Chapter Three / 11 : 45 / Conflict
Chapter Three / 11 : 45 / Conflict
“Why did things turn out this way...”
The time: lunchtime on a weekend. The place: a burger shop on Shijou Street.
RyuZU asked Naoto, who was lying face-down on the table and looking totally worn out, “Master Naoto, are you aware of the phrase ‘fine feathers make fine birds’?”
“Yeah, I know its meaning. I feel a sense of spite from you bringing it up to me, though,” Naoto answered in a groan. He looked completely different than usual.
He was wearing his school uniform, denim shorts and a black shirt, that he had worn day in and day out, but in place of the cheap, overworn sneakers he usually wore with it were black leather boots—which, despite their simple design, were rather tasteful. His voluminous, ruffled hair been turned into a neatly trimmed shorter cut that curled outwards.
At this point, no matter how one looked at it, Naoto had become a “stylish person,” a fellow comrade of normies.
...In appearance, at least.
“I didn’t know what to expect when you told me we were heading out in the morning, but... being thrown into a barbershop, then taken all over the place shopping has made me seriously tired...”
“Master Naoto, it wasn’t a barbershop, but a beauty salon.”
“How are they any different?” Naoto grumbled as he raised his face.
RyuZU, who was sitting facing him, was attracting all sorts of attention from the crowd in the store.
I guess that’s a given.
After all, RyuZU was “inhumanly” beautiful.
She had lustrous silver hair that swayed softly, a face as white as snow, and eyes that glittered gold. On top of that, her ephemeral limbs made her appear like an angel even when she was simply sitting.
However, RyuZU paid no heed to those gazes of admiration, saying, “With all due respect, Master Naoto, this much personal grooming is a given. I think your shabby looks would go to waste if you wore only your school uniform every day, forever.”
“I have no idea what I’d be wasting if that’s the case, but...” Naoto said as he exhaled a small sigh. “Well, it’s true that loitering about until nighttime in my school uniform would be a bad idea... but wouldn’t a go-to of mine like Uniloq or Shimumara have been fine?—”
“Master Naoto, to look good in Shimumara or Uniloq would require both a befitting flair and face.”
“D, Don’t say face...” Naoto said in a trembling voice, but RyuZU ignored him.
She continued. “Should inadequates pick something out half-heartedly, they would have even their financial sense questioned, much less their looks and taste, making their inadequacy all the more apparent. Though admittedly, to be daft enough to deliberately challenge oneself like that despite everything would be sublime in a way.”
“...RyuZU, aren’t you awfully well-informed despite having been asleep for two hundred years? Did you look this up in the manga cafe?”
“Yes, that is a part of it. However, it is also that both brands have existed since a thousand years ago, and it does not seem like they have changed their direction much during my slumber, either.”
“Wow... Those brands have had that kind of public image since a thousand years ago?”
RyuZU nodded; however, Naoto suddenly tilted his head.
“By the way, I guess this is late, but how did you find the money to gladly pay for these boots and my haircut?”
“I raised it,” RyuZU answered with a calm face, but Naoto knit his eyebrows.
“—More specifically?”
RyuZU smiled sweetly and presented Naoto’s passbook to him.
...Now that I think about it, I’ve left her with my passbook the whole time, haven’t I, he remembered.
He had completely forgotten about it. Naoto opened his passbook for the first time in a while.
“——”
He froze.
Looking at the zeroes, there were one, two, three.................. there were a lot of them.
“M-M-M, Miss Ryu, Ryuryuryuryuryuryu, Ryu RyuuuRyuuu, Ryuuu, ZU?”
“Master Naoto, no matter how impressed you are by my abilities as the pinnacle of all this world’s automata, you need not have expressly sang my name in praise with such awful musical sense.”
“That’s not it at all! Rather, huh? Like, is this for real? What? How...?” Naoto spurted out in such a fluster that his pronunciation turned awry.
RyuZU pityingly gazed at him in such a state. “Master Naoto, please rest assured, by no means will we end up being chased by the police.”
“Umm, that explanation only makes me more uneasy, you know.” With an eye half-closed, Naoto asked, “Seriously, what’s up with all this money?”
“While it may have been impudent of me, I took the liberty of putting Master Naoto’s paltry savings to work.”
“By investing... uh, with just that little to start with?”
“A credit-based economy is but the generic term for financial systems in which it is possible to generate wealth out of nothing when taken to the extremes. If one has a thorough knowledge of the structure of the system and the intelligence to navigate it, accumulating this much money is not even a trifle of trouble.”
—There’s no way that’s how she got the money.
So Naoto thought, but if he pressed her, he’d probably end up discovering the truth, which he’d rather not know. He kept his mouth shut.
RyuZU smiled with the face of an angel.
“In any case, as you can see, we need not worry anymore as far as finances are concerned. Hereafter, I shall pay for expenses like Master Naoto’s food and clothing, so you can lead a life that can at least be considered civilized. As such, please do not worry about the future. Enjoy the life of a kept man—excuse me, I mean a life of luxury.”
“...Didn’t you say ‘kept man’ just now?”
“No? Even if I did increase your savings by a more than a hundredfold, the capital did come from Master Naoto’s savings, so this wealth is all yours. Even if you were to blow through it like a kept man would, there would not be even a sliver of justification for you to be called a kept man, you kept man.”
Naoto collapsed without a word.
...A kept man, huh... I’m a kept man, huh...
...And I’m not even the kept man of a woman I seduced, but an automaton.
RyuZU, who was in top form, sprinkled the salt on from above his head.
“If Master Naoto were not in the poorest segment of society, or more specifically, if you had even a single usable bill in your wallet, I would not have had to do this, you know.”
“But I did! If I withdrew some savings, I would have had some!”
“In that situation, I believe you would have exhausted all your savings the moment you entered the beauty salon.”
“Spending that much money on a measly haircut is bizarre! It’s just gonna grow back in no time!”
“It’s a necessary expenditure,” RyuZU declared. “—Even though Master Naoto is shabby, short, and suffering destitution as a sacrifice of capitalism and democracy, if I do not have you keep up a minimal level of grooming as my master, then as your follower, my caliber will be questioned.”
“...Ah—” Naoto nodded.
Now that I think about it, it’s true that the absurd number of gazes that gather on RyuZU invariably focus on me afterwards.
—As if to say, “Why this chump?”
“I see. I get it now. I’ll pay more attention from now on so I don’t embarrass myself or you.”
“—Also, it was an expression of gratitude for the other day.”
“Gratitude? Did I do something to be thanked for?”
“If it is not in your memory, feel free to forget what I said just now.”
After that, they exited the burger shop and began walking through the shopping district, heading towards the station; however, Naoto stopped when they came across a flowery-looking boutique aimed at young women.
Staring fixedly at a set of frilly dresses displayed behind a pane of glass, Naoto called out, “RyuZU, wait up a bit.”
“...Master Naoto, if you are interested in cross-dressing, please mention that from the start. A dress wouldn’t go well with the clothes I’ve chosen f—”
“That’s not it! Forget that and come with me for a bit.”
Naoto pulled the venom-spewing RyuZU by her hand and entered the store.
“Welco—whoa,” the clerk who had come out from the back cut herself off, and her eyes widened as soon as she saw RyuZU.
Naoto had already gotten used to that kind of reaction since they got it wherever they went, so he ignored it and approached the mannequin that was being displayed through the window and checked the price tag.
“......Hey, RyuZU, could you wear this for me?”
“Are you telling me to undress myself on the spot? Never mind, it is not a problem. Meeting the needs of my master is also a part of my—”
“Quit intentionally misconstruing me! Use the dressing room! Excuse me, she’d like to try on this set of clothes.”
