The Antimatter Legion’s vanguard forces were finally repelled after the ten combat robots, pieced together from junk and enemy wreckage yet absurdly powerful, joined the fight.
The Seeker was battered and scarred, but it had managed to protect its core areas and withdraw to a relatively safe space for emergency repairs.
Inside the ship, the atmosphere of survival mixed with an indescribable strangeness.
The crew and researchers, still shaken, exchanged glances filled with confusion and…awe at the incredible reversal that had just occurred.
And those looks of awe, without exception, focused on the figure being led out of the repair bay by Herta’s hand—Baida.
Her face still had smudges of grease, her small hands were dirty, and her eyes had returned to their usual dazed clarity, with a hint of tiredness and satisfaction after a fight.
She was sipping the nutrition yogurt Herta had given her.
“Those…those robots…were made by Miss Baida?” a young researcher whispered in disbelief to a colleague.
“Who else could it have been?
She was the only one in the bay!”
“But…isn’t she…you know?” He pointed at his head, the meaning clear.
“I’m starting to wonder if we’re the ones who are…you know.
Hand-crafting mechs, and mechs that can upgrade themselves at that…”
“She called them ‘Self-Building Construction Robots’…Good heavens, if our planet’s defenses were all these ‘construction robots,’ would the Antimatter Legion even dare to come?”
Whispers spread through the corridors.
The gazes that had once been pitying or dismissive were now replaced entirely by shock, curiosity, and a hint of lingering fear.
This girl, always seen as the “genius’s accessory,” the “fool who needed looking after,” had demonstrated a strategic-level, inconceivable ability to create—or rather, to impose—at a critical moment.
Herta ignored the murmurs.
She brought Baida straight back to her main lab and ordered the ten robots, which had gone into standby like statues after the battle, to be transported in as well.
The lab door closed, sealing out the noise.
Herta let go of Baida’s hand and walked over to the most intact robot.
It stood three and a half meters tall, covered in vicious Antimatter Legion armor fragments, with unstable dark red energy flickering at its joints.
Several thick mechanical arms ended in pulse cannons and cutting blades, clearly modified from enemy weapons.
It stood there silently, radiating a wild, rough, yet heart-stopping sense of power.
Herta’s eyes, like the most precise scanners, examined this “masterpiece” from top to bottom.
She reached out, her fingertips tracing the crude weld marks, feeling the chaotic yet unusually active energy flow within.
“Initiate deep scan.
Structural analysis.
Energy circuit modeling.” Herta commanded the air, and the lab’s advanced scanning equipment activated, enveloping the robot in countless beams of light.
On the holographic projection, the robot’s internal structure was rapidly reconstructed as a three-dimensional model.
Then Herta’s brow, which had been slightly furrowed, gradually tightened into a full frown.
“What…what the hell is this?” she muttered under her breath.
The model showed that the robot’s internal structure was a complete disaster:
Energy lines were tangled like a mess of hemp.
Many nodes were connected by physical compression and some kind of…mental fixation—completely violating any known circuit principles.
The core power source consisted of three different models of antimatter engine wreckage, even with conflicting energy properties, forcibly crammed into a tight space and held together by a few twisted alloy plates.
They should have interfered with each other or even exploded, but instead maintained a fragile balance, jointly outputting surging power.
The transmission system was even worse—mismatched gears, bearings replaced with substandard substitutes, hydraulic lines coiled like intestines…
Not to mention the obviously random, functionless redundant parts, seeming to exist only to “fill space.”
“Ding!
Simulation running…”
“Warning!
Energy circuit node A-7 overloaded.
Expected meltdown in 3.2 seconds.”
“Warning!
Power core balance broken.
Expected annihilation explosion in 5.1 seconds.”
“Warning!
Leg transmission gear assembly jammed.
Expected structural collapse in 1.7 seconds.”
“Warning…”
“Warning…”
Dense red warning messages flooded the screen in an instant.
The predicted failure rate curve shot up like a rocket, eventually settling on a jaw-dropping number: 81.35%.
By any logic, this pile of junk shouldn’t have been able to last ten seconds after startup without disintegrating, let alone fight.
And yet, this “industrial garbage” with an over 80% failure rate had moved, had fought, and had fought fiercely, holding its own against the Antimatter Legion.
Herta fell silent.
She felt her years-built scientific worldview being ground into the dirt.
