Chapter 90
Chapter 90
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 90
Chapter Title: Interlude - Seti and the Saintess
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Seti thought about the Saintess.
She had none of the dignity you'd expect from a Saintess. She grinned like an idiot at the word "friend," and wandered around wearing an eyepatch that didn't suit her at all, supposedly to hide her eyes... A girl who had God's love all to herself.
Seti couldn't like her.
It wasn't some complicated emotion like anger or hatred. Seti's hatred was directed solely at the Korean government.
Jealousy, then? No, it wasn't that either.
If she truly envied the Saintess, she would have shamelessly taken advantage of her kindness.
She just... couldn't like her. Yeah, that was the most accurate way to put it.
The Saintess, who showered her with endless affection, would be shocked to hear that. But what could be done?
That's how human emotions worked.
They ignored reason, jumping this way and that on their own, burning innocent hearts.
'...Petty.'
As she crossed the Academy following the sound of footsteps under her transparent cloak, Seti judged her own feelings that way.
No one knew better than Seti herself.
Her feelings toward the Saintess were nothing more than childish tantrums.
The Saintess wasn't to blame for Seti's misfortune.
Even if she had been the trigger, it was only accelerating something that would have happened eventually.
The Saintess had fought honorably to prove their friendship. She was strong, and Seti had lost. That was all.
There was no malice or hostility in it.
It was just that Seti's situation wasn't normal.
The Korean government forcing her and her sisters to do "that" just because she hadn't performed well in the Superhuman Olympia.
The gods taking away all their blessings because they couldn't stand her filthy birth.
None of it was the Saintess's fault.
She knew that. She knew it. Intellectually, at least.
...By the time Seti had sorted out her thoughts, the footsteps she was following stopped.
Lacking the skill to find the Saintess under the transparent cloak, Seti stopped right next to where the sound had cut off.
The back door of the first-year girls' dormitory.
"...Classes aren't over yet."
Seti crossed her arms, staring at the firmly shut dormitory door.
If it were anywhere else, she might think she'd snuck away quietly, but... not after coming this far.
"Hey."
There was no reply, but Seti was certain the Saintess was watching from nearby and continued.
"...I'm heading back to my room like this. If you have something to say... you can follow."
With that, Seti entered the dormitory.
It was still during class hours, but since attendance was optional for these temporary lessons, the dorm was fairly crowded.
Seti passed through the first-floor lobby, where students were quietly chatting, and headed to her room.
The girls' dorm didn't have the brutal room wars like the boys', so Seti's room was nothing special.
Fifth floor, neither too high nor too low, right at the end of the right hallway.
Creak.
After entering her room, Seti left the door open for a while, waiting.
After about the time it took to drink a cup of tea, she closed the door and reached out into empty air.
A thin cloth caught on her fingertips. With a soft rustle, the girl hiding beneath the peeling transparent cloak revealed herself.
Disheveled white hair, a damp eyepatch, and hands clasped tightly as if in prayer.
Seti gazed quietly at the girl, then spoke softly.
"You okay?"
...She wasn't.
"What the hell is wrong with you?"
It was you two. You two...
"You tricked me."
"Huh?"
"I trusted you. I thought we were all friends..."
"What are you even talking about...?"
"I saw everything! That day on the rooftop! You two together!"
Rooftop? Seti realized what the Saintess meant and flinched.
"You looked so close? Like you couldn't have just met at the Academy?"
"..."
"Why didn't you tell me? Were you afraid I'd get in the way? So you pretended not to know?"
As the Saintess's voice rose, Seti's heart sank coldly.
How much had she heard? About the revenge too? No, they hadn't said anything important outright...
Just as Seti's mind grew tangled,
Words beyond her imagination burst from the Saintess's mouth.
"How long have you and Yeomyeong been... No, how far have you two gone?"
"...What?"
"You didn't... go all the way, did you?"
All the way? Does she mean what I think?
No way the Saintess would say something like that...
Seti stared at her in bewilderment, and the Saintess flushed red and shrieked.
"Did Yeomyeong leave footprints in Seti's pure white snowfield?!"
Oh, yeah, that's what she meant. Seti was speechless and shut her mouth.
The Saintess took that silence as silent affirmation and couldn't hold back her emotions, bursting into tears.
