WeTried Translations

Translator: Hydrogen B

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◈ Omniscient First-Person's Viewpoint

Chapter 255

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The Land of Steel and the Faceless Humans - 4

The princess could no longer become king, and this country was no kingdom. It was a military state, ruled by soldiers who enforced peace at gunpoint and bladepoint. In a place where everything moved under orders from Headquarters, it would be hard for anyone to feel responsible.

But the princess, the only child of King and Queen Grandiomor, the prime culprits behind this country's creation, did feel responsible. Not only for the remnants of the old kingdom who had become the Resistance, but for every citizen of this country.

She could have taken my words as a joke, but she took them seriously and shot them down at once.

"Stop trying to test me. A place like that has to disappear. Even if they're criminals, a hell that inflicts eternal suffering should not exist in reality!"

"You're not even king, yet you care a lot about the people's lives."

"I don't think like that! I'm only following what's right! To begin with, weren't you outraged too when you saw what was in there, Hui-nim?!"

"Ah, that wasn't the part that made me angry."

Barbarism is doing everything you can do without hesitation. Civilization, by contrast, begins by deciding what you cannot do.

Murder, first and foremost, then theft, threats, fraud, incitement, apostasy, rebellion, and so on. Sometimes a few are missing, sometimes bizarre new taboos are added, but fundamentally civilization is about cutting something out of humanity.

So if you asked whether I was barbaric or civilized, the word might sound ugly, but I was clearly barbaric. I'd committed every crime I could.

But I was an individual, and the influence one human can have always has limits. Even if I caused harm, you could catch me and punish me.

I had actually been punished, so I was the perfect example.

But what about the military state?

"There were people who acted brutally while dragging in all kinds of bizarre excuses, for the greater good, for the country. But at least those were excuses used to justify their behavior. This, on the other hand, is real. It was done in the name of the country, and for the country. It even feels like the country itself gave the order."

They built labor camps that exploited citizens, all for the state.

They ruled everyone with harsh law, all for the state.

They made all kinds of inventions and spread them everywhere, but everyone knew those inventions were not for the people.

A hook that pierces a biometric terminal.

A restraint suit made from a clothing packet.

Standard spellcraft cast at the cost of the body.

Compressed tin that preserves only nutrition.

Chimera beans, made with no thought for taste or happiness from the start.

The Thunder Wheel, which turns on its own and forces humans to match it.

The Meta-Conveyor Belt, built with blood, sweat, and corpses, and run with humans as lubricant.

Some were used especially viciously by the military state, but all Seven Great Inventions of the military state lacked any affection for humans. Strip everything else away, and only utility remained.

The princess agreed with me.

"That's right. Other countries are like that too, but the military state is especially severe. The one small mercy is that punishment is so harsh that no one in the middle can embezzle...."

"Yes, exactly. The military state never lets anyone except the military state commit crimes. In the military state, only the military state is allowed to sin."

"...What? Sin?"

"The military state has room to spare. It clearly has surplus resources it could share: wealth, happiness, time, pride. But it never shares any of it. It just keeps stockpiling."

The princess had already forgotten snapping at me earlier and focused on every word.

"...Then, Hui-nim. You're angry at the hidden power that controls this country while holding all of that in its hands, aren't you?"

"Who knows? I don't know who they are, where they are, or even whether they exist. How am I supposed to be angry at that?"

"Ah, I'm sorry. Let me rephrase. You want to find the one who created all this, right?"

As if she finally understood, the princess clenched one hand and slapped it into her palm. The force she'd used to argue with me just moments ago vanished in an instant.

I shrugged.

"More or less. But I wandered the military state for months, and lived in the capital for years, and still found nothing."

My kind of "finding" was on another level. I was a mind reader. Even if that person hid their identity and status and lived quietly as a lower-class citizen, if they met me, they'd be exposed immediately.

Even if they hid in some secret base, if they ever came outside even once, and happened to cross paths with me, I'd have figured it all out from a sideways glance at a distance.

It didn't even have to be that exact hidden ruler. People in power are inevitably connected to many others. If someone knew even a little about them, or had contact with them, I'd have grabbed that thread and patiently unraveled it.

...But in the end, I still couldn't find them. It wasn't a goal worth risking my life for, so I'd been taking it easy.

"So... that's why you tested me with that question earlier."

"Hm?"

A test? What test? I was a master at solving problems, but hopeless at making them. I knew everything the other person knew, but I couldn't think up what they didn't know, so my limits showed right away whenever I had to set questions.

When I asked honestly, the princess looked at me like the answer was obvious.

"Because you didn't know how I, as a member of the Resistance, would act if I met that person. You tested me by asking whether the refinery's existence might actually be better for the Resistance, right?"

'Right. A companion of Lord Shei would never say something so heartless. And I went and took it seriously for no reason! Yerien Grandiomor, train harder!'

