Chapter 101
Translator: Vine
Chapter: 101
Chapter Title: Don't Harbor Dark Desires for My Daughter
“Send me along too.”
The identity of that bizarre blue light was Acid.
He, who had been there yet not, had used his healer's power to make his appearance here.
Ted, flustered by his sudden intrusion from his younger brother, hurriedly waved his hands.
“Acid! What are you saying?”
“……Ted.”
“Acid, you can’t. You’re…… too dangerous.”
If he stepped in now, it would put him right in the middle of the power struggle between the temple, the imperial palace, and the Mirmod family.
Acid was still too young to know anything about the current situation.
At the very least, Ted wanted to stop his clueless brother from charging into the flames with dry wood on his back.
Acid looked at his brother Ted.
Time had dulled the baseless anger, but even so, he had never called Ted “brother.” That was how deep the rift between them ran.
“Brother.”
“……Acid?”
It was the first time Acid had called Ted “brother” since their reunion. Ted bit his lip at the word from his little brother.
Their relationship hadn’t mended, so dealing with Acid was always hard for Ted. But he had never felt such a wall from Acid as he did today.
“Sien is in danger. I have to go. Even if I end up in danger, Brother, that’s just how it is.”
“Why is that just how it is? Acid!”
“I was supposed to die back at the orphanage, but thanks to Sien, I got to live again. So I have to go.”
Matthias, who had been quietly listening to the brothers’ exchange, finally spoke up.
“This family has no one with holy powers.”
“Yes, just me.”
“We need a healer with holy powers to break the temple’s barrier anyway.”
The temple’s barrier consisted of two layers.
One was made of a complex magic circle, which Matthias could destroy if he went all out.
The problem was the other one. After expending his strength on the first, there was no way Matthias could safely break the second. Moreover, the barrier made of holy power automatically repelled anyone with impure thoughts.
Even for Matthias, the standout talent of the Mirmod family, destroying both barriers that the Pope had painstakingly crafted over many years would consume an immense amount of mental energy.
But if there was a holy power user by his side, the situation changed.
“Since I’m a healer, I can help. I can keep supporting you with holy power so you can recover your strength.”
Realizing his brother’s firm resolve, Ted’s voice grew quieter.
“No. Even from the rear, it’s dangerous. You……”
But he still wanted to dissuade him. At least, he thought he had to stop his own brother, so he quickly stepped forward.
Approaching Acid, he looked at the boy’s lips and muttered.
“You’re still too young.”
But Matthias was faster.
He tilted his head, looking at Acid with an intrigued gaze.
“A healer’s age doesn’t matter. Step aside. I need that kid.”
Ted ground his teeth at the attitude that saving his daughter made everything else irrelevant.
Acid spoke with a mysterious stubbornness, like someone who knew something.
“Yes. I’ll go. I have to rescue Sien.”
Acid closed and opened his eyes like someone who had received a mission.
Matthias stared at him intently and said.
“Sien said that, didn’t she?”
“Yes. She told me to come save her if she got hurt later.”
“I see. Then let’s go.”
Matthias asked no more. Instead, he gripped Acid’s soft hand with his own, calloused from rare hard labor, and said.
“Hand.”
Acid blinked in confusion at the sudden words.
“……Pardon?”
“We need to hold hands to teleport together. So, let’s go rescue her.”
It was then that the aides, who had been frozen in shock at Matthias’s declaration of “raiding the central temple,” finally snapped out of it and began murmuring.
Ted quietly bit his lip and muttered.
“Acid. I’ll trust your decision. I’ll do my utmost here so you can return safely.”
He had decided to respect Acid’s choice.
Acid gave a faint smile at those words.
“……Thanks. Then, shall we go now?”
Acid, at that tender age between boy and young man, carried a subtly mature air. Matthias, increasingly displeased, whispered in a low voice.
“Oh, and one more thing. I’m bringing you because you’re a healer, so don’t harbor any dark desires for my daughter.”
Acid didn’t respond. Instead, he nodded and bowed his head slightly.
It was the courtesy of a vassal, but it didn’t sit well with Matthias. With an uncomfortable expression, he activated the portable magic device.
A brilliant light flashed from the device.
And so, Acid and Matthias teleported to the central temple.
***
It was after a long time of being strangled.
Even in the suffocating pain that felt like my breath was stopping, I gritted my teeth and opened my eyes again.
Because Axel Mirmod’s grinning, teeth-baring face looked excessively wicked. I didn’t want to show any panic or suffering to a guy like that.
Axel smirked at me.
“Yeah, you’ve calmed down now. That was quite entertaining, Sien Mirmod.”
“…….”
I tried to retort as if it were obvious, but my body wouldn’t obey. Axel continued.
“Stupid little thing.”
“…….”
“You think your father will come rescue you, right?”
Perhaps from the prolonged strangling, convulsive coughs leaked out.
After coughing for a while, I fixed my bloodshot eyes on him.
