Naturally, Cardio did not smoothly let even my slip of the tongue pass.
“Inefficient, you say. That is not something I can simply laugh off, either.”
Cardio’s face was still calm, but judging by the way his tone had grown a little sharper, it was obvious he was angry.
“Our family’s biological weapons, chimeras, are combat weapons created by fusing superior monsters as materials. Already powerful monsters are used as components, harmonizing with one another to become even stronger weapons.”
“Let’s leave respect for life and the like out of this for now. For one thing, since you must be extremely selective with the materials, supply can’t be easy. I imagine you have it rough.”
Well, if they were going to turn them into weapons, they must have been incredibly picky about the monsters used as materials.
They must be seriously hard to make.
“On our side, as long as the quality isn’t excessively poor, we can make as many as we need, so that aspect is relatively less of an issue. Of course, since the royal family’s goods are carefully selected, I do understand the difficulties.”
Compared to their side, which had to procure monsters, our side honestly had it much better when it came to securing materials.
After all, with just the mid-to-low-grade mana metal mine we were set to receive this time, there wouldn’t be any major problems producing the Cyclops units sold to civilians.
Cardio was briefly at a loss for words, then spoke again.
“I’m glad you understand. Perhaps because of that, when a chimera is stationed somewhere, it has the effect of keeping monsters away from the surrounding area. As long as you feed it properly, it creates an excellent barrier on its own.”
“In exchange, ours can rapidly annihilate enemies from long range, so each has its strengths and weaknesses. I’ve heard that in the Phoenix County, on battlefields where Cyclops units are deployed, they put more effort into early detection. And when they’re not in use, you can simply turn off the engine, so there’s no need to keep them on standby every day.”
Somehow, the conversation had turned into each of us bragging about how amazing what we had made was, but honestly, I didn’t mind.
This was easier on the nerves than obsessing over taking veiled jabs at each other.
Cardio also seemed to be getting more and more heated.
“A chimera is a perfect weapon from the moment it is born. There is no particular need to train it; you simply put it on the battlefield. That would be one area where it is superior to a Cyclops, whose control methods must be learned.”
“To put it another way, that means anyone can wield a power that even knights cannot easily contend with, so long as they learn how to control it. Unlike a chimera that fights well on its own, it fights in step with people, so it would be easier to control.”
“People are willful. How long do you think they will obey control?”
“Wouldn’t they listen better than something that can’t understand human speech at all?”
Cardio was smiling.
I wondered what thoughts were moving behind that face.
For now, it seemed clear that he was finding it difficult to continue speaking.
After all, the glass in his hand, filled with some liquor called Devil’s Blood or whatever, was trembling.
He may have concealed it skillfully, but it would be hard to control even the vibration of the liquid.
Pretending not to notice, I simply looked at Cardio’s face.
Then that picturesque face narrowed its eyes sharply and spoke.
“Do not overstep yourself.”
His tone was gentle, but the words carried a chill.
“No matter how much you dress it up, what you create in the end are weapons of war.”
Cardio began to speak to the heart of the matter.
“In the end, what matters for a weapon is how many enemies it can kill, and how efficiently. A weapon of war is, at the end of the day, a weapon of war.”
Did he think he had seized the advantage as he spoke?
Cardio continued in a voice that carried more confidence.
“What you created, too, is ultimately a weapon of slaughter meant to kill people. Before you speak of whether it can be controlled or not, you should understand what position you yourself occupy, future warmonger.”
It was difficult to answer that.
I looked at him quietly, then asked.
“You know that applies to your side as well, don’t you?”
“We have already accepted that. Have you?”
“I would say my thoughts are different before it comes to resolve.”
Honestly, it wasn’t as though I hadn’t thought about that problem.
I didn’t have a perfectly clear answer myself, but I had thought about it and reached my own conclusion.
“The golem I made is a weapon for war. I have no intention of denying that.”
That was, from the start, like an inherent limitation of most of the things I loved.
Even if I denied it, it wasn’t something I could deny, nor should I deny it.
“But people ride inside my golems. They can move the immense power of a steel body according to a person’s heart and thoughts.”
The golem itself has no will.
That was why what it meant was clear.
“What to do with that power is decided by the pilot.”
Some people would certainly prioritize war and slaughter, but others would ride to protect their hometowns and families.
If I had to define what I made, what I loved...
“If what you made is a weapon of war, then what I made is power, wouldn’t you say?”
“Power?”
“A power that is mighty, yet has no will, and can therefore belong to anyone and accomplish many things. Regardless of good or evil, I dare say it is a power that realizes the human heart.”
I smiled quietly at Cardio as I spoke.
