252. Deception 12.
252. Deception 12.
"You've done well."
Shhk!
I struck the elf's neck off.
Thunk! Rattle-rattle...
The situation had twisted itself into knots, much like the elf's body convulsing after losing its head.
"Haa..."
'Father' was the problem.
They'd been buying up Holy Blood at premium prices, and supposedly supplied illegal goods that were nearly impossible to find on the open market.
Narcotics, forged identities, even explosives.
I'd barely slept, and the moment I stepped out I was drenched in blood. My condition was abysmal.
"Well done. But walking into that trap was a mistake."
"The intel was solid."
Lexi shot me a sideways glance.
At this point, whatever shocking thing anyone said wouldn't register.
I just felt... hot.
My head was throbbing. I'd figured it was just poor condition, but why was I so overheated?
"Could you help me remove my armor?"
"Fine."
I undid the chin strap and cast aside my helmet, then worked the gauntlets loose.
Lexi unfastened my pauldrons.
Once the breastplate came off, my body finally began to cool a little.
"...What is this?"
"What is what?"
Lexi was staring at my back with a rigid expression.
"Hold still. Dung poison has flared up on your back."
"...Excuse me?"
Dung poison.
The easiest poison to obtain, and also the lowest-grade poison there is.
"It's a stab wound. Looks like a dagger got you."
Stabbed? When was I stabbed?
...Was it the goblin that had clung to my back?
Lexi examined the wound, then glanced at me.
"Then why isn't the wound healing?"
A chill ran through me.
I'd been too worn down to think!
"...You didn't know? For an Immortal or a Holy Body, healing slows if you're poisoned or if nerves like the spine are damaged."
I squared my shoulders and cloaked it with a plausible-sounding line.
While I slipped off the leather armor and Lexi's attention was elsewhere, I shoved Holy Blood into my mouth.
Smack!!!
"Ack?!"
Lexi slammed my back, and I spat the Holy Blood right out.
"What is that thing you're putting in your mouth?"
"Candy—." "Answer me honestly."
Lexi's eyes flared wide as she grabbed me by the collar.
Her nerves were razor-sharp.
"What the hell kind of bastard are you...?"
...This was bad.
"That really is candy."
"Not funny..."
Lexi picked up the Holy Blood, popped it into her mouth, and chewed.
If it's not funny, why scoop it up and eat it?
"...Explain."
"Scavenging something off the ground and eating it — does that look amusing to you?"
Lexi's face scrunched up hard.
"I'm sorry. I must have pulled out the wrong thing."
"...Think about the terms of our contract. You cannot keep things from me."
That flimsy verbal contract?
Ever since Dantalian deceived me, I no longer believe in contracts.
I had to make a decision right now.
Whether to kill Lexi here, or whether to trust her.
"If you don't answer properly, I'll kill you. I'm asking what you are."
Her nerves were honed like a razor blade.
If she, too, was ready to kill me, then it was time to regain my calm.
"When did you switch places with Lee Si-hyeon?"
Switch places?
She thought I'd been replaced?
"You're right. Just as you suspect, the Holy Body is still in District Four."
"...Every time you open your mouth, lies slither out. Do you find it amusing when I play along?"
"Pfft!"
I deflected it with a laugh.
She'd definitely caught me. ...Was coming clean the right move?
As Seths had said, Lexi had only known me for a month, and before that she'd tried to kidnap me as 'Father's' pawn.
"You are— you are not the Holy Body."
Lexi, too, seemed to have reached her conclusion.
"...Is that such a significant matter? I have plenty of medicine."
I gave a half-hearted reply.
I meant to gauge Lexi's reaction before deciding how to handle this.
"In the end, the prestige of your 'Holy Child' name comes from that medicine—"
"It means you nearly died dozens of times just now—!"
Lexi's eyes bulged as she shouted.
"Right! That black Hosott who carried your scent — that's the Holy Body! No wonder I felt nothing. You were nothing at all! Not an Immortal! Just an ordinary human!"