So that was how she interpreted it. This princess really saw people through rose-colored glasses.

Then again, the deaf cannot hear sound, and the blind cannot describe color. For what you cannot perceive, you become literally numb.

In that sense, because the princess had never been exposed to hostility, she'd never learned to guard against it. She was mentally impaired in that way, born without any sense of danger.

No, maybe fool was the better word. She really was one.

"You're quick."

I nodded. It wasn't a bad misunderstanding. I had wanted to spark her curiosity in the first place.

If I planted that curiosity now, she'd be more proactive later when we infiltrated Headquarters.

The princess nodded bitterly.

"...You're incredible. I was so shocked by what was right in front of me that I couldn't think of anything else, but you were looking beyond what was happening now to what comes after.... Please forgive my shortcomings. I wasn't any help, and I even raised my voice."

No. She would probably be a huge help.

That authority that made it impossible for anyone to harbor hostility toward her. Its shine had dimmed a little after one lunatic who'd hammered gears into his own head nearly killed her, but there was no way I was letting that filthy overpowered ability rot unused.

And.

"Whatever. None of that matters unless we get out of here alive first."

"Hm? Get out alive?"

'Isn't everything done here already? We destroy the refinery and head for Headquarters... ah, wait. Destroy... ?'

She got it.

This place was a trap. And a particularly nasty kind at that.

It trapped us in a dilemma, not with force or physical power.

The princess went pale.

'How? How do we destroy it? Do we kill all the violent criminals, or free the laborers? Who decides, and how?'

Inside the refinery, it was hard to notice. They were the ones inside the dilemma, after all. People moving within a script might as well live in a world where nothing exists outside the stage.

That was why the princess and I needed to get out.

I explained.

"The alchemic steel refinery is a genuinely critical facility. In some ways, it's an even more important asset to protect than Headquarters."

Alchemic steel might be a resource with deep reserves, but it wasn't infinite. And a resource consumed everywhere, like alchemic steel, is never enough even when it seems abundant.

If production here was disrupted, every plan in the military state would be delayed. For a rigid, machine-like country, they'd never want the most important gear in the system to slow down.

"So the military state set a trap here. And we walked right into it."

That's why they were stopping us here, even if it meant deploying a powerhouse like Yeonggwe.

...Honestly, I didn't figure it out myself. I read Yeonggwe's thoughts and realized it afterward. Even I saw that script and thought, Wait, is this bad?

"But there were no troops here! Lord Shei checked before we came!"

"Exactly. That's why it's a trap. A place like this should never be empty, yet there wasn't a soul in sight. A military state that treats even legions as expendable should have had a delaying unit here to hold us back, even for a second. Even if it's currently night, Tyr's time."

In fact, during the day, they did deploy delaying units that cut roads and shelled us from a distance. They didn't delay us long, but still, that was the military state's way.

The princess looked overwhelmed.

"Th-then... what happened? Did the Gunslinger lure us into a trap...?"

"No. Ria's proposal was right. Thanks to that, instead of crushing us with overwhelming numbers and firepower, they had to work to confine us inside a crude trap."

Historia's strategy was military-state to the core. Hide your tracks, pick strategically important facilities, and launch efficient preemptive strikes.

The problem was that efficiency made it easy to read. The moment we changed course to destroy the motor carriage assembly plant, the military state could easily predict our next target.

More importantly, princess, the one who trapped us was your own ally Kerafald... or rather Yeonggwe Zikhrund, who extracted information from him. Don't shift responsibility.

I kept my mouth shut only because I couldn't reveal that I used mind reading. If we were assigning blame, you'd have been first on the stand.

Well, that wasn't what mattered right now.

"This place is a stage. A route from the refinery entrance to its deepest section, designed to show us the laborers' horrific conditions firsthand. The process itself is meant to burden the group with an even bigger dilemma. Kill them all, free them, or leave them. Ria and Mr. Shei will clash, Tyr and Siati will pile on, and things will spiral into chaos."

Historia was, in her own way, still a general of the military state. She had the authority to order the subordinates under her command to die, so she wouldn't value the lives of violent criminals.

The regressor was trying to prevent the flood of future sins. For her, even if someone said, "Let's kill countless helpless laborers right now," she couldn't accept that immediately.

Siati, who wanted revenge on the military state, would prefer freeing all the laborers. That would trigger even greater chaos.

Tyr, detached from life and death, was the kind of person who'd even offer the option of turning everyone into living dead.

Zikhrund likely separated me, the strategist, and the princess, who could erase conflict itself, to intensify that chaos.

After dragging things out like that, just before we took action, they'd surround and wipe us out.

"That really could happen! What do we do?"

Having fully grasped the possibility, the princess spoke in a bloodless voice.

"No! If you knew all this, Hui-nim, why did you come out here?!"

