This Goddamn Life (4)
Not that this is anything new, but I hate the Saintess.
More precisely, I hated every last person sitting at the top. They were the reason I'd lived through that garbage childhood of mine, and I wasn't exactly fond of the Holy Order's whole racket either — the one where they put on a charity act, scooped up orphans, and raised them as combat-ready members of the church.
"...The Saintess still isn't here."
"Yeah. You think something happened to her?"
A few of the nuns had started whispering among themselves.
The Saintess's expected arrival time had already come and gone by thirty minutes. That was why we nuns had lined up at the entrance to greet her — but strangely enough, the woman who'd supposedly be here any minute hadn't shown so much as a footstep, let alone her face.
As an aside, it was pretty cold out today. Even standing still, your breath froze white in the air. And I, who normally wouldn't set foot outside in weather like this, was out here shivering because the Saintess was coming.
It was still autumn, technically, but it already felt like winter. That was because the 7th Floor Area's neutral zone was one of the few floors where farming actually happened, and the reason you could farm here at all was that this place had four distinct seasons.
Other floors were winter year-round, or rained all day every day, or stayed dark around the clock. Dawnfall especially — that goddamn bottom floor of the Tower, where the light never reached — was a place of such darkness that without artificial light from mana or electricity, you couldn't see an inch in front of your face.
Compared to those places, this one was pretty livable. The natural environment was decent, and the air was clean.
...Except for the bugs. There were a few too many of those. Otherwise, it was comfortable enough.
"Hmm."
That aside, the Saintess was definitely running late. This area didn't have any particularly dangerous creatures wandering around, and unauthorized entry was blocked off besides, so there wasn't any real reason for her to be delayed. On top of that, the escorts with her were the Order's elite guard — it sure as hell wasn't because they'd been ambushed. Even if I closed my eyes and focused right here, I couldn't pick up any particularly noisy or chaotic presence.
And it wasn't like the Saintess would get lost, either. That woman couldn't see with her eyes, sure, but I knew she could perceive her surroundings as if she were playing a game in third person. Some special authority granted to the Saintess alone by God, or whatever they called it.
"Excuse me...! There's a message from the Order!"
Just as I was getting bored enough to yawn, a nun came sprinting over from the church, shouting in a panic. A message from the Order... probably related to the Saintess not showing up. Best to find out exactly what was going on.
"What's the situation? Does this have anything to do with that goddamn Sai— I mean, the Saintess being late?"
I asked the nun who'd come charging over in such a hurry. She was one of the civilian-origin nuns who'd enlisted — wait, joined the Order — two months ago when she turned twenty. Still a bit of a clueless rookie, but she did her own work diligently enough that I didn't mind her. At the very least, she didn't cause trouble for anyone else, which meant she was above average if nothing else.
"Yes, well... the Saintess will be a little delayed."
...Delayed? What for.
"What's the reason?"
Did she trip on the way and break a leg or something? This was someone who could regenerate a severed arm or leg with holy power in no time. What could possibly be holding her up?
Come to think of it, it was about time for the Saintess and the protagonist to run into each other. If that was the case, I could understand the delay well enough. And now that I thought about it, that goddamn protagonist hadn't shown up today either. On days he had nothing better to do, he came looking for me almost every single day, and it was genuinely exhausting and annoying — but he hadn't come today, which maybe meant he'd finally found his other half.
Was I finally free of that bastard?
It had been so long that I didn't remember the novel all that clearly, but I was pretty sure the protagonist and the Saintess — the heroine — first met in this 7th Floor Area, running into each other while walking alone.
"W-well, according to the message that just came in, the Saintess received a revelation telling her to go on alone. So she'll be several hours late, and there's no need to keep waiting..."
"Ha."
"Ah, I— I'm sorry! Sister Ruina! I should have told you sooner...!"
"Hahahaha! No, it's fine. People screw up sometimes."
"...Excuse me?"
"Humans aren't perfect. Making mistakes is what makes us human in the first place, so that much is fine. It's cold — you get inside too. The rest of you heard that, right? Wait indoors until I call you again!"
...That goddamn Saintess. She'd finally done me a favor.
If my memory was right, the Saintess would run into the protagonist, and the two of them would fall in love at first sight. Then they'd join forces with other hunters, form a party, and set out on a journey to conquer the highest floor. And in doing so, they would give the people living here something to hope for.
Most hunters had already given up on climbing the Tower thanks to the monsters that grew stronger with every floor — but because those two would take the lead and punch through to the top, the mega-guilds that had been sitting back and watching would start piling on one after another, looking to get their share. That was the Tower's last hope. And for me, it was a sliver of hope as well.
