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The Fourth World had been drifting through monotonous days for a long time.

Of course, it wasn’t that nothing happened. The events that unfolded here and there hinted at the changing times.

There was a wizard who led the undead to invade a neighboring territory. And then, there was another wizard who was preparing to invade with golems.

The wizard who brought the undead not only inflicted significant damage to the neighboring territory but also killed its wizard outright and devoured that territory.

In the process, countless people lost their lives.

So, did that make him a winner? No.

Before he even had the chance to enjoy victory, the wizards from the surrounding territories gathered and suddenly launched a concentrated attack.

The reason was simple.

In the noble republic, they would execute anyone suspected of murdering a council member on the spot.

The council member is the representative of the wizarding family. From now on, whenever something happened in the country, one representative from each family would come out to vote.

However, there’s no law punishing the killing of a wizard.

And there’s no law for summary executions either.

But, hey, can’t laws be made?

The council member is basically law. Not particularly rational, but it naturally allows retroactive application. So, it included the stipulation that penalties for actions prior to this law’s enactment would be subject to this law.

And remnants of rules from the time when it was a kingdom still exist. The methods that the Rempinion Family used to control other wizards.

If someone makes a mistake, everyone gathers together to punish them.

The Rempinion Family created this rule to watch over each other and hope not to fight.

Once made, rules don’t easily disappear.

And it’s all too easy to misuse them.

They hit back using that.

The reason is simple.

Wizards may seem a little rigid in their thinking, but they’re not fools.

If you leave a wizard controlling the undead unchecked, it’s obvious that danger will eventually come, right? The wizard knew that and stomped them down.

So, first, they crushed the enemy threatening themselves.

What comes next?

It’s about rooting out similar types.

For example, wizards who need to pry the lids off living people to get parts for golems. They killed them, saying they hadn’t committed evil yet but would surely do so in the future.

They were killed for a crime they hadn’t yet committed. A cowardly and cruel method.

Wizards identified and eliminated this way began to fade one by one. The justification they raised is quite amusing. It’s something that would make the long-vanished Rempinion Family happy and then wail in despair.

For the sake of the people.

Yes.

They’re using exactly what the Rempinion Family wanted.

However, there are slight differences in the details.

Is it for everyone, or only for those who are more human?

The wizards utilizing that justification know how to win the hearts of the populace, unlike Jeber, who has only just begun to walk.

Claiming to save people, they dealt with any wizard they didn’t like or who seemed threatening. Thus, the name of the wizard spread throughout the land like a hero from a story.

At first, I too didn’t understand why they worked so hard to win people’s hearts. From the perspective of a harvesting machine under them, they seemed the same.

If there’s a girl they fancy, they take her and use her without hesitation when they need people to boost their magical skills.

And when they need offerings, they get what they want even if it means forced labor.

To me, there seemed to be no difference.

But from the outside, there was indeed a difference.

I must have viewed the world too narrowly.

I thought there was a division between wizards and ordinary people. And that the wizards only commanded unilaterally when they needed something. But there’s interaction.

Good wizards act for the sake of people, while the bad ones do not.

As a difference emerged, citizens started moving their residences more and more. Of course, there are plenty of territories that legally prevent citizens from moving.

But does that mean there aren’t people who run away?

And the effect of a good name is powerful.

When one territory is shattered, where do the refugees head?

To the land of an unknown wizard? Or to the land of a good wizard?

It’s not just that it can absorb more population. As their reputation gathers, the mask of the good person becomes armor, and they begin to actively invade.

Justifications?

There are plenty. You just have to nitpick at whatever a wizard does.

A good wizard said so. The bad wizard can say that the other side does the same, but no matter how much excuse is made, it’s still just an excuse.

The value of a name proved that strong.

At first, the wizards who moved to catch the one threatening their lives began to move to absorb more territory.

Those who had been repressed by the Rempinion Family’s greed for conquest began to make their move.

They learned from the Rempinion Family how to turn goodness into profit.

And clothed in that goodness, they gained that profit. In simpler terms, that’s justification.

Wizards who only knew simple violence became even more cunning through the reign of the Rempinion Family.

And they used that to their heart’s content.

This is where my feeling of boredom comes in.

At some point, the warmth of those they killed stopped coming to me. If this is just a substitution, it must not be a ruler’s judgment.

If I were to turn the prince into a harvesting machine, and the person ruling the country is the prince’s mother acting as a regent, and if that woman is not a harvesting machine,

No matter how much chaos she causes, or how many people she massacres, I don’t feel the warmth coming to me.

