Honkai: Man(Sludge) From Future

Kiana, worried that her old man would disappear from her life again, asked nervously, "Where did he go?"

The android pointed to the house across the street. "He ran into the house across the way."

"Huh? Is the house across the way my dad's property too?"

Kiana's first thought wasn't to go find Siegfried, but to wonder just how many houses her dad owned.

Having been pointed out, Siegfried stopped pretending and simply opened the door for Kiana.

"I thought you'd run off somewhere. Why are you hiding right on your doorstep? What's the difference between hiding like this and not hiding at all?" Kiana felt her dad was being a bit of an ostrich, burying his head in the sand.

"Kiana..." Siegfried said with a bitter smile, "You don't understand. It's hard for me to explain it to you. In short... this isn't the outcome I wanted."

Kiana glanced at the android who looked exactly like her mother, then back at Siegfried. "What's the big deal? All you have to do is return the android and have it sent back to be remade. It won't cause you any trouble."

Siegfried looked at his second daughter with a complicated expression. "Have you ever seen Otto kill Amber and send her back to be remade? This one... she's too much like a real person. I can't even tell if she's Cecilia or not. She knows everything, even the private matters between Cecilia and me, as if the real Cecilia has been resurrected in an android's body."

"Then she is a real person! There's no such thing as an android!"

Seeing her father's pained struggle, Kiana subconsciously looked at the Cecilia android again. She knew clearly that Cecilia Schariac was well and truly dead. This android was definitely not Cecilia.

But even so, Siegfried still couldn't tell if this woman was real or fake.

How on earth did Heliopolis Life Sciences Pharmaceutical manage this?

As if a thought struck her, Kiana guessed it was highly likely that Cecilia's memories and will had been preserved in some way. If that was truly possible, then creating a perfect Cecilia android wouldn't be a problem at all.

"But, Dad, that has nothing to do with sending her back to be remade."

"Kiana, how did you become like this?" Siegfried truly couldn't explain it to his daughter. Perhaps in Kiana's eyes, the best outcome for an android was to be recalled and remade. At best, maybe they could stay together for a lifetime.

But Kiana also knew that an android in this state was just a companion for a period of time. If human lifespan were extended, who knows how many partners one might go through.

Even in current human society, people might change partners more frequently than they change jobs.

"I'm not wrong."

"I can't do it. Think about it..." Siegfried pointed at the android, his face contorted in pain. "I can't take someone who looks exactly like Cecilia, has the exact same memories, and even the same emotions... and then what? Casually say to send her back to be remade?"

"Sending her back to be remade is killing her! Kiana, how can you accept something like that?!"

Even if you say that to me, I can still control my emotions. Kiana's current body was just like that. Although she felt a little sad about the android's existence, it wouldn't shake her will or attitude.

As Noldrei said, whether an android was a real person didn't depend on the android itself, but on whether the density of their interaction with humans had reached a sufficient magnitude.

This Cecilia android had, in fact, completely inherited all of Cecilia's past memories of her interactions with Siegfried. She could perfectly replicate all their past emotional moments.

Naturally, Siegfried couldn't bring himself to casually dispose of this person. He couldn't even bring himself to kill this android with his own hands.

"Dad, you're in such a miserable spot..."

Kiana looked at the android lady. She was even worried about Siegfried's mental state, wondering if the android had ever had the subtle thought that it would be better if she just disappeared.

Thinking of this, Kiana felt that this matter was indeed very tricky.

"Why would Otto do this?"

"If I knew why he did it, I'd be Otto!" Siegfried, in his anger, slammed the door in his daughter's face, locking himself in the small house and refusing to see anyone.

It was clear how much of a mental blow Siegfried had suffered. To make such a tough Honkai warrior become like this showed that the power of the Cecilia android had reached a level that was beyond certain boundaries.

Kiana didn't mind her father's foul mood. To be honest, if she were in his shoes, she'd probably be just as furious.

The young girl was still a very kind person. She even turned around and comforted the android, "You... don't mind his attitude too much. He just can't accept it for the time being. And you see... you're... you're too much like my mother, whom I've never met."

Misteln. The name of the woman popped into Kiana's mind. She hadn't expected there to be a competition for Cecilia's resurrection.

The Schicksal Overseer was a real piece of work!

"I know. The Overseer had already set this for me before I left the factory. I'm not allowed to choose suicide in any way, but being killed by Siegfried wouldn't count as suicide."

The android seemed quite cheerful. She seemed to really like Siegfried.

Even Kiana couldn't tell if this android was a real person or not.

Terrifying, this is too terrifying! Kiana shivered again, feeling that Noldrei had unleashed a very dangerous existence.

"I know what you're worried about, but don't worry about these things. There will be specialized S&M androids to fulfill the needs of others."

She explained these things to Kiana warmly, as if she were teaching her own daughter whom she had never met.

Kiana felt a little scared. The thought that she had no relationship with this person, yet the other already had a certain degree of affection for her as an unseen daughter... this sense of incongruity and fear made it difficult for Kiana to accept this android for a while.

Now Kiana understood a little of what her father was feeling.

Send her back to be remade?

Kiana felt that treating this android in such a way was a bit too cruel. She thought about it and decided it was best to leave the android's fate to her father to decide.

If it were Noldrei, he wouldn't even consider this much before making a choice.

After asking the android to take good care of her father, Kiana fled as if something terrifying was chasing her from behind.