WeTried Translations

Translator: Hydrogen B

Editor: Hydrogen B

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

Chapter 44: The Undying Have Plenty to Say

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The immortal jolted upright as though waking from a long sleep. Despite having lost both arms and legs, he neither screamed nor stared in horror. He merely furrowed his thick brows and looked around.

It was an unremarkable reaction for someone who had suffered a tragic accident and been torn apart.

Naturally. For immortals who did not die even when their limbs were ripped off and their heads fell from their shoulders, injuries like these were part of everyday life.

The only difference was that this was the Abyss, a land cut off from its veins, where they could not regenerate.

Once he came to his senses, he shouted in bewilderment.

"Oh! What happened? My limbs were definitely torn off!"

"They're still torn off. Here."

I held out his severed arms and legs. Rather than cry out in pain, act horrified, or become wary of me, he eagerly took his limbs and pressed them to the stumps. He even gave me a thumbs-up with his reattached hand and smiled cheerfully.

An immortal, all right. Losing a few limbs was apparently no big deal.

"Thank you! You're remarkably kind!"

"It's nothing. Keep putting them back on for now."

I had kept the audience waiting long enough. Turning my back to the immortal, I spread my arms and called out to everyone.

"Well, did you see that? Ta-da! Resuscitation! A complete success! I haven't managed to reattach his limbs yet, but his heart is definitely beating!"

A miracle that brought a dead man back to life. Could I be the Holy Maiden Reborn? If I started a religion, I could probably fleece a few dozen people.

Well, if we got into the details, I had only forcibly woken an immortal from a suspended state. Forget a Holy Maiden. I was no different from a cheap military state alarm clock.

Still, I had made a stopped heart beat again. Smiling proudly, I looked at the regressor and the vampire. Magicians lived for their audience's attention. Their reactions were what kept me going.

Especially the regressor. She was the biggest reason I had woken the immortal, since she held clues from the past.

'With a method like that... he can wake up. So that's how the immortal in the past woke up! Then does that mean this is that moment?!'

What moment? Please, stop saying things like that and think it through. Don't just call it "that" because you're referring to a previous run. Actually remember it!

No need to rush. I could leave the regressor alone for now and slowly dig it out of her later.

That left the vampire.

I eagerly read her thoughts.

The vampire did not disappoint me.

'He forcibly made his heart beat again?'

A wave of emotion crashed over her.

The weight of twelve hundred years was enormous. She widened her eyes as though witnessing a miracle, stunned beyond belief. Comparing their thoughts, she was far more shocked than the person who had actually awakened.

'No. It is only possible because he is an earthfolk. He is an immortal who does not die even when killed, so his stopped heart can be made to beat again. Give him a spark, and he can move once more. Yes, that was only a spark...'

Then the vampire remembered something else.

Vampires, who moved blood through bloodcraft, were also a kind of immortal.

'...Could I too?'

If she only had a spark to ignite her dried-up body.

If she could hold that spark in her chest.

'Could my heart... beat again as well?'

Someone's expectations.

Common sense they had firmly believed in.

A conviction bordering on obsession.

The fact that a mind that seemed solid was actually nothing, that even the strongest belief was an illusion, and that it could all shatter at a single remark.

It was delightful.

This was the only way I could live, which made the thrill even greater. The satisfaction of being alive, the confidence that I could exist as myself, filled my body.

Did humans evolve to find food delicious and happiness in eating because it helped them survive? Or did food contain deliciousness and happiness from the beginning?

There was no need to distinguish between them.

A sweet taste lingered on my lips.

While I was drunk on satisfaction, the immortal finished assembling his limbs and stood. He had somehow attached his arms and legs, but they did not look much more reliable than if they had been taped on.

The immortal held out his right hand, which he had attached incorrectly so that the back of it faced inward.

"Pleased to meet you! I am Rashy. And you are?"

Uh, even if it was backward, I should still shake his right hand with mine, right? I firmly grasped the back of his hand and shook it.

"I'm the newly appointed instructor here. I found you in the cafeteria slop bin, no, the cabinet over there, and revived you."

