Johanna's eyes widened at my words. I offered a bitter smile. After a long moment of deep thought and silence, Johanna slowly raised her head.
“I have work to do here.”
"It's not possible here, Johanna. Retaliation in kind won't end things. Those in power who fill their own pockets with war still live in luxury, and even when civilian casualties are inflicted, they simply assume their troops and taxpayers have been reduced."
“But even if it’s a retaliatory bombing, we can prevent this disaster from happening again.”
“It’s just a waste that consumes the life of the nation, but it doesn’t eliminate the root cause.”
“I can’t forgive Frogen for killing everyone. That’s the only revenge I can take.”
Johanna's cerulean eyes were tinged with hatred. I took a dry breath, waiting for her anger to fully inflame before opening my mouth.
"I've tried many things. I've pretended not to know, I've retaliated against the target, and I've even used my capital to inflict financial damage. At least, I didn't want to give up my humanity, so I've chosen to avoid sacrificing lives as much as possible. But, unfortunately, I've always lost the same."
“...”
“If you don’t completely eliminate the cause, it will just keep repeating itself like a pendulum that never stops.”
“Is it possible to take him there?”
"No, that's my plan. I intend to stop the war by controlling the countries that cause it."
“If you’re talking about Frogen and Lenin... is there any reason Captain Rotsilt should leave this place?”
I closed my eyes tightly. Until now, I'd never hoped to stop a war by dropping atomic bombs on other countries. It would eventually be developed, but it was too early. I knew we would never escape its effects. But I also knew that violence could be suppressed with greater violence. That's how war ended in my world.
"To prevent greater sacrifices. And Medea is just like them."
“Of course not. The Queen is a just and peace-loving person.”
"Is it justice to grant the legitimacy of peace to a goal no different from theirs? Medea, who pretends to recognize rights under the guise of an ideal symbiotic relationship, then transforms it into interference, domination, and colonization, is no different from a war criminal nation. It's hypocrisy with the same goal."
Medea used the method of recapturing colonies that had been brutally trampled by the great powers. They even made weaker nations, intimidated by the might of the great powers, into protectorates, no different from colonies. This, too, was a subtle form of invasion. It differed only in the method from coercive and violent invasion. Johanna's eyes widened at my words, then narrowed.
"Medea saved our people. We weren't exploited or dominated. Providing her with knowledge and cooperation was purely our will to repay a favor."
She took it as a sharp insult to her benefactor and retorted with a voice visibly displeased. It's a matter of how much you know. Johanna is unaware of Medea's close relationship with the powerful and the selfish, and the fact that the seemingly altruistic and benevolent Queen is actually a calculating businesswoman.
"What did Medea do while the Kingdom of Eiland was invaded and millions of Esat people were killed? Isn't it strange that she only saved the intellectuals, scholars, and skilled workers of Eiland, not the nobility or the capitalist class? And even that was led by the Rotsilts and Fords."
Medea was a nation of equal strength to the Frogen. A true leader who championed peace should have formed an alliance and declared war on the Frogen to stop this inhumane genocide. I looked straight at Johanna and continued speaking stiffly.
"In that situation, the two countries maintained a strategic cooperative relationship. Only after everyone was dead and only a few remained did they belatedly warn the people to stop the massacre. Isn't that contradictory? Medea turned a blind eye to the terrible tragedy of her people. It was for the sake of preparing for future war reparations and for a provocative justification that would sway international opinion in their favor."
And yet, under the pretext of "saving us and giving us a place to live," they passed on their knowledge and exploited their technological prowess, forcing most of the Esatians into the Cynthia Empire's industrial complex like machine parts. I've never seen an Esatian who fully established themselves in Medea and entered society. And yet, they tried to assign an Esatian the task of dropping nuclear weapons. They tried to pass off the sin of taking countless lives as a noble judgment. It's a despicable act of seeking only profit without getting their hands dirty. A country of gentlemen? A country of obsessive-compulsive hypocrites.
“Her Majesty Queen Grace... how could that be?”
Johanna's shoulders trembled as she was completely soaked by the truth pouring down mercilessly like a downpour. But she didn't refute me further, as if my words had some merit. I was determined to make her understand.
