Honkai: Man(Sludge) From Future

"Is life… always this bitter?"

A seven- or eight-year-old girl said in a melancholic tone.

"What? Is it so painful to learn your dad wasn't your real dad? Well, you have a long road of suffering ahead of you."

Noldrei's reply was as insensitive as ever.

After all, he didn't have parents, which made Kiana frown.

What was her fault? She was just a seven- or eight-year-old girl with no memory of her past. It wasn't possible for her to control who created her, or who gave her the name she had in this world.

After thinking about it, Kiana felt that it was a good thing that Noldrei had come.

Right from the start, she had received such a nice name from a beautiful girl.

Kiana suddenly had a thought and said, "How about this, Noldrei, I'll call you Dad from now on, and you can call me Mom. We two parentless people can be each other's parents."

Noldrei was stunned, hesitating whether or not to give Kiana a future-style 'brain enlightenment' operation.

But considering that the girl hadn't experienced much in her life, and hadn't gone through the suffering of genetic locking, mental imprisonment, cognitive distortion, or loss of presence that awaited her in the future,

Noldrei forgave his crown princess for her wavering will.

"Damn it, I'm just an ordinary teenage girl who hasn't come of age yet!"

Kiana felt a pang in her heart. She tried to cry but quickly managed to adjust her body to give herself a better mood. The depressing emotions were quickly suppressed thanks to her conscious control.

The Herrscher of the Void, who was hovering behind Noldrei, tried to jump out and speak several times, but Noldrei pushed her back each time.

He said, "I told you before. Helping humanity progress faster will benefit your ordinary teenage life. As long as most people in the world are living lives similar to yours, then your life will no longer be unique."

Kiana sighed out of habit, saying, "But I can't just go around killing everyone's parents, right? Then wouldn't I become a demon? Besides, most people have parents. How can they accept having a whole generation of parentless children?"

Kiana still didn't want to change the world like that. She said helplessly, "Forget it, I still think this world is pretty good. There's no need to use other ways to continue human reproduction..."

Just as she finished speaking, a commotion suddenly broke out in front of her. Soon, a group of students shoved their way into the open space in front of Kiana.

"Stop! You bastard, stop!"

"Beat you to death, you waste!"

"Trying to run?! You parentless scum, I'll kick you to death!"

Just as Kiana was saying that the world was nice, people started beating up a child.

It was a slap to the face that lasted for less than three seconds.

"You're trying to steal stuff! Die!" Those teenagers weren't holding back their punches and kicks, not even looking at their surroundings.

The crown princess was instantly furious. She had just said that the world was great, and that the world was beautiful, and then someone came and slapped her right across the face.

Noldrei didn't know if Kiana was lucky or unlucky.

After a moment, he decided that Kiana was lucky, otherwise she wouldn't have encountered so many things and yet have survived this long.

That meant that she was actually quite lucky.

The young girl's sense of justice immediately rose. She rushed forward and, with a few punches and kicks, stopped the situation from getting worse.

She was about to deal with the 'thief,' but the kid turned around and ran, clutching something in their hand.

But how could they outrun Noldrei? He grabbed the kid by the scruff of the neck and dragged them back.

Noldrei glanced at the things in the 'thief's' hand and immediately realized that they didn't have much to do with the others. After a single look, he knew that the scent on the object was unrelated to those who had beaten the kid.

"Kiana, your intuition is indeed very good, he didn't steal it." Noldrei turned to the kid and asked, "Why didn't you explain yourself?"

"They… they were too many…" The boy said, his head down.

"What does being outnumbered have to do with whether you explain yourself or not?" Kiana clapped her hands, looking at him in confusion.

The boy looked up at the eight-year-old girl. Though he was surprised at her terrifying combat ability, he honestly answered his savior's question.

"Because there were too many of them, my explanation would be useless."

The boy spoke a cruel truth.

Kiana understood now. Being outnumbered meant that the other side had enough momentum, and could suppress his explanations. They would create an environment that branded him as a thief, preventing anyone from speaking up for him.

"It's simply that there were more people talking. Even in your imagined meetings with powerful bureaucrats, whoever has the most people supporting them has more power."

Noldrei seemed to be very familiar with these kinds of things. No wonder he had adapted to this backward primitive society so quickly.

With his abilities, he could easily become the biggest powerholder. No one in this era had the productive capacity to surpass him.

"Meetings are essentially about the allocation of the right to speak. That's why officials will try everything to keep ordinary people out of these meetings. In your era, whoever can control the meeting process can control the meeting's result."

"It's the same for elections, and for voting."

Noldrei looked at the boy, who was standing there obediently with his head down, and asked, "Why didn't you use money to avoid this disaster?"

"If I give it to them this time, they'll come for more next time. I don't have any teachers or adults I know. For us orphans, taking a step back is like falling off a cliff."

The boy's tone was somewhat emotional now. It seemed he had been through a lot in Academy City.

"This place is letting you openly commit acts like this, then they must be doing it to other people. Most of these hundreds of thousands of students have parents that won't come here. Technically speaking, they all have no background."

Noldrei reminded Kiana that most of the students here were dragged to this place by the Japan government.

"That's right, especially those of us from orphanages. We were just sold along with the others."

What the boy said struck a chord in Kiana.

It made the girl wonder if she was living in too much comfort.

"What's your name? Where do you come from?"

Noldrei weighed the items in his hands. He quickly understood the boy's financial situation.

"I'm called Black(Kuro)."

"Do you have any family?"

"......"

"Be honest."

"I have a little sister called White(Shiro)."

Black didn't know how Noldrei knew he had family. He was just trying to live carefully with his sister in Academy City.

"That little bit of income is not enough. From now on, you'll bring your sister and follow her."

Noldrei threw the wallet in his hand to Kiana.

"From now on, their lives are in your hands. You can do whatever you want with them."

Kiana's blue eyes widened.

'Weren't you just supposed to be comforting me? I don't even have much money right now. How can I raise other people?'

Now that she was a child without parents herself, she felt sympathy when she heard the siblings' story.

'Can someone's life be so casually handed over to someone else?'

The crown princess's New Year had once again been ruined by the cruelty of human nature.