"Protecting the weak is the duty of the strong-I once believed that, too.
But I'm only a jujutsu sorcerer, not some champion of justice."
Suguru Geto tilted his head up slightly, gazing at the sky carved into fragments by the city's buildings.
"Later, I witnessed countless tragedies and discovered that non-sorcerers were not only weak, but ugly.
They trample one another out of fear, hurt others out of ignorance, and hate anyone different out of narrow-mindedness...
They keep spawning curses, yet feel no gratitude toward the people who save them."
He lowered his gaze and looked back at Dio. His smile remained gentle, but something cold and resolute had settled in his eyes.
It was not a fool's fanaticism, but the clear-eyed awareness of someone who had abandoned every illusion.
"Even if we keep proving the value of our lives and saving others however we can, it all amounts to wasted effort in the end!
So I thought-perhaps non-sorcerers don't need 'protection.' Perhaps what they need is a thorough cleansing."
Dio fell silent for a moment.
The afternoon sunlight filtered through the gaps between the old apartment buildings, scattering tiny patches of light at his feet.
The faint sounds of traffic and children playing drifted over from afar, along with a television commercial spilling out of a window-the noisy, vibrant sounds of the ordinary world.
He asked another question, as calmly as if he were confirming the known variables of a math problem:
"What distinguishes sorcerers from non-sorcerers? What proportion of the population does each make up?"
Suguru Geto seemed to have anticipated this question.
"The difference lies in the structure of the brain at birth.
Without that structure, you cannot perceive or manipulate cursed energy.
As for the proportions..."
He paused briefly, weighing his words.
"Unfortunately, sorcerers are one in ten thousand.
We are a higher species, born with extraordinary powers, so naturally, our numbers are few.
Worldwide, there are probably only a hundred thousand or so people with cursed energy or the potential for it.
So my ideal is not 'enlightenment,' but 'the chosen people.'"
Though Geto called it unfortunate, there was not a trace of regret in his voice.
Dio did not interrupt. He merely nodded slightly and raised a hand in a gesture that said, "Please continue."
"Humanity already stands at the top of the food chain, yet still dreams of higher beings, calling them 'gods' and placing its faith in them.
Don't you find that strange?
Gods are supposed to protect people, and so are jujutsu sorcerers.
With us jujutsu sorcerers around, humanity has no need for such dreams."
He paused and looked Dio straight in the eyes.
"Yet non-sorcerers would rather ignore beings superior to themselves... or even fear them, reject them, and try to wipe them out.
Because the weak are so numerous, they often drown out the strong who should have shone, wearing them down in a sea of mediocrity. How tragic!
The paradise I envision needs only the strong-only clear-eyed peers who can face reality, shoulder responsibility, and create value."
Dio's voice betrayed no emotion. "Then how many people support your ideas?"
"Forty-nine," Suguru Geto answered without hesitation. "With you, that would make fifty."
"Then-how far have you progressed with your plan? Or rather, how many non-sorcerers has each of you killed?"
"I haven't counted carefully. A hundred or so."
Suguru Geto said it without batting an eye.
"The plan hasn't begun yet. We're still in the initial capital accumulation stage, earning money by using curses to solve people's problems."
"As for me... thirty-something? Thirty-six, I think?" The foreigner actually gave it serious thought. "Oh dear, I can't quite remember~"
"Forty-something," the bandaged young man said, offering another number of equally uncertain accuracy.
"Were all those people... innocent? I mean innocent in the sense of being law-abiding and morally decent."
"Of course not.
Whether it's the clients who come to us to kill people with curses or the poor bastards who get killed, they're pretty much all capitalists with blood and tears oozing from every pore."
The foreigner spoke with the certainty of someone who had seen it all before.
"Geto dear-I think he massacred a village nine years ago.
But that was because the ignorant villagers wanted to kill two innocent little sorcerer girls.
Even curse users have principles, you know.
After all, we're going to sound the trumpet that ushers in a new age. We certainly wouldn't stoop to anything too vile."
"That sounds quite good." Dio nodded. "Then one last question-have you ever seen an atom?"
For a moment, everything went quiet.
The blond man raised an eyebrow, while the bandaged young man said nothing.
Suguru Geto tilted his head slightly, as though he had heard a harmless joke.
"How could anyone see atoms with the naked eye? Unless they're a one-of-a-kind exception like Satoru Gojo."
"See them directly with his eyes?" Dio pressed. "Is his cursed technique a scanning tunneling microscope?"
"No, it's an innate gift of his, a special visual organ called the Six Eyes," Suguru Geto patiently explained.
"Oh, but I've seen atoms, too."
A subtle note of wonder entered Dio's voice.
"Through human technology, using quartz tuning forks and atomic force imaging, we can 'see' what atoms look like."
"Hm? What are you trying to say?"
"If you truly viewed yourself as a god, you wouldn't hate non-sorcerers so much.
It's perfectly normal for non-sorcerers to be inferior to sorcerers-just as children are inferior to adults. That's simply the natural order of growth. Why get angry over it?
And sorcerers are born from non-sorcerers, after all, so sorcerers protecting non-sorcerers is like adults protecting children.
If I were you-I would find joy in saving people, and joy in clearing away the trash.
Your mistake was treating trash and children as the same thing!
There's no need to feel any guilt about clearing away trash!"
Suguru Geto's pupils contracted slightly.
Those words... had pierced the crack buried deep in his heart for years with astonishing precision.
The cold logic he had spent so long constructing to uphold his entire "righteous cause" had now been casually dissected and reassembled by someone he had only just met, pointing him toward a direction even he had never clearly examined.
Clearing away trash... and protecting children had always been two different things.
Satoru, so I was wrong...
Noticing Suguru Geto's shock, Dio continued his analysis of reality, his voice filled with reverence and admiration:
"Remove the trash and look again. What powerful, tireless, intelligent creatures... humans are.
Just as ants are born unable to see the world in its entirety, humans are naturally constrained by their senses, unable to see the world's true nature directly.
Yet at every turn, humanity pushes the boundaries of knowledge and technology with unimaginable passion, turning the unknown into the known.
Can you imagine it?
The humans of the future might create virtual reality and develop artificial intelligence-not recording reality, but creating something from nothing, building entirely new worlds out of streams of zeros and ones."
"So you're a believer in science."
Suguru Geto's smile faded a little as he stubbornly refused to concede.
"If you're looking for investors or sponsors, you can leave. Since you're a fellow sorcerer, I won't kill you."
"I never said I wouldn't accept your invitation."
"Oh?"
"But even if I join, who gets the final say is another matter." At last, a hint of amusement entered Dio's voice.
He stepped forward and extended his right hand, palm up, in an inviting gesture.
"In the world of sorcerers, the strongest should rule, shouldn't they?
Why don't we make a bet?
We fight, and whoever wins calls the shots for the next ten years. How does that sound?"
Before you continue