“What……ever.”
I didn’t want to give him any hints. Ignoring my bruised throat, I lowered my gaze.
‘Their target isn’t me. It’s Dad. So I just have to hold out. Without dying. Then my plan will work.’
Once the coughing finally stopped, I gathered my thoughts quickly and replied in my hoarse voice.
“My dad won’t come get me. Because he hates me.”
Axel cackled with laughter.
His ear-splitting laugh lasted nearly a minute. The moment I glared at him, feeling like my ears would burst, he whispered.
“Sien…… You’re saying something that’s not even funny. Your dad hates you? He cherishes you so much that he…….”
“……?”
“Sent me to the demon realm.”
My eyes widened hugely. I couldn’t quite grasp the sentence “He cherishes you so much that he sent me to the demon realm.”
Axel started cackling again, knowing I was staring at him in bewilderment.
“Don’t you know what kind of bastard your father is?”
“I do.”
He was a kind and good dad. A noble man who shouldn’t be slandered by the likes of Axel.
Thinking that, I glared at him with fierce eyes.
Then Axel laughed as if he’d seen the greatest comedy performance.
“Hahaha, how ridiculous. Well, yeah. Even trash bastards raise lilies in their bosoms. Otherwise, they couldn’t survive.”
Even watching Axel Mirmod sneer, I couldn’t understand exactly what he meant.
Of course, from his perspective, our dad was “trash.” But Axel’s rage seemed overly exaggerated. Like fury toward someone who had thrown his entire life into the gutter.
But as far as I knew, our dad wasn’t the type.
“You’re probably that mangy role for him.”
My voice had become much huskier as I muttered.
“……No.”
“Matthias Mirmod is trash. The worst kind everyone in the empire knows. You might think I’m crazy, but your father is a murderer who uses everything and everyone.”
At that utterly absurd talk, I glared at him with blazing eyes.
“My dad…… isn’t like that. You’re trash, so he looks like trash to you. Like they say, you see what you are.”
I didn’t want to show emotional agitation. But I couldn’t tolerate the provocation using Dad.
“Get lost.”
I spat at Axel mockingly. Blood mixed with saliva from my torn mouth fell to the floor.
But despite my rebuttal and mockery, Axel wasn’t shaken. He just looked at me as if I were amusing.
“If that’s what you think, the truth will reveal itself soon enough.”
With a sinister smile, he spoke, and then a door opened behind him. Seeing the faint light flowing in from outside, I thought blankly.
The man in the Pope’s robes was entering. I focused on the Pope, trying to forget Axel’s mocking words.
‘Hmm, is that guy the Pope? Then this really is the central temple.’
The presumed Pope smirked mockingly at me.
“Oh dear. You’ve seen my face? What a pity. Doing something so unsavory, and you’ve seen my face.”
He snapped his fingers lightly with a “tak.” My vision went dark again.
This time without a blindfold, so he must have temporarily blinded me with holy power.
‘These damn bastards!’
No matter how I thought about it, this world apparently had no prisoner rights charter.
I became seriously curious about what “unsavory thing” the Pope was about to do.
***
I don’t know how long I stayed blind.
Without sight, I couldn’t tell what the Pope and Axel were doing in front of me. Narrowing my eyes, I sorted my thoughts.
‘They’re probably up to some dogshit business?’
A faint, ominous breathing suggested the Pope had come closer.
Holding my breath and sitting still, a sinister voice whispered in my ear.
“Good girl. Now I’ll release you.”
It was the Pope. I retorted mockingly, word for word.
“That fake gentle voice is annoying.”
“Ahh, what a badly behaved little child we have here?”
With the sound of clapping, my vision cleared again.
Blinking to readjust, the Pope parted his lips and muttered an ancient incantation I didn’t recognize.
“Rune.”
I didn’t know exactly what a rune was, but pure white light instantly appeared around him. It twinkled like fireflies, but felt subtly unpleasant.
A sticky sensation crept over the back of my hand, and rune letters began forming there. Narrowing my eyes, I muttered.
“Mental…… binding?”
“Heh heh. You can read runes.”
The Pope chuckled in satisfaction and patted my head.
Pure white light gathered at his fingertips. The light flowed over my cheeks and body like water.
Then, as it enveloped my entire body like saliva and vanished in an instant.
‘What are you staring at? I already know all your filthy deeds anyway.’
Surprise flickered in his eyes. While inwardly cursing the Pope freely, I recalled all his past actions.
He was trash who sacrificed orphanage children indiscriminately, a murderer of priests, and deserved to be torn apart horribly.
Receiving my piercing gaze, the Pope dry-washed his face and muttered.
“Ahh…… Now I understand?”
I didn’t know what he meant right then.
But……
“I’m saying I now know how you became such a special child.”
The Pope, having read all my thoughts, grinned slyly and lifted his chin.
“Reincarnator, Sien Mirmod.”
At this moment, it was clear he knew my secret.