Chapter 174 - Volume 8, Chapter 32 (2/2)

“““………”””

Her subordinates didn’t answer her attempt at a joke. They hadn’t been made to do so in the first place.

Sebra knew that, but made the joke anyway to calm her nerves, and then saw something completely astounding when she entered the warehouse.

A gorgeous dress that was made of silver thread embroidered upon black, the likes of which she had only seen in classics that were over a thousand years old.

A beautiful girl that caused Sebra, who had been genetically modified and had only ever seen beauties, to be stunned at her grace.

Beauty standards changed with culture and even age. And yet, why did she feel that this alien girl was so beautiful……?

Designer children had been banned hundreds of years ago, since the pursuit of beauty drained the person’s vitality. And yet, there was none of the unnaturalness that surrounded designer children, and Sebra, who had been stunned by her fascinating natural beauty, only managed to contact her after [Mother] helped to suppress her emotions.

A golden-haired girl and a black cat.

She was incredibly intelligent and responded with a smile as they quizzed and questioned her.

…… But even though smiling meant the same to the girl and herself, Sebra could not help but feel a chill on her back when she saw that smile.

* * *

I was finally released after they questioned us for an hour and did tests on me.

As I listened to Sebra’s story, it really felt like an SF novel, with this place being a spaceship.

I don’t think this was the future of Terra…… but I hadn’t been able to confirm anything since I hadn’t been allowed near an information terminal.

This ship was a colony ship with a population of about 80 million…… incredible. I didn’t know what their units of measurement were, but it felt as big as the UK.

“…… Yurushia, you sure are calm.”

“Oh, really?”

Somehow, Sebra’s gaze hurt a little…… I’m too calm?! But, everyone on this ship was no different from normal people, and nobody seemed to feel threatened…… I wonder, was she suspicious because of my strange deceptive smile?

“………”

As I turned my eyes to Rinne in my lap, he curled up into a ball.

…… This rascally cat. Leaving me to deal with all the trouble.

For now, even though they were like space people, in their appearances, their ways of thought, and their expressions of emotion, they were no different from the “humans” I knew.

…… Well, now that I thought about it, humans weren’t much different on Terra, Atra, or even Tess, so if these other worlds were on another star, it might have been the same as aliens.

“Maybe, it’s because I’m a “Demon”?”

As I answered cheekily towards her, Sebra looked angry for an instant, but then broke out laughing.

“Ahahaha, Yuru, you sure are interesting. Gods and Demons and “religions” were things that were from a thousand years ago, Yuru sure must have studied them.”

“……Ahaha”

Ah, I see now. I don’t know if Demons had been translated correctly, but it seems that here, religions were a thing of the past, like something you’d learn of in history class.

But without religion, what did they rely on when their hearts wavered?

Sebra, who was in front of me, looked normal…… but her men, who were watching me from a distance, didn’t seem to have any emotions I could sense at all.

…… Anyway, I’m being called “Yuru” here too, huh.

All of the meals on this ship, even after several days, was incredibly tasteless. But at least I finally got permission to go down into the city.

Far from being an object of worship, rice here was being made by machines, so it didn’t suit my palate. And Rinne has disappeared somewhere else today. …… If you’re going to get snacks, you should have invited me.

Although I had borrowed some casual clothing to blend in with them, when I went into the city, everyone’s attention was on me for some reason. I wonder if it’s my hair that’s conspicuous after all.

Oh? As the people watching me all turned expressionless for an instant, they all returned to work as if nothing had happened.

Is there some system in place to protect their spirits so that they didn’t need religion? I guess it’s okay unless it’s some sort of strange drug.

“……n?”

“What’s wrong, Yuru?”

Sebra noticed that I had found something strange.

“That child…… I think I’ve seen him before? But that hair color……”

“Ah, it’s a model 0247. It’s a cloned fertilizer body that’s been popular these past few years, so there are a lot of them in this regard.”

“Heh. heehhh……”

Clones…… But what did they mean fertilizer? Was it a normal human born of a cloned egg with similar appearance? And his soul was rather weak …… somewhat weaker than a normal human’s. But if I examined them closely, some of their spirits were clearly very thin.

For example, the shop vendors and the people like Sebra’s subordinates. …… It seems like something irreversible if I decide to interfere.

“Ah, but I’m not a copy clone like them. I was made from the biological data of the [Mother] of this ship.”

“I, I see.”

Don’t tell me. …… Sebra’s soul didn’t quite feel stable.

*ping~*

“Eh, what’s that?”

“Oh, it’s something like breaking news.”

As I stood surprised by the sudden sound, the river that flowed with stars turned into a screen, and the breaking news began to scroll.

[When we launched our probe during our dimensional navigation, we found a planet that had an 87% chance of being a successful colony, and it will be our destination next.]

I heard the loud cheering from the city. I’m not sure, but is 87% very high? Does it represent a planet that resembles Terra? But……

“Yuru, it’s amazing! We can finally get to a planet where we can colonize by dimensional travel!”

“………”

Sebra was excited too.

“Hey, Sebra. …… What happens if there are natives there?”

“……what? Ah, right. If they are like us, a [Human type], then we’ll be able to collect their genes and life nucleus, and save ourselves a lot of trouble.”

“Collecting……?”

“That’s right, it’ll be nice if we can harvest more than a hundred million of them, since they would die when we collect their life nucleus. Ah, it’s alright, because the collection is easy. The number is only because there’s only about a 0.0000419% chance. But we can increase it.”

“……oh. Are these genes so important?”

“They are. Because there are only 1291 sets of genes left over from our mother star.”

…… Isn’t the closest dimension from here…… [Atra]?