How to Become the Alpha (5)

Luka had picked this forest as the site of his trial for no particular reason. Of the handful of places left once the dungeons were ruled out, this one had simply been the most fitting. Some spots looked far too easy for someone like Lucy, others difficult to the point of excess; some were crowded enough that she risked being spotted, while others lay so distant the timing could never have worked. Weigh it all together, and what remained was this dead forest.

He had begun fretting over it that morning, made up his mind by noon, and dragged her out here by evening—which meant preparing for this place in advance had been impossible. Had the forest been well known, she could plausibly have claimed to know it from the start, but even that was a stretch. The Dead Forest was wreathed in nothing but ugly rumors: nobles felt no reason to come anywhere near it, superstitious adventurers would not so much as set foot inside, and while priests did visit with some regularity, they did so only as caretakers, keeping the assorted evil spirits from slipping out beyond its borders. Plainly put, there was nothing about the Dead Forest for the world to know. And so he could state it with certainty: studying this forest in advance was impossible. How does one study a place about which nothing is known?

And yet, bizarrely, Lucy Aln knew this forest intimately. Her steps through those black woods, where one could hardly see an arm's length ahead, knew no hesitation.

Had nothing appeared at the end of her stride, he might have dismissed it as baseless confidence. But that was not the case. Something always waited at the end of Lucy Aln's steps—and every one of those somethings held tremendous sway over this forest. They were the very things anyone who knew of it would, with a single voice, warn must never be met.

When she felled the first evil spirit, he thought it coincidence. When she met the second, he felt a flicker of doubt. By the third, a single thought had taken root; once the fourth was down, he judged the possibility high; and now, facing the forest's true master, he had arrived at certainty.

What was Lucy Aln's purpose here? She meant to purify this forest—this forest that, ever since the necromancer set foot in it in the distant past, no one had ever thought to save. This forest, judged not worth the effort, left to rot under a mere holding pattern. She meant to return it to what it once was.

Why? That much was surely not Lucy Aln's own will. It would be the will of something far above her—of whatever being had so profoundly shaped the Lucy Aln of today.

The corrupt thing that had unmistakably dyed this forest in death was vast beyond measure. It had smothered the light of moon and stars beneath black miasma, and where the forest's guiding lords had vanished, it had filled the vacancy to overflowing with its own power. In no sense was it a light existence. Even Luka, a professor of the Academy, could feel its pressure.

An ordinary citizen who faced that thing would have dropped to his knees, crying out the name of whatever ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠god he trusted. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠A seasoned adventurer, meeting it, would not have been fool enough to draw a weapon—he would have fled at once to carry word of what he'd seen. Had the lord of the neighboring territory laid eyes on it, he would have begged the Church for deliverance rather than face it himself.

A thing that flaunted its existence while blotting out the very sky was not something a first-year Academy student could stand against alone. It was the sort of creature a knight order of the Church should be dispatched to exterminate.

Had the girl standing there been merely a first-year, Luka would have stepped in and struck the spirit down in her stead. He was a man who threw his students onto the borderline between life and death—not a man who threw them into death itself.

But this once, and this once only, Luka had not. He felt no reason to. Nor was Luka any exception; anyone who saw Lucy Aln shining like a sun at the heart of the forest would have thought the same.

Luka had watched. He watched her walk toward a corrupt presence that would wring a scream from anyone. Watched her, having seen the spectacle at its very center, steel herself to fight rather than freeze in terror. Watched her stand proud as a lamp in the dark, gathering every spirit's gaze onto herself alone. Watched her lift her voice against the master of the forest. And watched her carry the battle against that corrupt existence without yielding a single step.

The curses spewed by the surrounding spirits were not even permitted to land on Lucy. The corrupt miasma of the forest's master fared no better; the power that should have rotted and blackened all it touched did nothing before her but scatter like smoke. The spirits risen from the soil were purified the instant they brushed her divinity, and the spells of the forest's master proved little different.

Lucy's attacks, on the other hand, were always a threat. Every time she swung her mace, the forest master's colossal frame shuddered, and a moan of agony rolled across the entire forest. Every time she kindled her divinity, the spirits around her thinned and scattered. This was beyond anything the word advantage could explain.

Overwhelming strength, impossible for a girl of that age.

He had worked long years in the field. He had taught any number of students at the Academy. He had seen countless stars etched before his eyes—and because he knew, better than anyone, what the most brilliant of those stars looked like, Luka could not help but breathe out a sound of awe.

"That... is a first-year at the Academy?"

Had the one standing there been the Saintess of the Church of the Main God, Luka would have ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠understood. Chosen by god, tempering her divinity since childhood, she had already worked miracles in many a place.

But the one standing there was no Saintess. Until only a few years ago, she had been a brat who flung insults at god without a second thought—a child who would long since have been erased for blasphemy, were it not for House Aln's prestige. That girl, carrying divinity of such scale.

"'The One Favored by God,' was it."

