The Traitors' Gathering #2
Wherever people gather, religion follows.
And so, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, this continent had a religion of its own.
The only difference was that it had never fractured into countless branches the way Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam, or Catholicism had. It remained a single, unified faith under one name:
the Continental Church.
Isabel was the Saintess chosen by that Continental Church. She could wield Holy Power itself—a tangible light that embodied the goddess’s miracles.
Any cleric who had tempered their faith deeply enough could use Holy Power, yet the power a Saintess commanded was something else entirely. She was the one who answered the goddess’s oracle, the one who would send a Hero down to a land on the brink of death. That alone made the difference inevitable.
A Saintess refined her Holy Power through hardship and could work greater miracles than any ordinary priest. The goddess’s blessing walked with her.
Once bestowed, that blessing could never be taken back—not even by the goddess herself. It could not be weakened or strengthened. Such was the law of the covenant that bound them.
Therefore the growth or decline of the blessing rested solely in the Saintess’s hands.
And Isabel possessed that ability.
Even after she had knelt before Castro and sworn obedience, even after she had turned her back on the Hero—if the goddess had not been a true goddess, things might have been different. But she was divine, and so she could only watch.
Thanks to that, Isabel smoothly cultivated her Holy Power with the aid of miracles, helped people, and eventually hurled herself into the dangerous, raging storms that led all the way to the Demon King… and returned alive.
As a result, Isabel’s prestige soared without limit until her worldly authority brushed the very chin of the Pope. Had she wished it, she could have become Pope herself before long.
Yet Isabel seemed content with the modest station the title of Saintess afforded her, and she made a great show of finding the height of her position burdensome. She feared that someone who knew only how to pray had risen so high, and more than once she tried to step down and refuse.
Every time, a swarm of opposition forced her to remain.
No one but Isabel herself knew that every one of those gestures was a lie.
She had woven a black cloth of deception and hypocrisy to veil the eyes of the world.
“Haaah…”
On a night when a bright moon hung high in the sky, a woman let out a languid sigh atop the white-clothed altar prepared for the goddess’s rites.
Even beneath the dim moonlight her golden hair and eyes shone brilliantly. Beautiful features. And a body so lewd it seemed better suited to serving a demon than a goddess.
The woman—Isabel—scooped up a sticky, milky fluid that clung thickly to her skin, tasted it, and smirked.
The semen that dirtied every corner of her body carried a green, youthful tang, a fishy reek, and a sticky, grass-like chew. Of course it did; it belonged to young men still bearing the last traces of boyhood, or those only a little older.
Isabel swept her gaze over the men sprawled across the floor—men she had drained dry—then quietly flicked her fingers.
“You called for us, my lady?”
Several priests in pure white robes approached without a sound and knelt at Isabel’s feet.
Ordinarily, priests who revered the goddess and lived by doctrine would never have accepted such a scene. They would have raised their voices to condemn the Saintess and submitted motions for her expulsion and punishment.
Yet the eyes of these men who ought to have spoken the name of the divine with purity were cloudy, and a faint madness swirled within them.
To the priests gathered here, Isabel’s every word was doctrine and the goddess’s oracle. Therefore they believed that everything she did was right.
Because Isabel had made them think and act that way—by secretly feeding them a drug laced with Holy Power, something a Saintess should never use.
She knew the danger. She knew that if she filled her own desires, cracks would eventually appear. But if she did not devour men and chase pleasure, the dark sin of the day she had turned her back would swallow her whole. That fear drove her.
So she thrashed and struggled through these orgies, trying to escape the nightmares. While she drowned in pleasure she could forget everything.
“Clean them up.”
“Yes. At once.”
The priests answered the Saintess’s command with joyful obedience, slung the collapsed men over their shoulders one by one, and left. Strengthened by Holy Power, they carried the slender youths with ease.
Isabel watched them depart in happy submission, then slowly set her feet upon the floor. The smooth marble, cold enough to reflect a face, sent a chill climbing up through her soles.
She walked unhurriedly toward the bath, never noticing how sharp the eyes of the majestic goddess statue standing behind the altar had become.
This building, standing within the vast grounds of the Grand Cathedral—the heart of the Continental Church—was Isabel’s private sanctuary. Therefore everything that happened here was her right: ferrying people through the secret passages she had prepared for emergencies, bringing them in through those same passages, and moving with silent steps herself.
“Mm-mm…”
Isabel hummed a song while warm rain from the shower washed over her. It was a hymn of praise to the goddess, one no member of the Church could fail to know. Like doctrine itself, it was a piece of culture everyone learned regardless of rank.
Then, abruptly, she thought of a certain cleric whom the opposing faction had begun to push forward, and her expression hardened.
The cheerful melody had long since died. The lingering pleasure clung to her body like foul mire that refused to wash away.
