." Hearing Bronie say this, K423 lowered her head in disappointment.

"I don't have a name."

Bronie put her hand on the girl's head and comforted her, "You will have one eventually. You can ask your dad for one, or you can prove to your dad that you can indeed be his daughter and tell him you love him."

Saying that, Bronie slowly inputted a few letters on the character input name.

Kallen.

"What does this mean?"

The girl didn't quite understand. "This is the name of our protagonist. In history, she was a famous saint who sacrificed herself to protect everyone. It's a name worth remembering."

"Okay! But... what about your name, big sister?"

"I'm called Bronie."

"Bronie~"

"Hmm?"

"I like it because dad often makes delicious food for me."

A little foodie.

She should have known earlier, with her Kaslana lineage, the food Siegfried brought while enough for ordinary children, was still far from enough for the girl.

"If you're hungry, just tell me, I'll definitely find you something to eat."

"Mmm..."

Now the game really began.

...

Actually, there weren't as many Honkai beasts outside as one might imagine.

Siegfried had a magical phone that could detect the concentration of Honkai energy nearby, and the entropy surveillance system would send reports of Honkai beast sightings at any time.

Before anyone got into trouble, Siegfried would rush to the scene and eliminate them quickly.

However, during this time, the frequency of Honkai beast births was decreasing, and Dr. Einstein and Dr. Tesla judged that this was a phenomenon after the preliminary stabilization of the Herrscher Core.

Perhaps it was because it had entered a dormant state?

Anyway, in the days to come, he could relax a lot.

Although he was currently somewhat connected to the members of Anti-Entropy, Siegfried hadn't fully joined them.

He wanted to temporarily avoid the gaze of Schicksal with the child, temporarily accompany her growth, and temporarily alleviate his own inner sadness.

His daughter, Kiana Kaslana, died in a plane crash not long ago.

And what destroyed everything was Anti-Entropy's anti-aircraft weapons!

Thinking of this, feelings of self-blame surged in his heart, then he went to the small shop in town and bought the whiskey displayed in the window.

Ah...

Right.

There's also the child...

He needed to cook for the child tonight, then Siegfried's gaze fell on the instant noodle cups on the shelf of the small shop.

"Boss, check out."

"It's... "

The shopkeeper came to the counter with the money, and seeing the instant noodles piled up, he couldn't help but frown.

Siegfried knew everyone in the small town, and the shopkeeper certainly knew Siegfried too, right?

After all, he was also one of the high-spending customer in the small town. Regardless of the brand of alcohol in his store, he always accepted it.

It was obvious that he had been through something terrible and was drowning his sorrows in alcohol.

But he was still with a child.

"You're going to let your kid eat instant noodles? Wait for me!" Saying that, the shopkeeper walked into his room.

Siegfried became nervous and instinctively put his hand on his waist.

About half a minute later, the shopkeeper returned with a basket and placed it in front of Siegfried.

"If you can't cook, you can always ask someone nearby. You can't let the child suffer. Here, take these sausages and pickles, add them to the instant noodles, otherwise, the child won't get enough nutrition!"

Siegfried fell silent for a moment, then took out more money and slapped it on the table, then took the basket and packed the instant noodles into it before leaving straight away.

The shopkeeper was also helpless.

This kid, he felt as stubborn as a mule. He didn't know what terrible things he had experienced before.

But it should be related to his wife, right?

Today Siegfried came back early.

Since there weren't many Honkai beasts outside, the remaining time should be spent with the girl at home.

Dolls, princess dresses, Siegfried naturally wouldn't miss any of them. Siegfried, who didn't know how to raise a child, under the suppression of his inner emotions, subconsciously brought everything that could make the child happy back home.

But this time, when he arrived at the door, Siegfried heard the girl's laughter.

"Who's there!"

Siegfried suddenly opened the door and saw two little figures overlapping each other in the warm room.

"Hmm?"

Bronie turned her head.

Seeing Siegfried standing at the door, she was slightly surprised.

According to Bronie's observation, Siegfried usually didn't come back until nearly seven o'clock in the evening.

But this time, he came back around two o'clock in the afternoon!

"Uh... welcome back, Dad..."

The girl still looked a little cautious as she looked at Siegfried, afraid that Siegfried would suddenly become unhappy and then drink again.

Then it would be another state of silence, with no chance of communication between them.

"Who let you into my house!"

"Hmph, can't I come by myself? Leaving the child alone at home to mess around, do you know what she wants? Being alone in an empty house, with a strange and terrifying world outside, do you know how scared she is!"

Siegfried was speechless.

If Bronie hadn't mentioned this, Siegfried might not have realized the problem.

"And also..."

"She said she doesn't have a name. Are you really a father? Do you really treat her as your own child?"

"You wont understand me! You... I..."

Siegfried knew there were some things he could say and some things he couldn't.

But most of the wounds in his heart belonged to the category of things he couldn't say.

"In my eyes, I only see a loser who is immersed in past sadness. If you only look back at the past, you will lose sight of the future. If you can't be a qualified father, then I have to call the police and send the child to an orphanage. At least the orphanage won't let children eat instant noodles."

Bronie looked at the basket in Siegfried's hand, disappointment in her eyes like a sharp blade digging deeper into Siegfried's wound.

Bronie put the girl down from her arms, then put two game controllers into the girl's small hands.

"The other game is a two-player game. If you have any demands or thoughts, you can only convey them to each other by speaking out. So talk to your dad properly about what you really want, okay?"

Games are really magical.

Especially after playing Undertale briefly.

Watching the protagonist in it entertain the monsters in the underground world in various ways, and then become friends with each other.

The girl had a different idea.

"Dad, I just want to make you smile, don't hurt yourself anymore, and don't come back with injuries every day. Play games with me, okay?"

Seeing the pitiful crying K423, Siegfried couldn't get angry.

He could only blame himself for not being competent. This child knew so much even after coming out of the cloning laboratory.

"Sorry for worrying you, let's play together for a while."

"Mmhm! Bronie said that both of these games were made by her! So amazing, with music and magical moving pictures!"

The games she made?

A look of surprise was cast over, and Bronie proudly asked, "What's wrong? Can't stand the genius game maker? Next, I'll make even greater games, use games to bring enough smiles to everyone, and experience the care of a great game maker. You better be grateful!"