"The Queen values the royal family's reputation more than the lives of others. To protect her own position, she attempted to place a fake, Erita, on the throne instead of me, her illegitimate child. Now, she's sending my former husband, Noah, to war to kill him. To ensure I become the perfect successor."
Johanna shook her head in disbelief.
"She's your biological mother, isn't she? Status is more important than blood ties. And besides, you're her lost child..."
I recalled the Queen's efforts to conceal Erita's crimes and smuggle her out of the country. When I brought up the fact that the starving prisoners had mutilated Erita's body as a casual aside, she simply looked at me with her cold, abandoned green eyes and said nothing.
“What a truly terrible story.”
Her voice and gaze were the same as Janet's, as she recounted Celine's gruesome death. I spoke to Johanna, wiggling my fingers on the armrest of the sofa.
"I thought so too. Her attitude toward Erita, who wasn't her biological daughter, was emotional and maternal, but it wasn't like that for me. She and I are just strangers."
“I’m sorry I couldn’t understand how much you must have suffered, Princess.”
Johanna looked genuinely apologetic. "Why are you apologizing to me?" I pursed my lips and sat up straight.
"Isn't it a good thing? Since there's no such thing as family bonds, I can overthrow the current Queen without hesitation at any time."
I showed my decision with a smile. It didn't matter if Johanna told me this. The wise Queen would have already considered this. She probably hoped that, burdened by an insurmountable authority, I would eventually harbor ambition. That's why she subjected me to such trials and pushed me so hard. Burning with vengeance, I would do anything to seize the throne as the next Queen. That's what Queen Grace II is after.
“I plan to become a predator, eat everything, and become the top of the food chain.”
Johanna, who had been hesitating and silent for a while, slowly raised her head and looked at me. Her small lower jaw trembled as she spoke the words she was afraid to say.
“Depending on the situation, are you even considering treason?”
The Queen, to whom I am subordinate only by blood ties, was also one of the causes of my unhappiness. She views my precious person as a nuisance and seeks to kill and destroy him. I've been drowning in a sea of despair for quite some time. When drowning, we instinctively grasp onto something else to survive, even if it's a person. Perhaps it's human nature to kill rather than die. The thought of it makes me sad.
"I just don't want to lose what I have. Wishing for peace or helping the world are just empty words. I just have to live. If I lose more, I feel like I'll lose myself too."
I remembered the beautiful, silver-haired man who had whispered sweet nothings, promising to remove all my distractions. I wanted to free my suppressed instincts, tamed and coaxed. I wanted to kill all the causes of unhappiness, to prevent unwanted outcomes from ever occurring. I'd never made such a decision. As a modern man, having only been here for two years, it was terrifying. So, I had no choice but to take the long, difficult path, escaping from such a simple and easy answer.
"Noah already knew the answer. He was just waiting for me to wake up to reality and make a choice, to admit that this world was wrong."
Unlike me, who could only understand a part of this world after experiencing it firsthand, he had a profound understanding of its structure and providence. My mind began to dizzy, and then a burst of ecstatic laughter erupted uncontrollably. It was a strange laugh, a harsh scrape of vocal cords damaged by toxic gas and smoke. Johanna looked at me with a pale face. She might think I was crazy, but I didn't care. Who wouldn't go crazy at this point?
“Princess... Are you going to do this even though you know it is against humanity?”
“In the end, it can’t be helped.”
Johanna's hand gripped mine tightly, as if desperately holding on to someone about to throw themselves off a cliff. Her lips, with their straight blue eyes, moved silently, as if trying to say something. I knew what it was going to be, so I stared at her with a smile on my face.
"You became a fighter pilot to avoid repeating that tragedy? You, too, wanted to kill someone to make room for them. The reason you can't forgive the Frogens is that they took your place."
I was not respectful to her.
It was a rude accusation, poking at jer wounds and stabbing her in the eye, but she gently stroked the back of my hand with a kind face.
"Princess, my mother died shortly after giving birth to me, suffering from the aftereffects of torture at Frogen. I heard she was subjected to horrific medical experiments. Furthermore, Frogen has even put a bounty on the Esatians. They view us as pests, experimental animals, or prey."
Lukewarm tears were trickling down the back of my hand. Tears flowed ceaselessly down Johanna's cheeks.
