WeTried Translations

Translator: Hydrogen B

Editor: Hydrogen B

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

Chapter 3: Thirteen Regressions and You Get Cranky

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[We will not interfere with whatever you do. It holds no meaning for the military authorities. You only need to remain here and fill this place. If you die, that cannot be helped either.]

What the golem conveyed was completely unexpected.

Do nothing? The military state, which forced not only criminals but even ordinary citizens into labor whenever it pleased, would give me no assignment at all?

I knew the military state too well to be pleased. Whenever it showed an unexpected attitude, I had to uncover the true intent hidden within it.

Just as I felt a sense of danger and was about to question the golem, the prison's main gate swung open with a thunderous crash.

Something burst out with terrifying momentum. The moment it left the yard, alarms blared to announce the emergency, and searchlights began furiously tracking the escapee.

It was pointless. She ran so fast that even the searchlights could not keep up with her. Whenever a beam was about to catch its target, she had already vanished.

While the searchlights floundered after losing their target, the girl landed before me like a bolt of lightning.

Both the golem and I were speechless at her sudden appearance.

Then she lifted her head, wagged her tail, and barked.

"Woof! Nice to meet you! Nice to meet you!"

Her triangular ears stood upright, and a golden tail swayed at her waist. Her large eyes stared straight at me, radiating endless affection. Her lush hair bounced as she moved.

She was a dog beastman, a descendant of sins humans had committed in the distant past.

The dog beastman crouched on all fours as if she were a real dog, looking up at me from near my feet.

What was this? I awkwardly raised a hand in greeting.

"Uh... hello?"

"Hello! Hello! Hello!"

The dog beastman leaped about as she greeted me. She showed no intent to attack, and even her movements were friendly. Her reaction was less like a human's and more like that of a well-trained dog.

She looked so innocent and friendly that I could not even feel the caution one should naturally have when meeting a stranger.

That was why I realized it a little late.

The fact that she was so friendly toward someone who had appeared out of nowhere was deeply strange.

And that I, a mind reader, could not properly read this being's thoughts.

"Let's play! Let's play! Let's play!"

"What? Why would I?"

"Woof! Let's play!"

The dog beastman shoved her head into the ground, bit the hem of my pants, and began tugging. Just as I wondered what she was doing and tried to pull her off...

It felt as though a rope tied to a wagon had suddenly caught my foot.

The legs that supported an adult man's weight were helplessly lifted. I fell over, and the dog beastman grabbed me and took off at full speed.

My body was dragged along without resistance. Thump, thump. At that incredible speed, my body bounced as though I were skipping across water. It felt like a wagon was racing along with me tied behind it.

Then the pain came.

"Aaargh!"

I had expected I might suffer some terrible fate in notorious Tantalus, but I had never imagined I would suddenly be torn apart. And by someone who liked me, no less!

Grabbing onto something did not help. A greater force only dragged me onward. My clothes heated up from the friction. Drops of blood beaded up and fell from skin scraped raw against the concrete.

I was going to die. At this rate, I was really going to die. I flailed both arms and shouted desperately.

"Wait, stop!"

"Woof!"

Then something astonishing happened.

The dog beastman, who had enough jaw strength to drag me along, waited when I told her to.

Without the slightest hesitation.

I stared in disbelief.

"Huh? You listen to me?"

Even without the ability to read minds, anyone who had lived in this world would know this. More people treated my words as nonsense than actually listened to them.

Especially when those words interfered with what they wanted to do.

Yet the moment I ordered this girl to wait, she waited without the slightest hesitation. Without a thought or a shred of resistance.

Wait. What was this?

Confused, I read the girl's thoughts.

They would not come through.

'Wait? Wait! Wait, wait!'

No, that was not quite right. I could read them, and I could vaguely grasp the feeling behind them, but I could not understand them clearly. It was like reading a book from another country without translating it. I could only make rough guesses from the mood and emotions I sensed.

Her thoughts would not come through.

That was impossible. Was she not human?

'He told me to wait,' so 'I wait.' No suspicion, no hesitation. Like a pure child...

No, her way of thinking was closer to a dog's than a human's, since she did not even question it. Like a loyal dog obedient to humans.

But she had the appearance of a human with dog ears and a tail, and the strength with which she dragged me far surpassed that of a human.

Wait. Unless she was a mad beastman who believed she was a dog, could this being possibly be...

"A Beast King?"

After humans, beasts that walked on two legs, had undeniably taken dominion over the earth, the Beast Kings took on human flesh. They wore human bodies, spoke as humans did, and represented the beasts of their respective species in voicing their opinions to humanity.

Yet their essence was that of a king of one species. Beings who represented, spoke for, and acted on behalf of every beast.

And the dog beastman before me was the King of Dogs, representing every dog.

A puppy.

"Shit. A Beast King is a divine being. Why would they lock something like that in prison?"

And in Tantalus, of all places. Had the military state truly gone insane? I immediately turned toward the golem to protest.

'...I smell blood.'

A thought drifted out from deep within.

Every hair on my body stood on end.

The drops of blood from my wounds trembled. Darkness wound around me. Unable even to turn my head, I watched from the corner of my eye as my blood began to move.

The drops staining the concrete shook violently before rolling toward one side. Under normal circumstances, they should have left a long trail behind them, but the blood that had fallen in Tantalus ignored even that common sense. The concrete floor seemed to have turned to ice as the drops rolled across it like beads.

With trembling eyes, I followed their movement. They approached a deep, dark door in the distance and seeped through the crack beneath it.

Then, from beyond the door, I felt an intoxicating satisfaction. The fullness a predator might feel after biting into flesh, the fulfillment of quenching one's thirst with a prey's blood.

...And fear came first when I realized it was my blood.

