Holy Crusade 4
My vision, which had been shrouded in gloom, snapped open onto a vast, empty sky.
In other words, by the time I exhaled my fourth breath, the tree the size of a skyscraper that had stood before me — along with the countless ash-gray trees and vines surrounding it — had simply vanished. The landscape was so savage that "annihilation" fit far better than "destruction."
…Looks like nothing's left from here on out. Not only the plant-type event monsters, but the poison pools and paralysis swamps too — all gone. Nothing but raw earth, flipped over and laid bare, stretching past the horizon.
Did we just wipe an entire floor clean?
Thinking that, I casually glanced behind me and found priests and nuns sprawled across the ground. Looking at their pure white vestments filthy with dirt and dust, a twinge of guilt hit me. Ambrose was the only one still on his feet, so my party was probably rolling around on the floor too.
"How is your body, Brother?"
"Disturbingly good, actually."
Ambrose tossed the question my way with a hearty laugh, as casually as if we were exchanging greetings on a stroll. I answered him calmly enough, but my head was a mess of complications.
No, seriously — isn't the Temple way too strong?
If a single Saint's enhancement holy rite could do this, the Temple Knights could crack open the Demon King's skull, conquer the world, and declare a Holy Empire tomorrow. This was about as balanced as a bunch of people sparring with swords and spears, only for a tank to suddenly roll in and fire its main gun.
If this kind of enhancement holy rite was something you could just use whenever you felt like it, then the gap between a royal knight and a Temple knight wasn't a joke — it was the difference between a kendo instructor with a wooden sword and a tank commander sitting in an armored vehicle.
"Well, the Temple did push itself a bit. Brother, even if the Holy Power used in the rite flows away and fades, a little residual will remain in your body. That will serve you well as you walk forth in the Goddess's name."
"Pushed itself?"
Ambrose chuckled as if trying to help me understand, then jerked his chin toward the rear. A peculiar emotion lingered in his eyes as he watched the priests and nuns stagger to their feet, covered in dust from tumbling across the ground.
Surely the priests and nuns hadn't taken permanent penalties? Following Ambrose's gaze, something odd caught my eye.
"…Don't tell me. When you said you pushed yourselves—"
"Heh heh heh. Do not worry, Brother. We declared a Holy Crusade in the Goddess's name — this is a burden we are rightfully meant to bear. When one grows old and frail and departs for the Goddess's side, there is no way to take one's gold along, it seems."
The priests and nuns were empty-handed.
I was certain each of them had been holding staffs of pure silver, or gold staffs adorned with jewels — yet every person rising and dusting themselves off was bare-handed.
Just considering the length and size of those pure silver and gold staffs, they couldn't have been light. And if those were sacred relics used by the Temple, the price of them would be…?
The fact that every priest and nun getting up was perfectly fine only fueled that thought. The residual Holy Power that had overflowed after the enhancement rite alone had purified hundreds of meters of ground. They'd expended that much Holy Power, and yet all of them were fine.
"Um, Saint…?"
"Yes?"
"I'm a little curious — roughly how much did it cost to use that holy rite…?"
"Heh heh. How could one possibly convert the Goddess's grace into coin?"
Did he think I was feeling burdened, developing a sense of debt toward the Temple? Ambrose patted my shoulder with a benevolent smile, picked up my belt from the ground, and laughed heartily. That belt had been refined through alchemy from sub-dragon hide, and yet it had torn like nothing just from catching on the mace handle.
I took the torn belt and gathered up the lantern, and Ambrose — apparently with no intention of keeping it a secret — tossed out the truth as if in passing.
"Still, well, it did take about the price of a castle."
So they'd balanced the power of their faction with money, then.
On the surface it had looked almost effortless, but peeling back the details revealed that the Temple had spent far more money than expected. For one thing, the miniature temples they'd been building since the 30th floor weren't just for a comfortable night's sleep.
Five miniature temples of fine marble, from the 30th floor through the 34th. Hundreds of sacred relics of pure silver and gold held by hundreds of priests and nuns. A Saint who had risen from 5★ to 6★ through his own enlightenment, and a supporting 5★ Candidate Saint on top of that.
If those miniature temples hadn't been built for no reason, something else had probably been consumed inside them too. And the total of all that came out to the price of a castle. He'd said it half as a joke, but it was a figure that sent a chill down the spine all on its own.
"Roland? Something on your mind?"
"…Just thinking that if they'd dumped that money on the Adventurers' Guild, they could've raised an army of Upper-grade adventurers."
"What? Ahaha, you're joking."
Grace, still covered in dust from tumbling across the ground in the aftershock, laughed as if my words were a hilarious joke and patted my shoulder. Of course, from my perspective, it hadn't been a joke at all — I'd meant every word.
