Unbeliever or Saint
"Your Holiness!"
By the time Mohaim sensed the shift in the air around them, it was already too late.
The warm, gentle atmosphere sank in an instant, turning heavy and suffocating like a stagnant swamp.
"Ugh...!"
It was hard to breathe.
An unpleasant, horrid pressure pressed in from every direction, as if someone had shoved his face into a pit of mud.
"How utterly arrogant. You would refuse what even the Empire could not?"
The faint golden radiance that shimmered around the saintess began to darken, little by little.
"To think unbelievers who cannot even fathom His will would dare..."
Her voice dropped low, and the tent groaned with an ominous creak, as though it might collapse at any moment.
"Kahak...! I-I can't... breathe...!"
The maidservant standing near her, unable to withstand the corrupted divine power that had crept over the area, collapsed where she stood and gasped for air.
Before the saintess could sink any deeper into her dark mood and crush the girl outright, Mohaim hastily changed the subject.
"Th-there is one person in particular, Your Holiness, whom you should be aware of."
"...Me?"
"Yes. A man called the Central Officer. He is the chief authority of the Southern Border."
"The Central Officer... What a strange name. Sounds positively heathen."
"There are rumors that he is a Talent Awakener."
The saintess's contorted eyes went round in an instant.
"Oh? A Talent Awakener? Really?"
"It is only rumor, but considering he became a senior officer at such a young age, I find it somewhat credible."
"If that were true, we would surely have heard of it already."
A fair point.
Once the Church verifies a Talent Awakener, that information inevitably reaches the Holy Order itself.
But as far as Erzena knew, only one Talent Awakener existed in the Crossline Kingdom — and she was a woman.
I've never heard of a male Talent Awakener in the Crossline Kingdom.
Which meant his claim carried two possibilities.
Reading her expression, Mohaim pressed on.
"It's possible the information was withheld for some reason — or it may simply be baseless gossip."
"...Understood, for now. Do you know what his ability is?"
"No specifics have been relayed to us. However, a few days ago, he is said to have calmed a furious fire spirit single-handedly."
"Single-handedly? All alone?"
Erzena tilted her head.
Only spirit shamans were capable of pacifying a raging spirit.
Without one, most spirits simply ran rampant until they burned themselves out or were put down by force.
She had never once heard of a person who could calm a natural disaster — least of all a spirit of fire.
"Is such a thing even possible...? Ah — perhaps he splashed water on it?"
At those words, Mohaim's expression turned grave.
"If he had, he's the one who would have burned to death."
"Then it might well be an exaggeration. Rumors always tend to inflate themselves."
"I would like to believe that as well. But the testimony of the witnesses was unanimous in every detail. It doesn't strike me as a lie."
His words drew her brows back into a frown.
But this time it was not anger — it was curiosity.
An ordinary individual, not even a spirit shaman, pacifying a spirit. If that holds up, there's really nothing it could be but a Talent Manifestation.
Talent Manifestations came in many varieties.
Among them, an ability to soothe spirits would most likely involve the manipulation of mana, or something related to spirit contracts.
But then a glaring contradiction arose.
"Hmm... Can a heathen really produce a Talent Awakener?"
"According to doctrine, it is impossible. For talent itself is a blessing bestowed by the Lord God."
Every so often, the Lord God gathered His overflowing love for us into a single gift and bestowed it upon His flock.
Countless miracles, inexplicable phenomena, and sacred relics — all of these were such gifts.
And among them, the most distinctive form of His love was the Talent Manifestation.
Not an object or a phenomenon, but love poured directly into a person.
It was a great grace that only those who served the Lord God most faithfully could receive.
In other words, unmistakable proof of belonging to the Church — something an unbeliever could never receive.
"Then he must be one of our faithful! Oh, and here I was worrying over nothing."
Having finally reached her conclusion, Erzena's expression brightened.
At the same moment, the oppressive air that had bound the room transformed in an instant back into warmth and comfort.
"If he isn't a heathen, he's fine by me. Someone who serves the Lord God is no problem at all. The moment he sees me, he'll understand exactly what our purpose is."
Bewildered by the sudden change in mood, Mohaim stammered a question.
"Er, Your Holiness? What do you mean by that...?"
"Talent Manifestation is a blessing the Lord God bestows only upon the deepest believers among the faithful, after all. Which means he must be on our side. He'll probably welcome us with open arms when we go to give the Evil God Cult a thorough beati—"
Catching sight of Mohaim's face hardening at once, she hastily rephrased.
"—a thorough punishment, I mean. And like you said, it wouldn't even be a lie. I would simply be traveling north to offer my encouragement."
"That is true, but..."
"Our Knight Commander worries far too much, you know. It'll all work out. Who's to say this wasn't all part of the Lord God's plan to begin with?"
Watching her revert to the picture of a carefree young girl, Mohaim opened his mouth to object, then let out a long sigh instead.
"If Your Holiness is content, then content we shall be."
"Exactly!"
Right — when it came down to it, the man was nothing more than a mere immigration officer.
He wouldn't have the nerve to pick a fight with a transnational religious order like ours.
Would someone who fed on the rot of a nation truly dare defy international politics? Absurd.
Even if he played the madman and refused her entry, a formal protest from the Church would force the border open in the end.
