Fine Tuning (4)
Shirone stared at Rian's broad back.
"Rian?"
His back, wide as a shield, always brought reassurance, but his mood was different from before.
The force that had once erupted like a volcano was now tightly compacted.
"Shirone, I'll take this."
With Rian there, no one would argue, but one thing had to be made clear.
"Be careful. This one has Imir's ma."
"Imir?"
Rian wanted to eliminate every potential threat that could reach Shirone.
From that perspective, Imir was a mountain to be climbed and the strongest rival.
"…Hmph."
Rian exchanged a look with Monoras across the Daejikdo and frowned.
"Can't trust that."
It was powerful, certainly, but its temperament felt too crude to be called Imir.
"Complicated problem. Maybe."
If Shirone withheld explanation, Rian had no intention of prying further.
"Understood. Leave this to me."
Rian also knew his first priority was subduing the head of the Pyrotechnics Company.
"Do it well."
As Shirone flew toward the city, Monoras twisted his body and prepared to follow.
"Don't let him get away."
"Hey."
Rian called.
"I'm your opponent. The moment you show your back, your torso will split in two—remember that."
Usually Monoras would have snorted, but this time he didn't move.
Rian's muscles contorted grotesquely, forming the full shape of a yasha.
"Not bad—"
Before the words finished, Rian's fist drove straight into Monoras' jaw.
The pig-like face crumpled, then was flung hundreds of meters and slammed into the ground.
KRAAAANG!
As Rian pulled the Daejikdo and lunged, Monoras burst through the smoke and charged.
"Guuuh!"
KUUUUUUNG!
When fist met Daejikdo again, a flash erupted and a shockwave tore through.
Both were stunned by the unimaginable resistance, and Monoras split his lips into a grin.
"Good to use my strength after so long."
Why did pain feel so pleasurable?
"Kruaaaar!"
When his deliberately thrown punch struck the Daejikdo, the impact traveled along the handle.
"Ugh!"
Rian's skin was torn to shreds, and Monoras' fist snapped with a sickening crack.
'Still won't break?'
The 〈Idea〉 could not be destroyed.
"Fuuuu."
Rian slowly stepped back and released the Daejikdo; it rang and clattered to the floor.
Monoras watched the weapon while eyeing the chain attached to his palm.
"What's that? Hmph."
Gehenna.
"All-consuming fire." Rian heated the Daejikdo a bloody red, pulled the chain taut, gripped it, and took aim.
"I'll take your ma… away." Even for true Imir's ma, whether it could be fully purified was uncertain to Rian.
"Hmm."
Monoras, uninterested in hell's systems, nonetheless recognized the chain of Gehenna.
"Heh heh. Heh heh heh."
Monoras' muscles bulged and, for the first time, a murderous glint flashed in his eyes.
It was unmistakably the aura of Imir.
"I will consume."
Summoning a force greater than mountains, Monoras thrust his upper body forward and charged.
'I will swallow everything.'
Leaving Monoras to Shirone, Rete arrived at Magrite's underground laboratory.
"Boss! Please have mercy!"
The top generals all knelt and begged, but Rete's response was cold.
"Magrite, you've disappointed me." Magrite, slammed against the lab wall, lay gravely wounded by hellfire.
"I won't excuse myself. But I did it for Satan. You know that, don't you?"
"Satan?"
Rete sneered.
"Satan is merely a creature born of the hell system. This world isn't something you made to toy with. The Pyrotechnics Company's statutes are strict."
Magrite nodded.
"I see. Now I understand. From the beginning… however this world turns, it would have been irrelevant to you."
"What are you trying to say?"
"Just one question. We shared five hundred million years together—so you'll answer, right? Or is even that time merely an instant to you?"
The top generals looked puzzled; that wasn't a question to throw out when facing death.
"Your Grace, what does that—"
Magrite cut off their protests as if silencing noise.
"Who are you, really?" "Why does an Administrator exist? Didn't it not matter to you what happened in this world? Whether Satan wins or Yahweh wins—whoever it is…."
Magrite's gaze pierced Rete.
"If this world can be maintained, couldn't you all care less?"
"You've lived too long, Magrite." Rete wore a sad expression.
"What does that matter? You are simply my children. If you hadn't betrayed me, none of this would have happened."
"Betrayal? What betrayal?"
Magrite frowned.
"You must already know my intent to aid Satan. So it's not that. The most terrifying thing is the Administrator's mission."
"The integration of the systems. When the systems you manage separately become one, we can reach the outside world. You tried to stop my collusion with Yahweh because of that, didn't you?"
"Not this again." Rete's face hardened.
"I really don't know. Whether there's an outside world, what it's like—even as an Administrator I can't know. My authority only extends to this world."
"I think so too. So maybe it's just my stubbornness. You can indulge in delusions. Even if you truly don't know about the outside world…."
