"Well, I understand the urge to boast. You did make it well. But that's only the exterior, isn't it? Did that 'Majesty' display sharp insight? Did she comprehend all the world's techniques at a single glance? Or did she cast a gaze toward you filled with a hint of awe... and jealousy?"
The Golden Mirror tightly sealed his lips.
He knows. Precisely because of who he is, he knows it all too well. That the Elik on the outside, always wearing a gentle smile, is a fake.
I dug into his wounds as I spoke.
"Well, if you only needed the body, that would suffice. But can you bring yourself to call that thing 'Your Majesty'?"
"I know! I know that! No matter how many times I make her, she isn't real!"
The Golden Mirror jumped to his feet. The sword dangling from his neck clanked, and the iron ball rolled away. Even within restraints that seemed too constricting to even move, he raised his voice in defense.
"Still, it's different! The reason I couldn't create humans isn't because I looked down on them. I, I merely couldn't understand them."
"You've confessed it yourself. That you cannot understand other humans. How can you comprehend human sin when you don't even understand them? You don't even know what sin is."
In the first place, no one has the right to absolve sin. Much less in the Golden Mirror's case, it doesn't even serve as a warning. Because no one else is capable of committing a similar act. He might have been subjected to retaliatory venting, but that is an entirely different matter.
The Golden Mirror slumped down powerlessly. He glared at the golden bell once more, looking utterly desolate. Unlike before, this wasn't because he had lost interest in me, but because he could no longer endure my gaze.
"There is one thing I just cannot comprehend. When I created gold, they cheered. Everyone extolled me as a hero. Those who received the gold bowed their heads and expressed their endless gratitude. Yet, how did it come to this?"
"Despite failing to understand humans, your conviction that their unpredictable actions are your own responsibility is quite a nasty mindset. It's like watching a self-proclaimed expert arbitrarily judging something they know nothing about. Why do you claim it's your fault when you know absolutely nothing?"
"But everyone said it was my sin! They said I brought about this entire tragedy! Even Her Majesty...!"
Overwhelmed by emotion, the Golden Mirror paused for a moment before vomiting his grievances and crying out.
"Even Her Majesty Elik, who taught and supported me when I had nothing! Even she ordered me to die! Because I committed a sin worthy of death, it was only natural to pay for it with my life!"
He would want to believe that. Otherwise, he would have to doubt not only himself, but also King Elik, whom he revered like the heavens.
However, that is not the truth. Sin is merely a label attached through retrospective judgment. Human actions stem from far more instinctive and primal reasons.
I spoke dispassionately.
"No. She simply needed someone who would take all the responsibility and die for her."
The Golden Mirror is not foolish. It is sometimes said that clever people are more easily deceived, but this is a different case. Everything—the memories and emotions I read—was read within this mental space.
Why Elik had forsaken him, through what process the Gold Nation had met its ruin. The Golden Mirror already knew. Bone-deep.
I gently offered words to the bowing Golden Mirror. Words that already existed in his heart, but which he had desperately tried to ignore.
"The Gold Nation was not beautiful at all. No, it was even uglier than elsewhere. A nation of artisans and techniques. A nation that earned money through commerce. It was filled with people who were more calculating and selfish than anyone else, selling their pride for coin. Because they only pursued their own profits, when the nation faced the threat of ruin, they demonized you and hunted you down. Did you truly wish to recreate a wretched nation like that?"
He gave no answer. It mattered not. My words alone were enough to shatter his paradise.
"Of course not. I can tell just by looking at the paradise you created. A Golden palace where Homunculi work without a word of complaint, keeping only the alchemists who can, at the very least, communicate with you by your side. The Steel King praises you with an affectionate voice, and all things in the world take on your ideal form."
He had sought to create the Gold Nation. Thus, he wandered about, 'alchemizing' everything in his vicinity. Villages, tools, and even the fields. Pastoral rural landscapes, flourishing cities, majestic castles. The ideal scenes he yearned for materialized into reality before his very eyes.
However, ideals are unreal. The scenes he considered ideal did not truly exist. I pointed out that very contradiction within the Golden Mirror.
"The Gold Nation you long for does not exist. Because this Golden Palace, built by turning away from the outside world and sticking together only the parts that pleased you, doesn't resemble the Gold Nation even one bit."
My words are the very voice of his inner self. No human can resist their own self. I forcibly awaken and stimulate the Golden Mirror, who retains nothing but residual thoughts without a physical body.
