Chương 46: Worldline α: The Laundryman Before Dawn

Countless particles of light rained down from the void, answering my desperate call. They gathered upon the palm of my hand, manifesting as a crimson, white-hot, pulsing flame. It was their collective will—the voice of everyone watching from the other side of the screen. There was no "surrender" in them. —We are sick of being managed by cold, heartless logic. —Even if we get hurt, even if it gets messy, we want to believe in "humanity" once more. —Give us back a Japan that can burn with passion.

Those raw voices crystallized into a definitive [ORDER], instantly incinerating all my doubts. The path they chose was the Asura's path. Instead of fleeing into the safety of an optimized, calculated system, it was a road of raw conflict, bleeding hearts, and unyielding passion.

"... I have received it." I pressed the glowing crimson light firmly against my chest and turned back toward Yari.

"Prime Minister... my choice is made." I slammed my fist against the glass of the sixth capsule.

"What we need from Ryoma isn't a cold-blooded, calculating CEO... It's the ultimate 'Big Brother' leader who will wash this rotten Japan clean from its very roots!" A faint, dry smile played at the corner of Yari's mouth.

"The binding of hearts and the restoration of raw emotion, huh? How utterly irrational. Yet, it is also an undeniable fact that calculation alone won't win this war. Fine. Let's place our wagers on the sheer, latent potential of humanity."

"Authorization granted. —We are resetting history." Yari rapidly input commands into the console. Inside the capsule, the crimson light began to violently vortex. It wasn't an orderly, sterile glow, but a torrential flash of absolute kinetic heat—like a raging solar flare.

"Project Re-JAPAN, Phase 6... Boot up, [RYOMA]. Mode: Passion!" Psssshhhh...! The capsule hissed open with a violent blast of pressurized exhaust. Standing within the vapor was no modern businessman in a sleek corporate suit. Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. He wore a tattered crest-bearing hakama robe and high wooden geta sandals. Tucked inside his breast pocket were a western flintlock pistol and a thick, weathered logbook.

And above all, his face bore a carefree, massive grin—the kind of smile that felt warm enough to raise your body temperature just by looking at it.

"... Man, I've been waiting forever!" The man took a massive, exaggerated stretch, the sword at his hip clicking sharply against its sheath.

"Everyone's weeping, saying Japan's lost its spark... Leave that gloomy, damp air to me! This Sakamoto Ryoma is gonna blow it all away with a fresh gale straight from the Pacific Ocean!" Sakamoto Ryoma. He wasn't a "CEO." He was a man who lived freer than anyone, dreamed of the future larger than anyone, and charged forward while dragging both friend and foe along in his wild wake—the eternal, charismatic rogue transcending time and space.

"Ryoma-san! Please... save Japan!"

"Save it? Nah, that ain't it at all." Ryoma flashed a blinding grin and thrust his clenched fist right toward me.

"We do this together! Washing a whole country clean is too much for me to handle alone. You, the Prime Minister, and every single soul watching from the other side! We're all gonna lock arms, form a massive scrum, and drag the dawn out ourselves!" The teleportation matrix roared to life, its pitch rising to a deafening shriek. Target Destination: A. D. 1867. A Kyoto on the absolute brink of collapse, heavily corroded by digital noise and fatal system glitches. That was to be the grand stage for our social overhaul.

When the blinding flash of the transfer light finally dissolved, "night" materialized. But it wasn't the night I knew. Static ripped violently across the sky where stars should have been, the constellations flickering erratically. It felt like looking up at a malfunctioning, broken monitor.

"... It stinks." I pinched my nose. The heavy stench of gunpowder and fresh blood hung in the air, oddly mixed with the acrid, burnt-rubber smell of a literal "System Error." [System Check... Coordinates locked. A. D. 1867. Fushimi, Kyoto... Man, this is a total mess.] Gennai's voice flickered through the comms, heavily distorted by audio static. We had been dumped onto a desolate riverbank.

The canal flowing right before our eyes—likely the Horikawa canal running in front of the famous Teradaya Inn—was filled not with water, but with a thick, viscous "black mud."

"Prime Minister, what is the meaning of this...?" As I called out, Yari looked up at the fractured sky with a grim, strained expression.

"Temporal collapse has already begun. Nobunaga forcefully tearing open a path to the future has caused a massive cross-wire between past and future data. The core system is flagging this entire era and processing it as an 'Error Zone.'" Yari pointed into the distance. Where his finger aimed, the historic cityscape of Kyoto warped like a living nightmare.

The tiled roofs of traditional townhouses floated aimlessly mid-air, black sludge bubbled up from the cracked earth, and the few passersby flickered like faceless, low-resolution ghosts.

"At this rate, this entire timeline will be dumped straight into the [Trash Bin]. We need to move. Our target should be nearby." I stood up, nursing my aching right arm. The severe burns I had suffered back at Honno-ji throbbed with a dull, white-hot pain. My body and soul were in tatters. But this was the final bottleneck. If we could break through this crisis, Japan would surely be reborn. Right then, a sharp, metallic click ripped through the dead silence.