I knocked Samjo unconscious with a blow to the head and immediately realized I had to clean up the situation. After all, I'd attacked an employee of a Wing, so I needed some kind of excuse.
Ignoring the faint sensation that I'd gone against some current I could barely feel, I quickly sorted out what I needed to do in my head. First, explain the situation.
"...I judged that stopping him was the right decision, so I rendered him unconscious. I will accept any punishment for acting on my own."
""
So Dante didn't care much after all. Maybe it was a sign of trust, like, "I'm sure you'll handle it." Or maybe he'd just given up.
After finishing that brief thought, I turned my head toward Dongrang. What I'd said had been directed at Dante, but also at him.
"Ah, there's no need to worry too much. I did, in fact, save Samjo."
"I apologize for using the ampoule without permission. As for attacking Samjo and the price, I'll personally compensate..."
"You don't need to go that far either. I've grown somewhat attached to Samjo myself, so let's just say he twisted his ankle one more time."
Watching Dongrang try to smooth things over with a throwaway joke, I gave a small nod. He didn't seem interested in making a big deal out of it, and he was being fairly friendly toward us. No need to dig any deeper and make a mess of things. Situation over.
Still, what was Samjo thinking, trying to dive into that thing? Even if it really had been an ampoule made with nanorobots, he would've died from over-regeneration or collapse. Drink too much water and you die too. No matter how much of a Singularity it is, fanaticism will get you killed.
...That wasn't the important part, was it? If things stayed like this, it'd become a nuisance in a lot of ways. Thinking about the flow of events that would follow, I'd have to be the one to stitch the whole thing back together after I'd disrupted it.
Then maybe I should wag my tongue a little.
"Dongrang, I have one question."
"Hmm... and what might that be? If you're asking about the special treatment given to top employees, then after Samjo wakes up..."
"The raw liquid in the ampoule—my guess is that it's the tears of something wearing the mask of a nanomachine. What exactly does it do?"
"....."
At my words, Dongrang's smiling expression froze for a moment. Had he not expected the usually cautious me to say something like that?
Though being cautious had become meaningless a little earlier anyway.
"Haha, caught me? Hmm... then you've probably guessed that the tears do more than simple regeneration."
"I have many other hypotheses as well, but... for now, just that."
"Wait, what are you two talking about...? You mean the ampoule doesn't just regenerate...?"
Sinclair looked back and forth between me and Dongrang with confused eyes. The other Sinners seemed more or less the same.
Of course, Dongrang, smiling gently as if the whole situation had nothing to do with him, put into words what I had vaguely suspected.
"Well, the role of the tears is to return things to their original form. The regeneration ampoules are made by refining and refining those tears. If someone without an arm gets injected with a 'regeneration ampoule,' they remember the version of themselves with an arm as their true form. If someone with a caved-in head gets injected with a 'regeneration ampoule,' they remember the version with an intact head as the original."
"Then, those who were dying like insects in the Lobotomy Corporation branch..."
"...In other words, everyone had been placed under hypnosis. If you hear a voice repeating 'you are an insect' in a sealed, quiet place... the image of an insect takes root in our subconscious."
To Gregor's question, Yi Sang, who had been silent until now, provided the explanation instead. So that was the plan: keep forcing the image of insects onto us, have Shurenne give us the 'slightly under-refined regeneration ampoules,' and wipe us out in one sweep.
Even though Dante's clock rendered it meaningless, it was certainly a sharp and dangerous trap. If it hadn't been a group with such unusual abilities, we would have fallen for it without question.
Ah, my thoughts are wandering off into the weeds.
As soon as I realized that, I cut off the train of thought trying to drift away somewhere distant and added to Dongrang's explanation of what had happened earlier.
"If Samjo had thrown himself into the tears as he was, he would've transformed into something infinitely closer to human. After that, he wouldn't have been able to get out."
"That's right. The tears work best when they're refined and diluted through the concept of a person. But if the tears themselves, without any interpretation, make contact... they return a person to a form that traces back to their most fundamental state."
So that was it. A fundamental state... I don't even have a trace of it in my memory, but I get the feeling I saw it once, somewhere. Not that I want to know, and not that I'll try to find out.
