Chapter 249: Sparring
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 249: Sparring
A priestess had the duty to pray before the divine statue five times a day: at dawn, morning, noon, evening, and night.
Naturally, not a single day could be skipped.
These weren't simple, abbreviated prayers, either. Each time, she had to kneel for nearly an hour. More than once, she'd wanted to quit being a priestess.
This was especially true since she had never wanted to become one in the first place.
Every girl in the tribe who possessed the aptitude had to become a priestess candidate, without exception.
She had been just one of them.
At first, she'd planned to fail out gracefully, but perhaps her talent was just too exceptional.
She was chosen by the former priestess and was forced to take on the role.
On the day of the succession ceremony, even as the floral crown symbolizing her new position was placed on her head, she could only wonder what was happening.
But when she was struck with a switch for not having the 'proper decorum of a priestess,' it was like a flash of lightning in her mind. She finally understood.
She had to escape this place, and fast.
But she didn't get far before she was caught. The former priestess was a monster.
Her life after being forced to inherit the Sealed Orb and become a priestess could only be described as dreadful.
There were the handmaidens who watched her every move, interfering at every turn and telling her to be careful with her words and actions. Then there was the priestess herself, who forced her to study the tribe's traditions and history until dawn.
Nothing about it wasn't difficult.
But as mentioned before, the worst ordeal was having to pray five times a day to a god she didn't even believe in.
The god her tribe worshipped was just a local deity that their ancestors, who settled the land long ago, had arbitrarily decided to venerate.
She didn't know what it was like back then, but now, it had been reduced to a minor god incapable of bestowing even the most meager of blessings.
Naturally, she felt no faith whatsoever.
If a god who truly protected the tribe existed, it would have helped when her parents were killed by magical beasts.
Unable to bear it any longer, she had pleaded with the former priestess to at least reduce the number of prayers, but all she received in return was a sharp sting from the switch.
'Hic...!'
She rubbed the stinging welt on her calf and headed to the prayer room.
Sigh. I have to do what I'm told.
Being weak was the crime.
As she was leaning against the wall, pretending to be deep in prayer but actually dozing off...
Tiring-
A strange sound came from somewhere.
At first, she thought someone had dropped something outside the prayer room, but she soon realized that wasn't it.
“What is this...?”
[A contract has arrived.]
[Would you like to view the contract?]
[Y/N]
*
“A contract?”
“Yes. Should I write it down for you?”
Noel searched her memory and transcribed the contents of the contract onto a piece of paper.
The contract, finished in just three minutes, simply stated that she had to help a lost traveler.
Other than that, it was an ordinary contract with nothing unusual about it. The only oddity, if any, was the lack of a contract period.
'Could it be...?'
A hypothesis suddenly occurred to me.
The lack of a contract period... did that mean the app knew from the very beginning that Noel would become my summon?
Or perhaps it made the contract with Noel with that very intention.
Of course, I had no proof.
“But still, how could you just accept a contract like that without knowing what would happen?”
Even if a human suddenly presented you with a contract, you'd be suspicious.
Even more so for someone who isn't familiar with the concept of a status window from various novels and webtoons like I am.
In response to my question, Noel averted her gaze.
“A priestess's intuition?”
At this point, I wasn't just dumbfounded; I was speechless.
Was she fearless, or did she have something to fall back on?
“After that, it's just as you know, Master. I appeared out of nowhere in a bunny girl outfit and recited the lines from the contract. Of course, when I was registered as a summon, I did feel like I'd been tricked.”
Having finished her story, Noel rested her head on my lap as if relieved.
“Wait, hold on. That's it?”
“What do you mean, 'that's it'?! Do you have any idea how nervous I was telling you all this?!”
I wondered what kind of incredible secret she was hiding to have avoided talking about the app so much, but now that it was all out in the open, it was really nothing special.
To sum it up, she made a contract with the app and appeared before me. Wasn't that all there was to it?
The way she spoke when we first met made her seem like she knew something, but now I see it was all a bluff.