"...Why on earth are you doing this? Does it matter that much whether I am the Holy Body or not?"
Had I struck some deep nerve of Lexi's?
Lexi flinched, then after a moment stared at me fixedly.
There was no hostility in that gaze.
I could tell, faintly.
...This person is on my side.
"You... what did you come here to do?"
"I wanted to gain fame—."
"A man who says he wants to become famous, having nothing to go back to — does that make any sense to you?!"
Lexi shoved me.
She'd put too much force into it, and I toppled backward. I hit the ground and stole a glance at her; her excitement seemed to have subsided.
But the chill in her eyes sent a cold shiver down my spine.
"Explain. What's your objective?"
...It seemed I had no choice but to come clean.
A grim premonition told me that if I spouted nonsense here, things would genuinely go badly.
"This isn't the place to talk."
Through the building's window, the people who had been the original residents of this area were stealing glances at us. Lexi followed my gaze and studied them briefly, then let out a sigh and loosened her intensity.
* * * * *
"Thank you so much for your help!"
"It was nothing."
"We heard! Even when we were still trapped underground, they say you injected some kind of air to create a structure that made escape easier..."
What?
I glanced at Edelin, who regarded me with an impassive expression — as if silently telling me not to bring it up.
"You are the savior of House Orlinge! Would you not do us the honor of sharing your esteemed name?"
"I am the Holy Child."
"Holy Child? Ho— Holy Child?!"
The seigneur's eyes went round as he shrieked.
"H-how could His Holiness the Holy Child be in such a humble place...! Are you not hungry? Would you not favor us by sharing a meal before you depart?"
The name Holy Child had spread quite far, it seemed.
That was fortunate. I needed smooth sailing moving forward.
"I am on a journey to deliver relief from the plague. If I do not hasten my steps by even a single pace, the people I might have saved will be lost."
Even at this polite refusal, the seigneur continued to insist I stay.
I bore no ill feeling toward him, but with Lexi glaring at me from behind, I couldn't afford to linger.
"To receive the grace of rescue and be able to offer nothing in return is too cruel!"
What's cruel about it?
I'd intended to abandon you and leave from the start.
The one who deserves your thanks is the Dragonia beside me.
So I was all the more stingy with my goodwill.
"...If I ever have cause to call upon House Orlinge, would you be so kind as to treat me to a meal sometime?"
Only then did a smile bloom fully across the seigneur's face.
"But of course!"
The seigneur and his family assisted us with the utmost devotion.
They'd said they would clear the bodies themselves, so there was no need to help with the burial, and we were able to depart at once.
Edelin quietly approached me then.
"I'll wash you clean."
"...Please."
Something cold cooled my entire body and cleansed me thoroughly.
"Thank you."
"It was nothing."
After that, no one spoke a word.
How long did we walk?
"...This time, it'd be in your best interest to confess everything."
Lexi growled as she blocked my path.
"Your guess is correct. That child is the Saintess, and I am not the Holy Child."
"No, if that's true, then your destroyed heart regenerating makes no sense."
"The Saintess is Venus's proxy."
At the unfamiliar word, Lexi's eyes narrowed.
"Proxy?"
"You'd be right to call her a god's direct subordinate. That direct subordinate personally entreated Venus, saying she wanted to live an eternal life with me. And so I received Venus's Blessing."
Lexi gave no answer, falling silent for a moment.
"...Do you know what your uncle told me when I became an Immortal?"
Has she already sorted it all out?
She's quick to judge. I'd still be asking questions.
"That no matter how high and far an Immortal monster flies, if its head is broken or its heart bursts, it dies."
"I received Venus's Blessing."
"Do you know how meticulously they've studied Holy Blood? Someone who received Venus's Blessing, even if they become an Immortal, it's the same. The conditions for death are absolute. And you — you've had your heart ripped out twice."
"Each time, I secretly ingested or injected Holy Blood."
"...I told you. Even for an Immortal, if the heart or head is destroyed, they die."
