Chapter 2221: Proof |
"I noticed you call the Difference Engine 'Great Wisdom' and not 'my Lord'? That's quite unusual."
The conversation in the air continued. Compared to the Difference Engine, these spiritual imprints from the past were far more reasonable; when they found they couldn't win an argument against Jenkins, they didn't press the issue.
"We approve of Great Wisdom's ideas and agree with its methods, so we helped it during the brief time it was free from its seal. We are equals with Great Wisdom, a fact it also acknowledges. That is why, before our deaths, we voluntarily severed a part of our own spirits and gave it to the machine."
the old elf replied.
"I didn't realize it had that kind of appeal."
Jenkins thought to himself, then said to the illusory old elf before him:
"But you won't be able to convince me. Bring on the next one. Though you are merely a manifestation of spiritual power, you are still an elf. How can you be so disrespectful to the World Tree?"
"The World Tree?"
The old elf before him couldn't even be considered a living being. He was just a shallow manifestation of spiritual power, capable only of reacting to specific scenes and information. Therefore, he naturally couldn't see what was unusual about Jenkins at a glance, as any other elf would.
"Though I agree with Great Wisdom and am willing to help it, I have never forgotten that I was once an elf. I, too, held my coming-of-age ceremony with my friends beneath the World Tree. I cannot convince you, but I must warn you—our appearance is by no means a simple attempt to interfere with your thoughts. Look at your arm."
With that said, he too vanished into the air.
Jenkins considered this, puzzled. Keeping one hand on his cane, he rolled up his other sleeve and saw several black marks mottling his glowing arm.
He hadn't noticed them at all before the elf's warning. This was no toxin or curse, but rather the effect of that stagnant, decaying spiritual power that had festered for years. In other words, that mass of spiritual energy—a mixture of countless muddled thoughts, repeatedly fused, refined, and weathered by time—had become something akin to refuse.
Rotting garbage might be reabsorbed by the earth, but rotting spiritual energy, if allowed to persist, becomes a deadly poison to all souls. Only an ancient existence like the Difference Engine could produce something comparable to the 'Pus of Man.' Yet, no other creature that had existed for so many years would be bored enough to house a great, slowly decaying crystal of spiritual power.
In any case, due to Jenkins's rash contact, the decaying spirit had already spread to his body through the mental link. He should have been able to detect it, but the peculiar nature of this spiritual energy kept it from his notice until he was warned.
"It's of no consequence."
He thought, and his spirit began to wash over his body. The black marks naturally faded, bit by bit, but because of his continued contact with the broken soul, they kept reappearing. It was a tug-of-war that would last a long time, unless Jenkins abandoned the battle on the spiritual plane.
The space of the Mysterious Realm was growing more unstable; black lightning streaked across the night sky. This wasn't thunder, but a sign of imminent spatial collapse. A Mysterious Realm was hardly a suitable venue for a final battle; after all, it was merely a fragment of space.
Suppressed by Jenkins on two fronts, and with the aid of twenty-four demigods determined to die in this battle, the Difference Engine's most important combat body—which it had deliberately pulled into the Mysterious Realm—was on the brink of total defeat, having failed to even break through the earth's crust.
Suddenly, a black spiritual light flared to its peak, converging in the space before Jenkins. Under the influence of this spirit, space collapsed, forming a massive black hole. With a sound like shattering glass, a huge metal tentacle emerged from it. Since the monster couldn't break through the stratum to reach the surface, it had resorted to shattering space itself.
The tentacle struck toward Jenkins's forehead, but before it could make contact, it froze in mid-air. Jenkins lifted his head, the phantom of a massive, rotating gear flashing in his right eye. As a bronze light seemed ready to shoot from his gaze, he spoke with exceptional calm:
"Go back."
And so, the tentacle obediently retracted into the spatial rift, which then sealed itself.
"What is the point of this?"
Jenkins had grown weary of this struggle. He released his full power, letting the bronze light pour into the double helix of vines and metal at his feet.
The sound of a bell rang out again, but this time it came from behind Jenkins. The phantom of a colossal, faintly visible iron tree reappeared.
"Wouldn't it be better to have your core self come see me directly?"
He suddenly raised his right hand and waved it gently through the air, scattering a metallic bronze sheen. When the great net of brass chains shot out by the tentacles was touched by these motes of light, it was instantly corroded into a rusted bronze. Jenkins was gradually seizing the great monster's power.
