“So you called me here just to use me as a guinea pig for testing the Simulated Universe?”
After climbing to her feet, Little Herta crossed her arms and showed no intention of moving as she questioned Herta.
She had been wondering why Herta had brought her along.
Seriously, even after transmigrating, she still had to run the Simulated Universe?
“You’re the first Simulated Universe tester, not a guinea pig.”
Herta corrected her.
“Isn’t that the same thing?”
Little Herta stared at Herta speechlessly.
“Whatever. Are you going or not?”
“Will I be compensated?”
Refusing was obviously impossible.
She currently couldn’t activate Unreasonable Mode, so she had no means of resisting Herta’s remote control.
Still, she genuinely didn’t want to work for Herta for free.
If Herta wanted her to help test the Simulated Universe, fine—but she had to pay!
“What do you want?”
“I don’t want to go back to Herta City and be your kitchen assistant! And… Hmm, from now on, I want to live a carefree life and do whatever I want. Yeah, this space station seems pretty nice. I’m going to live here.”
“…”
After hearing her demands, Herta fell silent and frowned slightly.
It wasn’t that she couldn’t agree.
She had simply realized that Little Herta’s main demand was not having to serve as her kitchen assistant.
Staying on the space station was merely an extra condition she had tacked on halfway through.
Herta didn’t understand.
All Little Herta had to do was assist her while she made pastries.
Was there any need to resist so fiercely?
Surely a genius like her couldn’t really be the culinary disaster this little brat claimed she was, could she?
“Fine. Having one more person in my kitchen makes no difference, and neither does having one less.”
Little Herta’s contempt for her cooking irritated her, but she still nodded and agreed to the request.
“Really? That’s great!”
Little Herta’s tiny eyes immediately lit up.
She bounded over to the Simulated Universe, then turned back, pointed at it, and asked Herta,
“This thing isn’t dangerous, right?”
Happy as she was, Little Herta hadn’t forgotten to confirm the experiment’s safety so she could prepare herself mentally.
“It’s a data world. Even if you die inside, nothing will happen to you. At worst, an accident will kick you out.”
After giving her assurance, Herta pointed at the glowing blue ring on the floor before the Simulated Universe and urged her,
“Hurry up. Just stand there. For a real person, the Simulated Universe would read and match their brainwaves. In your case, it’ll send you a direct connection request. Don’t reject it.”
“Okay, I’m going in.”
Only after receiving Herta’s assurance did Little Herta walk to the center of the circular platform.
She accepted the direct connection request and logged in as a tester.
“This place is… Hm?”
The moment Little Herta opened her eyes inside the Simulated Universe, she saw a blurry figure.
They stood amid a cosmic Sea of Stars, their body composed of countless mirror fragments, while their features were refracted over and over through prisms until they resembled an unfathomable riddle.
Then Little Herta involuntarily began reading her own memories.
Just as the process was about to begin, she sensed a surge of power erupt from her core.
She regained control of her body and stopped her memories from being read.
There could be no mistake.
The being before her was Fuli, Aeon of Remembrance!
The instant Little Herta realized their identity, Fuli’s figure changed before her eyes.
She saw a pink-haired Damselette smiling sweetly at her before softly speaking:
[Truth rolls up world-bearing, strides across flame-chasing, the bright moon brims with radiance, mocking existence, the fruit of the tree on the other shore…]
It sounded like murmuring and yet also like narration.
Word followed word, each seemingly meaningful yet impossible to decipher.
Amid that incomprehensible speech, Their—her—figure slowly faded away.
Immediately afterward, Little Herta found herself standing in the middle of an empty street in Herta City.
“Fuli appeared? Why? I clearly haven’t finished calibrating the parts involving Paths and Aeons, so why did They cast Their gaze upon you?!”
Herta’s exclamation simultaneously exploded in Little Herta’s ears.
“Is it that strange for me to see Them? That was just a simulated Aeon, wasn’t it?”
Little Herta was puzzled by Herta’s reaction.
She remembered that Herta had built the Simulated Universe to study the Paths and explore the mysteries behind the birth of Aeons.
Even if it was only in the early stages of development, encountering one or two Aeons here should have been perfectly normal, right?
The protagonist controlled by the player had even encountered two simulated Aeons during the first test.
“That was indeed a simulated Aeon, but at this stage, the Simulated Universe still uses the real universe’s parameters. In reality, the Aeons are shrouded in Mystery and impossible to fathom. A mortal might spend an entire lifetime without ever gaining the chance to behold even one. Yet just now, the simulated Aeon Fuli appeared of Their own accord.”
Screwllum answered Little Herta’s question, then continued,
“Question: Have you ever encountered Them in reality?” Enjoying the story?
“Uh, probably not?”
Seriously, the appearance rate of Aeons hadn’t been adjusted yet…
Little Herta scratched her head.
She now understood why Herta was so astonished.
From the very beginning, Herta had never expected her to encounter an Aeon the instant she entered.
“Either you have or you haven’t. What do you mean, ‘probably not’?”
Herta cut in after hearing her answer.
“I can’t really explain it. Just now, I think I saw Them turn into a pink-haired girl. She looked kind of familiar.”
It was Cyrene.
Although the image had been vague and indistinct, the figure Fuli transformed into had indeed greatly resembled Cyrene from the game.
Moreover, that seemingly meaningless string of words They had spoken included the terms ‘world-bearing’ and ‘flame-chasing.’
She suspected that she might meet Cyrene in the future, so Cyrene had deliberately crossed time and space to meet her now.
“A pink-haired girl? Tsk. There’s no record of that in the backend data.”
Herta clicked her tongue in displeasure, then continued asking,
“Besides turning into a girl, was there anything else strange about Them?”
“They also said, ‘Truth rolls up world-bearing, strides across flame-chasing, the bright moon brims with radiance, mocking existence, the fruit of the tree on the other shore…'”
Little Herta answered honestly.
“What is any of that supposed to mean? Are you sure you didn’t repeat it incorrectly?”
Hearing something as absurd and nonsensical as ‘No. 42 concrete mixed with spaghetti,’ Herta suspected Little Herta had gotten it wrong.
“Not a single word.”
“…”
“Forget it. Recording the appearance of an Aeon was an unexpected bonus. At the very least, it proves our research direction is correct and that the Simulated Universe can indeed be used to study Aeons. Let’s continue the test.”
Herta sighed.
Her purpose in building the Simulated Universe was to investigate the mysteries of the Paths and Aeons.
Although studying Aeons wasn’t the main objective of this test, Fuli’s appearance was cause for celebration in itself.
“So what’s the objective of this test? What am I supposed to do now?”
Looking around at the empty recreation of Herta City, Little Herta questioned Herta.
Herta still hadn’t told her what she was supposed to do inside the Simulated Universe.
★ ★ ★
T/N: If you spot mistranslation, do tell me!