Chapter 455: Hesitation and Reflection!
'Ugh… that hurts.'
Luke held his faintly aching head and sat obediently on the bed without a single complaint!
Forced to Behave (Luke Edition).jpg
After their little scuffle—no, after getting smacked once—Luke finally stopped messing around.
Recalling what Kurono had just said, he gently shook his head.
"The soul, huh…"
"Director, if you believe the soul—or perhaps the soul together with the body—is what determines whether someone is human, then I have a few questions."
"If a human soul entered an animal's body, lived an ordinary peaceful life without anyone discovering the truth, and eventually died, would that still count as a human?"
"If a human soul entered an animal's body, followed its survival instincts, ate both animals and humans, and was eventually hunted down, would that still count as a human?"
The two questions made Kurono hesitate.
This was a modern world, after all, and stories involving reincarnation or transmigration certainly existed.
So Kurono naturally understood what Luke meant.
If she followed her previous belief that the soul was the foundation of identity, then both should obviously still count as humans.
At first glance, that seemed perfectly reasonable.
But Kurono had already realized Luke was nowhere near finished.
Sure enough, without waiting for her answer, Luke continued.
"If a human soul entered a monster's body but behaved kindly and helped others, would that count as a human?"
"If that same person used the monster's body to commit every kind of atrocity, would they still count as a human?"
"And what if we reverse it?"
"If a monster's soul entered a human body and chose either good or evil, how would you classify them?"
"If everything is determined purely by the soul, then technically those questions can still be answered."
Luke paused.
He looked at Kurono's tightly furrowed brow, thought for a moment, then continued.
"But those are only the simplest examples."
"What happens if we add more conditions?"
"Imagine a human raised as a monster."
"Nothing about his behavior resembles a human. He has no family, and because of his upbringing, he has neither compassion nor emotional attachment."
"He never considers himself human, nor does he want to be."
"Nothing he does follows human logic."
"Now consider another case."
"A monster grows up in human society."
"Everything he says and does is indistinguishable from an ordinary person."
"He is kind, gentle, cheerful, and accepted by everyone around him."
"He wants to be human."
"He believes he is human."
"And no matter what happens, that belief will never change."
"Yet fundamentally—he is still a monster."
"How would you judge those two?"
Kurono fell silent.
The questions were not actually difficult.
She could still answer them using her earlier position that the soul determined identity.
But Kurono understood that Luke was not asking because he wanted an answer.
The real question was whether she herself could accept the answer she gave without any guilt or hesitation.
If she could, then the problem would naturally be solved.
For someone who truly believed the soul alone defined humanity, that conclusion could allow them to completely abandon the path of a Desperado.
Kurono's dilemma would end there.
But could she accept it?
Of course not!
Especially the final two examples.
Kurono could tell they were based on real people.
She did not know exactly whom Luke had in mind, but she could easily find similar examples among those she knew.
They were not completely identical, but the two cases strongly resembled Amane and Nene.
Shinomiya Amane, who before Luke intervened had become almost unbearably twisted.
And Saikyou Nene, who had already entered the Desperado realm but did not see herself as a monster and still firmly believed she was human.
Kurono was not close enough to the former to dwell on him.
But Nene was completely different.
Could Kurono truly look into her own heart and declare without hesitation that Nene was a monster?
Whether that judgment was right or wrong did not matter.
Emotionally, she simply could not accept it.
"Ultimately, who decides what counts as human?"
"You?"
"Me?"
"Or some absolute truth written into the laws of the world?"
"And more importantly…"
"Can ordinary people and Blazers in this world truly even be considered the exact same race?"
"Is the difference between them really so much smaller than the difference between Blazers and Desperados?"
"Blazers can manipulate things like time and causality."
"Would their souls truly be identical to those of ordinary people?"
Luke could have given countless more examples.
The Starpulse Generation and ordinary people from Asterisk.
Normal humans and Adventurers in the Dungeon world.
The countless different kinds of agents within the Main God Space.
Were the souls of all those beings who called themselves human truly identical?
There was no proper answer to a question like that.
Unless Luke someday became powerful enough to manipulate souls freely and discovered some law capable of defining "humanity" across every world—Then no matter how reasonable or logically sound an explanation appeared, it could still be wrong.
Reality did not care about arguments.
Whether you believed something or not, facts remained facts.
Any viewpoint that required reasoning and logic to persuade others was ultimately still speculation.
So when people made important choices, only one thing truly mattered.
Could they accept that choice themselves?
Only then could they avoid regretting it afterward.
Kurono was exactly like that.
Without definite proof, she simply could not view Nene as a monster.
In fact, she would much rather believe Nene was still human.
And that directly contradicted the reason Kurono had abandoned becoming a Desperado all those years ago.
That was why she was still troubled by the decision even today.
If Nene had reached the Desperado gate first back then—If she had entered the Desperado realm before Kurono completely made up her mind—Kurono probably would not have made her decision nearly so decisively.
Perhaps the final outcome still would not have changed.
But her hesitation and doubt would likely have been far worse than they were now.
In the end, Kurono gave up thinking about it.
She irritably rubbed her head.
She had originally come here hoping Luke could give her some answers.
Instead, he had only made the problem even more troublesome.
"Tch. Then what about you?"
"If you don't think becoming a Desperado means becoming a monster…"
"What do you consider 'human'?"
Kurono threw the question straight back at him.
Luke sighed somewhat helplessly.
He had already known it would be impossible to change Kurono's decision so easily.
Still, actually reaching this point left him somewhat emotional.
But Luke had never intended to decide anything for her.
So he had no reason to keep pushing.
The Kurono sitting before him now was no longer the same Kurono who had made that decision years ago.
Even if Luke genuinely made her regret it and convinced her to change her mind, that might not necessarily be a good thing in her current circumstances.
Having decided to end the topic, Luke stopped trying to guide her and simply gave his own answer.
"For me personally…"
"I suppose it would be 'consciousness.'"
"No matter what happens to my body, and whether my soul evolves or deteriorates…"
"As long as I still believe I'm human, then I'll continue living as one."
…
…
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