WeTried Translations

Translator: Hydrogen B

Editor: Hydrogen B

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Chapter 378: Lightning Did Not Fall from the Sky - 3

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The wall that had turned into cards fluttered down, revealing a narrow, dim room.

The first Thunder Lord's secret chamber contained only a small bookshelf and the desk connected to it. The shelves were packed with all kinds of books, their worn condition suggesting they had been taken out and read often. A single notebook sat on the desk, illuminated by a lightning lamp.

A notebook containing the Thunder Lord's secrets. I had already grasped some of its contents by reading the Thunder Lord's thoughts, but all I had read was the notebook as she understood it. People processed information through the knowledge they already possessed. If I wanted the truth, I needed to see the notebook myself.

What secret had the first Thunder Lord held? If my guess was right...

I turned to the first page.

- A today no different from yesterday guarantees the tomorrows to come.

They had not even tried to hide it. That settled it.

The first Thunder Lord. The Sanctum had created Claudia.

- The Lord of Gold has reshaped the world made by the Creator. Because of that accursed Demon God, the world's solidity has disappeared. One thing can become something else, and the iron promise that bound all things together has become a scrap of paper. Today cannot be the same as yesterday. The irreversible changes created by that Demon God will turn humans into something else.

- Yet the current Lord of Gold, terrifying as it is, is a monster that has lost its reason. If we stand upon this hill, watch over it, and prevent the changes it creates, we may still endure.

- We will reclaim the lost order.

Endurance, order. It was obviously the Sanctum. The Thunder Lord probably did not realize it because there was nowhere around here to study theology.

Clicking my tongue, I turned the page.

The following pages were filled with ways to distinguish the Lord of Gold's false gold, the limitations of alchemy, and techniques that required caution.

- Does it even create food? The blessings of the Celestial God and Mother Earth as well?

At some point, the writer became particularly focused on the crops created by the Lord of Gold. Beneath hurried exclamations of shock came findings written in a somewhat steadier hand.

- The crops created by the Lord of Gold are unnatural. If humans eat them, they cause serious problems. The younger and less developed the body, the worse those problems become.

- What a relief. No, was it only natural? Crops crudely imitated through alchemy could not possibly be healthy.

After that, the writer excitedly recorded one thing after another, then the entries gradually became shorter. At the end, a small note had been added.

- According to Frang's findings, the more the Lord of Gold's crops ferment or transform, the fewer side effects they have. If starvation leaves no other choice... It is not recommended, but consume them only after processing them as thoroughly as possible.

- Beware of homunculi. This land must not become like the duchy beyond the mountains.

There were also detailed discussions of food-processing methods and how to gather and dispose of the Lord of Gold's food. The figure who followed the Lord of Gold around, harvested its crops all at once, and processed them was clearly the model for the Suppression Lord.

Perhaps displeased with having compromised with reality, the writer barely mentioned crops afterward. Instead, the writer's interest seemed to shift elsewhere.

- Alchemy is certainly dangerous, but when used correctly, it is efficient. The ability to freely work steel has drastically reduced the facilities and resources required for metallurgy. In particular, reducing the time spent on trial and error to an instant has lightened the sages' burden.

- Sage Frang advocated actively using alchemy. Since it has already been revealed to the world, it cannot be hidden. I agree, but we must always take care when wielding such power.

- If alchemy can turn imagination into reality, perhaps it can turn our ideals into reality as well.

The Sanctum did not merely reject the Demon God. They feared the irreversible changes that would overturn the existing order, but no one was more eager to use the Demon God's power than they were. They had gathered more of the Demon God's power than anyone else in the world and made the best use of it.

And so, those blessed by fate steadily developed Claudia.

An alarm that warned when lightning would strike. Lightning towers to avoid and block it. Lightning wheels that allowed humans to use its power. Inventions describing how that power could be used and how it could help humanity. The ideas that now made up Claudia were written one after another.

As Claudia's brilliant leap forward continued beneath the Sanctum's blessing over the future...

- Frang. I warned you so often. Why?

I found a single line steeped in dark despair.

