Having exhausted stillness, Atem moves on to stimulation, which begins with a museum closed to the public for his benefit and ends with a brand.
Along the way: a sensory installation that people describe as a blessing, a research floor Seto has flagged to alert him the moment Atem files an application, and a glowing confection reconstructed from afterlife honey.
The brand is called Love and Theory. Royal households begin writing in.
This is a translation of an original work on Pixiv.
Original Title: 愛と理論 11 王、ブランドを創造する
Original Author: 葉人(@Hathor_yuki)
Personal site: https://prideshipping.sakura.ne.jp
"...The sa-ten and the relaxation, both were good. Human beings recover themselves by way of stillness."
Seto returns it briefly while operating a tablet.
"Human beings prefer extremes. Either stillness, or stimulation."
"Stimulation, is it. I see, that too is a variety of indulgence. ...I shall have to learn it."
Seeing Atem nod with a straight face, Seto laughed a little.
"I thought you'd come to that."
Already on that terminal, any number of lists had been put in order.
Amusement parks, art museums, cinemas, VR experience facilities, traditional performing arts, et cetera.
All of them representative examples of what modern people call stimulation.
But for Seto, that is not merely data.
He wants to watch, from beside him, the moment Atem enjoys a new world. That was all it was.
Atem declared the next destination himself.
"Seto, I want to go to a museum. As a king of antiquity, I need to learn how history is handled in the modern age."
"That too was predicted."
At the same time as he returned it, Seto was already issuing instructions to his staff.
The museum instantly went into a state of exclusive reservation, and the general visitors looked up at the sign reading "Closed today for special research investigation" and went home.
Two sets of footsteps in the quiet halls.
Every time Atem walks through an exhibition room, the sensors respond and the lighting comes on softly.
It was Seto's doing.
"Seto... since when have you been preparing this?"
"I knew the day when you said you wanted to learn would come eventually."
"I see. ...You really are a man who reads my future."
"Without reading it, I merely realise it by the shortest route."
While gazing at the relics of antiquity lined up beyond the exhibition glass, Atem smiled.
"I had thought our civilisation stopped here. But... it had continued."
"It's the result of your will never being cut off."
Seto's voice was calm, and somehow proud.
Hearing it, Atem quietly touched that hand and whispered low.
"It's because you were there. ...This age is warmer to me than the afterlife."
"I have never served you, nor have I any recollection of raising a rebellion."
The lighting of the exhibition room comes on, one and then another.
As though the past were blessing them.
The way home from the museum.
While walking through the night streets, Atem was looking up at the starry sky without a word.
Watching that out of the corner of his eye, Seto releases the car's remote lock.
"You've thought of something again, haven't you?"
"...Yes. Stimulation is not only something felt, but something created as well."
Atem laughs a little.
"People listen to music, draw pictures, make something for someone's sake. They call that enjoyment. ...In my age, creation was the domain of the gods. But now, anyone can become a god."
"It's the result of humanity obtaining permission by the name of freedom."
"An interesting age, Seto."
Atem thinks it over for a while, and suddenly turns serious.
"I want to try creating something as well."
Gripping the wheel, Seto raised an eyebrow slightly.
"What. DIY again?"
"Mm... something that gives the world a gentle shock."
Seto let out a short breath.
"...Going in a troublesome direction again. There's no chance a shock from you would be gentle."
But in that tone there was, rather than exasperation, the colour of expectation.
Several days later, Kaiba Corporation's research building.
Surrounded by displays, Atem was composing some sort of footage.
"Seto, this is footage that stabilizes the human heart. With sound and light and scent, it reproduces the repose of the afterlife."
"...The repose of the afterlife, with Kaiba Corporation's technology?"
"That's right. Modern people are exhausting themselves in pursuit of stimulation. In that case, we need only heal them with love and theory."
"Which is to say, stimulation that has evolved relaxation."
"Yes. Afterlife-style relaxation!"
While pressing at his temple, Seto cannot hide his interest.
"As technology it's promising. ...But I'll handle the trademark registration."
"Eh? Ah, I leave that sort of thing to you."
"Naturally. If you filed on your own, the world would fall into confusion."
Atem laughs and opens a new recipe for a scent across the monitor.
"Seto, you take the theory. I take the senses. This is our creation."
At those words, the corner of Seto's mouth loosened slightly.
"A fusion of love and theory. ...Fitting."
Several months later, all over the world,
a project titled KAIBA×ATEM – Sensory Harmony is launched.
Spatial design, footage, scent, sound — all of it optimised by AI, with Atem's sensibility tuned into it.
The users' impressions were in almost complete agreement.
"I felt love"
"My heart was purified"
"Rather than an experience, it was a blessing"
The world was updated one more time by their love.
Afternoon, the glass-walled living room of the Kaiba mansion.
Before a table for Solid Vision conferences, Atem was folding his arms and thinking deeply.
