The Line Between Prophecy and Fraud
"……An unexpected meeting."
In the dark basement illuminated only by a few torches, the Saint gripped his mace and spun it around. At a glance, the motion looked relaxed, but—
'He's flustered.'
To Namgung Min, who had activated Observation, the signs were clear. The Saint's feet kept twitching, his smile was stiff at the corners of his mouth, and the mace in his hand faltered several times, stopping and starting again. Individually, these were tiny tells that would have been hard to notice, but together they made his emotions easy to read.
'Stay calm.'
He steadied himself. Getting caught up in the Saint's pace would mean certain failure……
"……Ah."
"……? Fellow sinner?"
Behind the Saint, the nun—bound to a chair with blood streaming from her head—had her face lowered. ……She resembled someone from Namgung Min's memories. Only her hair was visible, yet the lifeless black strands, soaked in blood and hanging limply, were unmistakable.
"………Mother."
"Comrade?"
"……Saint, what seems to be the problem?"
"Well, obviously……"
The Saint had been about to answer without thinking when he suddenly noticed something strange. Until now, Namgung Min had been acting. Regardless of his inexplicable fortune-telling ability, he had been performing—projecting composure, mystery, and omniscience. The Saint had suspected as much from the faint traces, but……
……This was different.
"Is it because I came here? Or because I attacked the nun in the back alley? Or perhaps because I lied about the pilgrimage?"
"………Ha, haha."
Namgung Min laughed. It was the same smile as always, yet somehow more desolate. He was genuinely laughing. Realizing the shift, the Saint gripped his spinning mace tighter. Creak. Even the solid steel mace began to deform slightly under his strength. Yet even in the face of violence that looked ready to strike at any moment, the fortune teller smiled. Composure and a smile. As if he knew everything. As if he could see right through you. A fortune teller without composure was an amateur, and in this moment, he was anything but.
"…Fellow sinner. I will say this one last time."
"Please do."
"Leave. If you do, I will tell you everything later."
It was a major concession from the Saint. He wasn't asking Namgung Min to ignore the scene or stay silent. He was offering to reveal all his secrets if Namgung Min simply left now. It was only possible because the Saint still considered him a fellow sinner.
"I refuse."
"……A pity."
Flutter!
Before the Saint could respond, Namgung Min scattered the tarot cards he had created with his class skill. The cards floated in the air for a brief moment before falling.
"I won't kill you…!"
Whoosh!
The Saint didn't even allow that brief moment. He charged straight through the pile of cards, swinging his mace once to clear the obstructing cards.
My Own Little Fortune Teller Shop.
"……!!"
In an instant, the area around the Saint was engulfed by dark curtains. The Saint, forcibly invited into the fortune-telling space, looked momentarily bewildered before glaring at Namgung Min ahead of him. In the end, there was only one person he needed to face.
"Namgung Min!!"
Clang! Crack!
The fortune teller hurled a candlestick, which the Saint easily deflected. Tables and chairs meant to serve as shields were shattered in a single blow. Though the Saint class wasn't a direct combat job like Swordsman or Fighter, its status as a Special Class granted physical abilities surpassing most combat classes. In mere seconds, the Saint crushed Namgung Min's resistance and accelerated toward him beyond the splintered tables.
And the moment his body passed through the broken furniture—
Cleanliness.
"What!?"
The split table instantly returned to its original form. The Cleanliness skill restored broken or displaced objects to their proper positions. Normally, it would simply rejoin the two halves of the table, but with the Saint caught between them, the result was different.
Grind!!
"Kgh!"
Caught off guard by the unexpected ambush, the Saint couldn't react in time. Even as he felt the crushing pain of being compressed between the merging halves, he swung his mace to break the table—
Clang!
"Kack!"
—but before he could, a blow to the back of his head drew a scream from him. The previous surprise attack had already caught him off guard, but this impact was far greater. His vision blurred, his mind spun. The pain was worse than expected, and his body stiffened momentarily. Meanwhile, the table continued pressing against him as it tried to reform.
"Fortune……teller!!"
How? The Saint remembered Namgung Min from Aileen's house. He hadn't even been able to react to the Saint's casual movements. So how was he reacting now, when the Saint was attacking in earnest? Even through the pain in the back of his head and the pressure of the table, the Saint barely managed to lift his head.