“Huh?! Ah, r-r-right, please wait a moment.”
The clerk who had been enchanted by RyuZU came back to her senses and began moving.
After watching her disappear to the back, RyuZU began suspiciously, “...What is the meaning of this?”
“Nothing really. Look, just try it on.”
“Do you mean to say that you are displeased with my usual attire?” RyuZU said as she spread her arms out.
Indeed—Though RyuZU was wearing a school uniform now, she also had the set of clothes she had originally worn: a black, classic dress with ample amounts of frills and lace that seemed to have been woven and tailored from the darkness of the night.
That was probably why she hadn’t paid any attention to her own clothes, but—
Naoto smiled upon seeing the clerk return with the clothes to try on. “I think your usual dress looks good, too. It’s okay, just try this on.”
“...Certainly.”
RyuZU looked grudging and reluctant as she entered the dressing room with the clothes.
Shortly after,
“—Is this fine?”
The curtain was pulled back.
Even the female clerk who snuck a peek gasped in amazement at the sight of RyuZU.
A velvety, lustrous white camisole, a pink skirt made of cloth that had been layered several times over, and a shawl that was the same shade of pink. Every one of them left a gentle, light impression on the viewer, as if one were looking at a carefully wrapped confectionery.
“Yeah, I was right. It looks really good on you!” Naoto smiled enthusiastically, but RyuZU seemed hesitant.
“...Is that really so? I do not think this is proper wear for a servant, but...”
“That’s not true. Miss RyuZU, you really are the best.”
“However, if I walk alongside Master Naoto like this, it would be as if, rather than a servant... Never mind. Now then, I would like to receive an explanation any time now.”
“Explain what? Why I had you try this on?”
“As far as other matters that require an explanation, one would be why Master Naoto’s critical thinking skills require him to ask.”
“Because, I mean, I’m having so much fun. It’s like we’re on a date,” Naoto answered with a serious look, to which RyuZU made a sour face, as if she had just inadvertently chewed on bitter pills by the dozens.
“......Master Naoto, do you call bringing your watch along on a walk ‘having a date with your watch’? Your language interpretation is awfully profound and novel, I see.”
“Hmm? You sure say some strange things. It’s not like you’re a watch, RyuZU.”
“In that case, what am I?” RyuZU tilted her head slightly and sharply exhaled. “What am I to Master Naoto?”
“A super cute automaton girl.”
RyuZU opened her eyes wide at Naoto, who had answered without a moment’s pause. “......Cute, you say?”
“Yeah! I may have no eye for my own clothes, but I do have an eye for automata! I’m confident enough to assert this: The cutest automaton in this universe right now is you, RyuZU!”
“...Without even a point of reference to compare me to, how can you assert that I’m the cutest in the uni—”
“It’s a self-evident truth!!” Naoto declared without wavering, then seemed to suddenly realize something as he gushed, “Ahh, but I’d like to play around with your hair a bit as well. You have such beautiful hair, after all.”
Naoto reached his hand forward and began playing around with RyuZU’s hair. She wriggled her body, her face seeming to say that she felt a bit ticklish. Just then—
“Ah—”
RyuZU was taller than Naoto, and when he extended his hand towards her head, he ended up tripping over the step of the dressing room, whose floor was slightly elevated above the rest of the store.
The curtain that he’d tried to grab onto in a fluster slipped right out of his hands, causing Naoto to dive right into both the dressing room and RyuZU’s bosom.
RyuZU, who ended up being pushed down and having Naoto’s face buried in her chest, remarked in a dispassionate tone, “...I see. So you had an advanced calculation like this in mind. Allow me to applaud you, Master Naoto. I am forced to admit that this schemed sexual harassment surpassed my calculations.”
“What? No, that’s not it okay!”
Naoto abruptly popped his head up. RyuZU gazed at him coldly.
“As I suspected, do the organisms known as humans only exhibit abilities that exceed their own limits when pursuing base and vulgar lust, after all?”
“No, that’s... Ahh, ugh, I can’t deny that in all cases, but...”
“—So what do you plan to do now?”
“Huh? What do you mean?”
“After purposefully pulling the curtain closed as you fell, shoving me down in an isolated room and panting roughly through your nose as you enjoyed my breast components to your fill, surely you do not plan to pass this all off as a coincidence.”
“Err, I do actually. Is that bad?”
“Right, that is bad.” RyuZU breathed out a small sigh, then said, “...Well, it is fine, I guess. I cannot help but admire how you wrung that meager intelligence of yours to one-up me through deception—Please state your demand. What is it you desire?”
“Eh? It’s okay for me to demand something?”
That very moment, the capability of humans to exceed their own limits that RyuZU had mentioned just before manifested itself in full force as thoughts hopelessly oozing with worldly desires ran amok in Naoto’s mind.
All just to pick out the most suitable option from his endless sea of desires.
—In all sincerity, men are an incorrigible bunch.
“Th, Then... how about you start by stripping down?” Naoto pressed RyuZU as he made a fondling gesture with both hands, wiggling his fingers deviously.
●
“............”
Right now, the woman was exceedingly troubled.
She worked at a boutique marketed towards teenage girls.
Though her friends told her she looked like a college student, she wasn’t an employee of the store. She was its full-fledged owner, and the merchandise on display was all items she had meticulously and proudly selected herself.
The selection at the store was a mass of frills and laces that one might end up dismissing as simply sweet, white, or gothic lolita, but the clothes here were completely incomparable to the cheap imitations of the fashion used in cosplays. The only lolita clothes here were ones that measured up to her professional standards.
“For starters, lolita fashion is a burst of imagination that expresses the fleeting, innocent sweetness of a young maiden...” —Once she began talking, she couldn’t stop. The store was packed with that passion and taste of hers.
Now then, it was just a short while ago that a couple consisting of a girl who was a drop-dead beauty and a boy who was, eh, cute for the effort he put in entered the store she was so proud of.
When she’d brought them the set of clothes that the boy had requested, the beautiful girl had kindly unveiled herself wearing the outfit marvelously, which had made the store owner inadvertently let out a sigh of wonder.
Ahh, that’s right. It’s precisely for this kind of girl that I’ve gathered all these clothes.
...However—
The couple was acting strange. When the owner had heard a clamor in the dressing room and took a look, she found that the boy had plunged into the beautiful girl’s stall, after which he’d simply remained in there without coming out.
Feeling uneasy about all this, the owner had approached the dressing room, and she could hear rough panting from inside!
“—I cannot strip any more than this.”
“No, you still can. See, you still have one more piece left. I’ll help you take it off.”
“Ah—”
“Wow—... So this is what it’s like, huh... I guess I can’t really say. After all, I’d only seen it for just a few hours in a dark place before. It looks totally different from that time... So amazing...”
“Master... Naoto. Please do not spread it open so mu—”
“Ahh, I see, so you’re sensitive here. Then, how about here...”
“Please... do not touch me there.”
She was shocked. Bewildered. Baffled.
—Uh, what am I supposed to do in this situation?!
It had been three years since she’d opened the store; by this point, she’d become well used to managing it, but this kind of situation was still a first for her.
Nearly all her customers until now had been teenage girls, and though they’d bring a boyfriend along sometimes, there had never been anyone extreme enough to do the deed in the dressing room.
She clasped her cheeks, which had become hot, with both hands and wriggled about anxiously. She recalled her lover that she had broken up with after a fight around the time she graduated from college.
