Chapter 39 - That's Why

When asked how much one person is worth, an idealist will say you cannot put a price on a human life. But ask whether they would give up everything they own to save one person, and few will nod.

A realist will say you can put a price on a human life. But ask how much they would sell their own life for, and few can give a proper answer. Determining a person's worth was that difficult. Countless people had wrestled with the question since ancient times, yet no one had found an answer.

"To be honest, we were lucky."

In that sense, Li Qingyu was a rare person indeed. Here was a girl who had taken on that thorny question without hesitation and declared that her clan's vast fortune was a bargain compared to Limon's worth.

"... Lucky?"

"Yes. When we first drew up this plan, we were prepared for it to take a hundred years." She smiled brightly at Limon, who wore a baffled expression.

"Your reputation was so great, Sword Lord, that we wondered whether it would fade even after a thousand years, let alone a hundred."

That was no exaggeration. Humanity's guardian deity, who had slain the Demon God. The hero who had ended the Spirit Upheaval that swept across the Americas. The last Sword Master, who had thwarted the Seven Dragons Society's schemes time and again. The reputation Limon Aspelder had built over centuries was so immense that, until some thirty years ago, it showed no sign of fading. Even the Seven Dragons Society had doubted whether its world-peace plan would work.

"But people are remarkable, aren't they?"

The change people brought about after the Iron Age began and constellations and players appeared in the world was astonishing. "It took them just thirty years, not a hundred, to forget your reputation completely."

Players intoxicated by their newfound power. Those in power blinded by the riches dungeons offered. Ordinary people who had come to take peace for granted. People adapted to the changing age with astonishing speed and just as readily discarded what belonged to the old one. Absorbed in the wealth and peace before their eyes, they forgot who had protected the world so many times before.

No, it was less that they had forgotten than that they had buried it. It was as though they found it shameful that the world had once been saved by a mere ignorant swordsman. Without anyone needing to take the lead, people naturally buried Limon's accomplishments and turned Sword Masters into objects of ridicule. The shift was so swift it startled even the Seven Dragons Society, which had intended to bring it about.

"Strange, isn't it? People forgot you so quickly that it exceeded even our predictions, and we were the ones who planned the whole thing."

To one of the doubts Limon had harbored, Li Qingyu added a question of her own. Wearing a curious smile unlike any she had shown before, she continued. "It's not as though some transcendent beings intervened on a worldwide scale."

Her tone was light, as if she were joking. But her eyes were not smiling, and Limon raised an eyebrow. "... Are you saying the constellations are why I fell faster than your plan predicted?"

"If I told anyone else that, they'd call me crazy."

"At least you know that." Limon frowned. Only because it was him could he brush off her words so lightly. Anyone else would have thought Li Qingyu was a lunatic.

"If what you say is true, it means the constellations are brainwashing and controlling players."

"I wouldn't go that far. I just wonder whether players are being influenced by the constellations without realizing it."

"That's what brainwashing is."

It was an outrageous claim. No, it was sheer madness. In this Iron Age, it was common knowledge that constellations were great transcendent beings who granted people protection and blessings. Even a deranged conspiracy theorist would call it bullshit.

But rather than retract her words, Li Qingyu spoke calmly. "As I've already told you, the Seven Dragons Society has spent the past several decades working for world peace."

"I know."

"The thing we worked hardest at was gathering information about people."

"I can imagine." Having been called humanity's guardian deity, Limon understood her point in more ways than one and nodded. The problem was what she said next.

"I began to suspect the constellations because I found something odd in the information we'd collected."

"Something odd?"

"More people change their personalities after becoming players than you might think."

"It's common enough for people to change when they suddenly gain power."

"If they gained great power, perhaps. But what if even people who gained very little power changed?" Li Qingyu calmly described the changes in people who were only level 10 or 20 at most, bound to constellations with hardly any power and barely regarded as players at all.

A criminal who had repeatedly committed rape and robbery becoming someone who donated everything they owned. A person who loved swimming developing hydrophobia and becoming terrified of water. Someone who had studied all their life to become a doctor suddenly deciding to become a fighter. As Li Qingyu listed example after example, Limon narrowed his eyes.

"None of that is impossible."

"No. One in a hundred might be expected. But what if more than seventy percent of players underwent changes like these, large or small?"

"... Seven out of ten players change their personalities?"

"If you look at the figures for players who've been under contract for more than ten years."

"I've been watching players for decades, and I haven't noticed any such change."

