Major Premise (1)
For both those who had suspected the relationship between Shirone and Ikael and those who hadn't, it was a shock.
No one even entertained the biology-upending question that an angel could have a human child.
What mattered was simply that Yahweh—the representative of humanity—and the commander of Heaven's armies were bound by a powerful link.
"Shirone... Ikael's child?" For the officials close to Adolf XIII, the strengthening of Shirone's cause was bad news.
The succession ceremony was not far off, but these were people who had survived countless reversals to get where they were.
"Never give up until the end. There's always one card left. But if this claim is true..." Their future darkened.
"Should I switch to the Poni line now? If this keeps up, I'll be purged too."
Continents were opening to the demon realm and humanity faced annihilation, but who cared about that here?
They were in the hall to protect their own lives, not to save the world.
Shirone, who knew most of humanity's history, could read those minds as well.
"That's understandable."
As Ghaffin's final words had said, protecting oneself was not a sin.
When Shirone waited until everyone in the Grand Hall had sorted their thoughts, he spoke again.
"Ikael's joining would be a huge help to humanity, but it won't be enough on its own. If we classify world affairs by enemies, humanity currently faces three powerful foes: Nane, Imir, and Habitz."
They were figures beyond argument.
"Any one of them could be fatal to humanity. In depth of realm, I don't think I fall short of them. But the reason we couldn't stop them before..." Miro said.
"The Ultima system."
"Yes. The level I reached is based on the mind. After the succession ceremony, I'll go on a pilgrimage to gather humanity's hearts. Kingdoms and cities can be handled through Poni, but I'll personally visit villages and remote places where social systems haven't reached."
"So?"
Turning toward the voice, Gaold sat sullenly in a corner.
Kangnan was the one looking after him, and the moment Miro glanced over she immediately turned away from Gaold.
"What do you think you'll do by going? Go to each place and beg people to change their hearts for the world?"
Shirone said nothing.
"That might work. But you know human hearts..." He put a cigarette to his lips; Kangnan lit it.
"Cough! Cough!"
Putting aside that Poni would be the next monarch, Kangnan had mostly given up.
Gaold, coughing repeatedly, inhaled deeply and continued.
"If someone wants an apple, they will never voluntarily eat a strawberry. They could, but they won't. The heart can't even be turned on such a trivial question as which fruit to pick. Threaten them with a blade and of course they'll eat the strawberry—but that has nothing to do with the heart. Changing a heart means changing the person. Basically, it means becoming an entirely different human being."
He flicked the still-glowing cigarette butt and the officials backed away hastily.
"There's only one way to make someone who wants an apple change their heart and eat a strawberry. Do you know what it is?" Gaold held up two fingers. "Give them both."
Shirone remained silent, but his gaze answered as strongly as Gaold's.
"If you tell someone to have both apple and strawberry, they'll willingly take the strawberry. That's the heart. It's an uncontrollable beast that wants to devour everything. Even the most extreme labyrinth can at best lock it behind bars. Habitz set it free. The only one who might be able to kill that beast is Nane."
To excise the heart completely.
"But you think you can tame it? I don't mean to be a wet blanket, but I'll say this plainly: that's impossible. Not every human can become you."
Gaold's analysis still had a sharp edge, despite how broken he seemed.
Miro conceded. 'He's not completely gone.'
In a way, Gaold's own life might be the embodiment of that monster they'd just described.
"Can't cage it, can't free it. Can't tame it, can't kill it."
That life's name would be Miro's, but she didn't want to think that far.
"Gaold's right."
All eyes turned back to Shirone, and he admitted it quietly.
"As I told my friends yesterday, this is a technical problem. By normal means, we can't reach Ultima in time."
"Then?"
As Miro asked, someone knocked.
The large doors opened and Blitz and Aitra—who had left somewhere the night before—entered.
"Messiah, we brought them."
Following the apostles were figures familiar to some: the dream-entities Ruber and Monga.
Ruber smiled kindly and bowed.
"I came at the call of the Five Great Stars." Those who had experienced Drimo wore looks of astonishment, and Miro suddenly realized.
"You mean, Shirone... you had that method."
"Yes. Mr. Ruber is a dream-keeper who manages the domain of Drimo. In other words, he's connected to the psyche of all humanity."
Through Omega, Shirone already knew what Ruber was—not top-tier like Tae-seong or Argones, but an administrator within the system.
