"What are you?! Quinn!"
Gragg, weapon at the ready, lunged toward me. How much easier would it be to simply accept that attack—to let it strike me and die by his hand? But my body acted of its own accord.
This was a dream. It was nothing more than a reproduction of facts etched into my memory. Because of that, I would not be killed by him here. In reality, the outcome had been the exact opposite.
I swung my fist with everything I had. I shattered his weapon, crushed his ribs, and tore through his internal organs as blood sprayed into the air. The sensation of killing a human for the first time was reproduced with a vividness that made my skin crawl.
Immediately afterward, my vision was obscured by static. A momentary sensation of weightlessness followed. Then, Gragg appeared before me once more, weapon raised.
"What are you?! Quinn!"
The same question was repeated. Without answering, I killed him again. Every time I did, something within me was shaved away. I was becoming unable to think.
"You are—! —!"
The footage, which had been a loop of the same events, began to change gradually. Gragg's body blurred as if the image were bleeding. The red of the flowing blood clung to him, as if to fill in the gaps of his breaking form. A suit of red armor began to envelop him.
"You are me."
A loathsome, unbearable voice thrust the answer upon me in place of my silent self. It was a meaningless reply devoid of substance. It entered through my ears and eroded my brain, hollowing out the existence known as 'me.'
My own body began to blur as well. I could not maintain my outline. My outer shell was breaking. This signified the collapse of my spirit. A virus was attempting to invade the space where my vulnerability had been exposed.
I screamed. Although the 'me' within the dream did not make a sound, the collapse of my outline stopped. I struck Gragg with my fist. I continued to kill him. Doing so was the only way to maintain my sense of self.
The only emotion permitted to me was 'regret.' No other emotion could protect my mind any longer. Only a powerful, negative feeling directed at myself served as a flickering light that barely held my ego together.
Thus, I continued to kill him so that I could continue to regret. I recalled that scene over and over. If I didn't, I would be completely consumed by the 'Red Armor.'
The true identity of the Red Armor was a 'collective consciousness.'
Through Mental Synchronization, I had used the eggs within my body for my own convenience. I had sacrificed countless lives. I never considered their will as individuals. The will of the collective took precedence over everything else.
That was a fundamental function of the biological organism I was. For example, a male praying mantis is eaten by the female during mating, but whether that event is a tragedy or a blessing for the mantis is irrelevant. That is simply how they exist as living things. To feel 'sorry' for it is merely a human projection.
But I had imagined it. I realized that the countless 'me's' that existed were not all equal. There was the 'me' as the main body, the superior, and there were the 'me's' as eggs, the inferiors who were merely exploited. As an egg, I was a being that wasn't even permitted to be born, used until spent, merely waiting for my turn to die.
Everything began with the relationship with the Research Expedition. That was my first contact with the existence of humans. Out of a desire to know them, I took 'him' into myself.
Ultimately, that was what distanced me from humanity. Despite being a creature entirely different from a human, I had incorporated a part of human sensibility. Because of that, the divergence between my ideal and reality progressed further. I lost sight of who I was, and unnecessary empathy began to take root.
I was unaware of it at the time, but the foundation for the creation of the Red Armor was already in place. The first time I activated the Carbuncle Talisman was immediately after I killed Gragg. By killing him, I learned of 'death.'
No matter how desperate a situation I find myself in, I cannot learn about death from it. Rather, that is the domain of 'life.' To graze the edge of death, the one reaching it could not be myself; it had to be another.
The divergence between the Ideal (Human) and Reality (Me). I killed the ideal in order to live. That severed ideal was the Carbuncle Talisman.
I tried to push the things I hated onto someone else who wasn't me. It was something I had done countless times as if it were natural. As the superior main body, I forced the eggs, the inferiors, to bear that burden. How must the 'me' trapped in the ideal without any escape have felt? Surely, they must have suffered just as I am suffering now.
It manifested as 'Nen that strengthens after death.' It is an ability belonging to the taboos of Nen. It is said that when a Nen user dies leaving behind intense resentment, the effect of their ability can sometimes remain in the living world. My alter ego, who had studied humans and learned of death, had awakened to this power. Even after the death of the eggs, Mental Synchronization exerted its effect even more strongly, bringing explosive energy to Quinn.