It means that simply being a nominal ruler isn’t enough and that there’s some other structure at play.

Even if you made a fake and used it as a shield, the truth doesn’t change.

The criteria for gaining warmth isn’t the place defined by people but something unchanging and true.

For example, it’s one’s deeds.

In other words, from the moment I stopped being able to gain warmth, Jeber became unable to control the wizards.

Right now, outside, wizards are fighting each other while waging war, and yet I feel no warmth…

How can there be such a reality!

If it were someone else’s affair, it wouldn’t matter. Right now, each of those wizards has a harvesting machine attached to them!

Right in front of me is a warm stove, but I’m obstructed by a transparent insulated glass, feeling no warmth at all.

My warmth…

I’m not completely unable to feel warmth, but it is the warmth of citizens being exploited to death while the city rolls on.

Very little, and infrequent.

Rather, if it were a nation, it’d be okay. But this city is living off resources siphoned from several surrounding cities.

There are no people dying due to exploitation here; they’re in other cities.

Cities where Jeber’s influence does not reach.

Warmth isn’t coming.

It’s painful.

Especially with warmth flickering right in front of me, the fact that it doesn’t come to me is particularly tough.

Ugh.

Also, the experiments aren’t that appetizing. Aside from Alraune Rempinion, didn’t I say there are four pregnant artificial humans?

Three demons, one god.

Among them, two demons were injected with growth stimulants to give birth quickly.

Their kids didn’t come out properly. Instead of coming out the normal way, they tore through their mother’s womb when they were born.

I was watching through the harvesting machine’s eyes and thought they were some monsters from a horror movie.

Moreover, they didn’t even look like normal babies. Perhaps due to the drugs, they had distorted, monstrous appearances.

Jeber brought the three children he acquired before me.

And made them harvesting machines.

There was nothing special about them.

They had no knowledge, their light was the same as that of humans, and the children of demons were no different from ordinary artificial humans.

Again, we have to turn those demons into harvesting machines.

By the way, there weren’t any kids with red or blue skin, like the children of demons I saw last time.

I had a small question of whether their skin would turn white if I made them harvesting machines, but that question remained a question.

The only information I managed to get was that the twins don’t share the same soul? I cut open the bellies of the two demons, but there’s a reason there are three kids.

The remaining demon-possessed artificial human entered a regeneration tank. According to Jeber’s memories, demons give birth and die. They pass their power to their children and disappear. But those two are still here.

Hmm. What’s the difference?

Perhaps this time, due to the growth stimulant, they didn’t have the chance to pass everything onto the child.

As I analyzed that experiment from various angles, I realized a certain fact.

When the demon gave birth and died before, I didn’t gain the demon’s warmth.

If I recall when Tisah’s descendants killed someone, warmth came to me, which shows a difference.

There’s one assumption.

Even if there are children of the harvesting machine, and even if there’s a contract remaining, if I’m not in that world, I can’t gain warmth.

Ah, remembering that brings up another example.

Eunjai was the same.

Eunjai had descendants, but while Eunjai was alive, I would gain warmth when that descendant killed other beings.

But after Eunjai died, until the time I return to that world, I’ve never gained warmth.

I’ve remembered every piece of warmth I’ve gained from beginning to end. Because no matter how small the warmth is, pieces of memory come along with it.

In other words, to gain warmth, I need to exist somewhere in that world at least in the form of a harvesting machine.

It’s still just a hypothesis, but it’s likely that it’s a law.

So, even if I don’t have a vessel that I can move around with, there must at least be one harvesting machine somewhere in the world.

I must be careful.

While spending my boring time stealing glances at Jeber’s research, an unexpectedly interesting opportunity came up.

I undergo regular check-ups every three days.

At first, I was equipped with various safety devices, but over time, the equipment I used was simplified.

So now it’s just lying on a bed to check my body’s condition, and confirming and disinfecting the devices embedded in me.

And once that’s done, I get into the tank.

But today was different.

An artificial human who was pregnant suddenly had her condition worsen and was brought on a stretcher to where I am.

The place I’m in now is the room with the most advanced machinery.

Jeber, dressed in white surgical scrubs, along with the artificial human, walks in. They push me aside on the bed and immediately lay the pregnant artificial human down on the bed I was originally lying on.

In other words.

Right next to me, there’s a demon.

Hehe.