WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Haruto
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ A Gacha Addict's Life in Fusionpunk ◈
Chapter 30: Goal: The Nobel Peace Prize (2)
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1.
In this world, wine was a luxury ordinary people could never dream of.
The logic was simple.
A vineyard heavy with grapes in a cramped world containing all of humanity?
That was practically a lavish structure in itself.
It was classified as a luxury even in Aden. In Necropolis, it went without saying.
“This is good wine. Have some. Ah, what’s your name?”
“Cedric.”
In other words, Ceres had invited me into her home and served me wine.
It meant she was treating me as an honored guest.
That felt strange.
This was the first time across all the iterations that Ceres had acted like this.
Usually, her line was, “You have good eyes. Crazy eyes.”
Was this because of my Understanding of Death?
Was it related to the necromancer build tree?
“If you came all this way, you must have had a purpose. What brings you here?”
“Before that, I’d like to know why you wanted to hire me.”
“At a negotiation table, the party at a disadvantage shows their hand first.”
“Hmm, fair enough.”
I’d find out eventually.
For now, I needed to focus on the situation at hand.
“I came to make you an offer you can’t refuse. Before that, shall we build a little trust?”
“Trust?”
Ceres was an incredibly suspicious person.
I had to overcome that suspicion before we could talk.
I summoned an assistant.
“Please call your chauffeur, Julien, here. I’ll show you something interesting.”
At the unexpected request, Ceres pressed a button on the intercom with an intrigued look.
“You called for me, Director?”
What followed was familiar.
“I did not name a goat after you and fuck it, Director! Absolutely not! Are you questioning my loyalty?!”
“...Yes, that reaction is far too suspicious...”
Julien, the goat fucker whose filthy fetish had been exposed, was erased with a single gesture from Ceres.
“Cedric, was it? It’s impressive that you found out about one of my employee’s indiscretions, but... is that all you came for?”
“No. Think of it as a deposit to earn your trust.”
“And?”
“I intend to stop Project Z.”
Straight to the point.
“You leaked company secrets because you also wished to stop Project Z, Director Ceres.”
It was quite the shocking declaration.
Yet Ceres remained calm, not even twitching at my surprise announcement.
If I hadn’t known the future, I might have thought I’d guessed wrong.
“Go on.”
I continued without hesitation.
“You leaked the documents to Yiming of the Xuan Family in hopes that Overnus Pharmaceuticals would intervene, but... that bastard betrayed you. He reported you to Director Gisela instead.”
Once again, Ceres’s expression did not change.
Instead, she slowly took a cigarette from her case and exhaled a long stream of smoke.
The lipstick on the filter looked sensual.
“Phew... So?”
“I don’t know whether the other board members are aware, but Gisela certainly knows. Before long, the two of them will join hands and come after you, Director Ceres.”
“Ahahaha! Those two? Come after me?”
Ceres burst out laughing.
It was a laugh of utter disbelief.
Hey! This isn’t the time to laugh, damn it!
You’re really going to die!!!
I grew a little anxious.
Ceres wanted to stop Project Z.
I planned to ride that momentum and make this iteration a little easier.
But there was one important problem.
Half of this was a gamble.
I had no idea how strongly Ceres wanted to stop Project Z.
For me, it was tied to my lifelong goal of putting Arbel in a Reverse Bunny Suit...
But for Ceres, it might be something that would be nice if it worked out, but no big deal if it didn’t.
Even in the previous iteration, the only “effort” Ceres had made to stop the project was leaking information.
It couldn’t be helped.
Ceres didn’t know this was directly tied to her life.
I had to make her take it more seriously.
“Of course, I know you’re strong, Director Ceres, but... they’ve prepared thoroughly as well.”
“Hmm, did they prepare poison or something?”
I flinched.
Did Ceres already know about the Formless Poison?
“What are you so surprised about? Everyone knows the Xuan Family uses poison.”
So they were the Sichuan Tang Family.
Then what the fuck? You knew that, but you still kept stuffing yourself with whatever and got yourself killed?
“So what is this offer?”
