I held a book, sitting quietly on the sofa as I read. Every now and then, I reached out to pick up a cup of sweet milk tea from the side table and took a sip, feeling utterly content.

Beside me, Lu sat absorbed with my laptop. Her entire focus was locked on the screen. Occasionally, she’d reach out to tap a few keys before diving back into whatever she was reading.

After dinner that evening, I’d taken Lu to a bookstore first, buying several cookbooks before heading home. Once inside, I immediately introduced her to one of humanity’s greatest inventions—the internet.

Thankfully, both our worlds shared the same common language. I only needed to teach her typing basics and how to use a search engine.

After spending half an hour showing her the essentials, I waited curiously nearby, eager to see what she’d search for first.

To my delight, after a moment’s thought, Lu slowly typed three characters onto the keyboard: [War History].

Want to understand a world with millennia of history? Searching war history was undoubtedly the most comprehensive starting point.

Conflict was inevitable among living beings. A world’s—or a race’s—development always intertwined with war. After all, might made right. War was the simplest, most effective way to resolve contradictions.

Of course, that wasn’t all war entailed. Studying war history wasn’t about tactics—it was about understanding why wars happened and the meaning hidden behind them.

A war’s true significance for a world never lay on the battlefield’s surface. What mattered was whether it brought something new into existence. War, after all, was often science’s first catalyst.

Having lived countless years—and now holding knowledge from two worlds—I grasped this easily. Lu did too.

Before her sealing, she’d been groomed as the Demon Emperor’s successor. Her education had covered vast subjects. Yet, after a thousand years trapped in slumber, I’d worried her mind might have grown rusty.

Clearly, I’d worried for nothing.

Her first search term—[War History]—pleased me. At first, Lu had seemed fascinated by this world’s technology. But after careful thought, she chose to begin with war.

War was science’s first catalyst. By tracing global conflicts, she’d naturally uncover the birth of weapons, the origins and roles of technology, even glimpses of politics. I was quite satisfied.

As for me? I simply brewed two cups of milk tea. Then I settled nearby with my cookbook, glancing occasionally at Lu—utterly absorbed in her research—and felt a wave of warmth wash over me.

*If only moments like this could last forever,* I couldn’t help but think.