Saintess Sistina
The next day, the response came faster than I'd expected.
I was cleaning the church's outer walls as usual when a little kid came trotting up and handed me something.
"They said to give this to you, mister."
What the child delivered was a neatly folded note. I didn't have a single acquaintance in this world who'd send me something like this, so the sender was obvious.
I have something to discuss regarding clothes.
I'll wait in the alley behind the general store at lunch today.
Clothes, huh. Underwear, more like.
She'd even left her name off, probably worried someone else might read it. Mentioning clothes at the start was her way of making sure I'd know who it was from. She'd been too embarrassed to write underwear, so she'd sanitized it to "clothes." It was kind of adorable.
No. This wasn't the time for thoughts like that.
We'd arranged a place to talk, but it was far too soon to feel relieved. She still had to accept that Bishop Xavier—a man who was essentially the head of this church—was actually trying to kill the Hero and the Saintess.
The greatest danger of all was that I had no proof. Knowing her secret underwear situation wasn't going to be nearly enough to convince her. If Sistina didn't believe me, I couldn't even imagine what would happen next.
But I wanted to save her, no matter what it took. If she hadn't reached out a helping hand, I might have died in the streets. I had no choice but to make this work, by any means necessary.
I mapped out countless possibilities in my head and waited for lunchtime to arrive.
"The alley behind the general store... where is that..."
It was a little early for lunch. I was heading for the alley behind the general store, just as the note had said. I'd never taken that road before, so I spent a fair while wandering around looking for it. Good thing I'd left a little early.
The alley was almost completely hidden behind wooden barrels the general store had stacked outside. It was an inconvenient path, to be sure—nobody would come this way unless they had a reason. Just from the location she'd chosen, I could tell how badly my words had shaken her.
The moment I stepped into the alley, the cats that had been huddled together let out a short cry and scattered. With so few people coming through, it seemed the strays had claimed the place as their own.
So where was Sistina? I'd gone in quite a ways, but there was still no sign of her.
A moment later, I spotted someone in a pitch-black hood coming straight toward me from the other end of the alley. Their head was bowed so low I couldn't see a face, and a long robe covered them from head to toe. I had no idea who it was.
Cloaked in a black hood and robe to conceal his identity, he approached Yunoa with the air of an assassin closing in to drive a blade home.
I flinched at the sudden voice of the Narration.
An assassin? Don't tell me Sistina hired one to keep her underwear secret?
But the one who had hidden their entire body like an assassin was none other than Saintess Sistina.
Yeah, figures. So the Narration did bait-and-switch now, too. Unbelievable.
Anyway, the black-clad figure—now confirmed as Sistina—walked right up to me and stopped. Up close, her smaller stature was unmistakable, both in height and build.
"...Yunoa."
Sistina lifted her head and looked at me. She'd tied her hair up and tucked it inside the hood, so her cherry-blossom pink hair was barely visible. But even bundled up from head to toe, the beauty of her face was impossible to hide.
"What did you mean by what you said back then? Are you trying to blackmail me with it? What is it you want?"
Sistina asked, her expression tight with unease. I spoke, trying to put her at ease.
"First of all, I'm sorry for bringing that up the way I did. I had no intention of blackmailing you."
"..."
Sistina pressed her lips shut and lowered her head again. I glanced around to make sure no one else was nearby, then continued with the words I'd prepared.
"The truth is, ever since you showed me mercy, Saintess, I've been having strange dreams at the church."
I could have cut straight to the point, but I deliberately laid the groundwork first. There was no one else in this alley besides the two of us anyway. Right now, I needed to pour every last bit of my soul into talking her around.
She had to be confused. First, I needed her to understand that I was firmly on her side. She was still silent, just listening, so I figured a cautious approach was the way to go if I wanted to actually convince her.
"In the dreams, a bright light would appear and tell me all sorts of things. At first I thought they were just dreams. But little by little, I realized that what I'd heard in those dreams matched reality."