However, at that point, it only had enough influence to make Quinn run rampant. I made a decisive mistake that allowed the Carbuncle Talisman to grow significantly. That mistake was creating multiple main bodies.
There were multiple main bodies that were supposed to be the absolute superiors. Previously, there was a clear distinction between the subject of consciousness—the main body—and the eggs. A situation where the eggs dominated the main body was impossible. But now that thousands of main bodies had been born, there was no difference between them.
The main bodies had fallen into a situation where they were being used and discarded, just like the eggs before them. So, who was the superior giving commands to the swarm? It wasn't any single one of the main bodies. Their specifications were all equal and identical; no hierarchy existed between them.
In other words, there was no superior anywhere. It was a formless 'Vortex' that existed only on the network connecting the main bodies via Mental Synchronization. Despite being nowhere, there was a 'self' that held absolute dominance. Therefore, there was no way to resist its will. If the Vortex commanded death, there was no choice but to follow.
Hallucinations caused by drug addiction gave an 'image' to that vortex. We created a convenient evil and continued to dump our suffering into that massive hole. Because doing so was the easiest path.
Finally, unable to contain it, we tried to escape the vortex. We tried to sever the things we hated, just as we always had. We tried to dissolve the collective consciousness and act as if the network itself never existed.
But you cannot erase something that was formless to begin with. The grown vortex of nothingness continued to exist within us at all times. Nourished by the 'Nen that strengthens after death' consumed by thousands, the Deep Vortex bared its fangs and finally took over all of us.
I am just one of the many trapped within the armor. I have no control over my body, and I can do nothing but dream while imprisoned by my own remorse. I don't know how much longer this consciousness will last. When it fades, what will become of me?
One thing I understand as my existence begins to merge is that this Deep Vortex is aiming for the other side of the sea. It intends to cross Lake Mobius and head for the human continent. It is foolishly pursuing an ideal, attempting to reach humanity.
It intends to walk along the seabed, heading straight south. And when it reaches the continent, the Deep Vortex will likely try to incorporate humans in order to get closer to them. It has no other way to know another except by doing this. Even though that act will never result in the realization of its ideal. No matter how deep or far, the ideal diverges, and the Nen after death grows stronger.
It is a calamity. Can humanity eliminate this threat? No matter how much I worry, there is nothing I can do.
The imagery shifted. A new task was presented before me.
For a moment, my recognition faltered. I stared, unable to understand what it was. As I grasped the 'lump of meat' prepared for me and the intent behind it, my senses froze.
There lay the beginning of my sin. Imagery I had locked away in the depths of my memory. From the cage of memory, which grew narrower like the inside of a snail's shell the further in you went, the things I had suppressed began to ooze out.
I picked up the lump of meat.
There was a violent rejection. I couldn't go any further. I didn't want to see this. I wanted to run away right now.
'This isn't me.'
The vision blurred. The outlines distorted. My very existence was breaking.
'Regret. Repent. Do not look away. Do not run from your sin.'
I was only permitted to repeat it. To regret, I had to reproduce it. Only by 'eating' it could I acknowledge myself.
The thing taken from within the meat could not be recognized, as if it were pixelated even though I was looking directly at it. Only the smell of blood and warmth remained on my hands.
'If you cannot acknowledge your mistake...'
I brought it to my mouth. The imagery cut out repeatedly, disappearing into snow noise.
'...you have no right to be me.'
When I woke up, I was in a forest at night.
Chel and Tokunosuke were sleeping nearby. This was a campsite. It was a memory of when I accompanied the Research Expedition and explored the forest looking for Returns—in other words, this was a dream.
Quinn stood up from her makeshift bed. There was no light in the camp at night. Lighting a fire would be like telling dangerous creatures our location.
"Is something wrong? It's still a while before the watch shift changes, so you can sleep a bit longer."
A voice came from the darkness. A man was sitting with his back against a tree. I couldn't see his face because it was so dark, but I knew who it was instantly by his voice.
For some reason, Quinn did not approach him. She stood there, frozen, maintaining an unnatural distance.
"What is a human?"
Quinn asked abruptly. It wasn't that I made her say it. This was a dream, and I couldn't control the 'me' I was currently seeing. It was a scene reconstructed from past memories.
However, I had no recollection of experiencing this scene. I had no memory of throwing such a question at anyone.