Exactly how many gold coins it took to buy a castle was beyond the grasp of a commoner adventurer like me.
But one thing I did know: if the sum could buy a castle — not a manor, a castle — then it was more than enough to hire me and every adventurer I knew and still have change left over. With the money I'd scraped together over ten years in this body, I couldn't even buy a castle wall, let alone a castle.
I knew this world was the virtual reality game world of Han Se-ah's stream, and that hoarding gold was mostly pointless — but the sheer size of the number still left me feeling a little wistful. If they were going to throw money around like that, half of half of it would've been enough for me to grab a few people I knew and clear this in a month.
"What are you doing, Roland?"
"He's calculating how much money the Temple spent."
"What? Why would he— …well, hearing about it does make you wonder."
Was it residual fatigue? Whether from the massive Holy Power draining out of my body, or from learning that a single enhancement buff cost as much as a castle, I felt oddly drained. Sitting and resting in a tent the Temple had prepared, I watched my party members push the flap aside one by one and file in.
Grace came first. True to her nimble archer nature, she'd spun a few graceful circles through the aftershock of my weapon swing and landed cleanly on her feet. That hadn't kept the dirt off her, of course — but she was the only one who hadn't looked ridiculous in front of the viewers.
Han Se-ah, who'd been spinning around looking for me after I'd covered hundreds of meters in a single stride, had tumbled head over heels hard enough that I'd worried her neck might snap. Katie, who'd been standing there with her mouth hanging open watching the priests, had done the same.
The silver lining was that she'd floated the camera drone up high to stick it on me, so at least the viewers hadn't gotten a full, unfiltered look at the undignified spectacle.
"Oh come on, who the hell was supposed to predict he'd fly that far in a single step? I figured there'd be some dazzling light show and then — holy beam, whoosh — everything gets wiped. Who expects a guy to summon a storm with a baseball bat swing?"
Han Se-ah came in behind Grace and Katie, who still looked vaguely grubby after roughly dusting themselves off. Judging by the way her mouth wouldn't stop even as she lifted the tent flap, the viewers were giving her an earful.
Come to think of it — after that absolute mess, had the quest progressed?
One swing from right to left, like a baseball bat, and the entire field had shattered clean, monsters annihilated. No ash-gray trees, no vines, no colossal specimen remaining — so the Temple's priests were already leveling the ground and spreading Holy Power across it.
What worried me was that the field had been emptied so thoroughly that nothing was left — no trigger, no nothing. Not a single Mana Stone, not even a grain of the ash monsters leave behind when they die. If any quest was still pending, it was going to get thoroughly tangled.
"Still, the quest cleared. Looking at it, the 35th floor is going to become a kind of safe zone. Not the 50th — the 35th. A little awkward, honestly. After 35, is it 70, and the top at 100?"
I couldn't see the quest log, but fortunately the quest seemed to have completed. The mid-event of the 35th floor was apparently the Temple faction joining the fight and a massive base camp forming inside the Tower. Other players would somehow clear the 35th floor even without me, it seemed.
"Roland, how is your body feeling?"
"Perfectly fine. My Holy Power's increased massively, too."
"Is that so? I'm so relieved… Honestly, seeing that display of power, I was a little worried there might be side effects."
The last to enter the tent was Irene. As a Candidate Saint, she must have spoken with Ambrose — she arrived late, while Grace and Katie were still going on about my bat swing.
I'd been stunned by the "one buff equals one castle" line, but my condition wasn't bad at all. Just as Ambrose had said, my body actually felt sturdier than before.
The Holy Power that had been a fraction of my mana had surged with tremendous force, jumping all at once to roughly forty percent. My body felt as fresh as if I'd swapped it out for a brand-new one — skin tougher, muscles denser, bones hard as steel girders.
"So, what now?"
"What do you mean, what. We head up to the 36th floor. …Or we leave the Tower, get ourselves sorted, and come back."
"The Temple won't try to keep us here?"
"Why would they? Looking at the dirt Roland smashed flat, they seem busy compacting the ground because it's too soft. I think they're calling in mages from the Magic Tower for foundation work."
After checking my condition, I stood up from the tent, and the others naturally followed. Since we hadn't really done much on the 35th floor, we started discussing whether to climb to the 36th or leave the Tower. The conclusion we reached was to head outside, report to the guild, and pick up a new commission.
Honestly, the commission was half an excuse — they just wanted to wash off after rolling around covered in dirt. Even if it was just soil, it was the dirt of an undead paradise that had been full of poison pools and paralysis swamps, so of course it felt filthy.
……The fact that we'd ended up looking more wretched than on any adventure so far — and that it was my fault — was so absurd I almost laughed.
And so, leaving the 35th floor — now a safe zone — behind us, we set our steps toward the outside of the Tower.