Naoto Miura had no interest in anything but machinery.
He was a steadfast machinery maniac. No, a zealot, or one who was afflicted with a heavy reliance on machinery.
Ever since his childhood, he loved gears, engine cylinders, screws, springs, and wires. He truly loved the metallic glossiness and the ceramic touch. His heart would be at ease whenever he heard the ticking of a clock, and his heart would race whenever he heard the pin of the music box hit the metallic domes.
None of this changed at all even when he entered Middle School.
No, one could say that it actually got worse.
He never showed any interest whether it was manga, anime, or games. While his peers were creating ruckus over gravure pictures, he was simply concerned with tinkering with machines.
He was more interested in how automobiles worked than the debate between big breasts and flat chests.
He was more interested in the outlines of machineries than the sight of his female classmates in swimsuits.
He was more interested in documentaries regarding the development of the latest mainsprings than the borrowing and lending of adult videos.
At that point, he realized it.
—I see. So I guess I’m considered ‘abnormal’ after all.
But even though he had realized it himself, he would not have had to suffer this much if he could change the nature he was born with.
There’s a saying that a person’s personality is fixed since they’re young, and Naoto Miura grew up to be how he was.
He had a twisted personality of devoting all his love into machinery, and it was completely futile to correct his personality.
Naoto Miura was already a lost cause.
●
35° N, 135° E.
Grid Japan, first layer, Kyoto.
It was one of the few megacities in Japan, dubbed the millenium capital.
In this completely mechanized city, there were some wooden houses left as a part of the world’s heritage, yet they did not fit into the modern city—this was the city Naoto Miura lived in.
At a corner of this megacity, barely on the edge of the urban area, there was a tattered apartment building tilting slightly to the side at a region—and there was a room on the right end of this 7-storey building most suited for a test of courage.
That was where Naoto’s residence was.
“Ahh—today’s a good day too!”
Naoto exclaimed as he climbed up the staircase that would seemingly collapse the next day.
He was a small boy dressed in black uniform.
The tack on his chest pocket indicated that he was still a First Year student. He had no special characteristics on his face, and he was wearing a pair of cheap neon green headphones on his ears, seeming pressing down his messy black hair.
His only distinguishing characteristic was his unique pale grey eyes, but this unique trait was overwhelmed by his savage expression, seemingly displaying his twisted personality.
“They blackmailed me, scammed me, made me their gofer, splashed water on me, and even scribbled on my table! What other forms of bullying have they not done to me!? Haha!”
Naoto let out a dry laugh forlornly.
—It had been a few years since he realized his abnormality.
But though he had known about it, he never reflected upon it, or rather, he took it in stride. He openly admitted his interests, told everyone about his character, and politely rejected a beautiful upperclassman girl, who confessed to such a boy like him for some reason, saying that she had no mechanical functions.
And this was the consequence.
Even when humanity had revolved their lives around gears, the bullying in school would not stop.
But this was simply a price he had to pay for lacking social awareness—though he had realized this. It was insufficient in easing the discomfort of his drenched uniform.
“Haa…goodness me. I’m back…”
He opened the door, its paint peeling off around, and entered his own house. However, nobody welcomed him.
Naoto had been living by himself.
Several years ago, his parents died one after another; he had no friends, no friends, and what was left to him was this dilapidated house—and the work tools his parents, third-rate mechanics, had used.
Naoto threw his bag into the bedroom, and walked down the corridor to the living room.
That was his workshop.
There was a pile of spare parts placed beside the door, and work equipment used for cutting spare parts at the wall. The air freshener used for sucking dust in was at the ceiling, letting out a quiet engine noise.
In the middle of this dim room was an operation table—no, a work table.
And lying on it was an automaton.
The model build was Japanese-styled, and the physique itself was of a young girl approximately 14 years old. The dull glass eyeballs were staring upwards listlessly, and one could see the wires and strings dangling out, exposed from the openings all over the body.
“I’m back…”
Naoto said to the girl.
That was the automata Naoto built out of scrap parts.
In this era, the entire planet was driven by gears, and it was not a difficult skill to recreate the human body through spare parts.
During the spare time left between school and part-time work, he would rummage through the waste disposal plant and relentlessly gather every single gear and screw, experiment with the equipment and textbooks his parents left behind over and over again, and through the foundations of his repeated failures, barely managed to recreate it till this extent through the use of scraps.
This thing, which had barely taken form, was Naoto’s pride and joy.
“Then, I’ll take a bath to refresh myself, and then work hard later.”
He encouraged himself, and turned back on his heel.
Naoto then removed all his clothes, except for this headphones, and leisurely ventured towards the bathroom.
●
Thud*“Uhhaa–!”
Naoto let out a strange sound as he packed his body into the cramped bathtub.
He cautiously flipped the page of the latest issue of the ‘Automata Fan’ so as to prevent it from being soaked by the bath water.
“So the leg components of the Karasawa Heavy Industries are very mobile after all!! Ohh!? This is beautiful Double Gear Architecture!! Is Murakami Industry God!?”
The thing that captivated Naoto so much was a monthly magazine pertaining to Automata Hobbyists. It was a professional magazine detailing the latest technological trends in the industry.
To Naoto, this magazine was his beloved, on the same level as his pride and joy.
“I have to check out Kaiyou Hall for the latest technology after all. No-Sign isn’t too bad in terms of overall cost price though, I guess. Hm… as for springs, Damaz’s Rotary…”
Naoto flipped through the magazine excitedly, only to suddenly stop.
Listed on that page was a special collection of automata springs. It listed the specifications and prices for comparison, ranging from the now-defunct old famous types to the latest military parts.
Once he saw the second-hand price of the oldest part amongst them, Naoto could only sigh.
He scratched his head briskly,
“The problem’s still the spring after all. This is the only thing I can’t pick up from the waste disposal plant.”
The spring for an automata functions by itself as an energy generator that extracts energy from gravity; when it is abandoned, there is a need to recycle it in a specialized facility. Thus, unlike the other parts, it would not be thrown into the waste disposal plant.
“…I don’t have any money to obtain it legally…”
It took him a year to gather the spare parts from everywhere. It then took him two years of countless failures before he finally managed to piece the automata into shape.
He spent such a long time building the automata, but he was unable to take a step forward.
The issue was because he could not get the spring, and also because of Naoto himself.
Naoto often neglected his well-being due to his fanaticism with mechanics, but his technical ability was medicore.
—It was true that as an amateur, he did learn quite a bit. His hands were nimble, and he certainly was in no way untalented.
But that was the limit.
Leaving aside the fact that he was unable purchase the orthodox spare parts to assemble it, he did not have any expertise or technical skills in re-assembling an automata through the use of faulty parts.
He did manage to study through the use of old textbooks, but the vocation of gear engineering was not so simple that an amateur could be fully self-taught in it. Even if he wanted to attend such speciality clock schools, he had no money.
Furthermore, there was still the issue of whether the patchwork of the automata could really move or not. It did not have any power, so he could not test its movements at all.
It can move, perhaps, probably, maybe, he thought.
This was the situation.
“…Well, money won’t fall on me no matter how I complain.”
Naoto sighed as he said so, and again focused his attention on the magazine.
—At that moment.
Through his earphones, his ears picked up on a foreign sound.
He lifted his head without thinking.
Obviously, there was nothing he could see other than the ceiling of the bathroom.
However, he clearly heard something rip through the space above. It was not a plane; something was closing in at an astounding speed—
BOOMM!!!
And so,
A boom that could have concussed him agitated his ears.
The bathroom and building shook, ostensibly lifted by the jolt. The magazine he inadvertently let go of plopped into the bathtub water—the ink quickly seeped away, and the magazine quickly blurred into a mosaic.
“Argh!! I haven’t finished reading it’—wait, now’s not the time for that! What was that!?”
After a instantaneous escape from reality, Naoto hurriedly leapt out of the bathtub.
A deafening noise and shock suddenly struck the apartment; it sounded as if an explosion or a building demolisher hammer had struck directly. Either that, or—
“A meteor…!? You gotta be kidding me!”
Naoto muttered to himself as he rushed out of the bathroom with a towel wrapped around him.
What exactly happened?
Either way, he would have to check that the automata in the workshop was fine–
“ARGGGHHHWSEDRFTGYFUJIKOLP—!?”
He let out a scream that was beyond nonsensical.
The living and dining room at the end of the corridor was completely wrecked.
The ceiling was broken through, and a large amount of rubble and dust buried the room completely.
“Ho-How can… this be possible…!”
Naoto’s knees collapsed onto the floor as he let out an anguished cry, bawling away.
“What!? What is it!? What exactly did I do!?”
He did not know what was going on at all.
He wanted to enjoy a bath and read a magazine, but a meteor crashed into his home, wrecking it. He really did not know what to say, but—
“Ri-Right—I got to see what’s going on!”
Naoto supported his limp body and forced himself to stand up.
Was it really a meteor?
Luckily, it seemed the living room was the only area hit. Perhaps the workshop further in might be fine.
“Ahh, seriously… damn, damn it! Imbecile!”
Naoto cursed out as he rushed to the scene of the wreckage, where the dust continued to permeate.
“Wha… what the!?”
With his tears and snot dangling, he peeled aside the pieces of rubble one by one.
“Haa, haa…!”
Naoto’s palm was bleeding, probably because he cut himself on something. While he was clearing the rubble, the floor was creaking.
He looked up, and found a large hole leading to the roof.
The floor was not broken through yet, but one had to wonder how long it could withstand the weight… perhaps there really was something that fell from the sky—
“Don’t tell me it really is a meteor…!? What did I do to trigger this kind of ridiculous development!?”
