With ‘Nuna’s’ death, an end came to this memory as well. Was what just happened something that actually occurred in the past, or was it nothing more than a fleeting dream?
One thing is certain: this conversation brought no change to my life whatsoever.
That is merely a fragment occupying ‘Nuna's’ memory. It’s nothing more than a clue for me to understand and resonate more deeply with ‘Nuna's’ death.
In essence, ‘Nuna’ is a thread cut by a knife. To reconnect it, one must focus on the severed end.
For a king of humanity, she died somewhat emptily, but that's just how the king of beasts is. Stupid and simple, easily falling into traps or dying. It just means ‘Nuna’ was nothing but a naive and stupid beast.
“Listening quietly, that's rude! I may be naive, but I'm not stupid!”
“Uh, what. You were listening?”
‘Nuna’ bounded into my vision from outside my consciousness. This much liveliness in a mental image? Dead people are usually depressed or resigned, but ‘Nuna’ is almost shamelessly brazen.
“Of course! It's my memory! I felt like I was connecting with El somehow, so I was quietly watching!”
“How gloomy. You could have come out and explained.”
“Not gloomy, it's consideration! I already talked with El for a long time, and the conversation after that was directed at you. I stepped away according to proper etiquette!”
You already talked for a long time? You stepped away because it was after that? Listening quietly, I heard words that weren't easy to dismiss.
“A conversation? When? In my memory, all there was after going to the peak of Yulrim was being blinded by light.”
“I didn't show you that. It's privacy, right? You should respect it!”
What? Didn't show me? I've never asked anyone's permission to look into memories...
“And it wasn't a conversation either. El wove light into cloth and drew pictures to show me. Since it's not my memory, it was hard to show you.”
After choosing her words for a moment, Nuna clapped her hands and added.
“Just like ‘Shei's’ memories can't be read!”
Uh, hmm. So that means. I tried not to consciously acknowledge it, but I can't ignore it anymore.
I said hesitantly.
“Nuna, you're reading me too.”
Then Nuna stared at me and answered.
“Of course. You read me too, don't you?”
“I'm not protesting. I was just flustered because it's an unfamiliar experience.”
“But you're feeling displeased?”
...Well, maybe a little. I have privacy too.
“Is it because your inner thoughts were caught? Do you want to hide it?”
Don't read me when you know... Well, protesting probably won't do any good anyway.
I read Nuna and Nuna read me. What we know about each other is the same. Because, essentially, Nuna and I are the same existence.
“Order is merely a tool. Tools are useful. Therefore, order can be used usefully! That's what you think, right?”
That's true. Tools are always necessary. With the mental yardstick called order, judgment becomes easy no matter what happens.
You can discard it when you don't need it, but when you need it, you should use it.
“You've never denied order until now. You're not barbaric!”
Of course not. I'm a civilized person. Barbarism is what they call me arbitrarily.
...More than that, how far did you see?
“I read your memories! From when you were young, growing up among very ordinary people. To what you experienced while traveling.”
Sneaking a peek at memories arbitrarily? I want to criticize, but thinking about it, that's exactly what I've been doing. Making an issue of it would be like spitting on my own face.
...Ptoo.
“It was a novel experience from an ordinary person's perspective! I've never looked at each person so carefully like you do!”
I suppose so. As the king of all humans, you can't pay attention to each and every one.
“Compared to that, your field of vision is low but that much deeper, so I could feel it better!”
You indirectly experienced my experience. Like reading a scroll.
‘Nuna’ recited in a clear voice as if reading a scroll at Nebida's bedside.
“The country where you were born. The country called the Military Nation had many humans living there. They wove an intricate net to bind everyone and treated them strictly. Everyone lived fearing and following the invisible order. Within that, you could have destroyed the very pillars that held up the net, but you didn't.”
It wasn't a country I liked, but that tool was very precise and systematic. It was a shame to just break it.
So I entrusted it to someone who could use it better. Aibi will agonize and suffer at every moment of choice, but they'll use it much better than Saintess Yuel. Yuel, who has lost something precious, has no joy, but for Aibi, who has gained something precious, everything will be joy.
“The Nation of Exiles is a country of refugees who lost their nations. The order ruled by the Demon God of Gold wandered like the demonic beasts of that desert. Because of the golden order that creates everything, no other order could be established. You destroyed the golden demonic beast. To establish a different order.”
The Demon God of the Golden Realm is not creation. It's destruction. His perfect creations don't suit any human. We need to set it aside for a while to build a human order, not a golden one.
But that too is a tool. Wielded well, it's an all-purpose tool that can create what humans need, not gold. If it's Peru who shatters everything, it will strike a balance.
“In the Principality, you just returned the heart to the heartless monarch and that was it. So irresponsible! Making the heart beat like that and then just leaving.”
Shut up. That's just the beginning there. Tir, who had no heart, was a god. Something emotionless and unchanging, closer to a phenomenon or law.
The Elder under their command, and the Ain below them. And even the Yeilring below that. They were in a state of subjugation, unable to dream of even a speck of rebellion.
I like Tir, but an order that cannot be rebelled against has no meaning. If the world changes and humans change, order must also change. Tir also wanted to escape that tedium, so it was a win-win.
