[Saintess for You - 15]
[Saintess for You - 15]
Amazing.
I found myself thinking.
Looking around, countless shadow thorns had pierced through all the monsters, and furthermore, the Monster Tamer was restrained by shadows.
'It's almost an all-purpose magic.'
Apparently, it's a magic Ed created himself.
Considering how much of a hassle it is to create magic, I could tell how incredible it was that he used magic he created himself rather than pre-existing ones.
It wasn't even just simple magic; it was a spell that mixed the properties of lightning, water, earth, and wind.
It's sharp, has piercing power, and at the same time, it changes freely like a liquid and is hard.
It was truly a power that could respond to any situation.
At first, Ed couldn't use it properly either, so it consumed a lot of mana every time he used it, but as he got used to it and his control improved, it's said that it has improved to a level where there's no big problem even if he uses it all the time now.
In other words, it seemed like it was magic designed with very good mana efficiency from the start.
He had taught it to a few people on the battlefield, but it's said that no one could handle it properly.
A genius among geniuses who became a Paladin at age 10.
Even though it wasn't my story, I somehow felt proud of his reputation.
"Hmm."
I took a deep breath while maintaining the barrier.
Hmm, creating a barrier on the spot is indeed difficult.
Could I make it better if I practiced this too?
It had the disadvantage of consuming quite a bit of mana to cover the entire forest, and since it also required significant concentration, I could barely do anything else.
It would have been nice to design and build it well from the start, but I didn't have the luxury of time.
In the meantime, the moment a monster enters the village, it would go beyond pandemonium, and many people would die.
Considering the level of the guards, they aren't exactly reliable.
"......."
Ed's face came to mind.
Ed's expression when he heard my answer, "People are dying, you know," which I had blurted out without thinking, looked stunned. And the face he made afterwards, smiling as if satisfied, made my heart flutter slightly without me realizing it.
Ed might have gotten some kind of answer from that response, which came out without me thinking, rather than through careful consideration.
Whether it was the answer to the worries Ed was having, or an answer to something else, I thought it was a good thing that my answer made Ed happy.
Let's think about it after finishing the job.
I approached the captured man for a moment.
"His condition is....... What is this? Poison?"
His skin looked like it was necrotizing.
It was turning black and his condition was worsening.
I couldn't get information if I let him die, so I wanted to save him somehow, but since I didn't know what was wrong with his condition, only question marks floated in my head.
I barely managed to reach out and check his condition.
I thought that when I returned to the Cathedral, I should practice how to cast multiple spells at once.
If I mastered it, it seemed like it would be possible to cast a barrier and perform healing at the same time in situations like this.
I took a slow deep breath and concentrated.
Checking the Monster Tamer's condition, I quickly acquired information about his body.
"Is his mana running wild?"
As mana was secreted excessively, his body couldn't withstand it and was collapsing.
Ed had taken off the bracelet just in case, but perhaps his body couldn't withstand it because it was already not in a normal state due to that bracelet.
"You're stupid. You wanted too much power, so that's what happens."
"Sh, shut up......! What do you know, you who had everything from the start!?"
"That's true, I don't really know. I was strong from birth. It's not that I didn't put in any effort at all, but if you ask if I put in the kind of effort where I ground my life into it like most people, that's not the case. It's just the level of ordinary, daily practice."
About an hour a day?
Two hours if it's long?
Sometimes there were days I didn't practice at all for a whole day.
Nevertheless, I grew stronger at an absurdly fast speed, my mana grew endlessly, and I possessed more mana than anyone else in the Cathedral.
Even from the moment I first met Ed, I heard a lot that I had an absurd amount of mana, and I grew even more from there.
My power was truly overwhelming, to the point where people even asked if I was really the reincarnation of a Goddess.
Unfortunately, perhaps the person called the Goddess had no eye for talent, as she bestowed such a blessing on someone like me.
There must have been someone kinder, gentler, and more suited to being a 'perfect Saintess'.
There are people in the world who are so good that you can even feel madness from it.
There are people who are so evil that you can feel madness from it, so where is the guarantee that there aren't good people?
There are humans like me.
Then there must be humans like that too.
The Pope is a human who feels like that.
"Why didn't you live according to your station?"
"Th, this bitch......!"
"Stay still. If you get excited for no reason, the speed at which your body necrotizes will only get faster."
"......Wh, what? My body."
