The Saintess of the Stars
Before the Gate of Divinity.
The Efnel students who had finished their dispatch mission in the Neutral Zone stood in a long line, waiting to return to the Holy Federation.
Lethe and Lirinet were waiting their turn like everyone else.
"Our team got really lucky, all things considered!"
Lirinet said cheerfully.
By rights, they should have seen their dispatch scores slashed to ribbons for losing a head-to-head match against Kizen students. But Figaro, their team leader, had unleashed a horrific massacre in the Neutral Zone, and Efnel had taken the stance of denying every last connection to him.
Naturally, a gag order had fallen over Lirinet and her teammates regarding the mission itself — Lethe had warned them all to watch their mouths, too.
"Still, coming down to the surface this time taught me a lot! It felt like realizing I'd been a frog in a well — er, on a cloud! Next time I'm definitely not losing to any necromancer, so I'll work hard on my faith and…… Sister Lethe! Are you even listening to me right now?"
Lirinet turned her head. Lethe's forehead and both cheeks were flushed scarlet, cold sweat streaming down her face as she panted shallow breaths.
Lirinet pressed a hand to her forehead.
"Wah! Your forehead's like a ball of fire! Are you really okay?"
"I'm fiiiine."
Lethe dragged out the reply with great effort and shuffled a step forward.
"You are absolutely not fine! Did you eat something bad? Or catch some disease out in the Neutral Zone? Should I cast a Cure spell on you?"
"……Not thaaaat."
"Let me support you, then."
"I said I'm fine."
While the two of them bickered back and forth, the line dwindled away, and soon it was their turn. They passed through the Gate of Divinity along with the other Efnel students and returned to the Holy Federation.
"?!"
The moment they stepped through the gate, an astonishing sight spread out before them.
An armed company of soldiers — swords, shields, and full plate armor — was planted squarely in their path, waiting.
Pa-Paladins?
At the sudden intrusion of armed troops, the other Efnel students were thrown into confusion too, eyes darting every which way.
"Student Lethe Shardena."
A man in armor bearing an especially ornate crest stepped forward from their ranks.
"You are under suspicion of obstructing an official execution of Federation duties."
A murmur rippled through the crowd!
The sudden turn of events plunged the Efnel students into chaos.
"Do you acknowledge the charge of launching a preemptive strike against Paladins carrying out the Federation's orders?"
But Lethe, face crimson, was too busy gulping down air to properly hear a word of it.
The Paladin took her silence as an exercise of her right to remain silent, and his expression twisted.
"Continuing to ask questions here would be a waste of time. Take her away."
Two Paladins advanced on Lethe, golden chains in hand. Lethe still showed no movement of any kind, only kept gasping for breath.
"W-Wait just a moment!"
Lirinet hastily spread her arms and blocked Lethe from behind.
"Lethe's in far too poor condition to be interrogated right now! At least wait until she's recovered her health—!"
"Do you think such an obvious excuse will work?"
"The order is to bring her in immediately. Efnel student or not, there's nothing to be done until the charges are cleared."
Despite Lirinet's protest, the Paladins kept closing in.
"Move aside!"
"I-I will absolutely not move!"
In the end, a Paladin shoved Lirinet by the shoulder and knocked her down.
As she sat sprawled on her rear, sparks lit in Lirinet's eyes.
"Everyone, what do you think you're doing!"
She twisted around and screamed until her voice cracked.
"Are you all just going to stand there and WATCH while those thugs drag Sister Lethe away?!"
The words were barely out of her mouth—
WHOOOOSH!
Divinity surged skyward from every direction with terrifying force. The Efnel students standing around the Gate of Divinity whipped up their fighting spirit and began applying the pressure.
The Paladins advancing on Lethe flinched to a halt.
"Get lost, right now!"
"Who do you think you are, trying to arrest an Efnel student?"
"Obstructing official duties? That Lethe Shardena?"
When the previously quiet students suddenly joined forces and raised their voices, cold sweat broke out across the Paladins' brows.
"P-Please calm down!"
