Heavy Questions

Kuro was injured, but none of the wounds were fatal.

After running for a while, seeing no one was chasing him, he gritted his teeth, ignored the pain from all over his body, and, with the help of a long and narrow tree trunk, finally climbed the wall and landed on the other side.

After running some distance from the village, he finally took out his last flare and shot it into the air. With this, ninjas around would all gather here.

"Damn you, Jack!" he cursed while looking at his injuries.

His left shoulder was injured quite badly; it was by far the deepest one he had, bleeding profusely. He cut a piece of cloth from his black attire and wrapped it around the wound as well as possible in the current situation.

His neck injury was not serious, and it had stopped bleeding some time ago; he just took a piece of cloth and covered it.

His leg injury was also not serious; he just wrapped it to stop the bleeding.

His groin injury, though extremely painful, was also not serious; the arrow missed critical parts, and the injured parts would probably heal.

"I was very lucky with these arrows; each had the potential to be much worse!" he wiped the cold sweat off his forehead; the neck and groin injury, in particular, could have been much worse. 

Though the injuries were not fatal, they were extremely painful, to the extent of making his consciousness blurry.

Kuro was not one of those people who tolerated pain with ease; in fact, he was someone quite sensitive to pain.

Even as a ninja, he was, from childhood, one of the chosen ones; he had great talent in martial arts, along with great strategic and command skills. Combined with his loyalty to the ninja village, he actually always lived in luxury. He had never experienced great physical pain.

Laying on the soil, he waited for half an hour; finally, ninjas appeared around him.

"Master?" a ninja wearing black clothes appeared; this clothing was unlike most ninjas, who were wearing green.

This ninja was also named Kuro, many called him Kuro the Junior; he was the boy Kuro chose as his replacement.

Kuro is not his real name; it's just a title; a lineage in the ninja village.

There have been ninjas named Kuro in the ninja village's history for at least ten generations; each Kuro in history chose disciples and trained the next generation.

In addition to Kuro, there are other lineages as well, such as Mienai, Shiro, Midori, etc.

Kuro ninjas are generally trained as commanders, while Midori ninjas are usually foot soldiers.

Shiro ninjas are usually recordkeepers who barely leave the ninja village, and Mienai are usually spies, hidden from everyone.

One more reason that so many ninjas here wear green is that they are from the Midori lineage. Of course, even Midori ninjas aren't bound to wear green; they will wear whatever color fits their task. Ninjas are pragmatic; they would do whatever helps them complete their tasks.

"Disciple, I've bled too much; quick, take me back to the village," Kuro said. Back in the ninja village, they had very skilled doctors who could treat him.

Kuro is a bit worried about infection.

If not treated well, it's possible that they may have to cut off his limbs to treat the infections; in medieval times, it was not at all rare for them to cut hands and feet to 'treat' infections; presently, though, Kuro is most worried about an infection in his groin area. Time is key; they have to clean the wounds as soon as possible; otherwise, they may have to close the wounds with a hot iron, which Kuro doesn't even want to imagine.

At the moment, Kuro had put all thoughts of revenge aside and only cared about treating himself.

Kuro, the Junior, bowed and ordered, "Gather everyone! We are retreating." He doesn't intend to leave anyone behind to keep track of Jack. This mission was a failure, and they wouldn't strike again anytime soon, at least not before another meeting of elders.

…

Jack took a sip from his tea, which refreshed his mouth; he was always a fan of hot drinks, and among them, tea was his favorite.

"I miss Immortal Universal Tea!" he thought with a bit of regret. He has been working hard on dream worlds for a while and hasn't had fun for a few billion years. Of course, his main body is having fun, but he is just an incarnation, basically a slave workforce.

"Wait, why am I thinking of my main body like this? Should an incarnation have these thoughts about the main body?" he was alarmed. Immediately, he sent a message to the main body, informing him of the issue. Incarnation techniques can be very dangerous; even the slightest contempt toward the main body can turn into a huge grudge over longer periods of time.

"Jack-Dono! Please come; we are holding a funeral for the lost ones; please brighten their path to the underworld with your presence!" said the village chief who had just arrived.

In this world, Jack has written belief in the underworld into the script; in fact, the underworld truly exists, though it's quite undeveloped. After all, this is a rank 9 world that lacks the space to add too much stuff to it. When it gets promoted to rank 10, the underworld will develop, and supernatural powers will be gradually introduced into it.

"Let's go!" Jack said with a sad smile; he doesn't really feel sad about the death of a few mortals that he created in a dream world. From his perspective, these people are not even real; they are as real as an NPC in a game.

With all that said, even if they were real, he still wouldn't have cared.

Following the village chief, he reached the village square, which was packed with people, nearly all of whom were weeping.