My confession seemed to have been quite a shock; Lexi's voice was shrinking.
Had I fooled her too seamlessly?
I deflected again with a laugh.
"When has the world ever operated sensibly?"
'This world is fundamentally nonsensical.'
Maybe that's why absurd things happen like clockwork. If I thought of it that way, my own case was hardly unique.
"And why are you here?"
Thankfully, the question I'd prepared came up.
"I gifted rest to the former Holy Child, and brought about the birth of the current Saintess. That was... when I was fourteen. The Holy Child gave me a warning. She said Immortals were monsters of her own making, and that to sustain themselves they would target the Holy Child's blood."
"...So from the beginning, it was all an act to protect the Saintess?"
I'd been worried it was too convoluted, but she was following perfectly.
"Yes."
"Including you being here?"
"Correct. I've always known that an Immortal would attack someday, and I've effectively fended that off until now. Though I failed to fend you off."
Shame colored Lexi's face.
"On top of that, the Immortal had joined hands with the Phantom Legion. As luck would have it, my uncle — the Immortal's pawn — and you both misread the situation, so I decided to remove the Phantom Legion's reason to cooperate with the Immortal and draw their attention elsewhere."
Had the word 'pawn' struck too sharply?
The fervor drained from Lexi's expression.
"...This doesn't make sense to me."
"What doesn't make sense?"
"You."
I'd thought her expression had merely settled, but I was wrong.
She'd been staring at me vacantly, lost in deep thought.
"What do you mean by that all of a sudden?"
"When your body was turned into a pincushion by arrows as thick as your thumb, when your heart was ripped out — you weren't afraid."
"That's true."
"Then, just like today, you nearly died. From what I've heard about you... it's been that way since the first time you met Alex, six years ago."
That alone isn't nearly enough to rattle me.
"Haven't I said this before? I must have come close to death at least fifty times. After passing a hundred times being stabbed or cut, I stopped counting."
I'd tossed it out as a light joke, but Lexi only looked up at me with a graver expression. Déjà vu struck me.
As if she was about to start griping about selfishness again.
"I've killed many people. So when the stage is set, I've resolved not to shrink from death and hardship. Because that would be wrong. That's why I'm here."
"No, something about you is wrong."
What now?
"What's wrong?"
"From the age of fourteen, you followed your master around killing people."
The beginning hadn't involved any deep thought.
It was simply because Jul was the only person I knew. So I clung on desperately.
"At first, with no familiar faces, I wanted to follow my master. It was just my bad luck that the one I happened to run into was my uncle."
Even I found that unfair.
"Back then, your uncle's men had a Siren captured. They were spouting foul things — about rape, about cutting off her wings and selling her to a choir. I had a gut feeling they were wicked men."
"Don't change the subject. I've spent over a century rolling through battlefields. A fourteen-year-old child who can barely handle a bow competing against trained soldiers is absurd. In that kind of situation, you'd draw a bow on ideology alone?"
"I simply ambushed them and ran."
"No, that's impossible. If you told your story to an expert, nine times out of ten they'd give you the same answer."
Lexi stared at me with eyes laced with disbelief.
"That you're not human."
I'd gone out of my way to lay everything bare, but it seemed even the truth I'd told felt like a lie to Lexi.
It stung a little.
But what could I do? It was all my karma.
"I thought the reason such impossible results were possible was because you were the Holy Body. I thought you'd used your power, your abilities. But you're not the Holy Body."
"That's conjecture."
"Is it? Then how could a baby speak inside its mother's womb and start talking from the moment of birth? And moreover, for someone with such deep filial piety, you certainly managed to ruin my disciple's life nicely."
"Why are you bringing that up now?"
I reacted with anger, but Lexi's gaze didn't waver.
I was out of moves.
"That... was not what I wanted."
...So it's come to this.
Having unearthed my secret through sheer deduction, Lexi fixed me with a grim stare and spoke.
"Then what truly are you?"