I said it with trembling eyes, putting on the face of a man who couldn't believe it himself. The reason I'd called it a dream instead of the Narration was that it would be more convincing that way. I'd also deliberately set the timing of the dreams to after I'd started staying at the church. That way I could hide the Narration's existence, and maybe she'd take it as some kind of religious experience.
The problem was whether I could get her to believe the matter of Bishop Xavier based on nothing but the contents of a dream. No matter how much I insisted that what I'd seen in the dream was exactly what was happening in real life, getting her to actually believe it wouldn't be easy.
"Are you saying you see the future in your dreams, Yunoa?"
At last, Sistina lifted her head again and asked.
See the future, huh. I wish I could.
"I know it's hard to believe, but everything that's come up in my recent dreams has come true in reality. Not a single miss. If that weren't the case, I never would have dared bring something like that up to you, Saintess, based on a mere dream. Think about it. Would I have done that if I weren't reasonably certain?"
It felt like trying to convince her that a soybean was a red bean. Come on, tongue. Don't fail me now.
"And when I saw in the dream that your life was being targeted, Saintess, I didn't know what to do. I had to tell you, but it was obvious you wouldn't believe me. That's why I had no choice but to mention a secret that no one else could possibly know—one that belonged to you alone."
"...Honestly, I don't know what to think."
Sistina said, avoiding my gaze.
So it was too much after all. If I brought up Bishop Xavier's name while she was in this state, the whole situation could turn against me in an instant. Something. There had to be something more. Some way to earn her trust. If I'd just had one more card to play besides the underwear...
The moment that thought crossed my mind, a voice rang out inside my head.
Even now, at this very moment, Yunoa still could not let go of the thoughts occupying one corner of his mind: the Saintess's underwear.
The night before, he had freely speculated about the reason with all manner of perverted imaginings.
But contrary to his shameless fantasies, the reason was that Sistina did not want to be the Saintess.
Hey, I wasn't thinking about the underwear that much. I mean, I was curious about the reason, so I did imagine a little yesterday, but...
Wait. What?
Sistina doesn't want to be the Saintess?
The Saintess was chosen at the diocese's whim through divine oracle.
Sistina did not want the role of Saintess—a heavy duty she would have to bear regardless of her own will.
But she could not openly refuse a role that had already been decided.
"Yunoa?"
"Just a moment. I only need a moment."
I asked Sistina—who was looking at me with a puzzled expression—to wait. I was concentrating so I wouldn't miss a single word of the Narration.
But if the Saintess failed to find the Hero within one year, she would lose her position, and the church would select a new Saintess.
And the goddess's revelations for finding the Hero could only be received if the Saintess's purity remained unshaken.
That was why Sistina had decided to abandon her own purity, so that she could naturally slip free of her duties as Saintess.
So that's why she wasn't wearing underwear.
It made sense. Openly refusing the role of Saintess would have caused all kinds of headaches with the church. On the surface, she played the part of the ideal Saintess, while secretly going without underwear so the goddess's revelations wouldn't come down. If she held out for a year like that, she could step down from the position naturally—as if she'd done her best, but it just couldn't be helped.
But Yunoa, without the faintest clue as to her circumstances, had been indulging in nothing but vulgar fantasies.
I know that now, okay? You stupid Narration.
But thank you. You'd just handed me the best weapon I could possibly use in this situation.
"Saintess. Then let me get one more thing right."
I looked at Sistina and spoke with a voice full of certainty.
"The real reason you weren't wearing underwear."
"...!"
"It's because you wanted to stop being the Saintess... isn't it? You deliberately made it so you couldn't receive the goddess's revelations, hoping you'd be replaced as Saintess naturally. Am I right?"
In that instant, Sistina's eyes flew wide, a sharp gasp catching in her throat.
"How... how did you..."
"Can you believe me now?"
I asked, looking Sistina straight in the eyes. She might have written off the first one as coincidence. But if I guessed her secrets twice, she'd have no choice but to believe me, whether she wanted to or not.
Sistina stared at me with visibly shaken eyes, then quietly nodded in lieu of an answer.
And at last, I told her the truth.