Chapter 5. Conviction and Reality (5)
Chapter 5. Conviction and Reality (5)
When two sides don't share a language, how do they communicate?
Usually, the way to do it is to spend a very long time studying each other's languages.
In fact, on Earth, religion did quite a lot of work in cases like this.
To proselytize to people who don't believe in God, you have to know the language of those you're trying to convert. The isolated side, after all, usually had no interest in the first place.
And so, in the past, many people who traveled to various countries to spread the faith stayed in those countries and worked to translate the Bible into their languages.
The problem was whether that would even work on a people when we didn't know whether they had writing—no, whether they even had a language at all.
More than anything, the Church had its hands full right now. They had not even finished sorting out the editions of Scripture, so how were they supposed to deliver Scripture to anyone else?
So the people of this world came up with a much simpler method.
"The ones you brought in...... those, 'Goblins'—there's an emotion they all have in common."
Han Yu-ri set the report down in front of her as she spoke.
"Fear."
Han Yu-ri said.
Her expression looked a little serious.
"That emotion is fear."
"Could it be that they're feeling that because of me?"
I asked seriously.
It wasn't strange to think so. My power was enough to burn Goblins in droves. No one could watch flames blazing right in front of them and not feel fear.
"It's a fear a bit older than that."
"You can tell something like that?"
"Mana leaves traces that last quite a long time, even as time passes. If the subject is a Magical Creature—I can't read memories, but I can at least tell what intense emotions they felt a few days ago. And if that emotion continued without breaking for a long time."
Han Yu-ri pushed the report toward me.
"This fear has been continuous since before they encountered you, Saintess."
"......."
I read the report. I'd studied Magic and knew a little, but fully understanding a specialized field was still difficult. Still, at the end was a neatly organized summary that suited Han Yu-ri's personality.
"You're saying the Goblins were being driven down by something."
"Yes. At least, that's what we've understood. They were coming down from the north—and this group seems to be the vanguard, at least. Ah, and there's one more thing."
Han Yu-ri looked at me seriously as she spoke.
"Some of the Goblins still had wounds caused by Mana. Perhaps that vanguard was, in its own way, a handpicked group."
Magical Creatures could be harmed by Mana itself, too, even without turning it into icicles or fireballs through Magic.
People drink water, but if they stay in it too long, they die. They use fire to warm their surroundings to maintain body temperature, but in a place too hot, they die. They breathe oxygen, but inhaling pure oxygen above a certain concentration can be dangerous.
"......So they fled from something more dangerous."
"Yes, that's what we concluded as well."
Han Yu-ri nodded with a serious expression.
I turned to look behind me.
There stood Ria, in a posture as if she were my bodyguard.
"......."
After hearing that summarized story, I felt exactly one emotion.
What on earth is going on?
*
I came up with several hypotheses.
If Goblins didn't appear in the original work because they were simply treated as not much different from other Magical Creatures and dealt with accordingly, then naturally there would have been no occasion to read a Goblin's "emotions."
The original work does mention a "Gate that was closed because it was dangerous."
But it doesn't go into detail about where each individual Gate is. So I don't know whether that "closed Gate" was the one where the Goblins were found, or whether it referred to the earlier Gate where the giant monkey emerged.
There is a description of the Saintess having saved Lee Si-yoon, but that probably refers to the incident when Lee Si-yoon first came to the Church on the verge of death, or the giant monkey incident that happened right after.
Probably, by the main story's timeline, the Goblins would have kept coming down toward where Hunters were stationed, encountered them, and been annihilated—and what was behind them, and why the Goblins came down, would have become unknowable.
And I suspected that the "object of fear" was those dangerous things that appear after the middle of the novel.
"......."
The Hunters concluded that it was worth investigating.
Whatever the object of fear was, if it really was gradually approaching the Gate—or if there was a possibility of that—we had to check whether we could handle it.
If we couldn't handle it, simply closing the Gate was also an option.
After the sun set, I went up to the building's rooftop. A few Hunters were there. Our eyes met, but they didn't butt in. We just gave each other slight nods.
I walked to the railing and looked down. Unlike the building in Hyehwa-dong, it was a small building, but there wasn't much lighting around, and because of that darkness, the building looked strangely tall.
There was no pretty garden like the one there. Still, the rest area was well equipped.
Ria came and stood beside me.
Having listened to the conversation with me earlier, she probably had something she wanted to ask. But Ria didn't go out of her way to speak to me. She just stayed silently by my side, like a faithful escort.
When I turned my head and stared at Ria, she finally opened her mouth, laughing as if in disbelief.