Magrite lifted his eyes.
"You actually know, don't you?"
Emotion drained from Rete's eyes and a chill unfit for hell rose up.
"Rest."
As purification flames ignited Magrite's body, the generals launched themselves forward in unison.
"Your Grace!"
But before they could reach him, hellfire began to burn on their bodies as well.
"Lady Rete! Mother of Hell! Please consider our devotion!"
They were not afraid of annihilation.
What terrified them was the fate of being extinguished before the truth.
'Can we… not reach the truth?'
Even as the generals were erased, Magrite fought desperately to halt the purification.
"Yes, you were exceptional."
Royal blood.
"That power wasn't meant for that. Isn't that right, Grand Duke Magrite?"
As a murderous glint entered Rete's eyes, the purification flames flared dozens of times greater.
"Arrrrrr!"
At the instant the duke's scream tore out, a Hand of God flew in and snatched him up.
'A hand technique.'
The ability that deceived even Rete's perception doused the purification and moved Magrite to safety.
"Rete."
When she turned, Shirone was standing there.
"Yahweh…"
How much he had heard was unclear, but Shirone's expression said it all.
"Foolish to the end. Destroying Magrite would have done humanity a favor."
Magrite, his body charred like coal, leaned against the wall and rasped.
"Yahweh, kill Rete. As long as that woman exists, we can never be unified."
"Then this will do." Rete stepped forward.
"I will dissolve the demon realm. Also, the demons will no longer trouble the human world."
"You'll dissolve it?"
Shirone ground his teeth.
"Do you even know how many humans have died? To hear that single sentence from you—do you know how ruined this world became?"
"Then live like that."
Rete was nonchalant even as Shirone's eyes widened.
"Why are you so obsessed with truth? The deeper you go, the less you can know. Things may grow clearer, but ultimately they become neither this nor that—that's the essence of this world."
Humans cannot be perfectly defined.
"For example: love. The degree of understanding you have the moment you hear the word—that is the human world. Physical intimacy can be defined. Dig deeper and it's brain chemistry. Chemistry is molecules, molecules are atoms, atoms are particles, particles are—"
Rete stopped and spread her arms.
"Where is love in that? See? You don't know. The deeper you go, it breaks. So you people should just live here without overthinking."
It was a cold worldview.
"Just tell me one thing." Shirone asked.
"What's the terrible truth? The truth you tried to confirm with your own eyes—what is it?"
"He will return." Rete seemed to be running high-level calculations.
"But then everything will end. Your convictions will turn to dust. Is that really what you want?"
"It's useless. No matter what you say, her mind won't change. Because she has no heart."
Reaching the same conclusion, Shirone unleashed Miracle Stream and advanced.
"Then the only way is to input the signal directly. Let's see what output appears."
Rete muttered.
"Monoras."
When there was no reaction, her pupils began to dart rapidly.
'Why isn't he coming?'
As Shirone surged like a flash, Rete—abandoning calculation—shouted.
"Void!"
Black smoke rose before her and Deputy Director Void stepped forward.
At the same moment Shirone struck, Miracle Stream began to be sucked into Void.
"Useless."
Darkness spun in Void's eyes.
"I am the vacuum of the universe."
If the universe were so full it could not store information, new concepts could not form.
Time itself could not flow.
'Entropy Administrator.'
Shirone forced Hexa with all his strength, but the sensation was empty and vast.
"No matter how much you thrash, you can't escape the void. Give it up."
"Is that so?" The ultimate of the heart—agape. Miracle Stream flared in brilliant light and Void's face contorted.
"Human hearts transcend the universe." When a single piece of information grows too large to be stored and capacity fills—
Grrrr!
The black pupil cracked and blinding white light began to leak out.
'It's just information. Process it. Press it down until somewhere the universe cannot hold this singular thing.'
"Damn it."
The vast void filled with light and became unable to process even the faintest signal.
"We will press on to the end."
At that moment the world stopped.
"Woooooh!"
Void's body cracked and thousands of streams of light poured out, dismantling the signal.
"Phew."
Shirone exhaled and looked around, but Rete was gone.
"...Up there."
The dying duke pointed to the ceiling with his index finger, and she—who had not gone far—was visible.
Shirone guessed the reason.
"Rian."
She had tried to put as much distance as possible between herself and Yahweh, but she was forced to hang in midair—
"…No. Impossible."
Because she had witnessed the land evaporating, purified to the horizon.
"Kraaaaah!"
Monoras, impaled by the Daejikdo in his chest, clutched the blade and howled.
'This ma isn't something humans can handle.'
If so, then what is that?
Following the chain with his gaze, Rete looked to the ignition point of the enormous flame.
〈Idea〉.
One yasha was withstanding hellfire, white smoke puffing from his mouth.