Strike the Blood - Volume 21 - Chapter 4.1

CHAPTER FOUR

RECOLLECTIONS

1

The eccentric acting ruler was holed up in the Goplam’s workshop high atop the back of a bizarre sorcerous device.

The machine was completely enveloped in steel plating. It looked like some kind of vehicle.

Instead of wheels, it ran on treads, and there was an inordinately long cylinder-shaped part mounted on it.

Though it had been constructed chiefly in accordance with basic principles, it was also designed with elaborate craftsmanship that betrayed a powerful passion bordering on outright obsession. It made one sense the strong will of its maker or perhaps the possibilities of the machine itself.

The acting ruler wore the garments of a technical officer as he zealously inspected the unfamiliar machine.

“Cain, you’re…slacking off on work again, aren’t…you?”

The young military officer visiting the workshop made a pained smile as he looked up at the ruler.

He was a small-statured individual with purple hair. At first glance, he looked like a fair maiden, but he was actually a man. On top of that, he was a high-ranking noble whose incredible power had made him famous in Senra. He was one of the eccentrics on par with the city’s acting ruler.

“Heya, Aswad. Thanks for your hard work suppressing insurrection.”

“It’s good that you’re safe,” said the man called Cain with a little smile, but his hands never stopped fiddling with the device.

Though dejected by Cain’s typically obsessive attitude, Aswad found his interest piqued by the machine that had enthralled the acting ruler to this extent.

“What is…this? Some sort of abandoned toy you picked up from somewhere?” asked Aswad.

“It’s the weapon Ki and the others returned with from the Eastern Lands.”

Cain gave the cylinder on the back of the vehicle a little stroke. Come to think of it, the attachment sort of looked like the thing called a cannon he’d seen in the Eastern Lands.

“Wea…pon?”

“Apparently, it took sacrificing eight beast people to destroy an identical machine. I heard it almost ripped Ki in half, too.”

“A weapon crafted by mere men was capable of hurting Ki, you…say?”

Surprise shined in Aswad’s eyes. The man named Ki Juranbarada was a famous warrior and a wielder of divine power that few Devas had. No doubt he found this talk of an inferior species like humans being capable of harming Ki quite implausible.

Even the superior race known as the Devas did not know for how long they had ruled the surface. But they were sovereigns and dominators, nevertheless. Their preeminence was absolute, and none could eject them from that position.

Though both species bore a strong resemblance to each other, the Devas had long life spans and resilient bodies, while humans were short-lived and fragile. On top of high athletic ability and physical strength, they possessed the supernatural ability of divine power. Their regenerative capabilities also made them practically immortal.

The Devas had employed their advanced technology to create various lesser species.

They crafted the beast people with high combat abilities to serve as guards and soldiers. They endowed the gigas with herculean strength to construct things and transport materials. They made the fairies so they could have pets and domestic laborers. They produced the mermen with an eye toward underwater labor. And after that, they crafted innumerable variants of these species.

Using their divine power, they worked the lesser races to the bone, culled violent demon beasts, and constructed vast cities on the surface. Civilization had grown to such a high level that reaching the sea of stars no longer seemed like a mere fantasy.

Though they enjoyed the position of absolute rulers, even the Devas had concerns.

One was the sun.

The instant they were bathed in its rays, the Devas’ cellular structure broke down, and they turned to ash. What awaited them was certain death—no, annihilation. Though the Devas had enhanced their already resilient bodies further through genetic engineering, they still had not achieved the subjugation of sunlight.

Another shackle placed upon the Devas was the existence of the race known as humans. The Devas saw humans as a precious source of labor, subjects to be protected, and an important source of food.

They needed human blood to uphold their divine power and maintain their vitality.

In essence, the Devas were creatures that could not live without drinking the blood of living persons.

“Yes. This really is an incredible weapon. A mid-ranking noble’s divine energy would bounce off this steel wall, and a direct hit from cannons like these could blow away even gigas. On top of that, the driver’s seat is completely sealed, so even we cannot invade it in mist form. I imagine even Ki would have quite a bit of trouble if several of these attacked him at once.”

With an excited air, Cain lavished praise upon the weapon they’d obtained from humans, their supposed food source.

