WeTried Translations

Translator: Hydrogen B

Editor: Hydrogen B

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

Chapter 15: The Origin of the Biometric Terminal

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The regressor shot me a sidelong glare.

"Once you get a biometric terminal implanted, whether you like it or not, you'll be tied to the military state. It isn't enough that the military state monitors your every move using that information. Other countries will look at you with suspicion too. In nations hostile to the military state, like the Empire or the Federation, you might even be put under surveillance."

What was she going on about now? I leaned back just as crookedly and replied offhandedly.

"It isn't much of a concern unless you plan to defect to another country."

The regressor glared at me. I glared right back.

It was fine to criticize the military state. That place was practically a sham of a country that threw innocent offenders into the Abyss.

But I couldn't stand her insulting the biometric terminal I used! I didn't use biometric terminals and clothing packets because I was loyal to the military state. I used them because they were convenient!

"...Besides, a biometric terminal is a weakness in itself. It's a magical device capable of affecting my entire body. Its shape may be different, but it isn't any different from the slave brands used in the past."

What? Was she calling me a slave? That suddenly put me in a bad mood.

I had wished for the military state to collapse several times a day myself, and ever since being trapped in Tantalus, cursing the military state had become second nature. If we counted the kinds of crimes I had committed as one of the back alley's most notorious petty criminals, I probably had several times more than she did. Fraud, gambling, embezzlement, blackmail, bribery, and plenty more!

And she was treating me like a slave of the military state? No, I was the military state's worst minor offender! The nature of our crimes might differ, but I had far more of them!

I snapped back at her.

"That's taking it too far. If you look at it that way, what in this world is safe? You could look at a tight suit and claim it was a prison constricting me, then look at a tie and say it was no different from a collar around my neck. By that logic, we'd have to confiscate every fountain pen in the world. After all, they say the pen is mightier than the sword."

The regressor leaned against the back of her chair and stared straight through me.

Old, hardened hostility pricked at me. It was chronic hatred. A dark shadow that had followed her through thirteen deaths, tiresome yet never fading. The grime steeped into her beneath the military state's shadow still occupied one corner of her heart.

"...You must know too."

The regressor gave me a frigid look carrying the emotions of several lives. Her heart was so cold that it seemed it would never burn again.

That gaze chilled me to the bone, and I muttered inwardly.

Military state. What on earth did you do to make the regressor hate you this much? You should watch yourselves. The world is wide, and somewhere out there, individuals can stand against a nation. Like a regressor who returns endlessly.

From now on, maybe torture people less and treat them better...

"The first thing the military state used biometric terminals for... was torture."

A faint trace. A short, sharp recollection. Through mind-reading, I read the past the regressor had recalled.

It was a long time ago, during her first life.

All I felt from that old memory was fragmented pain.

The only thought in her mind was, 'It hurts.'

That was all. Like a cheap piece of performance art, those two words filled the final page in black, alongside ragged scars.

I swallowed hard.

Military state, I think it's already too late for you.

I needed to leave this country as soon as possible. Adios. Once we parted ways, let us never meet again.

"A biometric terminal is an Aki Avatar forcibly opened from outside through alchemy and magic. A double of my body. If you force it open and inject a specially made toxic substance... Hah. You can preserve the senses and leave only the pain. Run electricity through it, and it spreads through the whole body in an instant. The iron needle may be touching my wrist, but my toes curl on their own. Heh. The military state didn't just develop ordinary technology. The technologies that advanced fastest and most drastically were those for making weapons... and inflicting pain."

Dark emotions washed over us. Even the vampire forgot what she had meant to say, and even dull Azzy raised her tail and watched the mood.

The vampire stayed silent.

Still, it was obvious where her heart leaned. If her heart had been a compass, its needle would have pointed toward the regressor.

As the regressor recalled the pain, she repeated a hollow thought.

'Everyone subjected to that torture died. I couldn't endure it either, so I killed myself. After that day, I carried poison so I could die without pain whenever I needed to. No matter how I think about it, I can't forgive them. The military state...'

I was screwed.

If I had known, I wouldn't have pretended to be an instructor. I didn't read painful memories like that!

No wonder she had started throwing blades at me. Should I consider myself lucky to still be alive?

The regressor clenched her fist, hard enough to draw blood just to stop her hand from shaking.

"Do you still think biometric terminals are necessary after hearing that?"

'If this man learns about the military state's darkness and still takes their side, we'll collide sooner or later.'

The regressor was measuring me right now. If I acted carelessly here, I would be branded an enemy and suffer for eternity. This wasn't the regressor's last life.

Would she believe me if I told her I wasn't actually an instructor now?

Then.

I lowered my voice. The cheerful voice that had been half a tone too high was replaced in an instant, as though I had changed masks.

