Translator: Alpha0210
"Did you not say I had an important role to play?"
"I did."
"And what role would that be? If only a select few can fight Destruction out in 'The Outside', then it stands to reason I ought to be among them, does it not?"
"You're not wrong. In many ways you're an irreplaceable asset."
"Then why?"
Residue looked at the Half King once more. The smile had vanished from that clean-cut face at some point, yet for some reason he could tell she wasn't picking a fight, but simply asking for a reason she could accept.
She seemed a touch heated, sure, but for the moment reason was clearly winning out.
Of course, why someone who hated fighting would be upset about no longer having to head out to "The Outside" was beyond him. Shouldn't she be glad, if anything? Even as he thought this, Residue went ahead and laid out the reason he'd prepared.
"There are several reasons, but the decisive one was the fight just now. You're the only one who can rally those out in The Outside."
"Impossible. Having crossed blades with them myself, I know it now. True, I held the edge in raw combat power, but that was all. They are not the sort to be subdued by force."
"Not subdue, rally. And that much is enough. They're like coiled springs: the harder you try to force them down, the harder they'll push back. The relationship you have now is just right."
Even so she still looked unconvinced, so Residue spelled it out plainly.
"Don't you see, Half King? You've become the one and only being the Rulers respect."
The Lightning God and the Black Thorn Demon King would no longer sneer at the Half King's words. For even if they hadn't been utterly defeated, the simple fact that they'd been pushed back in a fight had been carved into their chests as a scar.
Whether they healed that scar or let it fester was a matter of their own capacities, but – at any rate, they'd have no thought of a rematch for the time being.
He'd expected she would understand by now, yet the Half King's face was still sullen. At last she heaved a deep sigh and spoke.
"I see. So there is work for me here, then."
"That's right."
"And what of you, then? Will you be all right out in 'The Outside' without me?"
"Hm?"
"I worry for you."
Now this was an unexpected remark.
"I fear you might go out there, do something foolish, and end up dead altogether. Once you go on a rampage, you have a tendency to disregard your own life."
To that, he had no real rebuttal.
At the same time, the fact that this pint-sized thing was worrying about him made laughter burst out of him.
"You're hundreds of millions of years too early to be worrying about this one. Mind your own affairs first."
Still, feeling oddly proud of her in spite of himself, he gave her hair a couple of light pats, when he suddenly noticed that his surroundings had gone far quieter than he'd expected.
Glancing around, he found most of them watching the scene with their mouths hanging open. It looked as though a different sort of shock from before had just swept through them.
Wondering what kind of reaction this was, Yang Inhyeon spoke up on everyone's behalf.
"...Residue, what exactly is your relationship with the Half King?"
Come to think of it, was it only a tiny handful who knew that Residue had once fought the Half King?
Futurix was watching the spectacle with conflicted eyes, while Agolet's thoughts remained as unreadable as ever.
The thought of explaining the long-winded affair that had taken place in Futurix's domain struck Residue as far too much trouble, so he had no choice but to keep it brief.
"Daughter."
"......!"
At that, no fewer than three people flinched.
One was Luca, one was Sedi, and the other was the Red Knight. The first two he could understand, but Red Knight, why you? Just as Residue, oddly unsettled, was about to snap at him, a dazed voice spilled out from up front as well.
"Daughter......?"
"It's a joke, so pull yourself together."
The Half King's expression had gone strangely hazy, so he gave her shoulders a shake to bring her back to her senses, then looked around once more and said,
"...Anyway. Besides the ones who just left, there are bound to be plenty more who still have complaints about this one's choices. I'll hear every one of them out, so come at me one at a time. It'll be tight on time, though."
"What do you mean by that?"
"Hm. Didn't I say? This Ticket has to be used as soon as possible. There's a time limit, you see."
Residue said it, fluttering the Ticket back and forth. Of course, not a single soul present had ever heard him mention any time limit.
The Half King asked,
"How much remains?"
"It was 24 hours from the moment I received it, so... a little under twenty hours left by now, I'd say?"
"......!"
*
Twenty hours was no small amount of time, but it was by no means generous either.
First he decided to gather up all those with complaints and deal with them at the very end, and before that, Residue sorted through the things he needed to do one by one.
From his breast pocket he drew out the "Thorn" he'd received from the Black Thorn Demon King. The externalized power of the Black Thorn Demon King, "Thorn", in a materialized and fixed form...... An item incredibly hard to come by in its own right, yet Residue needed one more thing like it.
