Chapter 87: The Interrogation (2)
(AN: In the previous chapters, I used the black squares to indicate simultaneous translation, but starting from now, I will prioritize readability and write in a more natural conversational style.)
“First and foremost, I would like to ask, what is the reason for your invasion? Why are you launching such an offensive against us?” Marcellus asked.
“Allow me to express my thoughts first. Personally, I was opposed to the invasion from the beginning, and I still am. There are many others who also oppose it. However, we couldn’t stop it… The predominant war faction within our ranks believed in a noble cause—to rescue our fellow compatriots—and that’s why it came to pass.”
Then the white armored soldier began to explain the reason behind their invasion. It traced back to an event that unfolded over a millennium ago, involving her ancestors.
Long ago, her ancestors had conquered the Shisha Continent, a vast northern landmass. They mercilessly eradicated nearly all intelligent life, including various human races, that dwelled across the plains, establishing their dominance as one giant nation. And as they grew, they began to invade the great forest that was said to have once existed on that continent in order to make the plains their own.
In that long-forgotten forest, there resided numerous gods. Despite being well aware of this fact, the invaders proceeded with their assault on the forest, and the reason for that was because…. this blue-skinned human race, called the Khan race, had also given birth to a number of gods of their own while in the process of unifying the entire continent. These gods ruled the great nation directly, and drove the people to war.
The battle between the gods of the Great Forest and the Khan race was said to have been dominated by the Khan race from beginning to end. The gods, who resided within the vast forest, were unable to unleash their full power to protect their sacred home, resulting in continuous defeat at the hands of the Khan race’s gods.
In a similar vein, the gods’ kin also suffered repeated defeats. While they engaged in hunting as predators and clashed over territories, they lacked the efficient methods employed by the human species to effectively annihilate their enemies.
Furthermore, the Khan race ruthlessly felled the trees of the Great Forest, clearing land for their settlements, seizing the habitats of the creatures, eradicating unwanted species, and domesticating those that served their purposes. The Khan race’s territory expanded further, and only the sacred peak, known as the spiritual mountain, remained in the heart of the Great Forest. The remaining gods and their kin took refuge there.
And so, the final battle commenced. Leading the Khan race, the gods encircled the spiritual mountain and began their advance with the aim of annihilating the great forest gods completely. As the Khan race advanced, burning down the trees of the spiritual mountain, an unforeseen event unfolded. The gods of the Great Forest, who were expected to put up fierce resistance, united as one and made a determined breakthrough toward the south.
Moreover, the gods, who had restrained their power until then, completely disregarded the damage to the spiritual mountain in their bid to break through the encirclement. They slew the Khan race’s gods and their leaders, who were in the south, then continued their descent, crossing the sea to escape from the continent.
Unaware of what was happening in the south, the Khan race’s army finally reached the summit of the spiritual mountain. There stood a single massive tree, the true guardian of the Great Forest, known as the “Divine Tree of the Spiritual Mountain.”
The Divine Tree posed a question. What reasons justifies such barbaric acts? Why are innocent creatures living peacefully slaughtered without cause? The gods of the Khan race responded, it is for our own prosperity. They saw no wrong in killing pests that hindered their progress.
Upon hearing their defense, the Divine Tree spoke. Then let me return the favor in your own manner. I shall curse the creatures that ravaged and destroyed the Great Forest for all eternity.
With those words, the Divine Tree began to wither away. The abrupt and seemingly inconsequential end of the ruler of the Great Forest left the gods of the Khan race astonished. They proceeded to uproot the Divine Tree entirely, setting it ablaze until nothing remained but ashes, which they callously discarded in the surrounding area.
“However, that was a grave mistake. It was the curse left behind by the ruler of the Great Forest, the greatest and oldest deity on the continent. The gods, who had grown arrogant and complacent, underestimated its powers.” The white armored soldier said.
For approximately a hundred years thereafter, the Khan race, which had seized control of the Great Forest, thrived even more. The numbers of the Khan race multiplied rapidly, and their population exceeded a hundred million, or so it was said.
However, amidst this prosperity, peculiar events began to unfold. The inherent fighting spirit and spiritual power of newborn children grew weaker, and agricultural yields gradually decreased. People initially dismissed these as mere fluctuations, believing that the declining production could be compensated for by enhancing the land’s power through spiritual practices. Consequently, the gods also remained optimistic.
Yet, an incident occurred suddenly that shattered their illusions. All of the numerous gods of the Khan race met their demise almost simultaneously. Their deaths shared a gruesome similarity, with branches and roots protruding through their bodies from within, resulting in a tragic end.
Without even a moment for the Khan race to mourn the deaths of their gods, a new calamity befell them. Across the entire continent, plants withered away. Despite desperate efforts to address the issue, the cause remained elusive, making it impossible to prevent. Famine swept through the entire land.
As a result of the famine, people fought over dwindling food resources, causing rivers of blood to flow and countless lives to succumb to the agonizing torment of starvation. It is said that nearly eighty percent of the Khan race living on the continent perished in this chaos.
Undoubtedly, the cause of this catastrophe was attributed to the curse of the divine tree. It was the only plausible explanation for the sudden death of the gods and the profound impact on the entire continent. The arrogance and desire for conquest among the gods had brought about this dire situation.
The upheaval caused by famine and the deaths of the gods led to the division of the once-great nation, plunging the land into an era of turmoil. The main catalyst for this division was the demise of the ruling gods themselves. In any society, there are always individuals driven by the desire to seize power, and with the chaos as their opportunity, many such individuals emerged.
“Those who possessed the remaining slivers of land claimed themselves as kings and ruled over various territories. However, hardly any kingdom had enough crops from its own lands to feed its people. As a result, an era of turmoil and warfare began, with kings competing to seize land and food from one another.”
