WeTried Translations

Translator: Hydrogen B

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◈ Omniscient First-Person's Viewpoint

Chapter 145

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The Road Flows with the Traveler - 1

The military state was a country of control.

An obsessive country that watched roads and railways to the smallest detail, with inspectors checking tickets one by one.

When a military vehicle that should have been running through the wasteland came onto a public road, the sentry on duty started inspection with more suspicion than ever.

If I had been alone, I probably would have ditched the vehicle somewhere secluded, snuck onto a train or regular route, and taken a long detour.

It's not that I couldn't.

I just didn't see why I should put up with that hassle.

If I wanted good bread, was I supposed to till the fields myself, set up scarecrows, water everything, nurse it along with care, then when the ears turned golden harvest it in tears, brutally pound it into grain, mill it into flour, knead it with devotion, bake it, and only then eat it?

At that point, I'd just pay and buy bread. That's the efficient way to use the economic system humanity built.

In short.

"So you are a Captain, sir! Loyalty! Please proceed!"

If you had one living pass, you got waved through automatically. No need to go out of your way and suffer.

Just having a captain in the driver's seat was enough. The guard didn't even check the passenger side. If the other party was a captain, there was no point.

"Ah, this is nice!"

I leaned back and shouted.

Captain AB, communications officer of the military state, stared forward with a deep frown and muttered,

"Do not get comfortable. Be aware of your position."

"A petty criminal released after serving his full term, heading to the capital with a military-state captain."

"...That is exactly why I have not restrained you."

The captain kept her eyes fixed on the road as she spoke.

"Do not forget this. Even if your workplace is gone, you are still suspected in connection with Nakseong. The only reason you are not currently detained is because you are traveling with me to Amitenggrad. If you make any suspicious move, or try to break away midway, I will arrest you immediately."

Captain AB had lived as a golem, and even in a body of soft flesh she spoke like iron. I didn't care. I kicked my legs up near the front, yawned wide, and asked,

"If that's how it is, you should've handed me over to that guard earlier. I'd have been arrested on the spot."

As I said it, I casually read her thoughts.

This was the answer in her head.

'Communications officers must not reveal their assigned mission or their post outside the [Windowless Room]. That is an absolute rule for communications officers who handle all forms of classified information. To hand over a prisoner's custody, I would need to explain circumstances, but doing so requires revealing my post. Contradiction....'

"...Classified."

She organized everything neatly in her head and still only said "classified" out loud. Maybe that was a communications-officer trait.

Either way, she was easy to read, which made asking questions fun. I asked again.

"And why go all the way to Amitenggrad? You could go to a nearby unit. Or send a message. Why is a communications officer not communicating?"

'If the [Windowless Room] is damaged for unavoidable reasons, or if the officer must leave it, all forms of communication to that officer are cut off due to leakage risk. The same applies to me; contacting other communications officers is forbidden.'

The Windowless Room was basically a giant twin-gem setup like what Callis and Lieutenant General Ebon used.

If a communications officer's room was damaged and the inside exposed, a signal was sent to the military state, and all communications officers were notified immediately.

Then all communication with that officer was completely severed, so no more information could leak out, in case that officer had been captured by the Resistance or an enemy state.

To restore that, she had to return to headquarters in Amitenggrad within two weeks.

The captain only went through that in her head, then answered a beat late.

"...Classified."

For something she called classified, her internal filing was way too clean. I read all of it without even trying.

"Fine, you can say classified, but why do you keep pausing half a beat?"

'To avoid possible information leaks, it is better to keep a fixed interval before every response than to answer immediately. In extreme situations, even a slight delay in reaction can itself become information.'

"...Classified."

Model behavior, really. From a mind reader's perspective, there wasn't an easier target. She felt like a manual that explained itself whenever prompted.

I read Captain AB the way you'd observe some rare life form.

She was a strange book.

A kind of encyclopedia. Full of disconnected information that existed only in passing. She had almost no personal "life," so the book branched out in chaos with no central thread.

What little she did have was trivial stuff, like communications-officer rules or ninety-nine ways to cook canned food.

Other than that, there were only a few memories: conversations with other communications officers, or things she'd glimpsed through a golem's perspective. The experiences that made her who she was felt unnaturally transparent.

The military state really was something else. They used people like components.

'In truth, the moment this one learned about the Windowless Room, I should have taken poison and killed myself.... But this one kept me alive. Why did this one save me? I do not understand.'

Why? Because I wanted revenge, obviously.

I was going to get revenge on the people who locked me up. That was all I could think about.

And of course the military state was on that list too. Small-minded commoner that I was, I wasn't forgiving anyone just because they were a nation.

Especially this woman. She was a communications officer handling all kinds of state secrets. If I kept her close and pulled information out of her, something useful was bound to come out.

Maybe I could even coax her onto my side.

'...This one knows I am a communications officer. A grievous mistake. What should... I do.'

Distracting thoughts crept into the captain's head, and those thoughts showed up immediately in the driving. The motor carriage, which should have been going straight, started swerving wildly left and right.