"Stop being so stubborn. Your wish cannot be fulfilled. Not because you lack the ability, but because you don't even know what you truly desire. That is why your final creation, the 'Golden Mirror,' has harbored a meaningless desire, wandering the earth in vain for hundreds of years. Foolishly alchemizing its next prey even as the wild dogs tear apart your creations."
The Golden Mirror. A magic relic of the Demon God meant to reconstruct the Gold Nation, and the final work of the first alchemist who remembered the Gold Nation.
Yet the Golden Mirror failed to reconstruct the Gold Nation. To fulfill an impossible wish, it wanders alchemizing everything around it, but the traces of the Gold Nation it creates are merely devoured by wild dogs.
The Golden Mirror gritted his teeth and spoke.
"What... do you desire?"
I am going to destroy the Golden Mirror.
Not because the Golden Mirror is hindering me, nor because it will wage war against the Military Nation. The Golden Mirror is a delusion. As long as it exists, the Golden Mirror's wish can never be fulfilled.
I will strip away all his attachments, destroy the Golden Mirror, and take him into myself.
"I desire your wish. If your desire is to repeat this illusion for eternity, then this might serve as an answer, but that isn't your true wish, is it? Why does the Golden Mirror exist? Why does the final period you stamped fail to conclude the story, instead dragging on forever?"
And it isn't just the Golden Mirror. All those who have died. The lingering delusions of those who departed from this world while dreaming of heaven and hell within their hearts. All of those delusions originated from 'her'.
In place of a nonexistent heaven, I have become a columbarium. Now it is time for the Golden Mirror to enter within.
"What is it that binds the Golden Mirror to its shackles? What is your true desire?"
A living human might choose not to answer. Desires can change at any moment, and even without voicing them, one can fulfill them with their own power.
However, for one standing before death, there is no such luxury. They spit out their regrets to leave behind their wishes before they vanish from the world.
If so, then for those who are already dead...
"...I will build a beautiful Gold Nation."
They cannot help but speak.
I slowly asked in return.
"Even though the Gold Nation is a vile country that pinned its sins on you and killed you?"
"Even so, I loved that land."
"Even though Elik, whom you loved, betrayed you in your most difficult moment?"
"Even so, I revered her."
With every word, his heart grew clearer.
He loved his nation. Not out of patriotism, but from the nostalgia of it being his homeland.
He loved Elik. Not out of loyalty, but because he admired her appearance and capabilities.
Sin, responsibility—they pinned all sorts of reasons to justify his death, but in truth, he was killed as a scapegoat to vent their anger. If they truly sought to punish malice, they should have killed the thousands who looked out for their own profits even amidst the chaos. Unlike the Golden Mirror, who couldn't bear to leave his nation, they had abandoned it without a moment of hesitation.
Since they couldn't do that, they killed the Golden Mirror.
And through it all, the Golden Mirror loved his nation and his king.
Even if they dress it up, wrap it, and fabricate all sorts of reasons, it ultimately comes down to the human heart. There is no need to attach lengthy, meticulous circumstances to it.
"Is there really a reason to recreate that nation? Judging by how it looked, if someone other than you had discovered alchemy, it surely would have destroyed itself."
Though he likely felt no sense of duty, the Golden Mirror found his reason with ease.
It was an ugly nation with an irresponsible king, yet the Golden Mirror loved it all. He wanted to return to the days he was happy within it. And so...
"Because I wish to do so."
He had made up his mind.
*Click.* The shackles binding his feet fell away. The guilt that had ensnared the Golden Mirror had vanished. With trembling legs, the Golden Mirror slowly stood up.
I asked as if to confirm.
"Even if it turns out different from the Gold Nation you once lived in?"
"When you fix something, it is bound to differ from its original state. I will fill what is lacking, restore what is broken, and mend what is wrong. That is what alchemy is for, and that is what the Golden Mirror is for."
*Clank.* The chains binding his arms snapped strand by strand. The Golden Mirror reached out his freed arm and grasped the golden bell in his hand. *Jingle.* A clear, resonant sound filled the room.
I asked one more time.
"But is it possible? The Gold Nation created by the Golden Mirror lacks sustainability. No matter how flawlessly you craft it, without humans to maintain it, it will vanish before long. Even if there were maintainers, the wild dogs would tear it all apart. You don't desire a nation that will fade away in an instant, do you?"
It took a little longer for him to answer this time. But not long. Now that he had firmly grasped his own heart, nothing could stop him.
"...If it lacks sustainability, then I will 'create' that as well."
Create?
*Thud.* The sword constricting his neck split apart and fell to the ground. Nothing bound him any longer. Having found perfect freedom, the Golden Mirror held his head high and declared.