Naoto growled as he wiped the sweat off his forehead using his bleeding hand.
He wondered as he continued on.
What exactly caused this to happen?
If it was a human cause, he definitely had to make that person cry, apologize, and give compensation.
But if it was a real meteor… no, wait? It seemed a meteor could be worth lots of money. In this sense, it might be a blessing to him. He could live in a new apartment, and even buy a new spring—
As Naoto thought, there seemed to be something amidst the rubble, and he stopped as a result.
“…What, is this?”
Naoto stared at it, observing.
There was a large black box buried amidst the rubble—a container box.
Its texture and structure seemed to be different from that of a metal box, and it seemed like the only people who would use this would either be the ‘military’, or perhaps a certain research facility…?
But no matter what it was, it seemed there was something rather important hidden within.
“Well, it’s not a meteor anyway. It’s something valuable…right?”
One could tell simply by observing that it did not have the capability to withstand a fall from a great height—the container’s frame was largely dented and there was an opening large enough for a human to enter through.
Naoto pondered for a while, and then concluded.
“…Right, I don’t know what’s inside it, but if it’s something valuable, I’m going to use it as compensation and relief for my distress. Get ready!”
Naoto squeezed his body into the container gap and entered.
He stepped on the soft cushion material as he continued in, grumbling,
“If there’s no treasure inside, you better be ready, you know? No matter where you drop from, I’m going to investigate and demand for an apology and compensation, whether it’s through the judge or—”
However.
Naoto stopped talking once he saw what was inside the container.
No, he was not simply at a loss of words; his breath was taken away.
Perhaps his heart had ceased to beat.
That was the extent of shock he felt.
It was a coffin.
That was what Naoto thought, at least.
It was a coffin made of glass, filled with wondrous technology that resembled an intricate mechanical clockwork movement…
A girl was sleeping within it.
She was buried amidst the flowers of mechanical parts—screws, engine cylinders, wires, springs, gears, sleeping silently.
She seemed to be in her teens; she had flowing silver hair and a tender face. Though she was dressed in a simple, elegant black dress, that slender, pixie-like body could be imagined in his mind.
Naoto was left speechless.
Or rather, any critic, no matter how scathing they might be, would be left speechless.
A certain ‘ultimate’ form was right in front of him, able to instantly captivate the viewers’ heart. That beauty was not something that could be limited by the terms, pretty or cute; it had already encompassed all forms of beauty in the world.
…Right, it was…
The Clockwork doll, Automata, the ‘ultimate’ form…!
Once Naoto had realized this, he was in the midst of his ecstasy.
●
It was a ‘port’.
Several large stripes of steel laid below the black night sky .
Those were trestle bridges.
The 3500m runway was spinning counterclockwise against the massive gear of Grid Osaka’s, which was spinning slowly.
—Kansai International Airport.
It was an international interchange that was used long before this planet was covered in gears, full of history.
Though it had a history of more than 1000 years, the construct itself was refurbished a few years ago. The gears could be heard spinning everywhere, clear as crisp.
Amongst them, there was a large transport carrier at a corner of this harbor floating in mid-air, the 7th cloister, a runway that was not open to the public.
The work machines would enter from the opened hatch by the side, and containers with paint markings on them were transported out in an orderly manner, under the supervision of a massive number of workers.
The containers that passed through the runway would be sent to the storage in the 7th terminal area. They would then be loaded onto the trucks and sent to the pistons at all the hazard areas and back.
…Though that should have been the procedure.
“It fell, you say?”
The location, the reception room in the 7th terminal.
A girl dressed in deep blue shirt and beige summer coat-like haori turned her head around and asked skeptically.
“Well… it seems, there’s some sort of a problem…”
“I can tell.”
The girl sounded aloof as she swayed the light blond hair on her neck. She glared at the man sharply, prompting the latter to continue.
And in response, the man averted the girl’s stare throughout this conversation by lowering her head.
As he continued to fidget timidly, his image as the freight manager and the posh looking suit were already disintegrated.
“You just said that a container dropped. I’m having a little difficulty understanding this, what is that about?”
Was it a machine failure or a human error? No matter what, this certainly was a fault on the port’s side, especially since there was delicate machinery packed in a special casing. Even if it fell off during transport, there would not be any major issues.
“Was it an accident involving with workers on site?”
“No, that’s not it. The loading was fine, and the remaining containers were all shipped within an hour.”
It got more and more confusing.
Where exactly was the problem then?
The freight manager stuffed his sweaty handkerchief into his clutches, looking troubled as he stared at the girl.
“The accident I’m talking about happened in mid-flight, not during takeoff or landing.”
The girl remained silent as she watched the freight manager.
In response, the man could only say sheepishly, probably due to the pressure from the girl’s stare or her petite size that was probably a third of his.
“Well, it-it was a sudden request. There was a lapse in the loading work, so we forgot to fasten one of the containers…”
“So it fell out in mid-flight?”
“I-I’m really sorry about this…this is the first such incident ever since our airport began operations. We do admit that we spent quite a lot of time on this, and there was a delay in the report.”
“What’s the container that dropped off.”
The girl asked with a sharp, cool tone.
And the freight manager was ostensibly gasping,
“…The YD-01 Container.”
“—”
“I-I’m really sorry about that!”
He lowered his head further, but the girl did not pay any attention to him.
“…This is what you were trying to tell me, no?”
The girl spoke, her voice ostensibly rising from the depths of hell itself.
“A large carrier making an emergency flight has important personnel and materials on board, and for some reason, the hatch opened itself. One of the 3558 containers was not fastened due to carelessness, and it so happened to be the most important, precious one, ‘that’ irreplaceable container?”
“Yes…”
“If this is some sort of Japanese-styled joke, I really can’t laugh at that.”
“I-I’m really so…”
The man had apologized for the umpteenth time, and he peered at the girl, wanting to see her reaction.
Her stoic face remained emotionless as she stared back.
At this point, the freight manager was feeling no different from a death convict facing his own hanging.
In fact, the situation was quite similar to this metaphor. It was beyond the state of settlement through apology and compensation; it would be a major relief itself if he were simply fired, but from how the girl looked, perhaps the company would have to fold—perhaps?
The girls smiled as brightly as that as a blooming flower.
Her gentle green eyes showed a boyish look, her thin pink lips curling in joy.
—And a complete change occurred.
The girl turned sharply, slamming her suitcase into the man’s face.
His nose was broken, blood splattered.
She looked down at the man who squealed like a slaughtered pig, writhing in agony, her eyes blazing with rage.
She then spat:
“You’re useless at work, your excuses are foolish, your jokes are weak—looks like the hardworking and capable Japaneses are a thing of the past. Now I understand completely—Halter!”
Upon hearing the voice call for him, a bald man, who had been on standby in a corner of the room, slowly got up. He was over 2m tall, his muscular frame practically suited within a deep grey suit, and clearly, he looked the part of a professional killer or a terrorist no matter how it looked.
He spoke mildly.
“Meister Marie—I do think that it is uncourteous to raise your voice like that. Also, violence is never a good thing.”
Upon hearing this, the girl called ‘Meister Marie’ snorted, and snobbishly retorted:
“Halter, who hired these useless folks?”
The man questioned, Halter, stared at the sobbing freight manager in pity.
“No, their performance history has been very exceptional, and I do remember the whole team of staff performing well, very experienced in their work. The problem here, I think, should be the overly packed schedule?”
“So what? Are we going to just excuse an unprecedented, unexpected failure of the latest transport carrier dropping a cargo with ‘we were too busy’?”
The girl took out a ‘Chrono Compass’ from her chest pocket, saw the time on it, and sighed. It was a really intricate timepiece, a symbol of a ‘First Rate Clock Technician (Meister).
“—But it’s true that we really don’t have much time. Ahh, my sugar levels…”
The girl took out colorful pop candies, and started licking them, commanding with an unhappy look.
“Send for a reclamation team immediately. We need to confirm that the contents inside is unscathed, let alone the box. Ensure that she is taken back no matter what.”
“Understood.”
Halter bowed like a butler, and started using the telecommunication device inside the reception room.
The girl glanced at Halter sidelong, and went off to the lobby.
“…It’s true that we don’t have time.”
In the current world, cities were built upon gears.
As the gears continued to move, there was a limit as to how far they could transport things even if they were moving goods from one city to a neighboring one. The only ways were a ‘Cylinder Tunnel’ and the air route.
The construct of the ‘Cylinder Tunnel’ meant that they could not change directions freely, and due to the distance, an air delivery would be the only choice—
102 Technicians.
500 Automatas.
And 3558 Containers.
Even the girl felt that it was a little too tough delivering such a large batch of goods from Canada to Japan within a day.
However—
“Even if that’s the case, there has to be some limit to the kind of mistake made, right…!?”
Once she arrived at the entrance lobby, she found that the team team had already gathered there with their luggage in tow. Technicians of different genders, ages and race immediately stood still the moment they saw the girl.
They were looking at her, remaining still, but the girl showed no signs of timidity as she calmly asked,
“Is everyone ready?”
“Of course, Meister Marie.”
The man in his 50s, the mechanic officer, stood as their representative, and nodded. The girl then said to him:
“The unloading will be done in an hour. While all these are transported to the Core Tower in Kyoto, please unseal all the containers required for our work.”
“Leave it to us.”
“I will head directly to the scene once the work at the administrative bureau is done. We’ll begin work tomorrow, local time 06000. Before then, all automatas must have their springs installed, and the work teams will be left to each leader, understand?”
“Roger that.”
The staff members bowed politely to the young girl once she clearly stated her instructions.