Trembling hands, soaked eyepatch, apple-red cheeks, and snot dripping from her pretty lips.
Her hiccuping sobs quickly turned to wailing.
"Hwuuuaaa...! Seti...!"
***
After crying for a long while, the Saintess exhausted herself and collapsed toward Seti.
Seti didn't push her away but pulled her into an embrace. Without a word, she patted the heaving back of the Saintess.
A habit ingrained from dealing with her emotional sisters.
Her mind was still struggling to catch up to reality.
'...What the hell is wrong with her?'
As Seti desperately tried to figure it out, and the Saintess sobbed messily into her chest, smearing snot everywhere.
Finally, the Saintess stopped crying, lifted her head, and cautiously asked Seti.
"Seti... sniff, did you forget... our promise?"
...Promise? What promise?
"When I become a proper priestess... ugh, we said we'd live together in the Holy Kingdom..."
Ah, only then did Seti recall the promise from their middle school days at the Superhuman Olympia.
When I become a priestess, we'll live together in the Holy Kingdom.
A promise blurted out by a young girl who could still dream, desperate to escape the hell of Korea.
The one who made it had forgotten it completely, but the Saintess had cherished it.
She couldn't become a priestess if she lost her purity, so that's why she cried so bitterly?
Seti found the misunderstanding so cute... no, pitiful, that she smiled faintly without realizing.
She slowly stroked the Saintess's back and said.
"...Sorry. I can't become a priestess anymore."
Half lie, half truth. She really couldn't. Just not because of her purity.
"S-Seti..."
"But it's not like I broke the promise completely? Even if I'm not a priestess... I can still live in the Holy Kingdom."
"..."
No sooner had Seti finished than the Saintess bowed her head deeply. She looked ready to burst into tears again.
'...Non-priestesses can't enter the Five Great Temples.'
She barely swallowed the words rising to her throat.
Should I be the only one trapped there again, waiting for you? Not even once a week, maybe once a month if we're lucky?
That wasn't the future the Saintess dreamed of.
What she wanted was everyday life with Seti.
Talking together, praying together, sometimes even sleeping in the same bed... that kind of routine.
Not lonely days guarding the temple, waiting for a friend who visited occasionally like the previous Saintess.
...As her thoughts reached that point, a certain man's face floated into the Saintess's mind.
'Yeomyeong.'
Her second friend, and the intruder who left footprints in Seti's snowfield(?).
She didn't know why, but thinking of him sparked a small flame deep in her chest.
An unfamiliar emotion no one had told her about.
The more she thought about Yeomyeong, the fiercer and more unquenchable it grew.
From their disastrous first meeting, fighting the dragon together to save Manchuria, coming to the Academy together, her slapping him in the shelter, and then...
Waking up to breakfast alone with Seti.
Once her thoughts reached that, the emotion swelled beyond what she could handle.
Was this the anger she'd only heard about? Or jealousy? Or...
"...Seti. What do I do?"
Finally, unable to contain it, the Saintess spoke.
"Huh? What's wrong? If it's about the promise..."
"No, not that. Um... I... I think I like Yeomyeong..."
"...Yeomyeong?"
"Sp-special... like."
The moment she heard the confession, Seti's face hardened into an expression colder than any the Saintess had ever seen.
Only after facing that look did the Saintess realize what she'd said.
"Um... Seti? Th-that last thing I said..."
Before the Saintess could explain, Seti pushed her away.
"...Saintess, did you know?"
A voice devoid of ups and downs, ice cold. The Saintess made a tearful face.
"S-Seti. Why are you suddenly using formal speech...? Don't..."
"Actually, Yeomyeong and I have nothing to do with each other."
"...What?"
"Not yet."
The Saintess's mouth fell open.
"Wha...? Wait, then the snowfield?"
"...Who knows? Think whatever you want, Saintess."
The Saintess tried to ask more, but Seti suddenly scooped her up.
"W-Wait! Seti!"
By the time the Saintess yelled after being thrown out into the hall, Seti had tossed the transparent cloak out after her and slammed the door.
Bang!
Staring blankly at the closed door, the Saintess flinched, realizing what she'd done.
"...Wh-what did I just do?"
Behind the Saintess, who bowed her head with a flushed face.
An elf girl who had been waiting in the hallway for the door to open backed away carefully.
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