Chapter 10
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: penny
Chapter: 10
Chapter Title: Chief Purification Priest Eleanor
-----------------------------------------------------------------
“Hah… To think it was this powerful.”
I looked down at the lingering afterimage of mana rippling in my palm.
I hadn’t even used the secret technique of Benedict Style.
I’d merely imitated a tiny fraction of the mana circulation method and sensation he’d passed on to me, yet the senior interrogator’s armor had crumbled away so pathetically.
I thought I’d fully grasped his strength by peeking into his life, but even that calculation of mine had been wrong.
So after a brief flush of pride, a bitter aftertaste lingered.
Originally, Benedict’s technique excelled at piercing the enemy’s weak points like an awl.
But my attack just now had been nothing more than forcibly ripping the armor apart with overflowing power.
This body still couldn’t keep up with its rapid growth.
‘From now on, I need to train alongside it.’
I regripped the stiletto and gazed down at Roderick’s writhing body.
“Ku, kuhuk…!”
Roderick was gushing blood from all over his body, but he was tenaciously clinging to life.
I stepped forward to finish him off.
But right before my dagger could touch his throat.
“Isn’t that enough, Interrogator Ian?”
A woman’s voice rang out from behind me—cold as ice, yet eerily serene.
At the same moment, an oppressive pressure washed over my entire body, as if thousands of invisible threads were binding me tight.
It was on a whole different level from Roderick.
It was the same sensation I’d felt from Damian before—like facing a massive predator head-on.
I tried to forcibly turn my head, but even the air around my neck felt solidified, refusing to budge.
Click, clack.
With the regular tap of heels, a woman entered the edge of my vision.
A white veil draped so deeply it covered her eyes.
And through the gap, a glimpse of a sinister smile on her lips.
From her entire body emanated an energy too murky and chilling to call divine power.
I felt like I’d be overwhelmed at any second, but.
“Kuh…!”
I gritted my teeth and drew up my mana.
I had no intention of being helplessly toyed with like before.
Krunch-!
The mana wave exploding from within shredded the invisible threads binding me.
“…Oh my?”
A short exclamation slipped from the woman’s lips.
Seizing the opening, I twisted my freed body to widen the distance and glared at her with murderous eyes.
The woman fiddled with her eye-covering veil, staring at me with evident interest.
“Who are you? I’m curious about your intent in interfering with my duties.”
“Oh dear, I’ve been remiss with greetings. I am Eleanor, Chief Purification Priest of Camp 1.”
Chief Purification Priest.
The head of that cruel department which, after heretic interrogators carved away flesh, would stitch the wounds back under the pretext of ‘purification’ to prolong the agony.
But the instant I faced her, a powerful doubt surged within me.
In [Hymn of Ruin], the position of Chief Purification Priest had never appeared all the way to the end.
To be precise, there was only a curt line about her losing her life to a monster attack.
Why would this woman, who’d shown no activity and remained completely hidden away, suddenly appear to rescue someone like Roderick?
Eleanor paid me no mind and gazed down at the fallen Roderick with pity, continuing.
“Interrogator Roderick merely erred in judgment for a moment due to his excessively deep faith. Letting him die here would be a tremendous loss to the Church. I’ll take him and guide him onto the proper path… ‘induce’ him correctly.”
It sounded merciful enough at first listen, but a chilling truth flashed through my mind at her words.
Roderick had been her loyal hunting dog from the very start.
In the original story, the tale of Roderick being executed for secretly peddling the saintess’s divine power had always felt off somehow.
How could the man overseeing the saintess right before her execution sneak past surveillance into the underground lowest level and hawk divine power on the black market?
Roderick must have offered the siphoned divine power to Eleanor.
And his recorded execution was likely just her personally severing the tail that had been stepped on.
I pressed my pounding heart and maintained my composure.
The figure before me was as dangerous as Damian—perhaps even more so.
I opened my mouth in a voice stripped of emotion as much as possible.
“If the Chief Purification Priest is stepping in personally, then I shall withdraw.”
And as I sheathed the stiletto, I added coldly.
“However, regarding the senior interrogator’s attempted mutiny, I will report it exactly as it happened to Director Damian.”
“Hehe, I won’t interfere with that either, Interrogator Ian.”
Eleanor entrusted the fallen Roderick to her subordinates who had trailed behind her, then approached me.
She gazed at me intently from behind the veil.
As if intent on dissecting my mind piece by piece.
Eleanor’s red-painted lips twitched briefly before she spoke languidly.