She turned to look at Baida, who was sitting on a tall stool nearby, swinging her short legs and licking the yogurt lid with complete focus.
“Baida.” Herta’s voice carried a dryness she herself hadn’t noticed.
“Mhm?” Baida looked up, a ring of milky residue around her mouth, her big eyes staring blankly at her sister.
“These things,” Herta said, pointing at the robot, “how did you make them?”
Baida tilted her head, as if trying hard to understand the question.
She put down the yogurt box, hopped off the stool, and trotted over to Herta’s workbench.
On the workbench, among the precision instruments and data pads, sat an unremarkable, slightly worn metal drawing board.
It was a gift from their parents when they were very young—a “doodle board” where they could draw with special energy pens, and the marks could be preserved for a long time.
Baida stood on tiptoe, rummaged around the board with her little hands, and pointed at one of the doodles.
“Look!
This!” Her voice carried a hint of excitement.
Herta stepped closer and looked down.
It was a very childish, crookedly drawn, colorful doodle.
From the blurry outlines and colors, one could vaguely make out two stick figures holding hands—probably meant to be themselves.
Beside them was drawn a…well, even more abstract “robot.” It had a square head, messy colors on its body, a few lines representing arms, and legs drawn like sticks, and beside it, in crooked handwriting—probably Herta’s own annotation at the time—it said, [Older Sister and My Robot].
That was from when they were about four or five.
On a rare occasion, Herta had briefly set down her research and let Baida drag her into drawing together.
Herta had probably just casually sketched the simplest robot outline, while Baida had excitedly colored it in bright shades.
An absurd thought struck Herta like lightning.
She pointed at the crooked robot in the doodle, then at the steel giant beside it, her voice carrying disbelief: “You…you made it based on this?”
Baida nodded firmly, her face breaking into a happy “you finally get it” expression: “Mhm!
Like it!
Herta drew it!
I made it!” She reached out her little hands, mimicking a piecing-together motion.
“…Just, bigger, and added…boom boom boom!” She mimicked the sound of firing.
“…”
The lab fell into an even longer silence.
Herta looked at Baida’s pure, untainted smile and at her eyes shining because Herta “understood” her.
She thought back to the 80 percent failure rate simulation result, and the reality of this thing wreaking havoc on the battlefield.
An incredibly complex emotion surged in her heart.
Absurdity.
A mix of laughter and tears.
Shock.
And a trace…of indescribable tenderness.
This foolish older sister…she understood nothing of engineering, energy circuits, or materials mechanics.
She had simply taken a doodle she and her sister had drawn together as children, and using her unreasonable [I Reckon] ability, “realized” it.
As for why it worked despite the high failure rate?
Why was it powerful despite the disastrous structure?
In Herta’s view, this was no longer within the realm of scientific explanation.
It was more like a…cosmic-level BUG.
A terrifying ability that bypassed all physical laws and logical limits, forcibly transforming “concept” into “reality.” That doodle was the “concept” in her heart, and she had simply materialized that BUG with her hands.
“Pfft…”
An extremely faint yet clearly audible laugh escaped Herta’s lips.
She looked at Baida and shook her head, her grayish-white hair swaying.
Those always calm, wise eyes now held a certain resignation and…affection, if that word could ever apply to her.
She reached out, her fingertip gently wiping away the yogurt stain at the corner of Baida’s mouth, her tone softer than ever before, carrying a resigned helplessness and amusement:
“Big sister really is…a complete fool, isn’t she.”
So the true strength wasn’t wisdom, nor some hidden technological knowledge.
The true strength was those miraculous hands that could turn “wild thoughts” and “childhood doodles” into reality—this ability that existed entirely outside the bounds of common sense, like a BUG.
Baida didn’t quite understand why her sister was laughing, but seeing Herta smile, she smiled stupidly along with her, showing her little fangs, and reached out to hug Herta again.
This time, Herta didn’t dodge.
She let herself be held, but her gaze once again fell on the combat robot and the childish doodle beside it, her eyes deep in thought.
The secrets hidden in this foolish sister seemed far more interesting than she had imagined.
And that 80 percent failure rate…perhaps it was the perfect entry point for studying this BUG ability.
The genius’s thirst for knowledge was ignited once more.
Only this time, the subject of study had become this foolish older sister who always brought “surprises.”