Nejimaki Seirei Senki – Tenkyou no Alderamin

Under a perfectly clear, cloudless night sky, a lone old man dressed in a white lab coat stood motionless.

The light he held in his hand was not a light spirit but an oil lamp. Currently, he was blocking even its weak light by holding out his hand. What he wanted to see was not at his feet where the lamp light could reach, but something which, while being in a complete opposite position, also required no light to observe.

“Wait a minute, Professor Anarai, if you’re outside at a time like this you’ll catch a cold!”

Suspicious of the condition of the old man, who wasn’t so much as shivering as he stood, a young man in a white lab coat came running out of a house. …Compared to the land of intense heat where they had lived previously, the night air here was a bit colder. Since his body hadn’t become accustomed to the climate, he was worried for Anarai’s health.

“Oh, Bajin. Calm down, I’ll return shortly.”

“…Ahh, were you observing the sky? It is quite clear today, isn’t it? So, which star do you have your sights on? Or is it the moon?”

“A star. One that definitely won’t disappear for another thousand years.”

From that strange phrasing, and the direction of Anarai’s gaze, Bajin quickly pinned it down.

“Alderamin[1] …right?”

“…Brrr! Hey, stop that, Bajin, simply call it the North Star. You’ll bring back memories of those abominable inquisitors from the Alderah Church.”

Saying that, Anarai finally returned back to the house. No matter how much time pa.s.ses, he’s as moody as ever- thinking that, Bajin followed after him.

The new laboratory which the Kioka government gave them was no more than a single house, but for the two of them it was paradise on Earth where they could live without being intimate with mold or dust. Just with that, Bajin was ready to recognize his patriotism to Kioka, but Anarai was contrarily bold.

“Kah- those people in the government. They sent us a refusal!”

While rummaging on his desk through postal items recovered from the mailbox, Anarai suddenly growled. Inferring the situation, Bajin shrugged his shoulders and spoke.

“Is it the experiment from earlier? Well, no matter how large Kioka’s wallet may be, they won’t give us permission, you know.”

“What? Don’t you want to do it, Bajin?”

“…It’s hard to say. As a researcher I want to, but as a human being I don’t. At any rate, there will be opposition, you know, ‘’against spirit dissection’’.”

Anarai scoffed. –Yes, what this old professor had requested permission from the government for, was the dissection of the four great spirits. Of course he would use empty sh.e.l.ls without “soul stones,” but even in the Kioka Republic, a country zealously founded on technology, permission wouldn’t be granted so easily.

“There’s nothing we can do about it. A state religion isn’t specified as it is in the Empire, but over 80% of even Kioka’s citizens are adherents to the Alderah Church. Even if the separation of church and state is more or less making progress, the commandments of the Alderah Church will nonetheless influence law.”

“What I want to say is much more fundamental. Why is it, that ‘human dissection’ is allowed if permission was received while the person was alive, but only ‘spirit dissection’ isn’t allowed? Unlike humans who die permanently, a spirit is immortal if you bring its ‘soul stone’ to the ‘Sanctum’, isn’t it?”

I understand your logic, but… Bajin’s face said everything with a wry smile. Anarai sank into silence, one might think because he were sulking, but suddenly he stood from his chair and moved to a corner of the room. What were lined up there, resembling the things from their previous laboratory, were life-sized models of the four great spirits.

“Hey, professor, stop putting it off and just tell me. What is the purpose of creating those ‘artificial spirits’?”

“I shan’t tell an unworthy disciple.”

“Ah- so cruel! If I, who has followed you so far, am an unworthy disciple, then you’ll never find a worthy disciple no matter where you search in the world!”

Bajin began sorting through scattered doc.u.ments while voicing his anger. Catching glimpses of him from the corner of his eye, Anarai began talking in a quiet voice.

“Listen, Bajin. This is just a feeling, but don’t you think free will is characteristic to all living things?”

“-Huh? ‘Free will,’ you say?”

“Yes. Or not adhering to another’s will…shall I say? For example, wild animals once used to attack humans. In order to control that, we had to use traps and weapons to fight. Even when we lured them with a smile, they wouldn’t lower they guard that easily. That’s free will, right?”

“Huh…”

“However, when they became livestock and pets, things changed a bit. They became emotionally attached to humans and fawned over us. They would give us a front paw when we say ‘shake,’ and lay bare their genital organs when we say ‘beg.’ Of course livestock and pets are existences which have meaning in our lives, but that aside, they no longer have ‘free will,’ do they?”

“Since they are living things without free will, they are beneficial existences to humanity… is that it?”

“Yes. If ‘free will’ is the essence of living things, then I believe that ‘benefit to humanity’ is the essence of artificial things. And, when you observe them keeping that in mind…”

Anarai gazed at the models before his eyes one-by-one. The fire spirit which simply produced fire for us, the water spirit which always prepared clean water for us, the wind spirit which kept air pure, and the light spirit which became our light in the dark nights….

“…These existences which are so beneficial to humanity, humans’ good partners without a fragment of free will, can we really call them living things?”

Taking those words in, Bajin finally understood Anarai’s reason for creating “artificial spirits.”

“Professor Anarai, basically…As means of proof that spirits are artificial lifeforms, you’re reproducing spirits by your own hand?”

“I’m well aware that this is far from being absolute proof. Since being able to create them doesn’t mean that I am able to create the same thing G.o.d purportedly created. …However, in that case, I’d be satisfied if only a fraction of people are able to cast doubt on it.”

A human’s efforts were able to reproduce them to this extent. One hundred years later, two hundred years later, it might come even closer to the original. One he thought of it that way, people who’d come to that idea would certainly arise. …Wait. If a human hand was able to reproduce them to this extent, then ‘’might not there be the possibility that humans created the original in the first place?’’

“However, spirits are born at the ‘Sanctum.’ I hear that their mysterious inst.i.tution existed even before it came be recorded in history. Isn’t there no way that the humans of that era were able to create something that even Professor Anarai of the current era can’t adequately reproduce?”

“It’s exactly as you say. Therefore… I think that if there were humans who created them, then wouldn’t they be a race of humanity without any direct connections to us? They might have ‘’failed to connect with us’’, or even have ‘’wanted to deliberately cut ties’’…whichever it is, I believe that the thing which they left to us as a single precious legacy- might it not be, basically, it the four great spirits?”

“That’s magnificent. With your logic, that would mean that at a time that came far, far earlier than our civilization, people existed who possessed technology far more advanced than ours. Could we call it a super ancient civilization?”

“Hm, that naming isn’t terrible. –Alright, it’s settled then. Henceforth, we shall identify our various pursuits concerning the ‘Manufacturers of the Four Great Spirits’ by calling them our ‘Discourse on the Super Ancient Civilization’!”

Perhaps because he was thrilled at having a.s.signed a name to his hypothesis, Anarai had suddenly entered a good mood, and began taking the models into his hands. Bajin showed a wry smile and stared at the back of the old man’s snowy head.

No matter which country or place they came to, he rushed on seeking truth without care for law, government, G.o.d, or time. Professor Anarai Khan’s intellect was beloved by freedom. Quite possibly, from the perspective of another of the many geniuses, that might have been a very enviable thing.