A Catechism of Faith, and One Stubborn Inquisitor
"Third verse of the Prayer."
"That all creation may take the great Deva as its mother."
"The Tenth Penance."
"The penance of absolute want — neither eating, nor drinking, nor sleeping."
"From the Book of Marao, chapter eight, verse thirty."
"When the Mammonites invaded, Priest Raven raised a sturdy wall and built an altar upon it. On top of the wall he set up scarecrows. The Goddess, taking pity on them, transformed the scarecrows into soldiers of heaven, and the Mammonites, stricken with terror at the sight, fled."
Ooooh—
Even the Inquisitors listening from around the compartment found themselves genuinely impressed by the way Simon answered, smooth and unhesitating. Metin, spurred on by spite, had bombarded him with questions for nearly twenty minutes straight, and Simon hadn't wavered once.
"Seriously? Chapter eight of Marao? I couldn't remember that kind of detail even about my own life."
"He's remarkable."
"Rookie, call it quits. Why are you so desperate to catch the one pious man on this train?"
Metin's teeth ground together.
Impossible. It made no sense. A guy reeking of necromancy from head to toe was sitting right in front of him, and he was just supposed to let him walk?
His molars ground again. He should have skipped the interrogation entirely and gone straight for the neck. If Simon passed the interrogation this cleanly, wouldn't that mean he — Metin — was the one forced to vouch for Simon's faith?
"Hey."
Lead Inquisitor Baccara's face had hardened. He, too, was getting fed up with his subordinate's one-man crusade.
"We don't have time to keep him held up here."
"Just one. Let me ask one final question."
Metin shoved his face right up close to Simon, practically chewing the words as he spoke.
"The Eighth Penance."
"The penance of rolling one's body over boiling sand and enduring it for four days."
"No, not that one."
Metin smirked.
"You said you're an apprentice priest, right? Then tell me — in eeevery last detail — what happened in the two hours right after you finished the Eighth Penance. It was recent, so you'd remember it perfectly, no? Stumble, and it's over. Go."
A detailed account of past memory.
If this were an experience the man had never actually lived through, the longer his answer ran, the more likely mistakes would creep in — or lies would pile up.
But Simon, showing not a flicker of panic, drew in a slow breath.
"When I rose to my feet at the end of the Eighth Penance, my throat was scorched and my skin had peeled away entirely — the pain was exquisite. And a little ways off, an elder who had camped out for days watching my penance…"
"Ugh, dying already. Don't tell me his whole appearance too?"
"A man in his fifties, dark-skinned, with heavy brows and thick lips, furrowed his brow and handed me a canteen. He told me that looking at me reminded him of his firstborn son — a boy who, at only sixteen, had ruined his immune system with reckless penance and that same year fell ill and returned to the Goddess's embrace. The elder admitted there was a time he'd resented the Goddess for taking his son so soon. But when he looked at me…"
"Enough! Enough! That's quite enough!"
Baccara bellowed, cutting Simon off mid-sentence.
Metin and the other Inquisitors glared at him. Metin was protesting that he was being denied his interrogation; the others, that he'd cut off the story right at its crucial moment. Baccara brushed them all off lightly.
"Our thanks to the faithful brother for his cooperation! It was deeply discourteous of us to doubt your faith even for a moment. Now — let's move!"
Baccara and the Inquisitors crossed over to the second-class carriage. Metin thrashed and insisted he had to see the interrogation through to the end, but his seniors grabbed him by the scruff and dragged him out.
With a heavy thud, the compartment door closed, and only then did the tension drain away. Simon let out a long breath of relief.
"Is it over?"
As if on cue, Lethe came striding down the corridor, snow-white hair billowing behind her.
"Yeah. Somehow got through it fine."
"No last-minute trouble?"
"Metin sank his teeth in like a rabid dog, but everything he asked was on the list we prepared."
"Good to know all that forced memorization paid off."
She shuffled into the compartment looking utterly exhausted and slumped back against the seat. Simon spoke up.
"Fine, I was held up by the Inquisitor — but what took you so long?"
