'Even though we've only exchanged a few words, I understand now—you really aren't an ordinary brat.'
A subtle change passed through Gozuki's gaze.
He hid it well, but when he looked over at Noah, Noah could clearly sense the gravity in it.
He was being put on guard.
Which was hardly surprising. One only had to look at this underground facility to understand why.
There were many outstanding assassins here, orphans born with innate abilities different from ordinary humans.
The Empire's standard method was to gather such people together and aggressively brainwash them, thereby gaining complete control over their power.
And because they were all children, brainwashing them was significantly easier.
But clearly, that kind of low-level psychological method was useless against Noah.
The stronger a person's sense of self, the worse standard brainwashing worked on them, because such people would not blindly believe everything they heard and saw.
A thoroughly brainwashed assassin carried out missions without distraction, caring about nothing except the kill itself.
But children with excessive curiosity, or children who were too clever, would always end up touching taboos, breaking rules, and becoming difficult to control.
"So what's the real matter?" Noah took the initiative and steered the conversation back to the point, no longer allowing Gozuki to keep verbally probing him.
Through everything they had said just now, Gozuki had been subtly bringing up other topics, disguising them as casual stories and complaints.
But Noah had ignored all of it.
He knew the master assassin wanted to see right through him, to judge from those small, leading questions what kind of political thoughts and opinions he held, and quietly assign him a threat score.
Unfortunately, Noah truly had no interest in any of that.
He didn't even care whether the Empire itself would fall or not.
All he wanted was to find an opportunity to properly study these so-called Imperial Arms, and through them improve his personal skill as a craftsman.
In Orario, the value of "experience" depended heavily on the individual.
A person who had been an adventurer for fifty years would surely possess terrifying combat instincts, but that specific experience would be of little use to most other people facing different monsters.
Compared to obvious gaps such as Falna status values, Development Abilities, and rare magic, basic "knowledge" and "experience" could not truly show their worth in the hands of the weak.
The true essence of Yog-Sothoth was a cosmic magic that let him personally enter other worlds through physical projections and learn their unique knowledge firsthand.
That knowledge didn't just manifest out of nowhere.
It had to be learned, observed, and absorbed.
Sooner or later, that gathered ability would blossom as he grew, and ultimately make him one of the foremost powerhouses back in Orario.
Imperial Arms were wondrous, reality-bending things.
Those mysterious abilities were the sort of god-tier craftsmanship that would tempt even the divine smiths of Heaven like Hephaestus.
That, and that alone, was what interested him here.
"Heh." Gozuki let out a self-mocking laugh, then suddenly relaxed his posture.
He crossed one leg over the other, spread his muscular arms, and leaned back comfortably against the leather sofa.
"Fine. Though honestly, my original purpose for coming down here doesn't matter anymore. After seeing something even more interesting, I only have one thought right now—I want you to provide technical support to my unit."
"Support?"
"Yes. Let me explain my unit first. It consists of seven children, all either your age or slightly younger. They're incredibly talented, and I'm raising them into elite assassins capable of bearing the burden of protecting this nation. Unlike those defective products down the hall, they don't need to use drugs to fight. But your gravity ring is excellent for training, and so is this new toy."
Defective products...
He meant Kurome and the others.
The modified orphans whose raw combat ability had to be artificially enhanced with toxic drugs.
To possess physical strength far beyond modified humans without needing a single drop of drugs—no wonder they were called elites.
Gozuki picked up the plain hilt on the tea table again.
"Does this thing have an official name?" he asked.
Noah shook his head.
To him, it was nothing more than a cheap disposable toy.
If he wanted, a single thought would let him unleash Weaver wind blades dozens of times more terrifying than this mechanical copy.
Once his magic stats eventually reached S-rank, Weaver's performance would naturally improve as well.
So naturally, he had no reason to formally engrave a name on something like this.
Nor had he ever bothered giving it one.
Even a low-grade magic sword from Orario worth 500,000 valis had slightly more cutting power than this.
Back home, something like this might sell to a rookie for around 200,000 at most.
The capabilities of the top-tier people in this world were highly abnormal.
Some especially gifted individuals could, through martial arts and physical training alone, grow strong enough to defeat Super Class Danger Beasts barehanded.
That was unthinkable in a modern world.
Even Blazers would generally struggle to achieve something similar without summoning their Devices.
Esdeath was the clearest example of this phenomenon.
Her internal body structure was completely identical to that of an ordinary human, yet she grew at an absurd, terrifying pace, easily breaking through the biological physical limits normal humans were bound by.
The density of her muscles and bones, as well as the kinetic load they could withstand, exceeded that of ordinary humans by more than ten times.
That made the raw force behind her strikes extraordinary—enough to instantly kill even an armored rhinoceros in one blow.
But at their core, they were still biologically human.
Their skin and flesh were still flesh, not steel armor, which meant that even a primitive matchlock gun or a farmer's rusty woodcutting knife could still fatally injure them if it hit.
As for Esdeath—if her current physical abilities were converted into Falna status values, then it would probably be something like:
Strength: B
Endurance: C
Agility: A
Dexterity: B
That was roughly the impression he got from her sparring data.
And all of those values used a seasoned Level 3 adventurer as the baseline.
