WeTried Translations

Translator: Hydrogen B

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◈ Omniscient First-Person's Viewpoint

Chapter 147

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The Road Flows with the Traveler - 3

Even without their senses, humans can still recognize unfamiliarity.

The bed was fairly comfortable, and the room was narrow but clean. Still, I didn’t sleep deeply. My body hadn’t adjusted to this unfamiliar place.

"Wake up."

A subtle difference in pillow height. A slightly different posture from the softer mattress. A little warmer and dustier than the Abyss. On top of that, noise from outside kept needling at my nerves.

At the tip of my nose lingered the smell of military soap and dry grass. An unfamiliar smell. Not unpleasant, but irritating: the smell of the military state. Mixed into it was a dry, crisp air.

"Wake up.... Wake-up request attempted three times. I judge further attempts to be meaningless."

Even the sound by my ear was unlike anything I’d heard before. All those sensations kept disturbing my sleep. It was so light that one word from someone could wake me.

"In accordance with response protocol, I will initiate forced wake-up protocol."

Wait. Why did that sound familiar?

"Wheeeeeeeeeeeeen!"

"Gyaaaaaaah!"

Startled by the sudden noise, I rolled across the bed. I sprang up in a hurry, and there stood the captain, already fully dressed in uniform, staring right at me.

She looked perfectly calm, like she had no idea what she’d just done. I shouted at her.

"Why are you yelling like that?!"

"It has been ten minutes past wake-up time. You did not wake even after I turned off my alarm and finished preparing, so I had no choice but to execute forced wake-up protocol."

"Just tap me instead! That’s way better!"

The captain nodded.

"First priority is request, second is warning, third is use of force. Direct physical contact with another person’s body should be deferred until later."

"No, that warning is as intense as use of force! It feels like getting punched in the eardrum, so just wake me gently by tapping my shoulder!"

"I refuse. If I approach close enough to touch your body directly, there is a risk of damage from reflexive flailing of limbs."

"Captain AB, that’s your real body right now."

The captain blinked twice and shouted.

"Ah!"

God, what an idiot.

How long had she lived as a golem that she still couldn’t adjust to her real body?

"And even if I flail, it won’t hurt you anyway. Next time, just pat my shoulder to wake me."

"...Input accepted."

The captain gave a reluctant nod.

After inserting the clothing packet, we went downstairs and ate the provided breakfast. Bean canned soup with standard-issue bread filled our stomachs, and with our travel passes in hand, we headed straight for the Meta-Conveyor Belt waystation.

A supply officer saluted the captain, then quickly checked our passes.

"Amitenggrad waystation. Two personnel, travel time approximately three days. Please take sleeping bags for overnight use, multipurpose lamps, canteens, and rations. Would you like packet sleeping bags? We also have non-packet sleeping bags for those short on magical energy."

"Please give this officer a packet. As for this...."

The captain glanced at me. I scratched my head, pretending to be awkward.

"I’ll take a non-packet one. Unlike Bbi, I’m a little short on magical energy."

'Bbi?! Still?!'

I was only level one, but maybe because I was supposedly the captain’s family, the supply officer answered politely.

"Understood. A non-packet sleeping bag for your older brother. Performance may be lacking, so please make good use of the straps."

'Negative! Not older brother...! Urgh! Endure! Once we board the Meta-Conveyor Belt, this will all end anyway!'

Would it, though? Did she really think I’d throw away this fun forged identity just because I boarded the Meta-Conveyor Belt?

Ha. Not a chance.

Once we had all our supplies, AB and I headed to the waystation.

Even while everyone slept at night, the ground flowed and cargo arrived. So what was the solution?

Simple. Don’t let the laborers sleep.

Cargo arriving overnight still had to be unloaded, so laborers worked in day and night shifts. The night shift workers had deep fatigue carved under their eyes, glancing back and forth between containers approaching from afar and the day shift coming to relieve them.

Some of them heard us and brightened, thinking we were relief. Then they saw who we were, fell into visible disappointment, and turned away in case they caught the captain’s eye. Sighing, they readied themselves both to sprint for cargo at any moment and to begin shift handover.

We passed them and headed to the boarding lane.

The "people" who rode the Meta-Conveyor Belt were long-distance travelers, especially soldiers reassigned to other regions or carrying out operations. Unlike cargo, they could board and disembark by their own will.