'...Muddy. I never thought my tastes were particularly refined, but this blood is truly inedible.'

She drank it without me even offering it, then complained that it tasted bad. She was locked up and still picky about her food.

Still, I could not voice that complaint carelessly.

I did not need mind reading to realize what the being beyond that door was.

A vampire. The Queen of Blood, who had lived for a thousand years and would live forever as long as she was not killed.

The Progenitor, Tyrkanzyaka.

The oldest darkness, who had shut herself away in the Abyss because conflict with humans was too bothersome.

"Shit..."

Vicious criminals? No matter what kind of vicious criminal they brought here, none could compare to those two. The King of Dogs was a divine being, while the vampire was a monster that defied the heavens and mocked such gods. They were people an ordinary person would never encounter, much less dare look directly at.

The scale of it all frightened me, far beyond anything I could handle...

But inwardly, I felt relieved.

Fortunately, those two were friendly toward humans or indifferent to them. The King of Dogs clearly adored humans, and the vampire would keep me alive if only to obtain blood. Unless I caused serious offense, they would not kill me.

Maybe I could even win them over and make them my allies...

Then it happened.

"Fly."

A hard, sharp, beautiful voice rang out. It was beautiful enough to make any passerby turn their head, yet all I could sense from it was cold hostility and killing intent sharpened like a blade.

The moment I read it, I hurried away from the golem.

Then...

"Skywarbler."

A hairline crack appeared in space.

A land made of nothing but light and darkness. As if space itself had been carved away, the light and darkness warped. A diagonal fault split the shadows. Sparks flared from the severed air, and lightning struck the dark Abyss.

An invisible blade sliced the golem cleanly in half.

The golem instantly lost its light. The essence of magitech contained within it, the precisely designed machinery, its circuits, and its mana, all of it.

One slash had divided it in two.

One half of the golem slowly slid down and fell to the ground. With a simple crackle, its body collapsed.

The cut was so clean that it looked like a cross-section in a diagram. It seemed as though it might still function if someone simply put the pieces back together.

But the golem's crystal ball never regained its light. The remotely controlled golem had stopped functioning. Static came from its microphone before it gave a faint pop and died.

In its place, a beautiful voice as sharp as a blade spoke.

"Was there still a spare golem left? What are they, cockroaches? I'm sick of this. Don't tell me there are more."

A girl with short black hair and loose pants slowly approached. She caught the transparent sword wavering in the air and glared at the golem as though it were her mortal enemy.

Her eyes lingered on the golem for a moment before turning toward me.

"All right, then... who are you?"

My instincts sounded the alarm. They screamed that I would die if I did not do something right now.

I reflexively used mind reading on her. As thoroughly as I could.

There was nothing special about her.

She was an extra so ordinary that her story was not even worth telling. She had grown up in an orphanage, lived in the back alleys, suffered from crime, illness, violence, and more, before dying.

She had learned some swordsmanship, only to have a wandering swordsman cut off her head. She had learned magic too, only to be burned from head to toe by a mercenary mage. An ordinary person who lacked the talent to achieve greatness no matter what she tried, who lacked the ability to turn an opportunity into success even if she seized one.

There was only one difference.

She had endless opportunities.

...Huh? What did that mean? Had I read her correctly? I did not understand.

Over the course of five deaths, she had swung a sword until she gained enough skill to cross blades with the Sword Saint.

Over seven other deaths, she had learned magic directly and indirectly, gaining enough mana to stand against the Demon King.

That only meant she had earned the right to stand before them. If she fought either of them head-on, she would still lose miserably.

And that was not even the end of it.

"Answer me."

The girl retrieved the treasured sword, Skywarbler. A legendary blade found only atop the highest mountain. Unless someone knew the future, they could never obtain the sword that resembled the sky itself. It hummed as she raised it toward me once more.

She was someone who had surpassed thirteen deaths, repeating endless attempts to prevent the world's destruction.

The regressor Shei held her sword and looked at me.

"If you don't answer... I'll kill you."

To grow stronger. To stop the world's destruction. To end her regressions and find eternal rest.

The regressor had wandered in search of fortuitous encounters before reaching the Abyss.

She was seriously weighing my life. Whether she should kill me or spare me. Which choice would be right for guiding this round forward.

If I did not meet her standards, she intended to kill me and eliminate the variable.

"...Ha."

One could run so fast that even searchlights could not follow her.

Another could exert dominion over blood from hundreds of meters away.

And the regressor was a monster who could destroy a military magitech golem used in war in a single instant.

Yet I felt relieved instead and waved both hands in a friendly greeting.

"Nice to meet you, everyone!"

Right. The ones here were incredibly strong. Even if there were ten thousand petty criminals like me, they could probably slaughter us within seconds. They had more than enough power to do so.

But when had I ever survived because I was strong?

The back alleys where I had lived for more than ten years. Even in those narrow back alleys, there had been countless people stronger than me.

Yet I was always the one who survived in the end.

The man with enough brute strength to smash rocks barehanded had his head taken by a swordsman who could cut steel. That swordsman was caught in a trap set by a wandering mage and burned from head to toe. The mage demanding payment drank a poisoned drink and became a handful of bloody water.

Only I, the one who could read minds, had catered to the swordsman's temper, walked far around the mage's traps, and picked out the poisoned cup exactly, preserving my life.

It was the same here.

No matter how monstrous my opponents were, as long as I could read their thoughts.

If I catered to the whims of those absolute beings, avoided the tender spots in their hearts, and built enough of a relationship with them...

Why would they kill me? No, why would I die?

I had lived my whole life as a back-alley con artist. No one was better than me at pleasing others and drawing their interest.

I spread both arms wide and shouted loudly.

Footnotes:

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