The girl watched her team get ready to work, and sighed as she stood in the middle of the lobby.
Why was it that things were not proceeding smoothly this time?
It had been unprecedented, whether it was the short preparation time or the accident in the midst of transport.
“…I have a bad feeling about this.”
Let’s just hope I’m worrying too much. The girl muttered to herself.
At this moment:
“Pardon me, but are you Professor Marie Bell Breguet of the ‘Meister Guild’?”
A voice could be heard from behind, and the girl Marie turned back.
There were probably 10 men standing down there, dressed in black suits like they were at a funeral, smartly dressed in uninteresting ties.
Feeling repulsed by the fake smiles they showed, Marie spat dangerously:
“I don’t like people calling me by my full name.”
“My apologies then, Professor Breguet. It is an honor to meet you.”
The men maintained their smiles, and continued.
“We’re from the ‘military’, representing Grid Kyoto. Welcome.”
“I’m sorry that we were unable to arrange for living facilities on our side due to the abruptness of this situation. We have arranged a room for you in the Central Hotel, so if you don’t mind, Professor, please…”
“No need for that.”
Marie interrupted the men, and spoke.
“I’m grateful that you spent so much effort in this, but I have to hurry to the scene immediately and establish the restoration plans.”
“Is that so… however Professor Breguet, where do you plan to stay?”
“My staff would be sleeping there with just a blanket over them. I too will be at the scene like them.”
“But as the princess of the Breguet family…”
“We’re not here for sightseeing.”
I have nothing to say. With this attitude, Marie ignored the worried men as she turned towards the entrance.
The men hurriedly followed her.
“Please wait, Professor Breguet. We hope that you would at least rest in the hotel tonight. There’s a banquet arranged for tonight.”
“I don’t have the time.”
Marie marched on without looking back.
A man amongst the pack tried to argue back, saying:
“Professor Breguet, you don’t have to be so impatient.”
“Yes. Currently, Kyoto is undergoing maintenance with 1,400 technicians, more than 10,000 automatas available. There are no issues with safety.”
“Of course, we have instructed for them to follow your instructions during the work—”
“There’s no need for them.”
Marie turned back, speaking nonchalantly.
“Just leave the work to my team. Soon afterwards, I’ll send a representative to obtain the map data from you.”
“Y-Yes… but Kyoto is currently under the control of the ‘military’. I humbly do not think that nobody would be earlier on the city functions than us.”
“The city adjustments require an intricate amount of cooperative work. The work will not proceed smoothly if the technicians are not in sync.”
“Pardon me, Professor Breguet, but they are considered top notch in our country…”
“—I guess it’s to be expected of a country with the worst sense of jokes. Well, I guess I you won’t understand until I spell it out.”
And so, Marie showed a gentle smile.
“All the untrained amateurs will get in my way if they’re involved. This is what I’m trying to say.”
“This…”
These vicious words from Marie stumped the men. She taunted them with an icy stare, and sneered:
“Do you want me to tell you what you’re really thinking? This is the ‘military’s area, we’re watching over you, so don’t you dare try anything funny. That’s what you’re trying to say, right?”
“Su-Surely not? We definitely have no such…”
“Even if a drop of wine falls into mud, mud is still mud. But if a bit of mud is mixed into the wine, there’s no way to drink it.”
“…”
“There’s only one request I’m asking of you. Just keep your mouths shut and wait on the sidelines. You definitely can do that, right?”
After that, Marie turned to leave without anticipating the men’s responses, passing through the entrance gate.
There was an obsidian-like exquisite sedan parked at the rotary in front of the airport’s gate, and Halter, who made his move first, was waiting for her.
Marie handed the heavy luggage to Halter, and sat in the car.
Halter then got into the driver seat. Marie fastened her seatbelt, and said:
“Let’s go.”
“Understood.”
●
“—Going as planned.”
One of the black suited men said as they watched the sedan leave.
Interestingly, there was no sign of rage or dissatisfaction even after they were mocked by such a young lady. They were smiling, ostensibly relieved.
One of them grinned, and said,
“Luckily, she’s a haughty princess, just as the rumors have stated. She’s easy to manipulate.”
“Then, let us have her work for us.”
They showed sinister smiles, sneering at the words the girl had just mocked them for.
They were the only ones who heard these words.
●
“Ahh—I’m so tired.”
On the moving car.
Marie slumped into the seat like a deflated balloon.
Halter witnessed this through his rear-view mirror, and grimaced.
“It’s been tough on you.”
“Tough? My foot! I’m being watched by hyenas no matter where I go! You gotta be kidding me!”
She answered immaturely as she took off her summer coat and her boots. Then, she took a bar of chocolate from her bag pocket, and gnawed on it.
“Nobody, even the ‘Meister Guild’ or the Japanese government can do any preparations beforehand. I’m just a clock technician, why do I have to deal with the local organization?”
Marie fussed as she rolled about on the back seat, clearly abandoning all aspects of a insufferable princess who commanded the older men.
She was already in her arrogant and rotten girl mode.
Halter killed off the urge to laugh at such a huge difference, and reproved her.
“Well, Milady, please don’t forget your etiquette as a fine lady even if you’re in the car.”
“Leave me alone.”
“It’s my job anyway. See? The hem of your shirt is crumpled.”
“So? What? You wanna see?”
“I have no interest in brats. Maybe in another 10 years.”
“Die.”
Marie sent a kick into the back of the driver seat.
Halter nearly hit the steering wheel in the front, and laughed, saying:
“The brats at the Academy would faint with faint of happiness if they saw it.”
“Like I care about them. Who do you think I am?”
Well, of course. Halter broke a chuckle.
Ahem. He cleared his throat, and answered.
“You’re the famous, unprecedented beautiful Professor Bregeut who graduated as the valedictorian from many famous universities. During your studies, at the youngest age of 13, you managed to become a first-class clock technician, a Meister, the apex of 200 million clock technicians in the world. I, Halter, am really delighted to be your secretary—”
“That’s disgusting, just shut up!”
Marie wailed, and Halter stopped talking as he snickered away.
He gently stared at the girl, now puffing her cheeks, and continued,
“Please, Milady, do not go about making enemies.”
“What? Is that a lecture?”
“It is an advice. I do understand that you are very impatient about such things, but they are still important gears that create this society even if they are like that. We will not benefit in any way if they suffer and hate us.”
“I believe I’m already courteous with them already, no? If it were ‘big sister’, they would probably have vanished with their company.”
“There’s no need to compare yourself with that otherworldly…”
“Speaking of which, what else can those amateurs do?”
“—Yeah, they can’t do anything, nothing.”
This was the terrifying part, but this girl had yet to realize it.
Even though she had the highest level of talent in the world, she was still immature. Halter lowered his eyebrows.
“…Well, in fact,, there’s something funny going on.”
Marie continued to lean on the seat, enjoying her chocolate as she tilted her head.
“Though we sent them off because they’re too annoying, why are we rushing so much when there’s a ‘military’ base nearby?”
“Hm…? Speaking of which, what’s the reason they sent us in?”
“It’s just a common gravity problem. They said that there’s an error with the Core Tower, that the gravity can’t be reset to the normal values or something like that. The value has increased by 1% or so.”
“That’s really weird. A simple maintenance will be enough to settle that level of level.”
“Seriously. There’s no need to get everyone here on such short notice from Canada; why did they even call me here ‘just in case anything happens’?”
“The ‘military’ technicians however aren’t on our level of technical expertise let alone numbers. Had the Japanese Government not sent a request to the ‘Meister Guild’, they probably would be worried about being unable to deal with such responsibility if a mishap happened, perhaps?”
“It’s always politics, politics, politics everywhere… it’s unforgivable that my vacation’s in smokes just to save those geezers faces. Ahh, I miss Paris’ Absinthe…”
“That’s not something a young pretty girl should be drinking.”
“You’re annoying.”
“Yes yes—we’re going to the administrative bureau first, right?”
Halter asked, and Marie nodded as she gnawed on the chocolate.
“Ah—yes please. I plan to rest after finishing the procedures and the plans. Call me immediately no matter what if you find her.”
“Understood.”
She could see the center of this city from the car window. The Core Tower, standing tall into the clouds, would be her temporary workplace from the next day onwards. She lifted head, and saw that the ‘Equator Spring’, which seemingly split the sky into two, was spinning as usual.
This world was built through the use of a countless number of gears covering it.
And the one providing all the momentum was the ‘Equator Spring’, which created a massive amount of energy through the Moon’s gravitational pull.
—The Clockwork Planet.
A mechanical world that had its wind, temperature, weather and even gravity controlled by gears.
The dried seas, dead lands were chiselled into gears along with the entire crust.
Currently, there was nothing under those large gears.
The Earth had already become an empty husk floating in space.
It was a scenario that had continued since 1000 years ago.
But for this world that was no different from a very precise mechanical clock, regular maintenance was needed to ensure normal operations.
Any form of machinery could not continue running forever.
They would break down, age, depreciate, and finally cease to run.
Thus, there was a need to interfere and realign the gear mechanisms of the planet.
This would be Marie Bell Breguet’s job.
“I really… want some Absinthe.”
Marie indulged herself in the Bohemian atmosphere as she stared blankly at the scenery moving outside the window.
●
Naoto slowly approached the ‘coffin’ that was before him.
“I don’t know when the floor’s going to collapse. Got to move this thing away quickly…”
He had cold sweat upon him once he heard the floor creak on the slightest movement.
He twiddled with the ‘coffin’, looking for any openings. After searching, he did not find any holes or sorts. It did not seem to be a type that required a key, but there were many movable parts. Was it something like a puzzle…?
