[200] 1. God's Mercy (5)
Shirone grit his teeth. There was nothing else he could do.
He could probably cast magic, but if he tried to teleport in his current condition his body would be shattered.
'Damn it! I have to move somehow.'
If time kept passing like this, Kanya's mother would die.
No — everyone would die. In the end, what would remain would be a hideous giant whose name no one could even know.
"Give up, foolish humans. No one can stand against Ra's Law."
Igirin watched with satisfaction as all the humans knelt.
This was authority. Obedience wasn't imposed; it came willingly.
"Damn, why is this thing so heavy?"
At the voice from behind the statue, Igirin's expression stiffened.
Then came the thud, thud of footsteps. Everyone turned as if a ghost had appeared.
Tess cried out, face lit up.
"Rian!"
Rian frowned and took a step forward.
He felt like he weighed a ton.
Yet he wasn't being crushed because the burden was being distributed throughout his body.
"What did you do to me? My body's absurdly heavy."
"How can I move…?"
This wasn't a magic you could fight with raw strength. Because the load was applied in proportion to muscle mass, the stronger the muscles, the heavier the body would become.
If he could move, there was only one way: exert more force than his muscles could normally produce.
Of course, even that couldn't be called normal human ability.
'Exert force beyond the body? No way. That's one of the highest giant techniques.'
While Igirin mulled it over, a dull noise came from where Shirone and the others stood.
"Heh heh heh, what a ridiculous magic. This is why combat is fun."
A Harvester rose up from Kanis's shadow.
Shirone realized something by watching Rian and the Harvester.
The load being applied was relative, not absolute. If the activation principle differed, the countermeasures would too — that was crucial information.
"Where should I grab first?"
The Harvester surged at Igirin. But Igirin's flying ability was no joke.
Shirone, briefly absorbed by the chase as if watching a match, shouted to Rian.
"Rian! There's no time! You have to break the statue!"
When Rian raised his greatsword toward the statue, the airborne Igirin's face went pale.
You could excuse the shadow chasing them as nonhuman, but the swordsman was flesh and blood.
To swing a greatsword while under the effects of an unregulated rite required dominion over the body approaching one hundred percent.
Rian let out a shout and slammed the blade down on the statue — a thunderous crash.
The citizens flinched, but not a single crack appeared on the statue.
Rian ground his teeth.
He wanted to smash everything in sight, but in the current situation all he could do was add another blow.
"Damn it! If only this weren't some weird magic!"
The liquid in the orb had risen to half. The targets already seemed resigned, eyes closed.
From their perspective, they'd almost prefer to hate Rian — if no one interfered, everything would have been peaceful by now.
Arin spoke over the mental channel.
- We have to find a way. Binding the movements of hundreds with a single utterance doesn't fit equivalent exchange. There must be a condition we're missing.
Shirone agreed.
No matter how bizarre an unregulated rite's power, it still operated within the zero-sum of equivalent exchange.
Judging by the strength of the effect, there had to be some way to release the binding while under it.
Shirone replayed Marsha's advice.
Unregulated rites are deeply tied to their caster's disposition.
Igirin was a fairy of authority. So it was likely an omniscience shaped around the concept of authority.
"Yaaaagh!"
Rian kept hammering at the statue.
Each booming strike made the citizens' faces pale one by one.
Then, at some point, Amy's crimson eyes flared. Her self-image had detected an immediate change in bodily state.
- Shirone, it's not a fixed binding. The weight just dropped by about five kilograms. Now seven, nine... Every time Rian swings, weight leaks off.
Shirone's eyes brightened. Through Amy's words he grasped the mechanism behind Igirin's unregulated rite.
"Rian! Keep striking! Ilhwa's Art isn't some regenerative spell! It's murder!"
- Shirone! It just dropped by about sixty kilograms! Could it be...!
- Yeah! Not exact, but it looks like Igirin quantifies authority into physical force. The more people who doubt, the weaker the load becomes.
As if to confirm Shirone's thought, Igirin's features twisted.
At Shirone's cry that Ilhwa's Art was murder, counts of doubt suddenly surged.
It wasn't a howl of blind hatred. It meant the heretics had figured out the magic's triggering condition.
An unregulated-rite authority.
Igirin could bring a scale to the faith and doubt of beings within her domain.
The moment she spoke the verbal command, every living thing around split into believers and doubters.
There were 318 people gathered in the central square; believers to doubters were 293 to 25.
If everyone believed in Igirin, the unit-area burden would equal one hundred percent of their muscle strength, making movement theoretically impossible.
Conversely, if the rate of belief fell to half or less, the Price of Usurpation would trigger, and Igirin would pay the cost of having a one hundred percent load applied to her for twenty-four hours.
Shirone realized why Rian's actions affected the magic. The fear of the heavenly symbol being desecrated was sowing seeds of doubt in the citizens' hearts.