That was the Tusk, the externalized power of the Seven-Toothed Dragon. This too he would have to obtain by persuading Beniyang, and Residue recalled the look Beniyang had sent his way during the talks. Beniyang seemed to have some grievance about the selection, so the dragon would no doubt come looking before long. He could discuss it then.
After that, Residue turned his thoughts to what would come once both "Thorn" and "Tusk" were in his hands.
One way or another, he had to use all of them to forge the Rulers' power into one.
If he were to use them, in what order should it be done?
The tooth first, or the thorn? If he used both at once, wouldn't his body pop like a balloon?
Just as he was sinking into pointless musings, a knock came at the door once more.
Residue spoke with an annoyed look.
"It's open."
At that, Iris came in wearing a look every bit as annoyed as Residue's. Of course, she hadn't come alone. Behind her, a string of truly distinctive characters filed in.
A brown-haired man, a giant demon, and a silver-haired beauty of a girl, no less.
Iris said with a crooked expression,
"I rounded them all up, for what it's worth."
"Good work."
"......"
At his attitude, acting as if he were her superior, the corner of Iris's mouth twitched. ...Endure it. Endure. That's Lukas. A twisted Lukas. Right now I'm doing this as a favor to Lukas......
"Hmm."
Residue stroked his chin and looked over the ones standing in a row.
"Quite the lineup, now that I see you side by side. Lucid, who stepped down from the Four Knights and became little more than a corpse; the self-proclaimed Kasajin, a half-rate Absolute; Iris, versatile enough but with subpar combat power......"
"S-Subpar......"
Iris, who had been busy hypnotizing herself, let out a low groan and glared at Residue.
Ignoring her, Residue turned his gaze to the last remaining girl. She was even smaller and slighter than the Half King or Sedi.
"And what's this?"
"...Anastasia."
"I know the name. I've a rough grasp of the identity, too. Schweiser Strow, the former Great Sage. Born by injecting a copied personality and memories into a fairly precisely crafted doll. I feel a strange sense of kinship, you know?"
"Kinship how?"
"Because this one, too, is a being born from a copied personality."
Anastasia gazed up at him blankly, then turned to Iris and said,
"...Until I got here I thought it was all nonsense, but seeing it with my own two eyes, I can't help but believe it. Still, watching him carry on like that with Lukas's face is almost refreshing, in a way."
"Quiet, you. You're one to talk, when you'd forgotten all about him."
"That wasn't something I could do anything about. And you, too–"
About to snap back, Anastasia caught sight of Iris's expression and stopped short.
Iris let out a sigh and looked at Residue.
"It rubs me the wrong way, but you're right. Honestly, I don't think the four of us can do a thing in a fight against Destruction. If you've got some ulterior motive, I'd say you'd better come out with it now."
"Not an ulterior motive. How about my true intentions, then?"
Residue said it with a grin, but no response came back. How humorless of her.
"Fine. All right. At any rate, since we'll be traveling companions for a while, I suppose I ought to at least reveal the destination. First, the reason this one assembled these particular five members is......"
Savoring the focused gazes upon him as if relishing them, he finished with a faint smile.
"...there isn't really one."
"......"
"If I had to put it into words, it was an impulsive move."
An impulsive move.
An impulsive move......
Iris tried hard to decipher the hidden meaning behind those words, but to no avail.
The look on Residue's face said that was exactly it.
Which was to say, this man had truly pulled off something like this with no plan and no rhyme or reason whatsoever......
Snap.
A vein bulged on Iris's forehead.
Residue regarded the witch's now-fierce expression and added to his explanation.
"Now, now. Calm down and hear me out to the end. Getting angry can wait until after that, it won't be too late."
"...Spout away, then."
"The truth is, the members this one originally put together were myself, Iris PeaceFinder, the Half King, Luca, and lastly Retip. There were concrete reasons, too. Depending on how it's developed, Iris PeaceFinder's ability might even evolve into a technique for returning from 'The Outside' to 'The Inside'. The Half King is, needless to say, the single strongest force in the Unified World, and Luca hails from Destruction. She's a dim one, but venturing out to The Outside might just become the spark for something useful in her."
"What about Retip?"
"Who's that?"
At Anastasia's question, Kasajin quietly replied.
"Lightning God's subordinate. An Absolute."
Still unaccustomed to the being before her, Anastasia regarded Kasajin with a strange look.
"Not just any Absolute. Among the Absolutes, a Conqueror powerful enough to be counted on one hand."
"I see... a force of that caliber would carry weight enough, then."
"No. Not particularly?"
Residue shot it down in a single breath.
