The majestic voice had barely finished reverberating through the space itself when the charging Guilty froze in unison, as though time had stopped.
Even the faint glow in their eyes seemed tinged with bewilderment.
However, that lasted only for a moment. They once again branded me a sinner and began tightening their encirclement.
《No defendant can escape the circle of law.》
《And… you are the defendant.》
Their argument was so careless that it made a mockery of the title City of Law.
Their voices once again disturbed my thoughts.
‘Right… the circle of law, is it?’
In that case, I merely had to destroy their pathetic circle.
“Then, let the defense begin.”
The power of words could halt even their movements. That was the unique nature of a trial.
At my declaration, the darkness filling the space stirred as though a gallery of spectators were murmuring among themselves.
These were the rules of Gray Judgment.
Under ordinary circumstances, this would have become a physical confrontation, but special situations like this followed a slightly different logic.
It had taken the form of a trial. Whatever modifier might be placed before it, the law ultimately had to be asserted.
As though this damned game had intended to turn the player into a legal professional, I had been forced to memorize legal provisions for all manner of situations.
‘Or enact the laws myself.’
Now that I had become the Absolved whom I had once controlled in the game, I felt strangely different.
Legal knowledge blossomed within my mind.
I immediately raised the end of the chair leg in my hand and pointed it at the nearest member of the Guilty.
Like the blade of a prosecutor.
“If you intend to charge the defendant with a crime, you must be able to prove that crime. Yet what are you doing now? Evidence, witnesses. You have neither!”
The words were closer to a thunderous rebuke.
They became the first new law to blossom amid the rules of Salus, the City of Law, which had been distorted by the Outer Gods.
[‘The Absolved’ Ash Gray declares a new law!]
[Trial Law, Article 1 : ‘Presumption of Innocence’, no one may render a guilty verdict when no substantiated evidence or witness exists.]
‘Oh, so that was his name.’
Ash Gray, the protagonist of Gray Judgment.
It seemed I had been given the default name without alteration.
WHIRRR, CLANK―!
Even as I considered this, the sound of machinery rapidly turning echoed around me.
The new law of the trial meshed with the gears and began to move, while the hologram floating before my eyes whispered those facts to me.
The surroundings, which had been stained in darkness, slowly regained their outlines. The ominous energy enveloping the creatures gradually faded as though it had never existed.
《Urgh… Aah…?》
As though a fracture had formed in the law of judgment controlling them, they clutched their heads in confusion and once again began howling like beasts.
The unmistakable hostility they had directed toward me wandered aimlessly, deprived of its destination.
It was the fitting end of ghouls driven mad by the law.
The corner of my mouth rose naturally. With a cold smile, I swept the chair leg through the air and drew a line before me.
“From this moment onward, any accusation made without evidence is dismissed.”
[The trial of ‘The Absolved’ Ash Gray, ‘Turnabout Trial’, activates!]
[The weapon ‘Broken Wooden Chair Leg’ temporarily transforms into the ‘Noble Gavel of Judgment’!]
[You can now use the new skill ‘Noble Gavel of Judgment’!]
The chair leg in my hand became enveloped in golden light.
The object was far too enormous to be called something used during a hearing. It had transformed into a massive war hammer.
Despite its seemingly immeasurable size, it felt remarkably light in my hands.
“Furthermore, the trial you seek to conduct cannot even be considered valid! You persecuted another without justification. The weight of that crime will crush you!”
I proclaimed those words as I brought the golden hammer down against the floor.
At the same time, I roared at the Guilty who had attempted to approach me, rebuking them like condemned criminals.
“Hear me, lawbreakers driven mad by sin! Have wretches such as you, who have lost even reason itself, any right to usurp the authority of judges and pass judgment upon the innocent?!”
CRRRRACK―!!
At that moment, the sound of the world splitting apart rang out. The dense darkness filling the surroundings began shattering like glass.
The crimson glow within the eyes of the Guilty gradually vanished, and the domain of the ‘improvised trial’ they had declared began losing its power.
《This… cannot, be…!》
《O-our… law…!》
《It is… collaps, ing…!!》
Their dark courtroom slowly receded.
Once the authority they had wielded as the trial’s ‘representatives’ was stripped from them, the creatures that had already died collapsed to the floor once again.
“The trial is… over.”
The creatures remaining on the first floor looked up at me with expressions filled with bewilderment.