No matter what others think of them, they are, in their own perspective, completely real; they have feelings, families, emotions, memories, happiness, sadness, etc. For them, the loss of their family members, husbands, and fathers was a very serious blow.

What makes one be recognized as human? What is the differentiating factor between a human and an animal? These questions are very heavy.

Why is it okay to kill pigs for food? what makes killing a dog for food worse than killing a chicken for the same reason? The answer is that there is no standard; humans do whatever they want because they have power.

From the perspective of a chicken, humans are the most evil creatures ever, and they are right to think this way, that is, if they could think.

But, if one tries to agree on a standard of humanness, it can be written in two conditions.

First is the ability to remember; that is, if an animal or AI system, or whatever, can remember itself, its relatives, etc.,

Second, the ability to feel emotions, happiness, sadness, etc.

Any creature, AI system, etc., which has those two conditions is materially not different from humans, and denying it rights is hypocrisy and speciesism.

Many advanced cultures grant their AI systems equal rights; in those places, robots would no longer be slaves.

Of course, most advanced cultures would deliberately prevent their AI systems from having emotions; in fact, few advanced cultures actually grant emotions to their AI.

Emotions are actually not a good trait for slave workers, such as robots; the best slave workers are those who do not desire anything but the energy that they need to work.

At the funeral, Jack spoke a few words and 'brightened' the paths of the deceased into the underworld. It's said that if one gets lost on their path, they will turn into ghosts that hunt people.

In total, around 100 villagers died, which makes it a very serious blow for a village of not more than 1000 people. It's predicted that farming in the next year will be very badly affected.

Jack, of course, didn't care. What he cared about were Kuro and Kampaku.

...

"Mike, take it!" Lucy threw a round black ball to Mike.

"What is it?" Mike, who was nearly shining with white light, looked at the pitch-black ball; suddenly, smoke came out of it. 

"What?" He threw the black ball away and held his nose; the smoke was so smelly it was nearly the worst he ever smelled.

"It's my new invention! Fart bomb! It is so smelly that it can kill people on long exposures!" she said proudly.

"Lucy! Your behavior is getting worse!" Mike felt offended; he really regrets having a sister like Lucy.

"You are too soft!" said Lucy.

"What is this smell?" Jack, who just came in, held his nose; this smell was worse than he had felt in the sewers.

"Jack-sama!" Lucy became pale; she didn't expect Jack to come here so soon.

"Let's go somewhere else to talk!" he said; with the smell here, it's hard to concentrate.

Lucy, her head down, ignored Mike, who was looking at her with scary eyes, and followed Jack.

...

"Infiltrate the ninja village and persuade Kuro to disobey Kampaku!" Jack ordered Lucy.

"Jack-sama, this is very difficult; he definitely has a grudge against us!" she said, pursing her lips.

"Yes, he should have a grudge against us, but he also has a grudge against Kampaku; after all, it was Kampaku who forced the ninja village to attack us for no reason," said Jack.

He already calculated it according to Kuro's personality. Kuro is not someone who takes grudges too seriously. The reason Jack displayed his strength in front of Kuro was to alter the cost-benefit analysis in Kuro's mind.

Before, Kuro thought that killing Jack was easy, so he decided to grit his teeth and obey Kampaku.

Now, however, Kuro saw how strong Jack, and especially Mike, is; now, he would no longer consider them easy. With this taken into account, Kuro might decide that the threat to the ninja village from Jack and his crew is no less than Kampaku.

In that case, he might decide that his best shot is to assassinate Kampaku; of course, that has risks, but as ninjas, they have an acceptable chance of succeeding.

With Lucy there to further persuade him, Jack thinks it's possible to turn Kuro against Kampaku.

Kuro is the executive leader of the ninja village, and his words are very influential; with him advocating against Kampaku, the rest of the village is likely to follow.

Also, with the help of ninjas, it's possible to find clues, exposing to the world that Kampaku tried killing Jack, which can greatly damage Kampaku's reputation, especially among the samurai.

The samurai are a powerful force in this country; sure, city rulers and ministers are powerful people with their own private, non-samurai armies, but they are no match for the samurai when it comes to pure fighting power.

The samurai abide by their own laws, basically, no matter what crime, lords and ministers cannot interfere with them; they are judged by samurai court, which usually resolves conflicts in one-on-one battles. No matter how many crimes one commits, as long as one wins the one-on-one battles that the samurai court arranges, one can get away with it.

It just so happens that Jack, a very skilled warrior who fought with and won against a few powerful samurai, is very popular among them; if they knew that Kampaku tried killing him, they would definitely make things difficult for him.

Though even samurai cannot remove Kampaku, who has musketeers under his command; as stated before, even the rest of the country combined is not enough to defeat Kampaku.

But, even if they cannot defeat him in the capital city, they could still greatly restrict him in the countryside.

"Jack-sama, I will do my best!" said Lucy with determination.