Our Little Providence
Shenyang, China.
Hotel Jen Shenyang by Shangri-La.
Headquarters of Lazarus, the hacker collective operating under North Korea's Reconnaissance General Bureau.
Most North Korean elites who made it abroad couldn't last three days before the truth dawned on them, swift and inescapable.
The realization that their beloved Republic was, frankly, a cesspit of a nation.
A puppet state that hardly deserved the name of a country — mocked, scorned, and ridiculed the world over.
The realization that the people of the world were watching them the way one watches monkeys in a zoo.
And the moment that truth landed, they tore off — or quietly hid — the portrait badges they had once worn with such pride.
To foreigners, they passed themselves off as South Koreans.
Kim Soo-hak had been one of these North Korean elites.
A hacker for Lazarus, he had funneled countless sums of cryptocurrency back home in service of the motherland.
None of it had been earned honestly, of course. It had come through every creative and relentlessly obsessive form of cybercrime imaginable.
What am I even doing with my life?
For reasons like these, Kim Soo-hak had long been drifting.
On the surface, of course, he never let it show — his poker face was immaculate.
Watchers surrounded him at all times.
One misstep, and he could be dragged back to the homeland.
Clack-clackity clack clack.
So he did the work he was given, soullessly, day after day — all to sustain a homeland that ought to have ceased existing long ago.
Then one day, an order came down.
[Investigate the augmented-reality game application Providence: Raising a Cleric.]
An order to investigate some program made in South Korea.
What now?
He tilted his head, then pulled out the iPhone he had procured through back channels.
The iPhone's blind, brainless lack of built-in surveillance was an irreplaceable refuge for a man like Kim Soo-hak.
Miraculous effects? And what in the world is Holy Water?
Before installing the Raising a Cleric game, he dug through everything he could find on it.
Why would the Bureau be interested in something this bizarre?
Even a cursory search made one thing clear: it was a cult. A complete and utter cult.
The Providence Sect. "Provians." A very hilarious South Korean outfit, this.
Though, to be fair — it wasn't as though a man from the world's largest cult of personality, the one that worshipped one Kim Jong-un as its Supreme Leader, was in any position to talk.
Has the Supreme Leader's health gotten worse again?
He could roughly infer why the top brass had taken an interest in this strange sect.
For the leadership to care about something this trivial, they had to be in a real panic.
Come to think of it, China and Russia have both been obsessed lately with life extension and anti-aging too, haven't they.
It wasn't just his own country.
The dictatorships on its borders were all chasing the same obsession these days.
Presumably because the Supreme Leaders of the Republic, of China, and of Russia were all hanging by a thread, health-wise.
That's why we've been hacking American anti-aging labs to death lately.
Recalling the mission he'd recently attempted and failed, Kim Soo-hak installed the Providence app.
Several hours later.
Kim Soo-hak was staring at his iPhone, trembling.
This... this is possible?
Astonishment. Wonder. Reverence.
(In silence.)
On the chat screen, the counseling bot Love was gazing back at him through an emoticon.
The messages that followed squeezed the air from Kim Soo-hak's lungs.
And yet, curiously, amid that suffocating pressure he felt something like peace.
This app was sacred. It was truth.
He wanted to keep watching it. He wanted to lean on it.
It was like the embrace of a mother.
Thump-thump-thump-thump.
For a while, Kim Soo-hak just sat there bouncing his leg in silence.
Then he squeezed his eyes shut and sent the email.
After sending the report.
"Hoooh..."
For the first time in his life, Kim Soo-hak felt faith.
Washington D.C., United States of America.
The Executive Residence of the White House.
"Riley, this Holy Water you won in the raffle — I have to say, the results are simply remarkable."
"Right? If people saw us now, they'd never guess we were mother and daughter. They'd think we were sisters."
"Oh, you."
Mother and daughter were enjoying a warm, intimate conversation.
"Oh, that's right, Mom! How far have you leveled up in Raising a Cleric?"
"Just yesterday I made Devout Believer. And it's truly uncanny — every day, the daily mission shows me some act of virtue that fits my exact circumstances."
"Already? You really are working hard."
"Of course I am. That's the only way to earn Holy Water, isn't it? Lately... Mom is just so happy. The fact that our daughter introduced me to Holy Water, and to Providence — honestly, it feels like I'm living a second life."
"Oh! So that's why!"
"Why what?"
"Your approval rating's higher than Dad's these days, isn't it? It was because you've been grinding your daily missions!"
"Hehe. Should I run for office after your father, then?"
"Honestly? You might actually have a shot."
The mother-daughter conversation was warmer than it had been in years. And at the same time, utterly clandestine.
"But... Mom, you know, right? This has to stay absolutely secret."
The daughter, just stepping into adolescence, spoke carefully, tentatively, to her mother.
