Saint Front Knights (2)

The Entat Parish sits at the northernmost edge of the Holy Empire of Eliac—literally the farthest border of an already remote region. Its isolation had shaped several unique traits. Chief among them were its minuscule size, less than a tenth of any other parish, and the complete absence of ordinary believers or civilian residents. The only souls within its boundaries were the Archbishop and the members of the Holy Front Knights.

The parish existed for one purpose: to stand as the first line of defense against magic beasts climbing down from the forbidden zone farther north, a place commonly called the Land of Magic Beasts. The invasions were constant, their numbers overwhelming, and every so often a truly powerful monster would appear. Because of this, the wider world referred to Entat Parish as the place where butchering magic beasts counted as prayer to the divine. Or, more bluntly, as the clergy’s dumping ground.

That was Bowt’s explanation when I asked what kind of place the Entat Parish really was. I hadn’t paid proper attention the last time—mostly because that damn Clown had been trying to kill us.

“The clergy’s dumping ground?”

“Yes, exactly.”

“Why a dumping ground?”

“It’s a little awkward to say this in front of you, Lady Levia, but… most of the people who volunteer to come here are failures.”

Failures?

“Some are assigned here as punishment. A form of disciplinary exile.”

In other words, go suffer in this frozen hell and repent.

“So what exactly makes someone a ‘failure’ who volunteers?”

“The Archbishop—that old coot—said you’ve become able to use holy power now… Is that true?”

“Yeah.”

“Congratulations. You’ve received divine grace.”

“Grace?”

“Indeed. A cleric can only wield holy power if the Goddess acknowledges them or personally chooses them.”

Either your faith is recognized during the baptism ceremony and holy power is granted, or the Goddess selects you—sometimes from birth, sometimes later in life.

“Huh…? It’s not an awakening?”

“An awakening?”

“You know… like something that was locked inside you suddenly goes boom and explodes out?”

“No, not at all.”

…That’s exactly what happened to me, though. Weird.

“In any case, baptism and grace aren’t given to just anyone. That’s why people with weak or nonexistent holy power—clergy in name only—end up here.”

Once you become a priest or holy knight, you have an obligation to carry out clerical duties. Priests go on pilgrimages. Holy knights are deployed to the front. In any world, those lacking talent have limited choices. They’re still better off than people with zero power and zero strength, but the higher-ups who make the decisions don’t see much difference. Naturally, the only places left for them are the ones nobody else wants. The ones everyone avoids. That’s how the Entat Parish became the gathering point for every rejected, incompetent, or disgraced cleric. Hence the nickname: the clergy’s place of exile.

To someone like me—who came from a world without magic or holy power—this whole setup still felt like pure fantasy. A place where things that should only exist in stories actually happened. But hearing the ugly reality behind the fantasy left a bitter taste in my mouth. I felt both sympathy and sorrow.

The parish’s stated mission was to stop the magic beasts at the front line. Yet they filled that critical defense point with the weak and inexperienced. Which meant these people were…

“The Holy Front Knights are basically meat shields, aren’t they? Cannon fodder. If an unmanageable wave of beasts breaks through, they’re the ones who charge first to buy time for the rear to prepare. A sacrificial unit. Or rather, a sacrificial order.”

“…You truly are perceptive, Lady Levia.”

I’d hoped I was wrong. I wasn’t.

“Well now, this is truly an honor! The Saintess candidate herself is worrying about us! The boys will be so moved they’ll cry snot bubbles everywhere! Kwahahahaha!!”

Bowt saw my gloomy expression and tried to lighten the mood with a loud, theatrical laugh. It only made me feel worse. Sorry, Bowt. Sorry, Holy Front Knights.

I’d only suggested visiting them because I wanted to skip prayer studies. I never imagined I’d be intruding on people who already lived in hell. Even if we never ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠spoke, just having a supposed Saintess candidate here would make them uncomfortable. To them, my visit was the fantasy-world equivalent of a division commander or four-star general showing up at your military unit in my old life. A walking natural disaster.

What do I do? Turn back right now…?

No matter how hard I tried to act like a rude brat to get myself disqualified as Saintess candidate, this was crossing the line. Making this many people anxious just because I didn’t want to study? I hadn’t thought it through. Maybe my brain really had gotten younger along with my body. What a selfish, shortsighted idiot.

…There was a time I thought that way.

What the hell is wrong with these people…? It’s actually scary.

These are the Holy Front Knights? These guys?

In the middle of that chaotic frenzy, my eyes landed on dozens of grown knights crying as they handed over their coin pouches. Goat-bearded Bowt was gleefully stuffing every last one into his subspace pouch with the world’s smuggest grin.

Ah. Right. These were the idiots who bet on whether I’d speak or not. Give me back my guilt this instant.

Holy Knight Hasad, currently in charge of training, suddenly found himself thinking back to the Holy Front Knights of five years ago. Back then, just as the outside world claimed, the order really had been nothing more than an exile.