"Because the easiest way to ruin a prepared stage is an intrusion from outside the stage."

"Huh?!"

Magic and theater both prepare a stage for an audience. They also both require acting.

But if there's one difference, it's the duty of the genre.

Theater has to satisfy everyone's expectations in the end, while magic has to defy everyone's expectations. That difference creates countless others.

We were finally seeing the end. The concrete outer wall that had seemed like it would continue all the way to the military state's border was running out, and we had reached the side opposite the refinery entrance.

Only then did I stop the motor carriage.

"The refinery is a building with no doors. So this side, farthest from the entrance, is the deepest section."

There were no doors in the refinery. The wall just stretched on like smooth skin. Remembering that we hadn't found even a single side door on the way here, the princess looked puzzled.

"Why didn't they make even a side door? What if there's a fire...?"

"They divided the building by zones instead, right? Looks like they planned to isolate sections with bulkheads."

"But then people in the burning section would have nowhere to run."

"Whoever designed this building probably thought that was better."

She looked shaken by my answer. I left her there and hopped down from the motor carriage. Walking over to one corner of the wall, I pulled out a card and flipped it. My most-used tool, the Diamond 1 skewer, greeted me with the same familiar feel as ever.

"Long time no see, my friend. Miss me?"

"Bark! Didn't miss you! Saw you too much! But good to see you!"

I called my friend, and humanity's friend came instead. I waved Azzy away as she followed me.

"...Go fetch Nabi. I have work to do."

"Bark!"

Azzy nodded quickly and ran off to retrieve Nabi's box. While she was gone, I gripped the skewer with both hands and aimed it at the gray concrete wall.

"Hup!"

A full-force thrust. I put both hands into it and drove the skewer forward with all my strength into the concrete wall.

...About one centimeter.

"As expected of concrete. It doesn't budge with my strength."

But that's exactly what earth arts were for. The technique people mistook for divine power when I was trapped beneath the Abyss.

I dragged the skewer hard. A small but sacrilegious scratch appeared on the smooth gray wall. Like graffiti carved into a historical relic, an irreversible mark that made you want to keep going.

"Ugh, this is still pretty hard...."

I moved the skewer in a circle to form a closed curve, then wiped away sweat and let out a breath. Dust rose from the carved concrete.

All right, time to work. I placed my hand on the wall, took a deep breath, and focused. Recalling the distant, vast earth and my own trivial existence crawling on top of it, I used earth arts.

Kkiiiik.

The section I'd outlined with the skewer shifted under my hand as though it had only been loosely set in place.

The earth always seemed unchanged, eternal, but it wasn't. It rose, sank, collided, and even its skin buckled. Her divine body changed like a human body.

Because Mother Earth, like humans, had hot crimson liquid pulsing beneath her skin.

What we called earth was really just plates resting atop that bloodlike fluid, and those plates flowed and moved along lava-like bloodstreams, colliding and thrusting upward.

...The mountains we looked up to in awe were, from Mother Earth's perspective, nothing more than chapped skin.

No wonder someone could become a Demon God.

"To cut a wall so smoothly with nothing but a skewer...!"

'So Hui-nim simply never had a chance to show his strength. He was actually a sword master! His inner energy must be at such a realm that it makes no sound at all!'

The princess stood there with a hand over her mouth in shock. She thought I'd penetrated the concrete with inner energy and cut it from within.

Are you blind? It's earth arts. If my inner energy were at a level where I could casually use penetrative force like that, would I be struggling like this?

I pushed harder with both hands, and the cut-out chunk slid inward and dropped. A heavy thud came from the other side, and pitch-black darkness appeared through the round hole.

Good. This side was ready.

"Nyaaaang.... L-let go, nya. I-I won't move, nya...."

"Bark! No! Work time! No work, no food!"

Azzy came dragging Nabi by the scruff while preaching the importance of labor. Nabi dug her claws into the ground to resist, but against Azzy's strength, Nabi's claws were no more than a plow scraping dirt.

Those claws were still sharp. More than enough for breaking things.

"We're ready. I'll go in first, so bring Azzy and Nabi and follow me in."

"Yes...!"

'You seem to have an ingenious plan! If I can help, I'll gladly do it!'

The princess clenched her fist and watched closely as I climbed through the hole. Heh, good. The more impressive she thought I was, the more faithfully she'd follow my plan....

Huh? Wait, this wall was thicker than I expected. It was almost like a tunnel. Then wasn't this hole too small... oh.

"Uh-oh, I'm stuck! Princess, could you give me a push?"

'...You do have a plan, right?'

You're doubting me already? If you're going to trust me, at least trust me properly. Why does your trust expire so fast?

"Bark! Push! Heave-ho! Heave-ho!"

"Not you! Not you! Ack! Don't use your claws!"

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