Chapter 733: Screwing Them Over

Back when they first requested a trade.

We had hostages being held.

Because of that, the structure of that trade could only be somewhat disadvantageous for our side.

'We got all those hostages out.'

At this point.

The trade between me and them had become fair.

And now.

'In terms of power, I have the advantage.'

If I set my mind to it.

I was in a situation where eliminating them was possible too.

“Let’s try this again. Conversation and trade.”

The favorable and unfavorable positions had reversed.

This trade now could only be favorable to me.

“You tasted the dish I fed you earlier, didn’t you?”

{.......}

“You should know better than anyone that its effect is sufficient. So I’ll make the offer again. If what you want is for me to keep you, or the ones who follow you, fed enough to live, I can grant that as much as you need. Of course, there’ll be other conditions attached...... So? Do you feel like accepting this condition now?”

But.

{Still impossible.}

Despite that change in situation.

Its answer was still the same.

“......That hurts my pride a little.”

I frowned as I asked.

“Was my cooking lacking? That level of effect still wasn’t enough?”

{That is not it. Rather.......}

For a moment.

I felt as if that energy trembled in some subtle way.

{......The effect is sufficient.}

“?”

It felt as though the thing’s emotions had wavered somehow.

Anyway.

That meant it was not because it had complaints about my cooking.

“Then why?”

In truth, I had been wondering about this for a while now.

That thing had been demanding a recipe from me from start to finish.

If you called a cook over, having that cook make food for you was the more common-sense demand.

Requesting the creation of a recipe was, when I thought about it, not exactly a normal demand.

It had not answered before.

But perhaps the change in situation had meaning this time.

This time, the thing answered my question.

{That method is likely something only you can do.}

“......For now, yeah.”

I had met other cooks before.

But they did not have abilities like this either.

Maybe they would be able to do it if they grew as much as I had.

'Their specialized fields are too different.'

Even if they grew, they would grow within their own fields.

So there was a high enough chance they would not gain an ability similar to mine.

{Then when you disappear, we will have to face ruin again. That is why it is impossible. What I want is not dependence on someone who may disappear at any time...... but cooking for independence, so we can survive on our own.}

“So why?”

But.

Even if no one else with a similar ability appeared.

It was entirely possible for me to extend the lives of this thing and the small number who followed it more than enough.

If it was only thinking of its own survival, that would be plenty.

In the end, what this thing demanded was something beyond that.

“Why do you want more than that?”

{Because.}

And.

The answer to that question of mine...... was simpler than I expected.

{It pisses me off.}

“......?”

***

{You saw the kin gathered in the south, did you not?}

“For now.”

{And you must have seen the kin who invaded this city just now.}

“Yeah.”

{Then.}

After crossing over to the north.

I had seen an enormous number of zombies.

But.

{How many other living beings have you seen?}

“......That’s.”

The only living creatures I had seen besides zombies.......

Other than humans, were those rock giants attacking this city.

Even those guys stopped being living beings not long afterward.

{The countless living creatures on this land. My kin have already succeeded in parasitizing most of them.}

“.......”

{Our parasitization speed is extremely fast. To the point that we parasitize much faster than life can be born.}

Just as it said.

No matter how strong a parasite’s reproductive ability might be, their parasitization ability was on an abnormal level.

The speed at which they created hosts and expanded their forces was itself beyond imagination.

{And we do not engage in any reproductive activity except giving birth to offspring for further parasitization.}

Naturally.

The zombies that rose again from dead corpses did not mate with each other.

The only method those things had for increasing their numbers was the additional parasites born from the main body, the parasite itself.

They did not move the bodies of the hosts they had parasitized and give birth to the hosts’ offspring.

“......Huh?”

And.

After hearing that much, I had no choice but to tilt my head a little.

Parasitization at a tremendous speed.

The hosts successfully parasitized that way no longer gave birth to life.

In other words.

'Doesn’t that mean the number of hosts they need for parasitization decreases as time goes on?'

Living beings would give birth to offspring and increase their numbers as long as they were alive.

But from the moment they became zombie hosts, they no longer reproduced.

And the zombies’ speed was faster than the speed at which living beings gave birth to offspring and prospered.

“Then that means.”

I frowned and looked at the thing.

{You noticed.}

On the surface, their numbers would keep increasing.

And the number of other living beings would keep decreasing.

As the number of living beings capable of giving birth to the next generation decreased, the number of other lives being born would inevitably decrease as well.

So the speed at which zombies increased, and the lives of this land decreased, would accelerate more and more as time went on.