Their strangely emotional expressions made them seem almost human again, and I could not help but chuckle.
“Now, it is time to clean up.”
I swung the golden hammer down upon them with all my strength.
BOOOOM―!
An enormous explosion-like roar erupted as the blow reduced the Guilty from their heads to their torsos into minced flesh.
Unlike before, the creatures now seemed utterly helpless. Every part of their bodies touched by the golden light turned into gray dust.
It was not merely cleaning.
It was the complete erasure of their existence.
The golden Gavel of Judgment had already returned to an ordinary wooden chair leg.
“Phew….”
Only after releasing several deep breaths in succession did I finally regain my composure.
Had I truly been the one who said those words?
The question arose naturally.
It was almost as though someone had been sleeping inside me.
Even with the repulsive stench of the Guilty’s blood filling the air, my heart remained unnaturally calm.
‘I don’t know. Am I being consumed by this being called the Absolved… by the original owner of this body?’
While playing the game, I had assumed those words were nothing more than the character’s dialogue.
Now that words I had never consciously considered were emerging from my own mouth, however, I could only feel unsettled.
‘Whatever happened, I survived.’
Even greater ordeals would be waiting for me, but I would have to overcome those as well.
‘It feels as though I am not myself.’
Even in a situation that should have made me vomit, only calm thoughts entered my mind.
It felt as natural as an ordinary physiological response.
The fact that I felt no fear, terror, or even nausea over what I had done was astonishing in itself.
‘No, that isn’t right. Thinking about such things is a luxury.’
Had I hesitated while striking them, I would have been the one to die.
They had barged barefoot into another person’s home without warning and immediately attempted to kill me.
After enduring that, would it not have been stranger to spout nonsense such as, ‘These people were human too’?
“Still… that was fortunate.”
Only after taking a moment to recover did I look at the corpses strewn around me and realize how fortunate I had been.
Had a judge—or even a court clerk—been present, matters would have become considerably more troublesome.
These creatures were merely sinners who did not even understand how to wield the weapons they had been given.
The first rule of Gray Judgment was that those within a domain where a judgment had been declared would gain enough power to surpass their normal limits.
However, that applied only while they were capable of maintaining the ‘domain’.
‘Even so….’
I had assumed that the Absolved was merely an image or role assigned to the protagonist.
That was not the case.
The Absolved was someone capable of exploiting the loopholes inherent in the very concept of law.
That appeared to be the existence the donor had referred to when he called me the ‘Absolved’.
“Phew―”
Whatever the circumstances, I finally felt as though I could take a moment to breathe.
‘The merchant NPC should be next…… just as I thought.’
I sat loosely on an unbroken wooden chair leaning against the wall and began taking slow, measured breaths.
Then I heard footsteps.
STEP, STEP.
Just as I had expected, someone was approaching.
“My, how impressive. Their crimes may have been minor, but there were still so many of them.”
“Huh?”
……Or so I had once thought.
If this was fate, I wanted to believe that fate was playing a joke on me.
Someone I had never expected to see had appeared.
A figure emerged while offering an awkward round of applause.
“Ah, excuse me. My name is…….”
“Ravenwood.”
Of course I knew her.
Her appearance and clothing alone were more than enough to identify her.
A raven mask covering her face.
A fedora.
A black coat concealing her entire body and a slender cane long enough to touch the ground.
Despite the concealing clothing, she possessed the unmistakably curvaceous figure of a woman.
Her pale ash-gray hair left a particularly strong impression, standing in complete contrast to the dark clothing she wore.
She had unmistakably been modeled after the plague doctors who had personally traveled from place to place treating people during times of pestilence.
“Oho, how do you know me? What an honor. I never expected to meet someone familiar with me in such a remote region.”
“Of course I know you.”
She responded to my words in a pleased tone.
Naturally, I knew her well.
She had been one of the central members of my party.
‘The absence of the merchant NPC’s quest is somewhat troublesome…….’
I had intended to complete it even without receiving the quest.
The problem was why Ravenwood had appeared here.
She was supposed to join the party only after the middle regions of the game. She had never appeared in an early area like this, much less near the player’s residence.
‘Ah, is this because of that?’
Variable Generation.
The very beginning had already changed, with the Guilty invading the house and attempting to kill me.
Everything had unfolded in direct opposition to the knowledge I possessed.
It was as though this place was not governed by the fixed structure of a game, but constantly changed like a living person’s life.