“The order in the places you touched didn't collapse. It just changed. More humanely.”
After reciting the past, ‘Nuna’ understood me.
“In the end, saying that order is also a tool means it's not order's fault, but the fault of the person who wielded it and hurt others, right? You entrusted order to human hands.”
I didn't particularly defend order. I still have no hesitation in destroying useless order.
“What you hated wasn't order.”
However. If one wields order while claiming to follow something beyond their own will. If one claims that all the winds and desires they unleashed upon the world were unavoidable, something forced upon them by order.
“Knowing they would be hated. Shifting all that responsibility and guilt, suffering and groaning, criticism and anger onto order, which is nothing more than a tool.”
I just want to see what happens when that lie is exposed and order is shattered.
“You despised the humans who held order.”
Disliking villains and liking good people. That's not the issue. Because both evil and good are just parts of humanity.
But, if you want to pursue justice and avoid sin. You can just act accordingly.
Committing something yourself and saying you couldn't help it. Saying I too was just swept up by others' intentions. Saying I merely responded to faith and followed commands.
While being part of the world yourself. It's strange to blame the world for what's bad.
If the world is bad, then humans are bad too.
“Little sibling is strict and cold. You're telling me not to run away and to keep fighting.”
Did I tell you to fight the world? I meant fight your own heart and compromise appropriately. The only truth in the world is the Demon Gods. My heart too, and the order humans create too, can be wrong at any time.
“Yeah. Thanks. I understand enough now!”
It seems like you've answered enough now. Can I ask this time?
“Of course!”
‘Nuna’, why did you make such a promise?
“Promise? What kind?”
The promise to discard all power and become ordinary. The one you made with the first Saintess.
“Ah!”
You remembered? After sharing the promise, ‘Nuna’ died just like that, and only that promise remained.
But even that power and the qualification to represent were divided among the five kings, so the reason for a king of humanity to exist in this world disappeared. After a long time passed like that, because the king was driven out of all nations and lost representativeness. I was born into this world with no power, holding only the qualification to represent humanity.
I spoke as I took form again within the mental image.
“So. The one who made me like this was ‘Nuna’.”
You made me live in this world having lost power, ordinary, with only mind-reading.
It wasn't the first Saintess who made me lose my power. The first Saintess might have known I would come someday, but she wouldn't have wanted me to end up like this.
The one who made me like this is ‘Nuna’. That wish, even the first Saintess couldn't stop. She only succeeded in delaying the timing.
“Yeah. That's right!”
‘Nuna’ admitted it readily. When I asked “Why?” in my mind, Nuna said with a slightly troubled expression.
“I needed a yardstick too!”
“A yardstick?”
“Yeah! To me, all humans are the same. They're the same humans.”
This doesn't mean she couldn't distinguish humans. Inside ‘Nuna,’ the king of humanity, humans are like cells. Even if they play slightly different roles, they're all precious parts of her, but losing one or two doesn't particularly cause a problem.
“But now humans fight among themselves. Not against rough storms or savage beasts, but against other humans.”
“The surface is now humanity's domain.”
“And when they fight, they come to me. They ask me to stop the fighting.”
But the problem is that ‘Nuna's’ cells fight among themselves. There, whose side can Nuna take?
“I don't know whose side to take. They're both the same humans. But they want me to take sides. They say that's what a king should do. They all stop fighting and wait for that.”
Without the powerful existence called ‘Nuna,’ they would have fought each other, and the victor would have held a festival with the loser's corpse.
But as long as ‘Nuna’ exists, that can't happen. Because no matter how strong they are, they know an absolute being exists. ‘Nuna’ is merciful but a beast. If bared fangs are shown, she naturally punishes. Anyone has no choice but to obey Nuna and watch her moods.
Humanity's greatest power is observing and learning.
Humans learned of the existence of the absolute being called the king of humanity. Because of that, no one can return to barbarism.
“I'm special, so I can't like or dislike certain humans like you do. So no matter how much they want that from me, I can't give it. Because I don't have the kind of yardstick you have.”
When I returned from ‘the Nation’ after defeating the monsters of the frontier, the countless requests Nuna received were like that.
They fought, quarreled, plundered, and killed. Humans harmed by other humans appealed to Nuna. As many grievances and condemnations as the number of humans came to Nuna.
She could do anything but could do nothing. Just as she understood the monsters that harmed people in the frontier.
Like the omniscient and omnipotent god in the Bible. Perfect and omniscient and omnipotent, loving all humans, but precisely because of that, merely watching.
“But, most humans want it.”
However. The world desires Nuna's intervention. Almost all humans belonging to ‘the Nation’ believed in and followed Nuna, and in ‘the Nation’ that had reached humanity's autumn, an enormous number of humans lived.
More than half of all humanity.
The king of humanity represents humanity. Most of humanity wants it. Nuna, who is the very consensus of humanity, moves the consensus of humanity.
Which came first, the chicken or the egg. Within that predicament, Nuna found one answer.
“If there's no yardstick, I just need to make one!”
“What?”
“You, weak and insignificant, are the yardstick I created!”