Although he can still die from disease or battle wounds. Hikaru didn't have to worry about life after the war between humans and the parasites. After overcoming the natural cycle of life and death, his carefreeness intensified such that there was a tranquil glow about him.
Chiho noticed this while eating and asked, "What are you smiling about?"
Hikaru looked as if he was smiling while thinking of something. He came back to reality and began cutting a steak with his knife.
"Hmm. If you could live forever, what would you do with your life?"
"Hm... I would go see the stars, astronaut."
"You want to be an astronaut?"
Chiho finished chewing and swallowed.
"No. I want to become a school teacher, not sure which year levels to cover though. I just want to head into space once."
Chiho was surprised that she sounded normal while speaking when she was struggling to suppress the shaking in her voice.
"Most people wouldn't last an orbit mentally... Although I'd want to visit once too. Is that all you want to do?"
"Work and travel, I want to enjoy my life and keep my youth after 25 years old. Mmm, even if I live forever, I still want to be young mentally too. My life's pretty simple."
"Aren't your goals the same even if you didn't have eternal life?"
"Yeah, they are. It's what I always wanted to do. What about you?"
'World destruction'
Hikaru had almost said it out loud. Hikaru had felt little need to hide anything from people who would die soon. Earth is about to become a warzone. Everyone in this restaurant was death flags to him while at night, they were food.
Ever since the fight with Genji, all harvesting operations in Midori ward have ceased for 48 hours. So, he took this opportunity to get sustenance for himself and grow stronger. He had secretly gone to other wards to hunt.
It was punishable by death to disobey direct orders from an officer. The most obvious reason was that any parasite that could disobey an order from an officer was lacking in impulse control or obedience. It was beneficial to weed out the incompetent or disloyal to protect their mission. It was also too risky for one parasite to hunt alone as prey could escape if there weren't enough team members to catch them.
Even if Hikaru was a prized enhancer and had hunted in other wards where harvesting was ongoing, he knew that if he was lucky, he would be let off once with a warning.
After the Genji incident last night, he had gone off to kill 123 people in Izumi ward. Hikaru had decreased his absorption time by three minutes to one minute per body. After absorbing his first enhancer victim (Phillip), his strength had exponentially grown and he was confident he could defeat Botan.
Analysing Phillip's genetic data, he had discovered that the enhancers' strength is dependent on their host compatibility. An enhancer requires biomasses such as vitamins, minerals, proteins etc. for fuel and materials for structural integrity like calcium to modify their bodies. They could grow parts of their bodies into weapons.
Eating food would only increase their strength to a limit defined by their genetics. Of course, they could still pick up martial arts, sword skills or guns. There wasn't much of a need for they were only performing assassinations but Daichi, the officer of parasites in Midori ward had encouraged the use of weapons like guns for dealing with tough situations like the Genji incident.
Although guns weren't used often because they wanted to keep a low profile. Law enforcement would be on alert for firearms. It was also why the parasites wouldn't be dealing with arms trafficking as it was too early to risk pulling the curtain on their operations.
Their numbers were too little but that also meant that they were hard to detect. The world had already noticed an increase in accidents, grisly murders, cannibalism and missing persons cases.
Hikaru found out that Phillip was actually very strong but hadn't reached his maximum potential. He didn't eat any humans and had simply doubled and sometimes tripled each of his four meals a day.
His bone spikes could have been a lot denser and longer. Hikaru would have used level 4 tentacles to shield himself but if Phillip had a better diet, he could have made a spike as long as a spear and impaled him with it. Phillip's hybridised genome was certainly capable of that level of manipulation.
Whereas Hikaru's abilities were limitless. They could grow from gaining experience but were much faster achieved by absorbing experience from others. After absorbing Phillip's ability, he became proficient in spike manipulation. Hikaru could now carry on from where Phillip left off.
"I'd just be busy trying to cure the world's diseases as a scientist. If I could live forever, I'd get to see what every scientist dream of, the fruition of their life's work and its effects in the following centuries to come."
Chiho had frozen for a moment. Her eyebrows were raised and curved. She quickly looked down as she cut her steak. Her cheeks scalded soon after as if she was slapped a couple of seconds ago. She felt extremely lucky to be on a date with Hikaru. If only Aimi were here to see this.
'I can't wait to tell Aimi!' She thought excitedly.
The truth was the opposite. Hikaru wanted to make a bioweapon like a novel virus that could destroy the whole world. Nothing has changed after gaining immortality apart from the method used and that he wanted to live in a world where everything was dead and enjoy the serenity before killing himself too.
Life is inherently meaningless. Meaninglessness isn't a negative concept - it's neutral. Meaning is an unnatural social construct, an idea, and nothing more.
Humans may believe they need meaning because they have evolved to understand cause and effect. Understanding cause and effect has helped gain an advantage over other animals in that it helps to identify patterns over time, understand the causes for occurrences, and enable humans to capitalize on those patterns.
Humans actively seek "why" things happen because that's the core of who they are as a species. But this all breaks down in the face of death and their short time here. People say and do things as if they will care about the result when they are dead. Leaving a lasting legacy, caring about their grandchildren's future, serving the community, etc.
It's "good" to be like that. But, ultimately, nothing one does ever matters. Whether it's the homeless guy on the street or Elon Musk, nothing will last and none of it will be carved into infinity. When one is dead, he or she won't care, and the people they affected will die as well and not care.
Eventually, the planet will be engulfed by the sun, or, if humans are lucky enough to evolve to be space-faring, the universe will end one way or another. Everything will be erased, including all personal achievements.
Knowing that life is meaningless is liberating if one understands that nothing else matters and the most important thing is to do whatever makes them happy.
Hikaru like everyone else wants to leave behind a legacy. If everything Hikaru did was meaningless, then he wanted to leave an infinite legacy. He wanted to destroy all of existence. That was the only meaningless thing that was meaningful.