Seeing that figure, Seto says while closing his documents:
"...You've thought of something again, haven't you?"
"Seto. I have the feeling that in the afterlife, the stimulation called settling wasn't sought after as much as it is in the modern age."
"Naturally. Your age always came with the exchange of lives. Survival took precedence over relaxing, presumably."
"But now it's different. Modern people have made settling into an indulgence. In that case, we must procure a different stimulation from the afterlife."
Atem's voice was quiet, but it carried heat.
Seto sighs.
"...You intend to start importing civilisation again."
"Civilisation repeats. Fashions and history, and indulgences as well. In the records of the afterlife, something the present age needs is sleeping."
"Oh? And what will you procure this time?"
Atem was silent a while, and then smiled brightly.
"A conference."
"What?"
On the display was written "Afterlife → Mortal World: List of Import Candidates."
Lined up among the items are "clothing," "handicrafts," "architecture," "luxuries" and the like.
Leaning back in his chair, Seto bore the role of controlling Atem's sensory selections.
"Let's organise the premises. The objective is to give the human heart a new stimulation. Therefore the means is not the importing of civilisation, but the redesign of culture."
"I see. Which is to say, rather than bringing it as it was in the past, we acclimate it to the present age."
"That's it. ...Otherwise it becomes the King's global expansion again."
"I see... I'll be careful."
Atem thought a little, and then said seriously:
"Seto, there is already the venue called the Sanctum Café. How would it be to bring the sweets of the afterlife into it?"
Seto's expression changes slightly.
"Afterlife sweets... Importing the culture of indulgence from the afterlife, is it."
"Food is a mirror reflecting civilisation. Reproduce the sweets of the afterlife with modern technology and it becomes the sign of a new civilisation."
"...As a theory it holds together."
"Taste connects directly to emotion. After love, it's what evolves civilisation."
Atem says it and smiles.
Twirling his pen around, Seto laughed as though a little exasperated.
"...To think we'd arrive once again at the conclusion that luxuries develop civilisation."
"For the afterlife and for the world both, the direction of progress lies in love and sweetness."
"...Then we start with a trial product. If we're starting at all, I'll bring it to a perfect form."
The next day.
Kaiba Corporation's food research division abruptly launched an "Ancient-Style Saccharide Structure Analysis Project."
The code name: Project DUAT.
Beside it, Atem was drinking herbal tea, looking satisfied.
"Seto. Indulgence leads civilisation after all."
"...In your case, civilisation is led by indulgence."
Along with Seto's wry smile, a new age began to move again.
Kaiba Corporation, Seventh Research Floor.
Ordinarily a zone where AI taste simulation and molecular cooking trials are conducted, one of the most tightly secured sections in the company.
In front of it, Atem was facing an application terminal with a serious face.
"Purpose of use: reproduction of the sweets culture of the afterlife, and modern adaptation experiments... good."
At the same time as the input completes, the access application automatically goes up to the executive level.
But a mere few seconds later, the screen flashed red.
Use permission on hold: approver, Seto Kaiba
"...Ah, I see, so that's how it comes."
When Atem smiled quietly, the automatic door behind him opened with a sound.
The one who appeared was, as a matter of course, Seto.
"Honestly... it was the right call to build the system so that a warning goes up the instant you file an application."
"Seto. Do you not trust me?"
"I trust you. But precisely because I know your executive capacity, monitoring is necessary."
"...I see, let me interpret that as praise."
Atem laughed, looking entertained, but Seto's eyes were serious.
"As a premise, your at-home-date cooking skill is theoretically domestic, but in reality it's on the scale of a disaster."
"Scale of a disaster?"
"Have you forgotten the chocolate incident before? The matter of trying to summon a spirit of flame in place of a hot water bath."
"...That was not a failure. It was a magnificent attempt."
"By my observation, it was an explosion."
The researchers were watching that exchange from the corridor, holding their breath.
Someone has already put a video up on the internal unofficial social network.
The tags are
#quantummarriagesightedagain
#thepresidenthimselfsupervisingafterlifesweets
The comment section goes on being buried under "sublime" and "is the world going to move again."
In the end, a joint experiment began with Seto taking on the theoretical supervision and Atem handling execution on site.
"Input the arrangement of the saccharide molecules into this simulator. I'll reference the afterlife's materials."
"In the afterlife, sweetness was called the medium of memory. I want to reproduce that sensation of the heart coming undone in a single mouthful."
"...Too poetic. Say it a little more in data."
"It's the reproduction of emotion, Seto. A taste that lies beyond theory."
"Which is to say, love."
"That's right."
Silence.
And then Seto laughed a little.
"Then I'll process it with theory. I'll construct the equation of love, as you'd put it, for you."
Atem nods, looking satisfied.
In that instant, the air of the research building changed completely.
Temperature, humidity, light level, all placed under control, and a space termed the fusion of love and theory was born.
