Ch.5959. God.

“Wow, they even hid stuff in places like this.”

I was going around the building, discovering one by one the items people had hidden away as I found a box containing alcohol and suspicious powder.

When I lifted an ordinary-looking desk, a hidden space appeared underneath.

The bottom section of a double drawer, cleverly disguised with a panel the same color as the drawer itself, making it easy to miss at first glance.

As if acknowledging that what they were doing here wasn’t proper behavior, people had hidden things in all sorts of places. When I gathered everything in one spot, the amount was greater than I expected.

“If only all this had been food instead.”

The problem was that all my hard-earned discoveries were alcohol, drugs, contraceptives—items meant for irresponsible pleasure.

The role of religion as I understand it is to help people who have lived immoral lives repent for their sins, and to guide humans toward good deeds so that social groups can maintain stability.

But what are these things?

Substances created for pleasure like alcohol and drugs don’t directly harm the altruism that religion preaches, but they numb the reason that suppresses our biological selfishness and instincts.

Humans with impaired reason cannot make socially correct judgments and lose control of themselves.

Of course, everyone’s temperament is different, so I can’t say that intoxicated people will definitely cause problems.

But it’s dangerous because even the person themselves cannot predict what thoughts or actions might emerge when freed from the shackles of self-restraint. It’s like no one can tell when one gear among many in a complex machine might stop working or start turning in the opposite direction.

That’s why humans have long been wary of losing their reason to primal pleasures like alcohol and drugs. They send alcoholics to rehabilitation facilities and constantly teach children from a young age to avoid these substances altogether.

“I wonder if the role and doctrines of religion I knew have changed over time.”

But this place was overflowing with items meant solely for pleasure. If not for the crosses and uncomfortable chairs typical of religious facilities, I might have mistaken it for a brothel.

Before me, with all the items I’d found laid out on the floor, stood a massive cross. The figure of a man bound to the cross looked down at me. The fact that his expression seemed so bewildered probably reflected my own feelings.

Well, come to think of it, there have been many religions throughout history, but few directly prohibited alcohol.

Just as some religions forbid pork, there might have been religions that considered even approaching substances like alcohol a sin—but ultimately, since religions need people to survive, such strict doctrines couldn’t last long.

Even religions that strongly prohibited drinking made exceptions for fermented water or fermented animal milk.

This might not apply to those who follow religion for personal discipline and reflection, but many religions have continued because of believers who trust in salvation from the painful mortal world. Such believers couldn’t stay away from alcohol, which offered the quickest escape from worldly suffering.

“I guess what matters isn’t what you eat or drink, but whether you do bad things or not.”

While alcohol can cause social disorder, broadly speaking, it’s just a type of liquid, so the act of drinking itself can’t be called wrong.

This world has existed through cause and effect—causality—but what’s more important to humans is “what am I doing right now.”

It’s like having a gun—as long as you don’t display it to create fear or shoot at people, it’s fine. If you quietly enjoy something by yourself and go to sleep, what’s the problem?

“If we’re looking for clear sinners right now, it would be me rather than the people who hid alcohol or drugs here.”

Whether the people who hid these items here actually did anything wrong is uncertain.

But I’ve entered someone else’s space without permission, opening locked drawers and boxes at will, coveting their belongings.

Yet no punishment befalls me. God merely looks down upon me.

[This place looks like a church. How interesting—even in a world where self-thinking robots roam around and machines and robots can handle everything, there are still people who believe in God.]

Just then, a message arrived through the drone.

I had been in the building for quite a while searching for hidden items, but only for three or four hours at most.

As the distance between us shortened, we could now talk about the same topics in the same space.

It was an incredibly joyful thing.

“Hey. Do you think God exists?”

People believed in God for their own reasons. But God never ultimately answered humans.

I’m usually in the gray area on most things, but on this one point I could state with certainty.

There is no God in this world.

An old philosopher once said: God is dead. That God himself is our oldest lie.

Just as everyone turns away from the medical device with its sharp needle, we turned away from reality.

But unlike the momentary sting of a needle, the pain from unfulfilled desires persists throughout life, creating the need to deceive ourselves that this suffering leads to tremendous rewards.

I believe that God is the imaginary goal created through this process.

“Long ago, humans believed in God out of fear of unknown phenomena or the unknown itself. But through continuous development and research, when humans discovered that all these things were merely causal effects, they began to doubt God’s existence for the first time. Just like Mori does now.”

“So, what do you think?”

“Well, I have no information about the object called ‘God.’ How could we know something that humans, our creators and gods, don’t know?”

From a robot’s perspective, humans are gods. They created us and can remove us from the world on a whim—they are gods themselves.

Therefore, robots cannot know what gods do not know.

Though the bodies made to do what humans cannot are much stronger and more capable than human bodies…

The thoughts and ideas within are just as imperfect as humans’, and their existence is equally finite.

Thus, all living beings can only create beings in their own image. Even if an external being that created us did exist, it too would have been imperfect and finite.

“In the first place, if a truly omnipotent god of humans existed, the world wouldn’t have been made like this.”

Even if an omnipotent being did exist, there’s no reason to believe in or follow someone who ignores us as we die.

“Ah. Could it be that people who realized this came here in their final moments to drink alcohol and indulge in instinctual behaviors?”

People who dreamed of an eternal world and prayed to God must have felt considerable betrayal by a god who remained silent until the very end.

So perhaps in their final moments, they chose to break free from rules and regulations, enjoying freedom and instinctual deviation in the very place that betrayed them.

“…Well, whether they drank alcohol here, grilled meat, or had sex, I’m in no position to judge.”

In truth, I cannot condemn any debauchery that took place in this religious facade.

This isn’t about tedious talk of rights. I’ve been doing the same things as these people. The more I condemn, the more I’m just spitting while lying down.

Alcohol, drugs, cigarettes—all created to escape painful reality, if only for a moment.

There might be considerable differences in how they affect daily life or their aftereffects, if we get into details.

But essentially, they were the same in trying to escape reality and the approaching doom.

Who wouldn’t have done the same in such times?

I looked down at the box. Staring at the liquid in the elegant black bottle, I blurted out a thought.

“…Does alcohol have an expiration date?”

“What?!”

The robot raised its voice as if startled by my muttering.

Actually, I was a bit surprised too. Just as I had a negative impression of cigarettes, I used to think all drinkers were fools.

But now I was strangely interested in the liquid in the bottle. Perhaps because it was the first intact alcohol I’d seen here, and possibly the last.

“Assuming it was properly sealed, it shouldn’t go bad… Surely you’re not thinking of drinking it?”

“Well—I wonder.”

“It’s bad for you, bad! I thought you’d completely dislike this kind of thing. It’s quite unexpected, and a bit disappointing too!”

“One way or another, I’m still human.”

All human senses are made up of signals. That’s why it’s impossible to completely resist material pleasures.

Historically, among people accustomed to alcohol, cigarettes, and other preference-based consumables, many have thought about breaking free from these harmful substances that only provide momentary pleasure. But the proportion of people who maintained their resolve without wavering has been small.

Better than before meeting the drone but still living through stifling and bleak days, I found myself curious about such pleasures.

“I may be living well now, but I’m living a life where I could die at any moment. So when an opportunity like this comes along, I’d like to experience it at least once.”

Of course, only to the extent that it doesn’t endanger my life. I’m curious about this white powder too, but historically, no one who inhaled such things could maintain a normal life.

So I’ll put the drugs far away, and just take one sip of this one with the grape picture on it, just to experience it.

Muttering this to myself, I carefully opened the bottle.