The Saintess (2)
“A pleasure to meet you. I am Arwin, a faithful servant of Lady Eris.”
The Saintess—so dazzlingly beautiful she could put an elf to shame—offered me a courteous greeting.
Her hair and eyes shone with a radiant golden light, as if the very color existed to prove she had been chosen by the gods.
Blonde hair and golden eyes. A rare combination in these parts.
Of course, black hair and black eyes like mine were equally uncommon.
The aura she gave off was like spring sunshine, warm and gently enveloping. Simply looking at her stirred a natural sense of reverence.
Naturally, the demon inside me was having a full-blown screaming fit of pure terror.
But that was none of my concern.
“Rohan Blackwood, 1st Grade Management Officer of the Treasury.”
I drew my identification from inside my coat, held it out, and bowed my head with the same courtesy she had shown.
The elderly Holy Knight standing beside the Saintess immediately leaned in, inspected the badge, and gave a nod.
“You are indeed a civil servant of the Treasury. My apologies for the unintended discourtesy.”
“I understand.”
“Hmm. A 1st Grade Management Officer is a rather high post, as I recall. Are you traveling without an escort?”
“Yes. That is correct.”
“Ahem. It would appear you are headed north. Might I ask the nature of your business….”
“Official duties.”
Even after I had shown my identification, the Holy Knight kept firing off questions like an interrogation, suspicion still thick in his eyes.
It was thoroughly rude.
I answered every one of them briefly and cleanly all the same. I was under no obligation to reply, but inviting further suspicion would only make my life more exhausting. Better to give him what he wanted and leave as quickly as possible.
“Is the carriage behind you yours?”
“Yes. The road was blocked, so I came forward to see what the matter was. I have no other intentions. I will take my leave now.”
I bowed once more toward the Saintess, who had been watching me quietly, then turned on my heel without delay.
Best not to get involved.
It wasn’t merely because it would be annoying.
And it wasn’t because of the demon, either.
Even when they looked perfectly normal on the surface, Temple people were exhausting—no, they were simply out of their minds. The fact that they had sealed off this narrow stretch of road just to pray made that obvious enough. These were not people with whom common sense or ordinary conversation worked.
I would have preferred bandits.
Could my luck really be this rotten?
I bit down hard on my lip and scowled.
More to the point—why was the Saintess out here in the middle of these remote mountains in the first place?
No matter how I turned it over, this world was clearly running a hidden-camera prank on me.
The Saintess was a figure second only to the Pope in sacred prestige. She did not appear on the Temple’s formal hierarchy, yet her symbolism and holy power earned her treatment on the level of a Cardinal, immediately beneath the Pope. If one needed a comparison, she was something like the Temple’s princess.
In other words, she was the idol of a pack of deranged cultist fanatics.
Ordinary priests and Holy Knights were already tiresome enough. How much worse would their living idol be?
Right now, the only correct answer was a full tactical retreat.
“Excuse me, Brother? Just a moment.”
Whether she could read my thoughts or not, the Saintess’s nightingale-sweet voice called after me from behind.
For a fleeting second I considered pretending not to hear and simply walking on. Then I felt the Holy Knights’ eyes boring into my back like heated awls, let out a long sigh, and turned my head.
“You called for me.”
“Yes. Meeting like this could be considered Lady Eris’s will, could it not? If you are headed north, we are traveling in the same direction. How about accompanying us?”
Lady Eris’s will, my ass. This is pure coincidence. Stop assigning cosmic meaning to every little thing!
“I apologize, but I am currently engaged in official duties. Accompanying you would therefore be difficult.”
“It looks far too dangerous without an escort. Surely traveling together would be acceptable?”
“I am deeply grateful for the Saintess’s consideration, but this is a matter that demands both discretion and speed. I ask for your understanding.”
“Perhaps… am I making you uncomfortable? W-well, of course. Since I am the Saintess, I… I must seem rather difficult to approach….”
I forced down the irritation rising in my throat and refused with a reasonably polite excuse—and what happened next left me staring.
The Saintess’s entire demeanor collapsed. Her shoulders drooped and her eyes filled with tears as if she were about to cry.
I was so dumbfounded I sucked in a sharp breath. Then the murderous intent rolling off the Holy Knights hit me like a physical force, and I took an involuntary step backward.
Are these people insane?
A perfectly reasonable refusal to travel together, and the Saintess was sniffling like a spoiled seven-year-old denied a toy. The Holy Knights, for their part, were radiating killing intent over something this trivial simply because she looked upset.
Common sense and logic simply did not apply to these people. How were they supposed to be servants of a god? They were just a pack of raving lunatics.
“Ahem! Why not simply accompany her as the Saintess suggested.”
