My Robot Little Sister

After skillfully calling Fatty Liao and asking him to help request leave, Kraft took some milk and bread from the fridge for breakfast, then ran toward his workshop.

Pushing open the workshop door, Kraft uncapped the milk and gulped down two mouthfuls, then forcibly swallowed the bread he had stuffed into his mouth on the way over.

"Phew—almost choked to death…"

Kraft lightly pounded his chest with his fist and took another couple gulps of milk to calm himself down.

After tossing the empty milk carton into the trash, Kraft began drawing the robot’s blueprints.

Kraft did not actually need blueprints. He could have followed the memories from his dreams and reproduced the manufacturing process step by step. However, that would do little to hone his own skills. Since he now had enough money and time, with plenty of room for trial and error, he naturally chose the method that would better train his abilities.

Kraft had no plans to alter the initial version of the blueprints. Although quite a few designs seemed rather baffling to him, such as USB toes, a toaster for a head, and that oversized wind-up key the robot could not remove by herself.

Still, to play it safe, Kraft tried not to make any changes during his first attempt at building it.

"Hm?"

Kraft, who had been drawing the blueprints, suddenly turned his head and looked behind him in confusion. Then he stopped working and pulled up the workshop surveillance feed. Yet from beginning to end, the footage showed that he had been the only person in the workshop.

"Was it just my imagination…"

Kraft scratched his head, but still warily glanced behind him a few times. While drawing the blueprints just now, he had vaguely felt as though someone were watching him from behind. Kraft’s intuition was extremely sharp. This strange instinct had been with him ever since he could remember, and it had even saved him several times during his days on the streets. So he trusted his intuition deeply.

Of course, there were times when his intuition was wrong. Especially when Kraft had first discovered how useful it was, he would become terribly nervous at the slightest disturbance, only to later realize it had all been in his head. It had taken him quite some time to adjust, so after checking the surveillance footage and finding nothing suspicious, he did not dwell on it any longer.

Once Kraft returned to work, he quickly finished the blueprints. Then he deliberately blocked out the memories related to Dr. Dongyun’s robot-building process. He was already quite practiced at doing this. It was also related to the nature of his dream memories: unlike ordinary memories, every dream involving inventions and creations was like a separate file that he could access whenever he wanted. It was somewhat like a memory palace, though it only worked on Kraft’s dream memories.

After blocking out the relevant memories, Kraft began building the robot according to the blueprints he had drawn himself.

Once he started, he remained holed up in the workshop for over a week. Martin Lee had already returned from his business trip, yet Kraft still had not emerged from the workshop.

Dr. Dongyun had clearly built the robot in less than a day…

Kraft had only blocked the memories related to the construction process. He still remembered the other minor details.

I should’ve blocked those out too…

Kraft scratched at his hair, which had become a complete mess from being neglected for so long, and sighed inwardly.

"Hey! Kraft, did you stay up late again last night?"

Martin Lee walked in carrying a bag of soup dumplings. Seeing Kraft’s bloodshot eyes, he frowned.

"No, no."

Kraft hurriedly waved both hands. His work was nearly finished. If Martin dragged him back now, it would be such a waste.

"I just overused my eyes. If you don’t believe me, you can check last night’s surveillance footage. I went to sleep after eleven!"

"Really? But you promised me you would be asleep before ten."

Martin stared at Kraft with a stern expression.

"I was just so absorbed in my work that I forgot…"

Kraft moved closer to Martin and put on a flattering smile.

"I’ll set an alarm today. I’ll definitely go to sleep before ten!"

It’ll be finished today anyway. I just need to fool him for now!

"You said it!"

Martin had no idea what Kraft was scheming. He raised a hand and tapped twice at Kraft’s forehead from the air. At last, a smile appeared on his face, and he handed over the soup dumplings.

"Eat your breakfast."

"Oh! David’s soup dumplings!"

Kraft had just reached out to take them when Martin suddenly pulled his hand back.

"You haven’t washed up yet."

"…Fine…"

Kraft’s hands froze in midair before he helplessly lowered them. He shuffled toward the bathroom, looking back every few steps.

After finishing the breakfast Martin had brought, Kraft stretched his limbs and threw himself back into building the robot. By now, the robot’s overall structure was basically complete. All that remained were a few finishing details and the final connection to the power source.

The so-called power source was not the huge wind-up key on her back, but a device that converted food into energy. The blueprints placed this device in the robot’s abdomen. Put simply, Dr. Dongyun had actually designed a "stomach" for the robot.

Using food intake to convert into power…

That was completely unscientific!

Having returned from his business trip, Martin Lee was relatively free at work and did not hurry off. Instead, he watched with great interest as Kraft gradually assembled the nearly completed robot girl.