"Eh? A human? Hmm... let's see..."
The silence continued as if he were struggling for an answer. Quinn waited in silence. In the quiet, windless forest, she just waited quietly.
I don't know what a human is, but I do know the most 'human-like thing' in this world.
It is 'to compare.'
...Was that different from the answer you expected? I wish I could have said something more inspiring, but I'm sorry I can only say something like this.
People compare themselves to others. They are creatures that can only feel happiness by doing so.
Is that wrong? Yes, I think so too. A person's happiness or unhappiness is something only they can understand. No matter how much I pity children starving in developing countries, I can't understand their unhappiness, and those children probably won't understand the unhappiness of someone starving right next to them either.
In the first place, these aren't things that can be compared, yet we only find value by doing exactly that. That's why people obsess over things that seem trivial to others. They pour time and money into things that make no sense at all, or even throw away their lives.
But isn't that mistake exactly what makes us human? Suppose there was a person who was entirely correct. That person could complete their own value within themselves without comparing themselves to anyone. With neither hope nor despair, they would have no need to understand anyone but themselves. There is no such human.
Human desire has no end. If there is no standard for feeling happiness, one will seek it without limit. Surely their heart will never be satisfied, leaving behind only regret that degrades themselves. Even if we pursue only the 'correctness' within us, we cannot live correctly. We cannot continue to be ourselves.
Life is full of mistakes. Yet we can live unbothered without noticing them. Because we can believe in someone without basis and compare ourselves to them, people feel envy, contempt, respect, and love. By meeting someone different from yourself, you can change for better or worse. That is how, bit by bit, a 'human' is formed.
From now on, you will meet many people. To compare, you must understand that person. That is something so difficult it seems impossible, but you must strive to understand them. You won't gain much by merely feeling like you've understood the surface. Whether they are an ordinary person or a genius, a good person or an evil one, they have something you do not.
Please compare that with yourself.
...It looks like dawn is coming. I've talked quite a bit, which isn't like me.
Shall we head out, Quinn?
I wake up. The first thing I felt was pain.
Heat and steam were raging, enough to bake me. Unable to endure the heat of the red-hot ground, I reinforced my footing with the Almeiza Machine. That pain proved that this place was not a dream. I could move my body of my own will.
Where was this? The surroundings were covered in thick fog. Beyond that fog, a massive shadow crossed. A giant was walking. The earth shook.
This was where the island had been. The single shot from the Railgun that the Colossus fired at the end of the battle with the Regenerating Squid had evaporated and exploded the sea, even altering the topography of the seabed at its roots. The previous island was no longer here. Where I stood was merely a part of the uplifted seabed.
There was no sign of the Regenerating Squid. It must have been evaporated without a single cell remaining. And despite being at the ground zero of such destruction, the red Colossus existed as if nothing had happened. Had it endured the explosion, or had it been destroyed and regenerated from nothing?
The reason I was safe was because until just a moment ago, I had been incorporated as part of the Colossus. For some reason, I was now separated. 'I was luckily overlooked'—there was no way such a thing was possible.
I recall the dream I saw just before. The most important memory is there. I desperately grasp at the fading threads of memory.
'Katroi...!'
That's right. I met him. That scene was not a record of the past. I certainly spoke with him.
He was in that place. Within me, he inherited his own spirit and received a new life. And once again, he saved me.
In order to let me escape, he took on the burden I was supposed to carry. He is capable of that. Allergic Incense attracts all malice. Even the self-loathing that the Red Armor forced upon me.
And so, I alone was saved. Many of 'me,' and he, are still within that suffering. The Colossus did not even look at me as it walked into the sea.
A feeling welled up. An uncontrollable emotion.
It was gratitude. I thanked him from the bottom of my heart.
Finally, I have reached the 'answer.' Who am I? Now, I can answer without hesitation.
I pick up the object lying beside me. It is scorched and tattered, but I recognize it. It is my storage bag. It is as sturdy as one would expect from material sourced from the Dark Continent. And I could never let go of this bag. The medicinal flowers tucked inside haunt me like a curse. They return to me.
The contents of the bag are safe. I take out a small stone and eat it. I don't just lick the Spirit Stone; I eat it all. I incorporate the power of that 'ore' into myself completely.