For a moment, Cardio seemed at a loss for words and merely stared at me.
Then shall I slip this in now?
“And once everything is over, golems can be dismantled and recycled. You can simply change their equipment and deploy them for postwar reconstruction. In one way or another, I think they will continue to have uses.”
Their function of defending territories from monsters was already there, too.
Cardio smiled and opened his mouth.
“If that is the case, then chimeras can also...”
“If you manage the research, that would be possible. Research to make them easier to control, that is.”
Cardio quietly drained his glass.
From what I had heard in the Phoenix County before, Avatus’s biological weapons were effective at first, but ultimately led to a tragedy involving as many as fourteen knights.
The trauma must have been severe, considering there had even been a knight unrelated to me who tried to make a show of force against me.
I hadn’t heard the details of what happened at the time, but now that I knew the position of the Avatus Count family was beyond what I had imagined, I could clearly tell they must have forcibly smoothed it over and dismissed it.
That was probably why he couldn’t open his mouth any further.
“Our side proved its usefulness to the very end, after all.”
There had been a lot of help, and I had been blessed with heavenly luck, but compared to the chimeras that had ultimately caused a major disaster in the county, our side had fought to the end without issue.
After draining his glass for a while, Cardio soon smiled and said,
“We are continuing related research on our side as well. There will be good news soon.”
“I’ll look forward to it. Though I suppose I’ll hear about it late, since I’ll be busy.”
“I’m sure you will be. From what I hear, you are making something new, but it isn’t going very well.”
That remark bothered me a bit.
“You are well informed.”
“We do have many sources of information...”
Well, the authority of the Avatus Count family was considerable, so there must be plenty of people monitoring our situation and reporting it.
It wasn’t as if I could say we had conducted the experiments in complete secrecy, so it wasn’t a situation where I could make a fuss about confidential information being leaked, but it still didn’t feel good to have my every move watched.
It meant they were that concerned about us.
“I hear that Professor Reina rode the one you made this time, but it was still utterly defeated by the Cyclops, which must be an earlier version?”
“That’s right. Things don’t always go well.”
“I understand. Allow me to offer my sincere condolences. Failures are always bound to appear.”
So he wanted to mock the technology demonstrator we made this time as a failure.
“I suppose House Avatus rarely fails.”
“That’s right. Given the great support we receive and the research accumulated over hundreds of years...”
“We have almost none of that on our side, so we fail almost every day. I’m quite envious.”
I said it with a quiet smile.
For the first time, Cardio showed curiosity.
“Every day, you fail?”
“We fail almost every day. Despite how it may look.”
It wasn’t exactly empty talk.
As not only Cardio but even Gilford, who had been silent, showed curiosity, I looked at Noel beside me and smiled.
“Noel sees it every day, so you know, right?”
“Right? Last time, you tried to adjust the engine’s output upward and it almost exploded. And when you made something called a spring, you got struck by it and went flying, didn’t you?”
Those were relatively recent incidents.
If we went further back than that...
“Before, when I tried to improve the armor plating by making it thinner, Erika said even she thought she could break it, so I told her to try, and she really did break it.”
“There was also the time you said you were going to try making some giant flexible whip, and Lady Mina scolded you because of the budget, wasn’t there?”
“I’ve caused trouble for you too, haven’t I?”
“What was it called? A rail... gun? I remember you tried to reproduce it with lightning magic, and it exploded, so Lord Eisen hurriedly made a clay wall, and that was how we barely survived.”
“That happened too. Why did I forget? Maybe the sight of Professor Reina running over while swallowing headache medicine stuck too strongly in my mind...”
“That stuck in my mind too.”
I really had been causing accidents and failing almost every day.
Gilford, who had been looking at me with startled eyes for a while, quietly asked,
“Pardon me, but are you even human? You went through such dangerous things and lived?”
“It can’t be helped. Dangerous moments are always bound to happen, and I can’t push them onto someone else.”
Even though I prepared safety measures as thoroughly as possible, something blew up every single day.
Perhaps Noel, Mina, and Erika came by every day partly to watch and see what would explode today, and partly to check whether I might get hurt.
In any case, after trying many things on our side as well, making compromises in the end, and building them, we had barely achieved something close to success many times.
Looking at Gilford, who seemed slightly dumbfounded, I smiled and said,
“I think having few failures can mean many things. It could be something that has already gone through countless failures, so there are no more failures left to occur, or it could mean that an even greater failure is waiting.”
Or perhaps there were simply too few samples to begin with.
At the very least, there was one thing I could say for certain.
“After all, there is no way you can create a concept that does not originally exist in this world and have everything succeed without a single failure, now is there?”
Namely, that what we had produced had been completed through countless failures.