“Hm… over here? No, doesn’t fit. This one? Eh, what a waste of time—”
Click!
There seemed to be something meshing together at his hands, and the heavy springs inside the ‘coffin’ jumped. After that, the sound of gears spinning could be heard, and a white steam shot from the gap in the installation.
“Great, it’s open!”
He slowly opened the lid, released the belts fastening the girl down, pulled out the cables that were of unknown purposes, and pulled the girl out from the ‘coffin.
—She’s light.
That was the first thought he had.
This weight would not be unnatural for an ordinary girl, but she was very light for a full-sized automata. It was possible if she was an automata used for sex, but it would be hard to image such a high quality thing being simply used as a toy. No, however, what was with the softness of the skin? Which manufacturer made such skin quality?
“No, now’s not the time to think about this. If I don’t hurry…”
Naoto stumbled about as he carried the girl, spending quite some effort pulling her out from the container.
When looking out from this forcefully reformed open-aired living room, he could see the silhouette of the ‘equator spring’ driving this world behind the starry sky.
This building was practically a wasteland, and was afflicted by an impact equivalent to a meteor fall.
If he were to dawdle on, perhaps the floor would really collapse…?
Naoto calmly looked around to assess the situation, and at this moment, he found some sort of seal on the neck of the girl he was carrying.
—’Y, ‘RyuZU’.’
“…RyuZU? Is this her name?”
Of course, nobody would respond, but it probably was correct.
Naoto again wondered how to deal with this ‘ultimate automata’ ‘RyuZU—the first thing he needed to do was to ensure he had the necessary tools.
He pushed the rubble and went off to the workshop.
Luckily for him, the workshop did not seem to be really damaged.
He pushed the door aside, went inside, and found parts and tools scattered everywhere.
He carefully made sure not to let his bare feet step on them as he went towards the middle of the room, the work table.
He stared at the automata he had yet to complete—
He then made up his mind, and moved the incomplete automata from the work table to the hangar, putting RyuZU onto the table instead.
In the meantime, the building creaked and trembled, ostensibly giving off a warning.
He touched RyuZU’s neck, pricked his ears, and listened carefully.
“…The spring’s still moving, but nothing else is moving. Is it really broken after all?”
If that were the case, he could only repair it here.
He could not bring all the necessary tools, and even a miniscule amount of dust would cause an anomaly in the extremely small gears used on the automata.
He pondered over and over again, and made up his mind.
He decided that he would finish the repairs before the building collapse, and escape then.
“—Okay!”
He slapped his cheeks to motivate himself.
He put on his work clothes, took down the waist bag dangling on the wall, strapped it on his waist, readied the soft light on the work table, and switched it on.
The preparations were complete.
He carried the girl, and pulled down the fastener on the back.
He removed her dress like a person removing the wrapping of a present, and found the back profile of the girl’s white tender shoulders in front of him…
Naoto began to work in the midst of the wasteland-like building that was in danger of collapsing anything.
He turned RyuZU over, moved his fingers along the shoulder blades. There seemed to be something hard beneath the soft skin. He pressed it slightly, and it made a click as her back opened down the middle like blooming flowers.
“…Wah!”
The intricate functions were shown beneath the opened skin, causing him to feel that the entire universe was encompassed within.
Naoto gulped.
He really wanted to study the parts completely if not for the current situation. He shook his head and moved the extremely small tool into RyuZU’s back.
—If his actions were to be seen by a certain Meister, there would be an outcry, for sure.
Naoto’s methods were way too clumsy as compared to the complexity in RyuZU’s construct.
He was fumbling here and there due to his confusion and frustrations, but was able to accurately pinpoint the correct position for some reason. However, he had to retry over and over again due to choosing the wrong tool.
First, he had never used a measuring instrument, let alone a map.
A humanoid automata made completely of gears was a collection of millions of intricate parts. To repair a tiny gear without a map, one would need a pricey instrument meant for pinpointing the fault.
That should be the case, but Naoto was searching through the infrequent use of his hearing.
And there had yet to be a mistake. It was as if he did not need to check, but that he already knew where the fault was…
“—Is it here?”
Right, Naoto definitely knew where the fault laid.
For he simply needed to hear.
It was as if there was a melodica blown by a kindergartener in the midst of an orchestra larger than the Vienna Philharmonic.
There was a stain in this perfect masterpiece.
How could anyone stand the presence of such a disturbance?
A perfect design, product, was imperfect because it could not move, and in summary, right—it was frustrating. That was what Naoto thought.
However, the problem…
“What’s this part anyway…?”
Naoto’s knowledge and expertises were insufficient for him to understand this.
He had no idea what this part was, or why it broke.
In the end, he could only hear and slowly try to adjust the countless number of keyholes one by one.
If his hand accidentally slipped, he could slice the mock nerves that were thinner than spider threads, or he could end up tilting the nanosized gears. Once the Main Cylinder was damaged, it would be unsalvageable.
It was a risky challenge of utmost danger.
…And Naoto spent 3 full hours doing this dangerous repair job.
●
“—Haa…!”
3 hours passed.
It was a harrowing 3 hours where his body, and probably his soul were grinded.
Naoto’s mind and endurance was depleted, his breathing erratic.
“Thi-this should be repaired now… I guess?”
He had confidence, but he thought uneasily.
His ears were telling him it was fine, but he had never checked the construct itself.
At this point, a sense of regret rose in him.
Should an amateur like him have tinkered around with this supreme machinery? If it were to fail, he would have committed an irredeemable crime.
Naoto felt fear creep into him the moment he thought this, and shook his head.
“…No, it’ll activate again once I spin the spring again… I think.”
Naoto reached his hand tentatively for the girl’s nape—the spring hidden under the silver hair, and calmly started to spin it.
However, the building did not look to be in good condition. The ceiling had been shaking for quite a while, and new cracks were forming on it as tiny fragments were peeling off and dropping.
“…Haa… haa….”
He spun the spring round after round, gathering elastic energy to activate it.
But no matter how much he spun it, he could not feel anything.
A throbbing regret rose from his gut, and bounded him tightly.
No way, no way no way! Did I really fail?
“—Damn… you gotta be kidding me!”
Pshh—
He heard a fatal sound.
He did not see it, and in fact, he did not want to know the details.
Even so, Naoto’s ears could conclude through the headphones.
The building was starting to collapse.
“Ah, da…”
He looked up.
The ceiling just so happened to collapse, falling right at Naoto—and RyuZU.
But at the same time, he felt a slight touch on his hand.
At that instant.
—RyuZU jumped up from the work table without any foreboding.
She was at immediate top gear.
The girl embraced Naoto with such a fluid motion, it was impossible to see her activating.
The leg actuators were spinning at full speed, and the accel gears were spinning rapidly as RyuZU shot out of the window beside her, with Naoto in her embrace, like a cannon.
All this happened in mere milliseconds before the ceiling collapsed.
“Uh, wahh…”
They were falling.
Inertia had captured the duo.
The 7th level of the apartments was approximately 20m tall, and an ordinary automata would not be able to land safely from this height. It would definitely be wrecked, and Naoto would land directly on the ground… however, the automata girl carrying Naoto showed elegance and smile—and poise.
Naoto stared at her sidelong expression.
It was a short moment of several seconds, but it felt dozens of times longer than that.
The moment they were close to the ground, the girl suddenly moved her legs and changed her position, agilely spinning around.
They landed.
“—!!”
A heavy thud could be heard.
But the impact did not reach Naoto at all.
How potent are the shock removers in this automata? Are the leg constructs wrecked? Ahh, is the artificial skin damaged by the glass–?
“…”
RyuZU wordlessly let go of him, and he left the girl’s clutches as he landed.
And so, he fell without managing to stand straight.
His mind was completely blank, and he could not think properly at her. He merely stared blankly at the girl in front of him.
“Y—”
The girl’s dazzling topaz eyes were staring at Naoto with a mysterious glint.
And he could only blink blankly at her.
The breath from the slightly opened mouth was shaking the air.
“Yo—u—”
The vocal generator started to shake, and there was some noise mixed with the voice.
Was there an error because it was not activated for a long time? The girl reached her hand for the neck, lifted her eyes to the sky, and adjusted her vocal generator.
Soon after, she slowly lowered her arms, looking satisfied as she nodded.
After adjusting herself and her clothes.
She stood still, ostensibly reverting back to the perfect state she always was in for hundreds of years.
The girl briefly looked around to check the surroundings, and again stared at her feet.
“Are you perhaps the one who repaired me?”
It was a delightful voice, ostensibly played by a music box.
The mercury-colored girl was slender and lovely, wearing a dress that was ostensibly woven from the night itself.
A pair of dazzling golden eyes, ostensibly made of precious stones, stared at the speechless person in front of her.
“—Ahh, after one such silly malfunction, I was forced to suspend functions for 1,804,926 hours, and yet humanity’s intelligence still remained at a level no better than that of a flea? I sense neither intelligence nor grace, but are you perhaps the first graduate from that level.”
If he were to listen closely, he could slightly hear an inorganic audio driver.
But that rhythm was overlapping with the inadvertent high-pitched throbbing of his head.
“…Goodness. Humanity’s foolishness knows no boundaries. If possible, I sincerely wish that My Master is at least a superior being to that of an insect.”
Her words were scathing, but she still reached her hand out to Naoto elegantly.
Her expression was gentle, in stark contrast to her spiteful words, and a smile lingered on her lips.
Naoto too smiled back, reached his hand out, and gave a thumbs up with all his might.
And at that instant, he lost consciousness.
