Creating Happiness with Heart in Honkai

Bronie opened the door to a bar called Raven's.

Behind the door, a young, cute, and somewhat decadent girl had been waiting at the bar for a long time.

This girl's name was Cioara, and she shared the same name as the guy who took care of her in another world where Bronie once lived. Even their appearances were identical.

As for why another world? That was due to the fact that a transmigrator had been pressed inside Hyperion's main gun during the HI3rd final plot, launched to the invincible 9999-layered Diabolic Kevin Terminator, and later reborn in a Cyber Arc City. She was adopted by the Taixuan Gang, pestered a mercenary named Raven, and gradually grew into the most legendary hacker in the city.

But the final outcome of this story was that the cute bunny broke free from the cage and, by chance, found a way to dive into the quantum sea and reach different world bubbles.

The Honkai Impact 3rd world in front of her was Bronie's latest stop.

"It's been thirty minutes and ten seconds. Today is your second day at work. I hope you can step through the bar door on time tomorrow."

Cioara had already changed into work clothes and seemed a little dissatisfied when she saw Bronie's late arrival. Bronie stepped through the bar door on time, not a second too early and not a second too late. For her, at least.

"In exchange for labor, you get what you pay for, right? Just from that fact, doesn't it show that I have a very contractual spirit?"

"Who came to my shop pitifully two days ago and said he was almost out of food and homeless? Who asked me not to call the police, saying that if she were taken away by the police, she would only be sent to an orphanage? Who is it that says she is very capable and hard-working and will never take advantage of others? Didn't you just waste a lot of time changing clothes?"

Cioara was still very wary of the little girl with unknown origins in front of her, but it was precisely because of something special about her that she allowed herself to keep Bronie. Two days ago, she had acted pitifully, as if she would die without being well-supported, but within two days of being together with her, her true nature was exposed.

"Work does not create any value for oneself. Normal work is nothing more than an exchange for remuneration through labor. Only by squeezing out leisure time reasonably during work hours can we strive for value for ourselves and reflect that life is not so worthless and meaningless, isn't it?"

"You mean, taking your sweet time while working is the meaning of life?"

"Otherwise? Is it possible that we have to go to the pier to get more fries?"

Cioara held her forehead with a speechless expression, and then quickly returned to her normal state. She didn't know what was going on with the kid in front of her. It felt like she was very familiar with her, but Cioara could guarantee that she definitely didn't recognize the kid in front of her.

"The apron is over there. When you become a full-time employee, I will prepare work clothes for you. After putting on the apron, wipe all the tables, chairs, and benches aside, and then go to the kitchen to process the ingredients. Last night's dishes tasted good, and I gained more appreciation from a few guests than usual."

A familiar feeling, a familiar tone, and a familiar sense of stability. Cioara had been like that back then. When the mercenary got tired of her dirty work, she opened a shop for herself, but she didn't want to completely break away from the mercenary industry, so she opened a bar instead, thinking of creating a stable place. 

A quiet environment that left you alone while still feeling connected to people.

But she felt quite sorry, as Bronie was not born with a stable temperament, not to mention that the whole world was like a cyberpunk cage trapping the Bunny.

Bronie skillfully put on her work clothes, styled her big spiral hairstyle, and walked out of the kitchen with a capable look.

"By the way, I'm leaving for three days starting tomorrow. I won't open the store during that period."

"Oh? Does this sound like a paid vacation?"

"Exchange labor for reward, and you want to get the reward without the labor? How can such a good thing happen? I am not doing charity here."

Of course, Bronie's salary was paid daily, so Cioara directly refused to pay herself, as if she wanted to fend for herself.

"Besides, as long as you don't spend the money in these two days, you can squander it for three days. Plus, aren't you that type of person who uses her wit and skills for equivalent exchange rather than repaying using labor in exchange for reward?"

[Grey Serpent: I have a task for you. The price is 150,000. The difficulty is easy. Return quickly.

Raven: Only 150,000? Didn't I say that I would quit World Snake?

Gray Serpent: Then two hundred thousand, three days.

Raven: Deal.]

Bronie took out her phone, looked at the message belonging to Cioara, and subtly raised her eyebrows.

"Okay, I have plenty of ways to earn money. There's always instant noodles as a last resort for three days, after all."