This was the heart of the White House. There was no mad agency out there bugging the President's own family — probably — but there was no harm in being careful.
"Shouldn't we at least tell your father? With the Firstborn Son — with His abilities..."
"No. Knowing Dad, he'd order Lee Seop kidnapped and flown to America by sundown."
"But he is your father, dear. And his health isn't what it used to be... and above all, he's the President of the United States..."
If my husband were involved, couldn't we acquire more Holy Water? Maybe even that relic from the rumors? The thought had crossed the First Lady's mind.
But she hated the idea of disappointing her daughter, so she kept it to herself.
"Not yet, Mom. Not yet. Besides... the Holy Water we're winning now is plenty. And we can still enter for the relics with raffle tickets."
"?!"
Her daughter's sober words gave the First Lady a start.
Her daughter was no longer a child.
She understood everything worth understanding.
"And above all — Mom, you saw the warning window yourself, didn't you? You know what happens to people who get careless."
"There are... penalties. Yes."
"This is just my guess, Mom, but — if penalties really exist, they'd have to be the exact opposite of what Holy Water does."
"!!!"
At that, a chill ran down the First Lady's spine.
Skin she had clawed back from the brink. Skin that grace itself had made more beautiful than before.
To lose that? To end up worse than before? The mere thought was horrifying.
No! Absolutely not! O Mother Weaver! Forgive the irreverent thought I had just now!
The post of First Lady of the world's most powerful nation was, in truth, a position with all of the scrutiny and none of the authority — a role of endless responsibility and relentless judgment.
The stress compounded naturally, and her skin had suffered the worst of it.
And the merciless press and public had busied themselves mocking that haggard First Lady face at every turn.
What had saved her was Providence Holy Water, and the Providence Sect.
If Holy Water had rescued her skin, the Providence Sect had rescued her mind.
"Let's tell him only once Love gives the green light. Understood, Mom?"
"Mmm... once Love gives the green light... yes. Let's do that."
In the end, the First Lady nodded.
Yielding to her daughter's plea and her fear of divine penalty alike, she resigned herself to keeping the Providence Sect hidden from her husband — but it wasn't entirely unwelcome.
The exclusivity, the sealed circle — the sense that only a chosen few knew the truth and tasted its benefits.
Come to think of it, there was something quietly thrilling about it.
It was as if they had become a secret society.
"Now, let us pray."
The First Lady and the First Daughter carried out the day's final rite, as they now did every night.
With Raising a Cleric open on the phone stand on the desk.
Eyes closed, hands folded.
"O Weaver of Providence, Mother of All Things, we thank Thee for granting us the safe completion of today's missions."
"Thy daughter and I shall do anything, anything at all, to protect the Firstborn Son, Lee Seop."
"Humankind is still too small and too frail a vessel to bear the Weaver and the Firstborn Son... so we beseech Thee, pour down Thy favor upon us."
"Providence. By Divine Providence."
"Providence. By Divine Providence."
In the manner of the heathen.
The First Principle of the Providence Church:
The Principle of Non-Proselytization First.
The rule against preaching to anyone unprompted applied even to me, Lee Seop. No exceptions.
That said, there was one small loophole at our disposal.
And that was Revelation.
Finding the right artisans and artists for Revelation was honestly the hard part.
We leveraged the Providence Network to its fullest, compiling a list of talented craftsmen and artists, then running those names through another filter to identify the ones the Providence Sect actually needed.
The Revelation skill is essentially a matter of pulling forward — ahead of schedule — someone who would have joined the Providence Church eventually anyway.
In fact, every artisan and artist I had ever cast Revelation upon — whether they were flourishing or foundering — shared one common trait: isolation and drift.
They were people teetering on the edge mentally, socially, physically, or within their own families.
Had the Providence Sect never reached them, most would have turned to drugs or ended their own lives within five years.
"Lee Seop, the CIA's Korea station has lowered its interest-level classification on the Providence Church."
I was mulling over Revelation when Elder Hong Dong-soo, chief of the Providence Network, delivered his report.
"Good news."
As I listened, my mind drifted back to a recent episode.
The memory of our Providence Network operatives, disguised as ordinary believers, selling heavily watered-down Holy Water to a CIA agent still made me smile.
"The genius of the app you created played a part as well, Firstborn Son."
Hong Dong-soo's voice pulled me back from my reverie.
"Raising a Cleric isn't my creation. It's what the Mother made using my hands."
"Of course. Forgive me."
Hong Dong-soo reflexively traced the Providence sign of the cross.
Then his eyes turned razor-sharp.
"And what... shall we do about the apostate who ignored the Mother's warning?"
"You mean that Oh Joo-hoon fellow?"
"Yes."
"Leave him be. By now he'll be performing his proper atonement. All authority over Raising a Cleric belongs to the Mother."
