The Blunder
Where had I gone wrong?
In the quiet of a room sunk deep into darkness, I sat still and turned my past decisions over one by one. What mistake of mine had brought things to this state? I retraced every step, hunting for the decisive error.
I could not find it.
None of the choices I had made so far seemed capable of producing the present catastrophe. Count Montpellier’s radicalism had simply outstripped my expectations by a vast margin. If I had to pin the blame somewhere, I could say I had underestimated the sheer violence of the lords of this age…
But was the problem really so simple to explain?
Even I could no longer tell where the thread had first tangled. The whole affair felt so much like pure butterfly effect that I could not even measure how much of the responsibility was mine. Perhaps this had always been destined to happen, and I was guilty of nothing at all.
But that would be too sad, wouldn’t it?
The countless lives that would be sacrificed from this point on would scatter into meaninglessness without even a target for their resentment. I could not lay the blame on the lords. They were nothing more than barbarians who had seized their places through bloodline and brute force—men from whom reason and rationality could never be expected.
Someone had to answer for their deaths. Someone had to shoulder the hollow resentment that would otherwise dissolve into nothing, and become the object of their hatred.
And among everyone entangled in this disaster, the only person qualified to bear that responsibility was me.
In all of France, only me.
No—perhaps in this entire world, only me.
“Haa…”
Yes. This was the Middle Ages.
An age where respect for human life left not even a trace, and no proper object of blame existed. An age so wretched that countless people died for the most ridiculous reasons, and the only things left to curse were the poverty of learning and the limits of the era itself.
I would have been better off as an ordinary commoner’s daughter who knew nothing at all. The modern knowledge I could not even properly use, and the shackles of the title of Saintess, only shoved an unbearable reality into my face while binding my ankles so I could do nothing about it.
…Well, even without the title of Saintess, I doubt I could have done much anyway.
The board had already begun to spin out of control, and there was nothing I could do. With the entire country now buzzing on the brink of war, any attempt to stop it at this point would fall on deaf ears. Trying anything serious would only make the situation worse.
“What am I supposed to do…”
I could see no path forward. No answer.
Innocent lives were about to be slaughtered in a meaningless war, and I—who was as good as the root cause—could do nothing. Worse, doing nothing at all was looking like the best option left.
“Just what am I supposed to…”
No. There was one thing.
In this hopelessly tangled board, with my arms and legs bound, there was still one act I could perform. One act that only I could do—and that I must do.
“Rebecca. Rebecca.”
I hurried to wake Rebecca, who lay on the bed. The moment I called her name she snapped her eyes open as if she had been waiting, and no matter how I looked at it, this girl had clearly been awake the entire time.
…Until three in the morning.
I remembered coming into the room and lying down around ten. Had she simply lain there motionless for five hours doing nothing?
Ugh. Goosebumps crawled over my whole body for no good reason. I had stayed up late myself, but at least I hadn’t pretended to sleep in silence. The thought made me dizzy. If I asked why she had been awake she would probably answer “to guard you,” and that would make me even dizzier—because it would be the pure, unadulterated truth.
But no matter how dizzy I felt, it could not match the dizziness of what I was about to do.
“I’m going to borrow the lantern for a bit.”
I took the lantern from her with complete confidence. The one and only sacred relic in this world, brimming with divine power. The very means by which the Goddess Vesta had guided Rebecca to me.
“Borrow…? Do you intend to leave your quarters?”
“Yes. I want to offer a short prayer to the Goddess.”
I was not lying. I simply planned to pray in a rather unique fashion.
“Then I shall accompany—”
“No. This only has meaning if I do it alone. I’ll be back before sunrise, so just wait a little.”
Of course I was not taking Rebecca. If someone capable of healing me were present, the whole point would be lost. I did not arm myself either. The divine power in the lantern alone was more than enough to keep my own body safe. There was no need to raise suspicion by packing blades this early.
“…If you have not returned by sunrise, I will come looking for you myself.”