“Mirabel… I wondered who this newbie was that chatted with that girl, but you’ve got some intriguing qualities.”
Cold sweat trickled down my spine at the sound of her voice.
Why was Mirabel’s name surfacing here?
“Hehe, I’ll be keeping an eye on you from now on, Ian.”
Before I could even reply, Eleanor turned with an elegant flourish and vanished into the long corridor beyond.
I let out a deep sigh and wiped my damp palm on my pants.
This place was a far deeper cesspool than I’d imagined.
“Let’s go, Seraphina.”
I prodded the dazed Seraphina into motion and started walking.
Only after we’d put enough distance that her gaze couldn’t reach did the abnormally hushed surroundings begin filling with noise again.
Stare-.
And I felt Seraphina’s gaze, following at my back, boring into me.
An enigmatic look, as if she had something to ask—or was redefining the very person I was.
Normally, I would’ve tried to read the intent behind that gaze, but right now, my nerves were wholly elsewhere.
After a brief trek, we arrived at an underground interrogation chamber.
The place where Elena was still confined, as her transfer hadn’t yet begun.
A place that still harbored painful memories, too.
Clang-.
A feeble rattle of chains echoed from the darkness.
There was Elena.
Her wretched figure was bound in the corner of the interrogation table, head bowed.
The saintess’s robes had deteriorated into rags worse than scraps, barely covering her skin, while the exposed white flesh was marred with scars of torture and restraints.
I approached wordlessly and snapped the chains binding her.
Thud.
The heavy iron mass hit the stone floor.
“…Who are you?”
Perhaps hearing the sound, Elena opened her eyes and spoke in a cracked voice.
She groped at the empty air with unfocused eyes, as if the figure before her were some hallucination.
I reached out to assess her condition, but.
“Get your hand away!”
Elena slapped my hand away in a convulsion and shoved herself into the corner against the wall.
The instant her back met the frigid stone, she curled into a ball and began trembling violently.
“Hypocrite… no, demon. Filthy demon.”
Naked curses spilled from her lips.
“Why did you keep me alive? To make me slaughter more innocents? Or to revel in my screams again?”
Elena’s blue eyes brimmed with venomous hatred and the shattered fragments of a broken soul.
She had been utterly consumed by guilt, convinced that innocents had died due to the list I’d given her for her confession.
I kept my face as blank as possible and rose from my spot.
Gripping my right hand—which trembled incessantly—with my other hand, tight.
“I was simply following Director Damian’s orders to transfer you to the lowest level.”
“Kill me… Just kill me here and now. Dying would be far better than suffering by your hand.”
Elena wailed as she crawled across the floor right up to my feet.
In the end, I couldn’t bear it and stepped out of the interrogation chamber.
Even as the iron door slammed shut, from behind came the sound of her clawing at the wall amid sobs.
“Haa…! Haa…!”
Leaning against the wall, I heaved ragged breaths.
The cold corridor air stabbed into my lungs, but the wretched scene I’d just witnessed refused to fade.
Elena was a woman who hadn’t lost that spark in her eyes even when crushed by torture and devoured by terror.
But now, her gaze held only despair—the conviction that death alone was her sole respite.
It was the consequence of my actions, the one I’d turned a blind eye to for so long.
It took quite some time to gather my fractured emotions and revert to an expressionless mask.
A moment later.
Seraphina, who had silently kept watch at my side, asked in a very low voice.
“May I ask a question, Ian?”
“Speak.”
“Voice analysis from beyond the door indicates Elena believes innocents perished due to her false confession. However, they were already confirmed criminals steeped in corruption.”
Seraphina’s violet eyes pierced me sharply.
“Informing her of the facts would improve her condition. It’s the rational choice from a management efficiency perspective, so why leave her as is?”
For an instant, I was at a loss for words.
Tell her the truth?
That the list was actually records of genuine villains I’d prepared to save her life?
I averted my gaze and murmured lowly.
“…It’s not the time yet.”
“I cannot comprehend. ‘Time’ is a variable metric. Right now—”
“Be quiet.”
My voice emerged sharper than intended.
Seraphina blinked in surprise, then obediently clamped her mouth shut.
“…Understood. I’ll assume you have your own intentions, Ian.”
But unmistakable doubt lingered in her eyes.
Gazing at Seraphina’s receding back, my hand trembled out of habit.
“I know that too…”
I was simply terrified of Elena’s reaction upon confronting the truth.
I lacked the confidence to withstand the look she’d turn on me once she learned I’d committed such deeds to save her.
I was nothing but a coward, unable even to face my own actions.