Become My Apostle! (6)
"This is crazy. First, let's find a place to hide."
The shock of discovering his gloomy companion's true identity was brief. Yohan looked at Falco and suggested they get out of there immediately.
They had spent quite a while talking after digging her up, and the process of healing her old wounds had emitted a brilliant light. It wouldn't be surprising if the grave robbers on the first floor noticed something was off and came rushing out at any moment.
"R-right."
Though Falco seemed deeply flustered by the sudden turn of events, she obediently followed Yohan's lead.
The two quickly relocated to a forest a short distance away from the grave robbers' hideout. Yohan took one last look at the abandoned building visible through the thicket, confirming that the grave robbers inside hadn't reacted.
"So..."
Yohan muttered softly, looking at Falco, who still wore a dazed expression.
The fellow grave robber he had assumed was just a quiet, gloomy guy was actually...
—"Is that not a pointy-ear?!"
At that moment, the Goddess's voice rang out like thunder inside his head.
"Ah, shit. Pointy-ear or whatever, what's your problem?"
—"Those of her kind hunted my believers and trampled upon the sanctuary dedicated to me!"
The Goddess seemed highly displeased by the fact that her divine power had been used to heal a pointy-ear.
"You're one to talk, considering you were starving to death with even your name stripped away..."
Yohan retorted sarcastically before turning his head to look directly at Falco again.
"Uh, so... you've had a rough time. Actually, I got stabbed in the back by the other guys on my way back from a job, too."
"...I heard."
Falco, who had been silent, finally spoke up.
"You heard?"
Yohan asked, taken aback. Falco nodded.
"While they were burying me, they were talking among themselves about the next target to clean up."
"Those bastards."
It seemed this wasn't just a rogue action by the guys who had gone out on the job with him. It was a large-scale loose-end cleanup orchestrated from the top, not just by low-level grunts.
—"It is the nature of scoundrels to prune their own ranks when the time is ripe, even if they band together."
"Yeah, yeah."
Hearing the Goddess's nagging in his head, Yohan gave a half-hearted reply and let out a soft sigh.
"Anyway, since things turned out like this..."
Yohan pointed toward the distant hideout. Falco's gaze naturally followed his finger.
"Why do you think I didn't just run away after barely surviving, but came back here instead?"
"To pay them back for what they did."
Falco answered Yohan's question. Though her voice was quiet, her desire was clear enough.
"Exactly."
Yohan's lips curled into a smirk as he looked at Falco.
"The sweet taste of revenge is always twice as good when shared."
"It looks like most of them are out, except for a few left to guard the warehouse."
"Right. There should be two on the first floor, and three in the basement."
The two drew up a quick plan on the spot before launching their assault on the hideout.
—"Those remaining in the hideout and those yet to return are all traitors alike, so slaughter them all! The hour of justice is at hand!"
Watching their conversation, the Goddess chimed in. Yohan reflexively looked up at the empty air.
"You were throwing a fit about pointy-ears earlier, but I guess you're fine with it now."
—"Though those of her kind destroyed my sanctuary, it does not mean all of her race are the same."
It seemed her earlier outburst was just a sudden explosion of emotion triggered by painful memories of the past.
Well, she had been imprisoned alone for thousands of years. An ordinary person would have lost their mind long ago.
"By the way, you were buried alive. How on earth did you survive until now?"
Yohan asked, looking at Falco. Falco idly rubbed her wrists, which had been tightly bound with rope.
"Elves are more resilient than humans."
She replied, her voice tinged with a strange bitterness.
Yohan immediately understood why.
Falco had always gone around with her entire body wrapped in bandages. She had claimed it was due to severe burns covering her body.
The only reason she could walk around fine with burns that would have killed an ordinary human was her resilient elven physiology. But that didn't mean she hadn't felt the agonizing pain of those burns.
"..."
Yohan finally understood why Falco had so often volunteered for night watch duty, even when it wasn't her turn.
"Actually, I still almost died. The mud kept sliding into my mouth and nose, suffocating me."
Seeing Yohan's expression darken rapidly, Falco quickly changed the subject. But even that story was painful and pitiful to hear.
The sudden rain had saved her from being burned alive, but conversely, the wet soil had collapsed on her, nearly suffocating her to death.
"But it's fine now. I don't know how you did it, but I'm completely healed thanks to you. Even my burns are gone. Thank you."
—"Hmph. At least she is a pointy-ear who knows how to show gratitude."
As Falco expressed her thanks, the Goddess's voice echoed in his mind once more.
"But no matter how I look at it... you don't seem quite right."
"Huh?"
Just when the atmosphere seemed to be getting warm and friendly, Falco suddenly spoke with a look of concern for Yohan.
"You've been looking up at the sky since earlier, and you keep talking to the empty air as if you're having a conversation..."
"Ah."
So that was it. Yohan shook his head as he realized what Falco meant.
The Goddess certainly existed and could converse with him in her spiritual form. But to an outsider, it would look like Yohan was talking to thin air, so it was only natural to assume he had lost his mind.
