WeTried Translations

Translator: Hydrogen B

Editor: Hydrogen B

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

Chapter 453: Which Comes First, the Many or the One?

──────

This was seriously no joke. How had things ended up like this? I expected to be confined for a while, but if a vampire's "while" meant years...

I needed to find a way out.

"Still, I can't just sit around doing nothing, can I?"

[What are you trying to do now?]

The moment I mentioned doing something, she became suspicious. I couldn't tell her I was going anywhere. Instead, I walked over and casually wrapped an arm around her. I could feel Tyr's mood soften a little.

She would've complained before about where I was putting my hands. Tyr had changed a lot too.

"I don't have anything in particular to do, so I'll just play with a doll here. And look, there's a perfect doll right here."

[If that is what you mean, then it is yours. You may do as you please.]

"I was going to, but it seems separation anxiety is acting up and won't let me."

[It depends on how you use it. Does not everything have a use suited to it?]

I sat Tyr on my lap and combed through her hair with my fingers. Even vampires couldn't avoid getting their hair tangled after a fierce battle. As I carefully worked loose each snag that caught on my hand, I asked as though confirming something.

"Tyr."

[Speak.]

"You want me to change, don't you?"

I had already changed Tyr. Even if it had been her own wish, that didn't change the fact that I had altered her myself. This, too, had only been possible because I had lost my strength and become ordinary, but...

Tyr turned her head slightly and asked,

[If I wanted it, would you change?]

"I'm sorry."

The Beast King was the Speaker for all beasts. It wasn't an exact comparison, but perhaps a Beast King was the form taken by the results of polling every beast. That was why they had to be strong. I had lost my power for some reason I didn't understand, but...

Tyr turned away from me again as she answered my apology.

[You need not be sorry. Just as you do, I act according to my own stubbornness.]

"I'm really sorry."

[I said you need not be.]

"Not just for that."

I had finished fixing her hair. With static electricity building in my hands, I hugged Tyr from behind and pulled her close. My hand rested against her chest, but Tyr accepted it without resistance.

'Binding Hyu this way cannot be the ideal relationship everyone would envy.'

Tyr laid her hand over mine and fell into thought.

'But even the worst life together is better than parting with Hyu. I am sorry, Hyu. For making you suffer because of my greed.'

"...Because I'm using my kindness like this."

A Demon God was an enlightenment that brought immense change to humanity. Something that embodied supreme knowledge.

And enlightenment that dealt with the human body itself might be trivial compared to the great laws of nature...

But to humans, it was more important than anything.

"Set, Frang."

Lightning flashed in my hand. Pulses of brilliant light resonated with Tyr's heart.

Tyr suddenly went stiff. For an instant, her body slipped from her control. Sensing something was wrong, Tyr tried to rapidly restore her body with bloodcraft and regain control.

But she failed. The Ace of Hearts, the heart bearing my card, resisted Tyr's bloodcraft, if only for a moment. Her hand twitched and moved against her will. I tightened my embrace around Tyr, gripped the lightning in my hand, and poured it into her.

Tyr's body was functioning perfectly. The problem was that it worked too well.

'----!!!'

"The shock would be too much for an ordinary person... but Tyr will be fine."

The senses were windows through which we received the world. The light, sound, temperature, and vibrations that flowed through those windows changed me.

But... those windows weren't left wide open.

Every living thing was born with an instinct to protect itself. The world was death. Illness, insects, blades, sunlight, curses. Everything that could alter and ruin the body came from outside it.

Life was the act of preserving the difference between myself and the world. Death was when I inevitably became one with the world. Resisting change was life itself, and death came when that resistance stopped.

The human body had windows to respond to outside change. Yet it blocked them with glass so that outside change couldn't enter. The world we saw was only harmless information, filtered once through glass.

And that followed the law of lightning.

The lightning I held flowed through its pathways. I had engraved the paths of lightning throughout Tyr's body. Tyr couldn't resist. Her body was hers, but I had made those paths. I was the one who had set the window in its frame.

The homunculus dilemma. If you built a body by borrowing someone else's power... this could happen.

That was why I hadn't wanted to do this if I could help it. I was afraid I'd use it one day.

'------!!!!!'

Tyr's thoughts stopped. A tidal wave of sensation rushed into that void. Sensations amplified to the extreme could no longer distinguish pleasure from pain. They drove out Tyr's thoughts with their overwhelming presence and ruled her body.

The last time I had touched her, I had only used the Demon God's power. It had been on the same scale as the lightning flowing through my body. This time, though, I was using standardized magic. It was a weak electrical current, too weak to even call an attack... but if it flowed directly into the nerves, it produced sensations thousands of times stronger than what she normally felt.

Bloodcraft and Authority couldn't be used without consciousness in the first place. If I overwhelmed her before she had time to think, even the most powerful Authority would be meaningless.

She could stop her heart even now and become a corpse again to block it. But Tyr would never choose that method.