"There is milk in the nearby store. Adding that to the instant noodles is nutritious and healthy. You're still a growing young girl."

"Why do you act like an old woman?"

Bronie actually knew that Ciora would choose to adopt orphans after the third collapse, but the current Ciora seemed to be in a confused state in life for the meantime. Cioara was slightly silent when she heard Bronie complaining like this.

"It's me meddling in other people's business."

Suddenly, the atmosphere in the whole bar became very awkward. The embarrassed Bronie quickly wiped all the tables, chairs, and benches in the hall and went directly into the back kitchen to avoid talking to Cioara for the meantime.

Yes, Cioara in this world was not the same person as Ciora in that world, and their experiences were also different. She was the only one who was familiar to her previous Cioara, and she was projecting her similarity towards this similar Cioara unilaterally.

Hiding in the back kitchen, Bronie sat on a small bench in front of the trash can, peeling potatoes with nothing to do.

The drone was running aside, searching for information about digital life forms hidden in Arc City on the internet.

If she wanted to find the Elysian Realm, then she could only make a fuss about Gray Serpent in the end.

As a Transmigrator and traveler, Bronie was still very clear about this.

The plot had never described the specific location of the Elysian Realm, but fortunately, as the ancestral hall where World Serpent leaders and followers would be baptized and gather, their location always became similar when finding all their travel data. The Elysian Realm certainly did not have the ability to move independently, so as long as it had constant contact with the outside world, it would definitely leave traces, physical or data ones. There was one thing she needed to be wary of, sort of.

Gray Serpent was a high-end digital life form, created by scientists of the previous civilization to explore the infinite life, but it was somewhat similar to the world in which she was reborn. There was also a Gray Serpent in her own world, but whether it was a prosthetic body with too many cyberpsychotic implants or a real digital life form, Bronie didn't know.

As for this Gray Serpent, Bronie felt that she needed to challenge it as well as investigate it to the very core. It's definitely not because she had a grudge towards the Gray Serpent of her world and she is projecting that grudge towards this one, not at all, definitely.

As for worrying about being counter-hacked?

Unplugging the network cable and swiftly disappearing was a necessary skill for hackers.

Bronie was already familiar with this kind of thing. In addition, the equipment she used was created by her special ability she was born with. If her opponents wanted to investigate, they had no way to do so. At that time, she only needed to completely destroy the equipment of the other party to a physical level remotely, thereby completely cutting off the other party's desire to find traces of her.

"Uh-huh, this is an agent, um, this is also a cadre, uh-huh, uh-huh~"

Some people in large companies, especially the capitalists who specialized in providing various resources for World Serpent, were actually agents of World Serpent. When checking their travel records, some of World Serpent's information could be found from some overlapping places which should be a stronghold. The rest just required slow investigation and physical hacking. 

It was now 2008, and it was still a long time before the third collapse. Bronie had plenty of time to wait for exciting things to happen in the future. But before waiting for these things, Bronie was not an idle master who would wait without doing anything. So how do you find excitement?

In the post-Honkai Odyssey, Welt was abducted by Void Archives and brought along into another universe, where there was an Interstellar-level hacker codenamed Silver Wolf.

This opportunity couldn't be missed!!

In other words, she needed to experience the Honkai Impact in this world until the end, and then continue to wait for a few years until Saint Fontaine's problems were over before slipping away towards that universe filled with Aeons, her current final destination.

After waiting for more than ten years, Bronie didn't think she was the kind of person who could wait for so many years at once without getting bored, so during this period of time, she still had to find some fun in different ways.

Provoking the World Serpent, Schicksal, and Anti-Entropy? Bronie felt that she wouldn't be so reckless as to drive her truck to the three well-known organizations fighting against Honkai without plans. After all, the opponents were very powerful and might have a low chance of losing due to their infighting or incompetence.

Even if they didn't lose for plot reasons and then the opponent wasn't in a mess, how could Honkai be dealt with easily? So even if she managed to find the Elysian Realm, Bronie just thought that it would be best to move all the Sim Flame Chasers out before Corruption came knocking on their hidden pot, and to have more fun for herself before the Honkai ended. Cioara, that guy, usually looked like she was laughing and joking, but in fact, she looked like a salty, decadent fish waiting to die, which made Bronie feel angry.

