Ch.145The City That Denied the Sun. Belfort (4)

“It’s warm.”

“Mm.”

The rooftop was close to the sun, so naturally, it was warm.

The occasional chilly breeze reminded me that it was still winter, but without that wind, today’s cloudless weather could easily be mistaken for summer.

What reasons could those who tried to deny the sun have had, in a place so close to it, to incite a rebellion against the sun?

The Imperial Era may have had issues with quality, but quantity was never a problem.

It was a time when human civilization flourished to the point where technology was read as miracle, and magic was read as blessing.

“And yet they rebelled…”

I closed my eyes and felt the sunlight entering my body.

A slight stinging sensation tinged with faint anger made me open my eyes again, allowing me to glimpse, however slightly, the memories of that day.

Anger toward a sun that provides light but not grace. Directionless hatred nestled in the hearts of powerless common folk who couldn’t purify the rotting earth with their own strength…

In the end, the reason was nothing but insignificant hatred and stale anger.

Humanity’s sun does not help humanity.

Why doesn’t a being powerful enough to bestow the world’s light wield an iron fist against the corrupted? Why doesn’t it reach out to those standing at the edge of life?

If it can but doesn’t, it is evil; if it cannot, it is incompetent.

In the end, the omnipotent and merciful god failed to wash away humanity’s instinctive desire for judgment and punishment.

Just as darkness comes even under the sun’s light, and blizzards rage despite warm sunshine…

“In the end, mercy couldn’t overcome violence…”

I muttered while looking at the statues of the rebellion’s instigators carved on the rooftop.

People need light to live, but they cannot live by that alone.

They need food, clothing, shelter, and more fundamentally, they need faith to live as humans.

From the belief that tomorrow will be better than today, to the belief that the wicked will be punished and the good rewarded.

And… in the end, the sun failed to give them faith.

In so many ways.

The sun still watches over us from above, following us endlessly.

As if saying it wants to see with its own eyes how far you as a human can go, what you can accomplish.

I closed my eyes once more and accepted the sunlight shining on the rooftop.

Once again, I feel the light enveloping my body.

This time, there was no pain.

Instead, something else began to be felt.

Something enormous, filled with questions.

[Was I wrong?]

No, you weren’t.

[Then why did my descendants fall?]

I don’t know. I’m just an ordinary person born after everything had perished.

[How sorrowful! Where have all the cities and altars built under my radiance gone?]

They remain as myths woven into legend, becoming layers deep within the earth where we stand.

Like bedrock supporting soil, like rebar supporting concrete. Just as you’ve endured many wounds but never abandoned being humanity’s sun, so too shall I.

[Was I wrong? Do humans truly need divine blessing because they are weak?]

Humans must forge their own destiny. As I have done, others also have the strength to do so. It’s just that those who fear standing on their own have thrown their souls into the four storms that ravage them…

[I no longer see children bearing my name. Those who fly to me on rockets have forgotten their reverence for me… All I hear are the pitiful sounds tickling my ears from children bathed in sunlight…]

Then shed tears to make rain, and cry out to make thunder.

You are humanity’s sun.

Blood, desire, knowledge, prosperity—all exist beneath you.

Don’t you have the power to raise storms to wash away bloodstains, shine light to show the way to those trapped by desire, move stars to make those who thirst for knowledge tremble, and bring storms to turn prosperity into decline?

[But I cannot. For I have seen in the darkness.]

What did you see?

Can I empathize with your pain?

[My child, you are too weak. You cannot withstand my power that drove away the flickering darkness in the swirling shadows and the chaos crawling in the storming blackness.]

Why do you provide the materials to forge a sword but not the one to wield it?

Didn’t you feel it too when fighting against darkness… that humanity instinctively yearns for heroes…

[Look at the chaos of this world. Do the apostles blessed by the Four seem to have made this world better?]

….

I couldn’t answer.

If neither one nor many can be the answer, what should humanity worship absolutely?

Is the absence of absolutes the only absolute?

[I wanted humanity to rise by its own power. I wanted it to shine so brilliantly that it would belittle gods and consider my greatest achievements minimal. Like a baby eating solid food for the first time… like a baby speaking its first words instead of babbling…]

How sorrowful.

This was both my emotion and his.

Everything I had felt throughout my life, and everything he had guarded while burning at the unreachable center of the heavens, was melting into the world.

[But I failed… just as my empire collapsed…]

This was regret, disappointment, curse, and simultaneously, expectation.

He had not yet given up being the sun, and we had not yet given up being human.

As long as even the most vicious thief becomes a kind adult to children, as long as parents share their portion with their children, as long as men and women love each other and continue their lineage, his sacrifice will continue.

Even if 99% had fallen, if 1% remained pure, one could never say all of humanity had fallen—that was why he still illuminated humanity.

Because he was humanity’s god, the sum of humanity, humanity’s master, and humanity’s sun.

I looked at the sun.

Before the brilliantly shining sunlight, the light of stars could not reach, and no one on earth could escape the sun.

Why me?

Is my soul still pure?

So many people died… I killed so many…

[When you looked at the sky, what did you feel? When you were young. When you chose between life and death…]

Ah…

I think I now understand why the sun chose me.

I felt freedom then.

I had the aspiration to walk this world freely on my own two feet, and the ambition to embrace everything within reach of my arms.

Is that really all?

[Yes, it is.]

And when I opened my eyes, I realized I was flying above the clouds, wrapped in the sun’s radiance.

And from below, I could hear the shouts of those watching me, and only then did I truly grasp that I had brought the sun to a land that had denied it.

“It’s the sun! The sun!”

“It’s come to punish us!”

“What is that guy?! An apostle of the sun?!”

Fear.

What a narrow-minded emotion.

They shot guns and arrows toward the sky, and soon flames, lightning, rocks, and wind flew toward me.

And like cotton thrown by a child, they instantly dissipated in the sunlight, feeling like dandelion fluff blown by the wind when they touched my skin.

“It’s coming down! The sun is coming down!”

“Kill it! Kill it!”

And finally, with the light, I set foot on the ground of this city again.

To be surrounded by the citizens of this city who hated and feared the sun more than anyone.

[“We have come here.”]

We spoke.

The sun’s radiance descended upon every part of the city, shadows vanished, darkness retreated, and people’s eyes began to be purified of the impurities they had accumulated as they beheld the pure light for the first time.

[“And here we shall remain.”]

Yes.

The sun goes nowhere.

It simply watches over our journey as we walk forward with our burning souls.

[“After 210,001 years and 1201 years of patience, we bring you glorious news: your original sin has been erased.”]

The sins of the ancestors end here.

What remains are the newly born who have received forgiveness.

Now they will become ancestors themselves, continuing this city for eternity.

[“Rejoice and be glad, for we shall walk the world with you.”]