Ahh, I’m not unsatisfied with my current life of working myself to the bone chasing after my dreams, but even so, there are still times when I feel hopelessly lonely—
“Ahhh—”
“Alright... I’m in deep now. Wow—... Amazing. I didn’t think that it’d be so complicated inside.”
—The store owner snapped.
I don’t care anymore. To begin with, this is my store. It’s a store where adorable little Alices wear frilly dresses and show me their sparkling smiles. Just what kind of adult actions do you think you’re doing in this wonderland of mine you lovebird punks? Just blow up why don’t you?!
Pulling back the dressing room’s curtain with one swift jerk, she yelled, “Hey, what do you two think you’re do—!! ing?”
Her voice tapered off and vanished.
The scene inside the dressing room was far more confusing than she had imagined.
The girl is half-naked, her clothes are open—That much makes sense, but what’s up with her back? The skin is splayed open, and there are gears inside? And this boy, sticking a thin screwdriver into her inner workings as he uses a magnifying monocle to peer zealously inside, what’s he—
“Ah...ngh!” Upon the boy slightly turning the screwdriver, the beautiful girl—rather, the beautiful automaton girl, let out a coquettish moan and writhed.
As the owner stared blankly down at the two of them, the boy noticed her and scratched his head. “Umm... Sorry, we’re in the middle of maintenance right now. Ah, we’ll take these clothes. How much are they?”
She answered with a smile.
“Leave, you perverted brat.”
●
...How many times has it been now?
Marie sighed deeply in the provisional meeting room that used to be a storage area.
Despite the entire staff force pulling continuous all-nighters after moving to the twenty-fourth floor, the problem had yet to be resolved.
Right now, Marie was in the middle of her fifth meeting for reports and devising measures regarding the repair work.
Those gathered here were, including Marie, the chiefs of observation, analytics, service, and communications, plus the heads of material management and transport. None of them could hide their fatigue.
Hannes, the chief of observation, spat out, “—The problem is that we can’t pinpoint the cause of the malfunction. While there’s no mistake that there’s something wrong with the regulating mechanism for atmospheric pressure, its measured values themselves are normal. In other words, we can’t say that the cause is simply a degradation or breakdown of the system.”
—The Butterfly Effect.
It is the concept that even a trivially minute alteration can induce a huge change over time.
The “Clockwork Planet,” recreating the entire planet’s mechanisms.
Its structure was so mysteriously complex that it was impossible to fully grasp no matter how much one tried.
Even if an abnormality occurred in one system, replacing or repairing just that system usually didn’t solve the problem. As for why, it was because the cause of the problem often lay in a completely unrelated section from the system being affected.
It might be nothing more than a loose screw or a small gear becoming deformed.
However, when small irregularities like that piled up, they would sometimes eventually result in a fatal error.
The present situation that Chief Hannes was explaining fit that bill precisely.
“Kyoto’s city mechanism systems are separated by floor, so the irregularity on the twenty-fourth floor is definitely the cause of the problem. That’s something that all the observation squad can attest to. However...”
Massimo, the chief analytics officer, continued after him, “Based on the observational data, the calculated potential patterns of malfunction reached as many as 563,499,352 possibilities. If we had at least a month... No, even if we only had two weeks, it’d be possible to pinpoint the right one if we worked diligently, but...”
In the current day where the planet’s blueprint had long been lost, finding out the cause of a malfunction was done through brute force. One had to create an overall diagram without any repeated possible combinations, then check the portions that seemed like probable causes one by one for whether they had any relevance to the malfunction.
If there was only one cause, then things would still be manageable, but when there were two, three, or four causes, the possible paths leading to the malfunction propagated endlessly.
If one considered that, locating the cause of error in the estimated two weeks that Chief Analytics Officer Massimo gave would be astonishingly fast; however, Marie shook her head with a rueful countenance.
“We don’t have that kind of time.”
“But Dr. Marie, no matter how you look at it, as things are now we simply don’t have enough time to finish the job,” the communication chief said with a pale face.
“Would it not be possible for us using our current analytical data to make a behind-the-scenes political deal to postpone the purg—?”
“I’ll try to, but it’ll probably be difficult. How’s the work proceeding overall right now?”
Service Chief Konrad answered, “In order to speed things up, we’ve narrowed down the likely patterns of the cause down to 35,034 possibilities. The service squad and the communications squad are working together testing out those possibilities right now through trial and error.”
“What was that selection based on?”
“Just my intuition.”
Everyone rolled their eyes except for the chief analytics officer.
However, Konrad simply shrugged his shoulders, saying, “If I were to embellish what I did a little, I basically discarded patterns that were of the same type and gathered similar cases from our work log up to now, then put them in order by likeliness and ease of verification. Well, put bluntly, it was just my personal biases at work.”
Marie inquired, “Do you expect things to go well?”
“Not really, no.”
“......”
“However, if we didn’t at least do that, it would be impossible to finish verifying all the possibilities. Rather, it’s questionable whether we’ll even be able to adequately test all of the approximately thirty-five thousand possibilities in the current situation.”
“You’re sure there are no other means we could take, right?”
“Given our current equipment and method, this is the best we can do.” The chief of service nodded, and the head of transport stood up while breaking out in a cold sweat.
“Dr. Marie, if it’s almost certain that we can’t prevent the collapse of the city, shouldn’t we consider how to escape?”
Observation Chief Hannes stood up in anger. “Are you telling us to accept the purge?! Running away would be the same as what the military is doing!”
“Of course, I, too, have the resolve to continue the repair work until the very end! However, to be practical, if we can’t expect to succeed, we should consider the next best plan.”
Marie asked with a stiff face, “Do you mean to say that we should announce an evacuation advisory to the residents?”
“Yes. If we start now, it shouldn’t be impossible! Shouldn’t we be prioritizing the residents’ safety and publicizing the information we have?”
“We don’t have that authority. For starters, how are we supposed to evacuate twenty million people by just ourselves?” said Marie calmly. The head of transport ground his teeth.
—Their own city was going to be purged.
True, the resulting chaos when that information was publicized would surely be on a scale that one couldn’t even imagine.
Not everyone could simply evacuate on their own. The transportation facilities would surely be overwhelmed across the board, not to mention that there were residents who physically couldn’t move by themselves as well.
To begin with, just where were they supposed to evacuate to? And what would happen after that?
However, the head of transport refused to back down, asserting once again, “True, it will probably be both dangerous and chaotic. But rather than expend our resources on a hopeless repair, shouldn’t we consider how best to limit the number of victims?”
“In that case, wouldn’t the military potentially expedite the purge to conceal the truth?” Service Chief Konrad muttered as if speaking to himself.
In that moment, a dreadful silence befell the meeting room. Each head of staff, including Marie, had an indescribable look on their faces, and the head of transport gasped in a cramped, terrified voice.
“...Surely not, they wouldn’t...”
“What reason do they have to hesitate? They forsook the residents long ago. In that case, wouldn’t it just be a matter of sooner or later to them?”
“This city has twenty million inhabitants, you know!”
“Like I’ve been saying, it makes no difference to them.” The service chief snorted before continuing. “Listen up. To us, the worst-case scenario would be the city collapsing along with twenty million victims, but that’s not the case for them. What would trouble them the most would be the fact of the military forsaking the city becoming public.”
“That can’t be—!”
“How naïve of you. The reason the military isn’t interfering with us right now is because this is convenient for them.”
“What do you mean by that, service chief?” Marie asked.
The service chief stroked his white-flecked beard as he let out a deep sigh.
Out of everyone in the room, Service Chief Konrad was the most senior clocksmith.