"You're right, Princess. As an Esatian, I have no place to stand. I used to say it was a judgment for my people, but... the truth is, it was a choice I made to protect my one and only father and to be loved by him. I wanted to be recognized and gain the right to live a human life, even if it meant killing someone else."
I listened to her silently. Johanna asked, rubbing her eyes with her sleeve.
"Where does unhappiness come from? I've always wondered."
“The cause of all misfortune, the starting point of all despair...”
As I was quietly humming, something snapped in my head. The objects before my eyes began to blur. Misfortune always follows human life: hurting each other, separation, hatred, and discrimination. I, too, was the cause of Noah's misfortune. I spoke of cause and effect in a voice devoid of emotion.
"Birth is the cause, and death is the result. To live is to strive to delay the consequences as long as possible."
The roar of fighter jets and bombs from the Loganfield raid echoed, accompanied by a sharp headache. It was a memory that occasionally resurfaced involuntarily. A fierce, unpleasant fire raged within me. Barbara's hand was clearly visible beneath the charred remains. The sensation of holding Noah's bandaged hand was vivid. The moment memory and sensation overlapped, a suppressed anxiety surged through me, piercing my entire body from the inside out. I hugged myself with both arms, enduring the pain. Then I quietly muttered.
"I don't have a choice. I can't run away anymore. So take him and run away instead of me."
I was left with the terrible choice of killing everyone and keeping only those I wanted. I finally understood the thoughts of Noah Rotsilt, a man whose thoughts were so strangely disjointed and incomprehensible, who had once wished we were the only two people left in the world.
“I will do it. A contradictory ruler who subdues with force and power, while talking about peace.”
Successfully developed and possessed the atomic bomb, but left it as a warning to maintain international order and peace. Ultimately, subdue them with a devastating slaughter, and quell their despair with fear and awe. To achieve this, ascend to the throne of Medea and become a world power, leading the international order. I have been desperately trying to escape this choice. I handed Johanna a letter to be given to Noah.
“And tell him never to come back. I abandoned him to become the monarch.”
To do that, I had to break up with a man named Noah Rotsilt forever.
“I have work to do here.”
"It's not possible here, Johanna. Retaliation in kind won't end things. Those in power who fill their own pockets with war still live in luxury, and even when civilian casualties are inflicted, they simply assume their troops and taxpayers have been reduced."
“But even if it’s a retaliatory bombing, we can prevent this disaster from happening again.”
“It’s just a waste that consumes the life of the nation, but it doesn’t eliminate the root cause.”
“I can’t forgive Frogen for killing everyone. That’s the only revenge I can take.”
Johanna's cerulean eyes were tinged with hatred. I took a dry breath, waiting for her anger to fully inflame before opening my mouth.
"I've tried many things. I've pretended not to know, I've retaliated against the target, and I've even used my capital to inflict financial damage. At least, I didn't want to give up my humanity, so I've chosen to avoid sacrificing lives as much as possible. But, unfortunately, I've always lost the same."
“...”
“If you don’t completely eliminate the cause, it will just keep repeating itself like a pendulum that never stops.”
“Is it possible to take him there?”
"No, that's my plan. I intend to stop the war by controlling the countries that cause it."
“If you’re talking about Frogen and Lenin... is there any reason Captain Rotsilt should leave this place?”
I closed my eyes tightly. Until now, I'd never hoped to stop a war by dropping atomic bombs on other countries. It would eventually be developed, but it was too early. I knew we would never escape its effects. But I also knew that violence could be suppressed with greater violence. That's how war ended in my world.
"To prevent greater sacrifices. And Medea is just like them."
“Of course not. The Queen is a just and peace-loving person.”
"Is it justice to grant the legitimacy of peace to a goal no different from theirs? Medea, who pretends to recognize rights under the guise of an ideal symbiotic relationship, then transforms it into interference, domination, and colonization, is no different from a war criminal nation. It's hypocrisy with the same goal."
Medea used the method of recapturing colonies that had been brutally trampled by the great powers. They even made weaker nations, intimidated by the might of the great powers, into protectorates, no different from colonies. This, too, was a subtle form of invasion. It differed only in the method from coercive and violent invasion. Johanna's eyes widened at my words, then narrowed.
