Veterans know that battlefield conditions change almost every mont. By the space age, it's rare for both sides to stand still and exchange fire.
But now, OZ veterans feel the world is changing too fast. They thought MS pilots like themselves were on the verge of being phased out by the tis, but after today's battle, no one will likely field a purely Mobile Doll army again.
Because White Fang's Virgo IIs are now all drifting lifelessly across the intense battlefield, causing many in OZ's Space Leo units to lose control and fire several extra shots.
This left Reid, who had just ordered others to switch targets and attack the Libra Ship's thrusters first, feeling rather annoyed.
He signaled: Don't you OZ forces know what's good for you—if you keep destroying my Virgo IIs, I'll take you out first.
Fortunately, OZ soldiers don't have a habit of dismantling motionless dolls on the battlefield, even if they don't understand why all the enemy Virgo IIs suddenly stopped functioning.
But to avoid triggering the Mobile Suits' automatic counterattack systems and causing them to reboot by firing, Treize ordered everyone to ignore the Virgo IIs for now. The war isn't over yet—that mysterious unit and the Libra Ship still need to be dealt with.
Thus, the next phase of the battle centered around the Libra Ship.
Reid and his team were initially having a fairly easy and enjoyable ti dismantling the Libra Ship's engines, but with the arrival of OZ's main force, Reid had to send the others to handle OZ's Space Leos.
Because these Space Leos would also attack the Libra Ship. If the final blow that destroyed the ship ca from a Space Leo's Beam Cannon, then even if Reid later obliterated that Leo, the G-Coins for downing the Libra Ship wouldn't be recovered.
So, the approaching Leos clashed once more with the other Mobile Suits in Reid's squad, leaving only Reid to continue attacking the thrusters.
Fortunately, as the Gran Chaos towed the Eternal Peace closer to the Libra Ship, the Gran Chaos was now able to provide cover for this part of the battlefield.
At this point, no one doubted that this Gran Chaos belonged to OZ—because with firepower like that, you're telling it's an OZ ship? And since when did OZ have Beam Shield Technology?
As for this mysterious unit having just destroyed the Libra Ship's main cannon and then turning to attack OZ—no one paid that any mind anymore.
Because everyone could see this unit had no clear allegiance, or rather, their allegiance certainly wasn't to OZ or White Fang.
However, since the Joyeuse Gundam was hanging back attacking the Libra Ship's thrusters, it indirectly revealed that its pilot was likely the commander of this unit. So, Treize and Milliardo imdiately piloted their own Mobile Suits to charge over.
OZ forces naturally fought desperately to hold off the other MS on Reid's side, creating a one-on-one opportunity for their commander. Thus, the Tallgeese II smoothly advanced to confront the Joyeuse Gundam.
anwhile, seeing that Treize was now facing the enemy commander, Milliardo directly piloted the Gundam Epyon to hide in the gap of a destroyed Libra Ship thruster, waiting for a chance to ambush, and requested a communication line with the Tallgeese II.
Inside the Tallgeese II, after receiving the call from the Gundam Epyon, Treize instantly understood when the other side remained silent. He maneuvered his mobile suit to lower its cannon first, then initiated laser communication with the Joyeuse Gundam, saying:
"I am Treize Khushrenada, Supre Commander of the Earth Sphere Unified Forces. Mysterious enemy, the battle has reached this point. Aren't you going to reveal your identity?"
Inside the Joyeuse Gundam, Nein had just detected the heat signature of the Gundam Epyon, but when she tried to confirm its exact location, the heat signature suddenly vanished. So, Nein was currently searching for where the Gundam Epyon was hiding.
Reid judged that directly engaging the Tallgeese II now and then getting ambushed by the Gundam Epyon would be a bad idea. He decided to chat with Treize for a bit, buying ti for Nein to locate the Gundam Epyon.
However, Reid didn't want to reveal his na. He actually didn't really want to kill Treize, and besides, the Tallgeese II didn't have any technology worth coveting.
He was quite curious about what a W universe where Treize didn't die would be like.
Once Reid beca the administrator of the Super G Universe System, he would definitely be able to review the subsequent developnts of the worlds he had interfered with, satisfying his curiosity then.