I reset the mood through that sudden shift. Snap. I forcibly severed the flow of our conversation. If a conversation were a living creature, this would have been its death. I put up a wall of silence between us, as though claiming that none of what came next had anything to do with what came before.

The end of one conversation, the beginning of another.

Once I had prepared myself, I began anew.

"When biometric terminals and clothing packets were first created, they weren't intended to be used that way."

My voice was calm, as though I were looking on from somewhere far away, yet it carried warmth.

With as much depth as I could manage, I recited an old tale.

"The first person to devise the clothing packet was an old woman with a daughter-in-law. The old woman ran a small fabric shop, and she watched with pity as her clumsy daughter-in-law ruined her hands sewing and washing clothes. Her daughter-in-law had once been bright and cheerful, but her face was always clouded with worry now. Yet sewing and laundry were burdens she had to bear to help her husband continue the family business. The old woman thought long and hard about how to help her daughter-in-law grow accustomed to housework, but she couldn't find an answer. Then one day, a noble commissioned a garment from her."

Steep slopes and sharp shards of rock looked like gentle scenery when viewed from afar. A story alone could never contain all the tears and pain shed along the way.

But if it held even part of those feelings, a story could move someone's heart.

"The noble ordered the most splendid and beautiful clothes the old woman could make. When she heard the order, the old woman was horrified. The garment was covered in every sort of decoration, so much that it could hardly be called clothing. The old woman fell before the noble and replied."

"I lack the skill to make such a garment."

"Make it."

"The fabric and threads are tangled together like fighting dogs. If I make it as it is, it cannot be put on or taken off."

"It does not matter. Make it."

"There are so many layers of cloth that even the smallest child capable of holding a needle could not squeeze into the gaps. If it wears out or tears, it cannot be repaired."

"It does not matter. Make it."

"Silks and fabrics of different origins are woven together as though they were one body. It cannot touch water once it is stained, nor can it be cleaned even with a brush dipped in holy water."

"It does not matter. Make it."

"My lord, why do you desire clothing that cannot be worn again, repaired, or cleaned?"

"It is for one day. Only one day. Once that day has passed, it will be taken off, torn apart, and buried in the ground. Your concerns are unnecessary."

"It is a monstrosity that cannot be called clothing."

"It does not matter. Make it."

Like a traveling storyteller, I carried out the exchange alone. I wet my burning throat and continued.

"It was the strange order of a capricious noble. An order no one in the world could easily accept. She could have dismissed it as a whim or refused it as impossible. But for the old woman, who had long been thinking of her daughter-in-law, it was inspiration that came like a miracle."

Her daughter-in-law lacked skill and struggled terribly with washing and sewing. Outwardly, the old woman scolded her, but when she saw the blood and water stains on her sleeves, she swallowed her tears in private.

"If clothes were worn for only one day and thrown away, there would be no need for laundry or sewing."

Thus, she attained seamless perfection.

"It was impossible. It should have been impossible. Making new clothes every time someone dressed, then dismantling them through alchemy when they took them off. Does that even make sense? It couldn't have been easy. It must have been terribly difficult. The old woman must have burned through every year she had left. At an age when her dimming eyes should have made her consider retirement, she took up a needle again. Her skill was close to art, but her age was tragic. Her weak hands trembled, and dozens of needle holes formed in them. Unlike when she was young, they did not heal easily. Her blood never had a day to dry."

I stopped there and deliberately held my breath. Then I raised my wrist again, showing the hole in my body.

To explain what that tiny hole contained.

"The essence of the biometric terminal is a wound left by a needle. The clothing packet is the garment made for a daughter-in-law. The military state simply made it a little more... magitech."

The military state had made every bad thing in this world.

But before those bad things became bad things, they had been much smaller, much more precious feelings.

I walked toward the regressor. As I did, I reverse-summoned the clothing packet. The fibers unraveled strand by strand and gathered into my left hand, as though someone had pulled every loose thread from my body at once. Like a silkworm spinning a cocoon or a spider wrapping its prey. The fine threads changed from translucent to opaque before returning to a tiny bead.

After taking a few steps, I was back in my standard-issue shirt and shorts.

Click. The instructor uniform packet popped out of my biometric terminal. I caught it and stopped in front of the regressor's desk.

"I can't speak for the military state, and Trainee Shei cannot speak for everyone who has suffered. Even so, I will ask for forgiveness."

It wasn't something I had done. Still, I belonged to that place too, so I would ask forgiveness for my share.

With that meaning in mind, I took the regressor's hand to find her biometric terminal.

The regressor watched what I was doing without a word.

"For the sins of those who heated the warmest achievement in the world in hellfire and dragged it forth."

Then, I reached my fingers toward where her biometric terminal should have been.

Huh? Her wrist was smooth. I couldn't feel a hole, only her lively pulse.

Confused, I asked, "What? You don't have a biometric terminal?"

Why not? It was strange. Her memory of being tortured had been vivid.

