Lies
If I had to sum up the quality of the audiovisual material I was seeing for the first time in this life with one concise word, it would be this: abysmal.
The way it showed the story of a man named Lobel Wright without any filtering, without skipping, even the scenes I wasn’t particularly curious about or wanted to see, left me with the uncomfortable feeling of snooping through someone else’s diary. It was outright unpleasant. If the person who had written and directed this sloppy film hadn’t been the suspicious character who called himself a “god,” I might have blindly groped for the remote to switch over to a far more educational documentary about lions massacring zebras.
The moment the video ended, the ending credits that slowly rose up were plastered with the unsavory word “God” across nearly every role—director, producer, cinematography, editing, and more. The faint prerecorded cheers and applause drifting from beyond the darkened screen were nothing but grating.
What did he mean, well? I had spent both my previous life and this one flattering superiors until it became second nature—one of my proudest specialties, even. But when the other party was essentially a divinely possessed television set, coming up with the right note of agreement felt impossible.
“Uh… you made it well…”
I forced an awkward smile and tossed out a single word of praise. Smiles and compliments were universal. No matter when, where, or to whom you used them, they worked more than half the time as excellent tools of communication.
It seemed my desperate throwaway line had landed better than expected. When the other person hands you the end of the sentence like that during a conversation, it usually means they want to keep talking. Which also meant I had earned at least some degree of favor from him.
But his distinctly friendly attitude on our very first meeting only stoked my wariness. Pure goodwill without expecting anything in return does not exist in this world. There is always self-interest or self-satisfaction. People need a reason to help or show favor. And if the other party was a suspicious being whose identity and purpose were unclear, I absolutely could not loosen my grip on the rope of suspicion I held.
“If it’s not too rude… may I ask exactly what sort of person you are…?”
“Th-that is… when you say ‘god’… do you mean it as a symbolic expression, or… perhaps the name of some organization…?”
“Then at least tell me what kind of things you oversee…”
“Ah… I see…”
And so we continued exchanging answers so empty I began to think talking to a wall would have been more comforting. After a long while—
The self-proclaimed “god” television asked whether my curiosity had been satisfied. Come to think of it, the reason it had suddenly played an observational variety show starring Priest Lobel was right after I had grown curious about the circumstances between him and the Saintess. Thanks to that, my questions about the whole sequence of events had been cleanly resolved. Yet far bigger questions had sprouted in their place like bamboo after rain. Instead of feeling refreshed, my mind felt thick with fog.
“Yes… thanks to you…”
I couldn’t even finish the sentence. In a single instant that allowed not even one blink, the television vanished more silently than it had appeared, leaving behind not the slightest afterimage. My senses had been completely toyed with by that mysterious phenomenon.
“Just what was that…”
I thought about pinching my cheek to restart my dazed mind, but stopped myself.
“Mmm…”
As if she had only just woken up, the Saintess began to squirm softly in my arms. The soft skin pressed against me, the realistic warmth of her body temperature, confirmed beyond doubt that I had not been dreaming.
Even after waking, the Saintess stayed quiet for a long time. She clung to my upper body with her whole frame, blinking slowly now and then. If not for the fact that she showed zero intention of letting go—like a baby koala glued to its mother—she looked almost like her usual self.
But the moment I showed even the slightest sign of trying to pry her off or stand up to move somewhere else, she would begin warming up a heartbreaking sob, hiccupping wordlessly as if to threaten me to stay still. That part was genuinely exhausting; I couldn’t budge an inch.
“Saintess… I think my blood isn’t circulating properly, so could you please let go for just a moment? Just one instant. I’ll do some stretches and hug you again right away…”
“Uuuu…”
She refused. Instead of words, she buried her face in my shirt and let out a gloomy complaint. Yet even that was enough for me to understand her intention perfectly. The will behind the action was desperate and vivid. Children always express their feelings in rough, primitive ways, and the Saintess’s behavior until now had been the perfect example: if she didn’t get what she wanted she sulked, threw tantrums until she did, and harmed anything that annoyed her without hesitation.
But her appearance in this moment was strange. The usual Saintess would have thrown herself at me the instant her eyes opened, shoving her lips against mine without warning. She was like an open-world game NPC that charged straight at whatever she desired, expression unchanged even if something blocked her path. That was the person I had observed, heard about, and experienced all this time.
Having grown used to her every action being laced with madness, this sudden regression felt unfamiliar and new.
“He said… he won’t come… anymore… He said… he won’t come again…”
Her pitiful voice, still thick with sobs she couldn’t quite swallow, brushed my ear. It was more accurate to say the words had been dragged out by the crying than that she had spoken them. From the fragmented words I could guess what had happened. It seemed she had taken Priest Lobel’s boast about becoming her new exclusive attendant to mean I would never visit her again.
It was a rather exaggerated leap of logic, yet the conclusion it reached was surprisingly close to the truth of the story. I want to retire. That was the phrase I had repeated like a mantra ever since becoming the Saintess’s exclusive priest, and it was the long-cherished wish I had sworn I would one day fulfill.
“Where would I possibly go without you, Saintess? Look, I came to see you today, didn’t I? That priest just really loves pranks. He must have taken the joke too far because he wanted to get closer to you. I’m actually quite close with him too, but he plays so many mischievous tricks on me that we fight all the time.”
Feeling the tiniest sting of conscience, I rattled off every comforting thing I thought she wanted to hear. Naturally, I made sure to slip in several defenses of Priest Lobel. I didn’t like it—in fact I hated it—but I had come here to save the man. I needed to soften the Saintess’s terrible impression of him little by little whenever I could.
“R-really…?”
“Yes, of course.”
“You’re… not going anywhere…?”
“I promise. I swear I will never leave your side without your permission. I am your exclusive guardian priest, after all.”
“…”
When I smiled gently and stroked her hair, the dark cloud over the Saintess’s heart seemed to lift a little. Her arms still held me with the same iron strength, but the crimson eyes looking up at me now shimmered with a brilliant light quite different from before.
And I was not the kind of person to miss a golden opportunity like this.
“So, about that… Saintess. I actually have an urgent matter with that friend of mine. If it’s not too much trouble, could you please return him from the state you froze him in?”
Right at this perfect moment—
“Hm? Your brother is asking you like this, Welna.”
Even I had to admit the timing and angle were flawless, a divine move. The Saintess’s answer came immediately.
“…Lies.”