Oh, It's the SUPREME God! (1)
Goel simply could not keep his mouth shut any longer.
'I swore I wasn't going to say anything!'
But the urge to spill it was eating him alive from the inside. This doomed, insufferable family! He was so stifled he just had to get it out!
'I'm going to burst a blood vessel and die if I keep chewing on this, seriously!'
In the end, Goel shouted out the entire truth, and only then did he straighten his back, looking as if a great weight had finally lifted.
There! How about that? Has everyone finally come to their senses?
But having generously bestowed the truth upon them, he found his audience utterly unresponsive. They merely blinked at him, slow and blank.
Goel's eyebrows couldn't help but twitch.
“…Did you… hear what I just said?”
“What? The Supreme God?”
“Yes!”
“Who?”
“Isaac!”
“What about him?”
At that reaction, Goel beat his own chest in frustration.
Oh, for heaven's sake!
“He drew the Supreme God! At the Ordination Ceremony! He was chosen by the Supreme God, I'm telling you!”
“Goel.”
“Yes!”
“Did you dream this?”
Aaargh!!!
Goel clutched his head as if he were about to lose his mind.
“It's true, I swear! This came straight from a report out of House Berith! Why else would Berith try to adopt that boy, or try to kill him at the Gold Pentagon? Why would they go that far? Those pompous bastards who think everyone outside their own bloodline is common filth! What reason would they have to go to such lengths?”
Yet his father and younger brother only wore expressions that plainly asked, what nonsense is this?
“There's no way those bastards would pick anything of the sort.”
“That's right, brother. As adorable and lovable as our Isaac is, even that seems like a stretch. If you can't tell dreams from reality anymore, what are we to do with you…”
His younger brother didn't just disbelieve him—he was now shooting him a look of pure, pitying compassion.
“I'll have a word with the White Faith, so why don't you go home and get some proper rest…?”
“AAARGH! AAAH! AAAGH!!”
Goel felt like he was going to die from the sheer frustration of it all.
Fine, even he would have found it hard to believe!
Honestly, he wouldn't have believed it either!
“Brother. Would you like to hold Isaac's comfort doll? It's wonderful for restful sleep.”
When Rillai came over cradling a child's pillow and a stuffed toy and pressed them gently into his arms, Goel came within a hair's breadth of actually going insane.
But his younger brother was sincerely worried about him.
“Don't worry about the effectiveness! I've cast the White Faith's sleep divine art on that pillow!”
“AAARGH!”
Goel hurled the pillow across the room and ripped the comfort doll clean in half.
I swear, this saintly family is going to give me a stress-induced death! Just fall apart already, House Eshua! How does not a single sane person exist in this entire household?!
“Oh, fine! Don't believe me if you don't want to! We've just been handed a leash around the Pope family's neck, and you'd all rather stand there drooling and throw it away? Fine! Then I'm taking Isaac and leaving this house!”
At those words, even Rillai—and even Eli—rarely widened their eyes.
…I'm sorry, what? Who is taking whom where?
Him? Isaac??
“Brother!”
“There we go! So you believe me now, don't you?”
“Isaac loves peanut brittle the most. He drinks honeyed milk tea before bed. You must make sure he brushes his teeth, and…”
Is this lunatic serious?!
“And for his coming-of-age ceremony, be sure to have his formal robes tailored from Hisque silk!”
Instead of answering, Goel seized Rillai by the collar. Even then, Rillai prattled on about how blue flowers would suit his chest best, utterly oblivious to the fist shaking him.
But around that point, Eli began to find the whole thing strangely unsettling.
“…Don't tell me. Is it actually true?”
“YES!!”
Just believe people when they talk to you, you absolute morons!
However, Eli only scrunched his brow with a face like he'd just stepped in dung.
“How in the world does that boy get himself picked by the Supreme God?”
“That part, I don't know either.”
“With that level of faith?”
“I'm telling you I don't know!”
Eli looked up at the heavens. His face had gone quite grave.
The Supreme God… was a pervert?
Or did the Supreme God choose Isaac because he's the Saint?
Has everything we've been doing until now been wrong? Were we supposed to act the opposite way to earn love?
“Um… Father?”
Cold sweat poured down Goel in sheets.
The look on his father's face as he spiraled into increasingly deranged contemplation was deeply alarming.
But soon enough, Eli shook his head.
'No. The god's tastes are irrelevant. Now that he's drawn the Supreme God, even his piety can be glossed over.'
The god no one else had ever managed to draw.
A being that stood above even the Chief Gods.
So what could anyone do about it, when the boy had drawn a god who was divine even among gods? Was someone planning to strong-arm the Supreme God and drag Isaac off to a heresy inquest over it?
