Chapter 11
Chapter 11
Saint, You’re So Vulgar! – Chapter 11
Her chosen life had always been this way, so Versia remained a thorough bystander amid all these scenes.
Chasing only the individually visible elements.
The man's eyes brimmed with all sorts of emotions.
The most standout was pathos, yet resolve seeped through somewhere within.
At last, the old man opened his eyes.
"Umm...."
Why were the old man's eyelids, rising with his calm breath, so strikingly impressive?
And why did the sight of the man desperately forcing up the corners of his mouth while holding back tears lodge so firmly in her mind?
...She knew the reason.
Versia's gaze was still pursuing Asher even in this moment.
It had to be because he had brought about this scene.
"Father, you're awake?"
"Ah, Dale. Dale...."
The man clasped the old man's hand.
The old man's wrinkled hand gripped the man's with bulging veins, as if determined to burn up the dying embers of life completely.
Then, fumblingly, he spoke.
"My breathing feels easy. ...Yes, the Saintess has come?"
"Yes, yes...."
His eyesight wasn't normalthat much was clear by then.
Perhaps that was why he gripped the hand so tightly.
Asher withdrew at that point.
He turned, gave a faint smile, and mouthed the words.
Let's head back now.
With that, he slipped out of the house.
Versia paused briefly to look at the man and the old man.
"...I'm sorry, Father."
"You're saying that again. It's okay. It's okay, Dale."
Was it the unfamiliarity from Asher's decisiveness? Or the unexpected way it resolved?
A scene she wouldn't normally care about was drawing her eyes unusually today.
She knew it too.
What came next would be quite clichd.
Relief that it didn't hurt, the old man's final words sensing his death, reminiscences of past times ending in farewell.
No need to watch.
Yet her feet wouldn't budge.
"Knight."
Asher whispered softly.
"...Yes."
Versia shook off her lingering thoughts and left the man's house.
The sun was setting.
Asher stood with hands politely clasped, his gaze chasing the crumbling sunset beyond the mountains.
It was quiet.
A stark contrast to his usual constant nagging.
Versia strode up beside him.
Asher's expression was bitter.
The reason came to light right away.
"...He won't live to see next year."
"Is that so."
"Yes, tonight is his last."
There was no other motive.
Just watching that bitterness unconsciously brought the thought to mind.
Versia turned her gaze to the sunset as well and spoke.
"Isn't it shallow."
"What do you mean?"
"The design that leaves you no choice but to watch your loved one die."
Asher halted his steps.
Versia sensed it and stopped with him.
The added words might have stemmed from some deep-seated resentment.
"The Parent God wrapped up life's end with disease. Making countless lives love one another, only to force them apart in agony."
Of course, Versia had never lost anyone that way.
Her true resentment arose from something larger, far more complex.
It bordered on skepticism, and somehow, she felt Asher might share it.
But even that judgment could be shallow.
"I see it differently."
Versia's eyes shifted to him.
He narrowed his eyes, as if pursuing something beyond the sunset, and murmured.
"Mercy."
"...Pardon?"
"Perhaps it's mercy."
Clearly his own body and face, yet why did it feel so unfamiliar?
Only then did Versia vaguely grasp the reason.
"Mercy, huh."
"Yes, mercy."
Versia had no idea how to smile so purely.
* * *
Asher's upbringing couldn't even be jokingly called happy.
If a band of vagrants competed over "who among us is the most wretched," he could boldly vie for first, depending on the rivals.
Especially when it came to loss.
Asher learned farewell before meeting.
It happened when his height barely reached an adult man's waist.
This was before he knew Versiaback when his life drifted like duckweed, swept away by every crashing wave.
The painful memory of that day hung cold and chilling at his nape every instant.
"There are farewells where you can't even claim a proper end."
Asher spoke, a bitter taste filling his mouth.
"Unexpected partings sear with pain."
It wasn't a lecture for her.
