Honkai: Man(Sludge) From Future

The work in Academy City was tedious and long-term.

Noldrei took Kiana on these inspections in disguise, conducting them privately. If His Majesty the Emperor were to investigate these matters personally and openly, it would likely attract unnecessary danger.

After leaving the mental hospital, the two of them went to check on the research institute.

After Elysia's private visit to the institute and the mental shock she received, she had described the situation there to Noldrei.

The institute's overly advanced research results had thrown its ethical concepts into a state of considerable chaos.

However, one rule was strictly enforced: no one was allowed to privately use the institute's achievements, and most importantly, no one was allowed to go home and create new life on their own.

At first, people thought Academy City was enforcing family planning, preventing them from marrying and having children casually. But later, after the institute's staff gained a clear understanding of "procreative colonialism," they stopped complaining about this rule.

Human reproduction had become an important public work related to societal needs, so the concept of not creating people privately was accepted by the researchers.

They turned their attention in another direction. They couldn't directly use genetic technology to create humans, but they could transform living animals into humans!

And thus, the scene Elysia had witnessed came to be. It was soon discovered that humans transformed from animals could be changed back, so the overall harm wasn't as great as initially feared. After all, Academy City's monitoring capabilities were quite thorough.

When Noldrei and Kiana arrived at the research institute, they were not greeted by Welt or Tesla, of course. They had their own work to do. As long as Noldrei didn't interfere, the staff here had no intention of stopping them from observing.

Everyone went about their own business, contributing their light and heat to the future of humanity.

"What is that?!"

Kiana pointed to a girl suspended in an unknown liquid. Two ears sprouted from the top of her head.

Noldrei glanced at the label on the machine. He couldn't tell if Kiana was pretending not to see it or if she genuinely didn't know what it was.

"It seems to be a horse girl, created by modifying a horse's body and combining it with human and Honkai factors?"

Noldrei didn't think there was anything special to study here. He had seen people attach animal ears to themselves more than once, only to remove them later because they weren't suitable for rainy days. Noldrei actually thought it was completely unnecessary. How do animals move around in the rain, then? It was obvious that the aesthetic position humans desired for ears was, in fact, not a practical one.

Kiana thought these researchers were perverts. She couldn't understand why they would do such a thing.

"If you create a person, you must re-educate them according to human standards. Otherwise, you'll end up with something like the wolf children from stories. But they shouldn't be doing this in the first place. Animals have their own way of being, and many animals in the ecosystem have their own jobs to do. For example, carrying seeds, controlling herbivore populations, and so on..."

"If you turn a horse into a person, do you think this group will eventually turn all horses into people? And after they become people, will they plan to turn all other odd-toed ungulates into people? At that point, what animal will replace the role of the odd-toed ungulates? Will we have to specially create one?"

Noldrei's question stumped Kiana. She normally wouldn't care about such things, but considering she would have to manage Academy City in the future, she had to think more deeply.

"So, these horse girls must have no relation to odd-toed ungulates. For now, they pose no threat. When they do become a threat, we'll just eliminate them all."

Kiana was slightly taken aback. She looked up at the horse girl, who looked very human in her memory, and gained a deeper understanding of the future Noldrei spoke of.

Whether these lives were 'human' or not was a crucial criterion for determining their place in the future system of reproductive power.

As the two walked on, they came to another area.

This place was different from the last. Instead of whole beings, it displayed various chunks of flesh and tissue she had never seen before.

The flesh chunks here were no longer the single one Noldrei had created back then. There were now many living masses of flesh, maintaining their existence by absorbing nutrients from the surrounding fluid.

"It looks... a bit disgusting..."

Kiana really didn't want to see so many strange things, but now she had no choice but to keep looking.

"What's so disgusting? I think the most disgusting thing was when you grew a small eyeball on your fingertip to peek at Mei's cards when you were playing Old Maid."

Noldrei mocked his heir's moral compass, pointing out her tendency to cheat at games.

"H-how did you know?!" Kiana stammered.

"Who in the family doesn't know about your habit of cheating?"

Noldrei couldn't even be bothered to scold her. To be able to drive Bronya to the point where she disliked playing games with her, Kiana was truly one of a kind.

"Right, let me take you to see a true hero of our research institute!"

He suddenly remembered something and had someone fetch a small girl with twin tails.

Her name was Oyama Mihari, a talent who had entered Academy City with her outstanding research abilities.

"This person is the talent who is researching how to turn my gender-swapping system into a potion. If you need help with any research and development in the future, you can ask her to do it."

Kiana looked at the petite girl, then thought of Mobius and Dr. Tesla. She no longer doubted this world's bias towards women.

Why weren't the researchers bald old men as Kiana had guessed, but rather a group of clear, beautiful, and rather short young girls?

"Hello, hello!"

Kiana had always kept a respectful distance from such brilliant research talents. It wasn't for any particular reason, just a simple fear of their way of thinking. But for the sake of her future work, she knew she had to get acquainted with them.

Kiana couldn't help but ask curiously, "What made you want to research the potion form of this system?"

Oyama Mihari was a very talkative person. She said quite frankly, "It's because of my brother. I want to turn my brother into a girl, but he's always unwilling to come to Academy City. So, I thought I'd make a potion, secretly pour it down his throat, and turn him into a girl."

"Alright, alright, that's enough! You're truly a genius!" Kiana's expression changed, and she quickly stopped Oyama Mihari from continuing to describe her grand ambition.

Kiana was a little frightened by this person. She quickly placated the girl, promising her more resource allocation to get her to leave.

"Are there no normal people in Academy City?!"

Kiana suspected that even her subordinate, Shiro, would one day turn into one of these freaks.