Adaptation (12)
Having fled the funeral hall and hidden myself in the cult's reception room, I had sneakily lifted the curtain to peek at the commotion outside only to lock eyes with the cult's faithful, at which point I yanked the curtain back down in a panic.
“Oooooh! The Goddess Incarnate has graced me with her gaze! She shall grant me inspiration!”
“She wasn't looking at you! She was looking at me!”
“Speak no nonsense! The Goddess's eyes were upon ME!”
Whatever solemn dignity the funeral had possessed was long gone, replaced by a street dyed in madness, and once again I was forced to confront the truth of it — that goddess, and those believers of hers.
Ordinary worshippers, fine, I could forgive that. But why were the people who were supposed to be reining this in — the pontiff, the bishops — behaving exactly the same way? Seriously, that goddess really did come with that kind of congregation.
Scowling at the window through my disgust, I finally turned away from it all with a long sigh.
There they were — the Incompetent Dog and the Baldy, both with their foreheads pressed to the floor.
It was punishment for showing up not to protect their mistress in her time of need, but merely to spectate. And yet the two of them looked utterly at ease.
Within the Aln household they were nothing more than a mere knight and servant, but elsewhere either of them could have shouldered plenty of serious responsibilities — a little forehead-to-the-floor was surely nothing to men like them.
Even knowing that, I made no effort to commute their sentence. It was never really about physical strain anyway; the whole point was to grind down their pride.
“Umm... excuse me. Lucy?”
“What. You worthless fox, with nothing going for you but that soft, fluffy fur.”
“Might it not be time to release me? At this rate I fear my mind shall truly leave my body behind.”
“Your intelligence really is deficient. I'm doing this BECAUSE I want your mind to leave your body. Idiot.”
The Face-obsessed Fox, cradled in my arms, rebelled with a trembling voice, but I turned a deaf ear to her complaints.
You claim you'd protect me from the other perverts, and then when I actually needed you, you joined their ranks? Never. Absolutely unforgivable. Until you've clawed your way out of this cult, you're going to be my emotional-support plush toy.
Having effortlessly subdued the squirming fox, I settled onto the sofa and let my gaze wander around the room.
When I'd surveyed this reception room before acquiring my Aesthetic Sense skill, nothing had caught my attention. My whole reaction had been something like, "Nice, clean place."
But now, with the skill in hand, everything was different. Now that I'd received my blessing from that stalker Crow, I could understand just how meticulously this room had been designed.
The placement of the furniture. The color balance between the furnishings and the walls. The design of the tableware in use. Every element that might have seemed trivial was steeped in artistic sensibility.
Whoever designed this place was without a doubt the Pervert Apostle. No one but him could have pulled off this kind of eccentric extravagance.
As I found myself marveling anew at the Pervert Apostle's brilliance, an amusing idea suddenly occurred to me.
In the game, the Aesthetic Sense skill was utterly useless beyond letting you buy expensive things on the cheap.
It was a fairly handy skill if you wanted to play a merchant and max out your gold, but beyond that, it had no real meaning whatsoever.
But that was the story inside a game. Now that the game had become reality, couldn't things be different? Say, for example... finding the beauty in martial arts and using it to optimize...
“Incompetent Dog.”
“Yes, my lady!”
“Can you not bark at a reasonable volume? You're loud. Or what — are you deliberately lodging a complaint with me?”
“My deepest apologies. I will correct it at once.”
“Ahh. So you *don't* want forgiveness, is that it? You're picking fights because you want me to curse you out on purpose? You freak. You're so gross I don't even want to step on you.”
“I am truly sorry, my lady.”
“Enough. Quit the chit-chat, get up, and swing your sword.”
However inexplicable the request might have been, Carl rose from his spot without a moment's hesitation and carried out my order.
In an instant, the blade drawn from his hip carved through empty air. I had watched Carl's swordsmanship until my eyes bled back in the Aln territory, but now it looked new to me.
The first thing that caught my eye was the hand gripping the sword. After long years of wielding a blade, his hand had become one with the weapon itself.
To anyone ignorant of the sword, it would have looked like nothing worth remarking on, but through my newly acquired Aesthetic Sense, that hand looked like a work of art.
His swordplay was the same. At a glance there seemed to be nothing special about it, yet to the me of right now, it gleamed as precious as gold.
Only — it didn't look perfect. Something was missing. One step further and it would become truly beautiful, but I couldn't tell what that missing piece was.
Ughhh. SO frustrating.
“Do you require more?”
Just as I stood there frowning in contemplation, Carl spoke up carefully.
“Keep going.”
I strained to find the flaw in his swordwork, but the harder I frowned, the more my irritation simply grew.
Ultimately unable to arrive at an answer, I restored Carl to his original position — face down on the floor — and seated myself on the Baldy's back beside him.
“Ah— my lady!?”
“Is something wrong with my ears? Since when do chairs talk?”
The Baldy let out a bewildered cry, but at my next words he clamped his mouth shut. He had understood exactly where he stood as the punished party.
Carl was likewise biting his lip in silence. Knowing that dog, he was probably fighting the urge to wonder why the Baldy had stolen his spot.
For reasons unknown, the Baldy's back trembled slightly as I crossed my arms atop it and turned my thoughts to the potential I'd glimpsed in Aesthetic Sense.
