WeTried Translations

Translator: Hydrogen B

Editor: Hydrogen B

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Chapter 606: A Story of a Place Left Behind - The King of Humanity Doesn't Know the Human Heart

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People who lived in the World Tree's shade each kept a safeguard against falling. Rain, wind, or a jolt could easily send someone plummeting.

Maximilien was no exception. He spread his cloak like wings. It did not flap like a bird's wings, but spinning sawblades pushed the air away and lifted him upward. Maximilien could glide through the sky more gracefully than any bird.

With his back to the ground and his eyes on the sky, Maximilien watched the flames disappear into the distant heavens. His eyes filled with longing as he murmured,

"It wasn't the Demon God. The world hasn't been twisted."

Within his chest, Maximilien examined tiny, intricate gears meshing together. The mechanism, built by stacking logic atop gears that fit together without even a millimeter of error, still wound itself at a steady rhythm.

The World Distortion Detection Gear. As its name suggested, it detected distortions in the world. Maximilien's masterpiece was constructed so sturdily that no shock could throw it out of alignment, yet it was so precise that it could detect even the slightest change in the laws of the world.

When Maximilien encountered the Lord of Gold in the Lesser States, the sound of the gears changed. Simply approaching the Lord of Gold altered the nature of matter.

When he entered the Abyss, the gears spun uselessly. Within the Abyss, which had been made by borrowing space from the entire earth, the gears spread apart and could no longer mesh.

And when he approached the Arcane Federation's floating castle, the gears' rotation cycle changed ever so slightly.

Anyone could break a gear, but only a Demon God could alter the structure of its logic. Since deciding to become a Demon God, Maximilien had always carried it close to his chest.

That was why he knew the force that had burned the World Tree was not the Demon God itself.

"But those flames are unlike any flames I know...! A power born from a Demon God unknown to me!"

That enormous, incomprehensible power too. He instinctively understood that it came from a Demon God beyond his knowledge.

The flames consumed even ash, exhaled sparkling smoke, and instead of sinking, vanished high into the distant sky. Rather than the unpleasant stench of burning, a sharp, dizzying fragrance lingered at the tip of his nose. As though these were not flames born of this land.

The star's flame was so powerful and mysterious that even Maximilien could tell it differed from ordinary fire.

That was the kind of uniqueness a Demon God could create.

"My gears..."

Could not reach it.

His gears were insanely useful, but they did not transcend common sense. They were no more than tools created by assembling old, conventional devices into something complicated.

As the King of Humanity had said, gears could not escape being tools.

"I suppose I cannot become a Demon God..."

The gap was so vast it inspired despair. A distance that could never be closed.

Having struck a wall, Maximilien covered his face and laughed bitterly. His laughter spread lonely through the empty air, unheard by anyone.

"Thanks to this, my task has become clear! Good! Gears only need one direction to turn!"

His goal was not to become a Demon God. He only wanted to cover the entire world in the logic of gears. The military state was a masterpiece completed with unlimited support for his genius inspiration, but it remained far from his ideal.

That was why he had approached the Tree of Corruption, met Nevida, and joined the Lords of All Creation.

"Everything is for the King of Humanity."

His gaze turned downward, toward the great lotus descending alone as it scattered beautiful petals.

The lotus fell onto the earth as lightly as though it were settling upon water. It made no sound at all, seeming less like it had fallen than like it had just bloomed.

It wriggled. Then wriggled again. The lotus squirmed as if the space inside it were too cramped. After swaying back and forth for a while, it soon learned how to spread its petals. One by one, it unfolded the petals it had kept closed like fingers, revealing what it had concealed within.

Clouds burned in the sky from Nova's flames. Welcoming the clear sunlight pouring down, the being who had slept within the lotus stretched.

"Yaaawn."

The being yawned as lightly as the fresh weather, then stepped onto the ground.

Long gray hair reached her waist, covering her breasts. Her slender limbs were healthy, even wild in appearance. Though she wore not a stitch of clothing and seemed to feel no shame, she slowly gripped the earth with her feet.

She was a beast. It was only natural for a beast to set foot on the ground.

There was nothing special about it. Nothing important.

Yet this single step she took would transform all of humanity.

"Hello. It's been a while."

The King of Humanity, awakened from a long sleep, lightly greeted the world. The world welcomed her greeting in return. The gentle wind, swaying grass, dew brushing against her skin and flowing past, even the light shining upon her body.

Like a newborn child, like an elderly woman awakened from a long sleep. She looked around with curious eyes, then suddenly looked down at her body.

A naked body without a single thread upon it. Convention would scold her, while aesthetic appreciation would gasp in admiration. Whether she was naked or clothed, she herself would not care in the slightest.

"Oh, right. They said I should wear clothes."