Merely words he offered because he believed them... because he had to believe them.
"The Lord God denied eternity on this earth. In its place, He stacked countless fleeting moments to birth change."
"Doctrine class?"
"Commentary time. Anyway, that's the design, so problems arise. The moments that form us occupy different spots on the timeline we call time."
"......"
"Life's overlapping points begin with meeting. They end with farewell. We all part inevitably. The Lord God tethers love to those crossings to torment us."
"Drifting from mercy."
It felt odd.
Versia, posing the retort, wore an unprecedented sulky air.
As if she took issue with every word.
Somehow, her hunt for counterarguments felt emotionalunlike her.
Asher could only smile awkwardly and press on.
"Quite the opposite. That's why it's mercy. I believe the Lord God granted us disease as the end at those crossingsso our cherished love doesn't merely scar."
"An end..."
"A means to foresee it. That parting awaits."
Asher spoke measuredly.
Now faded and frayed memories retraced step by step.
"No one imagines tomorrow as their finale. No preparations, then. In a world without decay or disease, every death would be a gruesome tragedy."
From that view, wasn't it a blessing?
When one life at last finds its destination and halts, he'll gain a moment to glance back at his path.
With smiles of pride and regret, he'll share with someone what that road was like.
At least, he believed disease served that purpose.
For those denied even that, it was a trial to teach its worth through lack.
That was the logicand the answer it yielded.
"Sophistry."
Somehow pessimistic.
Asher smiled sheepishly.
"Yes, sophistry."
Versia stared, surprised.
Too quick to concede?
But no helping it.
He knew it himself, to a degree.
Still, Asher's convictions held firm.
"Sophistry or not, what of it?"
"Wasn't it commentary?"
"Yes, commentaryso it doesn't matter."
Asher cherished piety.
Zealous for doctrine above all; while others dozed through Order lessons, those hours brimmed full for him.
Thus he could declare it.
"The Lord God gave no answers. Nor barred our agonies or chosen truths."
They called it free will.
So this sophistry wasn't heresy.
"My personal takeand believing it lets me live piously. Isn't that enough?"
The shy coda stayed swallowed.
To reach this, you were there.
Your kindness marked the milestone guiding my steps.
Beautifying and voicing a memory held solo wasn't easy for Asher.
Embarrassment heated his cheeks.
Versia walked on in silence.
She looked deep in thought.
Not a word until sunset fully yielded to twilight.
Asher regretted the needless preaching, minded his wordstill her response came.
Versia snickered.
"...Impressive. Staying so upbeat."
"Pardon?"
The sulk had fled Versia's face.
Back to her usual languid look.
Laced with mischief now.
"That Lord God seems hell-bent on turning you into a bitch who loves a good spanking..."
"Stop right there!"
"You like getting hit, huh. Noted..."
"Enough!"
His shrill cry sent Versia giggling ahead, steps teasing.
Why always this ending?
Fed up with her antics, Asher launched not commentary, but true sermon.
"Can't you manage one good day? We were discussing faith! Be serious for once! The Saintess utterly lacks saintly awareness!"
"Right now, I'm Holy Knight, not Saintess."
"Holy Knights need faith too!"
"Eww, Marvin doesn't."
"That guythat guy's...!"
"Marvin said yesterday, those hips are just..."
"Ow! Don't hang with Marvin! Unwholesome company is banned!!!"
"He's your friend."
"......!!!"
...No peace ever.
* * *
Two days passed.
The inspectioner, medical serviceriddled with mishaps finally wrapped.
Now, time for rewards.
Purposeful charity still stabbed Asher's conscience raw, but since it served Versia, he'd let it slide.
Asher pocketed his special stipend and hit the streets.
And suffered.
"Knight, wanna check that place?"
"Ah, the bookstore?"
"Marvin said they stock erotica there..."
"Why are you like this? Really...!"
Tough sledding from the jump.
Asher wanted to cry.