"A crime? Is wanting to cleanse the filth and make the world clean a crime? Why should I have to hide that?"
I simply stated the facts as they were.
There wasn't even a need to lie in the first place.
I was genuinely in the right.
I wanted to raise this country's standards of public health. I wished everyone would pick up the habit of living a bit more cleanly.
Where in the world could you find a goal more pure than that?
Countless patients who might die from infections due to a lack of hygiene awareness. Newborns with vulnerable immune systems on top of that.
This was about saving countless lives and, while I was at it, saving my own nose from the torment of people who bathed once every five months.
"B-Boss! It's dangerous! Approaching without a weapon -- if that man decides to hurt you......"
Of course, things were honestly a bit tense.
There was a man holding a sword right in front of me.
It'd be stranger if I felt nothing.
Yet even so, I kept my expression composed.
"Don't worry. I'm certain of it. This man actually thinks what I'm saying isn't wrong."
After all, wasn't the current situation itself strange?
Had he come here to kill us?
Then there'd have been no need to announce 'Hey, I'm right here!' He could have just ambushed us and cut our throats.
On top of that, commoners were effectively livestock to nobles.
If someone rubbed you the wrong way, you just killed them. Yet this man wasn't attacking. He was standing there listening to me.
"Don't spout nonsense. The dreams you're chasing in this backwater are so absurd they're beyond laughable. My interest was slightly piqued -- I indulged a whim, that's all."
The noble told me not to read meaning into it. But that was precisely the proof that my instinct wasn't wrong.
If you had time to tell me to stop talking, you had time to swing your blade.
That's what most nobles would do.
"One more step and I'll cut you down. Well, you'd be arrested for treason and executed regardless. Whether you die here or get dragged away to die -- makes no difference, I suppose."
And yet, why wasn't he killing me?
Why did he keep talking about killing me without ever acting on it?
I had a fair idea why.
And so I spoke with a confident smile.
"Executed for treason? For saying the Empire's top brass reek of rot, so we have to cleanse them with our own hands? How is that a capital offense?"
"......Have you lost your mind? Insulting the nobility is a crime. The likes of you have no right to speak of purification. Nobles are inherently superior to commoners--"
I cut Sian off.
Normally, not handing over control of the conversation was a tactical advantage, but this time there was a bigger reason.
Because no matter how you looked at it, that was just too ridiculous.
"Has your sense of smell actually gone dead?"
"......What?"
"Nobles are inherently superior? There's no need for the likes of us to speak of purification? Unless your nose has rotted off, you know it too. How filthy the Empire's nobles are."
"......That's."
Just as I'd thought. My prediction was spot-on. Even if most nobles were trash, the occasional mutation was bound to exist.
Walking through the Empire's capital was like exploring a sewer. No matter how medieval the world was, at least one person had to find that revolting.
"......Shut your mouth. What matters right now is that you dared to rebel against the Empire. Traitors must be dealt with severely. There is no room for sympathy."
But going against the mainstream was never easy.
In this insane medieval world, I was the abnormal one for saying people should bathe at least once a day -- once a week at the absolute minimum.
He probably thought that humans were just supposed to smell bad, and that I was the strange one for making a fuss over it.
But precisely because of that, I had to push harder here.
"You can't deny it, though."
"What?"
"That the Empire's top brass reek of a putrid stench. You never denied it with your own mouth."
At my words, the man was struck speechless.
Of course he was. Even he must have thought the Imperial Family and nobles were too vile.
When sweat mixed with perfume, the result was truly horrendous. The nobles who doused themselves in perfume to mask their stench were actually worse than those who simply didn't wash. And Sian had lived among such nobles.
"You couldn't deny it, so you told me to shut up instead. You're trying to change the subject and dodge the point."
I slowly approached him.
Approached him, and spoke.
"You're turning a blind eye. You know something is wrong. But you don't want to be the one to say it yourself."
A person couldn't live without reading the room.
Even if I personally thought something wasn't right, if everyone else agreed, I couldn't be the lone dissenting vote.
Nobody wanted to take that risk.
"You know the problem but you don't speak up. Why? Because you're afraid that saying something like this might turn everyone against you. It's safer to just keep your mouth shut and ride with the majority."
That was only natural.
Wasn't it normal for a person to prioritize their own safety? If anything, those who threw their lives away recklessly were the abnormal ones.
So this was a perfectly natural phenomenon.
A natural phenomenon, but not the right thing.
"As a result, just as you are right now, no one calls what's wrong wrong. Because no one speaks up, nothing changes. That's how things ended up like this."