In fact, each time Rian struck the giant statue, the burden eased, if only slightly.
"Everyone, wake up! Ilhwa's Art is a lie! It's a spell meant to kill you!"
He kept pressing the citizens, but the weight stopped decreasing.
Trials strengthen faith.
Some might be terrified; others would burn with even stronger will.
"Shut up! You're the ones deceiving us!"
"Kill them! Kill the heretics!"
The faithful's fury at the statue's desecration reached a boiling point.
As fanatics multiplied, some doubters began to rethink, bit by bit.
Shirone persisted despite knowing how foolish it was. It was the only resistance possible while immobilized.
"Ilhwa's Art is regenerative? Next, it'll be your turn! Don't you get it?"
"We will follow the Law. We will complete the lifespan given by Ra and return to our original bodies!"
Shirone clenched his teeth. No matter the unregulated rite, the citizens' closed minds made him furious.
"You can live longer! The targets of Ilhwa's Art don't necessarily have to die today!"
As if his words were a lie, the citizens' shouting ceased. They all stared at Shirone in stunned silence.
At that sudden quiet, the Harvester abandoned the chase after Igirin.
There was no way this would be decided in the current state.
It judged it better to unsettle the citizens psychologically through her than to keep the chase going.
Igirin narrowed her eyes. The numbers showed how effective Shirone's words had been.
267 to 51.
Seventeen percent of the gathered targets had begun to doubt. The reduction in load was noticeable. A sharp change in sensation would work against maintaining authority.
"You say they can live longer? We... could live longer?"
"Yes. If those the Ilhwa's Art kills truly died because their lifespan had run out, we could at least give them a funeral. But they're not dying. Ilhwa's Art cannot be your grave!"
- Shirone, what are you saying?
Amy couldn't believe it. The lifespan ledger was absolute; wasn't that why the citizens followed? If this was a makeshift dodge to save face, the fallout would be terrible.
Shirone wasn't speaking with absolute certainty either. But after a night of thought, he concluded the possibility wasn't zero.
"I met heretics in Purgatory. Some of them hadn't been born in heaven. So they didn't know their lifespans. But no one else could control their lives."
"That's because they're heretics..."
"Wake up! Don't you understand? It's not that they choose not to; they can't because they have no names. If God is omnipotent, why is a name necessary?"
Igirin's expression grew grave.
229 to 89.
If the proportion of doubters exceeded half, authority would collapse. Only seventy counts remained to reach that point.
The executor shouted.
"Silence! That is merely the Law's principle as well! Whether we gain eternal life or are reborn by Ra's will does not change! Do not mock the faithful with heretics' logic!"
"It's not the Law! It's magic! If Ra's power is in any way tied to magic, then you can live longer!"
The word "magic" had an effect. If the sacred phenomenon arising from the Law was merely magic, then the stature of the divine could be reduced to human terms.
"How can you live longer? Do you have any proof?"
Someone in the crowd yelled.
Igirin glared at him. The doubt tally had just increased by one.
"I've studied the properties of time. To cut to the chase: time is relative. It applies differently to everyone here."
Among the citizens were those who studied time — mages from Nor and optical scientists from Meka.
Their number was maybe six. 222 to 96. Those who understood Shirone's words began to doubt.
"Even if that's true, so what?"
"If the power that grants lifespan is linked to time, then the lifespans of Ilhwa's Art targets aren't exact. Even if a lifespan is set at forty years, they won't necessarily die precisely at that forty-year mark. The time they experience is fluid."
"But that's just a hypothesis. If it's Law and not magic, then we have no chance at rebirth."
"It's not just a hypothesis. It can be tested. Even if everyone loses ten years, the times they were born differ. So why doesn't Ilhwa's Art adjust for that?"
206 to 112.
Forty-seven people remained.
Igirin peered into the glass orb. The black liquid was full. The body begins to decompose from the moment of death, so if anyone drowned, the rite would be as good as complete.
"If they could live even a little longer — even one second — then Ilhwa's Art is murder. It's drowning the targets and desecrating their corpses!"
The executor's eyes widened.
"Be silent! Even if what you say were true, what would change? The value of life isn't measured by time! Are you asking us to deny Ra for one extra second of life?"
"That one second is the second between choosing whether to write your own final period or not! Why won't you think about that?"
Igirin thought she could turn this around here.
243 to 75.
As expected, more people returned to belief.
Shirone had made a naive calculation. For humans, control over life isn't truly important.
What they want is benefit.
There's nothing to gain from a slightly longer lifespan. The faithful would gladly step into Ilhwa's Art, counting on the future.
As if to prove the scale's numbers, the citizens hurled curses at Shirone one after another.
"Damn it! We almost fell for it! Lifespans are fixed after all! Nothing would've changed!"
"You call yourself a Nephilim and scam people—spouting nonsense again? One second? What could you possibly do with one second?"