The Flames of First Parish
The Heresy Inquisition's Execution Division arrived at the First Parish.
It was just as Veronica finished the handover with them that the words passed through my mind.
You have completed a Job Mission.
Job Missions completed: 1
So that was the end of my first assignment.
It seemed heresy inquisitor duties didn't appear as separate quests. Judging by the way it was counting completed missions, there might be rewards at certain milestones.
"Good work, Special Task Force Captain. We'll handle the rest — you're free to go."
"……Thank you."
His voice echoed hollowly through the gas mask. I'd been told he was one of the squad leaders of the Execution Division. The inquisitors behind him were all wearing gas masks as well.
To wear those things — masks that looked hard enough just to breathe through — at all times. That alone reeked of fanaticism.
"By the way… who's the dark-eyed kid over there? Never seen him before."
The Execution Division squad leader slipped off a silver ring and handed it back to Agnes as he spoke. He'd borrowed it to communicate with Veronica and her Curse of Severance. The handover, at least, had to be done by the squad leader himself.
"That there's Lord Karl Manfred! A baron of the Laviart Empire, and our newest recruit!"
I could tell Agnes was deliberately drawing out the introduction. She wanted to show off that an imperial noble was working alongside them.
"Oho… a noble lord in the Special Task Force……? Hmm. We're busy, so introductions can wait."
The squad leader didn't seem particularly interested in me. He walked over to Father Daniel instead.
"You must be the priest assigned to this parish. Good work. Once we've finished the purification, peace will return to this place."
"I… uh, what exactly are you planning to……"
Father Daniel glanced uneasily toward the farmer's wife as he spoke. While the squad leaders had been handling the transfer, the Execution Division inquisitors had already stacked firewood into a pyre. The farmer's wife was bound to the stake.
"She killed her husband, didn't she. Murdered the man she was supposed to love above all others. A witch through and through — dangerous beyond measure. Summary execution is the only answer."
"Th-this place… before it's a parish, it's part of the Laviart Empire… Are you really allowed to do this?"
"Whether we're allowed is a problem for the people upstairs. Not our concern. Dark magic murder means the stake, no exceptions. Begin."
At the squad leader's order, the inquisitors stretched their hands toward the pyre. Flames erupted from them and engulfed the stake in an instant, surging upward like a pillar of fire.
The screams were swallowed whole by the overwhelming blaze. Black smoke billowed up and scattered into the sky.
"Burn! Burn until you crumble to ash! Burn until even the ash that remains is gone!"
A special fire among the magics of light. The divine flames that consumed evil.
"Come on, move it. Once the burning's done, we torch every last trace of dark magic left on this land."
The Execution Division inquisitors headed for the farmer's house. Before long, another column of black smoke rose into the air.
"……It seems the Saintess handled things well."
"Th… thank goodness… They won't burn the whole village……"
On the carriage ride back to the Holy City of Lumenon, the Special Task Force could finally breathe again.
We had discovered the Curse of Mutation in the First Parish — the curse known as Yellow Blood Disease, which had originated in the Humania-Peophir United Kingdom. The fact that Yellow Blood Disease was not a disease at all was a closely guarded secret, and the standing order was to burn every place where the curse was found.
That distinction — disease versus curse — carried enormous weight. Yellow Blood Disease spread through contact, so if you could just contain the infected, you could stop it from spreading. Of course, even that had failed, which was why the United Kingdom marched toward ruin in Luke's Biography.
But a curse was far more dangerous. If you knew the ritual formula, you could create an infected person anywhere.
"Th… but isn't this really… too extreme……? Burning everything……"
"……It is a dangerous curse. ……They don't want to leave even the slightest possibility."
Veronica hadn't wanted the people here to burn to death, so she had reported to the Saintess first. The Saintess said she would instruct the Execution Division that the incident had been caused by a Curse of Weakness. Following her directive, we destroyed the evidence.
We burned the corpses of the beast and the farmer, and erased the yellow bloodstains left in the forest. The paper bearing the ritual formula for the Curse of Mutation was swapped for one inscribed with a Curse of Weakness. As far as anyone here was concerned, nothing more than a common Curse of Weakness had been used.
In the process, everyone in the Special Task Force — and even Father Daniel — learned of the classified matter. Veronica explained that the mere fact the ritual formula had spread this far was proof the Church had already lost control. Since there was no telling when or where we might encounter the Curse of Mutation, she said it was safer for us to know.
"Captain, how did you know all of this?"
"……The Saintess told me some time ago. ……She asked me to inform her if I ever discovered this curse."
