Electrical Civilization (4)
Along the Dionas Kingdom's coastline, Shirone could see dozens of artillery emplacements.
Beyond a jungle-thick forest stood the royal castle, and vividly colored birds flew through the sky.
Aboard the Arakne galleon, Shirone first barred the refugees from coming forward.
"There might be bombardment. Wait here for now. I'll go ashore and take a look."
At that moment, a cannon blast cracked.
They turned, but what had been fired into the air was only a firework full of confetti.
A frivolous fanfare followed, and a swift launch came speeding in.
"Hold!"
Arakne's knights aboard the launch spoke with the pirates and returned.
"King Kalt of Dionas sent a welcome missive. He invites you to the castle."
Kearns crumpled the paper after reading it.
"Hmph. How brazen. They sent their brother to attack us, and now they invite us in?"
"Maybe they thought a fight at sea was their only chance. Either way, we'll go. What will Arakne do?" Shirone said.
"...Of course we'll go. But the galleon will not be allowed to dock. We don't know what tricks they might have — we can't risk taking our treasure ashore."
So a small team was formed: Kearns and his attendants, Shirone, and Sadoro.
"I'll come too." Rangi cut in. "Let me come. I'll be useful. First impressions matter, after all."
"You?" Kearns was displeased; in a sense she was the most important bargaining chip in the negotiation.
"This is enemy territory. If you get into danger, it could weaken our diplomatic position."
"Staying here doesn't feel safer. The safest place is—" Rangi grabbed Shirone's arm. "—right here, isn't it?" Kearns stared blankly but couldn't think of a rebuttal.
"Are you sure?" Shirone knew why she insisted on risking herself.
'To help me.'
And in Rangi's case, it made sense that the ship would be the more dangerous place.
"Let's go together. Besides, Jakhra is in our custody. I don't know how valuable the hostage is, but—"
Eleven people boarded Dionas's fast launch and went ashore.
Cutting through the jungle, they followed an elaborate path of planks lashed between trees.
Small outposts dotted the route, and menace seeped from each of them.
Poine smiled. "Their hostility is almost embarrassing. They might try to hide it, but they're obvious."
Because the path was rough, Rangi and Kearns had to rely on magic several times before they reached the castle.
"This the castle?" Shirone asked.
It was a brick building that looked like it belonged three hundred years ago, roughly the size of a central-continent monastery.
"His Majesty is a modest man," the envoy said. "He pursues a simple life — no greed for wealth, no hunger for power."
Poine chuckled. "Would a man like that order the kidnapping of a young maiden? Huh. Pirate words are meaningless, of course, but still."
"Do not insult His Majesty," the envoy warned. "Try to read his thoughts carelessly, and you will not escape death."
It wasn't mere bluster; the terrified Jakhra made that clear.
When the gate opened, pirates stood in ranks along a red carpet.
It was certainly a spectacle fit for sea-robbers, but Shirone's attention went to the man waiting for them.
"Kalt." A red-haired man, hair loose and wild, spread his palms in greeting.
"Travelers to the sanctuary of peace, welcome."
Where most people spoke in normal tones, Kalt's voice was consistently a little off — as if pitched a semitone away.
"Worry about nothing. As long as I am here, nothing will harm you."
His odd cadence was unpleasant, affected, and unapologetically depraved.
"I am one of the Ivory Tower's Five Great Stars." Shirone stepped forward. "Your younger brother Jakhra attacked our ship. You owe us an explanation."
Kalt looked at his brother with a casual gaze. "You aren't going to tell me you didn't know. This one confessed everything last night."
"Mm! Mm!" Jakhra, already broken and shaking his head, was no longer sane.
"Yes, I sent my brother. To welcome my soul's mate, Rangi." Kalt laid a hand on his chest and bowed. "Thank you for bringing her here yourself. You are as beautiful as ever, Rangi."
Rangi felt as if electricity ran through her body.
"Oh — by the way, you trimmed your bangs. About two centimeters — no, 2.3 centimeters." If a man were delicate, Rangi might have tolerated it, but this was excessive. "Your thirteenth eyelash curves by about 0.7 degrees. Where did the downy hair at 7.3 centimeters above your wrist go? It was my favorite. . . " A wave of nausea at the thought washed over her.
"There is no need to be afraid. I will not touch you. No—there's no need to touch." Kalt's eyelids trembled. "I already feel it." He let out a soft, crawling moan, drool at the corner of his mouth. "I feel everything. Your body, your reactions, even your thoughts... Ah, just now we became one. Integration. Incredible." Rangi's face crumpled. 'I hate it. I'd rather die.'
She wanted to grab Shirone and shout that she could not live with this man.
"Integration, huh." Shirone asked seriously, "What are you?"
Rangi's ability to pierce others could be explained as an electromagnetic effect. That thought brought a familiar concept to Shirone's mind.
'Ultima System.'