A few days' delay in the schedule was a perfectly foreseeable inconvenience.
No single individual could hold back the current of the world.
All the more so when that current was tied to the mission of the Church.
However she turned it over, it would all work out — just as the saintess said.
"Then I ask only one promise of you. Whatever happens, you will state that your visit was, first and foremost, a mission of encouragement as I have advised."
There was no sense in stirring up needless trouble.
Faced with the Knight Commander's relentless insistence, Erzena nodded with a look of distaste.
"Fine, fine. You really do worry too much. I won't go poking at sleeping dragons. Happy now?"
And with that, it was settled. Having at last wrung the answer he wanted from her, Mohaim moved to leave before her mood could swing yet again.
"I shall step out and attend to my duties. The time grows near when I must meet the envoys to be sent ahead to the border."
"Perfect timing, actually — I wanted some time to myself. Send for me when it's time to depart."
"Th-then I shall take my leave as well..."
The maidservant, reading the room by now, scurried out of the tent after him.
Erzena waved them off with a fluttering hand, and only once complete silence had settled did she sink into the sofa.
"Whew. Finally gone. Mohaim really does worry himself sick over everything."
That old Knight Commander and his habit of imagining the worst in every scenario. With the Lord God watching over us, what was there to be afraid of?
Apparently unwilling to dwell on it further, Erzena shook her head once and turned her attention to the man he had spoken of.
"The Central Officer, was it..."
A strange name. Probably a title rather than his true one.
She murmured with a faint smile.
"How marvelous. To think fate would bring us together like this."
A Talent Awakener.
A bearer of such a rare blessing, serving as an immigration officer of all things.
It was glad tidings indeed.
To Erzena, it felt almost like a revelation.
Is it truly plausible that in the very country we must pass through — in the one place with the audacity to bar our path — a Talent Awakener drenched in God's love should happen to hold the post of chief immigration officer?
It fit too neatly to be coincidence. It was, if anything, exquisite.
Perhaps the Lord God had orchestrated it all, placing the man along the road we were meant to walk.
For it is precisely His way to bestow blessings in unexpected places, through unexpected people, by unexpected means.
"But what if... all of this is truly nothing but coincidence and falsehood?"
Yet exceptions and cleverly wrought schemes are never in short supply.
Erzena was not naive enough to place blind faith in this farcical providence.
Looking back over this world's long history, blasphemers who stole the Lord God's grace had always existed.
This man called the Central Officer might be one of them.
Nor could she rule out the possibility that he was a heretic planted with cunning by the Evil God Cult.
Those heretics have always schemed to drag us down by the vilest means imaginable. Even this could be part of their design.
So thinking, the saintess murmured once more a scripture she had recited until she'd grown sick of it.
"Doubt leads the soul into unbelief — and yet, at the same time, it is the shortest road to conviction."
Her curiosity stirring, she slowly raised a hand toward the heavens.
"An unbeliever? A heathen? Or perhaps a corrupt official taking bribes from the Evil God Cult?"
The possibilities stretched endlessly.
Short of meeting him in person, the true identity of this so-called Central Officer remained a mystery.
And there were just as many ways to put such wretches to the sword.
Either way, it made no difference to Erzena.
If the rumor proved false, then he was a heathen — and one owed neither guilt nor reverence.
She would simply hang him on a cross for the crime of usurping the blessing of Talent Manifestation.
And if he really is a Talent Awakener? That changes nothing.
Then the Central Officer would simply be one favored by the Lord God.
And as one of the faithful, he would have no power to refuse me.
For I am the voice of God. God's own herald.
"I suppose I'll find out when I see for myself."
In the end, everything would be confirmed only when her own two eyes beheld this Central Officer with her own two eyes.
Erzena clenched her outstretched hand tight around empty air.
The way one might seize a venomous serpent by the throat.
In the far distance, the sound of drums announcing the envoys' departure rolled across the land.
"Right then — dealing now."
It was the third day of the Immigration Office's joint quarters, and I was about to start our two-hundred-and-ninety-eighth round of cards.
"Hold on."
The Hearing Officer's long ears twitched.
She gazed toward the south for a moment, then set her cards down.
"Hm. You'd best start preparing, Central Officer."
"Hm? Preparing for what, exactly?"
"Some very loud guests will be arriving soon. A day or two out, I'd say."
Loud, is it? Now who could that be?
Don't tell me it's a pilgrimage.
No, it couldn't be the pilgrims. They usually keep quiet and do nothing but pray.
I gave a casual shrug and turned my attention back to the game.
"If they're two days out, we've still got time. Let's finish this hand first. This is the final round, remember?"
"Whoever loses this one takes last place."
This matters more right now.
Tonight's night-shift lottery, that's what.
"Very well. Deal. It's the final round, so let's all focus."
At my words, the Smell Officer nodded and began shuffling the cards with dazzling flourishes before dealing them out.
"Come, come, everyone, eyes sharp. One for the Central Officer first, and one for the Taste Officer. One for the Touch Officer as well—"
"Not another move."
—Snap.
Just before the last card could reach the Touch Officer, I seized the wolfman by the wrist.
This cursed dog of a man is pulling his bottom-dealing tricks again.
"Smell Officer. Bottom-dealing right up to the very end, were we?"
"Gah! How did you...!"
Congratulations. You've won tonight's night shift.