Chapter 363: The King Who Kills Others, The God Who Kills Himself - 17
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 363: The King Who Kills Others, The God Who Kills Himself - 17
I explained the whole situation to the Regressor and Tyr. How I had tried to persuade the Golden Lord, only for his rage to be directed elsewhere. How Peru had stepped in to stop him from killing all the Dholes.
I braced myself, fully expecting to be grabbed by the collar again, but to my surprise, the Regressor simply nodded in understanding.
“Well, that can happen.”
“Huh? It can happen?”
“Things don’t always go as planned. Especially with an unknown entity like the Golden Lord.”
I’ve messed things up completely by meddling before, too. I once tried to stop the Military State by borrowing the Sanctum’s power, branding the State as an axis of evil, and ended up planting the seeds of a world war.
This is strange. I didn’t feel anything when Peru or Hilde criticized me, but the Regressor’s empathy makes me feel like I’ve done something terribly wrong. Is she saying I’m on her level? No way. I’m more normally sane than she is! I have to be!
Letting out a sigh, the Regressor magnanimously defended me.
“In any case, you did well. You stopped a war, at least.”
“But because of me, the Fallen Dominion is about to be destroyed.”
“It’s not like you’re the one destroying it. The Golden Lord is, right? There’s no reason to blame you.”
If he could control the Golden Lord at will, that would be even stranger. That’s something only the King of Sins could do. Anyway, it’s now certain that this Hughes fellow has the ability to communicate with the Arcane… He said he was from the Military State, but could his parents be exiled princes from the Empire? Well, his origins don’t really matter.
What’s with her? This is so out of character. It just makes me feel like scum.
Having grasped the situation, the Regressor immediately rose to her feet.
“Alright. Let’s go, then.”
“Huh? Go where?”
“To stop the Golden Lord, of course. We can’t just let the Fallen Dominion be destroyed, can we?”
The Regressor said it as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. Of course, it wasn’t. Hilde asked again, unable to believe her ears.
“Setting aside why the Fallen Dominion shouldn’t be destroyed, how exactly do you plan on stopping the Golden Lord?”
“We’ll have to see when we get there. We can’t stop him on our own, but we might be able to with the Witherarch.”
“Peru didn’t even help ‘us,’ did she? After that blatant disrespect, do we really need to risk our lives to stop the Golden Lord for her?”
“We can’t just leave them be, can we?”
“Yes, we can! Why would you get involved with that thing!”
Ignoring Hilde, who was practically hopping with frustration, the Regressor began to stretch, clearly intending to leave.
After a moment to collect ourselves and decide on a general course of action, the Regressor sheathed Chun-aeng and Jizan and looked around.
“Let’s go. As for directions…”
Her eyes scanned the surroundings and fell upon a grand road that began in the middle of the cornfield. She muttered to herself.
“Looks like we won’t need any.”
It wasn’t hard to find the Golden Lord’s trail. A straight path stretched out from the middle of the cornfield—a road he had forged as he walked.
Hilde borrowed (or so she claimed) a cart from a nearby Dhole. It was a simple cargo wagon with wheels and a frame, but it was enough. We attached a sail, and when the Regressor summoned a wind with Chun-aeng, the force was converted directly into speed, pushing the cart forward.
The road the Golden Lord created had no curves, and the power of Chun-aeng overcame air resistance. Speeding out of the cornfield, we spotted the Golden Lord in the far distance, entering a city.
And then, we were all struck speechless.
“R-Run away!”
“Gods…!”
How could one even describe that sight?
The Golden Lord was… yes, he was like a cleaning rag. Not in the sense that he was dirty, but in the sense that he wiped away filth to reveal the scene hidden beneath.
Dholes were staying in the city next to the cornfield. Knowing they would one day leave, they hadn’t treated the city with care. They had ripped out and sold every lock on the windows and hinge on the doors, thrown their trash anywhere they pleased, and knocked down walls and pillars to secure their own space. The city was vibrant, yet filthy.
And the Golden Lord was wiping away that filth as he passed.
With every step he took, the grime of the Fallen Dominion was scoured away. The brilliant Golden Empire, hidden beneath a layer of filth, regained its color. Scattered debris rose up and reformed into bustling streets.
A 500-meter radius was instantly blanketed by the Golden Empire. The Golden Lord was a giant, 500-meter-wide cleaning tool made exclusively for a nation.
“Ugh, ahhh…”
…One that also eliminated humans.
I could see people being crushed. Parts of the Dholes’ bodies were filled with the crops the Golden Lord had created. These were high-quality alchemical materials, and the moment they entered his sphere of influence, they could be deconstructed and used as ingredients.
Until now, the Golden Lord hadn’t actively harvested them. Dominarch Hector had prevented him from getting close, but the Golden Lord himself hadn’t shown much interest in them either.
But now was different. The Golden Lord was attacking the Dholes indiscriminately.
The city moved. Fleeing Dholes froze as their paths were blocked. While they were delayed, the Golden Lord’s homunculi attacked them without mercy.
There was no escape from the Primarch’s homunculi. The Dholes were crushed, city and all, by their overwhelming power. And yet, through it all, the city was restored to a state even cleaner than its original form, because the Golden Lord was restoring it more beautifully, with the exclusion of humans.
