[Whatever you do is of no concern to us. It holds no meaning for the military authorities. You are simply required to fill this space. If you die, well, that can't be helped.]
The golem's message was completely unexpected.
I was to do nothing? The Military State, which put not only criminals but even ordinary citizens to work on a whim, was giving me no tasks?
But I knew the State too well to be happy about it. When they acted unexpectedly, you always had to read the true meaning hidden within.
Sensing danger, I was about to ask the golem a question.
With a tremendous crash, the prison's main gate was thrown open as if to break it. Something shot out from within at a ferocious speed. As the figure left the yard, an alarm blared to signal the emergency, and searchlights began to frantically track the escapee.
But it was useless. The runner was so fast that even the searchlights couldn't keep up. The moment the light tried to illuminate its target, she was already gone.
While the searchlights flailed, having lost their target, the girl landed before me like a bolt of lightning. Her sudden appearance left both me and the golem speechless.
And for a moment, the girl snapped her head up, wagged her tail, and barked.
"Woof! Nice to meet you! Nice to meet you!"
Triangular, perked-up ears, a golden tail wagging at her waist. Her large eyes stared intently at me, radiating boundless goodwill. Her lush hair bounced.
A descendant of the sins committed by humans in the distant past—a dog beastkin.
The dog beastkin was crouched on all fours as if she were a real dog, looking up at me from near my feet.
What in the world? I awkwardly raised a hand in greeting.
"Uh… hello?"
"Hello! Hello! Hello!"
The dog beastkin jumped up and down, welcoming me. She had no intention of attacking; even her gestures were friendly. Her reaction was less like a human's and more like that of a well-trained dog.
She was so innocent and friendly that I couldn't even muster the wariness one should feel when meeting a stranger.
That's why it took me a moment to realize.
That it was incredibly strange for her to show such goodwill to a complete stranger like me.
And that I, a mind reader, couldn't properly read this being's thoughts.
"Play! Let's play! Let's play!"
"What? Why would I?"
"Woof! Let's play!"
The dog beastkin slammed her head on the ground, then bit my pant leg and pulled. What the— I thought, trying to pull her off.
Suddenly, I felt a shock as if a rope from a cargo cart had snagged my foot.
My leg, which had been supporting the weight of a grown man, was lifted helplessly. My body toppled over, and the dog beastkin grabbed me and took off at a dead run. My body was dragged along helplessly. Thump, thump. The speed was so immense that my body bounced like a skipping stone. It felt as if a cargo cart was dragging me behind it.
Pain followed a moment later.
"Gyaaaah!"
I had considered that I might suffer some terrible fate in the infamous Tantalus, but I never dreamed I'd be dragged to death out of the blue. And by someone who was supposedly friendly to me, no less!
Trying to grab onto something was useless. A greater force just kept pulling me along. The friction made my clothes grow hot. Droplets of blood welled up and fell from my skin as it scraped against the concrete.
I'm going to die. At this rate, I'm really going to die. I flailed my arms and shouted desperately.
"Wait, hold on!"
"Woof!"
Then, something incredible happened.
The dog beastkin, who had the strength to drag me by her jaw alone, 'waited' as I commanded.
Without a moment's hesitation.
I was dumbfounded.
"Huh? You listen to me?"
Even without the ability to read minds, most people who have lived in this world would know. There are far more people who treat your words as nonsense than those who actually listen to them.
Especially if those words are meant to stop them from doing something.
But when I ordered this girl to wait, she 'waited' without a shred of hesitation. No deliberation, no resistance.
Wait a minute. What is this? Confused, I read the girl's thoughts.
I couldn't read them.
'Wait? Wait! Wait, wait!'
No, to be precise, I could read them and get a general sense of what they meant, but I couldn't understand them clearly. It was like reading a book in another language without a translation. I could only make vague guesses based on the atmosphere and the emotions I felt.
I can't... read her thoughts.
Impossible. Is she not human?
'He said wait,' so 'I wait.' No doubt, no hesitation. Like a pure child... no, the fact that she didn't even question it made her thought process closer to a dog's than a human's. Like a loyal dog obeying its master.
But her appearance was that of a human with a dog's ears and tail, and her strength easily surpassed that of a human.
Wait. If she isn't just some crazy beastkin who believes she's a dog, could this being be...
"The Beast King?"
Long after two-legged humans came to dominate the earth among all the beasts that walk upon it, the Beast Kings took on human form. They wore human bodies and spoke like humans, representing their entire species to voice their opinions to humanity.
But their essence was that of a king of a species. A being that represents, speaks for, and acts on behalf of all beasts.
And among them, the dog beastkin before me was the king who represented all dogs. 'Azzy'.
"You've got to be kidding me. A Beast King is a divine being. Why the hell would they lock something like that in prison?"
And in Tantalus, of all places. Has the Military State finally lost its goddamn mind? I was about to turn and protest to the golem when...
'...I sense the scent of blood.'
A thought came from the depths.
Instantly, every hair on my body stood on end.
The drops of blood from my wound began to tremble. Darkness coiled around me. I couldn't even turn my head, only watch out of the corner of my eye as my blood began to move.
My blood, smeared on the concrete, vibrated violently before rolling away in a single direction. Normally, it would have left a long streak, but the blood that fell in Tantalus ignored even such common sense. As if the concrete floor were made of ice, the blood rolled in perfect droplets like marbles.
With trembling eyes, I followed the movement of the blood droplets. They approached a deep, dark door in the distance and seeped through the crack.
Then, from beyond the door, I felt a dizzying sense of satisfaction. The kind of fulfillment a predator might feel after taking a bite of flesh, quenching its thirst with the life of its prey.
…And the fact that it was my blood filled me with terror.
'...Impure. I have never thought my palate picky, but this blood is utterly inedible.'