He was a great veteran who had reached the point of slowly transitioning from his prime to old age. Ever since he became a Meister in his youth, he had always worked on the front lines. His experience and technique were acknowledged by everyone. Considering his talent, it wouldn’t have been strange for him to be leading this group instead of Marie if he had wanted to, but he hadn’t tried to do so. He preferred taking the position a step back, where he could simply give casual advice to his juniors.
Even now, he looked like he was chiding all the young faces present with his gaze as he opened his mouth and said blandly, “Listen up. First, let us assume that it’s impossible to repair this city in the ten hours we have left. At the very least, that’s what they think, and looking at things objectively, they’re exactly right.”
“Service chief! But—”
“I know, so just calm down, Hannes. Of course, I haven’t even the slightest intention of giving up either. However, that’s not true for the military. They gave up long ago and decided on the purge. The problem is what comes after that. What will happen to them after the city collapses?”
“What will happen? That’s...”
“Will they be disparaged? Yeah, they’ll be demeaned to all hell alright. Though it’s said that dead men tell no tales, an entire city will have collapsed and been annihilated. There’s no way they’ll be able to keep everything concealed. The heads of everyone in charge will come flying off. Considering the damage that will have been done, you could even say it’ll be quite fortunate for them if things end with just that—Now, that’s where we come in.”
The service chief turned his head as he surveyed all the faces in the room.
While everyone remained silent, Marie spoke up as their representative. “In other words... ‘Even though we called Meister Guild and had them conduct a do-or-die repair on the city, the problem was beyond even them. As such, we were unable to save the precious lives of the city’s residents.’—Is that the scenario you’re talking about?”
The service chief cracked a cheerful smile. “Dr. Marie, you are a kind girl, aren’t you?”
“Uwhah?” Marie forgot her act as she inadvertently let out a sound of confusion.
As he shook his head, Service Chief Konrad gazed at Marie as if he found her reaction adorable. “Unfortunately, what people call ‘society’ is something so filthy that it’s irredeemable. Understand? They probably plan to spin things this way—”
Service Chief Konrad paused for a breath before announcing, “—They’ll say, ‘While we were making do-or-die repairs on the city, Meister Guild forcefully interrupted us and ended up failing, causing an abrupt collapse of the city for which we were unable to prepare an evacuation in time. It’s exceedingly regrettable that things have turned out this way.’”
————
Just then, there was a loud noise as the door of the meeting room opened.
The one who had come was a bald man in a black suit—Halter.
He raised his hand awkwardly as the rueful glances all focused on him. “Excuse me—I was contacted by Meister Guild’s headquarters just now, you see.”
“What did they say?”
Without answering her, Halter approached Marie and held some documents in front of her eyes.
She took them and quickly ran her eyes over the pages.
In them was—
“——!!”
Krrrnnch. With the look of a demon on her face, Marie crushed the documents in her hand.
●
“What is the meaning of this?!” Marie shouted, slamming both hands on the table so forcefully her hair flew up in a storm. But the one being shouted at looked completely relaxed, seeming like nothing bothered him as he sipped black tea from his cup.
The man had introduced himself as Limmons.
He was a bespectacled man with delicate features and neatly combed hair, and he wore a black-striped suit. He was the liaison sent from headquarters, and it was his order that Marie be summoned to the Central Hotel from the core tower.
...At a time like this, when every minute and second is more precious than anything else!
Thinking that made Marie all the angrier.
“As I’ve been saying,” Limmons said with a composed look on his face, “from the reports you sent us, we’ve come to understand that the commission this time is a military conspiracy made with the intent of avoiding responsibility—and also that there are no prospects of finishing the repairs as of right now.”
“That’s—!”
“As such, it wouldn’t be in our best interests to remain on the scene—That is the verdict of headquarters.”
”...Are you telling us to forsake this city?”
Limmons smiled sweetly at Marie, who was trembling all over, and said, “Please rest assured, Dr. Breguet. Headquarters is aware of the situation as well.”
“...Are you saying that you guys will resolve the situation politically for us?”
“Yes, of course. This failure won’t end up damaging your reputation.”
“—Just what are you saying?” Marie said as if growling, “Who’s talking about my career? I’m talking about the watershed question of whether this city will be purged!”
“It’ll be purged,” Limmons said coolly.
He stood up and turned his back to Marie, who was at a loss for words. Approaching the window, he looked down on the cityscape beneath him through the spotless glass as he continued, “The City of Kyoto will be purged. That’s something that’s been decided.”
“...Really, what are you saying?” Marie asked, left practically gasping from terror, but Limmons didn’t respond.
While continuing to look down on the cityscape, he pushed his glasses up with his index finger. “The military won’t stop at this point, you know, Dr. Breguet. Given that they’ve been found out by us, if they abandon the plan now, all that would be left is the fact that they tried to conduct a mass killing of the city’s residents.”
“That would be just as bad as them going through with it!”
“If they dispose of the residents, they can make any excuse they want. Moreover, headquarters has already approved.”
Marie’s breath got caught in her throat. ”—What did you say?”
“If this kind of secret is exposed, it would lead to unrest as people lose all trust in the military. That wouldn’t be a desirable outcome for us, either. In order to prevent that from happening, we have no choice but to take the blame for the time being. —This is headquarters’ verdict.”
“Have you guys gone crazy?!” Marie exploded, but Limmons shrugged her words off like a breeze.
He didn’t even turn to face her.
“Dr. Breguet, how about you think about things calmly for a bit? What will remain after we expose the military’s conspiracy? We humans number four and a half billion. We have on our hands over twenty thousand core towers and metropolitan areas; adding in the supporting clock towers, there are over six million regions we have to maintain. If this incident were to cause the military to collapse, who would do the maintenance work?”
“That argument is completely irrational! Logically speaking, we should put a stop to their conspiracy precisely so that nothing like this ever happens again.”
“Do you expect the military to purify itself? That’s impossible,” Limmons said as he turned around. “The situation this time was caused by the military’s inadequacy. The purge is to conceal this situation that they cannot handle. The people should just rely on Meister Guild instead, you say? But we can’t handle every situation like this, either. Putting ability aside, we definitely lack the numbers necessary.”
“...What are you implying.”
“It’s a case of give-and-take.” Limmons smiled thinly. “Both the military and Meister Guild would be troubled if the other were lost. Considering that we are guilty of siphoning outstanding talents from the military’s localities as well, wouldn’t it be fine to take one for the team once in a while?”
“...Are you saying that you don’t care if you kill twenty million people for that?”
“They’re sacrifices who ought be mourned.” Limmons nodded. His expression revealed that he didn’t really think that one bit.
“—Now I thoroughly understand what you’re saying!” Slamming the documents—the ones with the order to withdraw written on them—onto the table, Marie turned on her heels.
“Oh my, Dr. Breguet. Where are you headed?”
“I’m heading back to the worksite and continuing the repair. Regardless of what headquarters says, we won’t give up.”
“Goodness, I’d be left in a pinch if you were to act at your own discretion like that.”
“Like I care. —We’re leaving.”
Calling out to Halter, who had been waiting like a statue in a corner of the room, Marie began to walk towards the door. As she grasped the doorknob, intending to walk right out, Limmons called out to her.
In a voice as cheerful as could be, he said, “—In that case, I shall strip you of your authority.”
Marie stopped dead in her tracks.
She turned around.
Before Marie’s sharp gaze, Limmons took out a scroll fastened by a blue cord. He unfastened it and rolled the scroll down. His rimless glasses turned opaque from the white light reflecting on them.
“You, the honorable Marie Bell Breguet, were appointed Head of the First Division’s Second Brigade on the tenth of April in the one-thousand thirteenth year of the Wheel. However, as it has been confirmed that you have breached direct orders from headquarters, I hereby strip you of your seat and its authority by means of a simplified resolution.”