Sage Frang. The person mentioned most often in this notebook, and the engineer who had laid Claudia's foundations. Frang had likely been a sage dispatched to assist the notebook's owner... Then why had this entry been left behind?

- Perhaps it is for the best. Lightning belonged to the Celestial God from the beginning. If it was destined to appear someday...

- There is simply one more thing to protect. I will become the Thunder Lord and guard the lightning.

After that, the notebook contained noticeably fewer references to people or technology. The rest was no more than a simple chronology.

There was no more information. Tch. If it were a human, I could have read it easily, but I was not the king of notebooks.

Still, one thing was certain.

Like countless other gods, the Thunder God had become part of the Celestial God. Perhaps it had not been that way originally, but it was now. Like old beliefs dismissed as myths and folktales, it would dissolve into the sky and become a servant that made the Celestial God shine.

Thanks to the Sanctum stealing the lightning.

As I flipped through the pages, I reached the end. There was no other noteworthy information. At the bottom of the final page was one last line.

- ...A successor is needed. A powerful and special being who will safeguard all these secrets for generations.

As I mulled over those words, the basement door suddenly flew open. The city's guardian, who had flung the iron door open with lightning, glared at me with faint anger in her eyes.

"I don't recall giving you permission to come here. What is going on?"

Tch. She responded quickly, just as I expected. I hurriedly turned around.

"That's why I snuck in. How did you know to come here? The Thunder God hunt is in full swing outside. There was no way you could have found out."

"It felt as though bugs were gnawing at the inside of my body. The feeling was so itchy and irritating that I came to check... I never imagined a thief would sneak in during this gap."

No, the Thunder God hunt was in full swing outside! You dropped everything because bugs were crawling around inside you? You should have endured it through sheer grit and dealt with it later!

There was no point pleading. This proved something.

Objectively and subjectively, the Thunder Lord should not have been able to come looking for me. A showdown between the Thunder God and the regressor was unfolding directly overhead, so how could she spare this place any attention? She had neither the leisure to focus on it nor any reason to imagine someone would do such a thing.

Yet the Thunder Lord had found me very quickly in an impossible situation.

A simple coincidence? Animal instinct?

Things like that did not conveniently happen, for me or for anyone else. If I shoved all my chips in after drawing the strongest possible hand, and my opponent immediately put down a joker, that was not once-in-a-lifetime bad luck. Someone had set me up. Take it from a professional.

This was not instinct. It was a revelation.

Like a priest receiving the Holy Maiden's call, or a communications officer receiving a transmission. Someone had told her to come here. Otherwise, there was no explaining that discontinuity in her thoughts!

Either way, I had been caught red-handed. There was no use denying it now.

"Thunder Lord. There's one truth I've learned."

The Thunder Lord dismissed it immediately.

"There is no legitimacy in truth obtained through improper means."

"It's still the truth, isn't it? Shouldn't you at least hear it out?"

I was about to talk my way through this, but the murderous Thunder Lord showed no sign of listening. She approached one deliberate step at a time, her hostility clear. Before she could reach me, though, she encountered a small obstacle.

"Th-Thunder Lord..."

Jeri, who had collapsed on the floor, grabbed the hem of the Thunder Lord's clothes and began to sob.

"Th-that person is saying bad things. Saying that the Thunder Lord hurts the children."

The Thunder Lord stopped. Unable to brush aside the little hand clutching her clothes, she turned and comforted Jeri.

"Jeri. Do not listen to him. We are not wrong."

"R-right? That person was lying, right?"

"That..."

"I wasn't lying, was I? Thunder Lord, you could have saved these children."

Using the opening Jeri had created, I drove the sharpest words I had into her weak point. A crack formed across the Thunder Lord's face, which had seemed too perfect to scratch.

"The disabilities in the Lesser States happen because food created by the Lord of Gold mixes into people's bodies. As their bodies grow, they become warped or damaged. You know that, which is why you grow food at the lightning towers, don't you?"

If I had to decide whether the Thunder Lord was good or evil, she was clearly good. Her sense of duty and every action she took were for the city. There was probably no malice in them. Even caring for these children came from goodwill.