The kid has grown up…

Looking at the robot girl’s adorable face, Martin Lee rested his chin on his hand and gave Kraft a meaningful look.

Kraft: ???

"Hey! Martin! Why are you looking at me like that?"

Feeling uncomfortable under his gaze, Kraft could not help protesting.

"No, it’s nothing…" Martin Lee withdrew his gaze, then said earnestly, "Although this robot looks very cute, she is not a real human being."

"Of course I know that! I made her myself with my own hands!"

Kraft rolled his eyes at Martin, utterly baffled.

"Oh, all right. Maybe I misunderstood…"

Martin smacked his lips. Kraft’s reaction made him realize he had probably gotten the wrong idea.

"You’re acting all mysterious…"

Kraft curled his lip and did not investigate exactly what his adoptive father had misunderstood. The robot was already in its final stage, and he had no mind for anything else.

After installing the final energy device into the robot, Kraft closed the abdominal panel, pulled down her rolled-up clothes, and smoothed them flat. With excitement surging through him, Kraft flipped the final switch.

"Click… click-click-click…"

As the wind-up key on her back turned, the robot girl slowly opened her eyes.

"Kraft?"

The robot girl tilted her head and called out the name of the boy before her based on the information in her mind.

"Hahaha! I did it!"

Kraft excitedly hugged Martin beside him, then shook his head wildly up and down.

"That’s right! It’s me!"

Kraft rushed in front of the robot girl and started poking and prodding her all over.

"I actually made it! This is unbelievable!"

"W-Wait…"

The robot girl shyly covered her body and cried out in a soft, weak voice.

"H-H is bad behavior!"

"H my ass!"

Kraft smacked the robot girl on the forehead.

"You’re a robot! What’s there to H about!"

"Aw!"

The robot girl let out an adorable cry of pain, crouched down while clutching her forehead, and tearfully accused Kraft of his brutality with her eyes.

Martin Lee watched his adoptive son interact with the robot he had created, his face completely blank and his mind in utter chaos.

This is a fucking robot?!

The robot Kraft had created had exceeded Martin’s expectations. He had thought Kraft would at most build a humanoid mechanical doll, essentially an oversized toy. But seeing the robot girl’s rich expressions and the intelligence she displayed while communicating…

Aside from the wind-up key on her back, she was no different from an ordinary human!

After excitedly interacting with the robot for a while, Kraft turned to look at Martin Lee, who appeared calm on the surface while storms raged in his heart.

"Martin, can you help get Alice some identification papers?"

"Alice?"

Martin came back to his senses and looked at Kraft.

"Yeah, that’s the name I gave her."

Kraft pointed at the robot girl he had made and told Martin the backstory he had long prepared. "Alice Lee, Chinese name Li Mingnai. Your distant niece and my cousin."

There was no need to give Mingnai a Japanese identity. Keeping the name was enough. As for Alice, it came from Alice in Wonderland and was somewhat connected to dreams.

"But she clearly looks older than you."

"Generational rank! It’s about generational rank!"

Kraft waved his hand in annoyance. The Mingnai in his dreams looked like a high school student, but there was absolutely no way he would call her his older sister!

"All right," Martin smacked his lips. Kraft had made her himself, so he could call her whatever he wanted. "But…"

Martin pointed at the wind-up key on Alice’s back.

"With that thing there, won’t other people question Alice’s identity too? Can’t you remove it?"

"Sure."

Kraft casually pulled the wind-up key off Alice’s back.

"It’s just a decoration."

"Huh? Huh—?!"

Alice Lee stared at the wind-up key in Kraft’s hand with a face full of shock and asked from the depths of her soul, "Then why did you put it on me in the first place?!"

"Ummmm…"

Kraft pondered for a moment, then answered with Dr. Dongyun’s exact words. "Because it’s cuter this way?"

As he spoke, Kraft casually inserted the wind-up key back into place.

"Click-click-click…"

The reinserted wind-up key mischievously turned half a circle.

Alice Mingnai Lee: "That doesn’t make it cuter at all!!!"

Kraft: I suddenly understand why Dr. Dongyun designed the wind-up key now~

As for Mingnai’s wind-up key, I was pretty conflicted about it too. If I leave it in, it would be too easy to attract S.H.I.E.L.D.’s attention. If I remove it, though, it feels like Mingnai would lose a lot of her charm.

That stupid cat Zhongyuan had started fighting with his own hind leg again lately. He had originally been grooming himself, but somehow kicked himself while licking, and after a round of fighting, he bit down on his own bed and kept growling… He probably thought the bed had beaten him up…