Finishing his recital of the scroll, Limmons extended his hand and showed it to Marie.
“The decree has been written in proper form. Would you like to confirm?”
Marie remained silent as she walked up to Limmons, upon which she snatched the scroll from his hand. She narrowed her eyes into a line as she traced its contents.
From her side, Halter stepped forward and asked, “Excuse me, Mr. Limmons? Sorry for butting in, but pray tell—Why do you have such a document conveniently prepared?”
“It was in the vein of making assurance doubly sure. As it turns out, it ended up being useful, after all.”
As a nauseating, faint smile crossed his face, Limmons continued, “If it were possible, I would have liked to settle things without using it, but I can’t simply let you do as you please with a hundred clocksmiths who possess precious technical skills.”
Marie rolled the scroll back up neatly before stowing it inside her pocket. Afterwards, she lifted her face and threw a glare at Limmons with dark, bitter eyes.
Limmons raised both hands up and put on a show, jesting, “Now now, please don’t consider disposing of me and pretending that you never heard what was just said.”
“......”
“I’ve already sent a copy of the same document to the city’s military. Having been stripped of your seat and authority, you are now just an ordinary person without the privileges accorded to a Meister. You won’t be allowed to enter the core tower without the military’s permission.”
The sound of teeth grinding escaped Marie’s mouth.
She scowled at Limmons and made a face that said she would gladly strangle him to death any number of times if she could, but—suddenly, her glare wavered and she looked perplexed.
She tilted her head to the side slightly and took her eyes off Limmons as she stared up into space. Her eyes widened.
I remember now.
Marie said quietly to the faintly smiling man, “—You called yourself Limmons, right?”
“Yes, what about it?”
“I remembered just now. I’ve seen your face at the get-togethers of the five great enterprises in the past. As I recall, you were a dependent of the Vacherons.”
Limmons’s smile disappeared for a moment, and then he smiled faintly once again.
“—Indeed, I’m honored to have you remember me, Ms. Breguet. We were in the same year at the academy as well. Do you remember that, too?”
“No, not at all.”
“...Is that so? Well, I wasn’t talented in that field, unfortunately. As you can see, I’m working on the administration side of things at headquarters now.”
Vacheron.
It was the name of a clan behind another one of the Five Great Enterprises that rivaled that of the Breguet family Marie belonged to—and also a sponsor of Meister Guild.
As much as Meister Guild liked to call itself a nonprofit organization, as long as it was an organization based on the movement of people, things, and money, it couldn’t completely exclude the will of its sponsors.
It was a matter of fact that the management of Meister Guild included those related to the Breguets and the Vacherons—in other words, representatives of the five great enterprises. Marie did know that and had even used it to her convenience before.
However—
“Is this a painting done by the Vacherons?” asked Marie in a low voice as she stared at Limmons.
He had said that there would be no damage done to Marie’s reputation, but there was no way that was true. If the purge was executed, the military would push the blame on Meister Guild, and if Meister Guild accepted that, they would shove the responsibility onto Marie—and in turn, the Breguet family.
There was no way the other four families wouldn’t take the chance to chip off some of the Breguet family’s influence.
—In other words, this is a collusion between the military and Meister Guild. A plot by the Vacheron family to enervate the Breguet family’s power!
However, Limmons shrugged his shoulders at Marie’s condemnation.
“—I have absolutely no idea what you could be saying.”
He showed off a sluggish, sludge-like smile. His expression substantiated Marie’s conjecture more eloquently than anything else.
“You... bunch of...!” In her anger, her voice had gotten stuck in her throat and her head was burning white-hot.
She couldn’t understand.
If they did something like this, Meister Guild’s reputation would take a big hit. The trust and pride their predecessors had built up with their blood and sweat starting a thousand years ago would be irreversibly stained with dishonor—and for something so senseless!
She recalled what she had said to Halter before.
“What could those imbeciles possibly do?”
I feel like I understand the meaning behind those pacifistic smiles now. The dreadful power of those who can’t do anything. Understand? No, like I could ever understand this. Like I would let myself understand this.
What is sacred? The precious legacy left to Meister Guild that must be protected above all else: tenacity, pride, ideals, life, and the purity of the soul!
Yet, for those things to be discarded for something so small, narrow-minded, ugly, filthy, and repulsive that it can’t even be dismissed as mere jealousy or envy—And for it to be done so easily.
Marie couldn’t understand.
“—Marie!!”
Being yelled at unexpectedly, Marie came to her senses.
“Let’s go. Staying here would only make you sick,” Halter said, his voice firm.
Marie was about to reflexively yell back, but she restrained herself. She tightened her trembling fist and calmed her breathing, then nodded.
“...Right, let’s go.”
Marie and Halter silently exited the room. Suppressing her impulse to wreck the faint smile on Limmons’s face beyond all recognition as he saw them off required an unbelievable amount of self-restraint.
The two remained silent as they advanced through the wide corridors before arriving at the elevator corridor. Halter pressed the call button, and they waited quietly for the elevator to come. Though in reality it only took a little more than two minutes, to Marie it felt like an hour or even two.
When the elevator arrived, they boarded it and Halter pressed the button for first floor.
Marie reached her limit.
“AAAAAGGGGGGHHHHHHHHRRRRRRRRRAAAAAGHHHHHH!!” she bellowed, kicking the wall of the elevator with all her might and causing it to sway so much that the emergency shutdown was triggered.
“Calm down, Marie.”
“Shut up!!”
Marie swung both hands about as she rampaged. Halter was about to lay his hand on Marie’s shoulder to try to pacify her when Marie punched his hand in defiance. The fact that that didn’t shake his hand in the slightest vexed her so much that it made her rage explode even further.
She cried, yelled, and bashed Halter with her fists. Panting roughly and with her light golden hair disheveled, she slammed her foot against Halter’s log-like legs and trampled on his feet.
Halter didn’t resist. He bore the brunt of the girl’s rage that had been unreasonably directed towards him in silence.
Of course, as he had been mechanized, such a feat wasn’t difficult at all.
Marie pulled Halter in by his suit and smashed her head against his solid abdomen. Thud. The shock spread throughout Halter’s body.
“—Do you even get it?!” Marie yelled with her head still smooshed against his abdomen. Her voice was hoarse and trembling. “Hey, do you even get it? This city! Twenty million people! For the sake of ruining me—for something as pointless as that, they’ll be sacrificed as collateral damage, did you know that ?!”
“That’s not true,” Halter asserted solemnly. “Marie, that’s not true. Don’t flatter yourself. The military will conduct the purge whether you’re here or not. The shitheads at Meister Guild simply threw you in for the ride.”
“How could you possibly know that for sure?!” Marie shouted as her rage burst a second time. With her face still buried in his abdomen, she struck Halter’s chest with her small fists. “If I weren’t here, Meister Guild might have pressured the military! More clocksmiths might have been sent! The purge might have been avoidable!”
“Even so, it’s not your fault.”
“Shut up!!” Marie shouted again, then punched Halter.
Halter didn’t waver. He stood silently as he was shouted and punched at. Suppressing a girl with a body of flesh would be easy, and aside from that, he wasn’t so inept that he wouldn’t at least embrace and comfort a crying girl, yet he didn’t do so.
—He knew that Marie Bell Breguet didn’t need such a thing.
After a short while, Marie had calmed down and become motionless, her face still against Halter’s stomach.
Her shoulders eventually began to tremble.
“......Hehe...Hehehe, hahahahahahaha!”