But if he didn't kill Treize, Reid worried he might be recruited by Codena Alias, so he was reluctant to give his real na. After agreeing to connect to the laser communication, Reid said:
"Is identity really that important? If you think it is, you can call the villain."
Treize was taken aback—who would call themselves the villain?—but on the surface, he remained composed and said:
"Very well, Mr. Villain. May I ask why you and your forces have intervened in this battle?"
Here, Reid couldn't very well say he was fighting because he had his eye on White Fang's Virgo II. So, he could only follow Treize's lead and invoke so grand ideals—after all, Treize loved that sort of thing.
Thus, Reid replied in a clearly mocking tone:
"I simply saw two naive individuals who thought that showing the world the cruelty and folly of war would usher in an era of peace where dialogue resolves conflicts, preparing to stage a grand spectacle of self-sacrifice with their subordinates, and I wasn't happy about it."
Treize didn't need to guess to know that the "naive individuals" the other was referring to were himself. But he wasn't angered, because the other had accurately stated his hopes, even if he didn't approve of them.
So, Treize now wanted to hear what alternative the other had after rejecting his plan. He asked:
"Not happy, I see. Then, Mr. Villain, are you unhappy because you see the world moving toward peace, or are you unhappy with this spectacle?"
To this question, Reid answered instantly:
"Both. Peace? Treize, why don't you flip through a history book? When has humanity ever truly known peace? Humanity has developed to this point through constant conflict.
There's an ancient saying in the East: 'One thrives in adversity and perishes in comfort.'
Of course, this shouldn't be understood with binary thinking, advocating extre adversity.
But it already illustrates that for humanity to continue developing, there must be conflict. And you want to resolve conflicts through dialogue? That really makes laugh.
Let give you another saying: If apologies were enough, what would we need the police for?"
"State violence is the foundation for maintaining social stability. By renouncing violence, you only give dangerous elents the opportunity to use violence to eliminate all peace-loving people."
Treize frowned deeply at Reid's argunt. He felt that what this antagonist said held so truth, but it was certainly not right, so he directly refuted:
"Antagonist, the path of using violence to ensure peace has already been proven wrong. The Earth Sphere Unified Alliance has achieved Earth's unification, but this has also bred corruption and dictatorship. Voices resisting injustice exist at all tis.
In any era, such resistance would be t with sympathy and understanding. Therefore, to resist governnt violence, these antagonists can only seek even greater violence.
Similarly, to suppress the resisters, the governnt will also continuously seek powerful violence.
In this endless spiral, humanity will one day create a force it cannot control and ultimately destroy itself with the power it created."
Upon hearing this, Reid thought it was the sa old theory about humanity eventually destroying itself. These people who loudly claim to believe in humanity's future are, in fact, the ones who least believe in it.
Because they all know that humanity's inherent flaws will never change. Once a person has a weapon in hand, they will do everything possible to use it against their enemies. And a person's enemies, as it stands now, can only be other people.
Thus, when a weapon capable of destroying the entire human race is created, it will inevitably be used against humanity, leading to its destruction.
So Reid directly retorted:
"Nonsense. A typical slippery slope argunt viewing the future through present-day lenses.
Humanity's creation of weapons requires technological advancent, and the most significant effect of technological progress is improving human survival capabilities.
People in the Middle Ages regarded the sky as the dwelling place of gods. They could never imagine that future humans would establish Colony Satellites in space beyond the sky, building nations in environnts where they themselves could not survive for more than twenty seconds.
To people in the Middle Ages, perhaps a single plague could destroy humanity. Earthquakes, tsunamis, and volcanic eruptions were all signs of the world's end.
But what about now? How many people still believe these things could suddenly wipe out the entire human race?
Therefore, your claim that humanity will destroy itself with its own weapons is a false proposition. Unless the weapon is brought by aliens, you might as well calculate whether the sun will suddenly undergo helium flash and wipe out all humans in the solar system.
Moreover, when you talk about abandoning force, you only an abandoning weapons of war. Even if all existing armants were sealed away, couldn't humans still fight with cold weapons? Without swords, humans could use stones and sticks. Conflict would never end. At the very least, there are still fists and teeth!!