Luka, well-versed in the rumors of the Academy, knew the nickname Lucy had lately acquired. The One Favored by God. A ridiculous moniker pinned on her merely for being close to Phoebe—and yet, somehow, Luka found himself thinking it suited her perfectly.

Come to think of it, didn't she say the reason she'd changed was that she'd heard the word of god?

Luka disliked applying the phrase "beloved by god" to those who made great names. In his view, it had cause and effect turned on their heads. He did not believe talent was a gift handed down as god's largesse; rather, god watched those with talent and chose them. It was because they had the makings of greatness from the start that they caught god's eye.

In that sense, Lucy Aln was, without question, one loved by god. She was someone he judged to possess talent worthy of a great god's favor.

"My, my. For all the pride I take in my craft, it seems even I must bow my head before god."

The great god was, in this trade, Luka's senior. When the one who had forged countless suns across a long and storied history had set His eye first, what business did Luka have playing games?

Admiring the sight of Lucy holding the forest's master at bay with her mace, Luka soon let out a low chuckle. He had to concede it: a greater craftsman's hand had already touched Lucy. And that he himself would be nothing but an obstruction in shaping the star she was becoming.

Hmm. Perhaps I shall simply watch from the side and steal a lesson or two. Let us see just how skilled my senior truly is. And perhaps, here and there, slip in a touch of my own taste as well. Though whether I'll be granted permission is another matter entirely.

"Eck♡ So proud of that big ol' body of yours, auntie?♡ Wow, what unique taste you have. What are you, half human and half orc?♡ It really, really suits you~♡"

Mm. Before any of that, I ought to worry whether my magic will even take hold on the young Lady Aln. She left the Academy's standard far behind some time ago; were she to work in the field right now, she would be counted a first-rate professional. Honestly, it makes me a touch uneasy. If my magic fails, how am I to plead my case? Would she be satisfied if I offered her my life on a string? I do hope so. I have no particular wish to kill myself just yet. Even in death, there is one thing I want above all: to see her drain the color from the light I once beheld.

"Spirits incoming!"

"Got it!"

From the moment the festival at Partran Territory ended, I had shut myself up on the estate, but those weeks had been stuffed to bursting with training. Through every waking hour of daylight I drilled alongside the knights of House Aln, and by night, in practice mode, I practiced handling divinity with Grandpa. On top of that, Bishop Johann had made a habit of visiting our manor whenever he could spare the time to teach me this and that, so the me before vacation began and the me standing here now might as well have been two different people where handling divinity was concerned.

This was one fruit of all that. Light of Purification. A sacred spell that served as the root of the miracle Grandpa had shown when we faced the evil god of fire at Menesteil. Its effect was simple: to purge every corrupt thing around you with the light of divinity. As with all magic of its kind, it depended enormously on the divinity of its caster.

And the divinity I carried was the Chief God's own divinity—granted directly by that loser Chief God. Before a divinity that even evil gods found threatening, what chance did a pack of petty wraiths have of holding their ground?

The spirits that had risen from the earth at the necromancer's summons could not bear the light and turned, one and all, back toward wherever it was they belonged.

"You bar my way yet again, is it... O Paladin!"

With the battle at full heat, the necromancer had lost her reason entirely. She no longer sought her daughter's name. Identifying me with the paladin she had beheld in the past, she moved for one purpose only: to kill me.

Okay. Beat her down a little more first, weaken her, and then...

"She cannot be persuaded."

"...I wasn't planning to try anything like that, you know."

"I know you full well. Think I've seen your kind only once or twice?"

Truthfully, I had thought it. That things might drift somewhere other than the way the game had written them. That maybe, the way it had with Karia, some way out existed. But I'd watched the standard, tragic ending until I was sick of it. Given the chance, I wanted—just this once—to see a different ending.

But Grandpa declared to me without hesitation: the road back had already burned behind me. What I was reaching for now was impossible.

"Harbor no regrets. What must be severed must be severed."

"...Yeah. I suppose so."

I knew it too, honestly. The reason Karia could be saved was that she was still alive. A necromancer already devoured by the spirits she commanded had no path of rescue left.

"End it. That is the only road to her salvation."

Letting the last of my hesitation go, I poured divinity into the head of my mace.

The evolution of Sacred Pugilism into Divine Martial Arts had brought ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠more than one change. Channeling divinity into a weapon had grown far easier. I could now wring greater force from less divinity than before. And one thing more: I had gained a technique worthy of the word finisher.

I drew a deep breath and heaved the mace overhead. As every trace of divinity running through my body converged, a small sun kindled above the mace's head. The gentle, warm light washed across the forest—and the necromancer shrieked in horror, frantically dragging her power together. But strength sapped by battle after battle was in no state to withstand the Chief God's divinity.

The mace came down, and the sun fell from the heavens—and every last shred of corruption in that whole stretch of forest was wiped from the face of the world.

*Ding—!*