kscans

Chapter 42 - Humans Cannot Be Trusted. But Numbers Never Lie

【Mechanized Magic City Nemesis Gear】
A warning light glowed silently in the black and silver tower. The Gear Archive, a fully automated recording mechanism, was announcing an emergency notification.

"Hero Ares, at the Pantheon Temple, a supreme sanctuary serving the God of Light, has murdered 34 priests, 12 shrine maidens, and over 230 citizens. Estimated refugees, 3,000."

In the tower's core, a space where a throne and an arithmetic unit were one, a single man sat quietly.

Crow Sakakibara. Also known as Magic-Armored General Crow.

The lens of his artificial eye converged slightly, and a magic array, mid-calculation, floated in the air. From the seams of his armor, heated ether pulsed with a low throb.

"...More 'noise', is it."

His voice echoed like cold metal.

"The behavioral prediction coefficient for a hero is always unstable. Emotion, a sense of duty, hatred, all of it takes precedence over logic."

【Allowable Error Margin, ±4%】
However, Ares's destructive actions had recorded an error of 【23.9%】.

Crow's artificial eye produced a single conclusion.

"The error has exceeded the threshold. Therefore, it shall be eliminated as 'noise'."

A sound came from behind him. Giant gears turned with a grinding creak, and dozens of magic turrets, Ether Cannons, began to hover in the space.

It was not a quiet anger. It was the indignation of an engineer whose design had been disrupted. The cold, silent killing intent of one whose ideals had been violated.

■ Flashback: The Past of Masato Sakakibara

Masato Sakakibara was once called a child prodigy. Until middle school, his grades were good, and he lived an unremarkable life. But at home, his father's angry shouts and cold indifference held sway, and at school, he was seen as an oddball who couldn't read the room and was kept at a distance.

The only place he felt at ease was on the other side of a display. It was a digital world brimming with infinite possibilities. By the time he entered high school, he had completely shut himself in his room, absorbed in a real-time strategy game with online competitive play.

Three monitors, a high-performance gaming PC, a custom-made input assistance device. His room was like a cockpit.

"People betray you. But code and logic are absolute."

That became his philosophy.

The battlefield Masato chose was the globally popular competitive e-sports game "Omega Conquest." He made a name for himself there.

Clockwork Reaper. A man whose every move was "as calculated." On the screen, enemies were just data, and allies were no different from AI parameters.

"An ally won't move? Then I'll make them move." He would even read his allies' intentions and, at times, use psychological manipulation.

His win rate was an astonishing 92 percent. In just one year, he reached 5th in the world rankings and was chosen for the Japanese national team.

The world tournament finals. His opponent was America's number one team, Ragnarøk. If he won this battle, he should have obtained the title of "world's strongest."

But at that moment, trouble occurred.

A bad internet connection. He could send commands with AI assistance, but the response was slightly off. Still, he was calm. It was a predictable error. The problem was his allies' emotions.

One of his teammates defied the AI's command and charged forward.

"Doing things your way isn't fun for anyone!"

In that instant, the team collapsed, and the tide of battle turned. Defeat.

Afterward, social media became a living hell.

"A dictator who can't read the room."

"He only thinks of people as pawns."

"Guess you really can't trust a shut-in."

Years of effort were negated overnight. His team and his sponsors cut him loose.

Masato deleted all his accounts and quit streaming and social media. He shut himself in his room, eating instant food, his days and nights reversed. He stared at the ceiling and thought.

"What went wrong? I was right... I should have been."

Betrayed by the world, abandoned by others, his own "perfection" was denied.

And so he jumped from the roof of a building, choosing to reset his life.

At that moment, a single phrase appeared on a screen.

【Would you like to reboot your soul in another world?】
Masato clicked without hesitation.