Archbishop Carlo was a damned old bastard both then ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠and now, but five years ago he had been a battle-crazed lunatic. He poured every drop of that madness onto the magic beasts and onto the knights under his command. Bloody judgment for the beasts. Training so brutal that death would have been a mercy for the knights.

Hasad was the training officer now, but five years ago he had been a mere holy knight. There hadn’t even been a training officer position; the Archbishop himself had overseen everything. It was literal hell. The barrier shattered constantly. If you let your guard down for even a moment, a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠magic beast would crawl into the barracks and devour a comrade alive. When the invasions slowed, there was no rest—only endless training. Thanks to that regimen, every knight’s combat ability had skyrocketed. But none of them felt any joy. It had been a desperate struggle for survival, nothing more.

Magic beasts. Training. Magic beasts. Training. That was their entire existence. On paper they were a holy knight order. In reality they were little more than mercenaries. Pride as holy knights? They’d thrown that away long ago. Faith? The only thing they believed in was themselves.

Anyone who survived in the Entat Parish for any length of time stopped welcoming newcomers. Even veterans who had lasted years would die screaming if a particularly strong beast appeared. So what hope did freshly ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠ordained greenhorns have? They were just like the veterans had once been—powerless, useless, yet still burdened with duty. The best they could hope for was not to become a hindrance. Those who had been sent here as true punishment for crimes had died long ago. In a place where you had to abandon everything just to survive, they could never let go of their vanity and arrogance.

Then one day the Archbishop delivered news like a bolt from the blue. A Cardinal and a Saintess candidate would be coming to live among them. They were already dying from the daily hell, and now they were expected to cater to high-ranking guests on top of it? That was what everyone thought.

But reality turned out differently.

The Cardinal, whom they assumed would simply take up space and do nothing, instead marched out alongside a young escort knight and began slaughtering magic beasts. He reinforced the barrier to a level they had never imagined possible. The Saintess candidate herself was also completely unlike their expectations. She was a baby who could barely control her own body.

The Cardinal and the escort knight continued their endless campaign of beast subjugation and barrier reinforcement. All of it to keep the Saintess candidate safe. And naturally, the ones who benefited most from their efforts were the Holy Front Knights.

About a year after the Saintess candidate and her party arrived, the Archbishop’s madness began to ease for reasons no one understood. Shift rotations were introduced. For the first time, the knights could actually rest. So it was only natural that someone eventually said it out loud.

“Hey… we should be grateful to the Saintess candidate. We escaped hell because of her.”

It wasn’t wrong. After all, the Cardinal had come here specifically to protect her. Life was still difficult, but it was heaven compared to before. They even had time to talk to one another now.

After two years, the knights had grown surprisingly close. The funniest part was realizing that despite surviving together for so long and cutting down countless beasts side by side, most of them had never even known each other’s names.

And around that time… it began.

“The Cardinal and Sir Franc are the ones doing all the hard work. Why are you praying to the Saintess candidate?”

“Shut uuuuuuuup!!!”

“Ack! Why the hell are you yelling?!”

“You idiot! The reason those two are suffering is because of the Saintess candidate! We’re just eating the crumbs that fall from her table! So of course we should pray to her!”

“If you’re a holy knight, you moron, you should be praying to the Goddess—”

That was how it started. A few knights began offering prayers to Saintess Candidate Levia.

“Did you guys hear? They say the Saintess candidate is really sick.”

“What are you talking about?”

“She doesn’t babble or cry at all.”

“Isn’t that a curse?”

Just the fact that she was like a living doll—as if cursed—had reawakened the long-buried hearts of holy knights inside them.

“She’s too young to have received either baptism or grace. She’s only a Saintess candidate in name; she has no holy power at all.”

Their shared experience of being unable to wield holy power properly created a bond. The Holy Front Knights made a vow: We will protect her so she can grow up safely.

More and more of them began praying to the Saintess candidate. Up to that point, it was still within the realm of normal. But two problems emerged.

The first was that men who had lived in hell now had the habit of bragging to each other about anything that could even remotely be called “peaceful.”

“Hey! Guess what I just did?”

“You got called by the old Archbishop, right? What happened?”

“I guarded the Saintess candidate in his place! For a whole five minutes!!”

“You lucky bastard.”

The second problem was that even though the Saintess candidate couldn’t speak, she was so unbearably cute and lovable—like a single ray of light in their dark world—that the bragging gradually shifted entirely toward her.

Being freed from hell was already something to be grateful for. But the person responsible was an innocent, impossibly adorable child. A child who might one day become the great and holy Saintess.

Five years had passed since the Saintess candidate first arrived. Now every single member of the Holy Front Knights—including Hasad—offered their prayers to Levia. Because ever since she came, they had been able to live like human beings again.

These madmen who had survived hell no longer worshipped the Goddess Lumentis.

They worshipped Levia as their savior.