Blooming
Blooming
There had been a massive event where I ended up becoming the Hero of the Demon God Church out of nowhere, but that didn't cause any dramatic change right away.
The only thing that had changed was that I now had one more reason to stay at the ruins, unlike the original plan. Seneran and my master wanted to continue the investigation with as much help as possible from the priests who could finally sense divinity, and for my part, I had to learn Holy Arts from the Saintess.
"You keep treating Holy Arts as if they were some kind of magic or skill. That attitude is blasphemy, Hero. Do not lose your pious mindset."
Fortunately, maybe because of the gruesome incident in our village, the place didn't see many visitors even as time passed. I looked at the Saintess, who was nitpicking my personal views, and launched into some sophistry.
"If Epaga chose a Hero like that, wouldn't that be the right way to be treated?"
Seneran's resourcefulness had the power to turn even midwinter camping into sentimental glamping, so the church members could stay long-term without any discomfort.
Personally, beyond convenience, I had worried it would be uncomfortable just being in the territory of the Human Race in the middle of a war, but maybe the fact that this was a temple that once housed ancient sacred relics and the place where a modern Hero was revealed made them feel like they were on some kind of pilgrimage. They were spending their days so happily investigating the temple and offering prayers that it was baffling.
And Saintess Deoni was no different.
"Unless Epaga is an incarnation herself, even such a thought is blasphemy. If she manifested her divinity directly to correct you, she might harm other innocent people. That is precisely why she chose a saintess—to educate you not to commit such blasphemy."
In other words, I am something like a teacher for your proper religious outlook, Hero. The Saintess said this and laughed it off as if it were nothing.
Only a week had passed, but by the day she had grown accustomed to my jokes and sophistry, and now, unlike at first, she only gave apathetic responses to most of what I said.
"So stop spouting nonsense and just use the Holy Art again. Properly. With focus."
As she quietly admonished me, I dusted myself off, stood up, adjusted the shield I had set down, and took my stance.
At the same instant, the Saintess closed the distance and swung her mace—it slammed into my shield, and the noise of metal striking metal echoed through the quiet forest. Since I was only permitted to defend in this sparring, I frantically used the Holy Arts I had learned over two days to reinforce the shield, mitigate the impact, and block her attacks.
Saintess Deoni's teaching was practically Spartan training.
As it turned out, she had been a reserve holy warrior who had trained in combat among heresy inquisitors since childhood. No wonder her mace-swinging had been anything but ordinary from our first meeting.
So, contrary to my worry that she would make me drone on reciting prayers, she understood the purpose of a 'Hero' very precisely: she declared I was excessively loaded on offense, and began forcibly cramming defense- and recovery-related Holy Arts into me.
Even by my standards, it was a truly merciless intensity of study, but no one took my side. Asilie, Seneran, and my master welcomed the chance to extend my lifespan with open arms, and the church members were convinced that if the Saintess willed it, it was correct.
And after all that training, I was whining just because I was barely blocking the Saintess's attacks? Obviously, there was a reason I said it was hard.
"Your Magic Power is leaking out! Suppress it!"
Because I had to fight with nothing but my own pathetic body and that feeble Divine Power.
On top of that, Magic Power was already practically one with my body, so for me, trying not to use it was twice as hard as paying attention to use it.
"Magic Power can run dry, but faith never runs out! Do not forget that even when you lose your strength and your body won't move, faith always overflows!"
At first I thought it sounded like some crazy cultist bullshit, but astonishingly, it was true.
The Divine Power used to manifest Holy Arts never runs out. It's just a matter of whether the hole it pours from is the size of a needle's eye, like a trickling spring, or a waterfall. No matter how high-level the Holy Art, if you just keep accumulating Divine Power, you can manifest it somehow.
But in the end, because it's still a fragment of divinity, the strain comes to the human body first. The user's exhaustion from overusing Holy Arts isn't due to the depletion of Divine Power, but fatigue from overexposure to divinity.
Having lived my whole life without any thought or chance to study Holy Arts, it was an incredibly novel and pleasant realization, but the process of discovering it was not very pleasant.