“Thank you for worrying about me.”
And I’m sorry. If I have not returned by sunrise, searching will no longer mean anything.
“I’ll be right back.”
I threw on a coat that looked suitably expensive, lantern in one hand, and stepped out of the inn. What greeted me was the chill air and a street utterly silent. A city at three in the morning, without electricity, was dark and still enough to raise the hairs on the back of the neck.
Yes. Better this quiet than the restless noise of war talk. Still, plenty of people made their living hidden in this silence, so I could not afford to let my guard down.
“Hey, little girl, come over here a second. Uncle’s a bit short on coin—”
“We’re not weirdos, kid! At least not right now. Heh heh…”
Sure enough, the flies came buzzing almost immediately. Or rather, moths drawn to the lantern’s light. A pair of thoroughly predictable back-alley thugs popped out, their lines so cliché I nearly yawned. I half-suspected every kid who squatted in alleys collecting “tolls” shared the same dog-eared manual.
“Ah, hello. My name is Asty.”
Even so, I bowed my head as politely as I could and introduced myself—so that at least they would have someone to resent.
Then I immediately drew flame from the lantern and hurled it into their faces.
“?!”
The lantern’s output was greater than I had expected. A flame flung by a complete novice who had never properly handled divine power melted three full-grown men at once. The moths who had been doused from the crown of the head never even got the chance to scream.
First their hair and skin burned. They sucked in superheated air that savaged lungs and windpipes. Facial flesh that could no longer endure the heat began to melt. The flame consumed everything they were, and the pitiful thrashing victims were at last freed from pain as a handful of ash.
“I’m sorry.”
I let the apology drift into empty air where no one remained to hear it. Coming from someone who had deliberately dressed in expensive-looking clothes, the words were nothing but grotesque hypocrisy. Still, I could not bring myself to believe they had deserved to die, so offering even this much apology felt like the right thing to do.
While entertaining that useless thought, I picked up a dagger that had fallen to the ground. The hand that gripped it shook violently. This was not even the first time I had killed someone. Maybe it was because the weapon had been flame—I felt myself being swept along by emotion for no good reason.
“I’m truly sorry.”
The plan itself was something only a madwoman would ever put into motion.
I headed without hesitation toward a place empty of people. Not a residential district, not a shantytown—somewhere where human footsteps completely ceased at three in the morning. A place where no one would find me at least until the morning sun rose.
When I finally reached a quiet vacant lot, I chose a suitable spot and set the lantern down. Every condition was now in place: the lantern that would serve as Vesta’s eyes, a sharp dagger, and a Lantern Bearer who would not leave her room for at least three hours. Preparations to drag the Flame of Benevolence to the negotiating table were complete.
And I would demand only one thing from her.
Divine power.
What kind of Saintess in the world could not even use divine power? Because our merciful Goddess had appointed me Saintess and then committed the outrage of withholding that power, I now found myself swept into a catastrophe I could not handle, able to do absolutely nothing.
If—if being tossed about by the currents of the age like this was her design… if her will as the benevolent Goddess Vesta was that I simply watch, powerless, as my own kind slaughtered one another in a blood-soaked civil war and despair…
Then she could go straight to hell.
If you force a perfectly dead person to reincarnate, you take responsibility to the end. Throwing me a single bodyguard and the title of Saintess and then abandoning me—what kind of stunt was that supposed to be?
I needed power.
Power to minimize the damage of the coming war and save as many people as possible.
So I had decided to take it.
I still did not know what she wanted from me, but she would not have pulled out the miracle of reincarnation and the title of Saintess for no reason at all. In that case, I would put my own life on the table as the stake.
If a Saintess freshly imported from Earth found herself on the brink of death, the Flame of Benevolence would have no choice but to bestow her authority—whether she liked it or not. Even if I failed, it was a safe gamble that ended with only my own death.
“When the board is against you, you raise the stakes. That’s just common sense, right?”
I lifted the dagger and aimed it at my own throat.
And drove it in.