A second Saintess, when the true Saintess already stood right here?
Isabel snorted at their claims even as she considered how best to deal with the problem. The priest who had been sniffing around her had already been turned into a faithful dog and was feeding them false reports; he would never learn what happened in this chapel. So she only needed to dispose of the woman the cardinals were elevating.
Having already committed one great betrayal, Isabel felt no qualms about eliminating a rival. It was a ruthless way of thinking hard to believe had once belonged to a pure heart. Had the filthy selfishness suppressed beneath all that education in goodness never awakened, she would never have thought this way.
She let the semen trailing down her thighs rinse away under the water, then shut off the shower.
“A pleasure to meet you like this. My name is Eric Howard.”
A brown-haired man held out his hand with an open, welcoming expression. He was the merchant the World Tree had spoken of—arriving a day earlier than the promised week. His operation was small, but he made his living dealing primarily in luxury goods. Fine tea leaves from the Elf Forest were among them.
Adonis clasped Eric’s hand and smiled as though genuinely glad. The man would carry them all the way to the Kingdom of Turnell, and during the journey he could share all sorts of useful information. It would have been difficult to treat him carelessly even without such calculations. Besides, Eric was not someone Adonis hated. He would have shown basic human courtesy regardless.
“A pleasure. I’m Kelvin. And this is my wife, Eris.”
“Oh! What a truly beautiful lady. It is an honor to meet you.”
Wife. Semiramis, standing with her horns concealed by magic, lifted the corners of her lips slightly and accepted the greeting. She had never been the type to find humans filthy and refuse to touch them, so she showed no discomfort.
“The pleasure is mine. I am Eris.”
The usual arrogance was nowhere to be found; she spoke with the natural voice and manner of a refined noblewoman. She had always known how to wear an entirely different persona when she wished—even if she had never once indulged in such play before.
“Mmm. I have heard much from the World Tree. I understand you give massages so fine that the World Tree itself invited you?”
“Pardon? Ah… I think the World Tree has overestimated me. It’s rather embarrassing.”
Adonis recalled the World Tree’s confident smile as it told him to wait without worry, that it would handle everything, and offered an awkward laugh. The good impression was welcome, yet the excessive expectations felt burdensome.
“How modest. Ah, speaking of which—would it be all right if I received a massage myself? You may find it rude, but I would dearly love to experience with my own body the skill the World Tree recommended. I’m dying of curiosity.”
“Pardon? The guildmaster himself?”
When Adonis tilted his head, Eric nodded quite vigorously.
“Yes. A merchant must always keep his edge sharp. Because of that, fatigue piles up and I often grow exhausted. I endure with focus and grit, but one cannot live that way forever without rest, can one? There comes a time when a man needs to let go and truly relax.”
“I’m no merchant, so I wouldn’t know… but I can feel how much fatigue must accumulate. Just the fact that you came all this way proves it.”
At any rate, Adonis paused and pointed toward a corner of the room whose door stood wide open. It was a sparse chamber containing only a few simple pieces of furniture—a small table and the like—and a large bed sitting alone, yet it felt more pleasant than any house. Every dwelling built inside the Elf Forest was like that, but this one especially breathed pure air. It was a house mixed with branches the World Tree itself occasionally pruned and cut away.
“Would you care to lie down in that room first? I’ll do my humble best with my meager skill.”
“Ohhh! Thank you! My body is going to be spoiled rotten today!”
Eric sprang up and headed for the bed. Adonis gave a small snort of laughter and followed at a leisurely pace.
“If you would first remove your outer clothes, I would appreciate it. Then please lie face-down.”
“Yes, of course.”
Eric sat on the edge of the bed and began undressing piece by piece. As a merchant who had accumulated a fair amount of wealth, both his outer garments and the pure white underclothes beneath were clean. There was no sign of wear or fraying.
Adonis looked down at Eric, who had stripped and obediently stretched out face-down on the bed, and his expression grew complicated. Magic had cleaned everything, yet only a few hours earlier the bed had been soaked with Semiramis’s and his own fluids. Semen, love juices, a tide of them—the thick, lewd stench had been enough to sting the nose. The thought of laying Eric on that same bed made him feel a belated pang of guilt, but it was clean now, so it should be fine… right?
Adonis rationalized it to himself and opened his eyes wide.
Thanks to the paper he had become, he could see at a glance where Eric’s body was uncomfortable and how the faint flow of mana moved through him. Keeping those troubled spots in mind, Adonis carefully felt along Eric’s body as though searching by fingertip alone. Then he pressed firmly with his fingers into the knotted places beneath both shoulder blades and poured mana into them.
This way he could loosen muscles that had seized up or places where the flow had twisted.
“Good heavens! This is—ngh… aahhh!”
If anyone later asked how the massage had felt, Eric would say it was as though his entire body had melted.