Decided not to put in anti-theft tags here. Also, please keep in mind that the author made it so that an each chapter is an “arc”. Each part is a “chapter”. I wouldn’t dare actually split the author’s chapters, no matter how long they be.
Another note, I’m going to go on a short hiatus. This is because I’m traveling to San Francisco (well, more like Silicon Valley) sometime this week, and adding to that, I’m also creating a new website… I’ll be gone for two weeks or so.
Chapter 2. Uhh… Mm… What’s that? Scary…
Unlike before, where I would train them viciously, feed them breakfast (of course, 102 got porridge as always), and teach them survival techniques, this time I brought the three kids to the actual drill hall.
“What the, so there was a legit drill hall here?”
Ha, I taught you up to 100 villain’s tidbit tips, a survival technique in the mountains, along with the information I brought from modern times, and you still think like this?
This is why you’re still a child, 102.
And for that matter.
“102, come out with your weapon.”
I gripped my wooden bat as I looked at 102 walk out with an annoyed mumble.
This wooden bat was, if I were to explain it, a bat that does not hurt its victims, but merely inflict pain onto them. A lot of pain. A shitload of pain, in fact. I hope that you, the readers, understand just how painful this thing is for me to repeat my words twice.
If it’s still hard to imagine… think of it like this: the victim basically turns into a sandbag in the face of the bat.
I smirked inside when I saw 102 grumble some more after seeing the bat.
Hoho, this is an extra powerful bat that I expended my own funds into, which not only gets rid of all evidences of attacks, but even gives a massage to the victim’s body. Truly, it is an amazing training tool.
But the thing is, it hurts a lot. Even the rookies that listen to me quite well turn vicious when they see me with the bat.
I decided to enlighten this poor lamb with the idea that the bat was unsurpassable unless he could completely overwhelm me in skill.
And how shall I do that? By hitting him, of course! Hoho, don’t look at me like that. This is the whip of love. And after all, all famous swordsmen use something that seems harmless as their weapon.
This is especially true in the case with these old men like sword emperors or sword masters. I never heard of them using a sword. Occasionally I’d hear of them slicing entire armies with a branch, or destroying an Evil Organization with chopsticks.
So in other words, I’m doing this to train the kid to watch out for seemingly harmless things as well! Of course, I’m just going to beat it into his body!
In order to do that, I’d have to make him more motivated first!
“If you manage to subdue me… morning practice is canceled.”
I used the power of cancellation! It was super effective!
“Huaaa!”
A left hand filled with sand appeared at the fact of the foolish child who was charging straight towards me!
Why’s there sand?
Pa!
“Wh, what the?!”
To throw it, of course!
The child gets confused when he got sand in his eyes. Hoho, to think he’d fall for something so basic. This skill was something that was called “Sand Attack”, which was one of the legendary skills in Pxkemon that lowered accuracy by quite a bit. I managed to master this skill before I had even turned 20.
And the legendary bat that had my 20 years of experience as a villain roared at the confused child.
Crack!
“Pue?!”
It was a strange shout that seemed to be a mix of a scream and a moan. This was one of the main advantages of the bat, which was to inflict unspeakable pain unto those who were hit by it.
“U, unf! Puha! W, wai… Uaaa!”
He tries to speak of fairness with eyes filled with sand. Haha, he still speaks of immature things.
“Unfairness… then do you think there is a fight that is ever fair?”
“F, fight fairly!”
“Fight fairly… they’re just fancy words.”
Crack!
“Kuhaaa?!”
Hahaha, it hurts, right? It has to. I tried hitting myself as a test, and I never decided to do tests like that ever again. Well then, I’ll break your fantasies along with this pain!
“Fairness. It sounds good. Yes, it truly sounds ideal. But there is no fairness in the world.”
“L, lia… kuha!”
“For example, there is the general known as Harten in the Empire. In the battle of Harken, he pushed away a large amount of soldiers to discourage the enemies from attacking the Empire.”
“S, stop hitting! Pukaa! W, while speaki- Uaaa!”
“He was known to be fair and just. But… fair? Are you kidding me? Anyone can push away an enemy with five times the amount of soldiers they have. If you want something that’s really fair, you should fight on equal grounds.”
“T, this and that are differeeeeennnnnntttttt!”
Haha, don’t try to refute your instructor, disciple. No, wait, it was all your fault for looking down on the legendary bat in the first place. Did you really think you could fight well? Come to the drill hall and fight me, then.
Crackcrackcrakittycrackcrackcrackcrackcrackcra
Badabada boom! I played the drums with a rhythm, and kept talking.
“What is the fairness you talk of? Justice? Don’t make me laugh. Justice all changes depending on the context. The heroes all gang up on the Demon King, and call that fairness? And they always talk about unfairness when they’re the ones to get ganged up on. Hostages are unfair? The very first thing the Imperial Palace does when dealing with criminals is to take the criminal’s family as hostage. Now, back to the main talking. Spraying sand into your eyes is unfair? You must be kidding me. If that were the case, all knights who use the life sword are unfair.”
“Wh, why is thaaat! Un, unfaaaaaaaair!”
Hoho, look at this kid. His stamina’s unbelievable. He says all kinds of stuff even when he’s going through all that pain. Alright. I suppose it is fine to bestow upon you the title of the Fourth King of Constitution? Also known as Sandbag the Fourth?
“Knights all talk of their sword skills. They think they would get strong the more they perfect their sword skills. But when they become able to use the life sword? They do not care for sword skills anymore. They just try to learn fancy skills, and do not try to learn more about the life sword’s essence itself. The life sword enables one to easily train his body, easily increase his sword’s sharpness, and easily kill his enemies.”