"If you have something you want to say, you can just say it, you know?"
"......I do want to say something, but I'm not sure what it is I want to say."
"Yeah?"
Ria shrugged.
"Then I'll just wait."
"Wait?"
"Until you say it."
"......Why?"
"Hmm...... no particular reason."
Ria looked at me quietly, then spoke.
No particular reason.
Ha, a short, hollow laugh escaped me.
When she says it like that, it somehow feels like we're friends. Friends talk about anything with each other for no particular reason, after all. No—could we already be called friends?
"I can't really tell what I want to do."
"You don't know what you want to do?"
"No."
What do I want to do in this world?
Prove Atheism? Prove that there was no God in this world and that the Being Above was not God, then erase this government's theocratic policies?
I don't think that's possible. I don't like that this is a Theocracy, but I don't want to deny the significance of religion.
Sometimes, its very existence gave people comfort. It could become a reason to live, and—I did not really want to admit it—some people even did good deeds because of it.
If you only look at the harm, nothing gets solved. Even Atheism is like that. There were dictators in the world who made Atheism the foundation of the state and oppressed religion regardless of kind.
I didn't want to create a world like that either.
"What about saving people?"
"That's...... not something I do because I want to."
It's because I think I have to.
Helping someone was also, in its own small way, rewarding. If even one person I helped thanked me with a smile, I felt as though I had chosen the right work, and it made me proud.
But even so, work is work. Because I have to. Because to prove my beliefs, I have to.
If I can help someone, I have to help. If I duck out with excuses, I'd just be a hypocrite.
I can't say that compulsion didn't exist.
So is that why that being brought me to this world? To see if I'd act the same way even here?
"I have power, so if there's an injured person right in front of me, I can't just turn away. Not helping when I'm in a position to help is just...... making excuses."
"Yeah?"
After listening to me, Ria turned, leaned back against the railing, and looked up at the sky.
Her red hair fluttered in the wind. The building and the area around it were dark, with little lighting, but Ria's red hair alone was vividly visible.
The wind blew, her hair scattered, and the pure white nape of her neck beneath it was visible, so I quietly turned my head back to face forward.
"If I were to describe how I've seen you so far."
Ria finally spoke.
"You...... when you're running around like that, you have this expression like you're alive."
"......An expression like I'm alive?"
"Normally you're annoyed by everything, you hate simple repetitive labor, you nod off during prayers—but the moment comes when you have to help someone, and you're already running faster than me with this sharp, alert look on your face. Even sweating."
Ria turned her gaze toward me.
"Even while full of worry, even while scared you might not pull it off, you ran with all your strength as if those feelings didn't matter at all, just to save people. Yeah. In those moments, at least, it didn't look like you were doing something you didn't want to do."
Ria smiled.
"Not doing things you don't want to do is your freedom. But not doing the things you want to do because of the things you don't want to do...... that's a bit much, isn't it?"
"......."
Things I want to do.
Things I don't want to do.
I—didn't want to believe in God. I had no desire to. Even though I could openly receive this kind of power, that was why I'd kept denying it all this time.
But that doesn't mean I don't want to help people. At least, if there's someone suffering in front of me, I want to help.
If an accident happens in front of me, or right before an accident happens—
"......Ah."
"Hey, what's wrong?"
When I pressed my hand to my forehead, Ria asked, a little startled.
"It's nothing. It just happens sometimes. Maybe it's stress."
"......."
—Anyway, yeah. In a situation like that, I want to help. If it's within my power. With everything I have.
Until now, those two feelings had been colliding with full force. Whatever the main story was or wasn't, I didn't want to take on the heavy responsibility of being the Saintess. But—
—Yeah. I don't want to watch people die, either.
If things are going to proceed that way anyway.
"......You're right."
"Well, don't worry too much."
Ria said, looking at me.
"You've got your knight, don't you? Wherever you go, you won't be alone."
"......."
Ria said something like that once again.
Those words made me feel strangely, slightly thrilled. That was...... unavoidable. If a pretty woman says something like that to me, I can't help it.
I already knew Ria's personality from reading the novel.
Even if she has a side that isn't very honest—I know she's an endlessly good person.
Even this right now, maybe it's just because she doesn't want to leave me alone.
We'd been sharing a room for quite a while now, and more than anything, well.
Honestly, I don't have friends, right?
There are people in the world who just can't leave a loner like that alone.
Honestly, so good-hearted it's ridiculous.
I turned my gaze back outside.
The mountain, without a single light, was pitch-dark.
Just far off in the distance, the Gate alone—like a mercury lake stood on end—was emitting a faint light.