So at the waystation where people got on and off, crisp guards stood in place of shabby laborers.

"Confirmed, Captain. And the captain’s older brother."

'Neg... I’m tired even of denying it. I just want to leave....'

Judging by the fact that her expression didn’t change, she seemed to have received some training. If not, maybe she’d just given up on everything.

"Estimated arrival is noon in three days. Please disembark from the flow on time. Otherwise, you will make one extra full loop in an unceasing current."

Even a plain statement of fact sounded witty on the Meta-Conveyor Belt. Those engineering corps workers who had been at this for twenty-five years weren’t strutting around for nothing.

Really, without this thing, the military state would have collapsed long ago.

The gate opened with the guard’s salute. The captain returned it, and I gave an awkward half-bow with one hand slightly raised, like a clueless civilian copying what he saw. The guard did not return my greeting.

'Must be nice, having a captain as your younger sibling. Riding the Meta-Conveyor Belt for free and all. Tch, why can’t my little brothers get into some officer academy....'

Leaving behind that guard, upright in posture and rotten in thought, we stepped onto the flowing ground.

The moment our feet touched, our bodies tilted for a split second. Then we quickly regained balance.

Waystation speed was one tenth of the main flow. At this pace, you could barely even wobble. I looked at the waystation slowly drifting away. Even the slowest motor carriage was faster than this, so the world looked as slow as someone taking a leisurely walk.

But then.

A tributary flowing in from another waystation merged into one stream. The Meta-Conveyor Belt gradually began to speed up.

Containers passing this point went straight through the waystation. Right after that, at the merge point, the containers that had looked tiny in the distance drew closer until they filled my field of view.

At the same time, speed became real. Before long, wind was whistling hard past my ears.

It was a bizarre sight. I was clearly standing on the same ground, and it was still solid. Yet the scenery rushing past outside kept changing.

It felt like the world had left us behind and was running backward.

A nearby sign disappeared while leaving us behind. A distant tree drifted lazily to the rear. Even so, the world around us stayed the same.

The wind blew. The proof that this ground was racing forward was the wind’s stillness. Wind moved sometimes, but on the larger scale it was still, so every time the Meta-Conveyor Belt advanced, that stillness hit us as headwind.

Symbols of stillness and flow had reversed, and the mismatch howled.

"...Cold wind. Quite fierce. A sensation I have not felt before...."

The captain, in her instructor uniform, gripped her hat tightly so it wouldn’t blow away. Meanwhile, I wrapped my face in my flapping sleeping bag and shouted.

"What do you want to do? Stay bundled up in sleeping bags here, or walk and look for other people?"

"...Walking would be better. I cannot agree with searching for other people, but a windbreak seems necessary."

"Great. Let’s go!"

We each took one step.

I went against the ground, and the captain went in the direction it was moving.

After three steps each, we realized the other wasn’t following. We both snapped our heads around. The captain, still clutching her hat, shouted from ahead.

"Should we not naturally go forward? Walking backward despite being able to arrive faster is an act against the mission!"

"You want to move with this wind in your face? Don’t be ridiculous. It’s bad enough taking it on our backs. How are we supposed to go forward!"

"I cannot neglect the mission over something trivial like wind!"

"You’re calling this wind trivial? Go against it and your body will fly away! We should obviously search while walking to the rear!"

Our opinions ran parallel.

No helping it. To resolve this kind of tiny conflict, there was only one precious human institution left.

I raised my fist high and shouted.

"Let’s settle it with rock-paper-scissors!"

The captain firmly shook her head.

"Negative. Impossible. I cannot decide mission attitude with something like rock-paper-scissors."

"Oh, come on!"

Was this diligence, or was she just stubborn as a brick wall?

How had the military state even produced someone like this? If every military-state citizen obeyed orders voluntarily like Captain AB, this country would have stayed rich and strong forever.

"I really didn’t want to use this method."

Still, going forward was insane. Rather than walking against that wind searching for a windbreak with no guarantee, I’d rather tank wind-element attack magic.

So this was your doing, Captain.

I spun around.

"...? Why are you turning back? I said we should go forwa-"

"Catch me if you can!"

I bolted backward. The captain stared at me fleeing in shock, then pointed at my back and chased me.

"Ah! Stop! Separation from this officer is not permitted!"