“Yes, let’s stop Project Z together, build good karma, and attain nirvana.”
Ceres ground out her cigarette as she considered it.
“Thank you for bringing me interesting information, but I’ll refuse.”
After thinking it over, her answer was rejection.
“There are three reasons. First, there is no reason for me to take the word of someone I met for the first time today at face value. You seem to have picked up some useful information somewhere, but all you have are words. You have no evidence to support them.”
“Second, I would like to stop Project Z if I can, but I’m not desperate enough to confront Twilight Resource Development head-on.”
“Third and finally, even if I wanted to stop Project Z... why would I need you as a partner?”
Wow. Good question.
If only she’d used that clever brain of hers to avoid eating things she found on the floor, Mama Ceres might have survived the previous iteration.
Agh!!! This is so damn frustrating!!!
Why are you acting so smug? You’re going to die pulling that tough-guy act, you bitch!
Saying, “I saw the future! You’re really going to die!” would be the worst possible move.
The claim itself lacked credibility, and it was against the rules of the genre.
A regressor blabs about their insanely useful regression ability and reveals the future to everyone around them?
That never ends well.
I’d either be tortured while screaming, “I only know two weeks of the future!” or turned into a brain in a jar.
Instead.
“Then, in exchange for stopping Project Z together, I’ll break your Commandment.”
I only needed to offer a carrot.
“What are you?”
At those words, Ceres’s relaxed demeanor turned vicious.
Pressure squeezed my heart.
An overwhelming presence.
Hostility and wariness reflected in her eyes.
My lips went dry.
“I’m Cedric. The eldest son of Count Montraven’s House, driven out of Aden. The man who’ll end your bondage play. And a Nobel Peace Prize candidate.”
I had a rough idea.
What I had seen through the monocle were complexes or facts someone desperately wanted to hide.
To Ceres, I was a suspicious person who had immediately seen through one of her secrets and offered a solution.
“I understand you’ve been secretly researching a way to break a Commandment. Am I wrong?”
Put another way, that would make me seem all the more mysterious.
From our first meeting, I had exposed her chauffeur’s misconduct.
I had brought up Project Z and narrowed down the list of traitors.
I had even seen through her desire to break the Commandment she kept hidden.
See?
This was why retail investors couldn’t beat institutions.
The quality and quantity of information they possessed were different.
Ceres twisted her lips in irritation.
“You’re pissing me off. A mage’s Commandment can never be broken. Do you take me for an idiot?”
Wow, what a fucking relief.
The worst case would have been Ceres considering even her Commandment no big deal.
But that line had made it certain.
“You didn’t kill me on the spot after I said that because you want to cling to even the slightest hope, don’t you?”
“...”
Breaking her Commandment was a serious matter to Ceres.
“I guarantee it. I will break your Commandment, no matter what it takes. Of course, no advance payment. If you plan to threaten me and force me to do it somehow, give up now. I’ll kill myself immediately.”
After a long silence.
Ceres stared directly into my eyes before opening her mouth.
“Fine. I’ll let myself be fooled. But if you’re trying to fool me with that glib tongue of yours...”
“Castrate me and send me to the male brothel district.”
A perfect finish.
“Deal?”
Ceres took the hand I offered.
“A male brothel district won’t be enough.”
“What will happen to me?”
“I’ll make you regret being born.”
Hmm, something the Fed chair often said.
...But what the hell was Ceres’s Commandment anyway?
2.
Anyway, I had successfully formed a united front with Ceres to stop Project Z.
Now it was Ceres’s turn to satisfy my curiosity.
“Can I ask now? Why did you want to hire me when we first met? We were complete strangers.”
I’d been genuinely curious about this from the start.
Earlier, she had said something about liking my eyes.
But this iteration was definitely different.
It wasn’t, “Your resume and interview were both impressive, but...” She had recruited me on the spot.
And she hadn’t even tried to pluck out my eyes.
“Because you have aptitude as a mage.”
“For the death branch, perhaps?”
“Yes.”
“That’s good. I never told anyone, but ever since I was young, my dream has been to become a necromancer.”
Ceres casually tossed out a question.