Naoto Miura had no interest in anything but machinery.
He was a steadfast machinery maniac. No, a zealot, or one who was afflicted with a heavy reliance on machinery.
Ever since his childhood, he loved gears, engine cylinders, screws, springs, and wires. He truly loved the metallic glossiness and the ceramic touch. His heart would be at ease whenever he heard the ticking of a clock, and his heart would race whenever he heard the pin of the music box hit the metallic domes.
None of this changed at all even when he entered Middle School.
No, one could say that it actually got worse.
He never showed any interest whether it was manga, anime, or games. While his peers were creating ruckus over gravure pictures, he was simply concerned with tinkering with machines.
He was more interested in how automobiles worked than the debate between big breasts and flat chests.
He was more interested in the outlines of machineries than the sight of his female classmates in swimsuits.
He was more interested in documentaries regarding the development of the latest mainsprings than the borrowing and lending of adult videos.
At that point, he realized it.
—I see. So I guess I’m considered ‘abnormal’ after all.
But even though he had realized it himself, he would not have had to suffer this much if he could change the nature he was born with.
There’s a saying that a person’s personality is fixed since they’re young, and Naoto Miura grew up to be how he was.
He had a twisted personality of devoting all his love into machinery, and it was completely futile to correct his personality.
Naoto Miura was already a lost cause.
●
35° N, 135° E.
Grid Japan, first layer, Kyoto.
It was one of the few megacities in Japan, dubbed the millenium capital.
In this completely mechanized city, there were some wooden houses left as a part of the world’s heritage, yet they did not fit into the modern city—this was the city Naoto Miura lived in.
At a corner of this megacity, barely on the edge of the urban area, there was a tattered apartment building tilting slightly to the side at a region—and there was a room on the right end of this 7-storey building most suited for a test of courage.
That was where Naoto’s residence was.
“Ahh—today’s a good day too!”
Naoto exclaimed as he climbed up the staircase that would seemingly collapse the next day.
He was a small boy dressed in black uniform.
The tack on his chest pocket indicated that he was still a First Year student. He had no special characteristics on his face, and he was wearing a pair of cheap neon green headphones on his ears, seeming pressing down his messy black hair.
His only distinguishing characteristic was his unique pale grey eyes, but this unique trait was overwhelmed by his savage expression, seemingly displaying his twisted personality.
“They blackmailed me, scammed me, made me their gofer, splashed water on me, and even scribbled on my table! What other forms of bullying have they not done to me!? Haha!”
Naoto let out a dry laugh forlornly.
—It had been a few years since he realized his abnormality.
But though he had known about it, he never reflected upon it, or rather, he took it in stride. He openly admitted his interests, told everyone about his character, and politely rejected a beautiful upperclassman girl, who confessed to such a boy like him for some reason, saying that she had no mechanical functions.
And this was the consequence.
Even when humanity had revolved their lives around gears, the bullying in school would not stop.
But this was simply a price he had to pay for lacking social awareness—though he had realized this. It was insufficient in easing the discomfort of his drenched uniform.
“Haa…goodness me. I’m back…”
He opened the door, its paint peeling off around, and entered his own house. However, nobody welcomed him.
Naoto had been living by himself.
Several years ago, his parents died one after another; he had no friends, no friends, and what was left to him was this dilapidated house—and the work tools his parents, third-rate mechanics, had used.
Naoto threw his bag into the bedroom, and walked down the corridor to the living room.
That was his workshop.
There was a pile of spare parts placed beside the door, and work equipment used for cutting spare parts at the wall. The air freshener used for sucking dust in was at the ceiling, letting out a quiet engine noise.
In the middle of this dim room was an operation table—no, a work table.
And lying on it was an automaton.
The model build was Japanese-styled, and the physique itself was of a young girl approximately 14 years old. The dull glass eyeballs were staring upwards listlessly, and one could see the wires and strings dangling out, exposed from the openings all over the body.
“I’m back…”
Naoto said to the girl.
That was the automata Naoto built out of scrap parts.
In this era, the entire planet was driven by gears, and it was not a difficult skill to recreate the human body through spare parts.
During the spare time left between school and part-time work, he would rummage through the waste disposal plant and relentlessly gather every single gear and screw, experiment with the equipment and textbooks his parents left behind over and over again, and through the foundations of his repeated failures, barely managed to recreate it till this extent through the use of scraps.
This thing, which had barely taken form, was Naoto’s pride and joy.
“Then, I’ll take a bath to refresh myself, and then work hard later.”
He encouraged himself, and turned back on his heel.
Naoto then removed all his clothes, except for this headphones, and leisurely ventured towards the bathroom.
●
Thud*“Uhhaa–!”
Naoto let out a strange sound as he packed his body into the cramped bathtub.
He cautiously flipped the page of the latest issue of the ‘Automata Fan’ so as to prevent it from being soaked by the bath water.
“So the leg components of the Karasawa Heavy Industries are very mobile after all!! Ohh!? This is beautiful Double Gear Architecture!! Is Murakami Industry God!?”
The thing that captivated Naoto so much was a monthly magazine pertaining to Automata Hobbyists. It was a professional magazine detailing the latest technological trends in the industry.
To Naoto, this magazine was his beloved, on the same level as his pride and joy.
“I have to check out Kaiyou Hall for the latest technology after all. No-Sign isn’t too bad in terms of overall cost price though, I guess. Hm… as for springs, Damaz’s Rotary…”
Naoto flipped through the magazine excitedly, only to suddenly stop.
Listed on that page was a special collection of automata springs. It listed the specifications and prices for comparison, ranging from the now-defunct old famous types to the latest military parts.
Once he saw the second-hand price of the oldest part amongst them, Naoto could only sigh.
He scratched his head briskly,
“The problem’s still the spring after all. This is the only thing I can’t pick up from the waste disposal plant.”
The spring for an automata functions by itself as an energy generator that extracts energy from gravity; when it is abandoned, there is a need to recycle it in a specialized facility. Thus, unlike the other parts, it would not be thrown into the waste disposal plant.
“…I don’t have any money to obtain it legally…”
It took him a year to gather the spare parts from everywhere. It then took him two years of countless failures before he finally managed to piece the automata into shape.
He spent such a long time building the automata, but he was unable to take a step forward.
The issue was because he could not get the spring, and also because of Naoto himself.
Naoto often neglected his well-being due to his fanaticism with mechanics, but his technical ability was medicore.
—It was true that as an amateur, he did learn quite a bit. His hands were nimble, and he certainly was in no way untalented.
But that was the limit.
Leaving aside the fact that he was unable purchase the orthodox spare parts to assemble it, he did not have any expertise or technical skills in re-assembling an automata through the use of faulty parts.
He did manage to study through the use of old textbooks, but the vocation of gear engineering was not so simple that an amateur could be fully self-taught in it. Even if he wanted to attend such speciality clock schools, he had no money.
Furthermore, there was still the issue of whether the patchwork of the automata could really move or not. It did not have any power, so he could not test its movements at all.
It can move, perhaps, probably, maybe, he thought.
This was the situation.
“…Well, money won’t fall on me no matter how I complain.”
Naoto sighed as he said so, and again focused his attention on the magazine.
—At that moment.
Through his earphones, his ears picked up on a foreign sound.
He lifted his head without thinking.
Obviously, there was nothing he could see other than the ceiling of the bathroom.
However, he clearly heard something rip through the space above. It was not a plane; something was closing in at an astounding speed—
BOOMM!!!
And so,
A boom that could have concussed him agitated his ears.
The bathroom and building shook, ostensibly lifted by the jolt. The magazine he inadvertently let go of plopped into the bathtub water—the ink quickly seeped away, and the magazine quickly blurred into a mosaic.
“Argh!! I haven’t finished reading it’—wait, now’s not the time for that! What was that!?”
After a instantaneous escape from reality, Naoto hurriedly leapt out of the bathtub.
A deafening noise and shock suddenly struck the apartment; it sounded as if an explosion or a building demolisher hammer had struck directly. Either that, or—
“A meteor…!? You gotta be kidding me!”
Naoto muttered to himself as he rushed out of the bathroom with a towel wrapped around him.
What exactly happened?
Either way, he would have to check that the automata in the workshop was fine–
“ARGGGHHHWSEDRFTGYFUJIKOLP—!?”
He let out a scream that was beyond nonsensical.
The living and dining room at the end of the corridor was completely wrecked.
The ceiling was broken through, and a large amount of rubble and dust buried the room completely.
“Ho-How can… this be possible…!”
Naoto’s knees collapsed onto the floor as he let out an anguished cry, bawling away.
“What!? What is it!? What exactly did I do!?”
He did not know what was going on at all.
He wanted to enjoy a bath and read a magazine, but a meteor crashed into his home, wrecking it. He really did not know what to say, but—
“Ri-Right—I got to see what’s going on!”
Naoto supported his limp body and forced himself to stand up.
Was it really a meteor?
Luckily, it seemed the living room was the only area hit. Perhaps the workshop further in might be fine.
“Ahh, seriously… damn, damn it! Imbecile!”
Naoto cursed out as he rushed to the scene of the wreckage, where the dust continued to permeate.
“Wha… what the!?”
With his tears and snot dangling, he peeled aside the pieces of rubble one by one.
“Haa, haa…!”
Naoto’s palm was bleeding, probably because he cut himself on something. While he was clearing the rubble, the floor was creaking.
He looked up, and found a large hole leading to the roof.
The floor was not broken through yet, but one had to wonder how long it could withstand the weight… perhaps there really was something that fell from the sky—
“Don’t tell me it really is a meteor…!? What did I do to trigger this kind of ridiculous development!?”