The moment he raised his hand for a handshake, his right hand dropped off with a thud. As though afraid his detached arm might fall away from the rest of him, it tightly held onto my hand and dangled there.

I had suddenly become a man with two elbows.

Silence filled the room. Looking at his fallen right hand, the immortal scratched his head with his remaining left arm and smiled awkwardly.

"Ha ha. Sorry for the inconvenience. If this were the surface, it would reattach within a second. But this is the Abyss, so it takes quite a while!"

"Well, that happens."

I pried his fingers off my hand one by one, then reattached his arm near the immortal's elbow. Wiggling his recovered right arm, the immortal spoke.

"What a surprise, the military state finally sent living people down here! Normally, they only send lumps of iron to spy on us now and then! By the way, where is everyone else? Did they all escape?"

"If you mean the trainees who were originally here, they all escaped. These are the only ones left."

As I spoke, I discreetly read the immortal's memories to find out how he had ended up with his limbs torn off and discarded in a slop bin.

Rashy the immortal had been a prisoner. The military state's advanced laws and systems had impressed him in many ways, and he had wanted to learn more about the place. Yet the military state had not made the same effort to understand him.

The nature of the immortal race was too different from that of ordinary humans. They did not care when injured, and they always took the lead whenever physical labor needed to be done. They did not tire easily, and even when hurt, they simply laughed it off.

He had clearly been a wonderful neighbor. The sort of person anyone would want living nearby.

That did not mean Rashy had been a pushover.

Because immortals did not fear injury or death, they valued honor and rules instead. They could laugh after someone carved up their body with a knife, but they would not tolerate insults to their honor.

Unfortunately, one citizen had forgotten the saying that the law was far away and fists were close at hand, then provoked him. The military state's military law, closer than any ordinary fist, seemed to have twisted the citizen's survival instinct.

The citizen solemnly recited a prayer that would have been nothing more than a crude joke among friends, but became a suicide wish when said in front of a barbarian. Barbarians had no refinement and never tired, so they were born to be slaves.

Rashy, as a courteous earthfolk man, showed restraint once and tried to reason with the citizen. Yet a fool's suicide prayer usually came in more than one wave.

Rashy, as a courteous earthfolk man, humbly accepted the citizen's wish and tore the citizen to death.

Those who attacked Rashy to save the citizen were also considered to have agreed with that wish, so he tore them to death as well.

The military state tried to execute him, but they had no way to kill a man who rose unscathed even after bullets struck him and walked out of fire. When the military state's skill at killing something proved insufficient, there was only one way to deal with a prisoner. The military state's leadership made its decision.

Rashy fell into Tantalus, lived there well enough, then got caught up in the Abyss jailbreak incident.

Hmm. Interesting.

Wait. If he had witnessed the Tantalus escape firsthand, did that mean he knew how they had done it too?

I casually brought it up.

"Trainee Rashy. You mentioned it earlier, didn't you? You asked whether they had all escaped."

"I did."

The dead told no tales.

Therefore, immortals who did not die made excellent witnesses.

Just as he had been a witness in the regressor's future, the immortal was a witness for me now. A precious witness who might know how to escape this prison.

"The military state authorities are very curious. This is the Abyss, a land that cannot be entered or exited through ordinary means. So how exactly did they manage to escape?"

Pretending to interrogate him, I pushed my mind-reading to its limit and questioned the immortal. If he recalled the relevant memories, I could gain a card called the method of escaping the Abyss. The regressor had fallen into the Abyss just before their jailbreak, so she did not know much about it.

I watched the immortal with great anticipation.

"I don't know!"

And I had to quietly watch him shout it without hesitation.

"That scrawny sorcerer did whatever he wanted, then suggested that we all escape together. He said it was more advantageous to escape as a group, or something like that! Well, I had no reason to refuse, so I nodded!"

"...Really?"

"Really!"

Damn it. What a useless immortal.

"You must have heard something in passing. Who he was, what method he used."

"How would I know? That scrawny sorcerer probably used some strange trick to escape."

"Come on, think seriously."