"By Divine Providence. All things according to Providence."
Elder Hong had received the Holy Stigma of the Monk — a combat priest class.
Thanks to it, he possessed both the hard-won seasoning of decades of experience and a superhuman body.
More than enough to entrust him with the church's intelligence and security.
"Also, Lee Seop — it isn't just the Americans. Intelligence agencies in other countries are watching us closely as well."
At Hong Dong-soo's report, my expression grew grave.
"Most still write us off as a cult, but a few nations are taking a keen interest in the Holy Water and the divine power our Clerics have been quietly deploying."
"Dictatorships, chiefly — North Korea, China, Russia, that sort?"
"Yes. Their dictators' ages and health are all in equally sorry shape, so they're grasping at straws."
"These are men who transfuse the blood of the young and transplant the organs of the young, and still they know no satisfaction. Disgusting."
"Which is why it's a stopgap at best — like pissing your pants to warm your feet in winter."
"So — how close have they gotten to us?"
"Thanks to the Mother's protection and the tight lips of our believers, they haven't yet come near the truth. Anyone harboring impure intent is turned away by the Mother's app on its own."
Hong Dong-soo continued.
"That said, a handful have experienced the truth of the Raising a Cleric app. The good news is that every single one of them became a Provian."
Hearing this, my gaze drifted to the painting hanging on the wall of the one-room studio.
The Mother of All Things, painted by a Pardner-class artist, gazed down upon us with serene compassion.
In the frame, the Mother wore the robes of Greco-Roman antiquity — a mature, beautiful woman with silver-blue hair and silver-grey eyes.
"All this time, I assumed the wonder of the Raising a Cleric app was a table you had set for us, Lee Seop. To learn the Mother herself manages it directly — it moves me. It is an honor."
"Thanks be to the Weaver Mother."
"Thanks be to the Weaver Mother."
"In any case, it's reassuring to know we have Provians inside the upper echelons and intelligence agencies of so many nations."
"Thanks to them, we've been able to operate openly while concealing our identity. But..."
Hong Dong-soo let the sentence trail off.
"It's a stopgap, nothing more — merely buying time. Thanks to the Mother's favor and the Provians' efforts, most of the world's leadership still can't decide whether our power is genuine or an elaborate stage trick. But..."
"It won't hold for long, will it."
"No, it won't. Our divinity is far too radiant and too mighty to stay hidden forever."
I nodded at his follow-up.
"All I can do is strive to make sure their devotion is never in vain."
With that exchange, my meeting with Hong Dong-soo concluded.
"May the Mother's blessing rest upon the Provians of every nation."
And so Hong Dong-soo left the prayer room of my one-room studio.
Status Window.
I opened my status window.
It seemed the devotion of the Provians laboring inside the world's intelligence agencies had paid unexpected dividends — an unplanned windfall had surfaced on the screen.
The status window displayed brief profiles of the two white women.
One — thanks, no doubt, to the effects of Holy Water — looked a good ten years younger than her actual age, somewhere between her late twenties and early thirties. The other looked to be in her early-to-mid teens.
The First Lady and First Daughter of the United States, becoming Provians. What an unforeseen gift. Both would have been suitable subjects for Revelation, but I'd shelved them because of the risk — and they became believers entirely on their own.
It was nothing short of a miraculous stroke of luck.
I looked once more at the painting of the Weaver on the wall and traced the sign of the cross.
Bless the algorithm. Bless the Mother within the algorithm.
This had been the algorithm's doing, pure and simple.
A daughter's worry over her mother's stress-wrecked skin had generated a search interest, and that interest had ridden the algorithm's currents straight to Holy Water and Raising a Cleric.
And an adolescent girl's religious sensibility, once ignited, tends toward the fanatical — one need only look at the cases of Heo Yuna and Heo Yumi.
And if those two become the starting point — if the First Ladies and mistresses of America's political and financial elite become Provians?
As the saying goes: if men rule the world, then it is women who rule the men.
Making active use of the wives, daughters, and lovers of the powerful seemed like an excellent strategy.
Of course, the Principle of Non-Proselytization First still stands — but there's nothing wrong with a gentle introduction to someone who's already curious.
Whether they believed after that introduction was solely their own judgment to make.
Still, the overwhelming majority, upon learning of the Providence Church, became Provians at a remarkably high rate.
What can I offer those two right now? Keeping them stocked with Holy Water, I suppose.
They were already receiving Holy Water periodically as raffle prizes — enough to use freely and even share with those around them.
I should send them a relic next time. Maybe a Holy Relic keyring engraved with the Lantern symbol?
Surely other Provians, diligently racking up good deeds for their raffle entries, would cry foul — but the First Lady and First Daughter's prizes were managed as bonus inventory, so it was fine.
At this scale, it fell comfortably within the authority of the app's middle manager — me.