The Instructor's Flex (2)

Two weeks before the term began.

Which is to say, the moment the old priest explained to Lee Han just why he had fallen under suspicion of heresy, and why an inquisitor had him in his sights.

And Lee Han...

"You've got a list of the cardinals and high priests gunning for me, right? Mind handing that over?"

"I have no objection to giving it. But why, may I ask, do you require it?"

"I'll go and wreck them myself. ...I might even be willing to talk it out."

"Heh heh. That last part was a lie."

"......"

He meant to try his hand at being an assassin again. Assassination. If he could only cut down the big heads aiming at him, the temple would stop aiming at him too.

He had the confidence for it. Bring the full weight of his true ability to bear, and he was a man who might even set his sights, in this world, on the second coming of the Shadowless Divine Art.

"Tristan, at least, was worth facing head-on. The temple isn't."

A man feels no guilt for killing a gnat or a mosquito. Lee Han felt the same about the temple's high ranks. Killing them did not strike him, even slightly, as dirtying his hands. He spoke their execution without a shred of shame, and at those words the old priest—

"Not a bad suggestion."

"...?"

—gave his approval, and it was Lee Han who ended up dumbfounded.

"...I know I'm the one who offered, but is it really all right?"

"Heh heh. My cultivation is not so deep that I can forgive vermin who hawk the name of the Light and swagger on borrowed might. Sometimes extreme measures are necessary. Do not worry. Even should you commit a sin, brother, I will take that sin entirely upon myself and go to Hell."

"Th-that's not what I wanted..."

Looked at a certain way, the man went a step further than Lee Han himself.

"...However."

"Yeah?"

"Putting them down will not be the answer."

"...Keep talking. I'm listening."

"Thank you. What I wish to say is this. To borrow your own example, brother, a pest is a thing you catch and catch again, and still it keeps coming. Just as the discovery of a single ant means ants are already scattered all through the house."

"...Catch those bastards and new pests just crop up. That what you mean?"

He could see the sense in it. There was an old saying: go after the bedbugs, and you burn the whole thatched house down. It meant ruining a great matter over a small one, but it could also be read another way.

"So if you want every last pest dead, you have to be ready to burn the house."

If you were going to catch them, you pulled them out by the root. Take the temple's high ranks and he would feel cleaner in the moment, and the trouble would look solved, but the temple would only keep producing people to make a nuisance of themselves. It had already begun to notice him. A second swarm of pests would come buzzing, grating, around his ears.

Infuriatingly so.

"Furthermore, the inquisitors of the Inquisition do not know how to give up. Stronger and stronger ones will come down upon you, brother. In particular, should those called special-grade inquisitors appear, then even you will not escape lightly."

"They strong?"

"It is less their strength than the fact that they are unscrupulous about means and methods. That is what makes them difficult. They may well aim not at you, brother, but at the people around you."

"...Then the temple and I just can't live under the same sky. That's all."

The temple was no small power. Even so, if he moved alone, Lee Han was certain he could bring it down as well, though it take him ten years. That was not arrogance. It was confidence. He was a narrow, petty bastard who could not live with a slight, who would not feel right until he had paid it back ten times over—no, a thousand.

"That would be a tragedy. For you, brother, and for the temple. And so, as I see it, perhaps we ought to spend a little time and let the matter proceed."

"Time?"

Would giving it time actually solve anything? That was Lee Han's doubt, and Raphael answered without hesitation.

"Of course. I, too, have not merely been idle. Fortunately, there are brothers willing to aid a worthless old man such as myself."

"Hoh."

He understood at once. After returning to the temple, the old priest had been gathering a faction, little by little. A former cardinal, the temple's highest elder, a man who had risen even to candidacy for sainthood. If someone like that formed a faction, the people willing to stand with him would be no ordinary caliber either.

"Once those who aid me are gathered, I too shall have to carry out the last duty of my life."

"Planning a reform?"

"If it proves necessary."

"...It won't be easy."

He had heard it said that founding a new dynasty was easier than saving a dying kingdom. To Lee Han, the old priest looked as if he meant to attempt something even more reckless than Lee Han himself. Even so—

"If someone must, then it ought to be me."

He answered as if it were ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠only natural.

"...All right. For now, let's leave assassination as the backup."

"Thank you, brother."

"Even so, if they ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠start getting on my nerves, I'll have no choice but to take that backup. Remember that."

"Heh heh. Of course. Even so, do not worry. So long as I keep my place at the Office of the Inquisition, neither they nor the inquisitors will be able to move as they please."

One raid had already failed, and the high priests were not stupid enough to stir while the old priest himself was watching. That would be the temple advertising its own corruption in the open, and it would hand Raphael nothing but a pretext to grow his influence.

"Power-hungry bastards never give anyone an opening to take their power. That's how it works."

"Heh heh. You understand the hearts of the powerful very well, brother."

"...Just how it turned out."

The guess was only possible because, among the people he knew, there was an older sister who might as well have been power given flesh. And as Lee Han and the old priest moved to settle on that agreement—

"But what do we do with these?"

"......"

For the first time, the old priest looked troubled. The eleven inquisitors Lee Han had taken captive. He still had not decided what was to be done with them. The old priest brooded a moment.

"Hm. Of these, I will take those two."

"Those ones?"

The priest who had first talked shit at Lee Han, and the priest who seemed to have been commanding the inquisitors. The old priest picked out exactly those two, and when asked why he was taking them—

"They are the adopted sons of high clerics. The ones who drove this affair are likely these two. Keep them, and the high clerics will not be able to move rashly. A great deal of what comes out of their mouths will be fatal to their patrons as well."

As expected of the old priest. Kind, but not wholly ignorant of politics. Even so.

"...So the temple puts blood first, too."

"......It is nothing but a failing of virtue."

Another absurd spectacle, and he was past knowing what face to make. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠The old priest let out a small sigh. Even as he did, wondering what to do with the remaining nine—

"Hm. Those ones, I believe it would be fine if you handled them as you see fit, brother. ...If I may offer an excuse, those brothers only followed their superiors' orders. So please, show them mercy."

"Didn't they say they didn't care if they left this life?"

"Heh heh. They lived, in the end, did they not? Then they ought to have a chance to taste mercy."

"......Awfully convenient mercy."

Lee Han answered offhand and glanced over the nine leftovers. From the bastards writhing in pain to the red-haired woman dressed as a man. He—

"Mmm. Assistant."

"Y-yes, Instructor!!"

"You've got juniors."

"......Yes?"

"I was going to keep grinding you, and only you, for whatever time you've got left. But somehow things worse than you showed up. So..."

"......"

"You handle them. You're the senior."

"...!!!"

Lee Han decided to give the assistant a gift. Interns you were permitted to kill, if they couldn't do the work.