WeTried Translations

Translator: Hydrogen B

Editor: Hydrogen B

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

Chapter 199: Land Flowing Like a River - 1

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The regressor showed as much interest in me as Azzy did. Pointing at herself, she asked casually,

"Azzy. What about me?"

"Woof? You're kind of small!"

Azzy's gaze lingered strangely around the regressor's head. The regressor waved a hand over her head for no reason as she thought.

'She means influence, right? It has to be that.'

"What if I lent him my strength?"

"Then I'd be happy! Woof! The more, the better!"

Investment, and now an idiom too. I couldn't get my bearings.

That dog was reciting poetry now. Did she go to school while I wasn't around?

"Woof, but you're still small. Small plus small is still small."

Now she understood math too? What was this? Had I misunderstood dogs all along? Was this only possible because she was the King of Dogs?

As I stood there with my mouth hanging open, the regressor nodded as if she alone understood.

"I see. I get the general idea."

'The qualification the Beast King demands is the influence an individual can possess. Until now, I thought it meant power, but from what Azzy says, influence isn't limited to power alone.'

Lost in thought, the regressor clicked her tongue.

'This is the kind of influence that's a problem. Every time I regress, all my relationships reset, so I can't gain it easily... I can seize power somehow through strength, but that tangles up my future actions. Power is too heavy a thing when I need to try so many different approaches.'

She glanced at me next, then looked at me with eyes much like Azzy's. Her eyes sparkled as though I were prey while she examined me from every angle.

'Then what if I use this guy? If I find some way to increase his influence...!'

She had finished thinking.

The regressor hid her dark intentions behind an unusually gentle smile and made me an offer.

"What do you think? Do you want power, like Azzy said? If you do, I can give it to you."

"No, when you say it, it doesn't sound like a joke. You talk about power like you've got it sitting in your pocket."

"Not to that extent, but I can introduce you to a suitable position."

The regressor's kind offer felt rather unfamiliar. At this rate, she'd bother me not only this loop but the next one too.

The me from the next loop would be a different person, but being pestered by the regressor for all eternity was still a problem. It would've been a perfect farewell if we just saved each other's lives in Tantalus and parted ways.

What should I do? Did I really have to travel with her?

I muttered in disbelief when a good idea came to me. Crossing my arms arrogantly, I looked down at the regressor.

"Oh? You said you'd help me earlier, didn't you? Does that mean you'll be my subordinate, Mr. Shei?"

"What?"

For a moment, anger welled up in her, and I flinched without meaning to. What was that? Was she a thug? Did she get angry whenever things didn't go her way?

After calming herself down, the regressor thought,

'If he gains the qualification, I'll have to leave all negotiations related to the Beast King to him... Well, I can be his subordinate at least.'

"More like partners... but fine. I'll be your subordinate for now."

Haha. Let's see if she could still say that after seeing this attitude of mine.

I swaggered as I tapped my feet on the floor like a delinquent. I understood my advantage in this situation and used it right away. With a crooked grin, I said,

"Then starting today, make the meals and do the cleaning. I'm sick of doing all the childcare, no, dog care, by myself."

"...What? All by yourself?"

Oh, look at her eyes go wide. She looked ready to bury someone.

But I'd already accepted Azzy's investment.

"If I say I'm doing it all myself, then I am. How dare you talk back? Azzy, I can't keep this up. Go find somewhere else to invest."

"Woof?! No! Woof!"

Azzy jumped up and clung to the regressor with her big eyes. The regressor, who had been glaring at me, trailed off with a deeply troubled look at Azzy's desperate attitude.

"Woof, just put up with it for a little while! The one who acts out gets to call the shots!"

"Tch."

'Whenever things start getting even a little better, he pulls some ridiculous stunt. Is he provoking me? Seriously, should I put him in his place from the start next loop?'

I was just about to successfully manage our relationship when it happened.

An enormous hostility swelled. It wasn't coming from the regressor, but from outside the container. At the same moment I sensed it, Azzy moved.

Azzy whipped her head around. Her ears twitched rapidly. The hair that couldn't keep up with the motion followed a moment later and mercilessly slapped her cheeks, but Azzy ignored it and launched herself straight at me.

"Woof! Danger!"

Azzy bit my collar and yanked me away. Having sensed the hostility too, I immediately followed her lead and threw myself down without resisting her strength. Not that I could've resisted anyway, given the difference in strength.

Thanks to that, at least, I was a little safer from the barrage of gunfire.

Tutatatatata.

Countless gunshots rang out. The continuous roar filled my ears like a downpour.

Bullets rained against the container walls. The noise tormenting us was beyond anything a percussion instrument could make.

The regressor sensed the attack and got up, drawing Skywarbler and Jizan.

"An attack? There wasn't anyone there when I went ahead earlier."

"It's not in front. It's beside us!"

"An ambush? Tch. I was so focused on checking the stop ahead that I neglected the side."

As the regressor clicked her tongue, Tyr's voice reached her ears. A heavy resonance filtered through her coffin, as though darkness itself had trembled into sound, and filled the container.

[It is noisy outside. Must I step in?]

"No, it's fine. Their objective is probably to wake you."

[Then I shall remain here a while longer. Call for me when needed.]