“T, that’s talent…”
Hoho, you dare talk of talent in front of me?
Crackcrackcrack!
“Kuaaa!”
“Talent? What is fairness to you? Is it fairness if two people tried just as hard, but lost because one was more talented? Is that what you truly think? Right, the life sword exists because of talent. It is like magic, but is completely different, making it like a completely different field of study. Right. Then do you mean that it is fine to not train your sword skills under the name of talent?”
“I, I’m not talking about thaaaaaahaaaahnnng!”
Uh, I stepped into the danger zone. That sound just now was closer to pleasure than pain. Oh shoot, I hit him too much because I got too happy about finding Sandbag the Fourth. If I hit him too much, he might actually fall into a really dangerous new world.
I stepped on the trembling boy, and kept talking.
“There is no fairness in the first place. There is no equal talent, no equal abilities, and your class is chosen the moment you are born. If you had the power to rule the world, and was of the Royal Family, you would be hailed as a holy king, but if you were of the peasant’s family, you would be marked as a seed for rebellion.”
Once I found that the two girls were staring at me, the bat, and 102 with eyes filled with fear, I immediately initiated brainwashing lesson phase one.
“There is no justice in the world. There is no evil in the world either. The opposite of justice is yet another justice, and the opposite of evil is yet another evil. There is nothing in the world without a story, and there is no action in the world that does not have a motive.”
This was my view of the world.
“What if there was a murderer who killed a single woman in front of you? Would it be alright to kill him? What if the woman was the witch who had destroyed his entire life altogether? What if she was someone who had stolen important files from the Empire? What would you do then?”
Well, this was just bullshit. 10/10, this was straight up bullshit. But sometimes, stuff like this actually happens. Then?
“W, we should listen to their story?”
17 said this carefully. 46 seemed to agree as well. Right, that’s why you’re still children. I smirked quite a bit.
“What if he had been lying? What if the woman was completely innocent?”
“W, what?!”
The girl widens her eyes and shouts. It must be nonsensical to her. Yeah, it has to be. This is wrong, and that is wrong as well.
“That’s why I said, there is no justice… there is no evil as well.”
“…Why does that matter?”
46 asks this with a confused face.
“There is no justice. Those who talk of it are just trying to convince others that what they’re doing is not wrong. Look at the Empire, for example. It is the strongest nation in the world, and it is also a place with 700 years of experience. It even has two subordinate countries under it. Truly, it is an amazing nation.”
In order to make things easier to understand, I raise the reputation of the Empire as much as I can. Seeing a 1st place fall to 4th place all of the sudden brings more shock than seeing a 10th place fall to 11th place, after all.
“Do you know the origin of this Empire? It is actually quite simple. A single peasant went against the Imperial Palace and revolted. He gathered comrades and destroyed corruption, and created this nation.”
“A, and therefor, he’s just… kahak!”
I step on 102 even harder than before. Huh, look at this boy’s regeneration rate.
“But what they did was ultimately a revolt.”
“N, no! At the time! There was only corruption!”
“Then are you telling me there is no corruption in the Imperial Palace as of now?”
“…That’s…”
Hoho, looks like I was right about him being from a fallen noble family. He talks like a patriot, then immediately shuts up when facing stuff like this.
“There is still corruption. There is corruption in any nation of the world. Even the Empire that was created to get rid of corruption is corrupt. Now, I speak again: is the Empire good, or evil?”
“…Evil?”
I smirked when I heard 17’s response.
“Then is this organization, which trains orphans then uses them like tools, just?”
“This is why justice and evil cannot coexist. If the Empire is just, this Organization is just as well, and if the Empire is evil, this organization is evil as well. What’s important is the importance of an individual. Do you get sad if someone dies? No. What if it’s a close friend of yours? You’d be sad. You’d be enraged. Right. That’s it. It just depends on whether you know the person or not.”
Haha, I dislike black/white theories. I tend to look at the world in a grey manner instead. Why? It’s a grey area. Because it’s a grey area, it’s hard to tell if the things you do are actually evil or not. An opportunist must always look at the world in a grey fashion. Otherwise you’d die when one side falls. Well, if I were to put it nicely, it’s like taking the middle path, and if I were to put it badly, two timing?
“Then… what must we do…”
“Decide for yourself. Do not think about justice or evil. Judgement? What a joke. Whether it be a king killing a slave, or a murderer killing a normal man, it’s both murder. But the Empire says that it is alright for an emperor to kill inferior humans, while it is evil for a murderer to kill a normal man. This is the reality of the Empire’s laws. But do you think you, who lived a little more than a decade, can judge this 700 year old system? Don’t joke with me. You’re not gods. No, even if you are, you still have no right to judge others.”
It might be heresy, but whatever. I’ve been shitting on gods and elementals as much as I could ever since I came here. Those bastards. They never bothered giving me a single buff when I came here.
“Have a desire of your own. Take what you want. Protect what you need to protect. You want to save someone? Save him. You want to kill someone? Kill him. Do not base your morals around what the world tells you. The world is the people, and the people are just numbers. They talk of justice just because they are the majority. I refuse to believe that I teach idiots who listen to those monkeys.”
Uhahaha! Well, honestly, the only thing that you have to protect is my old age. In other words, just ignore the kind folk for the sake of my retirement!
After a few more “lessons”, my worldview will invade their minds amidst the pain and chaos! They will no longer think of being in the Organization as a bad thing!
I smiled evilly inside as I looked at the three kids who were thinking seriously to themselves, and kept talking with a cold face.
“Next, 17.”
“Y, yes!”
She seems to be saying “Me as well?” Yeah, it gets annoying if you just dwell on my worldview, so… let’s beat you up a bit first, yeah?