Chapter 6
I’m translating the chapter directly into natural English and preserving the HTML rules, names, and tone. Next I’m shaping it into chapter title plus novel-style paragraphs, with special blocks only where the source requires them.CHAPTER_TITLE: The Church Without a Trace
There had once been an existence that reached the heavens through the Tower of Humanity.
There had once been one who shed all lowliness and rose to the highest place.
One human gathered ten; ten gathered a hundred. Then a hundred gathered a thousand, and a thousand gathered ten thousand, until at last humanity built a great tower that reached for the sky they had only ever looked up at from the earth below.
The feat was so astounding it shook the very heavens, a miracle that should have granted every soul within the tower a chance to ascend. But in the end, only one being attained greatness.
Because one greedy man had swallowed every opportunity for himself.
With a single gesture from the one who monopolized that chance, countless lives returned to the embrace of Mother Nature. And so, on that vast continent, only one god remained; humanity came to call him the only true god.
On the fourth day after reconstruction work began on the Tower of Chastity, the courtyard of Aphaia Basilica had been in an uproar since noon.
Trucks carrying the rubble of the collapsed tower rolled out over the broken wall, while vehicles hauling construction materials and heavy machinery streamed in behind them.
Administrative aides supervising the site hurried everywhere, shouting orders, while the senior clerks’ eyes gleamed with a cold light as they counted the incoming supply of Chain Cores.
One of the aides, busy all this time, suddenly stopped what he was doing when an unfamiliar shadow fell across the blazing sunlight. He looked up at the sky in a daze.
“Wow….”
There, a steel ship floated through the heavens, looking down on the earth with an icy indifference.
The culmination of Chain Engineering, the technology that refined divinity into standardized power sources, and the embodiment of military intimidation possessed by the Holy Military Command, the Order’s armed institution that sought to overwhelm even apostolic miracles with sheer firepower.
A small airship operated under their authorization was slowly descending.
Emblazoned on its hull was the unmistakable insignia of the Muheun Order: an arrow bound in chains, pierced by three steel wedges.
A moment later, the airship came to a heavy berth at the outer edge of the basilica.
From the Holy Inquisition, the intelligence and heresy-hunting arm that judged apostates and heretics and guarded the Order’s doctrinal purity, the investigators finally disembarked as the hatch opened.
In an instant, everyone in the courtyard stopped working and held their breath. Even the High Priest Elder who had come to greet them, the basilica’s highest authority, swallowed dryly at their severe bearing.
On the collars of the black uniforms worn by the investigators were sharp silver badges.
The will of the Holy Inquisition’s chief cardinals, who sought to dismantle even an Apostle’s Domain piece by piece, flared ominously with every step they took toward the interrogation room — the three scars that cut the net.
At the rear of that stern procession, the black-haired man who emerged from the airship descended the ramp with a strikingly relaxed air.
He had dark hair and a smiling face, with a vaguely sly, slick sort of charm.
Completely mismatched with the cold silence around him, his strange aura made the High Priest Elder forcibly suppress his irritation and extend his hand first.
“...I’m Elias Vier, the highest authority of Aphaia Basilica.”
“May Aphaia’s blessing be with you. Haha! It’s a pleasure to meet you, High Priest. I’m Sel Edrok, chief investigator of the Holy Inquisition.”
“You must be tired from the long flight. Allow me to show you and the other investigators a place to rest first.”
“Ah, no need. We’ve just come from executing a heretic nearby, so we’re full of energy! I’ll head straight to the interrogation room with the others.”
Heretic. Execution. For a man who spoke such chilling words, Sel Edrok looked far too bright.
Elias Vier suppressed the expression that nearly broke with displeasure.
He was a third-class official of the Muheun Order’s central administration, as well as a High Priest Elder. Nearly sixty years old this year, with experience and stature accumulated over a lifetime, he did not crumble over something as small as this.
“Ho ho… then I suppose it can’t be helped. If you need anything, call for one of the administrative aides. I’ll have them prepare it at once.”
“Very well.”
After parting with the High Priest in smiles, Sel Edrok soon headed for the Tower of Benevolence, where the interrogation rooms were located.
As soon as he set foot in the tower’s basement, horrible sounds drifted toward him from far away.
Listening closely, it sounded like a man’s desperate screams. The closer he drew to the interrogation room, the more those screams seemed to tear themselves apart.
“Aaaaaaagh——!”
At last reaching his destination, Sel Edrok threw the door open. Welcoming him was Aaron, strapped to a chair with a bandage around his forehead, blood seeping through it, as his fingernails were being ripped out.
The other investigators, who had arrived before Sel Edrok, were already carrying out torture under the guise of questioning Aaron.
“My, I did say to investigate him politely, didn’t I?”
“Aaaaaaagh—!”
“If we act politely, he just keeps denying the charges, doesn’t he?”
“Ah! So that’s why you decided to behave like gentlemen.”
“Something like that.”
The investigator holding the blunt-ended pliers nodded, then crouched down again and clamped them around Aaron’s nail.
“Now then, does that sting?”
“Aaaaaaaaaagh——!”
“The accused is being quite dramatic. What do we do?”
“Why are you asking something so obvious? The water already knows the answer. Carry it out.”
“Right away, then. Hey, kid! Go fetch some water.”
A moment later, Aaron’s face was shoved into the basin of water the youngest investigator had brought.
Gurururuk——.
“—Puhah!”
“Are you ready to admit your crimes now?”