Tyr lowered her voice and went back to sleep. It was less sleep than gathering strength or preserving her active time, but humans had no more fitting concept than sleep.

In any case, the regressor listened beyond the container in Tyr's place. The hail of bullets continued as though testing the container's durability.

Clutching my head, I shouted at the regressor, who was still unhurried.

"What are you doing?! Go deal with them already!"

"You said you didn't want to raise Azzy all by yourself. Then we'll divide the work, and you'll have to handle outside matters too. Isn't that right?"

"Is this really the time to argue about that? Fine, I was wrong!"

Perhaps satisfied with my apology, the regressor smiled and tapped the container wall.

"Don't worry. Tyrkanzyaka strengthened this container with the Mark of Fresh Blood, and I reinforced it with barrier magic. Bullets alone can't pierce it."

"That line sounds ominous."

"Ominous? They've been pouring bullets at us this whole time, but they haven't climbed aboard. If they're using guns, they're ordinary soldiers, not officers. They sent expendable ordinary soldiers first because they want to wear us down. The side that gets bothered by it loses."

The regressor wasn't wrong.

You couldn't use high-grade alchemical steel for bullets that were practically disposable. It wasn't cost-effective, and if the enemy captured and used them, that alone would be a loss.

By contrast, they freely poured legendary metals and high-grade alchemical steel into armor that protected their own lives. There was no need to explain why.

Even without bullet-deflecting qi art, projectile weapons had clear historical limits because of the imbalance in the value of metal.

At most, they were for harassment or disposable pawns.

The military state was an unusual country, mad enough about war to put difficult-to-make guns in the hands of ordinary soldiers. Still, its combat manuals were more rational than anyone else's...

Except.

'I can hear it. I'll reconstruct the inside by tracing the sound of bullets striking iron.'

My mind-reading caught a different thought.

'The walls are reinforced, but the inside is quite empty. It must be for habitation. The echoes aren't even, so there must be structures along the walls. Then the strange part of the sound here is...'

Along one of the few roads running beside the Meta Conveyor Belt, three military auto-carriages raced side by side.

Their wheels thundered over the firmly paved ground. Faster than the Meta Conveyor Belt, the military auto-carriages raced against the flowing earth with shrill screams.

The ordinary soldiers aboard them fired their guns at an officer's command. Tudududu. The officer's shouts were buried beneath the explosions. They said even water droplets could bore through stone if they continued long enough, but the container, its blood-red marks faintly shining, did more than withstand the barrage. It sent the bullets ricocheting away.

It looked like a meaningless act. They had changed magazines twice and failed to make even one hole. Yet the ordinary soldiers silently followed orders.

All for one person.

I sprang up, grabbed the regressor by the shoulder, and shouted,

"Historia is over there!"

Standing atop the foremost auto-carriage, Historia aimed a long rifle about as tall as a person in our direction. Her braid whipped violently in the harsh wind. Her loosely worn uniform flapped wildly.

She looked as though the wind were battering her, but it was actually her own method of reading it.

To Historia, even the weight of her hair and the flutter of her sleeves were sensory organs for feeling the wind. Click. Calculating the wind direction and speed with her entire body, Historia aimed the sight at one part of the container.

She worked the bolt and chambered a large bullet. At the same time, a blue radiance gathered around the barrel and the bullet.

'There.'

I didn't know exactly where inside this container Historia was aiming, but I could roughly tell the height.

'Hui. Just don't get hit and die.'

The spot she aimed at was around the height of my thigh if I were standing. If it hit me dead on, something might get blown off, but I wouldn't die...

Was not dying all that mattered? You bastard!!

At that height, it would hit the regressor around the pelvis. It was likely to miss, but I couldn't be sure.

I immediately wrapped my arms around the regressor and dragged her down as we rolled across the floor.

Bang!

A long, thunderous gunshot rang out. One enormous sound stood out even among the countless noises crashing like waves, and something huge struck the container at the same time.

Kugung. The container, hit squarely in the side, rang for a long time.

Screech, clunk. The impact was so powerful that the container shook slightly, if only for a moment. It felt as though gravity had wavered before coming to its senses while the world remained unchanged.

I rolled across the floor with the regressor. She shoved me away and said,

"Hey! What are you doing...!"

"Look above you before you talk!"

When I looked up, the container's outer wall directly above us had been horribly crumpled. The Mark of Fresh Blood that had been glowing inside the container had lost much of its light, leaving only red traces behind.

Light leaked from the edge of it. Even the barrier that completely separated the outside from the inside had been partially damaged.

Historia's bullet threatened even steel strengthened by the Mark of Fresh Blood and was powerful enough to punch a hole through a barrier!

"The Gunslinger? She caught up with us already?"

"She probably raced along the belt! Just because they got aboard doesn't mean they had to stay still!"

As I shouted, I threw the furnishings that had fallen onto the floor in every direction. Clashing steel made a tremendous racket. When sound began reflecting chaotically through the dented container, Historia, who had been reloading, frowned.

'...The sounds have become chaotic. Because the wall is dented? Or have they already found a countermeasure?'

But this only bought us a little time. If there was no reaction from inside, she could expose that entire section of wall.

It was time to come up with a countermeasure.

Footnotes:

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