Ina skipped as she moved forward, and every time she lightly stepped on the hill road connecting to the upper area, her hair fluttered.
“Analyzing situation. Detecting an abundance of ‘tasty’.”
“Sorry… I’m just not used to being called cute or pretty…”
“…Error.”
Qualia was having trouble learning why there was so much ‘tasty’ on Ina’s face.
His learning abilities were also struggling with why he reflexively called Ina’s untied hair ‘cute’.
Neither was something his optimized solutions could turn into ones and zeroes.
“Analyzing situation. This error, this ‘cute’, is not wrong.”
“I’m very happy to hear it.”
Ina held her basket behind her, and she looked up at Qualia with a very happy expression on her face. It was bright, and yet, it made his vision clearer.
They continued going up, as they saw more and more luxurious buildings.
Although this was still the lower area, there were many shops for the nobles who lived in the upper area.
They passed by a clothing store, where expensive dresses designed with things like jewels and furs were displayed.
“…Up until three years ago, I had no connection to myself as a girl.”
Qualia felt a slight error in his visual information reception.
He felt as though he was seeing a ten year old Ina look up at the dresses on the other side of the glass.
“I scrounged around for leftovers, looked for a good place to sleep on the street, did jobs that barely paid anything… Every day, I would hide in the shadow of my brother and try to not become a victim of the violence and murder I would see… I struggled just to survive, so I guess that’s all that mattered.”
Ina stopped her monologue for a moment.
“But I wanted to wear those kinds of clothes, and walk around town without a care. I wanted to dress well, and be pretty. I guess back then, part of me felt that way too…”
“Was it your objective to acquire these clothes?”
“No.”
A big smile returned to Ina’s melancholic face.
It regained its ‘tasty’.
“I got all the words I wanted from the person I wanted.”
“Request explanation. That…”
But then, there was a thunderous roar, cracking the little world they were in.
The ground rumbled, and from where they stood, they could see explosions all over the lower area.
“Multiple threats detected in the lower area.”
“W-w-what is…”
Ina covered her mouth with her hand, as Qualia plainly read the situation.
Smoke billowed from one place after the other. There was the sound of big, sturdy buildings collapsing.
The smell of gunpowder characteristic of fire magic reached Qualia’s nose, and he felt the oscillations in the atmosphere brought about by wind magic on his skin.
Every one of his five senses detected anomalies.
“Uwaaaaaaaaaaaaah!!”
He heard screams, as the wind carried the smell of blood.
Far in the distance, far enough that he could not focus his eyes, another ‘tasty’ was completely stained in red.
“W-we have to help!”
“Ina, request that you stay within a ten meter radius of Qualia.”
“Wah.”
Qualia grabbed Ina’s hand, and walked down the road.
But soon after, he saw the cause of this abnormal situation.
“Hand over all our freedoms you damn humaaaaaaaans!!”
He saw a slaughter. A sword being swung down, and cutting a human in half, bones and all.
He saw destruction.
Many people pooling their magic together to destroy a building from its foundation.
He learned it in a second. These beast people were simply devoting themselves to slaughter and destruction.
The screams of people running away were proof of the exponential decline of ‘tasty’.”
“Type GUN.”
“Type GUN.”
He seized all the threats within his vision. Seventeen.
Qualia finished his predictions in a hurry. He saw the future, even the behavior hidden by the obstacles and fleeing humans.
“Calculating optimal solution.”
He did not ask who these beast people were or why they were carrying out slaughter and destruction of this scale.
Instead, he shot beams at several people.
“Iguh!?”
“Guh!”
“Aga… It hurts…!?”
Seventeen beams.
In a moment, the beams fired in succession all avoided obstacles and hit the limbs of the beast people.
“Any further hostile action will designate you a target to be eliminated, including stopping your vital activity.”
Without closing his eyes in the face of smoke and embers, Qualia stared at the beast people whose arms and legs now had holes.
His first job as a part of Hello World had begun.
“You are wrong.”
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