“Then what about when you told me not to try and dig into the app?”
That wasn't a request someone who knew nothing about the app would make.
Noel hesitated for a moment at my question before slowly speaking.
“Actually... I was asked to stop you as much as possible if you tried to find out about the app. But it also said that if you asked very earnestly, I could tell you everything I knew...”
“...What?”
“Even if you make that face, there's really nothing more I can tell you. I truly don't know anything.”
Noel waved her arms, a troubled look on her face. It seemed she wasn't lying about knowing nothing.
A line from a mystery novel I once read came to mind.
The deeper I dig, the more the case seems to fall into a labyrinth.
That was exactly how I felt right now.
At this point, I was even starting to doubt whether the dating app was really my ability.
It usually ignored me completely, but under certain circumstances, communication was possible. Though even then, it was less of a conversation and more of a simple exchange of intentions.
'Is it a divine being, like a Constellation from the Tower?'
But there were too many points that didn't logically add up for that to be the case.
This was especially true since I already knew that beings called 'gods' were not omnipotent.
“Then why did you make those weird threats when we first met? Did the app tell you to do that?”
“That was just to get the upper hand... Hehe...”
I couldn't even laugh anymore.
Isn't she a total problem child?
“If you hadn't done that in the first place, you never would have become a summon.”
“...I don't think so.”
As if she'd never been cautious around me, Noel gazed at me with a playful smile.
The serious atmosphere had vanished, replaced by her usual self.
“The app said it would grant my wish.”
“Your wish?”
A strange light flickered in Noel's eyes. They were a mystical blue, as if they held the sky itself.
“It was a wish to escape my boring daily life and go somewhere new and fun, where everything I did would be exciting. I also thought it would be nice to date a handsome man, if possible...”
“And that's me?”
Noel blushed faintly and nodded.
The strange atmosphere and Noel's slightly different demeanor made me feel unnecessarily shy.
“The reason I accepted the contract in the first place was because I figured I had nothing to lose.”
“A moment ago, you said it was a priestess's intuition.”
“Oh, that was obviously a joke.”
A smile playing on her lips, Noel sat up. The blanket slid down, revealing her pale, naked body.
Noel settled herself between my legs and began to tell me a little about her homeland.
“Istria?”
“Yes. I heard that on other continents, they call it the Eastern Continent.”
Noel's subsequent explanation was rather shocking.
Istria, a land where hundreds of nations and tribes were in conflict, was a crazy place where they waged war day in and day out for the sake of their respective gods.
Furthermore, it seemed that gods whose faith had weakened would corrupt into evil gods, luring humans with sweet words to try and form unfair contracts.
“The closer a god is to corruption, the more desperate they are, so contracting with one that isn't yet an evil god is usually beneficial. That's why I accepted. Besides, it didn't seem like a god of such a low class that it would try to scam a human.”
A place where gods were constantly looking for a chance to backstab humans.
Noel, having survived in such a place until now, seemed amazing.
Of course, the concept of a 'god' in Istria seemed a bit different from the one on Earth.
When we think of a god, we usually imagine an omnipotent being, but in Istria, most gods were nothing more than local deities or high-ranking spirits that could even be subjugated if the need arose.
“Is your tribe doing okay?”
Didn't you say you worship a minor god that can't even grant divine power?
“Are you worried about me?”
Noel's lips curled into a satisfied smile as she quietly rested her head against my chest.
Her slowly twitching ears betrayed her mood, just like a puppy's tail.
“We're fine. We may not look like much, but we've been fending off foreign invasions for hundreds of years. Besides, if anything happens, you'll help us, right, Master?”
I didn't answer, simply stroking Noel's head.
“I'll think about it.”
“What??”
Perhaps I felt a sense of kinship from the fact that she, too, had lost her parents to magical beasts.
We talked about this and that, closer than we had been before.
The dawn deepened.
“Oh, right. That time I said the bunny girl outfit was a priestess uniform? That was a lie.”
“...”
