Everyday Life Crumbles
Ever since that day, I had been forced to endure a constant, invisible anxiety.
It was not as though I did not know the cause. The feeling had begun the moment a man named Tolfen arrived.
The problem lay in the sensation itself.
The sense of being watched from somewhere beyond the trees. It was so blatant that concentration became nearly impossible, and at the same time it pressed down on me with a relentless weight.
Naturally, Thea felt it too. Watching her grow sharper with each passing day was anything but pleasant.
"Huuu..."
I clenched my teeth against the clammy, clinging aura that seemed to stick to my skin. There were moments when we had no choice but to live outdoors, and so we were always exposed to it. Even after we went inside, the intensity of that gaze only grew stronger — never weaker.
No matter how thoroughly we tried to hide ourselves beneath blankets and cloth, the unpleasant sensation would not fade.
It was on the third day that she proposed raising a barrier to shut it out.
"If we use the same veil that covered us on the battlefield — the one that kept the dead from approaching — I believe it would work."
"Won't their miracles pierce a wall made of holy power? Even if what they're doing is shameless, it's still a miracle of the forest folk..."
Tolfen, and those he had brought with him, meant us harm. To defy Thea's will and pressure her like this was wrong. But I had no power to stop them from misusing holy force. Even if they twisted that power, the will to use it still belonged to them.
The best I could do was hold to a single belief — that God was watching over all of this.
"If we pour our own essence into the veil we raise, I think it will be possible."
Unlike me, who could only lean on Him, she took my hand with eyes full of resolve. What Thea was proposing clearly went against His will — unless there was a just cause.
"That is—"
"They're the ones who used a sacred miracle for something filthy first, Evan...!"
She cut me off before I could finish. And I understood. My will was far weaker than hers. When it came to seeing her intentions through, she never yielded. Unlike me, her decisions held no hesitation. Unlike me, she made her will unmistakably clear.
"We endured and endured, and still we were driven this far. When I think that I am the reason that loathsome creature looks at you with those eyes, I can't bear it. Even now, if I don't correct that mistake, I feel like I never will — and you're telling me I still shouldn't?"
She began to tighten her grip on my hand. It did not hurt, but it was enough to make me flinch. And what filled the vision that pain had forced open were her clouded eyes.
Disappointment in herself. Hatred for those outside. And worry for the man before her. All of it gathered in a gaze that had gone hazy and opaque, darkened by something heavy.
"Thea — I, I understand!"
If the Church learned of this, a severe investigation would be the least of our worries. I had once helped the heretic inquisitors — those who wore masks painted with eyes — burn an entire village that had fallen into darkness. Watching them mercilessly put the guilty to the stake had filled me with terror. I had sincerely hoped that fate would never turn toward us. Now that hope felt more desperate than ever.
God, forgive us for having no other choice.
I rose, clasping her trembling hands, and at last agreed to help her. There had never truly been a choice. She had given up so much to decide to love me — I had to give something up as well. I could not let her be the only one who kept sacrificing.
...Despair settled over me at the realization that I would have to set down the very thing I had held most precious: my faith.
"Why must You give us a trial like this..."
At the words I forced out in pain, her ear twitched faintly — but from her lips, as she wrote the prayer upon the floor, came nothing but the sound of drawn breath.
What she intended to do. There were only two reasons one would ever corrupt a miracle.
First: to block holy power. That alone was enough to mark it a grave sin — no explanation needed. To use a miracle meant to save or protect people in order to stop a miracle... that was to reject God's will, something that must never be done without just cause. Only the heretic inquisitors were granted limited permission to use it, and only to seize and transport priests under suspicion.
And second: to make unmistakably clear the will of the one who poured their power into it.
Holy power does not clash with holy power. It simply passes through. Naturally so — for it is the will of the same One, and there is no reason for it to collide and shatter. But when holy forces carrying the wills of others — wills that are not His — collide, everything changes. Being different, they strike against each other with violence and break apart. If only one side carries a will, that side's power remains, and the other is blocked and vanishes.
That was why it was forbidden. It was the act of daring to question those who carried out God's will — of saying they were wrong. In other words, it was arrogance.
And yet, at times, it was regarded as indispensable. One only had to look at the cases taught to us — instances where this very act had saved far more lives.
Even after turning all of that over in my mind, I still felt a residual hesitation. What she meant to accomplish through this was clear. She meant to declare, beyond any doubt, that her heart and mine were joined. The scale of it was the problem — far too vast.
Should I tell her to stop, even now? Or should I smile at the will of a woman who knew all of this and still chose to accept it freely?
"Come. Quickly."
Having finished writing the prayer, she shifted slightly aside and pulled me down to sit in her place. With her lower lip bitten tight and her brow furrowed, I did not need words to know how deeply unsettled she was.
But the moment she reached out her hand to work the miracle, I cast every thought aside.
...To work a miracle while pouring one's own will into it is not difficult. It is not the act of "bringing down" power that carries God's will into reality. It is the act of "using" power that carries one's own. The prayer is merely a description of the force to be performed. Whose will is poured into that force, and how it is carried out — that is what differs.
There is a clear distinction between a miracle bestowed from the heavens and a miracle whose power is wielded upon the earth.
And so, in that moment, I poured my own wish into the circle she had drawn. Wishing for the strength to protect her from the malice outside — and for the courage to answer the will of a woman who desired only me — I watched the threads of light spread outward to form the veil.
He had been born noble from the start.
As he grew, all had bowed before him. And now only a single final step remained. If the one who stood beside him was worthy of his exalted self, everything would be perfect.
And so the woman who would share his side had to be perfect. Untouched by the filth of others, and yet desired by all — something like a Holy Grail.
That was why Thea had caught his eye. And yet she had not only refused him once, but twice — and in this manner, no less.
Fine. That much he could accept. A charming little attempt to humiliate him was something he could tolerate. It was nothing more than a tiny act of defiance. A cute resistance born of ignorance — of not yet understanding a greater purpose. Once he showed her his worth, once she saw what he could give her, she would crumble soon enough. That much was obvious.
But this — this was something else entirely.
"How dare she — how dare she...!"
At first, when the light began to bloom, he had laughed. As always, she had rejected him. And that was good. A woman who refused so thoroughly must surely know her own high value. To pluck a flower from a cliff that no one else had managed to scale — the envy of all would be inevitable. Every act of defiance only raised her worth further.
Even the barrier that kept him from seeing her did not anger him. He need only open the door with confidence, look upon her lovely face once more, and break that defiance born of foolishness for all to see.
And so, had the barrier been made of pure gold alone, his body would never have trembled like this.
He saw milky-white vines winding around the stems of the very color he meant to claim as his own.
Holy power was pure white — transparent. But that was not. Those threads, slightly cloudy and dense yet still retaining their whiteness, coiled around the golden light and climbed. Then they split into strands and spread across the golden veil. Like milk poured slowly into water, they mixed in — gradual, and clouded.
It was intolerable.
That gold should have been his alone. An impurity had been mixed in. This was an insult. To allow the essence of some lowly creature to mingle while he was present — it struck him as a profound humiliation.
"You dare lay hands on what is mine? Don't be absurd. With those filthy hands, how dare you — how dare you...!"
He "woke" the lesser beings who stood gaping at the sight before them with his own hands, forcing them to cry out in pain.
"Have you lost your minds? Can you not see what just happened?"
This had to be changed at once. The scene before his eyes had to be set right.
"Prepare to bring Thea here — now!!"
She was a flower he alone must pluck. No one else was allowed to stand upon that cliff.
Absolutely no one.