Chapter 35
Chapter 35
I barged straight into the laboratory where Koran Rekias was working.
I had agreed to do Emily a favor, but to be honest, I’m not that good of a person.
I’ll help, sure, but I’m taking payment upfront.
There’s no guarantee that Koran Rekias will survive just because I help him.
Better to take what I can first.
I laid out everything I knew in front of Koran Rekias.
“……So Emily had already figured out that it was me.”
Koran Rekias seemed as though he had already realized that Emily had uncovered his identity.
Emily has the kind of personality where her thoughts are written all over her face, so it wouldn’t have been hard to notice.
Whether she had figured out that he belonged to Ex Machina as well, I didn’t know. But even if she had, it didn’t seem like it would have shocked her much.
“I’ve caused that child unnecessary worry.”
“Have you?”
Despite me exposing everything, Koran Rekias remained calm.
This was different from Emily.
When her identity was revealed, she gave off the impression that she simply didn’t care.
Koran Rekias, on the other hand, looked closer to resignation.
Because of that, all the contingencies I had prepared in case he made a sudden move ended up in the trash.
If things go smoothly, that’s even better.
“Student Johan, what do you plan to do with me now? If you wish to live an ordinary life, it would be best to report my identity to Olga Hermode or the Emperor.”
“That would be the sensible choice.”
Koran Rekias is a criminal.
No matter which side I hand him over to, it’s unlikely he’ll keep his life.
Even if he’s a valuable researcher from Ex Machina, the fact that he made a contract with a demon is a separate matter.
Demons and their contractors have left countless scars throughout human history.
Just being chosen by the Book of Lemegeton is enough to warrant severe punishment.
Making a contract on top of that?
That’s already the end.
If he wants to live, he should have stayed hidden and kept his head down.
But if that were the case, he wouldn’t have gone as far as making a deal with a demon just to set up a scheme targeting Tillis.
He had already staked his life.
“But I’m not that kind of good person. I’ll take care of my own interests first.”
I took out the Phoenix Heart and the Frost Giant’s Blood from my coat.
As the materials kept appearing one after another, Koran Rekias let out a hollow laugh, as if overwhelmed.
“You’ve brought quite a lot.”
“Experiments tend to fail. I brought everything I had.”
If I could resolve the most important part, my own experiment would finally have a path forward.
That’s why I took the risk and came to Koran Rekias in the first place.
“I had a granddaughter. A kind child. She was killed by the Saint. She just happened to get caught up while volunteering in the slums.”
“I’m not interested. I don’t care about the justification for your revenge either. I just want my experiment to succeed.”
“……Now that I look at you, Student Johan, you would have been well suited for Ex Machina.”
“That’s a terrifying thing to say.”
I’m not insane enough to stake my life on an experiment.
I do everything after calculating the risks.
If my life were truly on the line, I would have abandoned the experiment from the start.
Koran Rekias gave a bitter smile and continued.
“I know you’re not interested, but think of it as the ramblings of a man at the end. That child was my son’s pride, and my hope. But do you know how the world saw her death?”
“Not kindly, I assume.”
“They said she must have deserved it. They pointed fingers at her instead.”
As expected.
Tillis’ public image is so perfect that she’s called a Saint.
She doesn’t even bother hiding her true nature, yet people still misunderstand her.
A sacred race, the High Elf.
A beautiful appearance and a gentle voice.
And her supernatural ability, Charm.
So no matter what she does, it’s inevitably perceived in a positive light.
“Student Johan. I am hesitating. Even after coming this far, I cannot take that final step.”
Koran Rekias probably wasn’t a cruel man.
If anything, he was closer to being kind.
The only reason he had been pushed this far was simply bad luck.
The world had been cruel to him.
“Is it right for me to seek revenge?”
His granddaughter died because of Tillis.
But she died because of Tillis, not directly by her hand.
That thought was holding him back.
He was agonizing over whether it was right to kill someone called a Saint over his personal emotions.
“You should. You’ve come too far to talk about good and evil now. Your machines destroyed buildings, and the ones you summoned died in the Cradle. That alone was just luck.”
If Ariel hadn’t been there when the machines went berserk, the damage could have been severe.
If the criminals who entered through the torn walls of the Cradle hadn’t held back, there would have been casualties.
No, there probably would have been.
The students only managed to stop it because they were strong.
That was nothing more than luck.
“Let’s not pretend either of us is clean.”
I’m turning a blind eye to crimes for my own goals,
and Koran Rekias committed terror for revenge.
No matter what reasons you attach to it, a crime is still a crime.
“Haha! You’re bold to a fault. Professor Georg has a fine student.”
Koran Rekias let out a self-deprecating laugh and grabbed the materials I had laid out.