"Here's the plan. With Ruber's approval as Drimo's manager, we install the Ultima system into the primordial psyche of all humanity. We graft it directly into the mind."
"Uh..." Several people tried to speak, but their thoughts were still in disarray.
Once she understood, Amy's face lit with joy.
"That method...!"
Miro interrupted.
"It's a contradiction."
She was the only one who'd caught the blind spot.
"The method itself is fine. But there's a major premise built into it: the Ultima system must actually exist. At least conceptually completed. If it were, we'd have solved this through education, training, or mental resonance already. The reason we haven't is because this concerns the realm of sensation. It's easy to say what a 'sense' is, but who actually knows what kind of sensation it is? Even I can't even guess."
"That's why the pilgrimage is necessary," Shirone explained.
"This world is constructed by the exchange of photon and quantum signals. Half of it is background, and sentient beings fill it in with their minds. That means every event exists as a probability—so even seemingly impossible things could happen."
Shirone raised his index finger.
"Then why don't quantum phenomena occur?"
Everyone leaned in.
"Why don't people suddenly fall through floors into basements, or teleport to random places while walking, or transform into grotesque monsters?"
Miro said, "Because those things don't happen. More precisely, they haven't happened yet. It's paradoxical, but that paradox is the truth."
"Yes. If this world were made only of minds, anything would be possible. It would be chaotic and nonsensical, but internally consistent. Fundamentally, though, it's a photon signal. That signal creates preconceptions and, perhaps, drives the tiny probability of those events to absolute zero."
Shirone looked around at them.
"Assume a world built on electricity: the coupling of photons and quanta is astonishingly efficient. It lays down a background and lets users define things among themselves. Photon signals act like a kind of consensus organ. Because everyone's definitions combine to form the world, no special tuning is needed."
The world is constructed at the speed of light.
"Those who used this world long ago discovered that truth and developed that signal to extremes."
Eventually, one of them denied the cold world and climbed against the void.
"Not everyone reached Ultima from the start. A single trivial incident could change everything."
"Cognitive limits. You mean the realm of belief."
Sein spoke; Shirone nodded and formed a small material sphere.
"In a photon-quantum world, all truth is gained inductively. For example, the fact that this ball cannot pass through a wall isn't true because of any absolute law—it's because such an event has never occurred until now. But..."
He snapped the ball into his palm, turned to the window, and tossed it.
"One day."
The ball flew clean through the window and out into the night.
"When that inductive logic is broken." Everyone gaped as Shirone turned back.
"Human cognition can cross its limits and enter a new domain. In other words, a probability that had been suppressed to zero can suddenly spike."
Because half the world is made of minds.
"People often say they believe in gods. But even clergy cannot be perfect. I'm not disparaging them, but no being can truly believe in something they cannot perceive. That's why Eden's shield can never be flawless. But if, by chance, a god actually descended into this world—or even a single small miracle occurred—then perhaps the whole world would come to believe." Shirone summarized.
"That's why I want to purify people's hearts through a pilgrimage. Quantum signals are like a shared bandwidth used by many users; if their sincere intentions don't interweave, the effect weakens. A moment ago I passed the ball through the window, but if someone who wields the art of the heart had forcefully rejected it, the two phenomena would have collided."
Sein said.
"But there's no one like that. No one has expanded their cognition as far as you have."
"Yes. They can't even conceive the possibility. But for those of you who saw it with your own eyes, anything is possible."
Miro said, "You can say that, but don't expect imitation to be easy. It's not a technique you can replicate just by watching. That's why you want to plant the Ultima system directly."
So Shirone's argument remained a matter of possibility, but Miro no longer pressed it.
If it wasn't impossible, they had to try—humanity's situation left no choice.
"Alright, I understand the idea. But there's a second problem. Even if you implant the Ultima system deep within, what about the aftershocks? You achieved Ultima in Heaven, right? You can't just skip senses six through ten and jump straight to the eleventh—true integration requires more than simply perceiving every signal. Even if people could understand all the signals, it would likely cause social chaos."
Arrius, propped on his elbow on the floor, added, "There's also whether humans can endure it. In Shirone's case, Ikael grafted Ataraxia into him. At that time his mind must have been on the verge of collapse. Can ordinary humans—who aren't unlockers—stand that kind of shock?"
After all, his nickname had been Grave Robber.