In a burst, her face twisted as she let out a loud laugh. Her eyes were swollen and a little red. Halter sighed as he diligently pretended not to notice the stains that had gotten on his suit.
“...Have you calmed down?”
“Calmed down? What are you saying, Halter? I’m calm, alright. This may be the first time my mind has been so crystal-clear since I was born.”
“You really don’t look that way, though.”
“Ohh! Ohh, sorry about that, Halter! Are you mad at me because I punched you just a wee bit? Yeah, I’m really sorry! But thanks to that, I feel totally refreshed!”
“I’m sure glad to hear that.” Halter grumbled as he relaxed his shoulders and straightened his wrinkled clothes.
He pressed the button for first floor again, restarting the stopped elevator. Looking on, Marie let out a low growl of a laugh.
“Very well, you feeble-minded political crooks! Pull on others’ feet as much as you’d like. Taking away even that last privilege of wretched creatures who can’t do anything else would simply be too pitiful, after all!”
“...This is hopeless,” sighed Halter. Marie ignored him and furrowed her eyebrows.
“—Think, Marie. There should be something. Some way to break out of this shitty situation.” She pinched her chin and licked her lips as she mulled the situation over.
The military won’t stop. Meister Guild can no longer be counted on, either. It’s probably impossible to hope for a political resolution at this point. At this point, evacuating the residents would also be impossible. In that case, there’s no option left but to finish the repairs before the city is purged.
Well then, what are the obstacles to that option?
There’s no time. OK. There’s nothing I can do about that at this point.
In that case, let’s think it over: Can I finish the repairs to the city in the eight hours left?
Negative. Realistically speaking, it’s impossible. Then, what if I change the method? As long as the point of malfunction is located, can the repair work itself be finished within the time limit? Affirmative. However, I need a way to put that into practice—a method to promptly locate the point of malfunction.
“Think, Marie. It should be there. There should be some way!”
...Of course, no matter how much she racked her brains, no such method came to mind.
Even though they were a gathering of the most outstanding staff and equipment in the world, they still weren’t magicians.
Some things are impossible. One must acknowledge that—however, but, even so.
“For something to be ‘impossible’ because of those imbeciles’ meddling is utterly unacceptable!”
The elevator arrived at the first floor, and the door slowly opened.
Let’s continue thinking about this in the car, Marie thought as she lifted her head.
Just then—
She saw a face that she very much recognized before her.
“——”
“Say, RyuZU. Is it really fine for us to stay in a place like this?”
“Master Naoto, that flea-sized modesty of yours may be a virtue, but may I suggest that you act with a little more dignity and composure befitting of being my master?”
It was a duo of a short, headphone-wearing boy and a girl with beautiful silver hair.
She had no recollection of the boy. The girl was the problem.
Marie knew the face of that girl well. She had seen that girl’s face many times over since she was a kid. More specifically, it was the face that had slept in her family’s treasure house. Since Marie had become a Meister, she would bring her out to the worksites, and whenever she had spare time, she would challenge herself to fix her and make her move once more.
“A-, A-, Ah...”
“Hm...?”
“Is something the matter, Master Naoto?”
A perplexed face turned toward her.
The stunningly beautiful girl—or rather, automaton, was unmistakably operating.
—YD-01, First Machine of the Initial-Y Series, RyuZU.
Seeing the flabbergasted Marie, the slim hope that could possibly overturn this situation tilted her head, looking puzzled.
●
The lobby on the first floor of Central Hotel had become something like a mall.
There were shops on either side of the entrance; on the right were fine-dining restaurants, and on the left were boutiques and brand-name shops lined up in a row.
In one of those restaurants, having moved to the café lounge from which the hotel’s courtyard could be seen, the first thing out of Marie’s mouth was, “I’ll have you lend me your hand, RyuZU.”
Without reservation towards the automaton sitting opposite her, Marie placed her hands on the table and bent forward boldly. RyuZU looked at Marie with indecipherable golden eyes and a somewhat cold expression
Naoto, who was sitting beside her, raised his hand and asked, “Er, could I ask something really quick? To begin with, who are you?”
“You don’t know who I am?”
Naoto shrugged at Marie’s suspicion.
“Not one bit. Are you someone in show business? I’m not the kind of person who watches TV and the like, so...”
Halter, who was sitting next to Marie, slapped his bald head and laughed. “Show biz, huh? That’s a good one.”
“Halter, is this the time to be fooling around?”
“You say that, but that isn’t actually incorrect, is it? I forget whether it was for Automata Fan or Technical Weekly, but you modeled for the front cover of a magazine several times, didn’t you?”
“That was only because Elder Sister ditched that project, so I was forced to do it instead.”
“Automata Fan? If that’s the case, then I should have seen your face before...” Naoto muttered as he tilted his head. That was a magazine he had unfailingly and devotedly bought every issue of for as long as he could remember, yet he had no recollection whatsoever of the golden-haired girl in front of him.
Naoto shrugged. “Well, I guess there’s no way I could remember all the little details like cover models... So, who are you, then?”
“You keep asking who I am, but who are you supposed to be?” Looking displeased, Marie scowled at Naoto and said, “My name is Marie Bell Breguet. I’m a Meister belonging to Meister Guild. This YD-01 RyuZU is my family’s personal asset, you realize?”
“Personal asset...?”
Naoto threw his head back and yelled in surprise before standing up and saying, “So you guys were the worthless idiots who carelessly dropped a storage unit right above my apartment!”
“S, Storage unit?”
As Marie faltered, flabbergasted, Naoto pressed on with anger showing on his face. “Thanks to you guys, I lost the home and all the tools my late parents left me and became practically penniless. To top off becoming a hobo at sixteen years of age, I met RyuZU and ended up entering into a contract with her you know how are you going to compensate me huh indeed thank you very muchhh!”
The boy of small stature yelled all that out in one breath before lowering his head. Marie looked at him with seeming disgust before turning to Halter. “Halter, is this idiot complaining? Or is he thanking us?”
“Who knows. I think he’s probably doing both.”
“In—any—case! As compensation for the financial losses as well as the mental anguish I suffered, I’m making RyuZU mine! I decided that just now that’s right I’ve decided so leave already you cursed lumps of protein!”
“Stop babbling nonsense, you idiot!” Marie promptly shouted back, huffing violently.
Feeling a headache coming on, she pressed her hand against her throbbing temple as she slowly calmed her breathing before trying to pacify Naoto with a placid voice. “...Listen, okay? I sympathize with your misfortune. The cargo falling off was due to the ineptitude of the airport; still, I’ll apologize in their place as many times as necessary. However, RyuZU is an irreplaceable, precious asset to our family. I firmly request that you return her immediately. The compensation that is properly due to you shall be processed as a priority under my na—”
“No way. I refuse. RyuZU is mine,” Naoto cut Marie off and discarded her proposal childishly.
Marie, whose face had crumbled in disbelief, turned her head and looked at Halter.
“Let’s kill this guy and bury him. That would solve everything.”
However, Halter waved his hand, warning in a low voice, “...Cut it out, princess.”
”What? We’re in an emergency right now. We don’t have time to waste on dealing with an idiot like h—”
“I told you to knock it off, Marie!”
Startled by Halter suddenly raising his voice, Marie shut her mouth.
Immediately afterwards, she realized.
“Wha...?!”
Just when had...?
Rising from underneath the table, two black scythes surrounded Marie’s neck.
RyuZU, who seemed to have unleashed those objects from under her skirt without stirring at all, was reflecting Marie’s stiffened face in her eyes, which were unreadable, as always.