“You seem quite…pleased, Cain.”

Aswad said that in a tone rich with sarcasm, but Cain didn’t notice the barbs in his words.

“The advancement of technology in the Eastern Lands these last two hundred years has been a marvelous sight to behold. For all their lack of long lives, those humans sure change at a dizzying pace. It won’t be long until they arrive at a place beyond even our reach.”

“…You are saying that men…will surpass the…Devas? Those frail…creatures?”

Aswad laughed a little with pronounced scorn. Dead serious, Cain shook his head.

“Comparing individual superiority and inferiority is meaningless. The human species acts like a single unified creature.”

“Your optimistic way of thinking resembles that of these…humans.”

A hint of annoyance came over Aswad’s face.

“Human civilization will quickly…collapse. They are incapable of learning from experience… They will wage war upon foolish war, reducing culture and art to ash. So it has always been, so it shall always be…”

“There’s no guarantee of that. Even if one life ends, their blood memories live on.”

Cain stated this with great confidence. Aswad was perplexed, staring squarely at the odd acting ruler.

“Changes are not occurring only in the residents of the Eastern Lands. The subjects living on the surface are different from those who came before. You all see that, too, don’t you?”

Aswad nodded wordlessly.

Some humans were born with a special ability similar but inferior to divine power—fear and rumors along those lines had begun to spread among the Devas living on the surface.

The precise cause of this phenomenon was unknown. Some said it was a result of crossbreeding between Devas and other demons or human beings. Others claimed it was due to interference from some kind of higher-dimensional being.

Whatever the reason, those who obtained power sufficient to slay even a Deva were known as saints among the laypeople; they were even said to have become objects of worship. Beyond that, the Devas could not ignore the fact that races who were hostile to them, such as ogresses, elves, and dragons, were apparently cooperating with humankind.

Seeing this resistance, beast people and other lesser races had rebelled against the Devas and chosen to fight alongside humankind. The result was insurrection among their subjects the world over.

This was recompense for having treated human beings, whose blood they needed to sip in order to live, as powerless livestock or slaves.

Since they persisted on the blood of their subjects, the Devas would lose their prosperity if they relented their grip on humanity. Reduced to starvation, they would wage war against their own kind to obtain new subjects, placing themselves squarely on the path to extinction.

In order to avoid that worst-case scenario, Deva royalty had devised a plan to strike back—they would obtain new subjects from a world in the far reaches of Nod, the so-called Eastern Lands, the homeland of humankind. In other words, they would place humanity in captivity.

One could mock that decision as foolish or even deem it cruel. They simply didn’t know better.

Artificial light already raced through the darkness of the Eastern Lands. Even with the power at the Devas’ command, a broad hunt for humankind was no longer an easy feat.

Nor would the dragons protecting the Eastern Lands ever permit the Devas to take back a sufficient number of humans to assuage their hunger. The Devas no longer had the strength left to force them to submit.

“Are we Devas a race doomed to extinc…tion? I wonder, is it our fate to be destroyed by the humans whose blood we cannot live without?”

A small, lonely, self-deprecating smile emerged on Aswad’s lips as he posed the question.

“If we Devas reject change, it will come to that.”

Cain spoke calmly without any hesitation.

“Change?”

“Yes. Change so that we can live without drinking human blood, change so that we can walk under the sun.”

“That would be…marvelous. Truly, if such a thing could be…achieved.”

Aswad shook his head like a daydreaming girl.

“But it cannot be…so.”

“I suppose not. The Devas won’t accept change…unless someone forces them.”

A vaguely malicious expression came over Cain as he hopped down from the man-made weapon.

So far as they were concerned, the Devas were a chosen, superior race. They would never accept progress. If one of their own forced it onto them, they would most certainly call him a traitor.

They would call him a Sinful God, a man with the body of a divine Deva who’d nevertheless chosen to side with humanity—

“Hey, Cain…if a day should someday come when the Devas do not require human blood to live…”

Aswadguhl Aziz turned toward Cain and voiced his little wish.

It was a small, truly tiny thing—but it was a fanciful one, a fantasy, and so long as he remained a Deva, it could never be granted.