My legs, propped up in front, slammed back and forth with each jolt. Ah, so this was why people told you to sit properly in a car.

No, maybe just drive properly! I grabbed the handle and screamed.

"Aaaah! Drive straight!"

"......!"

"It's scarier that this is what happens when you stay silent and focus! Move over, I'll drive instead!"

"Ne...ga...tive...! I am... escorting...! I will... keep... the wheel...!"

"No, please! I'll go wherever you tell me! Let me drive! Just stop first!"

When I shouted, she turned her head toward me.

"I misheard...? Did you say to step on the right pedal to stop?"

"That's the accelerator! Fine, sorry! I won't distract you, just look ahead!"

Only after all that shaking did the steering finally settle down. I let out a relieved sigh and sat up straight.

"Be honest. This is your first time driving a motor carriage, isn't it?"

"Negative. I am familiar with operation. Golems also require movement, so I learned to operate many types of vehicles...."

I read her thoughts. She wasn't lying. How was that actually true?

"What? Really? Then what happened just now was psychological...?"

"...In a golem body."

"That suddenly makes me uneasy."

So in short, it was all secondhand experience. Wasn't she bad at using an actual body?

Well, whatever. She was sync-type. If she moved like a golem, she probably knew the sensations roughly....

"Even if there is an accident, it is not a problem. A golem can simply be recovered and repaired."

"This is your real body right now! Yours and mine, real bodies with warm blood! If we crash, we actually die, so slow down!"

At that, the captain jerked her head up and shouted.

"Real... body? Ah, affirmative! I am currently in my true body! I am feeling dizziness from the shaking!"

"Never mind that you're acting shocked like you just realized it, can you stop trying to feel reality by shaking the car?!"

The one lucky thing was that this road wasn't a difficult course, and once we were off it, I wouldn't have to witness the captain's horrible driving again.

One of the military state's seven great inventions, the pinnacle of civil engineering, the miracle of earth arts, their greatest achievement.

The Meta-Conveyor Belt would be waiting for us.

So the captain and I drove on, with our lives in danger, until the road finally ended.

Land flowing like a river. The Meta-Conveyor Belt.

A marvel that would shock anyone setting foot in the military state for the first time, and a fusion of civil engineering, earth arts, and arcane engineering. The military state's aorta.

A masterpiece literally built from the blood and sweat of hundreds of thousands.

The description was grand, but the thing itself was simple.

A giant conveyor belt responsible for most of the military state's logistics, circulating through half the country.

The entire ground moved at a fixed speed.

And that speed was faster than you'd think, fast enough to reach one end from the other in three days.

It crossed the military state to the coast, curved far upward, then came back again. Carrying all kinds of cargo, baggage, and people. Dropping off where needed, taking on more, and flowing on with the same steady force.

A massive bloodstream circulating half the military state.

Flowing earth, the epithet that gave Jiseon the name Gon-Gon-Rae. This endless, colossal current carried people and goods in one direction, silent and unshakable.

Northeastern Meta-Conveyor Belt waystation.

A point where a fast-moving stream split into ten branches, reducing speed to exactly one tenth.

A massive container followed one of those branches toward one of the waystations.

A cargo searchlight detected movement and lit up the container, and a huge crane draped with thick chains turned its head. A machine so immense it was nearly part of the landscape, creaking loud enough to be heard from far away whenever it moved.

Kugugugugugung.

A chain hook caught onto the container on the Meta-Conveyor Belt. Chains tightened in unison, and the giant container flowing along the ground gradually slowed. Screeching friction against earth. At the same time, the crane stretched and lifted the heavy container.

The steel body of the crane shuddered. The container was that heavy.

But a thunder wheel just as massive turned backward with a harsh metallic roar, and the chains and wires wound around it shrieked as they pulled tight. The sound of chain grinding against chain was like rolling thunder.

Cargo packed somewhere and shipped in that container reached the waystation and came off the conveyor belt. The crane that had seized it twisted toward the other side. A building-sized container hanging from chains and moving through the dark had an unmistakable physical weight to it.

An overwhelming sight just to look at.

Of course.

"Move, move, hurry up!"

At the overseer's order, the laborers who had connected chains to the container ran back against the belt, exhausted.

They had clung to moving containers to hook on the chains. Now they had to dismantle those containers and unload everything inside.

Delivery workers who had brought motor carriages, or ordinary horse-drawn carts, stood packed together waiting. Once the laborers unloaded the cargo, those workers would take it and deliver it across the region.

To factories, and all kinds of facilities.

It was happening all over the waystation. Running logistics on this scale took countless laborers. Dragged here from somewhere, they hurried about in fragile flesh between steel-bodied machines and flowing ground.

If the military state was steel, they were lubricant.

Laborers in a brutal nation, wedged between gears to prevent damage and keep the body turning.

To get on the Meta-Conveyor Belt, whether cargo or person, you had to specify the destination exactly. Otherwise you'd keep circling the military state and obstruct traffic.