—As someone who had disassembled her body for maintenance before, Marie knew that that was the one and only weapon RyuZU was armed with—and also that it possessed the ability to easily sever alloy-armored military tanks, much less a human, in just an instant.
Sweat immediately started to pour from Marie’s entire body.
The angelic-looking girl looked like she had transformed into a man-eating tiger from the jungle. Marie couldn’t even feel the blades that simply enveloped her neck gently, but she understood that they were literally ready to nip her neck like the fangs of a beast at any moment.
She only had one question—Why was she still alive?
“......Ah-, ah-.”
She couldn’t breathe. Her body wouldn’t move one bit. Even so, she managed to move just her eyeballs to glance at Halter. He was pointing his gun and ready to shoot, a tense expression on his face.
But the muzzle wasn’t aiming at the automaton.
It was turned towards—the petrified boy next to her with his mouth agape.
RyuZU was ready to kill Marie and Halter was ready to kill Naoto—As the two murderous intents intersected, a drop of sweat ran down Halter’s face. He proposed in a tranquil voice, “Alright Miss, let’s calm down, shall we?”
“—At just whom do you think you are pointing that gun?”
Even as he was being stared at viciously by those golden eyes, Halter smiled gently and continued, “Let me apologize for my companion running her mouth. She was entirely in the wrong. Something unpleasant just happened, so she’s feeling a bit hysterical, you see. She wasn’t serious, just a tad irritated. Please excuse her.”
RyuZU whispered softly, “If you don’t even have the intelligence to read between the lines, then let me rephrase. If a patchwork piece of junk like yourself, more inferior than humanity who are themselves lowlier than fleas, thinks it is acceptable to point a toy like that at Master Naoto, then I shall collectively tear both of you to pieces. Are you fine with that?”
Her voice was cold enough to make a demon cower and cry.
Though her eyes were inorganic, her gaze clearly harbored murderous intent.
“I get it, I’ll put my gun down. I wasn’t serious. See, I didn’t even release the safety.” Halter slowly turned his gun around and showed its safety mechanism to RyuZU before discreetly lowering his weapon. “So please, could you not decapitate our princess in kind?”
It seemed like she accepted those words as Halter had hoped, for the black scythes folded up without a sound and returned back under her skirt in an instant. During that entire time as well, RyuZU didn’t stir one bit.
“——Hah... Haah...”
Released from the mechanical murderous intent, Marie flopped onto her seat while rubbing her neck over and over again. Perhaps she couldn’t believe she was still alive, for her emerald eyes seemed somewhat out of focus and their lids were quivering.
“W, What just...”
“Listen here, princess...” Grasping Marie’s shoulder with his hand to calm her down, Halter said, “I’m irritated as well, but these two aren’t involved in our situation yet. Don’t say something thoughtless like that a second time. Otherwise, you really will be bidding farewell to your head.”
Marie angrily glared at him. “Halter! I was almost murdered just now! You know that, right?!”
“Yeah, you were. I’m glad you’re quick to understand.”
“Why can an automaton that isn’t even military-use kill a person?!”
Without hesitating, Halter said something preposterous. “She obviously doesn’t have a code of ethics programmed into her.” He glanced at the automaton, who was putting on a lucid face. “This Miss here hasn’t taken her eyes off you for even one second since the moment you showed malice towards that boy over there. That’s why I kept my guard up against her the whole time. Even so—I couldn’t even react to her speed just now. ...Do you understand what this means?”
“......That’s—”
It meant that even Halter, who had been reinforced with the latest cyborg technologies, didn’t have a fast enough reaction time to make out this automaton’s combat movements. Despite having kept his guard up the whole time, the best he could do was to take a hostage after the fact.
“—To tell you the truth, if she really intended to kill you, I surely wouldn’t have had time to make that boy a hostage.”
In other words, that was simply a warning just now. If RyuZU felt like it, that threat wouldn’t remain just a threat. Marie and Halter would both be shredded into bits and pieces before they could realize what had happened.
And by no means would there be any way for them to defend against that.
Halter waited for that fact to sink into Marie’s head before continuing, “...Understand? First, calm down. After that, forget the fact that she was the Breguet family’s personal asset. Even if it angers you, bear with it. Those are the rules in this situation.”
RyuZU smiled in a carefree manner and said, “I retract my words calling you a less-than-human piece of junk. You appear to be rather perceptive for a human.”
“I’m glad you understand.” Putting both his hands up, Halter said, “We apologize for our rudeness. Still, we want you to hear what we have to say. This is a momentous problem that doesn’t just concern us, but the lives of the twenty million residents of this city.”
After that, Halter explained the situation.
The abnormal fluctuations in gravity occurring here in Kyoto. The dispatch of Meister Guild, which was too rushed no matter how one looked at it, and the conspiracy and motives behind that. The military abandoning all responsibility and planning to conceal the truth, and the design of some in Meister Guild to try to turn that into an opportunity for political gain within the organization. And above all, the hopelessly insufficient time they have to work with—
Naoto, who had finished listening to Halter’s explanation, was left holding his head, speechless.
After a while, he barely managed to get himself together and said, as if gasping, “Wait wait, this city will be purged? Letting the residents die? —Are you saying this with a sober mind?”
“We couldn’t say something like this as a joke.” Marie continued, “I’m sorry to say that it’s all true. The military and a portion of Meister Guild have lost their minds. There are eight hours left—no, seven now, I think? This city will collapse. It’ll be annihilated, without a trace left behind. They’re totally insane, aren’t they.”
“That can’t be... Can’t you do something?”
“...To tell you the truth, we’ve got nothing.”
Marie cast her eyes downward and made fists with her hands as if vexed.
“At any rate, there’s no time. I was divested of my authority, so just to return to the core tower I’d have to break through the military’s obstruction. Moreover, even if I arrive at the site, there are no prospects whatsoever of being able to repair the system in time.”
“That can’t be...”
“It’s especially fatal that we can’t locate the point of malfunction. Our observation squad calculated that it would take two weeks to find it. It goes without saying that we don’t have that kind of time. But...”
Pausing there, Marie turned her face towards RyuZU, whose expression remained wholly unchanged even after hearing of such a hopeless matter, and she hesitantly asked, “If it were you, couldn’t something be done about this situation?”
Keeping silent, RyuZU didn’t answer her.
As if to speak up for her, Naoto interjected. “Hey, wait up, now. From what you’ve said, you guys are a group of Meisters, right? What’s RyuZU supposed to do on her own about something that would take you guys a whole two weeks at full force to accomplish?”
Without answering him, Marie peered into RyuZU’s golden eyes and said, “I know your legend. The Initial-Y Series. The supreme automata that the creator of this Clockwork Planet, the legendary ‘Y,’ left behind. You’re one of them. A mysterious automaton girl that wouldn’t budge a millimeter, even though nothing should have been broken...”
RyuZU gazed back at Marie without a word. Recalling the sensation of having almost been killed not too long ago, Marie stiffened her body and continued as if muttering to herself. “A little more than two hundred years ago, you suddenly stopped functioning. Afterwards, several thousands of clocksmiths, including me, took on the challenge of repairing you, but were left frustrated. Y’s ultimate treasure—the First of the Initial-Y Series. It’s said that he who gathers all the automata of the series will rule the world, will inherit Y’s legacy, but... well, let’s suppose that that’s just idle gossip. In any case, we, the Breguet family, have fragmented information on you as the ones who have had you in our custody.”
RyuZU didn’t reply. Marie licked her dry lips and continued, “The automata of the Initial-Y Series each have their own unique inherent abilities. You, the First, have the ‘Acceleration’ ability—It’s said that you’re an automaton specialized for ultra-high speed movements.”