But around that point, Eli's gravity shifted into something far more serious.
And it couldn't be helped.
'Do people truly understand what the Supreme God is?'
House Berith hadn't pulled their insane stunts for nothing.
The Supreme God's existence was an overwhelming stroke of fortune, yes—but it was a being no one had ever encountered, let alone grasped. And frankly, that was terrifying.
No, wait. That's not the point.
Isaac was dangerous in an entirely different sense.
'Something on the level of the Supreme God was never meant to be handled by a mortal in the first place!'
The opponent was simply too powerful!
And it was at that very moment.
“Lord Head of House, we have a crisis.”
“!”
The head of house's knight dropped to one knee before them in haste. The messenger, who never once lost his composure, was uncharacteristically pale.
Eli frowned in displeasure.
“What is it.”
“An enemy faith has launched a heresy inquest against Young Master Isaac.”
…WHAT?!
“What? A heresy inquest against whom?”
Chablis, Crown Prince of the Empire, furrowed his brow at the unexpected news.
“They launched a heresy inquest against Young Lord Isaac? Is this true?”
But the Black Cardinal answered the Crown Prince with cutting finality.
“Wash your hands of it. Now.”
“What?”
“He was under suspicion, and yet he deliberately pushed all the way into a place where the Fourteen Six Demons had been, and was caught reading the script of the demonkin. He's beyond saving. I had no idea the boy was that devoid of common sense.”
“That's ruthless, even for you.”
“We simply do not deal with those who lack sense.”
At the Black Cardinal's words, the Crown Prince let out a hollow laugh.
“And sending assassins after Count Molech to eliminate Young Lord Isaac—was that part of some brilliant scheme of yours as well?”
“That was because Your Highness insisted on getting close to Isaac Eshua, was it not?”
“…I beg your pardon?”
“If the Crown Prince saves him from a band of assassins, the boy will feel gratitude, will he not? And a member of House Eshua—who would sooner crack his own skull than leave a debt unpaid—will then swear loyalty to the Imperial family of his own accord.”
The Eshuas were, after all, the kind of people who repaid every debt to the last coin.
The Crown Prince could only stare in disbelief.
Good heavens. Is that truly a man of the cloth? The crows of the North, as ever—no lengths too far, no methods too dirty.
Well, to be fair, the men who guarded the most critical places in the Empire were second to none in skill. And among the sharpest minds the Empire had to offer, besides.
“Incidentally, it was you who started the manipulation campaign at the Black Pentagon, was it not? Attaching assassins to every household and setting them against one another—that was your doing.”
“The branches exist to be pruned. The house is already overflowing with festering problems as it is—are we to lounge about picking a Saint at leisure? A waste of time. We need combat-ready forces deployed now.”
“And yet as a scholar, even you took an interest in Young Lord Isaac's exam answers, didn't you?”
The assignment given to the apprentice priests over the course of the Pentagon had been 'How to Capture the Skeleton Demon King.' Isaac had ground his teeth over it, but he had submitted his answer all the same.
And the result? The professors and priests alike had marveled at Isaac's answer sheet, moved nearly to tears.
“-To think of such a method for capturing the Skeleton Demon King!
-Is he truly a genius?
-Azure is not yet dead!”
However, the Black Cardinal, who had been silent, let out a dry snort.
“If he actually wrote it himself.”
The Black Cardinal rose from his seat.
“In any case, keep your distance from that brat from here on. The heresy inquest will begin immediately after the Black Pentagon. If he has some way to prove his innocence through the God Summoning, perhaps things change—but as it stands, Azure will be annihilated, root and branch.”
Yes. That was what everyone believed.
Every single soul gathered at the Black Pentagon.
“The second act of the Sacrificial Offering Festival will now commence. Distinguished guests are in attendance, so you will not make a single mistake. First, you will perform the God Summoning and select the deity with whom you will contract.”
“……”
“…Ignore the priests glaring at you.”
How are we supposed to ignore THAT?!
The young apprentice priests quaked, their pupils rattling in their eyes. And small wonder—scattered across the God Summoning grounds sat more inquisitors than there were apprentices.
Their eyes gleamed as they stared, as though they'd finally been given leave to drag someone away.
And that wasn't all. The priests of Gold had their eyes locked on Isaac alone.
Which was precisely why Shuri could do nothing but press a hand to his forehead.
'Isaac, you little bastard. What did you do this time.'
He'd gone out hunting the Fourteen Six Demons and somehow kept missing the Fourteen Six Demons. Then he claimed he could read the message they'd left behind.
Well, even Shuri hadn't seen that one coming.
'Who would've guessed Isaac could read the Skeleton Demon King's cipher.'
