Ch.254016 Investigation Record – Double Compensation (4)

“Such articles would sell well, but… people love conspiracy theories as much as reassuring words, don’t they? For example, what if the terminals being transported are disappearing?”

The industrial spirit—small, or rather, the size of a large dog excluding its head—sat on its haunches like a dog in front of me. Its bizarre appearance with a grinder instead of a head was quite frightening.

Being frightening isn’t necessarily bad. In fact, in this situation, it was perfect. He tried to dismiss my words with laughter.

“How could such a thing happen? This is a task entrusted to us with the infinite trust of the Industrial Spirit King. Suggesting otherwise would be disrespectful not only to us but also to the Industrial Spirit King…”

His attitude instantly became defensive. I gently cut him off. Smiling back, I unwound the thread I had been spinning. This was Michael’s language. I always borrow words from others.

“It would be disrespectful, wouldn’t it? I was assigned this job, but it doesn’t seem like it will make for an interesting article. I wonder why the Industrial Spirit King keeps asking me to cover such ordinary matters?”

I spoke as if trying to lighten the mood before the interview. He was visibly relieved and flustered—so transparent that even I could see it clearly. Like Carmen said, he was the transparent type of person.

The contents were different. Perhaps not so different, but the direction in which those contents were used was completely different, so it was fair to say they were different. He smoothed down his chest.

“You have a talent for frightening people, reporter. And… I think the Industrial Spirit King might be bored. Honestly, if I were living a life where I couldn’t even raise my body, bound to the ground, with only a handful of matters requiring direct attention, I’d call for people too. Wouldn’t you?”

The Industrial Spirit King would never feel boredom. Instead of giving up because he could do nothing, he thought. The machine of the age, pressed flat against New York, endlessly thought.

He had been intoxicated by his fear of the end, and emerging from that intoxication, he sought ways to resolve that fear… or the end he had prophesied. There would be no time for boredom.

I said the opposite of what I felt. Naturally, I took his hand and walked out to a place beyond the ordinary. The industrial spirit would protect my body.

“That could be! But I don’t think he gets too bored? If you’re bound like that, even watching ants crawl over your body would be entertaining. The size difference between the Industrial Spirit King and us is about that much… Oh, is where you transport the terminals not on the Industrial Spirit King’s body?”

A series of affirmative murmurs followed, and he naturally nodded. Then his body stiffened as if the nod itself had been a mistake.

“Ah, haha. Are you suddenly moving to the interview? It’s probably because those Hive Mind commies built their building outside to avoid being monitored by the Industrial Spirit King.”

He tries to shift blame to the Idealists. And he clearly didn’t say “monitoring.” Usually, they express it as the Industrial Spirit King naturally knowing things.

This all means there’s something more that’s bothering them. Still, if I pressed any further, he seemed likely to get angry. Unfortunately, I didn’t have the ability to extract more information here.

I can borrow others’ words, but not their methods. Either speak now or never speak again. That kind of talk belonged to someone else, not me.

“Hmm, I think it’s good to naturally move to the interview. No matter how boring the job is, we can’t spend all day talking about other things, can we? Could you tell me more about the transportation work?”

What I heard afterward was quite nutritious for an article but not particularly useful for uncovering the story of disappearing terminals. I only discovered that they were deliberately hiding something.

Should I contact Husband Detective Agency on my way in? This seemed like it might be dangerous work again… but I felt I could handle these riffraff on my own.

After stroking the industrial spirit’s back, I waved goodbye to the drivers inside with the hand holding my notebook and left. By the time I was exiting, they had gathered as if plotting something, and the driver who had fielded all my questions was staring at my back as if trying to stab it with his gaze. If you can anticipate it, you can prepare for it.

After gently closing the break room door, I whispered to the industrial spirit walking beside me with its back touching my hand. If provided by the Industrial Spirit King, it could make an excellent guard dog.

“It was obvious they were lying, right? And that they might try to harm me. So could you be a bit more vigilant?”

