"Doesn't it feel hopeless?"
Wang Hu's tone carried a strange nuance, completely unlike his usual manner of speaking.
"I—" Kira hung his head low, his ears filled with the demonic whispers of the elder brother he once knew.
"Why is this world so utterly hopeless?"
Swept into this emotional tide, Kira's thoughts spiraled into a maze with no exit.
"The conflict between PLANT and the Earth Sphere—it's not so different from fighting over Flay. The underlying logic is similar, only far more intense."
"As a Coordinator, you understand this well, don't you? The difference between you and Naturals."
"A body stronger than others. A face more refined than others. A mind sharper than others."
"Look—isn't this the perfect human? The most primal dream of mankind?"
"And all it took was a simple procedure before your birth, letting you win everything from the starting line!"
One sentence after another, Wang Hu laid out every advantage Kira possessed—before suddenly twisting his words into a crushing blow.
"The only cost was the money your parents spent before you were even born."
"Fair?"
"...No."
As much as he didn't want to admit it, Kira couldn't deny the ironclad truth in Wang Hu's words.
With everything laid bare before him, Kira—being a kind-hearted person by nature—couldn't bring himself to lie.
"Yes. How blatantly you expose this injustice to the world. Before Coordinators existed, the masses could still numb themselves with the Pacifier Effect."
"Clutching at unrealistic fantasies, dreaming that if they worked hard enough, they too could one day rise from rags to riches."
"But then you appeared. You might as well have declared to the entire world: From this day forward, the children of the wealthy will remain wealthy, and the children of the poor will remain poor."
"Is there anything more despair-inducing than that? Social stratification will solidify. The path to upward mobility will be completely blocked."
"The world will split in two—half heaven, half hell. And those in hell will never climb out of that abyss."
"No... That can't be. It shouldn't be like this." Kira clutched his head, his pupils dilating and contracting violently.
How he wished he weren't a Coordinator. Then the intelligence granted by his enhancements wouldn't allow him to foresee such an apocalyptic future.
"Furthermore, the world's contradictions have reached a tipping point. Influenced by market forces and global cycles..."
"The capital within the Earth Sphere desperately needs a new growth driver. Otherwise, the only way to alleviate the coming economic depression..."
"Will be through bloodshed. Or a slow, collective march toward death."
"PLANT is the world's chosen solution. Don't underestimate those seemingly pig-brained Union elites."
"Stupidity is just the face they show others. If you really think they're pigs, then you're the one who'll end up slaughtered."
"But the Earth Sphere has invested manpower and resources to set the stage, hoping this platform will ease their conflicts and expand the pie for everyone."
"Let everyone around this table at least have enough to eat, if not eat well."
"Then the Coordinators came waving their flags, saying they had nowhere else to go, begging for just a small piece of cake to fill their stomachs."
"Out of humanitarian spirit and considering their modest request, the masters granted the Coordinators' plea, giving them a slice of cake."
"But the Coordinators, who in principle should only have received a small piece, once seated at the table tried to take the entire cake for themselves, leaving others to starve."
Staring at Kira, who was on the verge of breaking down, Wang Hu judged the moment right and handed him the knife.
"Willing?"
"Unwilling." Kira murmured with hollow eyes, as if clutching at his last lifeline.
"The Junius Seven tragedy."
"That was the Atlantic Federation's doing. It had nothing to do with us in East Asia, nor even with the Eurasian Federation."
Wang Hu had anticipated this point and naturally countered with words Kira couldn't refute.
"Every grievance has its perpetrator. If PLANT wants revenge, they should go after the Atlantic Federation, go after the radical group Blue Cosmos."
"If PLANT had chosen to bring this matter to the joint conference for discussion,"
"Even as adversaries of PLANT, neither East Asia nor the Eurasian Federation could have shielded the Atlantic Federation."
"But PLANT chose the most intolerable method—punishing innocent civilians who had nothing to do with it."
"Because ZAFT indiscriminately deployed Neutron Jammers across the Earth Sphere, our country has faced countless problems due to energy shortages."
"It's almost like 'white bones lie exposed in the wild, not a cock's crow for miles, of a hundred people barely one survives, the thought of it breaks the heart.'"
"Of course, that's a bit of an exaggeration."
Here, Wang Hu seemed to lighten the mood with what might barely pass as a joke.
Just as a faint glimmer of light appeared in Kira's eyes, Wang Hu swiftly extinguished that delicate spark.
"243,721 people—that's the number PLANT has tallied for the lives lost in the Junius Seven tragedy."
"And this number is repeatedly brought up by PLANT, over and over, as if to prove that every person in the Earth Sphere owes the Coordinators an endless debt of blood and tears."
"But regarding the impact of the Neutron Jammers on the Earth Sphere—regrettably, PLANT remains completely silent."
"By the way, Kira, do you know how many people in the Earth Sphere have died because of ZAFT's attacks?"
"I... I don't know."
Kira opened his mouth, trying to come up with a number, but no matter how hard he racked his brain, he couldn't find an accurate answer.
"Haven't heard much about it, right?" Wang Hu shrugged, feigning nonchalance. "Do you think that because no numbers have been announced, it's not such a big deal?"
"Maybe... maybe so?"
Kira haltingly spoke words he himself barely believed.
"The answer is—it can't be tallied. There's no way to calculate it accurately."
"Compared to Junius Seven, the Earth Sphere is far, far too vast. Because of ZAFT's attacks, even now, we haven't accounted for all the civilian casualties."
"Even if it's uncovered, it might be sealed in classified archives, not to be released until a hundred years later."
"Otherwise, the estimated blood debt of one billion people would set the world ablaze, turning the current war into a genocidal massacre."
Using his finger dipped in beverage, Wang Hu drew a long string of zeros on the table.
"Accidents, fires, water shortages, power outages, food scarcity—these problems have left even East Asia, the best-prepared among the three major powers, scrambling to cope."
"Eurasia and the Atlantic Federation are even worse off. If their domestic situations weren't so dire, ZAFT wouldn't stand a chance against the Allied Forces."
"I—" Kira's eyes went completely hollow, the brutal reality of things he'd never considered now laid bare before him.
The endless string of zeros Wang Hu had drawn on the table seemed like vengeful spirits demanding lives.
They wailed, they cursed—the resentment born from countless innocent lives now crawling toward all Coordinators.
"No! Not me, I didn't do it!"
Kira suddenly stood up, overturning the table. Drops of spilled beverage dripped from his hair and clothes.
The cold liquid stung his skin, feeling no different than the grasp of death itself!
(End of Chapter)