Wait... why am I thinking of that bastard Hermann here? Was there something I missed among the things that woman did to me...
Just as my thoughts were about to sink back into a maze, Gregor, still not understanding what had been said, asked with a puzzled expression.
"Fundamental... state?"
"To be precise, I should say it helps you return. Still... even then, it doesn't seem to reach all the way to that fundamental state. In the end, it does remove the pain, but well..."
Dongrang, speaking with a bitter smile, suddenly put on his usual expression again and looked at Dongbaek.
"So, are you satisfied, Dongbaek? You were right. If we'd left him alone, Samjo would've become something vaguely resembling a human form inside the tears. That didn't happen, though... Congratulations. So what do you really want now?"
"...A Singularity. And permanent annihilation of everything related to Singularities, by putting them all into a concept incinerator."
Crazy bitch. Was she seriously spouting that absurd nonsense about throwing every Singularity into a concept incinerator? I can say with confidence that it's impossible unless her brain is backing her up in a very literal sense. If K Corp hadn't half-deliberately left her alone in the first place, this group would've been shut down long ago, so what in the world...
"A concept incinerator. You're going to burn it in a concept incinerator again?
So then, Dongbaek, if you go back to that era with nothing at all... what then? You'll cut down trees, build houses, skin animals to make clothes... and live like that? Then mourn the trees you cut and the animals that died? Hey, Dongbaek... with a mindset like that... you can only live as a wild child. Is that really what you want?"
"You... always ask foolish questions. Now, and back then. We decided to oppose you ugly people by wielding ugly technology as weapons to wipe you out. Therefore, in the future we envision, no one can remain. That's why we were able to be free. Free from obsession with survival."
"Haha, what are you talking about? You're not envisioning the future—you're clinging to the past."
As Dongrang and Dongbaek's argument began to intensify, Yi Sang, who had been staring at empty space—or something beyond it—until now, looked directly at them and spoke.
"Both of you... stop. I do not wish to see an old quarrel repeated before my eyes."
"Yi Sang, you look fine."
At Dongbaek's carefree remark, Gregor's expression twisted sharply. If the person you killed with your own hands is standing there saying he's fine... yeah, that'd definitely be infuriating.
"You say that as if it's a relief. You wanted Yi Sang to..."
"Yes. I wanted him dead. But I imagine he wanted the same. He didn't resist even once, even when I pierced straight through his heart. If anything, it was unpleasant. It felt like I was fulfilling what he wanted."
"....."
After hearing Dongbaek's answer, Yi Sang swallowed his silence. Was that silence an affirmation, a denial, or... merely an evasion?
"It seems everyone's way of thinking is a little twisted. Does that make it justified just because you personally pushed someone who was hesitating at the edge of a cliff?"
"Hesitat... ha, why don't you let the person himself answer instead of you?"
After hearing Gregor's words, Dongbaek let out an exasperated sigh and demanded that Yi Sang, who had remained silent, explain the situation himself. If I had to guess why... maybe because Yi Sang wasn't someone hesitating at the edge of a cliff, but someone who had simply given up on death because falling would mean nothing—he'd just revive anyway.
In other words, Gregor's premise itself was wrong from the start.
"...I have nothing to say."
"Then the conversation is over. Good."
After hearing Yi Sang's final answer, Dongbaek threw off the K Corp researcher's coat and the drab-colored hood she'd been wearing.
"This is better anyway."
What emerged from beneath was still a drab brown robe covering her whole body, along with two umbrellas somehow stuck into her back and spread open. Her weapon was a single folded umbrella. A typical Lobotomy Corporation E.G.O.
"To commemorate this occasion, I'll kill the two old friends myself."
With those words, Dongbaek's umbrella pointed at us. A clear signal that she intended to fight us.
We had no reason to refuse. After all, the one we had to deal with was the leader of the terrorists, and we'd just finished moving the unconscious Samjo to a reasonably safe place.
"Everyone, prepare for battle!!"
With Otis's shout, the true, truly final battle of our request began.
...This is the final one, right? Something feels ominous.