Naoto growled as he wiped the sweat off his forehead using his bleeding hand.
He wondered as he continued on.
What exactly caused this to happen?
If it was a human cause, he definitely had to make that person cry, apologize, and give compensation.
But if it was a real meteor… no, wait? It seemed a meteor could be worth lots of money. In this sense, it might be a blessing to him. He could live in a new apartment, and even buy a new spring—
As Naoto thought, there seemed to be something amidst the rubble, and he stopped as a result.
“…What, is this?”
Naoto stared at it, observing.
There was a large black box buried amidst the rubble—a container box.
Its texture and structure seemed to be different from that of a metal box, and it seemed like the only people who would use this would either be the ‘military’, or perhaps a certain research facility…?
But no matter what it was, it seemed there was something rather important hidden within.
“Well, it’s not a meteor anyway. It’s something valuable…right?”
One could tell simply by observing that it did not have the capability to withstand a fall from a great height—the container’s frame was largely dented and there was an opening large enough for a human to enter through.
Naoto pondered for a while, and then concluded.
“…Right, I don’t know what’s inside it, but if it’s something valuable, I’m going to use it as compensation and relief for my distress. Get ready!”
Naoto squeezed his body into the container gap and entered.
He stepped on the soft cushion material as he continued in, grumbling,
“If there’s no treasure inside, you better be ready, you know? No matter where you drop from, I’m going to investigate and demand for an apology and compensation, whether it’s through the judge or—”
However.
Naoto stopped talking once he saw what was inside the container.
No, he was not simply at a loss of words; his breath was taken away.
Perhaps his heart had ceased to beat.
That was the extent of shock he felt.
It was a coffin.
That was what Naoto thought, at least.
It was a coffin made of glass, filled with wondrous technology that resembled an intricate mechanical clockwork movement…
A girl was sleeping within it.
She was buried amidst the flowers of mechanical parts—screws, engine cylinders, wires, springs, gears, sleeping silently.
She seemed to be in her teens; she had flowing silver hair and a tender face. Though she was dressed in a simple, elegant black dress, that slender, pixie-like body could be imagined in his mind.
Naoto was left speechless.
Or rather, any critic, no matter how scathing they might be, would be left speechless.
A certain ‘ultimate’ form was right in front of him, able to instantly captivate the viewers’ heart. That beauty was not something that could be limited by the terms, pretty or cute; it had already encompassed all forms of beauty in the world.
…Right, it was…
The Clockwork doll, Automata, the ‘ultimate’ form…!
Once Naoto had realized this, he was in the midst of his ecstasy.
●
It was a ‘port’.
Several large stripes of steel laid below the black night sky .
Those were trestle bridges.
The 3500m runway was spinning counterclockwise against the massive gear of Grid Osaka’s, which was spinning slowly.
—Kansai International Airport.
It was an international interchange that was used long before this planet was covered in gears, full of history.
Though it had a history of more than 1000 years, the construct itself was refurbished a few years ago. The gears could be heard spinning everywhere, clear as crisp.
Amongst them, there was a large transport carrier at a corner of this harbor floating in mid-air, the 7th cloister, a runway that was not open to the public.
The work machines would enter from the opened hatch by the side, and containers with paint markings on them were transported out in an orderly manner, under the supervision of a massive number of workers.
The containers that passed through the runway would be sent to the storage in the 7th terminal area. They would then be loaded onto the trucks and sent to the pistons at all the hazard areas and back.
…Though that should have been the procedure.
“It fell, you say?”
The location, the reception room in the 7th terminal.
A girl dressed in deep blue shirt and beige summer coat-like haori turned her head around and asked skeptically.
“Well… it seems, there’s some sort of a problem…”
“I can tell.”
The girl sounded aloof as she swayed the light blond hair on her neck. She glared at the man sharply, prompting the latter to continue.
And in response, the man averted the girl’s stare throughout this conversation by lowering her head.
As he continued to fidget timidly, his image as the freight manager and the posh looking suit were already disintegrated.
“You just said that a container dropped. I’m having a little difficulty understanding this, what is that about?”
Was it a machine failure or a human error? No matter what, this certainly was a fault on the port’s side, especially since there was delicate machinery packed in a special casing. Even if it fell off during transport, there would not be any major issues.
“Was it an accident involving with workers on site?”
“No, that’s not it. The loading was fine, and the remaining containers were all shipped within an hour.”
It got more and more confusing.
Where exactly was the problem then?
The freight manager stuffed his sweaty handkerchief into his clutches, looking troubled as he stared at the girl.
“The accident I’m talking about happened in mid-flight, not during takeoff or landing.”
The girl remained silent as she watched the freight manager.
In response, the man could only say sheepishly, probably due to the pressure from the girl’s stare or her petite size that was probably a third of his.
“Well, it-it was a sudden request. There was a lapse in the loading work, so we forgot to fasten one of the containers…”
“So it fell out in mid-flight?”
“I-I’m really sorry about this…this is the first such incident ever since our airport began operations. We do admit that we spent quite a lot of time on this, and there was a delay in the report.”
“What’s the container that dropped off.”
The girl asked with a sharp, cool tone.
And the freight manager was ostensibly gasping,
“…The YD-01 Container.”
“—”
“I-I’m really sorry about that!”
He lowered his head further, but the girl did not pay any attention to him.
“…This is what you were trying to tell me, no?”
The girl spoke, her voice ostensibly rising from the depths of hell itself.
“A large carrier making an emergency flight has important personnel and materials on board, and for some reason, the hatch opened itself. One of the 3558 containers was not fastened due to carelessness, and it so happened to be the most important, precious one, ‘that’ irreplaceable container?”
“Yes…”
“If this is some sort of Japanese-styled joke, I really can’t laugh at that.”
“I-I’m really so…”
The man had apologized for the umpteenth time, and he peered at the girl, wanting to see her reaction.
Her stoic face remained emotionless as she stared back.
At this point, the freight manager was feeling no different from a death convict facing his own hanging.
In fact, the situation was quite similar to this metaphor. It was beyond the state of settlement through apology and compensation; it would be a major relief itself if he were simply fired, but from how the girl looked, perhaps the company would have to fold—perhaps?
The girls smiled as brightly as that as a blooming flower.
Her gentle green eyes showed a boyish look, her thin pink lips curling in joy.
—And a complete change occurred.
The girl turned sharply, slamming her suitcase into the man’s face.
His nose was broken, blood splattered.
She looked down at the man who squealed like a slaughtered pig, writhing in agony, her eyes blazing with rage.
She then spat:
“You’re useless at work, your excuses are foolish, your jokes are weak—looks like the hardworking and capable Japaneses are a thing of the past. Now I understand completely—Halter!”
Upon hearing the voice call for him, a bald man, who had been on standby in a corner of the room, slowly got up. He was over 2m tall, his muscular frame practically suited within a deep grey suit, and clearly, he looked the part of a professional killer or a terrorist no matter how it looked.
He spoke mildly.
“Meister Marie—I do think that it is uncourteous to raise your voice like that. Also, violence is never a good thing.”
Upon hearing this, the girl called ‘Meister Marie’ snorted, and snobbishly retorted:
“Halter, who hired these useless folks?”
The man questioned, Halter, stared at the sobbing freight manager in pity.
“No, their performance history has been very exceptional, and I do remember the whole team of staff performing well, very experienced in their work. The problem here, I think, should be the overly packed schedule?”
“So what? Are we going to just excuse an unprecedented, unexpected failure of the latest transport carrier dropping a cargo with ‘we were too busy’?”
The girl took out a ‘Chrono Compass’ from her chest pocket, saw the time on it, and sighed. It was a really intricate timepiece, a symbol of a ‘First Rate Clock Technician (Meister).
“—But it’s true that we really don’t have much time. Ahh, my sugar levels…”
The girl took out colorful pop candies, and started licking them, commanding with an unhappy look.
“Send for a reclamation team immediately. We need to confirm that the contents inside is unscathed, let alone the box. Ensure that she is taken back no matter what.”
“Understood.”
Halter bowed like a butler, and started using the telecommunication device inside the reception room.
The girl glanced at Halter sidelong, and went off to the lobby.
“…It’s true that we don’t have time.”
In the current world, cities were built upon gears.
As the gears continued to move, there was a limit as to how far they could transport things even if they were moving goods from one city to a neighboring one. The only ways were a ‘Cylinder Tunnel’ and the air route.
The construct of the ‘Cylinder Tunnel’ meant that they could not change directions freely, and due to the distance, an air delivery would be the only choice—
102 Technicians.
500 Automatas.
And 3558 Containers.
Even the girl felt that it was a little too tough delivering such a large batch of goods from Canada to Japan within a day.
However—
“Even if that’s the case, there has to be some limit to the kind of mistake made, right…!?”
Once she arrived at the entrance lobby, she found that the team team had already gathered there with their luggage in tow. Technicians of different genders, ages and race immediately stood still the moment they saw the girl.
They were looking at her, remaining still, but the girl showed no signs of timidity as she calmly asked,
“Is everyone ready?”
“Of course, Meister Marie.”
The man in his 50s, the mechanic officer, stood as their representative, and nodded. The girl then said to him:
“The unloading will be done in an hour. While all these are transported to the Core Tower in Kyoto, please unseal all the containers required for our work.”
“Leave it to us.”
“I will head directly to the scene once the work at the administrative bureau is done. We’ll begin work tomorrow, local time 06000. Before then, all automatas must have their springs installed, and the work teams will be left to each leader, understand?”
“Roger that.”
The staff members bowed politely to the young girl once she clearly stated her instructions.