Lethe waved her hand as if to say don't even get me started.
"By the book, start to finish. That insane woman made me strip down to my underclothes! Inquisitor discipline or not, who does that nowadays? Unbelievably irritating."
She propped an elbow on the windowsill and vented her fury. Simon forced a smile and changed the subject.
"So all the hard parts are behind us now?"
"Yes. All done. We're going straight to the Tree of Life in one shot, so start banking your strength."
That, of course, was nothing more than the two of them hoping.
"Fun! Times! In heresy interrogation, you little punk!"
Metin stubbornly kept adding heresy-interrogation sessions to his schedule, and he devoted the majority of his allotted hours to grilling Simon.
And Simon, answering shoulder squared and tongue unbroken as if daring the man to ask, gave every bit as good as he got.
The two waged a war of nerves, trading interrogation and answer, interrogation and answer — and every single round ended the same way: Baccara or one of the senior Inquisitors hauling Metin off with a growl of that's enough.
And so came the second day of the train journey.
Simon, having been tormented by Metin yet again, was leaning his head against the window with a tired, worn expression.
…
Metin, having harvested nothing of value, was about to move on to the next compartment when Lethe, who had been staring at his back with narrowed eyes, called him to a stop.
"Inquisitor."
"What is it."
Metin turned to look at her. Lethe rested her chin on her hand and replied curtly.
"Once you're done with the interrogations, come see me for a moment."
A short while later, Metin — having finished the heresy interrogation in another compartment — walked up to Lethe. Brushing back his hair with an insolent tilt to his stance, he said,
"You called for me?"
On the way over, he had contemplated slipping in one more question — but Simon had gone to the bathroom and was nowhere in sight.
Lethe rose from her seat and stepped into the corridor, crooking a finger in a wordless follow me.
"Senior Ellen, you come too."
"Ah — yes, ma'am!"
With Ellen in tow, Lethe kept walking. They passed compartment after compartment until they reached the cargo hold at the very tail of the train.
"What is it, priestess?"
Metin asked, his voice dripping with irritation.
"I've got duties this afternoon, so make it quick."
"Senior Ellen."
Lethe turned her head and said,
"Look away."
"I'm sorry?"
CRUNCH!
Ellen's eyes went wide. Metin was staggering, clutching his stomach.
Crack!
This time her knee drove up into his nose. Blood streamed down his face as he wobbled back against the wall.
Then Lethe seized him by the hair, yanked him forward, and slapped him across the cheek with a sharp crack!
"Ah— ah…!"
Ellen clamped her hands over her mouth, trembling with terror. Lethe's voice was chillingly flat.
"Senior. I said look away."
"Ah — yes! Yes ma'am!"
Bam! Crack! Snap! Thud!
The cargo hold ran red. Blood poured in ribbons from his nose and mouth, and even as he took the one-sided beating, Metin didn't raise a guard and didn't strike back. Only the murderous glare in his eyes never wavered.
"Hey."
Lethe grabbed him by the collar.
"You know you're really scummy, right? Why do you keep messing with him? Is this your plan to tie me to that kid and lock us both up?"
Metin spat onto the floor. A single blood-soaked tooth rolled across the boards.
"I'm only doing my job."
"Funny how you don't give a damn about my face, though, huh?"
SMACK!
Another slap across the cheek — and for the first time, Metin crumpled to the ground.
"Frustrating, isn't it?"
Lethe seized the front of his Efnel uniform and hurled it up into the air as she spoke.
"Then take off the badge and cling to your pride, you idiot."
At those words, Metin grabbed the Inquisitor's badge pinned to his clothing, ripped it free, and slammed it into the floor. Raising his divinity, he pulled a spiked mace from his subspace pocket.
"You're dead now—"
CRRAAASSSH!
Before Metin could even register it, the sole of Lethe's shoe had ground his face into the floor and dragged him all the way to the wall.
"K—khagh…!"
A speed he couldn't react to.
Overwhelming strength.