"……Ah."
He met Namgung Min's gaze. Blood streamed from the fortune teller's right eye as he smiled down at him, gripping the candlestick he had thrown earlier. The pupil of that right eye had shrunk to a pinpoint, spilling bright red blood.
"How about it, Saint?"
"…………."
"You underestimated me."
As he said, the Saint had let his guard down. Fortune Teller was a non-combat class, and their first encounter had been so one-sided that the mistake was understandable. But the situation now was different. The Saint was slightly fatigued from capturing the nun and hadn't expected to find Namgung Min here, so he had charged in recklessly. Meanwhile, the Fortune Teller had come prepared with the new skill Observation and the intent to confront the Saint from the start.
"In truth, you already know this advantage is only temporary, don't you?"
"……Fortune teller."
"I'm not the only one with skills. You have skills too, don't you?"
Indeed. Namgung Min wasn't the only one with unknown skills. Naturally, the Saint had skills that could turn this situation around, but……
"Self-Recovery, Holy Radiance."
"………!!"
"One is meaningless, and the other carries too great a backlash if used, doesn't it?"
……What? The Saint no longer even tried to hide his shock behind a smile. Enduring the pain, he simply stared at the fortune teller with wide eyes.
"Ah, that expression says you're wondering how I knew."
"………."
"But you already know what my answer would be, don't you?"
"…Fortune-telling?"
"What else could it be?"
Fortune-telling? He figured it out through fortune-telling? The Saint could somewhat accept that Namgung Min had recited his past, predicted future events, and seen through Liu Yen's pocket and the maze. Fortune-telling was abstract by nature. But could it really reveal the exact skills he possessed? Skills the Church kept strictly secret?
"That……isn't fortune-telling."
"So what will you do?"
"……What?"
"Whether it is fortune-telling or not, I asked what you intend to do now that you know."
Drip. Drip.
Namgung Min's bloody tears fell before the Saint's eyes. Despite the ceaseless bleeding, he seemed to feel no pain. Otherwise……he wouldn't be able to smile so naturally.
"Ah, that's right. Why not test it?"
"Test, you say?"
"Yes. It's very simple."
Shuffle.
The fortune teller pulled a deck of tarot cards from his pocket and held them out before the Saint. Still trapped between the table halves and groaning in pain, the Saint couldn't take his eyes off the cards.
"Shuffle them well, and I'll let you pick one card of your choice."
"……And then?"
"I will guess which one you picked. How about it?"
"Ha."
Wasn't that just magic, not fortune-telling? More importantly, the pain in the back of his head was fading. If he could just keep the conversation going a little longer……
"If you keep talking like this a little longer."
"……What?"
"Do you think you'll be able to do anything?"
Clang!
"Kuhk!"
The fortune teller slammed the candlestick down on the Saint. As a class holder, the Saint wouldn't die or have his skull crushed by such an impact. It would only bring more pain and shock, just like before.
"I can see everything from your expression. What you're thinking, what you're about to say."
"………."
"So it's a simple test. Pick a card three times……and if I fail to guess even once……"
Murmuring slowly, as if singing, as if falling asleep, the fortune teller continued to smile.
"I will become your ally."
"What?"
"You intend to overturn the entire Church, don't you? My fortune-telling would be quite tempting, wouldn't it?"
"………."
At this point, the Saint didn't ask how Namgung Min knew his true intentions or his purpose that he had never spoken of to anyone. He simply nodded.
"Excellent! Very good."
Shuffle shuffle shuffle.
"……That one."
"Yes, is this the card?"
"It is."
Well, let's think positively. There were 78 tarot cards in total, so the probability of guessing the exact one was naturally 1 in 78. Moreover, the Saint had chosen the card himself, and there had been no sleight of hand. So. Surely.
"Major Arcana 12, The Hanged Man."
"……H-How?"
Surely. It had to be a coincidence.
"You don't believe me. Now for the second time."
Shuffle shuffle shuffle shuffle.
"……That one."
The Saint picked a card.
"Major Arcana 12, The Hanged Man."
Correct again.
"Two in a row……?"
"It's not impossible, is it?"
What were the odds of drawing the same card twice in a row from 78 cards? Naturally, one would suspect cheating.