"Medea saved our people. We weren't exploited or dominated. Providing her with knowledge and cooperation was purely our will to repay a favor."
She took it as a sharp insult to her benefactor and retorted with a voice visibly displeased. It's a matter of how much you know. Johanna is unaware of Medea's close relationship with the powerful and the selfish, and the fact that the seemingly altruistic and benevolent Queen is actually a calculating businesswoman.
"What did Medea do while the Kingdom of Eiland was invaded and millions of Esat people were killed? Isn't it strange that she only saved the intellectuals, scholars, and skilled workers of Eiland, not the nobility or the capitalist class? And even that was led by the Rotsilts and Fords."
Medea was a nation of equal strength to the Frogen. A true leader who championed peace should have formed an alliance and declared war on the Frogen to stop this inhumane genocide. I looked straight at Johanna and continued speaking stiffly.
"In that situation, the two countries maintained a strategic cooperative relationship. Only after everyone was dead and only a few remained did they belatedly warn the people to stop the massacre. Isn't that contradictory? Medea turned a blind eye to the terrible tragedy of her people. It was for the sake of preparing for future war reparations and for a provocative justification that would sway international opinion in their favor."
And yet, under the pretext of "saving us and giving us a place to live," they passed on their knowledge and exploited their technological prowess, forcing most of the Esatians into the Cynthia Empire's industrial complex like machine parts. I've never seen an Esatian who fully established themselves in Medea and entered society. And yet, they tried to assign an Esatian the task of dropping nuclear weapons. They tried to pass off the sin of taking countless lives as a noble judgment. It's a despicable act of seeking only profit without getting their hands dirty. A country of gentlemen? A country of obsessive-compulsive hypocrites.
“Her Majesty Queen Grace... how could that be?”
Johanna's shoulders trembled as she was completely soaked by the truth pouring down mercilessly like a downpour. But she didn't refute me further, as if my words had some merit. I was determined to make her understand.
"The Queen values the royal family's reputation more than the lives of others. To protect her own position, she attempted to place a fake, Erita, on the throne instead of me, her illegitimate child. Now, she's sending my former husband, Noah, to war to kill him. To ensure I become the perfect successor."
Johanna shook her head in disbelief.
"She's your biological mother, isn't she? Status is more important than blood ties. And besides, you're her lost child..."
I recalled the Queen's efforts to conceal Erita's crimes and smuggle her out of the country. When I brought up the fact that the starving prisoners had mutilated Erita's body as a casual aside, she simply looked at me with her cold, abandoned green eyes and said nothing.
“What a truly terrible story.”
Her voice and gaze were the same as Janet's, as she recounted Celine's gruesome death. I spoke to Johanna, wiggling my fingers on the armrest of the sofa.
"I thought so too. Her attitude toward Erita, who wasn't her biological daughter, was emotional and maternal, but it wasn't like that for me. She and I are just strangers."
“I’m sorry I couldn’t understand how much you must have suffered, Princess.”
Johanna looked genuinely apologetic. "Why are you apologizing to me?" I pursed my lips and sat up straight.
"Isn't it a good thing? Since there's no such thing as family bonds, I can overthrow the current Queen without hesitation at any time."
I showed my decision with a smile. It didn't matter if Johanna told me this. The wise Queen would have already considered this. She probably hoped that, burdened by an insurmountable authority, I would eventually harbor ambition. That's why she subjected me to such trials and pushed me so hard. Burning with vengeance, I would do anything to seize the throne as the next Queen. That's what Queen Grace II is after.
“I plan to become a predator, eat everything, and become the top of the food chain.”
Johanna, who had been hesitating and silent for a while, slowly raised her head and looked at me. Her small lower jaw trembled as she spoke the words she was afraid to say.
“Depending on the situation, are you even considering treason?”
The Queen, to whom I am subordinate only by blood ties, was also one of the causes of my unhappiness. She views my precious person as a nuisance and seeks to kill and destroy him. I've been drowning in a sea of despair for quite some time. When drowning, we instinctively grasp onto something else to survive, even if it's a person. Perhaps it's human nature to kill rather than die. The thought of it makes me sad.