"Nothing has been proven yet, so an investigation—!"
The students did not retreat a single step.
"Get lost, I said!"
"You do realize how incredibly dirty this looks, doing this in front of the Gate of Divinity?"
"That's right! If you're so righteous, come to Sky Island and go through proper procedure to take her!"
Lethe might have a rather cold face and a habit of settling things with her fists, but she was still Efnel's finest first-year, the sole object of everyone's respect and envy.
Above all, the ocean-vast divine power she commanded was the very proof of her faith.
Any student who felt belonging at Efnel would naturally never stand by and let an outsider spirit away the academy's greatest student.
"Th-This is obstruction of a lawful investigation!"
"Obstruction? You're the blasphemers here!"
Just as the Efnel students and the Paladins stood locked in tense confrontation—
"Make way."
A single voice cut through the crowd with crushing authority.
A man in mithril-wrought armor and a blue cloak — one who even kept at his side the 'Drake', hailed as the finest of all flying divine beasts.
"……An Arch Paladin!"
Paladins, alongside the Heresy Inquisitors, were one of the Holy Federation's principal fighting forces.
And among them, the Arch Paladins stood on an entirely different plane from ordinary Paladins — so much so that they found it distasteful to share the same title of 'Paladin' at all. Only Efnel graduates were ever granted the qualification to become Arch Paladins.
In other words, these men were, in effect, the direct seniors of the very Efnel students before them.
"I said make way."
KUWOOOOOOR!
The Drake behind him unleashed a roar. Whether by some magical effect or not, fear bloomed openly across the students' faces.
In that moment, the Arch Paladin strode forward, shouldering even Lirinet out of the way, and planted himself in front of Lethe.
"Seems being a Saintess candidate has blinded you to your situation."
His gaze flickered with menace.
"We'll discuss the details inside."
Though a killing glare bored straight down at her, Lethe still wasn't hearing a word.
She seemed to lack even the strength to answer; by now she had simply collapsed onto the ground, heaving for breath. Her face and forehead burned like fire, and her breathing only grew rougher.
"……Run."
"What?"
White hair spilled down as her eyes rolled upward.
"I said…… run!"
FWOOOOOOOOOOSH!
A colossal flame erupted from Lethe's body. The Arch Paladin staggered backward, face twisted in horror.
The fire climbed as if to touch the very sky, flooding everything around with light.
Before anyone knew it, her figure had been swallowed whole by the blaze, no longer visible at all.
"S-Sister Letheee!"
Lirinet stretched out her arms, on the verge of tears, but the others rushed over and seized her.
"Let go of me! That's my roommate!"
"If you go in there, you'll die too, Sister!"
Lethe's sudden self-immolation — something no one could have foreseen.
Everyone stared at the roaring fire with hollow expressions, while the Arch Paladin's lips trembled violently.
Don't tell me……
The flames coiling around Lethe were turning white.
FWOOSH!
And then, as if it had all been a lie, the fire parted and faded away.
Lethe stood in place, her right palm pressed over her forehead and eyes.
A heavy silence fell — and into it, the Arch Paladin approached with a stiffened face and extended his arm.
"Hey, are you alr—"
At that moment, Lethe's voice rang through the air.
「 Touch me not. 」
She swung her arm as if to swat the Paladin's hand away. The sky flickered — and a road of clouds tore open.
"Wh-What is that?!"
"Kyaaaaaaah!"
Toward the direction her arm had swept, a comet came crashing down out of nowhere and slammed into the earth.
KUGUGUGUGUGUGUGU!
A fountain of divinity surged upward like the World Tree itself.
The tremendous shockwave sent wooden crates and cargo wagons flying through the air, entire. Every Paladin and student nearby crouched low or flattened themselves against the ground to endure it.
Ghk—!
The Arch Paladin, too, was pinned prone against the ground as he raised his head.
Where that star had fallen, a crater of jaw-dropping proportions now gaped open.
The terrain itself had changed.
'A-arrest her by any means necessary — those were my orders. But this……!'
In the span of mere minutes.