The girl watched her team get ready to work, and sighed as she stood in the middle of the lobby.
Why was it that things were not proceeding smoothly this time?
It had been unprecedented, whether it was the short preparation time or the accident in the midst of transport.
“…I have a bad feeling about this.”
Let’s just hope I’m worrying too much. The girl muttered to herself.
At this moment:
“Pardon me, but are you Professor Marie Bell Breguet of the ‘Meister Guild’?”
A voice could be heard from behind, and the girl Marie turned back.
There were probably 10 men standing down there, dressed in black suits like they were at a funeral, smartly dressed in uninteresting ties.
Feeling repulsed by the fake smiles they showed, Marie spat dangerously:
“I don’t like people calling me by my full name.”
“My apologies then, Professor Breguet. It is an honor to meet you.”
The men maintained their smiles, and continued.
“We’re from the ‘military’, representing Grid Kyoto. Welcome.”
“I’m sorry that we were unable to arrange for living facilities on our side due to the abruptness of this situation. We have arranged a room for you in the Central Hotel, so if you don’t mind, Professor, please…”
“No need for that.”
Marie interrupted the men, and spoke.
“I’m grateful that you spent so much effort in this, but I have to hurry to the scene immediately and establish the restoration plans.”
“Is that so… however Professor Breguet, where do you plan to stay?”
“My staff would be sleeping there with just a blanket over them. I too will be at the scene like them.”
“But as the princess of the Breguet family…”
“We’re not here for sightseeing.”
I have nothing to say. With this attitude, Marie ignored the worried men as she turned towards the entrance.
The men hurriedly followed her.
“Please wait, Professor Breguet. We hope that you would at least rest in the hotel tonight. There’s a banquet arranged for tonight.”
“I don’t have the time.”
Marie marched on without looking back.
A man amongst the pack tried to argue back, saying:
“Professor Breguet, you don’t have to be so impatient.”
“Yes. Currently, Kyoto is undergoing maintenance with 1,400 technicians, more than 10,000 automatas available. There are no issues with safety.”
“Of course, we have instructed for them to follow your instructions during the work—”
“There’s no need for them.”
Marie turned back, speaking nonchalantly.
“Just leave the work to my team. Soon afterwards, I’ll send a representative to obtain the map data from you.”
“Y-Yes… but Kyoto is currently under the control of the ‘military’. I humbly do not think that nobody would be earlier on the city functions than us.”
“The city adjustments require an intricate amount of cooperative work. The work will not proceed smoothly if the technicians are not in sync.”
“Pardon me, Professor Breguet, but they are considered top notch in our country…”
“—I guess it’s to be expected of a country with the worst sense of jokes. Well, I guess I you won’t understand until I spell it out.”
And so, Marie showed a gentle smile.
“All the untrained amateurs will get in my way if they’re involved. This is what I’m trying to say.”
“This…”
These vicious words from Marie stumped the men. She taunted them with an icy stare, and sneered:
“Do you want me to tell you what you’re really thinking? This is the ‘military’s area, we’re watching over you, so don’t you dare try anything funny. That’s what you’re trying to say, right?”
“Su-Surely not? We definitely have no such…”
“Even if a drop of wine falls into mud, mud is still mud. But if a bit of mud is mixed into the wine, there’s no way to drink it.”
“…”
“There’s only one request I’m asking of you. Just keep your mouths shut and wait on the sidelines. You definitely can do that, right?”
After that, Marie turned to leave without anticipating the men’s responses, passing through the entrance gate.
There was an obsidian-like exquisite sedan parked at the rotary in front of the airport’s gate, and Halter, who made his move first, was waiting for her.
Marie handed the heavy luggage to Halter, and sat in the car.
Halter then got into the driver seat. Marie fastened her seatbelt, and said:
“Let’s go.”
“Understood.”
●
“—Going as planned.”
One of the black suited men said as they watched the sedan leave.
Interestingly, there was no sign of rage or dissatisfaction even after they were mocked by such a young lady. They were smiling, ostensibly relieved.
One of them grinned, and said,
“Luckily, she’s a haughty princess, just as the rumors have stated. She’s easy to manipulate.”
“Then, let us have her work for us.”
They showed sinister smiles, sneering at the words the girl had just mocked them for.
They were the only ones who heard these words.
●
“Ahh—I’m so tired.”
On the moving car.
Marie slumped into the seat like a deflated balloon.
Halter witnessed this through his rear-view mirror, and grimaced.
“It’s been tough on you.”
“Tough? My foot! I’m being watched by hyenas no matter where I go! You gotta be kidding me!”
She answered immaturely as she took off her summer coat and her boots. Then, she took a bar of chocolate from her bag pocket, and gnawed on it.
“Nobody, even the ‘Meister Guild’ or the Japanese government can do any preparations beforehand. I’m just a clock technician, why do I have to deal with the local organization?”
Marie fussed as she rolled about on the back seat, clearly abandoning all aspects of a insufferable princess who commanded the older men.
She was already in her arrogant and rotten girl mode.
Halter killed off the urge to laugh at such a huge difference, and reproved her.
“Well, Milady, please don’t forget your etiquette as a fine lady even if you’re in the car.”
“Leave me alone.”
“It’s my job anyway. See? The hem of your shirt is crumpled.”
“So? What? You wanna see?”
“I have no interest in brats. Maybe in another 10 years.”
“Die.”
Marie sent a kick into the back of the driver seat.
Halter nearly hit the steering wheel in the front, and laughed, saying:
“The brats at the Academy would faint with faint of happiness if they saw it.”
“Like I care about them. Who do you think I am?”
Well, of course. Halter broke a chuckle.
Ahem. He cleared his throat, and answered.
“You’re the famous, unprecedented beautiful Professor Bregeut who graduated as the valedictorian from many famous universities. During your studies, at the youngest age of 13, you managed to become a first-class clock technician, a Meister, the apex of 200 million clock technicians in the world. I, Halter, am really delighted to be your secretary—”
“That’s disgusting, just shut up!”
Marie wailed, and Halter stopped talking as he snickered away.
He gently stared at the girl, now puffing her cheeks, and continued,
“Please, Milady, do not go about making enemies.”
“What? Is that a lecture?”
“It is an advice. I do understand that you are very impatient about such things, but they are still important gears that create this society even if they are like that. We will not benefit in any way if they suffer and hate us.”
“I believe I’m already courteous with them already, no? If it were ‘big sister’, they would probably have vanished with their company.”
“There’s no need to compare yourself with that otherworldly…”
“Speaking of which, what else can those amateurs do?”
“—Yeah, they can’t do anything, nothing.”
This was the terrifying part, but this girl had yet to realize it.
Even though she had the highest level of talent in the world, she was still immature. Halter lowered his eyebrows.
“…Well, in fact,, there’s something funny going on.”
Marie continued to lean on the seat, enjoying her chocolate as she tilted her head.
“Though we sent them off because they’re too annoying, why are we rushing so much when there’s a ‘military’ base nearby?”
“Hm…? Speaking of which, what’s the reason they sent us in?”
“It’s just a common gravity problem. They said that there’s an error with the Core Tower, that the gravity can’t be reset to the normal values or something like that. The value has increased by 1% or so.”
“That’s really weird. A simple maintenance will be enough to settle that level of level.”
“Seriously. There’s no need to get everyone here on such short notice from Canada; why did they even call me here ‘just in case anything happens’?”
“The ‘military’ technicians however aren’t on our level of technical expertise let alone numbers. Had the Japanese Government not sent a request to the ‘Meister Guild’, they probably would be worried about being unable to deal with such responsibility if a mishap happened, perhaps?”
“It’s always politics, politics, politics everywhere… it’s unforgivable that my vacation’s in smokes just to save those geezers faces. Ahh, I miss Paris’ Absinthe…”
“That’s not something a young pretty girl should be drinking.”
“You’re annoying.”
“Yes yes—we’re going to the administrative bureau first, right?”
Halter asked, and Marie nodded as she gnawed on the chocolate.
“Ah—yes please. I plan to rest after finishing the procedures and the plans. Call me immediately no matter what if you find her.”
“Understood.”
She could see the center of this city from the car window. The Core Tower, standing tall into the clouds, would be her temporary workplace from the next day onwards. She lifted head, and saw that the ‘Equator Spring’, which seemingly split the sky into two, was spinning as usual.
This world was built through the use of a countless number of gears covering it.
And the one providing all the momentum was the ‘Equator Spring’, which created a massive amount of energy through the Moon’s gravitational pull.
—The Clockwork Planet.
A mechanical world that had its wind, temperature, weather and even gravity controlled by gears.
The dried seas, dead lands were chiselled into gears along with the entire crust.
Currently, there was nothing under those large gears.
The Earth had already become an empty husk floating in space.
It was a scenario that had continued since 1000 years ago.
But for this world that was no different from a very precise mechanical clock, regular maintenance was needed to ensure normal operations.
Any form of machinery could not continue running forever.
They would break down, age, depreciate, and finally cease to run.
Thus, there was a need to interfere and realign the gear mechanisms of the planet.
This would be Marie Bell Breguet’s job.
“I really… want some Absinthe.”
Marie indulged herself in the Bohemian atmosphere as she stared blankly at the scenery moving outside the window.
●
Naoto slowly approached the ‘coffin’ that was before him.
“I don’t know when the floor’s going to collapse. Got to move this thing away quickly…”
He had cold sweat upon him once he heard the floor creak on the slightest movement.
He twiddled with the ‘coffin’, looking for any openings. After searching, he did not find any holes or sorts. It did not seem to be a type that required a key, but there were many movable parts. Was it something like a puzzle…?