"I just don't want to lose what I have. Wishing for peace or helping the world are just empty words. I just have to live. If I lose more, I feel like I'll lose myself too."
I remembered the beautiful, silver-haired man who had whispered sweet nothings, promising to remove all my distractions. I wanted to free my suppressed instincts, tamed and coaxed. I wanted to kill all the causes of unhappiness, to prevent unwanted outcomes from ever occurring. I'd never made such a decision. As a modern man, having only been here for two years, it was terrifying. So, I had no choice but to take the long, difficult path, escaping from such a simple and easy answer.
"Noah already knew the answer. He was just waiting for me to wake up to reality and make a choice, to admit that this world was wrong."
Unlike me, who could only understand a part of this world after experiencing it firsthand, he had a profound understanding of its structure and providence. My mind began to dizzy, and then a burst of ecstatic laughter erupted uncontrollably. It was a strange laugh, a harsh scrape of vocal cords damaged by toxic gas and smoke. Johanna looked at me with a pale face. She might think I was crazy, but I didn't care. Who wouldn't go crazy at this point?
“Princess... Are you going to do this even though you know it is against humanity?”
“In the end, it can’t be helped.”
Johanna's hand gripped mine tightly, as if desperately holding on to someone about to throw themselves off a cliff. Her lips, with their straight blue eyes, moved silently, as if trying to say something. I knew what it was going to be, so I stared at her with a smile on my face.
"You became a fighter pilot to avoid repeating that tragedy? You, too, wanted to kill someone to make room for them. The reason you can't forgive the Frogens is that they took your place."
I was not respectful to her.
It was a rude accusation, poking at jer wounds and stabbing her in the eye, but she gently stroked the back of my hand with a kind face.
"Princess, my mother died shortly after giving birth to me, suffering from the aftereffects of torture at Frogen. I heard she was subjected to horrific medical experiments. Furthermore, Frogen has even put a bounty on the Esatians. They view us as pests, experimental animals, or prey."
Lukewarm tears were trickling down the back of my hand. Tears flowed ceaselessly down Johanna's cheeks.
"You're right, Princess. As an Esatian, I have no place to stand. I used to say it was a judgment for my people, but... the truth is, it was a choice I made to protect my one and only father and to be loved by him. I wanted to be recognized and gain the right to live a human life, even if it meant killing someone else."
I listened to her silently. Johanna asked, rubbing her eyes with her sleeve.
"Where does unhappiness come from? I've always wondered."
“The cause of all misfortune, the starting point of all despair...”
As I was quietly humming, something snapped in my head. The objects before my eyes began to blur. Misfortune always follows human life: hurting each other, separation, hatred, and discrimination. I, too, was the cause of Noah's misfortune. I spoke of cause and effect in a voice devoid of emotion.
"Birth is the cause, and death is the result. To live is to strive to delay the consequences as long as possible."
The roar of fighter jets and bombs from the Loganfield raid echoed, accompanied by a sharp headache. It was a memory that occasionally resurfaced involuntarily. A fierce, unpleasant fire raged within me. Barbara's hand was clearly visible beneath the charred remains. The sensation of holding Noah's bandaged hand was vivid. The moment memory and sensation overlapped, a suppressed anxiety surged through me, piercing my entire body from the inside out. I hugged myself with both arms, enduring the pain. Then I quietly muttered.
"I don't have a choice. I can't run away anymore. So take him and run away instead of me."
I was left with the terrible choice of killing everyone and keeping only those I wanted. I finally understood the thoughts of Noah Rotsilt, a man whose thoughts were so strangely disjointed and incomprehensible, who had once wished we were the only two people left in the world.
“I will do it. A contradictory ruler who subdues with force and power, while talking about peace.”
Successfully developed and possessed the atomic bomb, but left it as a warning to maintain international order and peace. Ultimately, subdue them with a devastating slaughter, and quell their despair with fear and awe. To achieve this, ascend to the throne of Medea and become a world power, leading the international order. I have been desperately trying to escape this choice. I handed Johanna a letter to be given to Noah.
“And tell him never to come back. I abandoned him to become the monarch.”
To do that, I had to break up with a man named Noah Rotsilt forever.
Comments
Post a Comment