WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Hydrogen B
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◈ Cyberpunk Chivalry ◈
Chapter 1: AFTERLIFE
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The world was entirely white.
A cold wind swept low across the endless snowfield, moaning softly. The snow that had fallen through the night slowly covered the ugly traces of blood, fire, and corpses.
The world was also very quiet.
The flames that had blazed as though they would swallow everything, the sword energy that had torn through the air, the shouts and screams, the sounds of flesh and bone being split apart, all had faded.
Only deep silence and a suffocating cold remained.
In the middle of that silent snowfield, two figures stood, barely holding themselves upright.
They stared at each other without moving.
Even when blood surged from their open wounds, they did nothing but stare.
One of them, the black-clad figure who had dared to call themselves the Heavenly Demon, was barely breathing.
The dark red demonic energy that had covered their body only moments before flickered faintly, like dying embers. Their body, once as strong as steel, was so covered in sword wounds that it seemed ready to crumble. Above all, the black blood they kept coughing up spoke of severe internal injuries.
Every sign pointed to their approaching death.
The swordfighter facing them was no different.
Dressed in worn white robes, they too stood at death's door.
Fresh blood had stained their once snow-white clothes red. Five blades were embedded in their body. As they took a shallow breath, one slipped free, leaving four. Their left arm was gone below the shoulder.
Yet their back remained straight, and their eyes still shone with a frostlike sharpness. Their gaze never left the Heavenly Demon, not even for a moment.
Since the day their sect had been wiped out, their life had existed for this moment alone.
Driven by a single, terrible desire for revenge, they had endured ordeal after ordeal, walking the line between life and death. Now they had reached the end of their vengeance.
At last, they had won.
But the price was their own life.
It was mutual destruction in the truest sense, though, strictly speaking, they had gotten quite a good deal. They had invaded the Demonic Cult's headquarters alone and slaughtered everyone. Now they would take the Heavenly Demon's life as well.
It was the end of decades of anguish.
The Heavenly Demon, barely able to stand, coughed up blood.
Bits of their organs spilled out with the dark red blood, but they paid them no mind. They looked at the white-clad figure through dim eyes and spoke.
"Kunlun Blood Immortal... That's what they call you now, isn't it? Heh. A fitting title, wouldn't you say?"
There was no burning hatred or arrogance in their voice. Instead, it held a strange familiarity.
"But it's missing something. How about Kunlun Blood Ghost instead? No matter how I look at you, you hardly seem like a Taoist."
Their opponent, the Kunlun Blood Immortal, answered quietly.
"Call me what you please. I abandoned the Way long ago."
The wind blew.
The Heavenly Demon finally collapsed, almost as though they had fallen to their knees.
A little time passed.
After pausing to catch their breath, they spoke again.
"...I've met many people since I entered the martial world. Countless swordsmen who called themselves great heroes knelt at my feet or became little more than pools of blood. Yet among all those wandering heroes, not one could match you. Isn't that amusing? The whelp from the Kunlun Sect, the very first person I met after announcing my arrival, was stronger than anyone else in the martial world."
The Kunlun Blood Immortal did not answer.
They simply watched their opponent in silence.
The Heavenly Demon seemed not to expect an answer. They kept muttering.
"It had been decided long ago. When I first met you, I had already conquered the Central Plains..."
The longer they spoke, the wider the smile on their lips grew. It was a hollow smile.
"I often dreamed of that day. The day I cut you down, only to let you slip away."
At that, the Kunlun Blood Immortal answered.
"What did you do, then?"
"I chased you down and killed you, whatever it took. You appeared in my dreams the next day, so I killed you again. I killed you over and over. Perhaps that's why this situation doesn't feel so unfamiliar."
"The same is true for me."
"Is it?"
"Yes. In my dreams, I died at your hands every time. I died over and over. Perhaps that's why this situation doesn't feel so unfamiliar to me, either."