His target had become a being whose arrest authority fell laughably, immeasurably short.
Clank.
The Arch Paladin dropped to one knee before Lethe and drove his sword into the ground.
"……Gratula mi kibilis."
At their commander's gesture, every Paladin fell to their knees and declared in unison.
"Gratula mi kibilis! We greet the closest daughter of the Goddess!!"
All hell broke loose.
The inspection staff at the Gate of Divinity, the merchants, the administrators.
Even the Efnel students who had stood there at a loss began sinking to their knees, one after another. The Efnel faculty who had arrived to contain the situation were no different.
"S-Sister Lethe……"
Even Lirinet, her own friend, knelt before her. Everyone bowed low in reverence.
"We greet the closest daughter of the Goddess!"
Fwoooong!
A wind swept through.
As her white hair billowed, rings of divinity traced themselves around Lethe, and a mantle of Pure White Flame draped itself across her shoulders.
With every movement she made, divinity crackled and scattered like sparks.
She swept her bangs upward and stared straight ahead.
Within her pupils, faint but unmistakable, a star-shaped pattern had taken form.
'So this is where I stand at last.'
Watching the crowd prostrate in worship before her, Lethe came to a realization.
'We stand on the same line now, Simon.'
It was the moment the next master of the Essence of Purification was decided.
Livito Village, in the Neutral Zone.
There, a man covered head to toe in tattoos was sprinting for his life, gasping for breath.
"Damn it! Damn it! DAAAMN IIIIT!"
He screamed, half-sobbing.
"Please, just stop chasing me!"
Above the fleeing man, Simon bounded across rooftops, closing the distance between them with every leap.
Simon's pupils moved with sharp precision, cataloging the terrain around him. He spotted a long pole jutting out beside a shop roof, a shop sign hanging from it. Simon drew a line of Cloud from his body, lashed it to the pole, and dropped.
WHUUUUNG!
Sliding down the line, Simon drove both feet into the fleeing man's back.
"Ughk!"
The man's body flew several meters through the air before tumbling across the ground. Simon landed lightly, walked over, and clamped a pair of cuffs around his wrists.
'Cleanup of the stragglers is almost done, too.'
"Simon~"
From a village alley, Camibarez came walking toward him with a face lit up like sunshine.
"Ah, Cami! Caught a lot of— whoa!"
Behind her floated no fewer than five gang members, trapped inside bobbing droplets of blood.
She smiled brightly and clapped her hands together.
"Yep! Caught a whole bunch, Simon!"
In the course of the operation to wipe out the Sentinel Gang, Camibarez had somehow become the gang's living nightmare.
The mere sight of her sent the gangsters into convulsions; they no longer dared even meet her eyes.
"You shouldn't say mean things!"
Apparently catching something odd in his tone, she stretched out her arm — and the droplets of blood began vibrating up and down at high speed. The gang members, in agony, rolled about chaotically inside their cramped blood prisons.
Having silenced the gangsters, Camibarez turned back to Simon and flashed him a sweet smile.
"These are the people who tormented Sasha, so I'm going to work even harder and catch more of them!"
"……Cami, you're kind of terrifying when you're angry."
The Sentinel Gang being a cell-based syndicate made an outright, one-stroke annihilation difficult — but ever since Group 7 had joined the operation, the gang had been so battered it was practically finished. Every ranking officer had been caught and thrown in a cell; only the leftover stragglers remained. And thanks to all this, the people of the Neutral Zone's opinion of Kizen had climbed considerably.
Simon handed the gang member he'd caught over to Camibarez and got to his feet.
"Newspapers! Get your newspapers!"
Just then, a merchant caught his eye, an old bag stuffed full of papers.
Agent Block made a point of buying that very paper once a day, Simon recalled.
Curious what a Neutral Zone newspaper might be like, Simon walked over, paid the merchant a few silver coins, and bought a copy.
"Ah……!"
As he unfolded it, Simon's eyes went wide.
'So it's you now, Lethe.'
Simon's gaze dropped to the article's headline.
<The Saintess of the Stars, Lethe Shardena>