But the captain's very identity was classified, so instead of speaking she submitted classified documents. The staff member panicked and ran to report to a superior.

A short while later, the captain and I were called into the waystation office.

"I am Colonel Calparus, chief of the Northeastern Waystation Management Office."

A middle-aged man with an imposing beard addressed me and the captain.

As expected of the military state's top infrastructure, even the officer managing this place was no ordinary figure. Not a general's adjutant, but a full colonel who had reached the rank on his own merit.

He was only a colonel because this was the northeastern waystation, basically a frontier post. At waystations in major cities, generals stood watch. The Meta-Conveyor Belt, the military state's aorta, was that important.

"Captain. You said this is a classified operation? You have orders, I assume."

"Yes, sir. Here."

The captain snapped a salute, took out the orders from inside her uniform, and handed them over. The colonel read them with a stony face.

"Two-week deadline from seal release. Four days elapsed. Level 4 classified. Cooperation requested from relevant personnel. Hm. Looks like only generals can see the contents. Not having stars is inconvenient."

The colonel grumbled and handed the orders back. The captain received them with both hands, tucked them at her side, and waited for his next words.

"Fine, understood. I'll authorize use of the boarding lane. It's late today, so receive the equipment you need tomorrow and depart then."

"Thank you, Colonel. However, this is an urgent mission for me. May I depart today?"

"Waystations are dangerous at night, even with searchlights. Two weeks is not such a tight limit. Give yourself one day of margin."

The colonel glanced at the wound on the captain's head and added,

"You don't look in very good shape either."

After being shown that much consideration, there was no way the captain could refuse. And he wasn't wrong.

At waystations where ten branches merged into one, all kinds of accidents happened. For example, a container not scheduled to stop here could merge in and turn anyone caught in between into ground meat. Or a chain hook might snag the back of your neck.

Daytime was safer. Since I couldn't read the thoughts of objects, I agreed wholeheartedly.

"...Thank you for your concern."

The captain accepted. Then the colonel's gaze shifted to me.

Unlike the captain, who had kept her uniform immaculate all the way here, I looked like an unemployed bum in a shabby shirt.

The colonel's thick brows drew tighter.

"...So who is this, joining you on a classified operation? Your lover?"

The captain's eyes widened at the sudden remark.

'Negative! This one is a suspect. I am merely escorting this one to Amitenggrad!'

But she couldn't explain that.

A communications officer's duties and status were classified. That was why they were given the nominal rank of captain in the first place.

The fact that she was a communications officer was information she could only reveal through communication protocol. If she told this colonel the whole story here, that itself would be a leak.

And besides, even my own charge was vague.

'...Though the charge is not yet proven.'

They said I caused Nakseong, but if I really had the power and intent to kill a general, would I obediently follow a captain to the capital?

Remove the suspicion and I was just an ordinary laborer. One who could no longer work because his workplace got "flipped."

...Whew. Good thing she hadn't seen anything else through golem eyes. I should thank the regressor who destroyed those golems ahead of time.

'I can list the suspicions, but that is beyond my authority. Also, contents I cannot mention...!'

The captain hesitated, unable to speak.

When no answer came, the colonel's eyes narrowed. His suspicion was turning toward me.

So much for keeping secrets. Tsk.

No choice. I lightly tapped the captain's shoulder and whispered just loud enough for the colonel to barely hear.

"What are you doing? Hurry up and tell him! Say I'm your oppa!"

If I was going to do this, might as well go with a fake identity.

At my sudden move, the captain glared at me with wide eyes. All kinds of thoughts poured out of those blue irises.

'Negative! Negative! What is this laborer saying as false report?! But denying this may itself count as classified leakage...! A dilemma!'

Ignoring her thoughts, I acted flustered and kept patting her shoulder.

"Why are you hesitating, Bbi! Hurry and say it! He's looking at me like I'm suspicious...!"

'Bbi?! Who? Surely not me?'

The captain fidgeted in panic.

"Hey!"

Instead, the colonel barked at me sternly. I flinched and looked at him. He clicked his tongue with a frown.

"Tsk. The personal information of someone carrying out a classified operation is classified too. Even if hiding family ties is pointless, how can the elder sibling run his mouth so carelessly?"

"Uh, s-sorry."

"Your citizen level?"

"L-level one...."

'Negative! This petty criminal is actually level zero! Even level one is impersonation!'

But the colonel couldn't read the captain's thoughts. Looking down at me, he clicked his tongue loudly and snapped,

"Tsk. You're nowhere near as competent as your younger sibling. Without your sibling, you couldn't even board the Meta-Conveyor Belt. Then again, that's why you're clinging to her!"

"Y-yes."

"Enough. Stop dragging your sibling down. I'm letting this slide because it's me. Anywhere else, you'd have been arrested on the spot!"

After scolding us harshly, the colonel waved us away. We bowed quickly and hurried out of the chief's office.

The captain didn't say a word while we were guided to the assigned lodging.

Instead, the moment she opened the door and stepped inside, she grabbed me by the collar.

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