The industrial spirit rotated its grinder cylinder, still seeming displeased. It probably didn’t like that I hadn’t given it orders on the spot.

“I could have taken down all seven of them by myself. The grinder on my head isn’t just for decoration. And my metal body isn’t decoration either. Why don’t you use me properly?”

“Hmm, well. My goal isn’t to take down those dangerous people here. My purpose is to uncover what’s entangled in this matter. To do that, I need to know how high up the stories of these apparent underlings go! So we’re stopping here for now. It is dangerous, but… or is it? I’ve been in much more dangerous situations, so it’s fine!”

The industrial spirit paused its cylinder for a moment, then pointed the grinder part toward me and spoke. It still didn’t seem to understand well.

“Humans have too many variables. Sometimes those variables do good things, but sometimes they make them stupid. Right now, you’re the variable, and your personality is the variable. Variables are better off not existing.”

“You wish I didn’t exist?”

Somehow its every behavior seemed dog-like, and there was something endearing about how it moved, spoke, and judged mechanically while still having clear preferences, so I teased it a bit.

The industrial spirit wasn’t used to such teasing. It paused again and then spoke with obvious embarrassment.

“Then I couldn’t complete the mission assigned by the machine of the age. I couldn’t learn or protect, so I would become useless. I don’t like being useless. Don’t you agree?”

This child had fears too. Being a machine created with a purpose, it seemed to fear deviating from that purpose. Feeling like I had teased something I shouldn’t have, I stroked it again.

“I took that gamble back there because I had a steel industrial spirit in front of me, so you’re doing a great job of protecting! And if we keep talking like this, I think you’re learning a lot too, so far from being useless, aren’t you very useful? The Industrial Spirit King would be pleased!”

I gave it the praise it most desired. The spirit seemed to have a parent-child relationship with the machine of the age. Something suddenly occurred to me, and I asked the spirit.

“You want the machine of the age to praise you, right? Then… will you go to the machine of the age and report what you’ve protected and what you’ve learned?”

The grinder began to spin cheerfully. I consciously endured the unpleasant tingling at the tips of my ears from the somewhat chilling sound of metal grinding against metal.

“I already told you about the things I met there. The machine of the age cannot move. If it moved its body, something terrible would happen, and even the mythril steel tentacles inside the machine of the age can’t leave the building. My purpose is to find out what the machine of the age wants and return. Other models were all released with the same purpose. Me too.”

It seemed that protecting me was for my benefit, while what this child learned and brought back was for the Industrial Spirit King himself. I naturally inserted a question, as I had done with the drivers.

“Pfft, they could just build an extension to the door. What did the Industrial Spirit King ask you to learn? I don’t know what I’m showing you, but it’s just very ordinary scenes, so I wonder if there’s anything to learn.”

Though the industrial spirit spoke of reason like a machine or The Reasonable Insight, its inner feelings weren’t much different from a child wanting to be loved. If someone praised it, it wanted to return the kindness.

“I told you not to worry. Worry is irrational. So you shouldn’t either. What I’m trying to learn is about people. What kind of beings are humans? What do the people of this city look like? And…”

“And?”

With just one light prompt, it spilled everything to the very end. The reason why this industrial spirit was so obsessed with reason was the final task left by the Industrial Spirit King.

“How can human irrationality be suppressed within an acceptable margin of error? All other models have failed. I’ll probably be the only one to succeed and bring it to the machine of the age. You’re a good specimen.”

The curiosity about how to handle emotional people must be related to the Industrial Spirit King’s time with the Idealists when all sorts of insults were hurled at them.

Normally, being called a “good specimen” wouldn’t be considered a compliment, but this time I decided to take it as one. I gently stroked its back where the engine sound was coming from.

“That seems difficult regardless of usefulness? Sometimes the most irrational responses are actually rational, and sometimes mechanical, rational responses are actually irrational. I learned long ago… the world isn’t completely black and white. You can’t divide what’s rational behavior and what’s irrational behavior as cleanly as cutting with a knife.”