"That bracelet, where did you get it? Did the Infinite Cult give it to you?"
"......."
"The necrosis has stopped because I'm touching you with my hand right now. If I take my hand off, the necrosis will immediately resume. I don't care either way, but what about you? Honestly, whether you live or die, personally, I don't care."
He's a villain.
No one would say anything even if I killed him.
Rather, there are many people who would be happy that I killed a villain.
However, if human life is truly precious, I should choose a method that avoids killing as much as possible, and furthermore, I might be able to prevent more damage with the information this guy has.
The bracelet.
The Infinite Cult.
He had a lot of information that was concerning in various ways.
Since it was the Infinite Cult I had met before, there was a possibility that they were still breathing as a group, not just a job carried out personally by remnants of the Infinite Cult.
Therefore, information was needed, and I needed to keep this guy alive to wipe them out.
"......I, I received it."
"Where? How?"
Don't you know you have to explain according to the 5W1H?
"They recognized that I had a talent for being a Monster Tamer and gave it to me, saying it was a gift."
"You used that without even thinking? A suspicious item given by a suspicious person? Then you're not a member of the Infinite Cult?"
"N, no! They just said this crest must be engraved before I go......."
"Hmm."
It's not hiding.
No, rather than not having the intention to hide, it was more like they were just advertising.
We are still alive.
We are still here.
I thought that's what they were saying.
They were a truly self-assertive group of fanatics, but in any case, at the point where they were causing harm to civilians, it could be said that they were no longer worth talking about.
I had to punish him, but if this guy was truly just an idiot who accepted a suspicious item without thinking and had no connection, it seemed like it would be hard to find their hideout.
And they said they couldn't get much information from The Old Freak (The Kidnapper) who tried to kidnap me last time either.
If I couldn't get information, there was even less need to keep him alive, but that's just because I couldn't get it right now; if experts did it, they might be able to get some other information.
Besides, since I took the bracelet away, he wouldn't be able to tame monsters anymore.
His body is also half-ragged.
"A, are you going to kill me? It's the death penalty anyway......!"
"Well, monster taming is that much of a serious crime. Besides, you didn't just do it, you had the actual will to attack civilians, so wouldn't it be difficult to survive? However, if you provide valid information about the Infinite Cult, your crime might be lightened somewhat depending on that."
"......."
"In the first place, why did you become something like a Monster Tamer? You didn't have to, did you?"
"There was nothing else I could do besides this."
"That's a great excuse. You have perfectly fine limbs, so it wouldn't have been a problem to do some labor somewhere, right? Are you sick? Or do you have a congenital problem? If it's not even that, is there some problem where your reputation is so bad that they won't even give you that kind of labor work?"
I could at least understand if it were someone like that.
If it were someone who really couldn't go anywhere, I could somehow understand them falling into a life of crime.
I remembered Ed saying that the role of the Goddess Church was also half that kind of safety net.
He said that someone who has already stumbled once has to go through a difficult penance to return to a normal path, and if even religion casts that person out, they fall into a deeper abyss and can never climb back up, and innocent victims inevitably occur in that process.
"They said you had a personality befitting a Saintess....... It was all bullshit rumors."
"I am a Saintess. To those who live their days normally and live kindly, and to those who have committed sins but sincerely repent and regret them......."
"......."
"And even to those who have no choices and are struggling in the darkness because they can't do anything. If my personality doesn't look good to you right now, that just means your life has walked a bad path."
I said, looking down at the Monster Tamer.
"Are you, the guy who tried to massacre civilians by unleashing monsters, pointing out my personality right now?"
I let out a small sigh.
"You'd better squeeze out every memory of when you met the Infinite Cult, somehow. If you don't want to be executed and die just like that."
At that moment, tuung, a light shot up toward the sky.
It was a signal.
It seemed Ed had taken care of all the monsters heading to the village.
"He's fast."
I saw the speed at which Ed moved, and it seemed he was incredibly fast, and he had just been adjusting his speed because of me.
'I caught the hidden Monster Tamer. I'll spread a large barrier that all the villagers can see, and everyone will know of my good deeds. As the saying goes, hard work should be done when everyone knows about it.'
I smiled.
'With this, everyone will think highly of me, right?'
If I pretend to have romantic feelings for Ed in front of the villagers under the pretext of reassuring them, wouldn't everyone be on my side?
The image of a girl in love seemed to work surprisingly well.
Hehe, it's starting to get fun.