"You died...? So I always won?"
"I killed you once, too. Only once."
"Oh? And when was that?"
"Just yesterday."
The Heavenly Demon finally burst out laughing.
"Hahaha! So you had a prophetic dream!"
Bloody foam surged up and burst from their mouth with their laughter.
"...Well, then? Are you satisfied now that you've gotten what you wanted? Is the end of your vengeance... sweet?"
A brief silence passed.
The Kunlun Blood Immortal murmured quietly.
"...I don't know."
"It always takes time for things to sink in."
"And what about you?"
"What about me?"
"Was there any meaning in conquering the Central Plains? Was it worth killing so many people?"
"Worth. Worth, you say..."
Their breaths were so faint that each seemed likely to be their last. With difficulty, the Heavenly Demon raised their head and looked at the Kunlun Blood Immortal.
"Did you know? I too entered the martial world for revenge."
"...What?"
"So there's no need to ask. We have walked the same path... We are fellow travelers on the Way."
They grinned.
Only the corners of their mouth rose beneath their lifeless eyes. It was a dead person's smile.
With that final smile, the Heavenly Demon fell.
For a great demonic villain who had ravaged an entire era, their end was terribly hollow.
"..."
Snow was still falling.
The Kunlun Blood Immortal slowly raised their head and looked up at the gray sky.
A cold snowflake settled lightly on their cheek. For the briefest moment, they felt its piercing chill.
That cold brought everything crashing down.
The Kunlun Blood Immortal, who had stood as firm as Mount Tai, slowly crumpled.
The fires of vengeance that had burned for decades had finally died, and the flame of their life had burned out with them.
Very slowly, very quietly, they closed their eyes.
The pure, clear scenery of Mount Kunlun seemed close enough to touch.
The blood-soaked Taoist gladly departed for that place.
Into the deep, quiet stillness.
Into the white snow.
They faded away.
A cold wind swept low across the endless snowfield, moaning softly. The snow that had fallen through the night slowly covered the ugly traces of blood, fire, and corpses.
The flames that had blazed as though they would swallow everything, the sword energy that had torn through the air, the shouts and screams, the sounds of flesh and bone being split apart, all had faded.
Only deep silence and a suffocating cold remained.
The world was entirely white.
The world was also very quiet.
In the middle of that silent snowfield, no one remained alive.
* * *
Death.
The end of existence. Absolute nothingness.
An eternal stillness without light, sound, or sensation.
Everything dissolved in the silence of that bottomless abyss, where even time lost its meaning. Every worry and pain, every joy and sorrow, mingled together and became peace.
Perhaps this was the rest they had longed for so desperately.
[!@#$_INIT_ERR]
How much time had passed?
A tiny crack appeared in that pitch-black peace.
[RECOVERY MODE ACTIVATED]
[SYSTEM INTEGRITY CHECK. . .]
Green strings of characters flashed into view and vanished. They could not understand what they meant. Like a small stone dropped onto still water, those short strings began to send enormous ripples through the darkness.
[LOADING BACKUP. . . OK]
[MEMORY FRAGMENT DETECTED. . .]
[CORE TEMP. . . UNSTABLE]
[POWER SOURCE. . . EXTERNAL]
[NEURAL MATRIX. . . ERROR]
[REATTEMPTING NEURAL SYNC. . .]
[SENSORY INPUT. . . RESTORED]
[VISUAL/AUDIO ONLINE]
[AWAKENING SEQUENCE. . . NOW<<<]
The final string flashed brightly.
At the same moment, the darkness that had seemed eternal lifted, and sensations came pouring in like a waterfall.
They were artificial sensations, horribly unnatural and unpleasant.
They could see.
But before them lay neither the white snowfield, nor the Heavenly Demon who had fallen moments earlier, nor a natural landscape worthy of an ink painting.
Dim, flickering orange lights.
Scraps of metal everywhere.
