The Gamer who traveled to Honkai: Star Rail

Just as Herta was filled with anticipation, the machine couldn't take it anymore—and exploded.

Staring at the blown-up machine, both Herta's puppet and her real body opened their mouths in shock… With that blast, the resources from dozens of star systems were completely wiped out.

With the explosion, Pei Guang, who had been thoroughly enjoying himself in the Simulated Universe, was ejected back into reality. 

Affected by the blast, he was literally thrown through the air.

Pei Guang was still dazed. He had just been watching the players catch a Preservation Emanator and trying to feed it through a funnel. Then suddenly—poof, it ended?

Pei Guang: "What happened? Why did I get kicked out all of a sudden?"

He had really been having fun. 

And it wasn't just him: the players he pulled into the Simulated Universe were all having a blast. But halfway through that fun, it ended? 

Every player involved in the event was now cursing the "dog dev" who shut it down just when they were enjoying it the most.

Herta, recovering from her shock, tried to stay calm: "Apologies. A small issue with the equipment caused the simulation to end prematurely. The Simulated Universe is currently unavailable."

Pei Guang: "Huh?"

He looked at Herta with obvious irritation. The experience felt like getting fully set up in endless mode in Plants vs. Zombies, having built a screen full of Apocalypses in Red Alert, or spending three hours gathering spell components to cast a big spell—

Only for it all to suddenly stop? Even Herta could tell how frustrated he was.

Herta: "Why are you looking at me like that? It's not my fault the machine exploded! How was I supposed to know the thing was this fragile?"

Screwllum: "No need to worry. Once the machine is repaired, we'll have you back for another round of testing. However, due to the severe damage, the next session will not carry over progress from this one. But don't be discouraged: Herta promises your rewards won't be affected."

"Ugh!"

Screwllum's words made Pei Guang sigh. "Fine, fine! First time I've ever had a game event crash halfway through… Wait, actually, maybe not the first time..."

Though rare, he had indeed experienced events crashing from overload before in his many years of gaming. Sure, you still got the rewards, but this "halfway through and the power goes out" feeling? 

He hadn't expected to relive it.

Pei Guang: "Looks like there's nothing left for me to do here. I'm heading out."

He turned to leave, but just as he did, his phone started vibrating like crazy. 

Opening it, he found a "greeting" from Silver Wolf, delivered in that very unique 'Punklordean' style. 

Clearly, Pei Guang wasn't the only one pissed: everyone who had been playing was furious.

But unlike the others, Silver Wolf knew exactly who was responsible this time. So she vented all her frustration directly at Pei Guang.

Pei Guang vented right back while walking off, grumbling the whole way.

Once Pei Guang left, Herta looked at the wrecked machine and, in a rare show of emotion, spoke with genuine regret: "All that data..."

Screwllum: "No need to be sad. Stephen and I already backed up everything we gathered."

Although they could no longer access data directly through the machine, Screwllum and Stephen had used a few tricks to extract everything that interested the four of them.

As for further player data… unfortunately, not even they could retrieve everything. But to Screwllum, what they did capture was already enough.

Among these players, there were some who had begun cultivating organic lifeforms. Strangely, according to the descriptions from the Simulated Universe, the cultivated organic life developed emotions identical to humans.

Although the raw data couldn't be directly retrieved, just by observing, Screwllum had already gained valuable insights. At most, in a thousand years, he was confident this technology could be realized.

Ruan Mei: "Is that so? Still, there were indeed some things that caught my interest this time. But the losses…"

Herta: "The losses are fine. If Screwllum and Stephen managed to collect the data I'm interested in, someone will cover the losses."

Ever since she got connected to Pei Guang, the resource consumption for the Simulated Universe had been growing larger and larger. 

If nobody had retained the data this time, Herta would've suffered a crushing loss: like, "down to her underwear exploded" kind of loss.

But with this data, it was a different story: some of it contained information on the Aeons dug up by the lore-hunters. 

Because of the IPC's relevance in the story, the lore-hunters had uncovered quite a bit about Qlipoth. She could pick out the parts the corporation liked to see, present the experimental results to them, and the funding would roll in easily.

It wasn't a scam!

These were proper experimental results, unaltered, recognized by the Aeon of Erudition, and acknowledged by all the Genius Society members who participated: information the IPC would be pleased to see.

Thinking of this, Herta directly contacted someone from the Interastral Peace Corporation: "Hello? I obtained some… information from this experiment. Yes! That's right. But there were a few issues during the process, let's discuss it in person."

Some things couldn't be explained well over the phone, so Herta decided to handle it herself this time and personally visit the company. 

Not to get ahead of herself, but this might not just get her everything needed for the experiment: it might even pull in some extra funding.

As she watched Herta prepare to leave, Ruan Mei also spoke up: "In that case, I'll be off too. There really were quite a few things that interested me this time."

Screwllum had no intention of leaving. Aside from the Simulated Universe, he still had other matters to discuss with Herta. 

They had only gone halfway through their exchange, so he would stay at the space station and wait for her return.

As for why the machine exploded? That was actually the Aeon of Erudition's fault. 

The calculations of the Erudition had reached the limit of the world: its path of logic could no longer sustain further computing and extrapolation, so it tripped its own breaker. 

Once the Aeon shut down, its connection to the Simulated Universe was severed, so without its computational support, the Simulated Universe naturally burst from data overload.

Of course, the Aeon of Erudition wasn't the only one that overheated. 

Some who had glimpsed the future saw countless multiplied timelines and were similarly overwhelmed. But unlike them, the Erudition, as an Aeon, had someone looking after it.

Seeing the Erudition injured, its best friend was now helping cool it down. 

Though the friend considered the Aeon of Erudition "just a lump of scrap metal," they still didn't want anything bad to happen to that lump.

So, in order to help Erudition cool off, they borrowed unmelting ice from across the universe, the most vital water, even fanned it with a huge fan, and laid a towel across its 'forehead.'

Clearly, none of this actually helped the Aeon cool down. On the contrary, this very behavior might spread throughout the cosmos. 

Perhaps years, decades, or even centuries later, the general perception of the Aeon Erudition might change.

But… isn't that a good thing?

Beneath the teary soy bean emoji profile picture, that smiling face became even more radiant. This wasn't a prank: they were genuinely trying to help their friend!