[----!! ----!]

I covered Tyr's face with one hand. With the other, I gripped her body tightly. I filled every one of her senses with me, amplifying them thousands, tens of thousands of times over.

Tyr's soft body stiffened like a block of wood. Her tensed muscles straightened her body. Her back bent like a bow, and she drew breath in frantic gasps as though hyperventilating. Each breath, heavy with my scent, made her tremble even harder.

Every one of her senses was now amplified to the extreme. Touch, taste, smell, all of it would drive her mad. Her tongue hung slack from her stupidly open mouth.

[Hup, huff. Hngh, hnghhh!]

A raging torrent of sensation that would drive an ordinary human mad swept over her. But vampires who could regenerate their bodies restored even nerves that had burned out. Tyr cried and shook in pleasure she could neither escape nor grow accustomed to.

She was already helpless, but Tyr was too strong for me to let down my guard. I tormented her senses to the point where it felt excessive.

This might be my first and last chance.

How much time had passed?

When I came to my senses, Tyr's body was drenched. Tyr had never shed anything but blood, yet tears and sweat streamed from her without distinction beneath the torrent of sensation filling her entire body. A sound that could have been a sob or a scream flowed from her open mouth.

Fortunately, there was nothing wrong with her body. After all, I had only amplified her senses. The shock itself had been insignificant. The force was far too weak to harm Tyrkanzyaka, the Progenitor.

Without relaxing my guard, I carefully lifted Tyr. Perhaps her senses were still too heightened, because even the brush of her clothes against her skin made her body convulse. A foolish moan, mixed with saliva, leaked from the corner of her mouth.

I laid the exhausted Tyr flat on the bed and whispered,

"I was holding back that time too."

Tyr stared blankly through unfocused eyes. I wondered if she was looking at me, but her eyes didn't follow even when I moved. She had completely lost consciousness.

There was no helping it. If she had been conscious, she would've caught me. This was the best I could do.

"Thank you. But... I still can't grant your wish to change me. I'm a Beast King too. The moment I change must be the moment humanity changes."

Wanting to change yourself was fine. If you had enough will and ability, I could grant that wish.

Wanting to change another person had nothing to do with me. That person had wishes of their own, and those had nothing to do with your will or effort. All you could do was persuade them. I wouldn't interfere.

But if that other person was me, I resisted.

Because I was a mind-reader. Wishes could truly change me. That was why I had to resist. Otherwise, I'd be tossed around until I became nothing.

It sounded complicated, but that was all it was. What if someone wished to kill me? I couldn't kill myself just to grant that wish, could I? Protecting myself came first.

...A wish to be loved wasn't that extreme, but it still changed me.

Hup. I had beaten Tyr once, at least. I couldn't exactly go around bragging about it, though.

What? It was a cowardly victory that relied on Authority? Then Tyr should come fight without bloodcraft.

Either way, there was no sign of anyone nearby. Tyr had wanted somewhere without people, so she had brought me to a villa some distance from the castle. That was fortunate for me too. It would take her some time to recover and understand the situation.

Leaving the dark room behind, I opened the door and stepped outside...

[Don't go.]

I heard it without any sign of presence or thought. Startled, I looked back, but Tyr was still unconscious in the same position. Even when I checked with mind-reading, I couldn't read any thoughts.

But Tyr's shadow moved like a living human and caught me.

[Where are you going? Don't go.]

Tyr's shadow. A collection of bloodcraft modeled after Tyr's body by her Authority. It clung to me and whined like a child.

I couldn't read its thoughts. That wasn't human. It was a collection of Authority, an existence Tyr had created by reinterpreting her own body through Authority to wield her strength. It resembled Tyr too much to call it a servant, and it had changed too much to call it human...

"But can I really say this isn't human?"

I reached toward the shadow. I could feel blood pulsing beneath its skin. I couldn't read the shadow's thoughts... but I could tell that tremendous power and Authority filled the body beneath its flesh.

A homunculus? No, it was a little different. Homunculi recreated humans structurally, but this shadow recreated them functionally. Its red eyes were clearly looking at me, and blood sent power throughout that enormous body. Its strength couldn't even be compared to a homunculus.

"Humans are beasts. They can do anything they're capable of doing. I just didn't know they could do something like this."

It was a collection of Authority Tyr had created to fully exercise her power. Once embodied outside her body, it had become something almost human. Yet as a tool she had made, it differed greatly from an actual human.

One day, this power would reach humanity. When that happened, distinguishing between beasts and species would truly lose its meaning.

Shaking off the shadow, I said,

"Let go."

[You can't go.]

"I'm leaving."

[Do you hate being with me?]

"No, I like it. But I don't like being here and nowhere else."

[I don't either. I don't want to be alone.]

Damn. I had thought it might happen, but I hadn't expected the shadow to act independently. I took out the Eight of Spades and stamped it against the wall. The wall caved in, and a pile of cards poured from the gap.

