After confirming no one else was around, the thought of staying in the mall made them sick, so they left. The pleasant evening breeze of early autumn helped them forget the reality around them.
The first to speak was Lucia.
“The idea is that you are nothing more than a brain in a vat and the world you know is no more than electrical stimuli given to that brain. Of course, it’s not meant to claim this is true. It’s more of a joke showing that thoughts are a subjective thing and all scientific theories can be explained away as only existing in that vat if you remove that subjective element.”
It was quiet outside as well.
This city was not a metropolis and there was not a full shopping district around the mall, so the only sounds would be the people passing by. So when there were no people passing by, everything was so quiet the autumn wind sounded far too loud in their ears.
“There are sometimes science fiction stories based on that joke. They present humanity as existing in a vat where they are shown a false reality instead of the real one. The person who develops a way to place themselves in the vat could just enjoy the perfect world they have created for themselves, but for some reason, they decide they want to share that happiness with everyone else and work in secret to turn all of humanity into brains in vats and they attack as a giant robot brain for the final battle.”
“Are you saying that’s what Mutsuki is doing?”
“I won’t say that. But in that state, he should be able to promise eternal pleasure to the brains – or minds, really – that he has locally collected.”
As they continued walking, they accidentally stepped in a black stain. Lucia did not seem to mind, but Ange found it gross and quickly stepped around it.
Machina was already used to avoiding others as she walked, so she never stepped in one to begin with.
“From what I can tell, 98% of the humans in the world have entered the same state,” she said with her phone to her ear.
She was not actually speaking with anyone; she was gathering global information over the network.
“That’s a lot,” said Ange.
“It actually makes me curious about the remaining 2%,” said Lucia. “What’s happened to them?”
“Anyone piloting airplanes, ships, submarines, or anything else that would cause harm if it lost control has been spared. But once they arrive at the airport, harbor, or coast, contact is lost.”
“I guess that’s what happened to them.”
They glanced over at the nearby road.
There were a lot of cars on the road, but none had gotten into an accident. They were all stopped on the side of the road with their shift lever in park, their parking brake on, and their headlights off. Every one of the cars had come to a safe stop…and there was a black stain on the inside.
Not one of the 98% who had disappeared had been attacked.
They had all ensured their own safety and chosen for themselves to become black stains.
A being was gathering people’s minds – that is, the Fruit of Wisdom.
What was that thing formed from the boy named Fujita Mutsuki? Ange and Lucia had no word to define it. An angel and demon like them were familiar with what the human world interpreted as “god”, but not even that “god” could do this.
There were of course plenty of things god could do which this being could not, but there was one major point in common between him and god.
They were revered.
No, they were loved.
The small amount of Adam’s power allowed out by the Serpent’s Eye showed that Adam’s nature was to capture the affections of all women. And if Lilith, bearer of the other Serpent’s Eye, had the opposite nature, then she captured the affections of all men.
Now that they had become one, they had created a being that could capture the affections of all humans.
It was unclear which one a gay person would be drawn to, but as long as they carried the emotion of love, they would fall in love with one or the other side of this being. Age was not factor. A newborn baby and an elderly person breathing their last were no exceptions.
And once they loved him, they lost all ability to resist him.
When he asked them to give up their Fruit of Wisdom, they would gladly do so and they were willing to let their abandoned body be reduced to mere nutrients – a pile of black flesh. They could not defy that being. Any who did so would instinctually choose to abandon living.
But what would happen to the gathered Fruits of Wisdom?
“They will live forever in the grasp of the one who loves them. They will have no thoughts or emotions. They will simply be with the one who loves them.”
“Well, they must be happy.” Lucia cackled. “Thus, humanity escaped the age of discord and lived happily ever after in the vat they named Eden.”
He was clearly making a joke, but he also stopped walking.
“It’s disappointing that Mutsuki-kun chose that woman, but if that’s his choice, I’ll accept it. I’m sure he’ll come for me too eventually. But what about you two?”
He looked to the others.
“…”
“…”
Ange and Machina were hesitant to respond.
It was hard to view this as a good thing. Something very close to being god had appeared out of nowhere and humanity had been eradicated. A hellish scene of a deserted world stained by dark liquid lay before them. Their sense of justice told them they needed to put a stop to this.
But Lucia’s words had greatly shaken them.
He had said this was what Fujita Mutsuki wanted.
Lilith had no real reason to want this.
She was the origin point of all demons and, since her name was never seen in human history, she must not have done much of anything for thousands of years. She had no desire to rule the human world or to eradicate humanity.
She only wanted to make Adam hers and she had accomplished that.
And since that young man was indeed a “man”, it was best to assume Adam’s – that is, Mutsuki’s – mind was most strongly in control.
And it did seem a lot like Mutsuki to be so oddly thoughtful about not hurting anyone by waiting for people to park their cars or land their airplanes even though he was going to eliminate them anyway.
So…
“This is Fujita-kun’s answer to the rivalry.”
“He does sometimes take things to an extreme.”
Their shoulders slumped.
This was the biggest reason why FeTUS had not told Mutsuki himself about his role as Adam in the age of rivalry.
It was meant to go the way the angels wanted: Adam would choose his Eve through a natural process, they would come together and have a child, and that would bring gradual salvation to Kali Yuga, the age of destruction that followed after the rivalry. That was the natural system created by god.
But that would mean a major regression in human civilization, so FeTUS opposed it. They believed the near extinction of the human race should be avoided even if that was unnatural, but if the rivalry led to a nuclear war, that would prevent any life from living on the planet at all. That was why their plan had been to artificially create the Holy Grail – that is, Eve’s womb – implant Adam there, and arrive at the source of modern human genetics.
“But to be honest, this is the best way of preventing the rivalry.” Lucia cackled again. “Even setting aside the deterioration of human genetics, humans are a species that kill and steal from each other.”
FeTUS’s plan to prevent the rivalry had been to avoid the short-term threat of extinction and produce new long-term problems such as limited resources when the population exploded.
Would Fujita Mutsuki want that? If not, wouldn’t Adam look elsewhere? That was FeTUS’s greatest concern and the reason they had not simply asked for his help in preventing the near-extinction of humanity.
But perhaps keeping it from him had been the wrong choice.
After learning the truth from someone else, this was the method Mutsuki had chosen.
“It’s no good. Heaven is being affected too.”