“Everyone! This way! Get to a vehicle as fast as you can!”
Dominarch Hector shouted, his voice amplified by a wide sheet of metal. The Dholes fled, using their greatest strength—mobility—to its fullest. There were casualties, but many were still alive.
Perhaps that displeased him. The Golden Lord made his next move.
The city bucked as if it were alive.
A Dhole running on his own two feet felt a strange sensation. He was confident in his speed, but his legs grew heavier and heavier, and his heart pounded as if it would burst. At first, he thought it was just fear and quickened his pace.
But the moment he fell, he realized the fatigue in his body was not just in his head.
Like slipping on a steep incline, his body scraped against the ground as it slid downward. He clawed at the stone pavement with his broken nails and muttered.
“The city… is… tilting…”
With those words, he ‘fell’ toward the Golden Lord.
This city was the Golden Lord’s creation. To deal with the insects hiding within it, he used a very simple method.
He ‘folded’ the city.
It was like a giant clam shutting its maw. The streets, now steep inclines, became slides, and the Dholes who hadn’t escaped in time tumbled down. Many managed to brace themselves by kicking off walls, but a few unlucky ones crashed into something and died before they could. Others rolled all the way to the Golden Lord and were instantly ‘resonated.’
A good number were still alive, but it was only a matter of time. When the city closed completely, they would have to choose one of two deaths.
Fall, or be resonated.
The terror-stricken Dholes screamed.
“Help! I’ll give you all the money I have!”
“Please, save me! Anyone, please, get me out of here!”
No matter how much they cried, there was no way to save them. Even if one could be saved, what Dhole would risk their own life to do so?
The Dholes who had barely escaped the city, or had been lucky enough to be outside, put even more distance between themselves and the chaos, fearing they would be caught in the aftermath.
Just then.
The city stopped.
At the same time, a lone figure charged into the city, against the flow of escapees. It was Peru, riding Aurea. As she approached, the folding city shuddered to a halt as if caught on something.
Her ability wasn't very effective on living creatures, especially beasts like Aurea with their powerful Qi. Atop the snorting, charging Aurea, Peru mapped out the city’s structure in her head.
…The city’s foundation has been turned to steel. The power source? Twisted iron?
Iron has restorative force. If you grab both ends of a rebar and twist it like a pretzel, it will generate a powerful force as it tries to return to its original shape.
The Golden Lord had alchemized ‘twisted iron’ from the start, using it as the power source to move the city.
Witherarch Peru was also a master of alchemy. Though she couldn’t create it herself, just by looking, she could roughly decipher the Golden Lord’s design.
…In that case, the power source.
She would disintegrate it.
The restorative force of steel vanishes if its structure collapses. Peru’s power couldn’t create something from nothing, but it could make something that already existed disappear.
She had saved this power, not using it until now, but this was the time. Peru reached out with her mind.
Metal objects can be melted down and reused. Such recycled items, when they grow old and worn, are polished and melted down to be reborn as something new. Alchemy is the same. As long as the cost is met, it can be repaired and reused again and again.
Peru was born to poor Dholes, and recycling a single item dozens of times was a part of her daily life. Her treasured tin doll had once been the spoke of a wheel, and before that, a crowbar, and it had gone through dozens of transformations since.
If so.
How many more times could it change?
A childlike curiosity guided her. Peru applied the alchemy she had learned using her precious doll as a subject.
Transform. Revert. Change the material. Turn it back to tin. Move it. Pose it.
Peru loved her doll, and she loved alchemy. She held onto that one toy until she was grown, playing with it with great affection. Because it was precious, she spent even more time with it.
But both the doll and alchemy have an end. Just as humans who fill their bodies with things from the outside continue to age, the doll, continuously exposed to the magic that changed it, one day came to an end.
It no longer responded to alchemy, and its body crumbled, unable to support its own weight. The tin, full of impurities, became mottled with colors, as if it had rusted.
No matter how hard she tried to restore it. No matter how she gathered the crumbs to reform its shape.
It only hastened the doll’s end.
At one point, the doll was completely finished.
The end. Someday, everything ends. Alchemy is perfect, but the humans who wield it are not.
No matter how grand and wondrous magic may be, as long as the humans who use it have limits, alchemy too must face its limits.
Her Unique Magic was the endless repetition of alchemy. The end that an object, repeatedly alchemized in a closed world, could reach. If alchemy was a journey given to an object, her ability was the final destination.
Unique Magic, Finality of Gold.
.
..
...
Crrraaaack.
The rusted iron split apart. The weakened structure could not withstand the twisting force. It collapsed under its own power, shattering like glass.
The city’s grip weakened. The closing clam went limp as if its strength had given out. Rumble. The folding city unfolded once more. Those who were about to fall into the Golden Lord’s maw instead fell to the opposite side. Their lives saved by a better fall, they ran for their lives out of the city.
The walls that blocked their path, the pillars that supported them—the moment they were touched by Peru’s ability, they crumbled like sandcastles, clearing the way. Thanks to her, the Dholes poured out like a flood. Even the homunculi couldn’t give chase, lest they be caught in Peru’s power.
The harbinger of an all-collapsing end rode alone toward the Golden Lord.
Even the Golden Lord could not ignore it. From the end of the path he had forged from Wither, the Golden Lord glared at Peru.