As I tilted my head, the regressor panicked and yanked her hand away.

"Ah, no. Wait."

'I was tortured in my second life, when I was running around without knowing anything... I never received the procedure in the first place this time.'

Ah, right.

She had been tortured in a previous life, hadn't she? I had been so immersed in the thoughts and memories I heard that I forgot for a moment. It was an incredibly intense memory.

Once I grasped the situation, I stopped talking and looked at the regressor awkwardly. The regressor also looked at me with difficulty, clearly finding the atmosphere deeply uncomfortable.

Huh. That made me look ridiculous.

I had read her thoughts and empathized too much, then created this mood all on my own. I thought the regressor had been tortured. No, she had been tortured. In her previous life.

In this life, she had actually gone around causing havoc instead.

Things had suddenly become complicated. The regressor had told a lie that could not be explained without regression, while I had learned something that could not be explained without mind-reading.

What should I do in a situation like this? What if she found out I was a mind-reader?

After a brief moment of thought, I waved both arms and shouted.

"Liar! You made it sound like you were tortured! I thought you were the one who got tortured!"

Get angry instead!

To make it abundantly clear that I had been deceived, I stomped my feet and shouted.

"What torture? You don't even have a biometric terminal! Huh? What are you supposed to inject into this smooth wrist of yours?"

"Th-this is..."

"Did you want to show off that badly? Or were you trying to steal even the painful scars of someone who was tortured? Were you going to make it a medal to decorate your own life? How shameless! First poverty, then torture and hardship, all stolen away!"

"W-wait! I definitely..."

"Definitely?"

When I raised my head and pressed her, the regressor moved her lips with an aggrieved expression. But she could not shape her thoughts into words.

'I still... can't tell him that I can regress!'

Naturally. The regressor's regression was probably a secret she had to hide until the very end.

Then how would she explain it? How did she plan to escape the predicament I had pushed her into?

The answer was surprisingly simple.

Bang!

The regressor threw herself out and fled. She had chosen physical escape.

Hah. To think she would run away using a method I couldn't resist. She got me good.

[That was a very interesting tale.]

The vampire, who had listened quietly the whole time, approached with a pleased air. She seemed to have enjoyed today's lesson immensely.

[It was worth breaking my seclusion to come out. Yet I have not heard the end of the story. What happened to that old woman?]

"Ahahaha."

[...Why are you laughing?]

"No, I was wondering why you called her an old woman. She lived in relatively modern times. Even if she were still alive, she wouldn't be two hundred years old yet. She's far younger than Trainee Tyrkanzyaka. So please don't call her an old woman. Call her a child instead. Wow. To think I can treat someone like that as a child..."

Bang!

The vampire smashed through the building's outer wall and left. She had fled.

Hah. I had made one woman and one corpse flee with nothing but my mouth. Someone who saw me would surely be proud.

Still, that coffin was made of wood. How did it break through a concrete wall without a scratch? It felt like common sense had been violated.

"This is property damage... Ah, whatever. Let it sort itself out."

I wasn't the military state's budget department. They would handle it. As long as I had somewhere decent to sleep, that was enough.

"Now, then..."

I walked toward Azzy, who was dozing in the back of the classroom. As my footsteps drew closer, Azzy's tail began wagging first. Then her ears perked up. Azzy lifted her head, noticed me approaching, and sprang to her feet.

Drool was running from the corner of her mouth, so it seemed she had once again lived the carefree life of a dog. Avoiding Azzy as she tried to rub her drool onto my hand, I said, "Azzy. Did you listen well in class?"

"Woof!"

"Can you tell me what today's class was about?"

"Woof!"

"So I shouldn't expect anything at all?"

"Yes!"

"...It annoys me that you only speak human language at times like this."

"Annoyed?"

"Yes! I'm annoyed, you mutt! At least try to listen!"

"Mutt?! Woof! Woof!"

Ugh. What was I going to do with this mutt?

She was incredibly gentle and fond of humans, but according to the future the regressor had seen, this girl would become a ferocious beast that tore humans apart.

I didn't know why that would happen, but it was a future I had to stop. I thought things might be alright if I gave Azzy some common sense, but...

"What was I thinking? Even the person who made that proverb about a schoolhouse dog reciting poetry after three years would scold me for not understanding metaphors if I brought in an actual dog."

As I scratched my head, Azzy stretched out her upper body and barked furiously.

"Woof! Woof woof! Woof!"

Azzy's gaze was fixed on my left wrist.

Could it be? Had she actually listened and figured out what this was?

Half doubtful, I showed Azzy my left wrist.

"What? Do you remember something? Here, look. This is called a biometric terminal, and if you insert a clothing packet here..."

"Chomp!"

"Aaaaaaaaaagh!!"

Along with the feeling of sharp, hard fangs digging into the hole in my body,

I lost consciousness.

Footnotes:

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