In any case, Ravenwood was notoriously difficult to locate because of her research.
During my repeated playthroughs, I had suffered considerably just trying to find her.
“Ravenwood, why have you come all the way to a place beyond the law’s reach?”
“Ha ha, what an impatient young man. Should we not introduce ourselves first? You know me, but I know nothing of you.”
Ravenwood struck the ground twice with her cane and asked for my name with an awkward laugh.
“……Ash. Ash Gray.”
“I see, Ash. How remarkable! Did you defeat this many of the Guilty by yourself?”
“Well, as you can see.”
“I have always believed it best to begin with light conversation before discussing serious matters!”
She had been nearly as much of a chatterbox in the game.
Even so, having her around would resolve many of the problems involving knowledge-related Perks.
After all, she was an alchemist who traveled around pretending to be a doctor.
There would be no disadvantage in making her my companion.
“That is true…… but what about you?”
“You truly are remarkably skilled! Well, as you know, I was conducting experiments as usual…… No, I was traveling around helping those in need. Even at the University, eccentrics such as myself are rather rare.”
That was a lie.
She was an evil-aligned character who actively enjoyed the present disaster.
There was no reason for her to wander around in search of sacrifices.
Even if she remained at the University, she could have as many laboratory rats delivered to her as she desired.
Still, the reason she traveled was simple.
She had never come this far before, but I knew exactly what she wanted.
There was no reason to drag out the conversation.
“Let us dispense with the preliminaries, Ravenwood. Have you come here searching for a living sacrifice? Were the specimens supplied to the University insufficient? Or…… have you come to replace those decrepit parts that have survived for more than seventy years?”
Her mask twitched.
I could not tell whether it was because she had become wary of me or because her curiosity had been aroused.
‘Ravenwood only takes action when something arouses her curiosity. In that case…….’
This was it.
Having reached that conclusion, I spoke calmly.
“Living sacrifices should be easy enough to obtain at the University… You must have entered the streets because you require samples to study the present situation. More precisely, you are researching the Outer Gods, aren’t you? The one that stained the night sky—no. Those things.”
“Oho, young man…… just how much do you know?”
Unlike before, every trace of laughter vanished from her voice.
That was fine.
I possessed more than enough information to persuade her.
It was knowledge I had acquired while clearing the game’s highest difficulty.
What Ravenwood wanted was information regarding the Outer Gods and their true identities.
‘No, to be precise…….’
She wanted to replace her flesh and soul through the power of an Outer God.
That was most likely the truth.
After all…… Ravenwood was already an old woman well past the age of seventy.
More precisely, an experiment had distorted her temporal axis and caused her to age rapidly.
That had been her background in the game.
“No comment. I still haven’t received an answer from you.”
At my deliberately evasive response, Ravenwood clapped and laughed.
“Ha ha! You are correct. My apologies. A scholar of the University cannot expect to covet knowledge without offering payment! Hmm, I see. What is it you desire?”
It was a formal exchange, but the important point was that she had proposed a deal first.
As a disciple of alchemy, she understood better than most how important the Law of Equivalent Exchange was.
I folded my arms and considered the terms of the transaction.
Material goods could be found eventually.
Talented individuals, however, were worth more than a fortune.
Yes.
There had never been any reason to deliberate in the first place.
“…My name is Ash Gray. Ravenwood, become my companion.”
“A companion? What an interesting proposal.”
“Why don’t you decide after hearing what I have to say?”
Ravenwood wanted only one thing.
The restoration of her body.
She wanted the youthful body she had possessed during her prime.
‘The method Ravenwood seeks really is possible.’
It would not rely solely upon the scientific power known as alchemy.
More precisely, it required offering lives to an Outer God, using that power to transform the body and soul, and then fixing them permanently in their altered state.
“I know the method.”
“Is…… is that true?”
With a deliberately indifferent expression, I threw aside the chair leg I had been holding.
“Well…… Ravenwood, surely you know better than anyone that every transaction is governed by a law?”
“The Law of Equivalent Exchange?”
Ravenwood lowered her head briefly at my words.
I could not see the expression behind her mask, but I had the distinct impression that a subtle smile had appeared there.
A moment later, the raven mask shifted as she extended her hand.
“……A scholar is one who seeks knowledge. If you can provide it, I will gladly cooperate with you, Ash Gray.”
Excellent.
I had secured one exceptionally useful companion.