"Judging by how this was handled, it seems the Saintess doesn't entirely agree with burning everything either."
"……Of course not. ……This is an outdated policy from when nothing was understood about Yellow Blood Disease. ……But His Holiness the Pope does not want change."
It was the same explanation I'd heard the day I first met the Saintess. That was the kind of person the Pope was.
"You said he also dislikes anything that creates a sense of crisis."
"……That's right. ……That's probably why they're hiding the fact that Yellow Blood Disease is a curse. ……And that someone is deliberately spreading the ritual formula."
Saintess Emilia strode down the corridor with a face full of barely contained fury. Behind her followed Sylvester, vice-captain of the Holy Knights and Hero of the Church.
They stopped before a massive set of doors. The holy knights standing guard stepped aside. The Saintess took a deep breath, steeled her eyes, and wrenched both doors open with both hands.
"Your Holiness!"
"Hwah!"
Inside Pope Aloysia's office, the seated Pope reacted to the Saintess's entrance with a comically loud start. Despite being considerably older than the Saintess, the Pope had such a youthful face that the two of them could have passed for peers.
"S-Saintess, what brings you……"
"What brings me?! Why on earth won't you make a decision?!"
"A d-decision?"
A vein stood out on the Saintess's forehead. Emilia advanced on the Pope with a menacing stride. The watching holy knights moved to intervene, but Sylvester waved them off, signaling that everything was fine.
"In the Empire, they——!"
The Saintess was so worked up that she nearly blurted out something she shouldn't. She shot Sylvester a look, and he led the holy knights out, clearing the room. Emilia waited until their footsteps had faded, then spoke in a low voice.
"The Curse of Mutation has been discovered in the Empire……! The curse that was never supposed to spread beyond the United Kingdom……!"
"Ugh… it was only one case, wasn't it? Why are you so upset?"
"We didn't track it down! We found it by accident! By accident! The ritual formula has probably already spread everywhere!"
"Then just find them all and burn them."
"How are we supposed to find them all?! Control has already failed!"
"E-even so… we can't admit our failure. Our standing as the greatest power on the continent……"
"Don't you understand how many people will die while you cling to that standing?!"
How on earth had someone so indecisive and shortsighted been elected Pope?
If the Saintess's role was to receive the will of God and deliver it to humanity, the Pope's role was to receive the will of humanity and deliver it to God. The Saintess was chosen by divine revelation, but the Pope was elected by a vote of the bishops.
When someone like this had been elected, Emilia had wondered if it was someone's scheme. But there was no sign of a shadowy mastermind pulling the Pope's strings like a puppet. When she discreetly asked the bishops, the only answer she got was that Aloysia hadn't always been this way.
Ever since Aloysia became Pope, countless critical matters had ground to a halt. On the grounds that the continent was currently stable, the Pope refused to change anything.
But the continent was anything but stable. The Empire was constantly watching for a chance to resume war. The Undead King was invading multiple nations in real time. Other countries, terrified of both the Empire and the Undead King, were leaning on the Church. And now the Curse of Mutation on top of it all.
The Saintess was frustrated, but there was nothing she could do. In the absence of a revelation, it was the Pope alone who had to decide humanity's course.
"We need to request cooperation from the Caligosa Principality! They proposed it first in the first place!"
The Caligosa Principality was a vassal state of the Empire, ruled by the Duke of Caligosa. The Caligosa ducal family, distinguished by their silver hair and purple eyes, possessed one of the finest intelligence networks on the continent. They had even managed to dig up the Church's secrets and reached out first. It almost seemed as though they already knew the Curse of Mutation had slipped out of control.
"Ugh… but the Caligosa Principality is an enemy nation."
"Your Holiness! Watch your language! The Church has no enemy nations!"
"On the surface, maybe… but if we aren't hostile to the Empire, then what are we? The Principality follows the Empire's lead, after all."
"Argh! If they wanted to screw us over, they would have exposed everything they found ages ago! I don't know what they want, but they're not trying to hurt us!"
Driven past the limits of her patience, the Saintess let slip language that was more than a little improper.
"What if they… find out? The true nature of the Curse of Mutation…… Even the Duke of Caligosa shouldn't know that much yet."
"……"
Even the Saintess had no easy answer to that. The Curse of Mutation, by its very existence, embodied the darkness of the Lumenic Church. That was precisely why they were covering it up as nothing more than a disease. She knew full well that if the truth ever came out, it would be catastrophic for the Church.
But what mattered most to the Saintess was not the prestige of the Lumenic Church. It was preventing even one more unjust, meaningless death.
"……Even so, we need help. We've reached our limit."