She drank it without my permission and now she's complaining it tastes bad. For a prisoner, she's got a picky palate.
But I couldn't voice such a complaint.
After all, I didn't need to be a mind reader to know what being lay beyond that door.
Beyond that door was a vampire. The Queen of Blood, who had lived for a thousand years and would live for eternity as long as she was not killed.
The Progenitor, Tyrkanzyaka.
The most ancient darkness, who had locked herself away in the Abyss simply because she found conflict with humans to be a nuisance.
"Fucking hell…."
A heinous criminal? No matter what heinous criminal you brought here, they couldn't compare to these two. The Dog King was a divine being, and the vampire was a heaven-defying monster that laughed at such gods. Beings an ordinary person would never meet, never dare to look upon.
While I felt a sense of dread at the scale of things, so far beyond my scope… I was also secretly relieved.
Fortunately, those two were either friendly or indifferent to humans. The Dog King showed affection for humans, and the vampire would at least keep me alive to procure blood. As long as I didn't seriously get on their nerves, they probably wouldn't kill me.
Maybe, I could even coax them into becoming my allies….
Just then.
"Fly."
A hard, sharp, yet beautiful voice rang out. It was a voice so beautiful that any passerby would turn their head, but all I could feel from it was cold hostility and a killing intent honed like a blade.
The moment I read that, I scrambled away from the golem. An instant later.
"Chun-aeng."
A fissure appeared in space.
In this land of only light and dark, space itself seemed to be carved out as light and darkness distorted. A diagonal fault line formed in the blackness. Sparks erupted from the sundered air, and lightning struck in the dark Abyss. An invisible blade sliced the golem cleanly in half.
The golem's light died in an instant. The essence of its magitech, its precisely engineered mechanisms, its circuits, and its mana—all of it.
Split in two by a single slash.
Half of the golem slowly slid and fell to the ground. With a simple crackle, its body crumbled.
The cut was so clean it was like looking at a cross-section. So perfect that it seemed it would function again if you just put the pieces back together.
But the golem's crystal orb never regained its light. The remote-controlled golem had ceased to function. A static noise came from the microphone before it cut out with a click.
Instead, a beautiful voice, sharp as a blade, was heard.
"There was still a spare golem left? Like cockroaches, so persistent. Don't tell me there are more."
A girl with short black hair and loose-fitting pants walked slowly forward. She snatched a transparent, shimmering sword from the air and glared at the golem as if looking at a mortal enemy.
Her eyes, which had lingered on the golem for a moment, soon turned to me.
"Alright, now then… who are you?"
My instincts screamed a warning. They shrieked that if I didn't do something right now, I would die.
I reflexively used my mind-reading ability to read her. In as much detail as possible.
She wasn't special at all.
An extra who grew up in an ordinary orphanage, lived in the back alleys, and died after suffering from crime, disease, and violence—so common she wasn't even worth a story.
She learned the sword for a bit before a rogue swordsman cut off her head, and she learned magic for a bit before a mercenary mage burned her entire body to a crisp. An ordinary person who lacked the talent to achieve greatness no matter what she did, who lacked the ability to turn an opportunity into success.
The only difference was that her opportunities were infinite.
…Huh? What the hell is this? Did I read that right? I don't get it.
In five of her deaths, she had wielded a sword, and she had gained the skill to cross blades with a Sword Saint.
In seven other deaths, she had directly and indirectly been taught magic, and she had obtained the mana to stand against the Mage King.
Of course, that only meant she'd earned the right to stand before them; if she fought them head-on, she'd be crushed.
But even that wasn't the end of it.
"Answer me."
The girl retrieved the treasured sword, Chun-aeng. A legendary blade that could only be obtained from the highest mountain. A sword that resembled the sky, impossible to acquire without knowing the future, hummed with a low woong. She raised Chun-aeng again and pointed it at me.
The one who has crossed thirteen deaths, repeating an infinite number of attempts to stop the world from ending.
The Regressor, Shei, looked at me with her sword raised.
"If you don't answer… I'll kill you."
To become stronger. To stop the world's destruction. To end her regressions and find eternal rest.
The Regressor who had wandered in search of opportunity and arrived in the Abyss.
She was seriously weighing my life. Whether to kill me or let me live. Which choice was the right one to lead 'this cycle'.
If I didn't meet her standards, she intended to kill me and eliminate the 'variable'.
"…Ha."
One could run at a speed even searchlights couldn't track.
One could exert control over blood from hundreds of meters away.
One was a monster who could smash a military-grade magic golem used in war in a single blow.
But I was actually relieved. I waved both hands in a friendly greeting.
"A pleasure to meet you all!"
Yes. The ones left here are unbelievably strong. They could probably slaughter ten thousand petty criminals like me in seconds. They were more than capable of it.
But hey, when have I ever survived by being strong?
The back alleys where I lived for over a decade. Even in those narrow alleys, there were plenty of people stronger than me.
But in the end, I was the one who survived.
The man with the monstrous strength to shatter rocks with his bare hands had his head lopped off by a swordsman who could cut through steel. That swordsman was caught in a trap set by a wandering mage and burned alive. The mage, who had been demanding his payment, drank a poisoned beverage and melted into a puddle of blood.
Only I, the one who could read thoughts, managed to stay on the swordsman's good side, go around the mage's trap, and pick out the poisoned cup to save my own skin.
It's the same here.
No matter how monstrous they are, as long as I can read their thoughts.
If I can get on the good side of these absolute beings, avoid the sore spots in their hearts, and build enough of a rapport...
Why would they kill me? No, why would I die?
I've lived my whole life as a back-alley swindler. When it comes to getting on people's good side and grabbing their attention, there's no one better than me.
I spread my arms wide and shouted at the top of my lungs.