I was finally free of that insufferable protagonist, and I wouldn't get dragged around anymore for tedious events related to the Saintess. A smile crept onto my face before I even realized it.
"I could have a drink today."
On a day this good, cracking open the whiskey I'd stashed away last time and pouring myself a glass didn't sound half bad. If the story I remembered was right, the Saintess would arrive a little past evening — carried in the protagonist's arms, no less, radiating that romantic atmosphere the other nuns were always going on about.
"I'll even say a special prayer for you two."
As far as I was concerned, either outcome was just fine.
...And so the Saintess still hadn't arrived, even as dawn broke.
I realized something had gone wrong when Mother Superior's hand came flying at me as I sat sleeping in a chair after drinking. I even screamed, I was so startled.
Goddammit.
"Saintess! Saintess! If you can hear us, please answer!"
Even Mother Superior had rolled up her sleeves and thrown herself into it. The nuns were sweeping the surroundings with flashlights. We were searching everything — the nearby paddies and fields, of course, but also the woods we didn't usually go into, and even the riverside where the water ran.
Wasn't this just hilarious? It wasn't like we were hunting down a deserter, and here we were scouring the area for a Saintess who'd vanished without a trace.
This was definitely around the time the Saintess and the protagonist were supposed to meet. For a moment I wondered if the story in my head had gotten a little tangled, and the two of them had taken one look at each other, grabbed hands, and gone off to a motel — and then I heard it on the radio.
That was when I realized this was no ordinary situation.
"...Ah, for fuck's sake."
This rotten Saintess. Where the hell had she gone?
Even if she was still somewhere nearby, all this area had were paddies, a river, and — if you went a bit farther out — a mountain. I did get a nagging feeling she might have gotten lost and wandered into the mountains, but even if she was blind, the Saintess could see just fine. Unless she had a truly spectacular sense of direction, there was no way. The mountain was on the opposite side from the church.
"Have you found any trace of the Saintess?"
That was when a knight of the Holy Order approached and asked me. If you really thought about it, this whole mess was their fault. What kind of people hear some bullshit about "the word of God" and send their precious Saintess out alone?
As far as I knew, revelations didn't even exist. The Saintess had simply been told by God, "Help humanity reach the summit of this Tower," and she was playing the part of a Saintess accordingly.
"No. We haven't found anything on our end either."
"Ah... I see. Ugh. This is all tangled up."
Yeah. Your career in the Order is what's tangled up.
Anyway, the Saintess I remembered was an outstanding con artist. She'd simply kept performing the ideal Saintess that people wanted, and then she'd hit it off with the protagonist and sincerely supported him. That she was actually a good person wasn't a lie. I'd disliked her, but I couldn't hate her.
"...She didn't head for the mountain, did she?"
That guy, asking me something like that. How the hell would I know?
Under normal circumstances, they should have at least been watching where the Saintess was going. Instead, they'd spotted local farmers secretly following her as unofficial escorts, figured they must be tired, told them to go have a snack and get back to work — and then they actually drank on the job. I was going to lose my mind.
"The mountain near here is a three-hour walk away. Maybe if she took a carriage or a car, but that rotten Sai— I mean, the Saintess wouldn't be covering that distance on foot."
"That does make sense... Understood."
The escort knight gave a slight bow and left to search elsewhere.
"...But I really can't see her."
That guy was actually the Saintess's escort knight? No wonder they'd lost her the first time the protagonist snatched her away.
For the record, the protagonist was not a good person. Not even close. The protagonist I knew — and the one I'd been watching here — was nothing more than an extremely powerful, obsessive psychopath. He just happened to enjoy hunter work as a hobby for his own particular reasons, and the people who'd seen him in action had arbitrarily slapped the title of Hero on him and started singing his praises.
"Do I actually have to check the mountain?"
Looked at a certain way, it was almost impressive that the Saintess had managed to save this world while dragging that lunatic along. The fact that she'd fallen for the guy who'd kidnapped her at their first meeting was proof enough that she wasn't exactly normal either. Well. Birds of a feather, I supposed.
"Haa. I'm going to lose it. That goddamn Saintess bitch..."
Anyway, just in case — for the genuine, actual what-if — I decided to go take a look at the nearby mountain. I wasn't bringing any of the other nuns, though. There was a 99.9 percent chance the Saintess wasn't on that mountain, and I had no desire to drag the others out there at this hour of the morning.
I'd just look around for her, and if she wasn't there, I'd have no choice but to contact the Order and have them comb every other floor for her like they were hunting rats. The ones who'd get torn apart for this wouldn't be me anyway — it'd be the escort knights.
There was another problem, too. A few nuns had already headed for the mountain. And they hadn't responded in over an hour.
"...Fuck."
I had a bad feeling about this.