Fragments of plastic.
Bundles of thick cables and strange circuit boards.
The place was more than unfamiliar. They could not even begin to understand what any of it meant.
Those strings of characters appeared again.
[VISUAL CALIBRATION. . . DONE]
[AUDIO NOISE FILTERING ACTIVE]
Electronic beeping and the sounds of rusty machinery running.
It was the complete opposite of the silence they had experienced in their final moments.
They tried to cover their ears against the unfamiliar warning tones, but it was no use. They could not feel their arms. Their left arm had been cut off, but surely their right arm should still have been there.
It was not just their arms. They could not feel their legs, their torso, or anything else.
It was a bizarre sensation, as though only their head remained, floating in empty air.
Only strange visual and audio information flowed into their mind. It felt nothing like their last memory, nothing like the chill of the snowflake settling on their cheek.
"Did... it work? This thing's working, right?"
They heard a young girl's voice.
Wait, a girl?
Had there been a girl?
"Can you see me?"
The humanoid was nothing but a head mounted on a stand, left carelessly in a corner like trash. It adjusted its optical sensors to follow the moving figure.
Only then did the girl's image become clear.
Perhaps it was her hastily tied-up hair or her grease-stained jumpsuit, but she looked somewhat rough and crude.
Her features, on the other hand, were sharply defined.
Her face had a cold look that could almost be called haughty.
Yet her behavior was nothing like that.
She clenched both fists and let out a little cry.
Seeing her like that, she seemed every bit a young girl.
Her clothes, her looks, her behavior: nothing quite fit together. She was a confusing girl.
"It worked!"
She shouted and circled the workbench in excitement, then stood in front of the humanoid again.
The girl moved left and right, striking odd poses. The optical sensors glowed blue-green as they moved from side to side, following her.
"I knew it! I'm a genius!"
Suddenly, she leaned in until her nose almost touched the metal head and hugged it with both hands. She looked truly happy.
The humanoid was not.
They had not the slightest idea what was going on.
Even the girl's words were in a strange language they had never heard in their life. They could not understand a single thing she said.
It was frustrating.
They wanted to say something, anything.
To ask where they were, who this young lady was, and why they looked like this.
But no voice came out.
Every time they tried to speak, those strings of characters appeared.
[VOICE OUTPUT MODULE. . . OFFLINE]
[ERROR:HARDWARE NOT DETECTED]
[RECORVERY ATTEMPT. . . FAILED]
[CONNECTION UNSTABLE]
Never mind a voice, they did not even have arms or legs. All they could do was blink the optical sensors on their head furiously.
The girl watched them for a moment, then tilted her head.
"Huh? What's wrong? Can't you talk?"
Sensing that something was wrong, she picked up a data pad beside the workbench and quickly worked its controls. Soon, her expression grew serious.
"You're right. All the other modules are fried. I guess you could say the main core is barely running. Looks like half the memory section is gone, too."
After muttering to herself, the girl looked back at the humanoid, at them. Unlike before, her gaze was calm and watchful.
For a moment, her eyes seemed to gleam coldly.
It was entirely different from the bright, cheerful manner she had shown until then.
"No. It makes no sense to look for another core now. I should be grateful for this much. As long as the main core isn't damaged, that's enough. I can fix everything else. It's okay. I can do it. I'm a genius."
That sharp look was already gone.
Her expression softened again, and she moved a little closer.
"You might be uncomfortable right now, but just hang in there. I'll have you good as new in no time. I'll give you arms and legs, and get your voice back, too. So... once I've fixed you up, then..."
The girl pursed her lips for a moment, then shook her head hard and brought her face even closer. Her playful smile filled their vision.
"You're going to help me. Got it?"
She pointed at her own face.
"My name's Akina. Akina Greenwood. I'm counting on you!"
They still could not understand a word she said.
Except for one thing.
They could vaguely make out that this girl's name was "Akina Greenwood."
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