I knew it was a lie, but hearing it directly still made me feel a bit dejected for some reason.
Noticing my reaction, Noel excused herself to the bathroom and returned wearing a bunny girl outfit.
It was the same one she wore when we first met.
Unable to resist the sight of Noel in her bunny girl attire, I took her until dawn broke. Alternating between passing out and climaxing, Noel let out rabbit-like cries as she soiled the mattress.
I was a little worried about my master, but I had cast a soundproofing spell, so it should be fine.
...Probably.
*
The next day, I headed to a nearby training room with my master. It cost a whopping three million won per hour.
The reason for coming here was simple.
Magic could be studied cooped up in a workshop, but martial arts ultimately required movement to train.
Furthermore, sparring with an opponent of equal standing was exceptionally important.
I held a practice iron sword and faced my master.
“Hng...”
But as soon as our eyes met, my master seemed to recall the events of last night and hastily looked away.
An awkward silence fell between us.
I was just as conscious of what happened yesterday, but I decided to put it aside for now.
To draw out my master's full strength with only the martial arts I had built up so far, I needed to clear my mind of all unnecessary thoughts.
This was both a spar and a challenge.
A golden Sword Qi shimmered over the practice sword.
Seeing it, my master looked quite surprised.
“...I didn't expect you to have already grasped how to imbue your will into your Sword Qi.”
“It's thanks to having a good master.”
Thanks to that, my master's gaze grew much more serious.
In the ensuing silence, our gazes crossed. A moment later, both our figures vanished.
CRASH!!
As our Sword Qi collided, a blast of wind pressure erupted.
My master's realm was the Transcendent Realm, a level higher than mine.
But I wasn't intimidated. To meet Cheon Yeo-hwa again someday, I had to be able to defeat an Elder of the Heavenly Demonic Cult who had reached the Extreme Demon realm.
I couldn't afford to stop here.
I unleashed the Formless Sword Art, pressing my attack against my master.
The entire training room shook with the turbulent waves of magical power. As the spar intensified, my master's true worth was revealed.
CLANG!
“Ugh?!”
My master's sword was a heavy sword.
It was somewhat slow, but its heavy strikes were deadly.
At first, I was the one on the offensive, but the impact that seemed to reverberate to my very bones forced me to change my approach. I switched to dodging and deflecting as much as possible, waiting for an opportunity.
And before long, the chance I had been waiting for arrived.
I used my 6-star Formless Step to evade my master's strike as it flew toward my side. Since a heavy sword cannot be recovered quickly, an opening was created.
Wringing out every muscle in my body, I instantly unleashed the Vajra Qi concentrated at the tip of my toes.
Thrum-
Formless Sword Art, Heavenly Light.
I became a bolt of lightning, thrusting my sword toward my master. But just before the blade made contact, her back bent at an impossible angle, and she dodged the attack as if it were nothing.
Is this the unique flexibility of a beast-kin?
I was disappointed to have missed a golden opportunity, but I didn't dwell on it.
Now that I knew she could move like that, I wouldn't make the same mistake twice.
However, I realized a step too late that even in a spar, mistakes are absolutely unforgivable.
'Caught...?!'
Heavenly Light is a thrust that pursues the ultimate in speed.
A thrust is a rather large technique, a movement that controls every element of the body from fingertips to toes to advance in a single direction.
A large movement meant that an opening was inevitable.
My master did not miss that fleeting opening.
KWAANG!
“Keuk?!”
With an impact like being struck by a giant boulder, I was sent flying backward. I barely managed to block with my sword, but seeing the broken blade, I had no choice but to admit defeat.
The match was over in a total of twenty-nine exchanges.
Considering when I first picked up a sword, it was remarkable progress, but I was still a long way off.
Just as I was about to approach my master to ask for another spar, I stopped in my tracks at the sight of her shadowed expression.
I rubbed the back of my neck and set down the broken sword.
It seemed we needed to have a talk, just the two of us, perhaps over dinner after the spar was finished.