“Fuck… I’m not—.”
Gururururuk——.
“—Puhuhu!”
“Are you ready to admit your crimes now?”
“I said I didn’t do it!”
Gururururuk——.
The awful process seemed to repeat for about six hours.
By then several fingernails had been torn off, needless to say, and as time wore on, bloody fingernails and toenails ended up scattered messily across the floor.
The investigators, used to it, lounged back in their chairs and passed the dull hours idly.
“Oi, kid, go out and buy something to chew on. My stomach’s practically stuck to my back!”
“Come on, Brother Kent, you got that much food in your ration earlier and you’re already hungry?”
“Don’t even start, Eric. The food in here tastes like absolute shit.”
“Hey, hey! Kent, that bastard earlier saw the face of the female priestess and got bewitched, taking three helpings of rice. Then he threw it all away, dumb asshole! Hah!”
“What? Seriously… what a disappointment, Kent. Maybe because you’re uneducated, you piece of trash doesn’t know food’s precious.”
“What the hell? You little shit! You’ve lost your mind!”
“Brother, I didn’t do it. I think the devil inside me did it! Get out of my body, you demon—!”
At that, one investigator burst into laughter, and the others followed suit, teasing Kent as they laughed.
Kent smacked the back of the youngest investigator’s head and let out a deep sigh.
Just then, Sel Edrok, who had been silently reading a thick ledger in the corner, shut the book with a crisp snap. The laughter that had spread through the interrogation room immediately died away.
Sel Edrok walked slowly over to Aaron, still bound to the chair. Stopping in front of him, he bent at the waist to meet Aaron’s eyes and asked in a low voice,
“Now then, Sir Aaron. Let’s get to the point, shall we? Surely by now we understand each other.”
“Khh, ugh. Bastards….”
Aaron hung his head, drooling blood-tinged saliva from his mouth. His shirt had been torn in several places, and the blood that had run down him had dried into sticky patches.
With all his fingernails and toenails torn out, raw flesh was fully exposed, so every time even the slightest breeze brushed his skin, Aaron’s whole body convulsed at the pain.
He muttered through clenched teeth, his voice heavy with grievance.
“I didn’t do it….”
“Then who did? Maybe an Apostle? Or perhaps the Benevolent Mother Hero locked up in the Tower of Chastity did it?”
“...How the hell would I know, damn it.”
“Sir Aaron, let’s be honest with each other. What matters right now isn’t who stole the holy relic. What matters most is where that relic is.”
The capital city of Crete, where the Muheun Order’s headquarters and the Holy Administration were located. There, one of the holy relics carefully managed by the main temple had vanished without a trace.
More precisely, it had been stolen. That fact had been discovered seven days earlier, and the Holy Administration had been thrown into chaos in an instant.
The missing relic was none other than the Eye of Rene, the keepsake of Rene, the Hero of the Spiritual Eye and a saint venerated after death.
The College of Cardinals, the highest deliberative body of the Holy Administration that assisted the Pope, was urgently convened, and in the presence of the chief cardinals of the Holy Administration, Holy Inquisition, and Holy Military Command, along with the suffragan bishops, a grave discussion dragged on.
After intense debate, the Holy Administration resolved not to make the matter public. Instead, they sent sealed orders only to the diocesan heads of each district, along with certain Apostles and Heroes, commanding them to investigate the theft in secret.
“Deputy guardian of the sacred district of Hart, Everett Aaron. Looking at the ledgers, you’ve certainly had your fill, haven’t you?”
With a light gesture from Sel Edrok, the youngest investigator, Eric, came over grunting under the weight of a thick ledger.
“Normally budget management would be handled by a scribe, a fourth-class official. Seems like you’ve lost the trust of the people above you.”
Sel Edrok flipped through the recent year’s ledgers with a swift motion of his hand, then let out a long sigh and handed them back to Eric.
He had completely misread the situation. The one likely to hold the clue to the relic’s whereabouts was not the Wall Hero, but the Mother and the Strong Body.
“You’re just plain stupid, so I don’t even know what to say. Fine. I’ve heard enough.”
“Wait—!”
Sel Edrok turned away without mercy. Aaron shouted something after him, but before he could continue, the other investigators grabbed him and shoved a gag in his mouth, cutting him off.
Investigator Kent approached Edrok quietly and asked,
“How should we handle the Great Wall Hero afterward?”
“What do you mean, how? Give him Weiss Wein like always and wipe him clean. Report it to Holy Inquisition headquarters without missing a detail.”
“Understood. We’ll do as headquarters requires.”
Weiss Wein. It was a name that suggested the famous white wine of the Empire, but its use within the Order was entirely different.
At first glance it looked like an extremely clear, transparent liquid, harmless to the human body. In truth, the instant it entered the bloodstream it paralyzed the central nervous system with terrifying speed, bleaching a person’s mind and self away so completely they became nothing but an empty husk.
Sel Edrok’s hand rested on the door handle, and as if remembering something he had nearly forgotten, he turned his head and added in a low voice,
“Ah, and send a cooperation request to the Holy Military Command as well. I think we’ll need to have a talk with the Apostle of the Strong Body.”
“Should we make contact right away?”
“Do that. I’m going to see the Benevolent Mother Hero.”
With that, Sel Edrok left the interrogation room.
An existence who had spent a lifetime locked away, living as a Hero’s plaything. His black uniform swept coldly toward the Tower of Salvation, where Alice, the Benevolent Mother Hero, waited.
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