"Saint, I didn't choose it—you did. And from completely different positions, at that. Did you see me swap the cards at any point?"
"……No."
Yet there was no evidence. It was true that Namgung Min had shuffled randomly, applied no tricks, and that the Saint had chosen himself. The smiling fortune teller was now preparing to shuffle for the final time.
"Third time. This is the last one."
"Don't shuffle the cards."
"Pardon?"
"…The top card."
It was the Saint's final struggle. At the very least, The Hanged Man wasn't on top. He had clearly seen it mixed into the middle. In a way, it was like raising the odds from 1 in 78 to 1 in 77, but the Saint believed there was something about that The Hanged Man. Otherwise, it wouldn't have appeared twice.
"Major Arcana 12, The Hanged Man."
"……Huh?"
So. It shouldn't appear a third time, right?
"Below it is The Hanged Man. Below that is also The Hanged Man. Below that is also The Hanged Man."
"Th……is!!"
Every tarot card was The Hanged Man. In that moment, the Saint's eyes widened as he realized he had been deceived. He had been serious about the card draw, but to Namgung Min, it was nothing more than mockery.
"This is fraud!!"
So the Saint shouted loudly, filled with anger and indignation. Even if it meant enduring the backlash afterward, he would use Holy Radiance—
"So what?"
"What?"
"When we first met, didn't I tell you?"
—that all he could do was read the desperate hearts of others and deceive them.
"Charlatans spouting all sorts of nonsense, claiming fates that don't exist."
"………."
"I was simply fulfilling the duty of a fortune teller. Fraud, that is."
"…………."
Drip.
The blood flowing from Namgung Min's eyes stopped. Splashing through the pool of blood he had created himself, Namgung Min—who had deactivated Observation—looked down at the speechless Saint.
"Are you worried about Aileen?"
"………."
"Because she's a Saintess? Because to be recognized by the Church, she must walk the same 'pilgrimage' as you? Because she might die without anyone knowing during that time?"
"…………."
"That may be part of it, but there's a more fundamental reason, isn't there?"
Saintess. In truth, Saint and Saintess were the same class, differing only in gender. Their class skills and aptitudes were identical. But since ancient times, Saint and Saintess had never been solitary classes. They were deeply intertwined with the Church. ……In the sense that they could shake the existing power structure of the Church.
"If a Saintess appears while a Saint already exists, what happens?"
"………."
"A faction seeking to serve her, centered around the Saintess, will emerge. And if she survives the pilgrimage? By doctrine, another power will arise that stands above even the Pope."
"…………."
"Then the Church will split, and internal strife will erupt. Humans are a species that cannot rest until they've completely eliminated their enemies, so they will fight until only one faction remains—the Saint faction, the Saintess faction, or the existing Papal faction."
"………."
"That isn't what you want, is it?"
The Saint desired the complete purification of the Church. He wanted a Church that served God freely and honestly, not one filled with corrupt clergy obsessed with power. But to achieve that, he paradoxically needed absolute power—enough to reform the Church exactly as he wished without any obstacles. That was why, in the game, the Saint had been a character plagued by anguish and indecision. He recognized the necessity of power yet hesitated to pursue it.
"Aileen is a Saintess. If you report her to the Church as is, the power dynamics within the Church will be greatly disrupted, and it will affect you as well. More than anything, she might die on the pilgrimage."
"……But if you leave her as she is."
"She will continue to suffer. Unless she finds her own god."
"So……a way……"
"There is one."
Namgung Min crouched down to meet the Saint's eye level. His intact left eye and his abnormally constricted right pupil. The eerie dissonance made the Saint swallow unconsciously.
"I will help you."
"……How?"
"That is none of your concern. You simply need to follow my words well."
"And I'm……supposed to believe that?"
"Haven't you seen it all this time? My strange fortune-telling. The fortune-telling that knows everything, guesses everything, accomplishes everything."
"………Fortune-telling."
"So just believe, and entrust it to me."
"……."
"I will save Aileen."
"…………."
He opened his mouth, but no words came out. He tried to move, but in the end, he remained still. The Saint agonized and deliberated. Even though he genuinely wanted to help Aileen, there was also a part of him that found her troublesome. That was why he had called himself a sinner in her presence. The Saint……
"Well done."
……nodded.