Even now I grind my teeth when I recall two days ago, when she said she'd teach me the healing Holy Art and then beat the shit out of me like a dog on the hottest summer day, pummeling me nonstop until the Holy Art activated.
"As expected, Hero, you grasp things easily when you move your body. It seems learning the healing Holy Art was no coincidence."
"Have you learned mind reading or something? I was literally recalling that moment and shuddering just now."
I'm proud that the reason I didn't lose my temper and use Magic Power during that irrational violence was thanks to my faith in Epaga and my solid belief that the Saintess had no reason to give me wrong lessons just to vent her anger.
Of course, if I hadn't later secretly asked the church members and gotten confirmation that it was truly an accelerated method to awaken Holy Arts, I probably would have dreamed up some petty revenge. But hearing my sullen reply, the Saintess burst out laughing mid-attack and answered cheerfully.
"Well, when else could I get to beat up Hero one-sidedly?"
Now she was so brazenly cracking jokes first; it felt truly wicked.
"Unlike magic, Holy Arts do not have a complex structure. Unlike the path of magic, which is considered to have no fixed answer, the path of faith is immutable. Those who cannot awaken Divine Power dismiss this as the vague nonsense of religious folk, but you must now clearly understand what this means, Hero."
I couldn't articulate it clearly, but it was true.
Unlike magic, which activates through a process of constructing a spell formula from scratch, calculating, and guiding Magic Power, Holy Arts are more like pouring Divine Power into a pre-existing mold and letting it set.
Therefore, unlike magic, which becomes unusable if you lack even one ability, as long as you have Divine Power and know the Holy Art, you can use it endlessly.
Even if it destroys your body in the process.
"The reason the process of learning Holy Arts often feels brutal is also because of that. Uncontrolled Holy Arts can endanger not only the user but also the surroundings, so there's a tendency to semi-forcefully push you into situations that deserve to be called ascetic practices."
There's no reason you couldn't learn it in a more dignified manner... but that method involves months of mind-numbingly boring lectures about the proper mindset of faith and hand-copying scriptures to learn restraint and vigilance, so getting the shit beaten out of you was a hundred times better.
I actually said that and had to endure another round of the Saintess's nagging, but anyway, the training continued smoothly, and I was getting accustomed to the Holy Arts.
Thanks to that, even if a blow filled with Divine Power sent my shield flying and an immediate follow-up came in, I'd reached the level where I could block once with a Holy Art.
-WHAM!
"Urgh!"
It was far from completely deflecting the shock, so I had to grit my teeth and endure, but just being able to withstand an attack that would have killed me otherwise was a huge improvement.
"Hmm... You are fast, that is true, but compared to when you use the healing Holy Art, it is subtly slower. Is this also related to the Hero's ability?"
But in the eyes of the star Holy Art instructor Saintess Deoni, it didn't seem that way.
She watched me stagger back more than five steps, tilted her head, shrugged as if still unsure, and dusted off her hands.
"Still, your acquisition speed is fast enough, so you don't need to be too impatient. After repeating this for a few more days, you'll grow accustomed to using Divine Power and be able to do it without my help."
"Uh, I have one question. Normally, doing this doesn't increase your Divine Power, right?"
"Of course not. Divine Power is proof of faith. Even those who serve the God of War and Strife cannot do that."
Feeling grateful that the Saintess was so tactfully rewording the statement 'It's because you're the Hero,' I went to retrieve my shield that had flown far away and tidied up the area.
Just letting the Magic Power I'd been suppressing move again brought vitality back to my body, so cleaning up wasn't too hard. If anything, listening to the Saintess lecture about the scriptures during that time was a greater ordeal.
"Come to think of it, Seneran said it was about time to purchase additional supplies from the city. She said she'd like your help this time, Hero."
"My help?"
"Yes. Since we actually dismissed everyone else except us, if the supplies we buy are similar, it could raise suspicion. So she asked you to introduce someone."
"Ah."
It was a problem I hadn't thought of.
Even if she sometimes seemed a few screws loose, she really was a smart person after all.