Most humans wore clothes, so she decided that she would wear them too.

The instant she made that decision.

Wild grass began to grow. Druidism, an understanding of plants' structure and origins, and the insight to control their growth. With that insight, she grew cotton. The cotton shot up, blooming into white flowers and bearing fruit in an instant before snapping off and dropping to the ground.

The seeds sleeping within the cotton crumbled away, leaving only pure white cotton fiber. A crackling skein of lightning seeped into every strand. The tangled fibers straightened as though someone had combed them, gathering into bundles and twisting around one another like snakes to become thread.

The King of Humanity moved her hands. Warp and weft intertwined, making cloth. It crept over her body and wound its way upward, stopping where it belonged. She swiftly cut the fabric with her fingers, scraps fell to the ground, and the cloth became proper clothing, receiving the honor of wrapping the King of Humanity.

-This entire process took less than a minute.

As though rapidly replaying human civilization, the King of Humanity created clothes from nothing and put them on. She roughly tied her hair to one side. Once she had moved it out of the way, she looked at the unfamiliar visitor.

"They say it's rude to watch someone getting dressed. Everyone said so."

"Haha. So even the King of Humanity possesses such common sense!"

Maximilien emerged from the tree's shadow. He had waited without particularly hiding himself, yet without revealing himself either. With a bright expression, he stood before the King of Humanity. She tilted her head and replied,

"Of course. It's common sense, isn't it?"

"No, King of Humanity. Is not your common sense different from everyone else's?"

Maximilien clenched the hem of his clothes.

"King of Humanity. You do not wear clothes because you need them. Nor does the world have the power to force you to wear them. Yet you wear them. It is because clothes have already become a concept inseparable from humanity."

"Yes. You can't live without wearing clothes."

The King of Humanity made a perfectly ordinary statement and smiled brightly at Maximilien.

"Unlike your gears, Maximilien."

She spoke as though she had seen through his thoughts.

There was no need to say anything more. Clothes were already part of humanity. Humans of every kind, born all across the continent, made things to wear upon their bodies. Even without anyone teaching them, they naturally converged on that outcome.

But gears were only one way to interpret the world, far from enough to become part of humanity.

That was why the King of Humanity wore clothes, yet did not use gears.

"Even so, King of Humanity. Though my insight cannot reach the level of a Demon God, and cannot spread to become universal..."

But conversely, if the King of Humanity used gears.

If their use spread from the King of Humanity to all humans.

The converse was not always true, but humans sometimes mistook it for truth. And if every human made that mistake, it would no longer be a mistake.

That was the relationship between humanity and the King of Humanity.

"If you use my gears, every human will use them as well."

Though Maximilien had created the century's toy called the military state and was satisfied with a structured nation that moved according to the logic of gears, he had thrown himself into the Lords of All Creation as though possessed and sought out the King of Humanity.

All for this moment.

"Use the gears. For me."

Every gear orbiting his body aligned. Click, click. At some point, the sound of meshing teeth was swallowed up and vanished.

Over 918,000 large and small gears connected as one.

The principle of gears was relatively simple, and a particular function did not require many of them. More gears meant greater friction and wear, making them less efficient. A number exceeding 918,000 went beyond unrealistic and entered the realm of a joke.

Yet Maximilien connected all that power as one, even at the height of inefficiency.

Maximilien's innate arcane, Gear Maiden. Its ability was to rotate gears themselves according to his will.

How terrifyingly great a force would it take to turn one gear and move a structure of over 918,000 gears? It could not even be measured. No matter how strong the gears were, they would break and wear down.

But conversely.

If he moved all 918,000-plus gears through his special innate arcane.

And concentrated all that force into a single gear.

If he could withstand the impact for one moment and plant it within the King of Humanity.

Maximilien's wish would come true.

"Full Gear Assembly."

Having absorbed every gear, Maximilien looked almost like a giant. With a grinding sound, his body's gears began spinning furiously without a load. Air trapped between the gears burst free, creating strange explosive sounds.

Every rotation inside and outside his body converged in one hand. A torrent of force created by layering dozens of gears concentrated there.

The gears throughout his body ground against one another. Such immense force wore down the gears themselves. The gears composing Maximilien's body were made of the highest-quality alchemical steel, but they crumbled and wore away under the pressure of logic built from layers upon layers of gears.

The force that no living being afraid of death could ever produce, a force that exceeded his limits according to logic, gathered in the single gear attached to Maximilien's right fist.

"It is the Sun Gear. Come, take it!"

It could no longer even be called rotation. The atmosphere heated from its terrifying speed and burst into flames. It resembled the wheel of a solar chariot.

A tremendous power, one difficult to find anywhere in the world, shot toward the King of Humanity, who watched him with eyes full of curiosity.

Footnotes:

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