Why was this Empire so horrific?
This was the conclusion I'd reached after a long time of thinking.
"Children can't live like children. People can't live like people. It's clearly a world full of wrongs. But no one is willing to open their mouth. And so the world ended up in this state."
I wasn't exactly a human rights activist.
But arriving in this damn Empire taught me just how monumentally important human rights were, down to my very bones.
"So what can I do? I don't have power like you do, and changing the entire Empire is probably close to impossible, but if nobody else will do it, then I have to step up."
Starting with the soap business.
Improve hygiene and save some lives.
Make some money along the way and free some slaves.
Small things, sure. But so what if they were small? Doing something was better than just standing by and watching.
I looked the blond noble straight in the eye.
Looked him straight in the eye and said, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
"So help us out."
***
Sian's mind went blank.
He couldn't even begin to figure out where to start criticizing.
A commoner talking like that in front of a noble? Being caught plotting treason and having the audacity to look this unfazed?
The man didn't give him a single opening to object.
He just rambled on at his own pace, spouting whatever he pleased.
"You said it yourself. I'm a commoner and you're a noble. You've clearly got the higher status and the power to actually do things. So why haven't you done anything, forcing someone like me to step up?"
"......Have you truly lost your mind? You're telling me to join a rebellion?"
"Rebellion? What are you on about? I'm just saying let's make soap, get people to wash, and improve public hygiene."
How could a person be this brazen? Judging by his expression alone, you'd swear he genuinely was just trying to sell soap.
Sian had seen the bomb with his own two eyes. He'd even heard the plan to use it in a bombing. And yet the man played dumb.
"You've been thinking it too, deep down. That nobles reek. It's so obvious it'd be harder not to notice."
......He had thought the Empire went a bit too far.
A world overflowing with hunger.
Yet their household, where there was so much food they threw it away.
Family trips in an extravagant carriage.
And the waifs who clung to that carriage begging for food, only to be kicked away by his father.
Isn't something wrong here?
He had harbored that thought, but that was all.
He was no fool. He knew how idiotic it was for a handful of people to stand against a nation.
So he had no intention of being swayed by such drivel.
"......I'll be merciful and pretend this meeting never happened. But if you're going to commit suicide, do it on your own."
"Y-Young Master? What are you saying?"
"Shut up and stay out of it. I'll handle this."
This was...... just a simple whim.
They wouldn't be able to do anything. Since they'd never accomplish anything, it made no difference whether he let them go or not.
"Get out of my sight before I change my mind."
Sian spoke with a serious expression.
This should have been the end of it. They'd back down, and both sides would go their separate ways. That was how it should have ended.
......He wasn't leaving.
The man was still standing right where he was.
"Are you serious? You can't possibly not understand how enormous a concession I just made. You're going to be stubborn even now?"
He was on the verge of genuine anger.
But the man just wore a sly expression.
What came out of his smiling mouth was, yet again, something outlandish.
"Yeah, that's exactly why I'm staying and not leaving."
As if he were the one doing Sian a favor. Facing the incredulous Sian, the man continued.
"If you walk away now, you're obviously going to regret it later."
"I believe I said I have no desire to commit suicide. I have no intention of getting myself killed playing along with your absurd little--"
"No, you'll definitely regret it."
The man cut off Sian and stated it as fact.
His brow furrowed, naturally. Irritation at what the hell this was supposed to be was about to boil over, but.
Their eyes met.
That strange pressure froze Sian's body on its own.
"Turning a blind eye doesn't make the problem go away. You're going to keep desperately pretending not to notice the putrid stench, suffering through it. Living a life that doesn't feel like living."
"What does any of that have to do with you?"
"It hurts, doesn't it? I'm sensitive about these things, so I can tell. You're the same kind as me. Doesn't it feel like living isn't really living?"
He was struck speechless.
Because he'd been hit right where it hurt. They'd barely exchanged a few words, yet the man had seen through his very nature.
"Saying you'd just let us go. That wasn't really for our sake, was it? It's for yourself. You feel uneasy too, so you're hoping someone else will change the world in your place."
The man approached.
Approached, looking Sian straight in the eye.
"Stop thinking about running."
There was clearly no weapon in those hands.
The weapon was in Sian's hands, rather.
So he could simply cut him down and be done with it.
But why -- how --
Sian was overwhelmed by a man who held no weapon. Even with a sword in his hand, he could not stop the man's advance.
"Don't push it off on someone else. If you think the world should change, then change it yourself, with your own hands."