Sera Gets Lost

"You broke it... I don't need to pay for it, right?"

Sera was still somewhat hesitant. He didn't have Credits to pay off the debt, and he didn't want to work for Miss Herta for the rest of his life to pay it off.

"No need, I'll even pay you for your demonstration."

There was no impatience in Herta's eyes, only curiosity about the unknown, for which she even patiently explained to Sera.

"Then—let's begin."

Sera could feel that the power within her body seemed more... complete than Remembrance. Thus, the mechanical device she raised was instantly Corruption, and her authority returned to its highest level.

"Interesting."

Herta kept checking the permissions of each machine and found no signs of attack on the firewall, yet it changed her highest privileges to second-highest.

She wasn't angry at all. What a joke! How could a genius be angry that someone is better than her? She would only feel delighted.

Based on their observations, the Herta concluded that Sera's ability is a conceptual form of Corruption, rather than a simple attack on data or inorganic life.

However, until experimental results are obtained to verify them, these are all just conjectures.

Are your abilities limited to mechanics?

Herta stared intently at Sera.

"This... I haven't tried it yet."

Sera shook his head. Although he had no Remembrance of this in his remaining Remembrance, his intuition told him he could do it.

"I'll give it a try."

As for the goal of the experiment...

Sera turned her gaze to the space, her power moving at her will, the space subtly being Corruption... Could this feeling of complete control be...?

Sure enough, after sensing the changes in his body, the forgotten and unusable core was rediscovered.

"Um...?"

Herta sensed a change in the spatial frequency of the space where Sera's palm was facing, and she revealed a knowing smile.

"In that case..."

With a thought, Sera caused the space in front of her to begin rotating like a Rubik's Cube, displacing objects within the Corruption range.

"Let's end the first experiment here. I understand the situation. I need to prepare the equipment for the next one. What kind of compensation do you want?"

Herta crossed his arms and stared at Sera as if afraid she would run away.

"I... want to go back."

Sera still longed for Amphoreus and Cyrene.

"You know me, but you don't know your own place in the world?"

Herta was starting to lose her composure. During her conversation with Sera, she felt like she was someone similar to herself, but... was her intuition wrong?

Someone who knows her doesn't know the coordinates of their own planet—is this guy an idiot?

"Are you an idiot?"

"Well..."

Sera turned his head away. He didn't know how to talk about this topic. After all, Herta was still in its teenage years and was even less able to deal with Lygus. He couldn't drag Herta down into the abyss because of his own selfish desires.

"I'm sorry, Miss Herta, I have a reason for this that I cannot explain."

"Forget it, I don't care where you come from, I only care about your unknowability."

Herta waved his hand dismissively and began to access his collection.

Your reward has been found.

The Herta displayed information about an item.

"Curio: Star-Surveying Probe. When the user holds it, the probe at the end guides the user back to their origin."

Thank you.

Sera breathed a sigh of relief upon hearing the Curio's function, but then worried whether Curio could overcome the limitations Lygus.

"Go find it in the storage room yourself. I'll go prepare the equipment first, and I'll come back and arrange a room for you when I'm done."

Sera nodded without saying anything more and headed towards the collection vault based on the map she had obtained while hacking the device.

The Herta hasn't built a space station to contain the Curio yet, so everything collected is piled up together. She's already studied them all and recorded their uses.

The Herta's house was quite large for Sera. Even with a Sera, it took her a long time to find the collection vault. Yes, Sera was a bit directionally challenged.

As soon as he entered, Sera saw Herta waiting for him inside.

"Where have you been? You've been gone for so long."

Herta stared at him expressionlessly. After tidying up her equipment, she noticed that Sera, who should have returned long ago, was still nowhere to be seen. When she arrived at the collection room, there was no record of Sera entering.

After waiting for a while, the Herta finally saw Sera, who had finished her long journey of searching.

Seeing the joy in Sera's eyes, as if she had finally reached her destination, she seemed to know the reason. Was this guy really like her? With this question in mind, Miss Herta wanted to observe this person who she intuitively felt was similar to her.

"I'm lost..."

Sera looked at Herta, who had clearly been waiting for her for a long time but was only showing some impatience, and felt a little awkward. For a genius, taking the time to wait for someone was already a sign that that person was very important.

Didn't you look at the map?

"I can see... and know where to go, but I still sometimes get lost."

Sera herself didn't know why; even though she had a map, she kept getting lost.

Perhaps this is his underlying logic, but Sera simply doesn't want it.

"You can't think of getting lost as just a conceptual ability, can you?"

Herta wanted to complain about what a strange thing this was, but he didn't say anything more and resumed his calm expression.

Herta's changing expression didn't escape Sera's notice. This genius seemed somewhat reluctant to express her emotions. Was it just her imagination? In the story, she always said what she wanted to say, and although she seemed a bit arrogant, she was mostly quite straightforward...

Could it be that she acted this way because she was still a girl and had no peers? Geniuses are mostly arrogant, especially since this galaxy has only produced a little over eighty geniuses throughout history.

What does it mean to be a genius? It means... having very few friends who can keep up with you and chat and laugh with you? Yes, the probability of three geniuses being born on the same planet in the same era, like in 2007, 2008, and 2009, is infinitesimally close to zero.

Elias Salas of the Genius Society invented Synesthesia Beacon and Telepathy to facilitate communication within the club. However, having grown up alone without anyone to understand him, how could a genius possibly learn to communicate with others?

Sera decided to do something; even geniuses should have the right to experience the joy of expressing their emotions.

"Alright, I've already taken the Curio for you. Try it again back in the lab."

Herta walked past Sera, saw him still standing there seemingly lost in thought, and called out to him.

"What are you waiting for? Follow me."

"Oh oh!"

Sera snapped out of her reverie and followed the Herta, but the idea had already begun to take root in Sera heart.

Could he change anything? Sera wasn't sure, but he knew that doing nothing was the only way to truly change nothing.