In the world of the gods, it was nearly impossible for the mortal races of the lower world to draw out the absolute potential within themselves without a god's Falna blessing.
But there was one universal truth that remained the same no matter the dimension.
There would always be a rare, freakish few capable of drawing out that superhuman potential on their own.
Just like the legendary heroes from the ancient age before the descent of the gods—people who, even without a divine blessing, could fight the Black Dragon and even take one of its eyes.
The veteran man before him, Gozuki, was the same kind of freak.
Because he had never tested him directly in combat, Noah could not estimate his stats precisely, but the man was probably still much stronger than Esdeath was right now.
Judging by his age, however, Gozuki's physical strength likely would not improve much further.
At most, within two or three years, the rapidly growing Esdeath would definitely surpass him.
The reason Gozuki had taken such a strong liking to the gravity ring was obvious. The ring was an unmatched training aid for his young elites.
As for that small blade made from a Kamaitachi, its greatest strength was its absolute concealability, which made it the perfect tool for an assassination unit.
After all, though poor civilians out in the provinces were still using outdated firearms like muskets and hunting rifles, the Empire's military had already developed heavy cannons and shoulder-fired rocket launchers.
Those heavy weapons were generally used for trench war and the subjugation of massive Danger Beasts.
They certainly weren't the sort of thing one could smuggle into a noble's party for a stealth assassination.
This strange, fragmented tech tree kept blindsiding Noah in the weirdest ways.
They had massive ocean liners crossing the seas, yet wooden horse-drawn carriages still ran through the capital streets.
They had guided missiles, yet the infantry was still armed with steel swords, spears, and lances.
There was an old saying: War is the mother of technology.
The leaps in technological progress humanity made during brutal, existential wars were beyond what anyone in peaceful times could have imagined.
But in this world, the great, existential wars had been ended a thousand years ago by the First Emperor.
He had even left behind the forty-eight Imperial Arms to permanently guard the Empire, making it the undisputed, strongest nation in the world.
From that point on, actual technological progress in this world had stagnated.
After all, scientific development could not exist without massive military funding, and an Empire with no real peer-level enemies had naturally been unwilling to waste tax money on so-called "alchemy."
Not only that, in order to ensure the forging methods of the Imperial Arms would never leak out to rebels, they had also systematically silenced and executed all the master alchemists and secret-art inheritors.
History repeated this paranoid cycle over and over, and that was what had created this bizarre, contradictory society—culturally backward and militarily advanced at the exact same time.
"I want you to supply this kind of weapon exclusively to the Empire's assassination corps, and at the same time, I want you not to produce any extra copies of it for anyone else." Gozuki's request was overbearing from the moment he opened his mouth.
He used the word "want," but in reality, that was a strict military prohibition.
After all, the gap in political status between them was enormous.
Noah was officially only a low-ranking researcher in the Scientific Corps, while Gozuki was a true high-ranking official with direct ties to the Prime Minister.
"Hold it."
At that exact moment, Bill spoke up from the sofa.
He shot Gozuki an unfriendly, protective look and warned, "You haven't forgotten what you promised me, have you, Gozuki?"
Seeing the paranoid old man actually step forward to defend him on his own, Gozuki was slightly surprised.
But he quickly understood.
'It seemed the old man really was extremely satisfied with this student of his.'
'And indeed, a genius like this deserved that kind of protective treatment.'
With a bitter smile, Gozuki spread his hands in surrender. "I know, I know. In exchange for his exclusive support, once my formal application for a Shingu is approved by the Minister, I'll provide it directly to you for research. What do you think, kid?"
Noah knew he had no real political choice in the matter.
He couldn't refuse Gozuki without making a powerful enemy.
But—a Shingu!
That condition was excellent!
"Fine. I accept the deal."
Rather than merely acceptable... it suited his true goals perfectly.
Was there really such a good deal?
Though it was a "failed" weapon and not a true Imperial Arm, a Shingu was still one of those strange, mysterious biological weapons.
All he had to do was assemble and provide some of those cheap, "scrap" little wind-blades, and in exchange, he would finally get the chance to personally study a Shingu up close.
That was far too worth it.
Seeing the kid accept the heavy demand so readily, Gozuki found himself momentarily speechless.
Something about this kid's lack of fear felt completely off!
"For the sake of those little brats under you, you're even willing to check out a highly restricted Shingu from the vault," Bill muttered, taking another sip of tea. "Looks like you're really growing fond of that batch of children, Gozuki."
"Heh. As long as they keep being good, obedient children, I don't mind playing the role of a loving father," Gozuki replied smoothly.
Gozuki knew Bill was mocking him.
What a ridiculous thing—that a hardened, veteran killer with an ocean of blood on his hands would actually grow attached to a group of disposable tools.
He could abandon even his own flesh and blood without a second thought if the mission required it, yet he still found the time to play father to a bunch of orphans in the woods.
And yet... though only a few days had passed since he last visited the mountain cabin, he was already beginning to genuinely miss their faces and voices.
Human emotion truly was a frightening, unpredictable thing.
It had infected him so unreasonably, working entirely against his cold logic.
Come to think of it... what should he buy for Akame's birthday present?
---------
Read 40 chapters ahead and support me on patreon.
patreon (.)com/Newbietranslator