“Want to learn?”
“Really?”
What was this?
Really? I had just laid the groundwork, and it was this easy?
Was this a mage class-change event for Cedric, the fucking weak-ass Grade 9 fixer?
“I’m personally curious. I want to know how far you can go.”
This was an opportunity I couldn’t miss.
“I’ll teach you one simple Rank 0 spell.”
“Not lesser magic, but true magic! Can I really learn something like that?”
“You’re a noble, so you must have mana circuits.”
“I have no talent. There isn’t a single spell I can use. I can’t even use lesser magic.”
I had already tried when I first came to this world.
But magic wasn’t something you could do just by having mana circuits and mana, then pressing a button.
They said you had to begin by feeling the flow of mana...
I gave up around my second day.
To me, it was as absurd as being told to feel the blood flowing through my veins.
“That can happen. I can’t handle branches opposite to my aptitude at all, either. Do you know the Three Elements of Magic?”
“Mind, skill, and body? More or less. Like the mind-skill-body virginity theory.”
“That’s right.”
“First, body.”
No matter how grand the magic, it ultimately began from the human body.
Bloodlines developed through the accumulated passage of time and history.
The innate mana circuits woven within them were more important than anything else.
Even with the same spell, completely different effects could manifest depending on the shape of one’s circuits.
That was why crude artificial circuits could perform lesser magic but never reach the level of true magic.
“At least you’re at the starting line. As a noble, you must come from a proper family of mages.”
Next was skill.
It referred to technique and finesse, but it applied exactly the same way to the mind-skill-body theory of mages.
“Magic is a staircase toward ascension, a miracle wrought through knowledge. It is never the product of chance. No matter how excellent one’s bloodline and constitution, if reason cannot control it, it is like putting a child on a fine horse.”
“Even with the same mana and circuits of the same quality, the difference in skill can make someone Rank 0 or Rank 2.”
A piano was an easy example.
Even if the keys and tuning were the same, a pianist and an ordinary person would be completely different.
Finally came mind.
Mind was the heart, in other words, the mindscape.
“Magic is forcing your own world upon the world. But the self is so small.”
“If this real world is an ocean, the world an individual can contain is no more than a drop of water.”
“To stir the surface with that one drop and create waves... you need an overwhelmingly powerful self.”
“You must project a resolute, vivid mindscape onto the world.”
I knew the theory.
That was also why mages were out of their minds.
Think about it.
They were the sort who could free-fall without a parachute while imagining, without the slightest doubt, that they were flying.
They were the sort who could put their hand into blazing molten metal and think, It’s cold.
“Then, shall we try a simple aptitude test?”
Ceres stood and covered my eyes with her hand.
Her hand was cool, and it still smelled refreshingly of lemons.
Something soft pressed against the back of my head.
“Oh.”
We weren’t that close in this iteration, were we?
Not that I minded!
“For one minute starting now, I’ll show you ‘death.’”
“What?”
The moment I asked at those chilling words.
My five senses vanished as if someone had switched off the power.
First my sense of smell, hearing, sight, and touch, then even my sense of direction.
It felt as though I had been flung out of reality and exiled into a distant abyss.
Before I knew it, I had been cast into pitch-black darkness.
Thoughts spun uselessly, and I felt my existence become tiny, tiny, and meaningless.
“What? Did I die?”
This was that place.
The place I went before regressing.
Did she snap my neck from behind?
That didn’t make sense. The Iteration Results hadn’t appeared.
As I panicked for a moment, my vision cleared.
“How was it?”
Ceres smiled in front of my stunned face.
“You asked for this, so you can’t blame me.”
She wore a triumphant smile, as though she had taught a cocky puppy a lesson.
So this was what it meant to show me the mindscape of death?
That was what I had just seen?
“Yeah, well. That was quite a sight. Does this mean I can use magic now?”
The moment I answered.
For the first time since meeting Ceres.
I learned that she could make that kind of face.
“...???”
Her mouth hung slightly open in a dazed, almost stupid expression.
Footnotes:
The Sichuan Tang Family is a common martial arts fiction archetype associated with poisons.
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