"Where is this?"
Alex felt a wave of disorientation. When he opened his eyes, his cramped little room had transformed into a massive library.
"What's going on? Did I transmigrate? Just like that?"
As a longtime fan of anime and manga, he accepted the situation surprisingly quickly.
Curious, he looked around. The place was enormous—shelves packed with books stretched endlessly in every direction, like an infinite archive.
A flood of memories rushed in, and Alex pieced together his new reality. This was the Xianzhou Luofu, specifically the Divination Commission's repository. He was now an archivist and clerk there—a role that basically made him a librarian.
In his old life, landing a steady government job like this would have been considered striking gold.
From a guy who spent his days grinding games to a Xianzhou civil servant? If his buddies back in his hometown heard about it, they'd be insanely jealous.
"*Honkai: Star Rail* world... it's pretty dangerous... but at least I'm on the Xianzhou."
Knowing he was on the Luofu gave him some relief. In this universe, ordinary people were safe under the Alliance's protection.
"Speaking of which, where's my system? Transmigration without a cheat is pointless! Come on, give me something awesome!"
Alex waited... and waited. Nothing. Annoyed, he reached into his pocket for his phone to kill time.
His fingers met something cool and smooth instead. He pulled it out—a jade tablet.
"Oh, right... this is a Xianzhou jade message."
He remembered now: the Xianzhou used jade tablets as mobile devices, all carved from polished jade.
He stared at the dark green, glass-like slab in his hand.
"In my old world, wouldn't this be some ultra-rare imperial green jade? Worth tens of millions, easy?"
He didn't actually know much about jade—he was just guessing—but he followed the muscle memory from his new body's memories and activated it.
The interface felt a lot like a smartphone; he picked it up fast.
"Let's check the latest news to figure out the timeline. That way, when Phantylia shows up, I can steer clear."
He had no intention of warning Jing Yuan or Fu Xuan ahead of time. Explaining how he knew would be impossible and would only cause massive headaches.
"Hmm? The Aetherium Wars offline Champion Tournament is about to kick off in Changletian?"
Scrolling through the news feed, the headline about Aetherium Wars jumped out at him and instantly triggered old memories.
Aetherium Wars was just a casual side mode in the game—players jokingly called it "*Honkai: Star Rail* Pokémon." You collected monster data and battled with it.
Calling it a stripped-down Pokémon clone wasn't far off.
Alex, curious whether the real version here differed from the game, dug deeper.
Nope. It was identical.
"This kind of thing gets popular? If I dropped real Pokémon on them, the whole galaxy would lose its mind."
After muttering that complaint, he was about to move on to the next article.
**"Ding! Host's intention to create a game detected. Game Producer System successfully bound. Please create and promote the Pokémon game, establishing its initial fame in this world. Mission reward: 1000 game points.**
**First-time binding bonus: Pokémon Red/Green game cartridge + the original Pokémon anime series."**
"The system is finally here?!"
Hearing that classic chime, Alex dropped the jade tablet in shock and immediately checked the system details.
It called itself a "Producer System," but it was really just an exchange shop for games.
You spent game points to redeem titles.
Points came from system missions... or, more importantly, from releasing games: the more players, the higher the buzz and discussion, the more points you earned.
Too bad he couldn't redeem actual Pokémon or anything tangible like that.
Alex shook his head and pushed those thoughts aside. Even so, getting the original game cartridge was already a huge win.
With the world's first legendary IP as his foundation, releasing it should rake in massive popularity and money, right? He'd be set for life.
After reassuring himself, he claimed the reward: a cartridge and a classic Game Boy handheld.
A bad feeling crept over him.
"Please don't be what I think it is..."
His hands shook as he powered on the console. The iconic Pokémon opening theme started playing.
The screen lit up with crude black-and-white pixel art.
Alex's face fell. He had zero interest in continuing.
"Damn it! This is the *Honkai: Star Rail* world! Who the hell would play this ancient thing here?!"
Furious, he hurled the Game Boy to the floor.
"System! Did you give me the wrong version?"
"System! Hey! Get out here!"
No matter how much he yelled, the system stayed silent.
In the end, he gave up.
The device, being system-produced, wasn't even scratched.
But staring at it, Alex could only sigh.
"My get-rich-quick dream... dead before it even started..."
Any gamer knows that as technology advances, players' expectations rise. Forcing people used to stunning 3D graphics and holographic experiences to play primitive black-and-white pixel art would be pure torture.
In a modern game store here, this thing would be ignored at best—or mocked.
Even the "pixel art revival" games from his old world looked polished compared to this raw original.
And this was *Star Rail*: a world already full of holographic battles like Aetherium Wars, VR titles, and full virtual realities.
Even if you ported this to a mobile device, it would look pathetic next to everything else.
Worst of all: without the anime backing it up, Pokémon was just an average, repetitive game that could flop hard.
That was exactly the problem the original Pokémon faced back on Earth.
Its core loop was old-school and monotonous—even then, it didn't perfectly match player habits.
It survived thanks to passionate fans who loved the brand and stuck with it.
Alex had been one of those kids: watching the anime, dreaming of having a Pokémon, then grinding the games like crazy.
But even he eventually got bored as time passed.
Still, now that he'd transmigrated with a system, he wasn't ready to quit.
"Looks like I really have to build a new version from scratch..."