The continent descended into a period of warring states, once again drenching the land in blood. Meanwhile, the newborn children of the Khan race continued to weaken in their innate fighting spirit and spiritual power. Both attributes could be honed through training, but eventually, their physical bodies became too frail to withstand that growth. Except for the exceptionally rare prodigies born with ancestral talents, the ability to fight using fighting spirit and spiritual power became almost nonexistent for the Khans.
However, the Khan race had once conquered the continent through battle. If they could no longer rely on fighting spirit and spiritual power, they needed to explore alternative methods. They sought to create weapons that did not rely on fighting spirit and establish technologies that did not rely on spiritual power. It is said that this process led to various technological innovations.
“The establishment of technology and science that does not rely on fighting spirit or spiritual arts. The invention of spiritual circuitry that can activate even with minimal spiritual power. The combination of these two gave birth to firearms and guns… portable weapons capable of efficiently killing the human race.”
The firearms, or guns, that we called cylindrical weapons were utilized by the military nation of Nonaris Republic, which was the first to invent them, to reunify the continent. Finally, peace had come to the devastated continent of Shisha. This was a story from twenty years ago.
However, the problems were far from resolved even after the reunification. Crops still struggled to grow, farmland continued to shrink gradually, and starvation remained a prevalent issue. That’s when their attention turned to other continents. They aimed to invade and procure food from those lands, relying on their military might.
However, there were issues with this approach. The surrounding seas of the Shisha continent were incredibly treacherous, making it difficult to even set sail. While the southern sea was relatively stable, there were dragon nests on the seabed, preventing them from venturing far offshore. As a result, the Shisha continent lacked both shipbuilding and navigation technology.
Now, you might wonder how they had knowledge of other continents. The answer lies in the fact that shipwrecks from other continents occasionally washed ashore on the Shisha continent. It was common knowledge among the educated that there were other continents to the south.
But I went off topic. The leaders of the Nonaris Republic, fully aware of the risks involved, hurried the development of battleships capable of intercontinental expeditions. Throughout history, they had exhausted all available options, such as soil improvement and crop breeding. Yet instead of overcoming the crisis, the situation only worsened. Their only remaining option was to obtain food from other continents.
Their ambitious development project, upon which their survival depended, bore fruit, and they succeeded in creating battleships. Simultaneously, a method to keep the sea dragons in check was devised, enabling safe navigation. The preparations for the invasion were finally complete.
“There were voices among the republic’s council members suggesting that we should obtain food through peaceful negotiations and trade instead of invasion. However, those voices were silenced. It was rejected on the grounds that it would take too long to acquire a sufficient amount of food that could reach the entire population… Perhaps war, plunder, and dominance are instinctual for the Khan race,”
“It’s a profound matter of karma,” the white armored soldier woman added with a wry smile. With the preparations in place, the Republic’s council members commanded the invasion. Their fleet set sail to the south, launching attacks on the cities of the newly discovered Enzo continent without any declaration of war, mercilessly pillaging and massacring its inhabitants.
The reason for slaughtering the people was not because the Khan race was inherently cruel, but rather because the curse of the Divine Tree had made their bodies fragile. Without their advanced technology in the form of armored suits and superior firearms, they would have been easily overpowered, even by the Enzo’s human children. The Khan race had become remarkably frail, far from what one would expect from a human species.
The vast lands they acquired by burning down cities and crushing villages were transformed by the Republic’s army into farmland. There, crops that had been genetically modified were cultivated to be sent back to their homeland. The wheat fields we witnessed were created to alleviate the suffering of the people on the famine-stricken Shisha continent.
“After securing sufficient farmland, some of the opposing members of the council proposed ending the war around this area. They suggested focusing on defense while employing a strong military force to pursue assertive diplomacy. However, the Khan race couldn’t shake off its bad habits… the desire for conquest resurfaced. They incited the notion that by fully dominating the continent with this momentum, not only would the Shisha continent be saved, but they could also abandon this barren land and migrate to a more prosperous territory. And foolishly, the people supported the continuation of the war.”
In the aftermath of the catastrophe triggered by the death of the gods, the concept of war for the Khan race living on the Shisha continent had always involved internal conflicts, where they fought amongst themselves for dominance. That is why they became so obsessed with expansion through invasive warfare, forcefully subjugating other races. It felt as if they had reverted back to the formidable Khan race that existed in the time when their gods were still alive.
This was the reason why the invading army….or rather, the Republic’s army, had launched an invasion and continued to occupy the Enzo continent. While it may sound noble to say that the lives of the people on their continent were at stake, for the inhabitants here, it was an incredibly selfish motive.
I couldn’t help but feel slightly sorry for them, having to suffer due to the sins of their ancestors, but it’s all because of their insatiable desires for more than enough land that the famine befell them. Also, because of these people, I was forced to march into the jaws of death every time. There is no room for sympathy for them.
Perhaps the reason the flaming projectiles didn’t rain down on the wheat fields when we fled was that they didn’t want to harm the crops. It was a relief to understand why we weren’t attacked. With such thoughts occupying my mind, I continued to listen to the conversation between Marcellus and the captive woman.
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TN: I really didn’t expect this. Like how one comment has said long before in one of the chapters, I thought that a reincarnated individual with a mission like our mc was the one who made the technology, or maybe even multiple individuals…. But then again I was questioning how they would remember their past lives if our mc doesn’t.
Still this situation seems logical enough, after all war and necessity was the leading factor for humanity’s advancement
TN: From now on I may be using terms like firearms and guns or even Tanks, but only if the mc changes the terms he’s speaking with.
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