So, stop talking about grand ideals. Your ideas have never been about peace but about preventing humans from inflicting large-scale harm on each other.
But as I said before, don't expect everyone to follow the rules. The reason bad people are bad is that they have very low or no moral boundaries due to various reasons. And since technology has already advanced to this scale, unless you carry out a massive super-genocide and kill all intellectuals, it will not regress."
Treize was left speechless by Reid's words, because what Reid was presenting now was an invincible theory—humans cannot describe things beyond their own understanding.
How far future scientific developnt could go was clearly not sothing soone of this era could predict.
If one were to speak of an era when humanity had not yet left Earth and could not withstand drastic environntal changes, it might still be possible to trace so logic and claim that weapons capable of completely altering Earth's environnt could destroy humanity.
But now, the existence of Colony Satellites provided humanity with an insurance. Many Colony Satellites had long been capable of self-sufficiency through space farming and aquaculture (it seed that among the several large-scale Gundam Universes with space colonization, only CE was not feasible). Even if Earth were to explode right now, the human race could still hold on for several hundred years to see how the future unfolds.
Therefore, unable to describe how future technology would develop, Treize naturally could not refute the other side's claim that his theory was a slippery slope. Because the so-called weapons capable of destroying human civilization were themselves re fantasies.
In fact, it would be more accurate to say that such weapons would lead to the death of most people.
But then he could no longer use the reason that he hoped to eliminate military force to prevent humanity's future extinction.
Moreover, Treize could not refute the statent that "the reason bad people are bad is because they have very low or no moral bottom line at all," because one could not expect that after this war, humanity would no longer give rise to ambitious individuals, or that everyone would simply forget about the existence of military force.
Thus, Treize rubbed his temples and said with an exceptionally painful headache:
"But without discarding military force, true peace cannot be achieved. Are you saying that humanity will forever be embroiled in internal strife?"
Reid had actually been waiting for Treize to say this and replied directly:
"Not at all. The most critical factor in humanity's internal strife is still insufficient resources to distribute. If there were enough resources, and those in power were not so greedy as to leave no room for survival, how many people would actually rebel? And in human history, how many rulers who liked to drain the pond to catch all the fish lived long?
So, vigorously developing space resources can solve most problems. As for the remaining stubborn remnants, just eliminate them.
Another way to unite humanity is to have a sufficiently powerful enemy. Let put it this way: suppose aliens invaded now, intending to exterminate all humans.
Then the vast majority of the human race would unite for survival. After all, although betrayers would never be few, compared to the entire human population, they would be a drop in the ocean.
And even without aliens, it doesn't matter—a sufficiently dominant villain can achieve similar results. And I am that villain."
Treize now understood this villain's theory. This person wanted to beco the "evil of this world."
When a sword of Damocles hangs over everyone's heads, people, however unwilling, would temporarily set aside their conflicts and unite against the external threat.
Of course, in such situations, internal sabotage would still be plentiful, but at least on the surface, everyone would cooperate, and things would not be taken too far.
However, Treize believed this to be a false peace. Maintaining peace through people's fear was putting the cart before the horse. Although the leader of this mysterious force had ideas, he was undoubtedly wrong.
Thus, Treize now reaffird his conviction and replied:
"Villain, you truly are a villain. In that case, I will surely hunt you down and eradicate you!!"
After speaking, Treize maneuvered the Tallgeese II to raise its Dober Gun, clearly preparing to fight.
anwhile, Nein had successfully located the Gundam Epyon hiding within the wreckage of the Libra Ship's thrusters.
It could only be said that Milliardo had sowhat underestimated the length of the Gundam Epyon's Heat Rod, leaving a small tail exposed. And Nein, after all, was an Artificial Intelligence—she searched by analysis, leaving no room for error.
Thus, while the human eye might fail to spot that faint red glimr in the darkness, Nein would not miss it.
Now that the Gundam Epyon's position was confird, Reid had nothing left to fear.
Treize was not weak, but in Reid's eyes, the performance of the Tallgeese II was hardly impressive. Next, he would consider where best to strike.
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