The Honkai destroyed everything Cioara had, and her hatred for Honkai was naturally real. But it seemed that her brother, who died to save her, asked her to live, so this sentence followed Cioara's life like a spell.

In order not to make her life so miserable, Cioara set a dream for herself, such as buying a mansion, a villa, or an island.

But she didn't know what she was living for, and her daily life was empty and numb. It was quite positive to deal with matters related to Honkai and participate in the elimination of Honkai. But there was still a certain degree of conflict between the last words of the living and the matter of fighting against Honkai.

Therefore, under various entanglements, Cioara felt that there was no need to stay in the World Serpent anymore, so she had the idea of washing her hands off it and left. She originally thought that her condition would improve after leaving World Snake, but who knew that her current state seemed to be getting worse? Emptiness and hatred filled Cioara. Although Bronie had not seen Cioara for so long, from her face that never smiled, Bronie felt that she should do something. Although the other party did not have anything to do with her, with Cioara's face, Bronie couldn't help but think of the mercenary Raven who once adopted her.

So, she booked a short-term goal first.

Let's not talk about destroying Honkai yet, let's not talk about blasting the island yet.

Maybe she can use something more profound to make the other person laugh and hack into the other person's mind?

After coming home from her work at the bar, the first thing Bronie did was to sit in the apartment provided by Cioara and turn on the computer, skillfully searching for the hottest gaming platform. The computer had just been freshly installed and had not seen much use. Some of the hardware inside was printed by her own abilities, which was decades ahead of the current market.

"You have to taste games from another world. Let me see if the games in your Timmy universe are all yellow-skinned rabbits and white-haired Kallen!"

Talking to herself, Bronie opened the search engine, excluding ads, and looked for the game platform with the largest number of users.

Sbeam introduced itself in front of her eyes, which made Bronie's brows jump.

After a skilled user clicked on the registered account, the yellow-skinned rabbit that made people's blood pressure rise, as well as the expected low-end modeling products, all showed that the cultural development of this world may not be as good as one imagined or even comparable to back on Earth.

But it was still many times better than her place of rebirth.

In the Light Curtain surrounded Cyber Arc City, entertainment products were an important means of paralyzing ordinary people, so their development would not be a hindrance to all the rich and influential. At that period of time, her mind was full of intent of learning any knowledge to change her destiny, but in the end, if she gave up learning for game-making, she wouldn't be here right now.

And this world had a disaster called the Honkai Impact. The second Great Eruption left too many scars on the world, so she didn't expect the entertainment in this world to develop very quickly in a short while or anytime in the future either.

Powerful capitalists had long been exposed to the phenomenon of Honkai to some certain extent, so they would definitely try their best to develop industries and please Anti-Entropy, Schicksal, or the World Serpent. In this way, there would be a glimmer of hope, maybe they could get the populace to be more hopeful and full of joy before the big collapse happened? Or when disaster strikes, everyone could have solace in games? The hand searching for the game gradually stopped, and Bronie fell into deep thought for a while, looking at the yellow-skinned rabbits filling the screen.

Then she clicked on the tab to find adult R18 content.

Bronie couldn't believe that even the local works in the special area were all featuring yellow-skinned rabbits. Although Homu did evoke an odd mixture of ugliness and cuteness, it's unlikely that people of all ages would feel particularly excited after gazing at that thing, right?

With this mindset, she resolutely falsified her age and persisted in creating her account.

Then Bronie was shocked.

Just like seeing slime-related content ranked tenth in the 3D area search rankings, finding Homu ranked highly made Bronie realize the diversity of human preferences in this world.

Fortunately, it wasn't as extreme as Bronie had imagined. At least in this aspect, human aesthetics still had some commonality. It was quite a risk; she almost thought she wouldn't find anything similar from Earth to here.

Bronie planned to be a copycat or what some might call a porter to pass the time, bringing over some games in her past life that could bring smiles to this world and stimulate the market to produce more interesting games.

At the same time, she would use this as a way to open Cioara's worn-riddled heart.

A truly powerful hacker should be more than just someone who manipulates information and data on the internet. They should be able to modify reality itself and explore the depths of the soul. That's the highest realm of hackers!

Bronie's hands flew across the keyboard, as if she were facing a spirited opponent before swiftly creating a new folder on the computer desktop. It had big characters written on it:

"Undertale".