"Meaningless."
He drew his cane with both hands, then thrust it forward fiercely. Green life, gray death, and bronze un-life—three perfectly balanced powers followed the double helix, pouring down from the highest, smallest point toward the ground.
The swirling brilliance lit up the entire plaza. But at the edge of the square, Papa Oliver could feel just how terrifying this power was:
"Jenkins has truly grown."
Looking out over all of Nolan, Jenkins resolved to end this now. The chaotic, tri-colored fusion of light plunged into the ground and immediately spread across the entire surface of the Mysterious Realm. People heard a rumbling from beneath the earth and saw flames and searing steam erupt from cracks in the ground.
Just then, Jenkins's arms suddenly began to itch—the effect of the contaminating, rotten spiritual power. But he remained completely unshaken. Closing his eyes, he fortified the already firm mental connection, making it even more stable.
He boldly opened his soul to connect with the soul of the giant metal monster beneath the earth. When he opened his eyes again, under the black night sky of a collapsing Nolan, translucent phantoms appeared one after another, surrounding him and watching him from the air.
These were the gifts left to the machine over tens of thousands of years by those who had believed in the Difference Engine's philosophy and were willing to help it. Among them were even people from the 18th Epoch.
The figures all extended their hands toward Jenkins in an inviting gesture, but he simply shook his head:
"You are only imprints left by spiritual power, not even complete consciousnesses. Be gone. This is all about to end."
he said, but the phantoms did not dissipate:
"Savior of the 18th Epoch, we have witnessed countless ages. The consciousnesses of thousands of us have long since proven the correctness of mechanization."
Everything around them seemed to be shaking. Black smoke and gray mist twisted together, whipped by a gale, as if the entire world were about to fall apart. But neither Jenkins nor the twenty-four demigods who had entered the Mysterious Realm were afraid. The spiritual lights that represented their powers shone with unwavering stability, like islands in a stormy sea.
Jenkins himself was confident, for he had already seen the outcome and had no cause for worry. As for those who had risked everything to help him, they relied purely on their courage and determination—the resolve to save the world. There will always be those who, at the world's most perilous moment, step forward to sacrifice themselves for even the slightest possibility of success.
Perhaps this is the courage of humanity. Perhaps this is humanity's anthem.
The voices of the phantoms could only be heard by Jenkins, who was in contact with them. The sound seemed to come from all directions, a chorus of thousands upon thousands of voices.
"You've proven it? No. Truth is often held in the hands of the few."
Jenkins replied to the gale before him. The wind whipped at the hem of his coat, forcing him to squint to keep his eyes from watering.
"No, truth must be proven. And we have been proving it for tens of thousands of years. Our conclusion is this: Savior of the 18th Epoch, you are obstructing the evolution of humanity—its final evolution."
One by one, the phantoms crossed space and lunged at Jenkins. They weren't attacking; they were transmitting all the information contained within their spiritual power to him. Even if these thoughts had no corrupting influence, they would be enough to brainwash a sane person into adopting their views. And that was without considering that this spiritual energy, weathered by time, had long since decayed into something akin to poison and refuse.
A vast amount of information washed over Jenkins's mind in an instant. The unwavering, collective thoughts of thousands echoed over and over in his head. Ideas about humanity's mechanical evolution, about the construction of a world where all things were equal—they all forced their way into his consciousness.
But it was all useless. The soul of a god does not fear the muddled thoughts of mortals. Moreover, Jenkins had witnessed technological civilizations far more advanced than this steam-powered one. He understood that as long as humanity's courage and curiosity endured, its intellect was its own greatest weapon. Humanity had no need to cast off its frail, flesh-and-blood bodies.
Forcing all of humanity to convert from flesh and blood to metal constructs would, on the contrary, lock away any possibility of further evolution. Every race possesses its own unique talents and abilities; no race is entirely useless. To abandon one's own racial traits to conform to the ideas of an alien entity was the most foolish notion imaginable.
Therefore, Jenkins did not fear the thoughts rushing madly toward him. Instead, he attempted to engage them in a debate within his own mind. But they were merely imprints of thought, incapable of exchanging views with him.
This made Jenkins realize once again that these things were nothing more than the Difference Engine's parrots, broadcasting its ideology. So he stopped paying them any mind and instead forcibly dragged the fragmented soul into his own.