"I'm sorry, but I don't make a hobby of remembering every little thing a man mutters. Especially if it's nothing but a sorcerer's vain babbling."

The immortal answered carelessly without even trying to retrace his memories.

Good grief. I never imagined someone who said they did not have a hobby of remembering things would actually erase their memories.

The immortal, who had been picking at his ear, asked back.

"So, what did you ask me?"

"Your lack of a hobby for remembering includes what I say too?"

There really was not a single person here who could help me. How could there be no useful information at all?

No, that was not it. I probably had not drawn enough memories out of him yet. Clinging to a sliver of hope, I pressed on.

"Then my second question. Why did you fail to escape while all the other trainees broke out? Was there a disagreement?"

"A disagreement? Hmm. There was."

The immortal spoke as he recalled the past.

"That scrawny sorcerer said he would help the prisoners escape. But perhaps his mind had gone strange after so many years in prison, because he suddenly wanted to kill everyone who was not a prisoner."

"Those who were not prisoners?"

"The laborers. Yes, the people who cooked and cleaned here."

Tantalus was a massive facility where vicious criminals captured from all over the world were imprisoned.

The military state could not control it, so it had practically let the place run wild. It was both a realm of hungry ghosts and the military state's execution ground. A place where anyone sent down would die on their own.

That was why the military state often sentenced politically influential figures whose execution would be troublesome, or ideological criminals who caused social unrest, to labor in Tantalus. It was another name for a death sentence.

"Not many were left because the other prisoners killed so many of them, but they had still been with us. I had some affection for them. They could have escaped with us, yet he insisted on killing them. I opposed him, but that sorcerer would not listen."

"If they were laborers in the Abyss, they must have been fairly important criminals themselves. Why did he kill them?"

"I don't know! As I said, I don't make a hobby of remembering every little thing a man mutters."

What a thing to be proud of.

"Anyway, I fought him and lost! Perhaps because he beat me so badly, my memory is hazy too! If only this were not the Abyss, I would have regenerated immediately and punched that slippery-faced bastard!"

"Is that all?"

"What else is there to say?"

He really was no help at all.

Whatever. I had extracted every piece of information I could. It was time to hand him over to the regressor.

"Trainee Rashy. Do you see that person over there?"

The regressor, who had been leaning forward and watching us with keen interest, flinched when I pointed at her.

'What? Me? Why me?'

The immortal looked at the regressor and said indifferently.

"You mean that boy?"

"That's right. Him. I don't know why, but he seems very interested in you... Ahem. In a somewhat peculiar way."

"What? What kind of nonsense is that!"

She kept trying to watch like a bystander, but not a chance. I would not tolerate anyone getting an easier ride than me.

I had failed to dig up any decent information, so I would at least read her thoughts. Go on, find it out yourself.

"Trainee Shei, aren't you interested?"

"Of course I'm not!"

"Then can I let him fall asleep again? Trainee Rashy will probably drift off again soon."

As soon as I finished speaking, the immortal staggered in place. He looked down at his body with a startled expression.

"Oh? Now that you mention it, my condition is strange. I woke up, but my body has not healed completely! What did you do to me?"

"I ran electricity through your heart and forcibly woke you up."

"Ho! That is impressive too! How did you do it?"

The immortal kept inspecting his own body, apparently fascinated that his life force was hanging by a thread. Perhaps because he was immortal, he had no sense of crisis at all. I asked the regressor once more.

"Trainee Shei, are you really fine with this? If we leave him alone, Trainee Rashy will fall asleep again."

"...So?"

"Trainee Rashy is the only person who knows Tantalus from before we came here..."

Azzy, yawning at the back of the classroom, caught my eye. Come to think of it, she was here too. Not that she would be any help.

I corrected myself.

"The only human, that is. Trainee Shei, if you have any questions, this is your chance to resolve them."

"What does that have to do with me?"

"You have no questions at all?"

"None at..."

The regressor, who had been about to shout, remembered something and closed her mouth.

'No. Now that the immortal is awake, there is something I have to confirm.'

With that thought, the regressor's memories began to travel back through time.

Footnotes:

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