Metin's trembling pupils stared straight ahead. In the dark cargo hold, two golden eyes glinted like drawn blades. And wrapped around her arm, sometime in the last few seconds, was a serpent-like living creature.
Metin swallowed without meaning to.
He had been utterly dominated.
This was a first-year?
"Gah!"
Metin instantly grabbed her white leg to pin it in place and swung his other fist. He'd meant to snap the limb right then and there — but her planted left leg came down like an axe and kicked his head skyward.
BOOM!
His body flew backward and shattered a wooden crate. Buried in a cloud of grain dust, he coughed and wheezed.
"GRAAAAAGH!"
Metin thrust out his right fist and clenched it. Ten fangs of divinity, conjured from every direction, flew in at once — but Lethe simply spread a protective barrier around herself and weathered them.
Then she pressed her palms together in prayer.
HAAAAAA!
A blessing activated, and a raging windstorm erupted from her body. Her white hair lengthened until it brushed the floor, and her golden eyes blazed brilliantly.
Lethe's Original — La Venue
At the overwhelming pulse of power, Metin swallowed hard.
When Lethe extended her right arm, the mouth of the white dragon coiled around it gaped open, and a sword of dazzling prismatic light sprang forth.
"I'll carve you to ribbons — right up to the edge of death."
Just as she stomped the floor and lunged—
"Lethe! Priestess Lethe!"
Ellen shrieked in horror.
"S-someone's coming! They're coming this way!"
…
She clicked her tongue. They must have been too loud in the cargo hold — a passenger had apparently gone and told the Inquisitors.
Lethe released the blessings she'd cast on herself.
"Ran."
Ran coiled around Metin's body, binding him limb to limb, and dragged him before her. Crouching down, she laid a hand on his face.
"Ghhk! What do you think you're—!"
"Quiet."
Radiant light washes over the wounds.
Metin's body began to recover at astonishing speed.
He was stunned. This woman — her healing arts were genuinely high-caliber. Before he could get a single word out, his face was fully restored.
"Minimal compensation, that's all. Whether you go sniveling to your seniors about getting beat up by Efnel is your business."
…
She withdrew Ran into her subspace pocket and left the cargo hold with Ellen in tow.
Metin sat dazed on the floor. For a moment he could hear Lethe and Baccara arguing out in the corridor; then she departed, and Baccara came inside.
"Good grief."
Taking in the wrecked cargo hold and Metin slumped on the ground — unhurt, but with the soul gone out of his eyes — Baccara gave a hollow laugh.
"Knew it'd come to this. I told you to leave it alone, didn't I?"
…
"You get hit? Be honest. Efnel may be their absolute jurisdiction, but if I report to the professors, I can at least push through an internal disciplinary action."
Metin hauled himself unsteadily to his feet. Then he picked up his fallen hat, beat the dust out of it, and put it back on.
"Nothing happened."
"Ha. You damn fool."
"And the interrogations will continue as scheduled."
Metin staggered out of the cargo hold. Baccara watched his retreating back and shook his head.
Back in the compartment from the bathroom, Simon was worrying about Lethe.
She had vanished without a word, and a long time had passed without her returning. The women's bathroom was directly across the corridor — if she'd gone there, their paths should have crossed somewhere along the way.
Just as he began to rise, wondering if something had happened—
"Why are you half-crouching over there like that?"
Lethe was strolling calmly down the corridor. Behind her, Ellen kept darting guilty little glances his way.
"You disappeared without a word. I was worried."
"I'm not so frail as to need your worrying."
When Lethe waved briskly toward Ellen, the girl scurried into her own compartment and sat down. Lethe returned to their compartment and took the seat across from Simon.
Before long, she let out a sigh.
"Something happened, didn't it?"
"Not telling. And honestly — it was nothing."
Simon studied her quietly for a moment, then looked away.
"If that's what you say, I'll believe you."
With a faint smile, Simon turned his attention back to the scripture laid open on the desk.
…
Belief.
He wasn't sure. Could something like trust truly exist between a Priest and a necromancer?
Lethe opened a fresh bottle of wine.