"Hahahaha! If people stopped just because someone said stop, why would officers and laws even exist! Catch me! Only then will I stop!"

"Warning...! If you do not stop, I will use force!"

"You don’t have any force worth shit! Not a damn thing!"

And just like that, with the captain trailing behind me, I ran backward across the largest belt in the world.

Maybe running in her real body instead of a golem still felt awkward, because the captain fell twice while chasing me. I almost turned back when I saw her clutching her reddened nose, but in this harsh world, running on your own two feet was basic survival training.

I told myself it was training, swallowed my tears, and kept running with determination.

'This vivid pain.... This sensation of riding the wind.... Things I could never feel in a golem with pain control. Truly, this officer is running in her real body....!'

What was I supposed to do? I felt too bad to keep running. At this point, wasn’t the military state the real problem for raising a puppeteer like a puppet?

Just then, I spotted a windbreak in the distance. I subtly slowed so the captain could catch me. She ran toward me with a proud expression.

"Got you!"

Uh, then why isn’t our speed dropping-

"Gyaaah!"

A heavy impact slammed into my back. The captain had tackled me without slowing down. Even for me, a full-body weighted tackle was hard to endure, so I rolled across the ground.

The captain climbed on top of me, grabbed my arm tight, and declared proudly,

"I issue a firm warning. If you arbitrarily separate from this officer after this point, this officer will restrain and escort you by whatever means nece-"

Clap clap clap.

Applause sounded from somewhere.

At the sound by her ear, the captain whipped her head up.

On the belt, dozens of meters away, stood a structure that looked like it had popped straight out of the ground. A windbreak.

Someone stood skillfully atop that bulging windbreak, shaped to let wind flow around it. A middle-aged man with a bold, sharp look stood with his arms folded, clapping as he watched us with clear interest. In this fierce wind, his body did not sway in the slightest.

He smiled like a mischievous brat far younger than his age.

"What a noisy entrance!"

The moment he finished speaking, faces appeared from both sides of the windbreak, people hiding from the wind. They looked at the new travelers with half expectation, half worry.

Meanwhile, the captain’s gaze locked onto the middle-aged man atop the windbreak.

Then came shock. Pure shock filled her mind.

'...?! Why is he here?'

While the captain fell speechless at the sudden appearance, I got up, dusted myself off, and pointed at the windbreak.

"Bbi! It’s a windbreak! It’s cold, so let’s get in there quick!"

'So again, negative on Bbi! This officer does not recall permitting a nickname from you! This officer has also never had a nickname called Bbi! And!'

Now that we were on board, I had to play the captain’s older brother. I kept acting calm and called out to the man on the windbreak.

"Looks like there are people there! Hello! Can we come in too?"

'You stop first! Entering there requires... deeper consideration...!'

The middle-aged man atop the windbreak gave a big nod and shouted back.

"Of course! That’s what this windbreak was built for! Come on in!"

A solid yet agile impression. An overconfident attitude as if the whole world lay under his feet. Upright posture.

Most of all, he took this raging wind head-on without the slightest shake, as if his body itself were declaring he was no ordinary man.

'Warning...! You are walking into mortal danger right now!'

Huh? Why? I didn’t sense any hostility. The aura was unusual, sure, but I was a survival specialist who made it out alive from the Abyss packed with regressors, the Progenitor, and the King of Dogs. I didn’t get tense around someone without hostility.

Unless the other side was some monster on the level of a murder tank....

'Danger! This officer cannot even tell you that fact! A person whose very existence is under security classification! Someone known by everyone in the military state, with that level of rank and power...!'

I had been waving and walking toward the windbreak, but I stopped dead. I turned my head and saw the captain looking at me pitifully, on the verge of tears.

'If he asks this officer about the mission, this officer will be forced to spill everything! There is no classified secret unauthorized to someone like him! Even the fact that you are a laborer who returned alive from the Abyss!'

She was so desperate that I read her thoughts again, and I realized what she was worried about. At the same time, a sense of crisis hit me: one wrong move could ruin everything.

No way. It couldn’t be this much of a coincidence....

'He is General Patraxion, one of the military state’s Six Generals!'

To think I’d run into one of the military state’s top combat powers. I turned my head back again. General Patraxion was just then jumping down beneath the windbreak.

...If I run the other way now, I really will get hit with a catch-me-if-you-can, won’t I?

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