Court-sense — the "gungsense" — might be electrical. When Babel had accepted the Ultima System, wasn't it also some form of electricity?
'If the universe was born from electricity, it wouldn't be strange for a special sense to be electrical too.'
The unique, primordial one.
"Who am I?" Kalt asked. "One who feels the waves of all things. One who is nothing. I may be a god, or I may be mere fertilizer."
Shirone was sure of it. 'It's similar to when I absorbed the Ultima System at Babel. The five senses can't explain it, but you can feel it.' If that immense sensation had dominated him for over ten years, it explained his madness.
"You don't even know yourself, so I'll tell you. Kalt, you're sick. You need treatment."
"Sick? You say I'm sick?"
"Yes. It's probably from an o-part. I don't know how you got it, but that did this to you. I'll help. Where is it now?"
He meant it sincerely. That was also why Kalt—who had ignored everyone else until now—fell silent.
"You say I'm sick..." It wasn't Shirone's voice so much as a wave of sensation.
The pirates raised their weapons. "Your Majesty! Don't be fooled! These people mean to steal our o-parts!"
They had never actually seen one. Ever since Kalt's personality changed thirteen years ago, everything had simply gone their way.
"O-parts? Ah, you mean Maika." Kalt reached into the air with a distant look. "It's beautiful. Can you see it? It's even here now. It drifts in the air."
He snapped back and looked at Shirone. "Want to see it? Shall I show you?" Poine protested this time.
"Messiah, this is dangerous. You mustn't act before a full analysis."
Her caution made sense, but Shirone's frequency was already resonating with Kalt.
"You can go to Maika?" someone asked.
"No, it's not that you go. They call. Yes — it's definitely a calling."
'They.' Words spoken with the five senses could become something wholly new at the eleven-sense stage...
"All right. I'll see it myself." Kalt, convinced there was no reason he couldn't go where others had gone and returned, pressed his temples.
Blue electricity began to whirl from his eyes. A moment later he stuck out his tongue; a thin, rectangular metal plate lay on it.
"What's that?" Arakne's stewards murmured, but Shirone showed no special surprise.
'Living things can't manufacture such machines. So it's a quantum phenomenon. Perhaps Kalt's...' Had it already become an o-part?
"Messiah, this is truly dangerous. Please don't let a foreign object be embedded in the body."
"It'll be fine. It's only a substance made from the five senses. I can control it." Shirone examined the metal plate Kalt had given him. "Now what do I do?"
"I don't know. Just—well, stick it in your head, maybe? I had my men do the same."
Shirone pressed the chip behind his ear. 'It won't go in.' In the end it would have to pierce bone — could that be called a function?
"Trust me." Kalt's cloudy eyes inspired little confidence, but Shirone squeezed the chip with his fingers.
"Huup!" Did it really pierce his skull? Nothing so dramatic happened, but electricity coursed through the metal and invaded Shirone's mind.
"Hah!" A blue gleam lit Shirone's eyes as a magnetic field wrapped him.
"Messiah!" Kaios and Poine lunged forward, tasting the familiar sting and grimacing. "Graaah!" Their brains felt as if they were burning; if it went further, memories might be damaged, but the two apostles reached out to the end.
"Mes...si...ah..." Just as Kaios's electrified hand was about to touch Shirone, Kalt murmured, "Meet them."
"Aaah!" The two apostles threw away their lives, and Shirone's physical body vanished in an instant.
"Where? Where did he go?" Blindfolded, Kaios squinted and leveled his sword at Kalt. "This is your first and last chance. Where has the Messiah gone? Speak if you don't want to die."
"Well." Kalt looked oddly sullen. "Perhaps...a terrible truth."
The ultra-ancient civilization Maika.
Hah! Hah! Shirone waited until the blue wash that seemed to wrap his retinas faded.
When his vision cleared, he looked around. "Maika." He could be certain because it differed from any region in Omega.
The terraced city was filled with countless buildings, like a real civilization. 'Not a civilization.' When he entered the structures, there were no traces anyone had ever lived there.
'This is...a kind of device.' The whole city felt like a machine built for a single purpose.
At its center stood horn-like curved towers, twenty meters tall and lined up in rows.
"...I don't know." Characters were carved along the towers, but none of them could be read.
'The Ultima System doesn't work.' Faced with decisive proof that this signal did not exist in the universe, Shirone shuddered.
'If there is an outside world...the closest analogy would be a higher layer implemented on the mechanism of the Great Void.' 'But that doesn't matter.' No matter how far you descend from reality, the end of imagination is still reality.
'No one knows until they go there themselves.' Shirone drew a deep breath. 'Pull yourself together. It doesn't matter what's there. What really matters is...why does it exist?'
"Hm?" As if a distant memory, the city trembled and electricity began to run beneath the ground.
"Guh!" Feeling the current, Shirone grit his teeth. Between two towers, an opaque curtain unfolded. Inside that veil, a single enormous pupil watched him.
To be continued.