Naoto’s eyes widened. He had been listening to everything from off to the side.
—I see, if that’s the case, it would explain all the questions I had.
The movements that allowed her to escape the apartment while holding Naoto right after starting up. The ultra-high speed movements that peeled the clothes off the three playboys in an instant, and the action earlier that didn’t allow Halter to even react.
That must undoubtedly be the inherent ability that Marie was talking about.
The high level of functionality she displayed that left even current military aircraft in the dirt would make sense if the great “Y” was her creator—I buy it.
Marie said, “You see, with the limited information I had, I interpreted the existence of you and your sisters thus: As this Clockwork Planet’s—maintenance machines that Y left behind for posterity.”
“I’m right, aren’t I?” Marie asked. She sounded like she was praying.
The Clockwork Planet that reproduced the planet’s mechanisms in their entirety was simply too complicated.
A mere human couldn’t possibly—No, not even a single one of the clocksmiths who had devoted themselves wholeheartedly to their profession in the last one thousand years had caught up to “Y.” None of them could understand the technology he left behind. With all their efforts, humanity had just barely been able to reproduce a portion of the Clockwork Planet through imitation, and even that process wasn’t perfect yet.
—In order for this planet to never perish again after his own death,
Did he not perhaps create his own successors that would neither grow old nor die?
“The children who inherited the now-lost technology of ‘Y.’ The stuff about ‘inheriting Y’s legacy’ was probably derived from that. The fact that you’re operating now when this city is about to collapse is—”
Marie looked at RyuZU with eyes filled with expectation. “The very proof of that.”
“Hoo...!” Halter’s eyes widened in admiration at Marie’s deduction.
Naoto turned towards RyuZU as well, unable to conceal his excitement.
I see. If what Marie’s saying is true, then there would be no doubt that it’s this very silver-haired beauty who will become the angel of salvation for this city facing the imminent danger of collapse.
However.
Having gazes of expectation and admiration from the three of them turned towards her, the legendary automaton in question put on a somewhat out of place expression, as if being the one contrarian to laugh at a joke that fell flat with everyone else, and informed them thus: “—I am clueless as to what you are speaking of. With all due respect, the current situation is gravely perilous—regarding your sanity, that is.”
●
A queer silence befell them.
Marie had frozen solid mid-smile, and Halter was digging into his ears with an indescribable expression on his face. Baffled, Naoto was repeating a sequence going back and forth, comparing RyuZU’s and Marie’s expressions and cocking his head in confusion.
Halter managed to mentally reboot the fastest out of the three of them.
“.........Ah—, excuse me, Miss.” He tilted his neck slightly as he calmly asked, “I want to confirm, just in case; in other words, are you saying that everything the princess here just said is wrong?”
“Yes.” RyuZU faced Halter and nodded. “She looked so exceedingly confident and smug as she graced us with her grand hypothesis that it was terribly difficult to speak up, but—yes, her conjecture was a complete whiff. It is almost comical how it fails to even scratch the truth.”
Marie’s face slammed onto the table. Her body was twitching and trembling while her face remained buried into it. Perhaps she had become unable to bear all the shame.
RyuZU continued dispassionately, “It is true that I was made by the one you call ‘Y’ and that I possess an inherent ability that belongs only to me. That I’m the world’s supreme automaton is, well, a self-evident truth that goes without saying, though.”
Marie’s head flew up, and she opened her mouth as if reciting a prayer. “I, In that case...!”
“However, it is not really my mission to maintain the planet’s mechanisms. I have neither the knowledge and skills necessary nor was I given an order along the lines of, ‘Protect the city.’”
Taking over for Marie, who had stiffened up again, Halter asked, “Then what are you actually here for?”
“—‘The Follower,’” RyuZU uttered, placing her hand on her chest and casting her eyes downward, as if to nonverbally assert that that is the most important thing of all. “That is the categorical imperative etched into me—To serve my master, Master Naoto, at his side and devote all of my being to him. That is my one and only reason for existing.”
Halter kept silent, his face indescribable.
Glancing at Marie, who was on the verge of fainting, RyuZU added, “Also, I would like you not to call my native ability a trivial contrivance like ‘Acceleration.’ Regardless, I don’t have the ability to locate a malfunction, and as for the problem you are facing—frankly, I have no interest in it whatsoever.”
After RyuZU declared that with a very pleasant smile, there was a drawn-out silence.
Marie was looking up at the ceiling while holding her face with both hands, and Halter was hanging his head with an exhausted expression on his face. Seeing a scene before him that could be titled “Despair,” Naoto couldn’t find any words to say, so he simply stayed silent.
When—
“...However, there’s just one person.” RyuZU muttered softly, to which Halter slowly raised his head.
“There’s just one person who may be able to answer your expectations.”
“Who would that be?!”
Marie turned towards RyuZU with a start as she vigorously latched onto the automaton’s words.
With their eyes on her, RyuZU slowly pointed—
At the dumbfounded boy on her left, before casually informing them, “I’m speaking of Master Naoto.”
“—Hah?”
“Huh?”
Being mentioned so abruptly, Naoto pointed at himself in a fluster, looking confused.
RyuZU nodded at him in response, then turned towards Marie and said, “Based on what I have heard from you, I believe that Master Naoto, who was able to repair me, may also be able to save this city.”
“Wait a second—He repaired you?!” Marie yelled out in astonishment. “What are you saying?! You weren’t broken anywhere!”
She was supposed to be the mysterious automaton precisely because she wouldn’t move even though she wasn’t broken.
“That simply means that you all are even more incompetent than Master Naoto.”
“Ah—I was just casually called incompetent as well. That’s fine, I guess...” Naoto grumbled in a small voice.
Ignoring him, Marie spoke up angrily. “I, Incompetent, you say...?! Are you insinuating that the Breguet family, which has continually turned out many hundreds of Meisters generation after generation, is below that chump over there?!”
RyuZU curled her lips as if scoffing.
She continued speaking with a smile that was different from the ones she showed Naoto—one that clearly contained anger.
“—Yes. ‘This chump over here’ corrected the fault in my body that the members of that lofty family of yours failed to even detect despite wringing the knowledge out of in their flea-sized brains as hard as they could for over two hundred years—in three hours.”
Being told this so forwardly caused the gears in Marie’s head to stop turning for a moment.
Looking stupefied, she pointed at Naoto. “...This dumb-looking chump did?”
RyuZU wordlessly held up the hem of her skirt. Marie shook her head in a fluster and cried out, “I, I get it, I take that back! ...No, it’s true that RyuZU is operating... Why was a clocksmith like him hidden in this city...?” Muttering to herself, Marie flopped onto the chair with a thud.
On the other hand, Naoto, the one who had been nominated, was breaking out in a cold sweat. “No, erm—Miss RyuZU? I appreciate your flattery, but you went a little far in suggesting that I’d be able to do something that a hundred great Meisters combined couldn’t mana—”
“You can,” RyuZU asserted. “As the one who was able to repair me, Master Naoto is, without any room for doubt, currently humanity’s greatest clocksmith.”
“No, I’m honored to hear you say that, RyuZU... but—”
—It’s impossible.
There’s no way I could do it. To begin with, I’m a total amateur who isn’t even an apprentice yet, you know?
Words of repudiation immediately surfaced in Naoto’s mind, but he was unable to put his thoughts to words when he saw RyuZU’s all-too-serious face.
He agonized and hesitated, but just when he thought he had something to say and opened his mouth to respond—
“—!!”
The city trembled furiously from a shock of unprecedented scale.