"The longer you've known someone, the harder it is to notice. It happens slowly, over decades." If a person changed overnight, anyone would be suspicious. But if the change happened over years or even decades? People would merely think they were a little different from how they used to be. No one would find it strange, not even the person who had changed.

"But you of all people should know, Sword Lord, that a person's fundamental nature doesn't change easily."

"..."

"So do you think it's normal for such profound changes to happen without any event or turning point to explain them?" Limon had no answer to that.

A brush with death. A life-changing experience. Plenty of people changed their personalities or their way of life after something like that. But if seven out of ten changed simply because they became players? If the remaining three were still changing, or their changes had simply gone unnoticed? Could he really say with certainty that the constellations had no hand in it?

"... Even if that's true, it isn't enough on its own to warrant suspecting the constellations."

"Yes. You're right, Sword Lord." Li Qingyu acknowledged it frankly. Even if players' personalities truly changed, that was no proof the constellations had brainwashed them. Perhaps the contract merely let a constellation's disposition rub off on its player. Plenty of people would ask what was wrong with that. A little change in personality was nothing compared to the benefits constellations gave them.

"In fact, that's why no one else in the Seven Dragons Society is wary of the constellations. At most, they're wary of players gaining too much influence."

"... Then why are you so wary of them?"

"I don't know much about constellations, but there is one thing I do know."

They had done no harm to the world and had never interfered with the Seven Dragons Society. Why, then, was she so wary of them on such flimsy evidence as changes in players' personalities? To Limon's puzzled question, Li Qingyu answered with a gentle smile. "There's no such thing as kindness without a price."

"... A wise answer to a foolish question." From spirits and gods to the seven dragons, history had seen many beings besides constellations who transcended humanity. But not one of them had ever shown humankind kindness without expecting something in return. Sacrifices, affection, faith, obedience: each had taken its price in its own way and granted benefits in return.

What, then, did constellations take in exchange for offering contracts and the power called skills merely to people who demonstrated their achievements? The chance to watch the players they contracted with for entertainment? It was possible. If constellations were great beings beyond even gods, perhaps giving away that much power was as trivial to them as a billionaire paying for a TV subscription. But the constellation Limon had seen had not seemed so great. And in his long life, he had learned a few truths.

"The things that look free usually come at the highest price."

"Yes. But far too many people these days have forgotten something so obvious." Li Qingyu gave a faint, bitter smile, then looked at the remains of the display cabinet Chao had smashed through earlier and let out a soft sigh.

"Quite a few people within the Seven Dragons Society have been influenced by the constellations too."

The Seven Dragons Society had maintained absolute secrecy while carrying out its world-peace plan. Only the princesses and elders of each clan knew the whole story. The plan had been so covert that even the clans carrying it out did not know its true purpose. If the secret of their efforts to preserve world peace came out, all that work would be for nothing. In the worst case, Limon himself might step in.

Secrecy bordering on paranoia. The Sword Master's decline, accelerated beyond their expectations by the constellations' intervention. The result was clan members like Chao, steeped in the assumptions of the present age and prone to underestimating Limon. Even Chao had done so, despite hearing about Limon time and again as Li Qingyu's bodyguard. There was no need to ask what the rest of the Seven Dragons Society thought of him, apart from a few exceptions among its leadership. Not even the Society, which had long operated as the power behind the world, had escaped the constellations' reach.

"How the hell did you end up caught in your own scheme...?"

"It is ironic." Perhaps embarrassed herself, Li Qingyu blushed faintly. But she did not forget to add, "Or perhaps it was inevitable."

Anyone who used poison had to be prepared to swallow it themselves. But they had neglected to prepare. No, they had grown complacent. Just as those who knew nothing had become intoxicated by the power constellations offered and the abundance dungeons brought, the Seven Dragons Society had been seduced by the wealth and prestige it gained by coming into the open, and by the arrogance of ruling the world from the shadows. The other clans no longer saw a need to keep the world-peace plan going to hold Limon in check, much less to guard against the constellations. That alone proved it. In that sense, perhaps it was inevitable: a tide of the times no one could escape.

"That's why I staked everything on proposing to you, Sword Lord."

"... Because I'm the only one in the world who can cut down a constellation?"

"Yes, that's right." Li Qingyu nodded, then looked at Limon with steady eyes and continued. "Now that players have taken control of the whole world, you're the only person who can defy the tide of the times and protect our Seven Dragons Society from the constellations, Sword Lord."