Editing HEAVY OBJECT:Volume10 Chapter 3 (section)

===Part 1===

The Panama Canal was a major entranceway to the world’s sea transportation routes and the Soberania Disturbance was fought over controlling the key to that entranceway. However, a “cleaner” justification was given.

There was a hideout for an anti-Object force in the Central American Soberania District.

That hideout was secretly training a special commando unit that specialized in largescale terrorist attacks on safe country metropolises.

Just north of the Soberania District was western North America, the home country of the Capitalist Corporations.

The special commando unit could create deadly weapons out of everyday items like detergent and compressed gas cylinders, were skilled at slipping into countries undetected, and most importantly, were as elusive as ghosts. The police force in charge of protecting the cities would be helpless, and even the intelligence agencies that worked in secret only had a fifty-fifty chance of capturing them.

Once they arrived, the concept of the “safe country” would collapse. No one could imagine how many cities would sink into rubble.

So they needed to be defeated before that happened.

They needed to be killed before their northward operation began.

“There was no special commando unit. The supposed training camp was nothing more than a digital detox nature camp set up by a tour company from your Capitalist Corporations. You sent young people out there and punished them as villains while they were none the wiser. It was quite the setup. You used overblown reports and doctored photos to get them registered as a truly frightening combat squad.”

The man spat out the words.

The square space was surrounded by metal walls and everything was blotted out by darkness.

“Saying you slaughtered them because you wanted the Panama Canal would damage the reputation of a great nation. Compromising with international society sure isn’t easy.”

“…”

“But thanks to that farce, my family is dead.”

His voice remained flat, which made it terrifying in a different way from an angry shout.

That man was said to have a thousand faces, so the standard expressions may have been meaningless to him.

“The funny part is that I had my skills as Nyarlathotep, but I had completely forgotten them as my family was killed before my eyes. I was so afraid of bringing those deadly skills into that small household that I used self-suggestion to fully seal them away. Do you understand now? It was the shock of seeing my family die that broke the seal of Nyarlathotep. If it had broken just a few minutes…no, just a few seconds early, it all might have turned out differently.”

His voice sounded like dripping coal tar and it was likely directly linked to his emotions and expression. After undergoing so much cosmetic surgery, he had completely forgotten the proper face he had been born with. His face may have melted in the darkness and splattered all over the floor.

“Laugh.”

That word felt like strength slowly building into a supposedly safe rubber knife until it stabbed into someone’s body.

That was the cruelest method that brought far more pain and fear than a simple sharp blade.

“You’re supposed to laugh at times like this, CEO. Or should I call you Azathoth?”

“Why…?”

That single word spoken by an old man sounded like forcing it out had worn an entire year off his life.

“Why don’t you just kill me already?”

“A death changes meaning entirely depending on the circumstances. In a back alley, you would be a victim. On a battlefield, you would be a war hero. At the execution grounds, you would be a despicable criminal. So I need the proper place to kill you. You already know where I’m taking you, don’t you?”

“You can’t mean…”

“Welcome to my home, the hell that was once the Soberania District.”

A metal door opened wide with a creak and a rusty smell.

Only then did the old man realize they were inside a container loaded on a ship.

They were surrounded by the colors red and black.

The entire sky seemed to be dyed in the colors of twilight, but it was not. It all came from the fires of war. The wreckage of homes, the historical remnants, the vast swaths of nature, and the people who had lived there had been mercilessly piled up and burned as the fuel for these crimson flames.

The idea of clean wars did not apply in the slightest. It was a literal hell.

And this apocalyptic scene had been created by Acre Kiss-of-Rose, CEO of Salem Logistics.

“We’ve arrived at the stage.”

Despite the red and black coloring the world, Nyarlathotep relaxed his entire body with an expression that said “I’m home”.

With a heavy sound, he pressed his palms against something, but it was not a table. It was a giant wooden barrel filled with something incredibly heavy.

“Now, how about we get started? You wanted the Panama Canal so badly, so that’s where I’ll kill you. So make sure you appreciate the effort I’m going to here, Azathoth.”