"But you know that if mixing them is the problem, then they simply should not be mixed."

She had goodwill in her heart, yet by following what was written in the notebook, something had become deeply twisted.

"Someone deliberately gathered newlyweds and children from the Lesser States in one place and supplied them with food. That is why disabilities have never stopped in the Lesser States."

Others might not know. But the Thunder Lord of Claudia knew. She was both a beneficiary and a culprit.

When two things caused disabilities by mixing, they would naturally separate into two groups that did not intermingle over time. That was only logical.

But because someone had artificially mixed the two, the dark shadow cast over the Lesser States remained even centuries later.

"Humans can do anything. But was this really the result you wanted? Passing the curse that lingers over the Lesser States down to future generations?"

"Be quiet."

"That isn't what you wanted, is it? If it were, there would be no reason for you to care for these children yourself."

The children's cries gradually grew louder. The shadow of disaster spread throughout the Lesser States. The Thunder Lord, who had both allowed it to continue and protected those suffering beneath it, glared at me as though I were her enemy. Under that resentful gaze, I asked her a question.

"Do not misunderstand. I'm not trying to blame or condemn you. I only want to ask what you truly think. Do you like what is written in this notebook?"

"We are not wrong. This notebook belonged to the first Thunder Lord, who created Claudia's order. Claudia has prospered thanks to their efforts."

"Do you really believe that? Even though tragedies in the Lesser States have continued under the order created by this notebook?"

"That problem exists because of the Lord of Gold. It is not the responsibility of the previous Thunder Lords or Claudia."

"Fine, let's say that's true. I have no intention of playing a childish game of passing blame from one thing to another. Honestly, every problem began because the Lord of Gold exists. Then why can't you be proud of yourself? Why have you hidden children screaming in pain deep underground?"

To keep them out of other people's sight? There was no reason to. It was common knowledge that among children born in the Lesser States, one-third died, one-third were born with disabilities, and only the remaining third appeared healthy. Having a child in the Lesser States meant entering an extremely dangerous gamble.

Claudia, where such mothers and children gathered, could not help having many children who died or suffered because of disabilities. If anything, everyone would support and praise the Thunder Lord for caring for them all.

"Isn't it simply because you want to look away from it? Can you call yourself proud if that's the case?"

Yet there was one person. The Thunder Lord of Claudia, who knew the truth, wanted to bury her guilt over contributing to the Lesser States' suffering underground. Because she was not proud of it at all.

Shadows fell across the Thunder Lord's face. Unable to bear watching the Thunder Lord she respected suffer, Jeri sprang to her feet and cried out sharply.

"Do not say bad things about the Thunder Lord! The Thunder Lord protects us... Thunder Lord?"

Without a word, the Thunder Lord released Jeri's hand. Jeri was a thunder trainee who had once been much like the Thunder Lord, but was now different as a result of not having been chosen. The Thunder Lord stared at the child and briefly fell into thought.

'I am one of the chosen. Until now, I have used my power to protect Claudia, just as the notebook says. But surely... It is also true that children suffer in Claudia. As he said, it would be a lie to claim I have never felt something was wrong.'

She was definitely thinking that. I read those thoughts with mind-reading.

The Thunder Lord, as a person, pitied the suffering children and tried to protect them. It was the way of thinking of someone arrogant, yet undoubtedly good.

'But no one can live exactly as they wish.'

At a corner of the Thunder Lord's heart, though, another thought surged forth.

There was no human anguish in those thoughts pouring out like a flood. She was Claudia's leader, the Lesser States' guardian, and one who received the Sanctum's revelations. She had countless things to do, and the duties upon her shoulders were far too great. Claudia trembled at every word she spoke and every action she took. The responsibility no ordinary human could withstand had turned her into an iron woman.

"To preserve a today that is no different from yesterday, that order must be maintained. If it causes pain, then that is the original sin those born in this land must bear."

Casting aside her anguish, the Thunder Lord spoke with firm resolve.

Footnotes:

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