"The reason this one meant to bring Retip along is that, aside from the Four Knights, the Rulers, and the Twelve Void Lords, he was about the most obedient of the lot."
"......"
Anastasia stared at Residue with a blank face.
Normally, the more one talks with a person, the more there's a certain satisfaction in coming to know them, yet with this one, every time he opens his mouth he becomes harder and harder to read. There's surely a reason behind the sense of wrongness his appearance gives off, too......
...Come to think of it, there was one more being Anastasia couldn't quite make sense of.
The largest of everyone present. An appearance that practically advertised "I am a demon" to all four directions.
Still unable to get used to him, Anastasia narrowed her eyes.
"...But are you really, truly Kasajin?"
"Yes. I am Kasajin."
Residue, who had been watching the giant demon and the beautiful girl, cut into the conversation.
"To be precise, he's the same as the rest of us. Asha."
"And what's 'Asha' now?"
"Your name was too long, so I trimmed it. This one can't be bothered with names of more than five syllables."
"Why not?"
"Because it's a pain."
"......"
"To continue the explanation, that thing was once called the 0th Demon. A Ruler-like being that existed in the World of Void......"
Residue summarized that grand and lengthy tale as efficiently as he could manage.
"...and one thing led to another, until it seized the memories and personality of the Magic Warrior King Kasajin and became what it is now."
"That explains nothing."
"That's all you need to know. There's no need to know any more than that."
"You're just saying that because you can't be bothered, aren't you?"
"If you know that, then quit pressing."
"Tch. This guy's genuinely a lunatic."
Anastasia looked up at Residue in a flabbergasted voice.
Iris pressed at her temple as if struck by a sudden headache.
"...In any case, there's no change to this lineup, then?"
"There's still one last round of interviews left, but barring anything major, this one means to go with it as is."
"Haah. Just thinking about heading out to 'The Outside' with you lot already makes my head ache."
"Why don't you drop that 'I'm the only normal one here' attitude."
Anastasia threw in a jab, but Iris, with a look of utter disbelief, said,
"But that's the truth, isn't it? Asha, if you've got eyes, take a look at the state of everyone but me."
"Don't call me Asha. You wench."
"Lucid's gone and become half a corpse. Kasajin's fused with some demon or other, by the look of it, a spectacle from the outside in. You've even had your sex flipped entirely. And that one over there wears Lukas's face but is rotten like that on the inside."
Her tone was rather cutting, so Residue burst into hearty laughter.
Iris shot him a disdainful glare, then planted a hand on her hip and said,
"By comparison, I, inside and out, am completely Iris PeaceFinder. Exactly as I was 4,000 years ago."
"Right. Must be ni–ce, being so old. Want me to call you granny?"
"Shut it. Brat."
"Brat......"
Still, it was a relief that these two at least had plenty to say.
Residue let his eyes fall on the two utterly taciturn men, then let out a small snort of a laugh.
"Wrong. Iris PeaceFinder. You, too, can't be called a wholly intact Iris."
"What?"
"In the final battle that took place in your home universe, you died once. You died for Lukas Trowman, and your soul was shattered to pieces. Afterward you were reconstructed in accordance with Lukas's wish, but that cannot be called a complete resurrection. Which is to say, there may be something somewhere that was left out."
"......"
Iris flinched, and her face paled a little. If that was so, it meant the self currently acting as Iris might not, in fact, be Iris at all.
Residue grinned.
Of course, it was half a fabrication, prompted by the way this woman seemed to be carrying herself with a bit too much confidence.
"I can tell what's troubling you. Don't be afraid. Even if you aren't Iris, nothing really changes. What matters is selfhood. So long as you can recognize yourself as 'me', identity is the sort of thing that settles itself."
"...It's not a problem I can make peace with that easily."
"Anyway."
Residue said.
"To pick up where I left off earlier, the moment I was about to call out the third member, Lucid stepped forward. Three out of five is as good as a majority, and in that instant this current picture took shape. After all, this one is also a being who carries on Lukas Trowman's legacy. Call it a sudden flash of the Five Heroes who are said to have saved the world long ago, if you like."
"...You dress it up nicely. But the bottom line is you did it on impulse, isn't it?"
Residue's tone grew a touch more serious.
"The flow of things isn't to be ignored. Try to force your way against it and you'll come out worse than where you started. Sometimes you have to learn how to ride the current and live at ease."
"......"
After mulling it over for a moment, Anastasia pressed him again with a frown.
"So basically. In the end, you're saying you just did it on impulse."
Realizing he'd failed to brush it off, Residue nodded and admitted it.
"That's right."
*****
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