Chapter 372
Chapter 372
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 372
Chapter Title: Saintess, Natida.
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Saintess, Natida.
Lania had first met her a year ago. She still remembered that initial encounter vividly. It had been such a shocking scene.
"Huuuuh..."
The Delorhim Church's main cathedral.
The prayer room, meant for offering prayers to the gods, was stained dark red with long streaks of blood splattered everywhere. At the end of those blood trails sat a girl astride a priest's corpse. She gazed up at the ceiling-blocked sky, exhaling slowly.
Ragged breathing.
Gray smoke billowing with every breath.
It was only later that Lania learned the girl was smoking a nerve relaxant—a treatment that drug addicts burned to help them quit.
"......"
The girl looked at Lania with hollow eyes.
Meeting Lania's gaze, the girl let out a hollow laugh. It was the laugh of someone filled with resignation. After one final long drag, she exhaled deeply.
Ashen smoke.
As the smoke rose, Lania glanced at the priests beneath the girl. Tools for injecting drugs were clutched in their hands. Vibrant vials of narcotics lay scattered across the floor. And when she looked up at the girl...
Her arms and the nape of her neck were covered in marks from repeated needle punctures. Those hollow eyes didn't belong to anyone sane.
That was more than enough to piece together what had happened.
The Delorhim Church was already on the path to ruin after the scandals came to light and the former saintess Sara retired. When Lania learned they were hiding the birth of a new saintess, she headed straight there.
Lania rubbed her eyes.
As if realizing that brainwashing alone wasn't enough after Sara, the church had resorted to even crueler methods to "educate" this new saintess. And the result of that education was the girl standing right in front of her.
"Ah. Ah. Ahem."
The girl opened her mouth toward Lania.
Her words slurred, so she kept fidgeting with her lips and rubbing her chin as she continued.
"You don't seem like you're with the church."
"If you came to the main cathedral to pray... you got the wrong prayer room. It's not here, so go somewhere else."
"Before you see something nasty, hurry."
Not a plea for help, but a warning to run and not get involved.
Even with her speech garbled from the drugs, she put force into every syllable. As she spoke, she flashed a grin—the dry, parched smile of someone who expected nothing from life.
Saintess, Natida.
The church's secretly hidden saintess of this generation. That was Natida and Lania's first meeting. Recalling those hollow eyes from back then, Lania let out a long sigh.
"Much better than back then. A lot better."
It had already been a year since Lania secured Natida's identity and installed her as an aide. She still lit up mana cigarettes at the drop of a hat, but at least she no longer craved hard drugs. That alone was remarkable progress.
...Still, there was one thing that worried her.
"Wow? What the hell?"
"You seriously think that's a pickup line? Give me a break. Wow, for real. Wow..."
Her flashpoint was ridiculously low.
On her last dispatch, she'd smashed a liquor bottle over the head of a noble trying to hit on her, sparking a "minor" incident. The fact that she was so unpredictable gnawed at Lania a bit.
"...Hmm."
Sitting in her office, Lania paused while reading a report and pinched the bridge of her nose. Now that Natida was up north, worry suddenly flooded in. She'll be fine, right? She probably will...
"Lania, as your master and father, I have one request. Please, no causing trouble. Don't stir up incidents and come crawling back. Handle it quietly. Quietly."
As those worries bubbled up, it almost felt like she could hear her master's voice echoing in her ears.
'So this is how Master must have felt.'
No, but I'd always handled things cleanly.
I'd barely caused any incidents.
And even when I did, I'd swept them under the rug without any loose ends.
"Eh, it's not the same thing at all."
Thinking it over again, it felt different enough.
Lania shook her head and dove back into her work. What trouble could she possibly get into? The girl knew how to read a situation.
"She's a good kid, as long as she doesn't get tangled up with the church."
2.
"Huh? Pissing me off?"
Natida let out a laugh.
With a mana cigarette clamped between her lips, she grabbed the priest by the collar and shoved him against the wall. The priest groaned as the back of his head smacked into it, and Natida thrust her face right up to his. Close enough for their foreheads to touch.
Then, huu.
The priest hacked and coughed from the harsh smoke she blew out. Grinning as if his sputtering face was hilarious, Natida muttered in a low voice.
"This stuff's killer, right? Your vision flashes when you light up. Sparks tingling everywhere? Killer high. Too good to keep to myself."
She slipped the cigarette between her fingers and pointed the glowing ember at the priest's eyeball.
"Wanna try one?"
The priest's eyes shook violently.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇ Rak's day began early in the morning.
Bellnoa and Chloe, who had come to investigate the problematic snowy peaks, spent several days surveying them before heading back to the knight order's outpost to report and discuss countermeasures. With routine restored, Rak began his day lightly.
His "routine" was simply training.
With his two axes strapped to his waist, Rak ventured deep into the snowy mountains. After a long walk, the Grace family's sanctuary came into view amid the raging storm. That was his training ground.
He didn't even need to steady his breathing.
As if out for a stroll, Rak walked casually toward the sanctuary. Even in the blinding blizzard, his breath never faltered. In moments, he reached the very heart of it.
The deepest core, lined with shattered statues.
Listening to the sound of water flowing between the statues, Rak exhaled briefly. In the past, he'd endured the environment by borrowing the power of the first lord of Grace... but now, he no longer needed to.