While I stood there with my mouth shut, unable to form a single word, the elderly Holy Knight who had been grilling me earlier cleared his throat with deliberate volume and made his displeasure plain.
Moments ago the man had been speaking in crisp, formal address. The second the Saintess started whining, his entire register shifted.
There was nothing normal about any of this. Nothing.
“As I have already stated, official duties—”
“No need to be so rigid. Think it over once more. You are on your way to carry out official duties; you are not currently in the middle of executing them, are you?”
“Travel to the destination is itself part of official duties.”
“Would it not be better to arrive safely, all things considered?”
“I apologize. Much as I might wish to accompany you, principles are principles. What cannot be done cannot be done.”
Further conversation was pointless. I turned on my heel without waiting for a reply.
And in that fleeting instant, at the edge of my turning vision, I saw it clearly.
The dejected look on the Saintess’s face snapped back to perfect composure as if it had never been there at all.
Goosebumps raced across my entire body.
I pretended I had seen nothing and walked calmly back toward the carriage.
“Listen carefully. I don’t care if it takes a few extra days—turn us around.”
“What?!”
“This is a personal tip from me. And if we reach the destination safely, I will double the fee I already promised you.”
“S-silver coins! Thank you! We leave at once!”
I pressed the coins into the hand of the coachman who had been waiting in tense silence and promised him double. The man lit up with pure joy and immediately hauled the reins around.
One way or another, silver coins remained the undisputed finest means of communication in existence.
Well—except with the fanatics behind us, perhaps.
“Who was that? From a distance it didn’t look like a bandit… Are you hurt anywhere?”
The moment I climbed into the carriage, Rhea shot to her feet and urgently looked me over.
“It’s nothing. Don’t concern yourself with it. Finish what you were doing.”
“B-but why are we turning the carriage around….”
She certainly had a lot of questions. This was all for the sake of her mental health.
“Secretariat Rhea.”
“Yes sir! 4th Grade Senior Secretariat Rhea!”
“If I say it is nothing, then it is nothing. What further explanation is required?”
“Ah. I-I’m sorry.”
“No need to apologize. More importantly—how did the task I assigned you go? Did you turn up anything new?”
I pointed at the documents she had been examining and smoothly changed the subject. Rhea tilted her head and opened her mouth with careful hesitation.
“I could not find anything particularly unusual. However, Count Richmond’s failure to pay the Fief Tax dates back two years, and that timing….”
“The timing?”
“Well… it could be coincidence, but according to the materials provided by the Imperial Family, that was exactly when Lady Richmond fell ill and they requested a healing mage from the Imperial Family.”
“Requesting an Imperial healing mage means her condition must have been quite serious.”
“Yes. They also approached the professor of the Academy’s Healing Magic Department, as well as every famous healing mage of any reputation in the capital.”
“Some incurable disease, perhaps. Did the Imperial Family actually send a healing mage? If they did, they would have included the medical report for us as well.”
That itchy sensation of almost grasping something made me press her. Unfortunately she glanced at my expression and shook her head.
“Well… they did dispatch one. But after completing the work and while returning from the Richmond fief to the Imperial Palace, the mage went missing and was later discovered as a corpse….”
“A corpse? Good grief. This is enough to drive a man mad.”
An Imperial healing mage dying by the roadside?
That post was not something one won at cards. Even a passing dog would refuse to believe it—it was an impossible occurrence.
At least it wasn’t the work of the Kingdom Coalition… How in the world did that happen?
Two years ago the war had been at its height. The possibility that Coalition agents were responsible was therefore very high—but if that had been the case, I would have known about it long ago. Even if I somehow had not, what would the Kingdom Coalition stand to gain by targeting a healing mage?
Hmm. Setting everything else aside, the death of an Imperial healing mage may well have become the snowball that rolled all the way to this point.
I would have to reach the Richmond fief and confirm it myself. But my guess was that the reason the Imperial Family had drawn the Fief Tax like a blade was precisely this. Most likely, after the healing mage died, Count Richmond either failed to provide a proper explanation—or made some critical mistake in the process and fell completely out of Imperial favor.
It’s unfortunate, but what can you do. I still have my own job to do.
I was still turning the uneasy, suspicious feeling over in my mind when—
-KRAAAAH!! They’re coming! They’re coming! Damn it all!
The demon I had assumed was asleep suddenly started raising absolute hell again.
Don’t tell me…?
My heart dropped straight through the floor of the carriage.
No. It can’t be. Don’t. Seriously—please!
But a moment later I saw them through the window: the Temple procession trailing after us in a long, determined line.
Apparently, just as Count Richmond had been marked by the Imperial Family, I had been marked by these people.
At this point, wasn’t that just stalking?
Aigoo. What a life.