Several hours later.
Before Seto and Atem was a single golden jelly, reconstructed from the honey of the afterlife.
"This is... glowing?"
"Photon-control saccharide. It absorbs light and converts it into taste stimulus. In short, eat it and the sense of happiness rises computationally."
"...Truly, the taste of love."
"What I designed was the taste of theory. But what was completed is the element of love that you mixed in."
Atem takes up a spoon and slowly carries it to his mouth.
For an instant his eyes shine, and he quietly let out a breath.
"...Seto. This is civilisation."
"No doubt. A joint production of love and theory."
Afterward, at the tasting session in the research building, the "glowing sweets" became a global topic, and social media was once again buried under
#quantummarriagesweets
#edibleloveandtheory
Seto murmurs quietly while closing his report.
"...In the end, whatever we do, it concludes in love."
"Naturally. I am a king. And you are a man who proves love by theory."
Faced with that smile, Seto could no longer say anything.
A newscaster on a news program speaks with a hint of excitement.
"Today, Kaiba Corporation's new brand Love and Theory has finally gone on sale. Access concentrated from the first day of release, and the online shop temporarily suffered a server outage. According to Mr. Atem, the supervisor, it is monopolizing the top of the topics not only in the mortal world but on the afterlife's real-time social network, Nefer-Link, as well!"
The studio footage switches to the night streets.
Before the shop, a long snaking queue.
People line up as though at a New Year's shrine visit, hold the boxes in their hands to their chests, and quietly close their eyes to pray.
The "worship" phenomenon.
At some point, someone called it that.
Atem was watching that on a display.
"...They are not tasting it, they are feeling it. Almost like a rite."
A calmly smiling voice.
"In antiquity, offerings were things dedicated to the gods. Now, perhaps they are dedicated to oneself, in order to heal the heart."
Seto was watching that profile from across the desk.
"Either way, the one giving it meaning is you, Atem."
"No, Seto. You gave it form. I merely remembered. The taste of antiquity, into the present."
A quiet interval.
Within the display, the lights of the city blink softly.
In exactly the same colour as the sweets.
"I feel the world beginning to move again."
At Atem's murmur, Seto folds his arms.
"The one moving it is generally you."
"...Not so. It's you and me. The two worlds, connected by the two of us."
Seto laughs, faintly.
"If that's what you say, then next... what will we move?"
"Let me see. This time, it's the matter of feeling."
Seto's brow moves slightly.
"So you come to that after all."
"That's the face of a man who says it was predicted."
"Naturally. By now I have exceeded the precision of your future prediction algorithm."
Atem laughs under his breath and rises from his chair.
"Then the next trial is touch and emotion. ...Seto, be prepared."
"The preparation is already complete."
The instant the gazes of the two overlapped, the Love and Theory logo displayed on the screen behind them pulsed faintly.
As though announcing the next evolution.
A mere ten days since the Love and Theory series officially went on sale.
It was by now not a single corporate brand, but a culture.
In a photograph posted by the official social media account of a royal household,
alongside a specially ordered glowing confection finished with gold leaf, a brief phrase was appended: with respect for the King's creation.
The post raced across the world in an instant, and on the afterlife's Nefer-Link, tags like
#thetasteoftheking
#thelightconnectingthemortalworldandtheafterlife
went into the trends.
Receiving that, features were run in the mortal world's media day after day.
"The Miracle of Kaiba Corporation"
"The King and the Scientist, Revived in the Present Age"
"The Future That Love and Theory Bound Together"
In every one of the headlines, the names of the King (Atem) and the president (Seto) stand side by side.
That afternoon, the president's office.
The mountain of correspondence that had arrived on the desk was official requests from the royal households of every nation.
Nothing but letters exhausting every courtesy, seeking permission for purveyor status.
Atem was reading them carefully, one by one.
Each time he read one, nostalgia and a quiet pride spread through his chest.
"...A banquet of kings. A nostalgic ring to it."
"I thought it would come to that eventually."
Seto's voice is low, and yet somehow exasperated as well.
"It was the same when I spread liquor through the afterlife, but this time the scale is different."
"No change. You move an age by way of taste. I guarantee it by theory. That's all it is."
Even while saying it evenly, at the corner of Seto's mouth is a faint smile.
Atem did not let it slip past him.
"Seto, you're smiling."
"I am not smiling."
"No, you're smiling. ...You're pleased, aren't you?"
"What pleases me is that the prediction wasn't off."
Atem shrugged and laughed softly.
"That you can predict it means that your world and my world are already influencing each other. If that's the reality of quantum marriage, then those people naming it wasn't entirely wrong."
"Then shall we formally adopt that name before long?"
"I can't decide."
A quiet laugh flows between the two of them.
Outside, the sign for Love and Theory was giving off light, illuminating the show windows all through the city.
The resonance of the two, straddling the mortal world and the afterlife, no longer knows how to stop.