Isaac said he'd been ambushed by assassins at the very site where the Fourteen Six Demons' message had been left.
Which was why the enemy priests had gone ballistic, demanding to know what he'd been doing there and launching into interrogation.
Isaac, for his part, had given the textbook answer: 'I merely sensed the aura of the Fourteen Six Demons and was conducting an investigation.' Sure he was.
“-We already know everything. That message left by the Fourteen Six Demons bears your name and hymns of praise to the Skeleton Demon King.
-Confess that you serve the Skeleton Demon King, while we're still being civil.
-Wait, what the hell are these bastards even saying. lol
-Still going to deny it? The content speaks for itself. <Though the Skeleton Demon King has knelt before God and atoned for his sins, his magnificent achievements, deeply…>—
-You absolute morons! It doesn't say ANY of that anywhere in there?! Do you want to die?!
-……?!
his magnificent achievements…>
'Isaac, you utter idiot!'
No matter how you looked at it, there was no way Azure could read the language of the demonkin!
Sure enough, the enemy had gone insane and resolved to drag Isaac off on the spot.
So why hadn't they seized him immediately, and instead let him come all the way to the Black Pentagon?
'Because Naizer is going to summon an enemy god right here.'
Once the god was summoned, Isaac—having drawn an evil god—would be punished by the enemy's deity. And the evil god along with him would be annihilated.
In other words, it was a spectacle staged for the distinguished guests.
“Is it truly the case, then, that Azure has fallen?”
“Did they not promise you proof of it today?”
Exactly!
This was even more airtight than a mere heresy inquest!
A method to cast Azure into the abyss in a single stroke before the eyes of everyone, while simultaneously exalting their own standing.
'Those bastards. Judging by the way they're smirking, they're fully convinced an evil god is going to appear.'
And yet, in the middle of all this, Isaac—the madman—was simply grinning from ear to ear.
'What is he planning?'
Then it happened.
The priests of the Holy See called out to the apprentices.
“Now, we will begin the God Summoning. Channel your holy power into the orbs and call forth your deity.”
With those words, everyone lifted their divine stones and began pouring power into them. All around, cheers and groans of disappointment rose up as names floated to the surface of the stones.
They had all spent their lives studying the crests and names of the gods for this very day, so the rank of each drawn deity could be judged at a glance.
And Isaac, divine stone in hand, simply could not keep the corners of his mouth from curling upward.
'A Gold faith god! Now we're talking!'
Ha! When he'd heard it was a nameless Lower God, he'd braced himself for a long road of suffering. But a god of Gold!
'The God of Wealth, perhaps? Is that what this is?'
Was it really okay for him to coast like this?
No. Honestly, at this point, it didn't even have to be the God of Wealth.
Any god under Gold would do splendidly. The gods of Gold—the God of Prosperity and the like—were wealthy through and through, every last one of them.
'Right. As long as it's not that doomed Supreme God, anything from the Gold side works.'
Drawing it would change his standing entirely, sure—but whatever. He'd caused enough chaos on that front already, in more ways than one, and it was a headache he didn't need.
Just then:
“What's the matter, you still haven't drawn yours?”
“And that's the end of Azure, then.”
Azure's team gritted their teeth at the sneers from those aligned with the Red faith.
The Gold Cardinal had his eyes closed, murmuring what looked like an incantation over something.
“Hurry it along.”
At those words, Shuri turned to Isaac with a face tight with tension.
Isaac lifted his orb and channeled his holy power into it.
'God of Wealth! God of Wealth!'
The God of Wealth fell just short of an Upper God, but that was fine by him!
'Wealth! Money! Cash!'
The God Summoning worked by the fervency of the priest's prayer drawing the deity down—calling a specific god's name made it all the more likely to answer.
Light began to shimmer across Isaac's orb. But the crest and name that soon appeared made Isaac flinch in shock.
[Hold on. Isn't this the crest of the Supreme God?]
The crest blazed brilliantly, as if to say look at me—but Isaac merely twitched his eyebrows.
No! I don't need it!
'God of Wealth, God of Wealth, GOD OF WEALTH!'
As if answering Isaac's desperate prayer, the crest began to shift—and the corners of his mouth slid smoothly upward.
Yes! That's it! That's the one!
It's here!
'The Gold God of Wealth!'
At that sight, the priests began to stir. And as the crest's final form locked into place, Isaac's grin stretched all the way to his ears.
“Yes! The Cash God…”
But it was at that very moment.
The crest changed again—shoving the God of Wealth aside, almost as if to say out of my way.
'Huh?'
At the newly transformed sigil, the entire assembly erupted into murmurs.
[That is the Supreme God.]
…I beg your pardon?
I'm sorry—WHAT?!!