“Hm… over here? No, doesn’t fit. This one? Eh, what a waste of time—”
Click!
There seemed to be something meshing together at his hands, and the heavy springs inside the ‘coffin’ jumped. After that, the sound of gears spinning could be heard, and a white steam shot from the gap in the installation.
“Great, it’s open!”
He slowly opened the lid, released the belts fastening the girl down, pulled out the cables that were of unknown purposes, and pulled the girl out from the ‘coffin.
—She’s light.
That was the first thought he had.
This weight would not be unnatural for an ordinary girl, but she was very light for a full-sized automata. It was possible if she was an automata used for sex, but it would be hard to image such a high quality thing being simply used as a toy. No, however, what was with the softness of the skin? Which manufacturer made such skin quality?
“No, now’s not the time to think about this. If I don’t hurry…”
Naoto stumbled about as he carried the girl, spending quite some effort pulling her out from the container.
When looking out from this forcefully reformed open-aired living room, he could see the silhouette of the ‘equator spring’ driving this world behind the starry sky.
This building was practically a wasteland, and was afflicted by an impact equivalent to a meteor fall.
If he were to dawdle on, perhaps the floor would really collapse…?
Naoto calmly looked around to assess the situation, and at this moment, he found some sort of seal on the neck of the girl he was carrying.
—’Y, ‘RyuZU’.’
“…RyuZU? Is this her name?”
Of course, nobody would respond, but it probably was correct.
Naoto again wondered how to deal with this ‘ultimate automata’ ‘RyuZU—the first thing he needed to do was to ensure he had the necessary tools.
He pushed the rubble and went off to the workshop.
Luckily for him, the workshop did not seem to be really damaged.
He pushed the door aside, went inside, and found parts and tools scattered everywhere.
He carefully made sure not to let his bare feet step on them as he went towards the middle of the room, the work table.
He stared at the automata he had yet to complete—
He then made up his mind, and moved the incomplete automata from the work table to the hangar, putting RyuZU onto the table instead.
In the meantime, the building creaked and trembled, ostensibly giving off a warning.
He touched RyuZU’s neck, pricked his ears, and listened carefully.
“…The spring’s still moving, but nothing else is moving. Is it really broken after all?”
If that were the case, he could only repair it here.
He could not bring all the necessary tools, and even a miniscule amount of dust would cause an anomaly in the extremely small gears used on the automata.
He pondered over and over again, and made up his mind.
He decided that he would finish the repairs before the building collapse, and escape then.
“—Okay!”
He slapped his cheeks to motivate himself.
He put on his work clothes, took down the waist bag dangling on the wall, strapped it on his waist, readied the soft light on the work table, and switched it on.
The preparations were complete.
He carried the girl, and pulled down the fastener on the back.
He removed her dress like a person removing the wrapping of a present, and found the back profile of the girl’s white tender shoulders in front of him…
Naoto began to work in the midst of the wasteland-like building that was in danger of collapsing anything.
He turned RyuZU over, moved his fingers along the shoulder blades. There seemed to be something hard beneath the soft skin. He pressed it slightly, and it made a click as her back opened down the middle like blooming flowers.
“…Wah!”
The intricate functions were shown beneath the opened skin, causing him to feel that the entire universe was encompassed within.
Naoto gulped.
He really wanted to study the parts completely if not for the current situation. He shook his head and moved the extremely small tool into RyuZU’s back.
—If his actions were to be seen by a certain Meister, there would be an outcry, for sure.
Naoto’s methods were way too clumsy as compared to the complexity in RyuZU’s construct.
He was fumbling here and there due to his confusion and frustrations, but was able to accurately pinpoint the correct position for some reason. However, he had to retry over and over again due to choosing the wrong tool.
First, he had never used a measuring instrument, let alone a map.
A humanoid automata made completely of gears was a collection of millions of intricate parts. To repair a tiny gear without a map, one would need a pricey instrument meant for pinpointing the fault.
That should be the case, but Naoto was searching through the infrequent use of his hearing.
And there had yet to be a mistake. It was as if he did not need to check, but that he already knew where the fault was…
“—Is it here?”
Right, Naoto definitely knew where the fault laid.
For he simply needed to hear.
It was as if there was a melodica blown by a kindergartener in the midst of an orchestra larger than the Vienna Philharmonic.
There was a stain in this perfect masterpiece.
How could anyone stand the presence of such a disturbance?
A perfect design, product, was imperfect because it could not move, and in summary, right—it was frustrating. That was what Naoto thought.
However, the problem…
“What’s this part anyway…?”
Naoto’s knowledge and expertises were insufficient for him to understand this.
He had no idea what this part was, or why it broke.
In the end, he could only hear and slowly try to adjust the countless number of keyholes one by one.
If his hand accidentally slipped, he could slice the mock nerves that were thinner than spider threads, or he could end up tilting the nanosized gears. Once the Main Cylinder was damaged, it would be unsalvageable.
It was a risky challenge of utmost danger.
…And Naoto spent 3 full hours doing this dangerous repair job.
●
“—Haa…!”
3 hours passed.
It was a harrowing 3 hours where his body, and probably his soul were grinded.
Naoto’s mind and endurance was depleted, his breathing erratic.
“Thi-this should be repaired now… I guess?”
He had confidence, but he thought uneasily.
His ears were telling him it was fine, but he had never checked the construct itself.
At this point, a sense of regret rose in him.
Should an amateur like him have tinkered around with this supreme machinery? If it were to fail, he would have committed an irredeemable crime.
Naoto felt fear creep into him the moment he thought this, and shook his head.
“…No, it’ll activate again once I spin the spring again… I think.”
Naoto reached his hand tentatively for the girl’s nape—the spring hidden under the silver hair, and calmly started to spin it.
However, the building did not look to be in good condition. The ceiling had been shaking for quite a while, and new cracks were forming on it as tiny fragments were peeling off and dropping.
“…Haa… haa….”
He spun the spring round after round, gathering elastic energy to activate it.
But no matter how much he spun it, he could not feel anything.
A throbbing regret rose from his gut, and bounded him tightly.
No way, no way no way! Did I really fail?
“—Damn… you gotta be kidding me!”
Pshh—
He heard a fatal sound.
He did not see it, and in fact, he did not want to know the details.
Even so, Naoto’s ears could conclude through the headphones.
The building was starting to collapse.
“Ah, da…”
He looked up.
The ceiling just so happened to collapse, falling right at Naoto—and RyuZU.
But at the same time, he felt a slight touch on his hand.
At that instant.
—RyuZU jumped up from the work table without any foreboding.
She was at immediate top gear.
The girl embraced Naoto with such a fluid motion, it was impossible to see her activating.
The leg actuators were spinning at full speed, and the accel gears were spinning rapidly as RyuZU shot out of the window beside her, with Naoto in her embrace, like a cannon.
All this happened in mere milliseconds before the ceiling collapsed.
“Uh, wahh…”
They were falling.
Inertia had captured the duo.
The 7th level of the apartments was approximately 20m tall, and an ordinary automata would not be able to land safely from this height. It would definitely be wrecked, and Naoto would land directly on the ground… however, the automata girl carrying Naoto showed elegance and smile—and poise.
Naoto stared at her sidelong expression.
It was a short moment of several seconds, but it felt dozens of times longer than that.
The moment they were close to the ground, the girl suddenly moved her legs and changed her position, agilely spinning around.
They landed.
“—!!”
A heavy thud could be heard.
But the impact did not reach Naoto at all.
How potent are the shock removers in this automata? Are the leg constructs wrecked? Ahh, is the artificial skin damaged by the glass–?
“…”
RyuZU wordlessly let go of him, and he left the girl’s clutches as he landed.
And so, he fell without managing to stand straight.
His mind was completely blank, and he could not think properly at her. He merely stared blankly at the girl in front of him.
“Y—”
The girl’s dazzling topaz eyes were staring at Naoto with a mysterious glint.
And he could only blink blankly at her.
The breath from the slightly opened mouth was shaking the air.
“Yo—u—”
The vocal generator started to shake, and there was some noise mixed with the voice.
Was there an error because it was not activated for a long time? The girl reached her hand for the neck, lifted her eyes to the sky, and adjusted her vocal generator.
Soon after, she slowly lowered her arms, looking satisfied as she nodded.
After adjusting herself and her clothes.
She stood still, ostensibly reverting back to the perfect state she always was in for hundreds of years.
The girl briefly looked around to check the surroundings, and again stared at her feet.
“Are you perhaps the one who repaired me?”
It was a delightful voice, ostensibly played by a music box.
The mercury-colored girl was slender and lovely, wearing a dress that was ostensibly woven from the night itself.
A pair of dazzling golden eyes, ostensibly made of precious stones, stared at the speechless person in front of her.
“—Ahh, after one such silly malfunction, I was forced to suspend functions for 1,804,926 hours, and yet humanity’s intelligence still remained at a level no better than that of a flea? I sense neither intelligence nor grace, but are you perhaps the first graduate from that level.”
If he were to listen closely, he could slightly hear an inorganic audio driver.
But that rhythm was overlapping with the inadvertent high-pitched throbbing of his head.
“…Goodness. Humanity’s foolishness knows no boundaries. If possible, I sincerely wish that My Master is at least a superior being to that of an insect.”
Her words were scathing, but she still reached her hand out to Naoto elegantly.
Her expression was gentle, in stark contrast to her spiteful words, and a smile lingered on her lips.
Naoto too smiled back, reached his hand out, and gave a thumbs up with all his might.
And at that instant, he lost consciousness.