The cards were nothing but thin pieces of iron. Such a pathetic result for the Demon God's Authority. But the Lord of Gold's Authority began with these pathetic scraps.

Using alchemy, magical power that transformed all things, I swept a hand over the spilling cards. Alchemical light flashed, weaving and binding the cards together.

Cards were materials. The Lord of Gold's enlightenment began there. Diversity came from differences in structure, while the elements making things up were the same. What mattered wasn't birth, but how things were woven together.

The cards that should have scattered apart became a single saber. I pointed the improvised sword at the shadow and said,

"I have to go."

[What for?]

"To catch up with humanity."

[Why?]

"Because they're getting farther and farther away. I need to run too. Otherwise... beings standing on the boundary like you will be left behind."

Could I defeat the shadow with my own power? Impossible. If I used all the Demon Gods' powers, I could somehow escape... but swinging this sword would remain a last resort.

The shadow didn't seem to feel threatened, but it understood my intent clearly. Tyr's shadow stepped back a little and said,

[You're trying to abandon me.]

"I've never done that. I won't abandon Tyr, and I won't abandon you either."

[You really won't?]

"I haven't. I know Tyr. I know you, Tyr's power, too. I'll never forget."

Over a thousand years of bloodcraft researched and refined by Elders and vampires. Tyr's Authority, made by collecting it all. The shadow of a Demon God that possessed all the functions of a human.

Something, one very small thing, was missing for it to become a Demon God... but I didn't know what it was either. My guess was that it had something to do with the special nature of its power. Tyr had used her Authority for herself, so her enlightenment hadn't been used for all humanity. It was special, and because of that, it couldn't become a Demon God.

Since it hadn't been used for all humanity, I couldn't use it either. Just like qi or magic. It was unfortunate, but perhaps this was a gain in its own way.

[Then.]

That was when the shadow suddenly came toward me. I didn't feel even a trace of presence. Unable to read its thoughts, I belatedly realized an obvious fact. I was damn weak. By the time I reacted and tried to swing the saber, the shadow had already swallowed me.

Darkness wrapped around my arm before being sucked away somewhere. Its head kissed me and vanished as though being sucked inside. Darkness flooded into my body through every opening. It felt as though the shadow was merging with me.

My vision darkened. My body rose. With darkness surrounding me while mind-reading didn't work, I could truly feel nothing. The only world allowed to me was my wretched flesh.

Just as I prepared myself to fight desperately in a world where I couldn't even breathe, a cold energy flowed through my blood vessels.

Coldness flowed through vessels so thin it would be insulting to compare them to thread. The cool energy melted into the veins as though declaring that this was where my blood was. The blood swiftly circulated from my fingertips to my toes and returned to my heart. When my heart reacted violently to the cold, the chilling energy surged toward my lungs like a torrent.

Then the darkness flowed out of my body again.

My vision returned in an instant. As I staggered backward, the shadow flickered before me. The girl's shadow modeled after Tyr had left something inside me before separating again.

[Take it with you.]

"What? What did you put inside me?"

The shadow didn't answer. It melted into the darkness as though sinking and returned to Tyr's side. Since I couldn't read its thoughts, I had to figure out what it had done myself. As someone who had lived by copying answers, it was troublesome to be handed a problem I had to solve on my own.

At least what the shadow had left behind wasn't very difficult to understand. That only made it stranger.

"This is... me?"

The body Tyr knew best was her own. The fact that the shadow modeled after her could speak and act on its own showed how deeply Tyr understood it.

And the body she knew second best was mine.

I wasn't a vampire. Tyr had never controlled my blood.

But Tyr was the Progenitor. We had lived together, she had watched me, and we had intertwined our bodies. Tyr had quietly observed me. She had felt the blood pulsing beneath a layer of skin. She had felt the heat my body gave off and heard the beat of my heart.

Tyr had the ability and countless opportunities to learn about my body. And more than anyone else, she had the will to find out. It hadn't been planned, but Tyr understood my body as well as I understood hers.

What the shadow had passed on was my body, shaped by Tyr's love and attention.

But.

"But this isn't humanity's. It's my body."

It was knowledge so personal that it couldn't become humanity's. I couldn't use it as the King of Humanity. There was a reason I couldn't use qi or magic. Those two forces, the extremes of self-cultivation, were individual powers, and they weren't permitted to me as a Beast King.

So I was grateful for the knowledge Tyr had passed on, but it was completely useless...

My left wrist suddenly grew hot. Something had entered the bio-terminal engraved there by the military state. When? How? I had no time to think about it. Enduring the dizzying pain, I carefully pulled out the thin card inside. The card, stained with my blood, was one I had seen countless times, which made it feel even more unnatural.

It was clearly not a Demon God. Why was this here?

I slowly turned the card over.

On the Six of Spades, red letters shone over the Demon God's idol.

Footnotes:

Join our discord at https://dsc.gg/wetried