"I know you were always a bit gloomy, but I don't remember you being quite this bad."
"Oh, boy."
—"Indeed! Tell her that it was I who saved your dying breath and healed the wounds of that pointy-ear!"
The Goddess's voice rang in his head again.
"You didn't hit your head when you fell, did you? If you're talking to auditory hallucinations, that's a pretty serious issue."
—"What in the world is that pointy-ear babbling about?!"
Yohan shrugged at Falco's question.
"I get it. Honestly, if I saw someone else muttering to themselves, I'd think they were crazy too."
—"What are you doing? Hurry and proclaim the existence of your Goddess as my Apostle!"
The Goddess urged him. But Yohan ignored her voice once again.
"Pfft—"
Yohan and Falco burst into silly laughter at the same time.
—"Apostle?"
The Goddess's voice followed, but Yohan, acting as if he couldn't hear her at all, simply giggled along with Falco.
Flash!
In an instant, a blinding light erupted above Yohan's head, and something falling from the sky crashed violently into his body.
"You little bastard!"
"Urgh!"
Manifesting physically on earth once more in a flash of bright light, the Goddess grabbed Yohan by the collar, unleashing a torrent of curses in a booming voice.
"My goodness... You're really a goddess."
"Hard to believe even when you're looking right at her, isn't it? I thought I was seeing things at first too."
"Do you still doubt me, even after the wounds eating away at your entire body were healed in an instant?!"
Suddenly, the three of them were gathered together.
Falco couldn't hide her astonished expression as she stared at the Goddess, who had puffed out her cheeks in anger. Yohan, on the other hand, felt a strong urge to poke the idiot's cheeks with a needle.
She said she was using a smaller body to conserve divine power, but did her personality have to regress into that of a toddler as well?
"Anyway, she's the one who saved both of us. And for now... I've somehow ended up as her Apostle."
Yohan lamented his fate of being dragged around.
"The sole believer serving an ancient deity whose very name has been forgotten... That's actually pretty cool."
"Are you mocking me?"
But it seemed Falco genuinely found Yohan's current situation to be cool.
"Now that things have come to this, go forth and annihilate those wretched grave robbers. After that, we can simply go our separate ways, can we not?"
The Goddess finally let go of her anger and offered her suggestion. However, upon hearing her words, both Yohan and Falco tilted their heads in unison.
"She experienced a miracle that brought her back from the brink of death, and you're just going to leave without making her a believer?"
Yohan questioned the Goddess. Even Falco nodded a couple of times in agreement.
"Well... a pointy-ear is a bit..."
"..."
But their agreement was short-lived. At the Goddess's hesitant reply, they grimaced as if they had just witnessed something repulsive.
"Hey, you. Just a moment ago, you said whatever her kind did was in the past, so you didn't care."
"T-that is true... but still, a pointy-ear is a bit much."
She didn't seem to be joking. She likely knew in her mind that her attitude was wrong, but the prejudice born from her past experiences made her react this way.
"Ah, damn it. What does the size of someone's ears or how they look matter so much?"
It was a shame, but there was nothing to be done. Yohan decided to cleanly give up on making Falco the second believer.
From Falco's perspective, it would be uncomfortable to serve a goddess who so openly disliked her kind anyway.
Still, it wasn't all bad. At least Falco was finally freed from the full-body burns that had caused her constant agony.
We'll just team up until we get our revenge on those grave robbers... and then we can go our separate ways, Yohan thought to himself.
"Falco, that's how it is. Sorry about that."
"Why on earth are you apologizing? My Apostle, have you forgotten your own standing?!"
When Yohan apologized to Falco, the Goddess got angry instead. Yohan glared back at her with fire in his eyes.
Step.
At that moment, Falco, who had been standing a few paces away, suddenly stepped closer to the Goddess. She knelt on one knee to match her eye level.
"W-what is it?"
Flustered by Falco's sudden approach, the Goddess even stammered.
"Nameless Goddess. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for saving me while I was dying in agony."
Falco thanked the Goddess in a remarkably gentle voice, one that even Yohan had never heard before.
"Though I may not be able to follow you despite experiencing your miracle, I will remember this day until the moment my life runs its course and I draw my last breath."
At Falco's words, even Yohan, who had been about to pinch the Goddess's cheeks, felt a sudden wave of emotion.
I always thought she was just some gloomy kid... but she's actually a really decent person, isn't she?
Falco bowed her head slightly toward the dumbfounded Goddess. Then, she finally stood back up.
"Shall we go pay back the bastards who betrayed us first, then?"
"Uh, y-yeah."
Right. Now was not the time to get sentimental. Yohan snapped out of it at Falco's words.
"Ah, ah..."
Meanwhile, the Goddess simply stood there with her mouth agape, a dazed look on her face.
"Ah..."
Yohan and Falco waited in silence for her to speak.
After a few seconds of silence, the Goddess crossed her arms and nodded.
"...Very well. Though I utterly detest pointy-ears... I shall make a special exception for you."
She declared with an incredibly solemn expression, looking as though she had made a decision far weightier than the one she made when saving Yohan's life.