Section Fifty-Three · I Need a Weapon That Feels Right
The distant past.
Terra.
"Surtr, what do you think I came to this world for?"
The Flame-haired maiden sat atop a solitary mountain. Reflected in her eyes was an endless black wilderness beneath patches of drifting, gloomy clouds. The cold wind swept across the mountaintop, sending her long hair streaming through the air with a whistling sound.
She placed the sword beside her. It burned, kindling a small campfire that warmed her surroundings.
"I don't know." The sword's voice was as usual. "Perhaps you came to display all that you've learned, bringing the thoughts, knowledge, and culture you acquired in that world to this one?"
"I tried, but it didn't work." The girl propped her chin on her hand and sighed softly. "There are simply too many factors that determine how this world and human society operate—economics, technology, industry, culture... A great many of them are incompatible with this place."
"People are born unequal. In this world, there are superior races that are naturally several times, even more than ten times, stronger, wiser, or longer-lived than others. Vayf is far stronger than Casters, and superior in almost every way. And even within the same race, the differences between individuals are astonishingly vast—
"I've seen a Feline who could tear apart mountains and rivers with sheer will. Members of her own race would break their tails simply by taking two consecutive steps with their left foot. I've seen Aegir who could scatter clouds with a wave of the hand, whose flesh was sturdier than tempered steel. Yet among their own people, there were plenty of fragile beings who would revert to infancy and be reborn after falling from the height of a second-story building."
"People are different from one another, different