In the end, aesthetic sense was, quite literally, instinct. It was something you came to know naturally — by looking, by feeling, by living it through your body.
In the game, no one had ever found a way to express that, so the skill had ended up as garbage. But now that everything was real, it was different.
I could find beauty not merely in appraising an object's value, but in everything I saw and felt.
No wonder the Crow had made such a spectacle of herself.
This skill is legitimately, INSANELY overpowered!
Humming with delight, I rose from the Baldy's back, thinking that maybe now I could finally understand why the fox and the perverts lost their minds the way they did.
Hmm.
Hmmmm.
She's definitely pretty and cute, no argument there.
In fact, it's to the point where I can't even find a single thing I'd want to change.
It's also true that she'd draw every eye in the room without even trying.
But was all that screaming really necessary?
Examining my reflection in a full-length mirror, I struck pose after pose — surely if I played up my charms a little, I'd see what they saw — but in the end, I simply couldn't sympathize with the perverts.
I suppose even the prettiest face in the world is hard to lose yourself in when it's your own. Narcissists really are an impressive breed, in their own way.
THUD!
At the sound of something collapsing like a toppled statue, I turned my head — and froze solid at the sight of the Pervert Apostle sprawled outside the door.
Uh. How long has he been watching? It can't have been long, right?! RIGHT?!
<Since you seem like the curious type, I'll tell you — I've been watching since you started puffing out your cheeks.>
'...Why didn't you SAY anything?!'
<And why would I? A cute child being cute is a heartwarming thing to behold.>
'Not heartwarming for the person BEING cute, it isn't?!'
As I stamped my feet on the spot, my face blazing scarlet, a discreet cough sounded beside me.
Erin and Alsaetin had turned their heads away and were valiantly fighting down their laughter.
Realizing there was no escape from this black page of my history, I dragged my knees up onto the sofa and buried my face in the fox's fur.
The Face-obsessed Fox, who had fainted dead away long before this, docilely concealed my burning face from the world.
After the entire cult turned out to see Lucy Aln off, the pontiff of the Art Cult slipped away from the fevered streets and returned to her place of work, where she exhaled a long, long breath.
She knew perfectly well that her duties were stacking up beyond counting — and yet not a single one of them would come within her grasp.
The inspiration that girl had left behind — Lucy Aln, a girl so far beyond belief that calling her the Goddess Incarnate was frankly the more convincing explanation — was still shaking her heart to its foundations.
If not for her position as pontiff, she too would have been pouring out her inspiration to her heart's content by now, just like every other believer!
...Do I really have to work right now?
She could put the work off until later, surely. But inspiration was a fickle thing — fail to seize it in the moment, and it might slip away forever.
Even if it caused a few problems, wouldn't completing a work of art that elevated the cult's prestige actually benefit the cult all the more?
Right in the middle of this relentless self-rationalization — a thing no leader of any organization should ever permit herself — the door to her office swung open, and Frete appeared.
Entering without so much as a knock was a breach of etiquette, but neither the pontiff nor Frete gave it a moment's thought.
For two people who had walked side by side since long ago, trivial courtesies had never meant anything at all.
“Did she depart well?”
“She left shouting that every pervert in this building should be thrown into prison.”
“Honestly. There's no hope of ever bringing the young lady back to us, then.”
“You never know. Last time, she said she'd never set foot anywhere a freak like you served as apostle, no matter what.”
At the sight of Frete's contented smile, the pontiff's eyes turned predatory.
You rotten bastard. Have you been monopolizing someone like her all this time? The other believers, fine — but you should have thought to share that joy with me, the pontiff of all people.
“My, my. Your expression looks strange.”
“It's not strange. I'm glaring at you.”
“No courtesy toward an apostle?”
“Shouldn't *you* be showing courtesy to the pontiff of your own cult?”
“Courtesy?”
The moment Frete let out a soft snort, the pontiff's face twisted — but her wrath did not last long.
Before she could work up a genuine scream, Frete drew a single painting from within his coat.
It depicted Lucy Aln gazing into a mirror, cheeks puffed out — so vivid it might have been the scene itself lifted straight from reality.
“So tell me. Who, precisely, owes whom courtesy?”
“...What is this?”
“A painting of the young lady making cute faces at her reflection. On an apostle's honor, I swear it differs from the true scene in no particular whatsoever.”
The pontiff swallowed involuntarily at the sight of it, yet after long deliberation, she shook her head, casting off the temptation.
“I have at least five more paintings much like this one. Are you quite certain you need nothing?”
“...Forgive me! Apostle of the cult! I knew not my place!”
She couldn't resist. There was simply far too much in Frete's hands.
Even after the pontiff meekly admitted defeat and bowed her head, Frete's arrogance showed no sign of relenting.
“And this is all the leader of our cult can manage?”
What the hell. What does he have now? There's MORE?
Frete met the pontiff's dumbfounded eyes as she slowly raised her head, and deliberately crossing his arms, he pressed on.
“The young lady of Aln has granted permission — we may create any art related to her as we please.”
“...Seriously?”
“Seriously.”
“On the Goddess?”
“On my art.”
“FUCK! Hey! Frete! I love you, you magnificent bastard!”
“Get away from me at once, Pontiff! Why are you like THIS?!”