Nevertheless, one thing was certain: the premise was wrong. The world of spectrum rather than black and white was incredibly beautiful. When I realized that even the spectrum wasn’t the truth but a palette, it was ecstatic.

If this child would relay messages to the Industrial Spirit King, I wanted to convey this. The Industrial Spirit King must also manage dye factories. He must know far more colors than I do.

If the palette I painted with my still young and greenhouse-confined heart was ecstatic, I wondered what the palette painted by such a powerful and magnificent being would look like.

Leaving the transport company, I entered a fairly bright alley next to the factory to speak more with the spirit. Since I had no destination, the spirit followed me without burden. I crouched down in front of it.

The industrial spirit looked dejected. It seemed like it might lie down on its belly like a dog, then it spoke to me. I was quite often grateful that we could communicate.

“So I’ve been given a mission that can’t be completed? If my manufacturing purpose can’t be fulfilled…”

“No, it can be completed! The question you received isn’t a simple yes-or-no. The machine of the age would be pleased just to hear what you’ve learned while exploring that purpose. The purpose is exploration, right? What’s the definition of exploration?”

The industrial spirit raised its body slightly. It seemed to have regained some strength. The grinder turned this way and that as if organizing thoughts, then began to spin in a determined direction.

“It’s researching something deeply. Researching to know the answer. It’s quite a reasonable inference that even if you don’t necessarily find an answer, the exploration itself can have value. Is that it?”

I wished I could stroke its head, but the grinder that replaced its head wasn’t something that could be stroked. Like its created purpose, most of it was quite perfect, but there was always one part that wasn’t quite right.

“That’s it! Now, shall we get back to our problem? It’s certain the drivers are hiding the terminals. We need to find out if those people have backers or employers. That will make things more dangerous.”

The mention of increased danger didn’t sound particularly threatening. If I asked the Industrial Spirit King for help, industrial spirits with concrete bodies unlike this one would come. If I called Straessen Private Investigation and Police Advisory Office, Mr. Willem would come with his cursed revolver. Not to mention Husband Detective Agency.

If I called Michael, he would call Paulina with his characteristic sarcastic tone, saying something like “The reporter needs a bullet shield.” I wasn’t afraid.

I thought twenty was too young to become a big shot, but seeing how I no longer feared cheap conspiracies like this, if not a big shot, at least my heart had grown a bit stronger.

The most frightening experience I’d had, both eight months ago and now, was when a silencer was thrust right in front of my eyes as I opened a hotel window. It was fortunate my heart didn’t stop at that moment.

I hadn’t expected it, couldn’t prepare for it, and had never even imagined such a thing. The mere thought made my body tremble, but thinking that person was Michael gave me some comfort.

The fact that I recalled my own near-death experience before The Cowboy’s death showed that I was inevitably selfish. I was truly the best specimen to show this little industrial spirit.

I took a deep breath. That story wasn’t something this child needed to know. Again, my eyes were on the pot rather than the cards in my hand. To remind myself of the original purpose, I asked:

“In that sense… what’s the difference between terminals and people? Why would someone need terminals but not people?”

“The human remnants that the Idealists named ‘terminals’ have instincts but no will. They won’t resist no matter what happens to them unless ordered by the Hive Mind. Yet they often react like people. Minimal programmed responses, I suppose. The machine of the age has researched terminals quite extensively, so I know about them.”

It’s good to know about the terminals you might use. And from those words, I picked up on one basic thing.

“Right. Yes. They’re people but not people, so you can do things to them that you couldn’t do to people. Right?”

They probably couldn’t be ordered to do anything complex or sophisticated. Even for factory work, they could only move if the Idealists’ Hive Mind or the Industrial Spirit King programmed the routines.

They don’t need to know anything. The body is necessary, but not the soul. They’re used for things that can’t be done to people. I thought I knew where to go next.