"If the Homunculi are imperfect, I need only improve them until they are flawless. If the wild dogs destroy the Gold Nation, I need only eliminate them so they cannot. Fortunately, both goals can be achieved through a single method. Killing two birds with one stone."
Wait. Hold on a moment.
His conclusion is strangely going in a weird direction.
"-So that nothing in the Gold Nation I build can ever be harmed, I will collect them... and use them as materials for the Homunculi. For Homunculi that will move for much longer, and lead this nation."
I might have just unleashed a monster.
The objects the Golden Mirror had created thus far were terrifyingly intricate and practical, but humans alone were somehow lacking. Perhaps, just as the Golden Mirror himself had said, it was because he couldn't properly understand humans. Or perhaps he held a slight aversion to creating humans.
But now, having cast aside all his shackles and fetters. Nothing could stop the Golden Mirror.
*Ugh.* What do I do about this?
"The dead cannot exert any influence on the world. Naturally, they cannot fulfill their wishes either. I'm not particularly fond of those who die so easily while harboring such precious desires."
However, the Golden Mirror is slightly different. He didn't just dump his desires onto me and die. Instead, even before his death, he created something that would fulfill his wishes.
The residual thoughts left here are his true desires. His pure wish, bound to no one, commanded by no one. If so, then I too must acknowledge it.
"Even in death, you left behind something to fulfill your wish. I'll root for you, for now."
Though, in truth, there is nothing else I can do besides root for him.
I am a magician. I can draw out his hidden desires, but I cannot quell those desires with an opposing wind. Magic may seem magnificent at first glance, but in reality, it is merely the art of deceiving the possible into appearing magnificent.
If he thought I would hinder him, he would kill me instantly. The Golden Mirror had cast off all his fetters. Lacking power, I couldn't even sway his mind.
"...I have but one master. Yet you, too, have imparted a great lesson upon me."
Fortunately, I was not included among the targets of his hostility. Showing reverence rather than enmity, the Golden Mirror took the bell, brushed past me, and headed out of the room.
"I will accomplish what I have failed to achieve until now."
The world trembled. With the story at its end, I felt the sensation of my very existence being rejected. As I felt my body being sucked away somewhere, I left him with one final remark.
"Give it a try. You won't know until you do."
With that, the world went dark, and I was expelled from his mental space.
*Jingle.* The sound of a bell rang from within my hand.
The sound of a bell has been used since ancient times to awaken people from their slumber. The Golden Mirror's relic was no different; its clear chime dragged me, who had been submerged beneath his mental space, back to reality. My deeply submerged consciousness surfaced. Gathering my wits, I found myself returned to the very moment I had rung the Golden Mirror's bell.
Time within a mental space, no matter how long it stretches, is but a fleeting instant in reality. I had conversed with the Golden Mirror for quite some time inside, but to an outsider, it would have looked as though I had merely played a speed bell-ringing game.
Setting my consciousness aside, my physical body had momentarily frozen to process the events that had occurred within that brief span of time. Did I read too much? I need to pull myself together quickly.
"Demo!"
It happened then. Elik shoved me aside with the full momentum of her charge. Unable to react because I couldn't read her mind, I tumbled roughly. A heavy pain throbbed in my back and waist.
As expected, pain is proof of being alive. It hurts, so I'm finally coming to my senses. Not that I particularly wanted it, though.
"You bastard, what have you done to Demo...!"
Elik, who had been glaring at me with furious eyes, came to an abrupt halt. With her eyes wide open, she turned her trembling head to look at the Golden Mirror. Eyes filled with shock, fear, and an unknown terror. Elik called out the Golden Mirror's name.
"De...mo?"
Even at the king's call, no answer returned. Instead, the Golden Mirror moved with a far more defined will. As the small boy took a single step, a roar resounded as if a giant were flattening the earth.
One does not walk a path because it exists; rather, a path is born where he walks. Instead of following the world as it is, he carves and mends it to forge the world he desires—he is truly worthy of the title Demon God.
*Crash.* The world transformed before the Golden Mirror. With every step he took, the earth packed down flat and smooth, and boulders were cleaved into perfect squares to pave over it. This instantaneous creation was akin to turning back the hands of time. Having forged a great avenue, the Golden Mirror strode proudly forward. Following in his wake, the Homunculus soldiers and his weapons began their march as well. And Elik, the Golden Cult Master who had overseen the Golden Palace, followed too.
The Golden Mirror, a relic of the Demon God Demo. It was the final creation forged by the Demon God just before his death, who had yearned to reconstruct the Gold Nation.