“The end of that is.......”

And if that situation continued.

If the lives of this land could not hold back the zombies.

The surface would become filled with those zombies.

If it were just that, one could say it was their victory and nothing could be done about it.

But the problem was...... those zombies were designed so they could not consume food on this land.

When only zombies remained in this world, and not even hosts who could increase their numbers remained.

If the two-year lifespan of that final generation of zombies passed.......

There was only one conclusion that could be reached there.

“That’s extinction.”

The only ending was one where not a single moving lifeform.

Remained on this land.

{We are not a species created to prosper in other worlds...... or to continue life.}

Despite clearly being living creatures.

They were not things that existed to spread life.

{We exist only to destroy other worlds.}

They were beings made to destroy worlds.

And then vanish in those worlds.

***

{We are not a species created to prosper in other worlds...... or to continue life.}

At those words.

I thought with my mouth hanging open.

'That makes no sense.'

If those words were true.

Then no matter how parasitic those things were.

It meant they had deviated from even the most basic law that living beings should possess.

All living beings.

Even human instinct had one most basic law engraved into it.

'The reproduction and prosperity of the species.'

Life could only continue by passing genetic information to the next generation.

This process was the foundation of evolution and biological diversity.

Those who did not aim for the reproduction of their species would be weeded out in the process of the struggle for survival that led to evolution.

That was why all surviving species were beings optimized for that reproduction and prosperity in some form.

And the instinct that placed that as the highest priority had taken root in them.

'Not those things.'

Reproduction also seemed to be included in their instincts.

But...... what mattered was the reason.

Their reproduction was not for the reproduction and prosperity of the species.

{We exist only to destroy other worlds.}

They parasitized every living creature in a world and destroyed that world.

And when they achieved such complete destruction that not even living creatures to serve as hosts remained.

They were born with a fate that forced even them to vanish from that world.

'......Is that why those things invade other worlds?'

I thought with my mouth hanging open.

Perhaps that too was an end reached by one branch of evolution.

Evolution did not happen systematically through some kind of will, but through natural selection.

Maybe, at the end of evolution, they gained a reproductive speed fast enough to destroy worlds.

But had no method of survival for the next stage...... when no beings worth using as hosts remained.

Maybe that was why they invaded universes to find other hosts.

That was what I thought, but.

'No, that’s not it.'

If that truly was the result of evolution.

And as a result, they had no choice but to invade other universes.

There was one thing.

'The way those things absorb energy can’t be explained.'

What one eats and uses to obtain energy is the most important part of survival in that world.

It is the foundation of the species itself.

But those things were beings that, from the beginning, did not consume additional energy.

{They invade other worlds and destroy everything in those worlds.}

If those things were the result of proper evolution.

Then at the end of it, if anything, they would have become capable of reproducing through the bodies of the hosts they parasitized.

There was no way they would have advanced toward a method of spreading to other worlds while limiting their own energy intake.

In other words.

{After they finish that task, they starve to death and vanish.}

Those things were not living creatures that had gone through normal evolution.

{That is what the being that created us intended.}

Thoroughly.

For a specific objective.

'They were lives designed like that from the very beginning......!'

I thought as cold sweat ran down my back.

In this world, I had met various other races.

I had also often heard stories about the creators of those races.

And those stories had one common point.

According to what Morzan, the being I had met in the past, said.

-A divinity...... is a being born with a fate that makes it unable to help loving its creations.

Even if the result ended in misfortune.

Those who could be called creators loved and cherished their creations.

'What do you mean, unable to help loving their creations......!'

I could not feel even the tiniest speck of love or affection here.

Living creatures created solely for use as tools.

And that intention was, on top of that.

The destruction of worlds, something far too cruel.

'An absurd level of malice.'

If that was true.

Then it meant those zombies were beings completely different in nature from the ordinary monsters that appeared in this world.

{The being that created us, far from feeling love for us...... simply wants us to vanish after fulfilling our purpose.}

“.......”

{That. That is.......}

While I was shocked by that fact.

The thing continued speaking.

{Is that not something that would make one terribly angry?}

Only then.

I was able to understand why that thing wanted [N O V E L I G H T] to save even its kin.

{Therefore.}

What the thing wanted was not its own survival.

Not even.

'The survival of its kin, including itself.'

To begin with.

Its motive was not some beautiful and selfless reason like wanting itself or its kin to survive for a long time.

Rather, it was the opposite.

What the thing ultimately wanted was none other than.

{I do not want to see things go according to that will.}

The being that had created them.

It wanted to screw that being over.