Because he'd grown over the past three years.
The immense mana flow crushed down on his body, but for the current Rak, that pressure was just right. He set down the weights he'd brought one by one and began his daily routine.
"...Huu."
The military-grade weights and restraints he'd received from Galahal in the past. Strapping them all over his body, Rak began his tempering.
Whoosh, swoosh.
He swung the axes steadily for a long while in perfect form. Once sweat began to bead on his skin, he ramped up the intensity. He lightly tapped his heart with the axe haft.
Heating.
His mana array fluctuated wildly for an instant.
But it never fell into disorder. Rak had completed every course at Aphria and learned mana arrays directly from Aphria's nightmare. The turbulent array snapped right back into place.
He repeated mana circulation through his superheated body.
The tower Rak had built from a rock-solid foundation stood firm. His breathing remained even amid the raging mana torrents from all sides. Compared to when he'd fainted at the mana spring's entrance as a freshman, it was astonishing progress.
Whoosh, swoosh.
Rak kept swinging the axes.
Each swing echoed with a sharp crack as something split. Using those cracks as background noise, Rak reflected.
It had been a year since graduating from Aphria.
Three years since Professor Lania had given him "that."
Looking back on those three years, had he grown? Rak could nod yes. He wasn't a superhuman yet, but he'd set foot at the path's entrance. Or perhaps he'd already gone beyond.
Ever since completing the Grail's trial that day, Rak no longer saw walls. He couldn't see them at all.
He didn't know what to surpass or how far he'd come. The professor had said he'd know when the time came, but Rak had no idea when that would be.
"......"
All he could feel was the fragment of the Grail embedded in his heart... and the seed the professor had planted that day.
'...Something's still missing.'
He didn't know exactly what.
But Rak knew he couldn't yet call himself a superhuman. Others judged his body and skills as already superhuman territory... but he didn't feel it himself.
The absence of something decisive.
He was wandering in search of it.
Unable to find the answer, he simply tempered his body relentlessly. Listening to the ever-growing crack, craaaacks, Rak slowly exhaled.
"Huu..."
As he breathed out and looked ahead, split space hung there. Gazing at the spatial slash carved into the air, Rak lightly clashed the axes in his hands.
Clang.
The echo of axe striking axe.
Reacting to the sound, space twisted and tore. Galatrikryu Kai, one of the Grace style techniques. Seeing its completion improve day by day, Rak felt a quiet pride.
Today's training was done here.
Sensing half the day had passed, he packed up and stepped out of the sanctuary. Cooling his sweat in the blizzard, the moment his foot touched the snowfield...
"Y-Young master!"
Sebas, the butler waiting outside the sanctuary, came running toward Rak. Wiping the sweat from his brow with the towel Sebas handed him, Rak tilted his head.
"What's wrong, Sebas? Why so urgent..."
"Th-The guest is causing a huge commotion!"
"...What?"
3.
Hurrying to White Night Castle alongside Sebas, Rak received a rundown of the situation.
"So..."
Rak blinked as he spoke.
"The guest sent by Professor Lania—no, by the Hero... that guest is beating the priest who came with her half to death?"
"Y-Yes..."
"Why her companion...?"
"It's... a bit complicated."
According to the story...
The guest who had come to the North was a fairly high-ranking church member. On the way north, the church had attached a priest to her under the pretext of providing an escort.
A few years back, the church's atrocities in the North had gotten them banned from sending anyone there... but Sebas added that it seemed they'd used the escort excuse this time to try slipping a foot in the door.
"The guest even bowed her head and apologized for breaking 'Northern rules' while explaining her situation... We thought she was a fine person."
That impression hadn't lasted.
Screams had echoed from the reception hall, and when they rushed over, the guest was beating the priest half to death.
"Given her status, we couldn't just step in easily. The Grand Duke ruled it as 'in matters of escorting, the master's freedom.' The situation's messy."
"...What kind of person is she, exactly?"
Rak asked as he dashed up White Night Castle.
Sebas answered.
"...The saintess. The church's saintess."
"What?"
Rak blinked.
Before he knew it, they were at the reception hall door. Warriors had gathered around, peering inside and clicking their tongues.
"Ah, young master."
Spotting Rak, the warriors stepped aside. As he pushed past into the reception hall, he unwittingly gulped.
"Ugh, uuuuh..."
A priest sprawled on the floor groaning, and a woman with her bare foot planted on his head, puffing a mana cigarette. Her light brown hair swayed in the breeze from the wide-open window.
"Huuuuh..."
Ragged breathing.
She exhaled a long plume of smoke amid her quickened breaths and locked eyes with Rak standing at the door. After blinking for a moment, she flashed a bright smile.
"Kuh!"
Stepping off the sprawled priest, she rose and casually flicked her cigarette ash onto his head before approaching Rak. She extended her hand as if for a shake but paused midway, noticing the ash and bloodstains on her glove. She gave an awkward smile.
"My apologies."
She peeled off the glove, crumpled it into her robe pocket, and offered her bare hand to Rak.
"I'm Natida, aide to Hero Lania van Trias and saintess of the church."
She smiled.
"It's an honor to meet you, Guardian of the North."
Facing Natida, Rak thought to himself.
Yeah, definitely the kind of guest Professor Lania would send.