“Then, Student Johan, if I help you, what can you offer me? I trust you didn’t come here thinking I’d be convinced just because you’re willing to look the other way.”
“Of course not. I’m not trying to get something for nothing. If I did, silencing me would be the cheaper option, and I know that.”
That part wasn’t a problem.
The only real concern had been whether Koran Rekias would even agree to talk.
But he accepted it easily, as if resigned, and that alone was enough to pull him into the negotiation.
That was already a success.
“I’ll let you choose the battlefield. If you prepare thoroughly and draw her into your domain, won’t it be much easier?”
“How?”
“It’ll be easier to explain if I tell you something first.”
I made Tillis watch me.
I made her chase me.
I was certain it would happen.
At this point, I was probably the only one who understood her true objective.
“Did you know? In the past, spirits were called something else.”
Saint Tillis.
“They were called Daimon. But at some point, that word changed.”
Koran Rekias wiped his face and continued my sentence.
“……Demon.”
A devil.
An evil spirit.
Isn’t it ridiculous?
People knew nothing.
Tillis was openly summoning and commanding demons, yet everyone wrapped it up nicely and called them spirits.
“And as it happens, I’m not so different from you.”
I showed him the Book of Lemegeton I had been carrying.
The reason Tillis was watching me was because I had been chosen by it.
She had sensed the presence of Mephistopheles and came to the Cradle, but found no actual contractor, leaving her searching.
But now, things had changed.
“You.”
“You are loved by spirits, aren’t you?”
When I met her, I had the Book of Lemegeton on me so she could recognize me.
With how bold I acted, she must have realized that even if I hadn’t made a contract, I was connected to demons.
It must have felt like prey walking right into her hands.
But that’s not important right now.
“Now think about it again.”
I decided to erase the last doubt in Koran Rekias’ mind with the truth.
“Are you sure your granddaughter just got caught up in it by chance?”
Saint Tillis.
On the surface, she’s portrayed as a perfectly good person.
But peel back one layer, and something far more interesting appears.
“Demons always approach with the face of an angel.”
That’s right.
She is one of the final boss candidates of this game, standing alongside the Prophet cult.
The Judge.
The Librarian of Lemegeton.
Ostilis Liberatio.
A being who seeks to save the world through evil.
The deal was struck.
As an advance, I received the combination method for the materials, and in return, I agreed to cooperate with Koran Rekias.
But there was one thing to clarify first.
“You won’t win.”
There’s no way he could defeat her, the Librarian of Lemegeton, as just a member of Ex Machina.
Even if he poured in every possible method, it would be impossible.
That’s why I’m trying to bring Eden into this.
Only then would there be even a slim chance of survival.
And in other words, even with the cult’s cooperation, defeating Tillis would still be impossible.
Even among final boss candidates, the starting point matters.
Tillis is nearly complete, while the cult is still in a growth phase.
“You’ll most likely die.”
“I abandoned my life the moment I chose revenge.”
“So you’re just going to die? If you’re risking your life knowing you probably can’t win, how is that any different from suicide? So let’s aim to come back alive instead.”
“……”
Koran Rekias stared at me for a long moment before speaking.
“Student Johan, I can’t tell whether you’re good or evil.”
“Let’s go with good.”
“Very well.”
“Now that you know I’m a good person, take care of this first. I won’t run off after taking it.”
I pointed again at the materials I had brought.
Nothing else mattered.
As long as he could combine these somehow, that was enough.
I refused to believe that after coming this far, he would say it was impossible.
If he did, everything I had done until now would have been pointless.
Koran Rekias silently looked at the Phoenix Heart and the Frost Giant’s Blood inside their cases, then reached out his hand.
“Student Johan. Do you know what kind of demon I made a contract with?”
“……I have a guess.”
At first, I didn’t know.
Abilities are vague by nature, so without knowing the name, it’s nearly impossible to even speculate.
But as the clues piled up, a name began to form in my mind.
And when I learned he was a researcher from Ex Machina, I became almost certain.
“Demons have their preferences too.”
I’m not worthless, nor am I in such despair that I would sell my soul.
Yet Mephistopheles approached me simply because my soul, which remembers a past life, interested him.
So what kind of demon would take interest in Koran Rekias?
What would fascinate a rigid researcher?
The heat and pressure emitted from massive engines.
Steel gears that don’t deform even under steam.
The supernatural ability to combine materials of different temperatures while preserving both.
“Heat energy… or more precisely, a demon that can control entropy. There’s only one I know.”
One of the four demons of scientific lore.
A being that can manipulate molecular motion to decrease entropy.
“Maxwell’s Demon.”
A demon born from a thought experiment, one that defies the laws of thermodynamics.