Wasn’t This a Night Game

Conferring an Order

The White Order’s combat priests and holy knights. Investigators from the Black Fortress, an intelligence agency directly under the Emperor, arrived at the scene barely ten minutes after I’d beat the Collector to death with my belt.

“It was for my own personal gain! He approached me, the illegitimate son of a no-name Baron, and asked if I wanted to believe in an Evil God! He said if I did, I could have power and money, everything would be mine! Figured I had nothing to lose, so I agreed! Then, one morning, my father and brother were dead, just like that! That’s how I inherited the barony!”

“Spitting it all out, eh? Good! Keep talking! It’ll add to the pyre we build beneath your feet!!”

“Huurk!! Spare me! Spare me!! I knew it’d come to this if I was caught, but I couldn’t stop!! Because everything I wanted, I got right away! What kind of fool would refuse that?! I don’t give a damn about the factory workers who burned to death!! Those beggar b*stards can die for all I care!…Screee!!”

“The Silent Order of the Pantheon and the investigators of the Black Fortress will give you *so much* love. They’ll make you wish you’d never been born!!”

“aaagh!! P-please!!”

Baron Hansen was dragged away, screaming his death throes like that.

The fat factory owner followed close behind.

“N-no! I don’t know anything!! Baron Hansen was a demon worshipper? I-I didn’t know! I didn’t know! Please, have mercy!!”

“If there was a story that you frequently fought with Baron Hansen, or even that you complained about him over drinks, we wouldn’t be doing this. But in just ten minutes of investigation, testimonies of your fervent loyalty to him poured out. You enthusiastically followed the actions of a demon worshipper, even if you weren’t one yourself? Your mental state is highly suspect.”

“aaargh! Please!! Please!! Holy One!!”

The factory manager, that b*stard, stretched his hand towards me.

I met his plea with a sweetly bright smile.

“He may not be a devil worshiper, but his mental state is just as bad. Burn him at the stake right beside the Baron.”

“N-no!! aaargh please! Grace!! Grace!!”

No grace for you. You son of a b*tch.

Only after the Baron and the factory manager were dragged away, squawking, could I finally relax.

Exhausted. Drained too much mental energy.

What a commotion in the middle of the damn night.

I need to go back and rest a little…

“Holy Amael-nim.”

“Saint of Healing-nim.”

“Amael-nim. Amael-nim.”

An immense number of people, gathered from who knows where, were now filling the Baron Hanson’s mansion gate.

Eyes full of awe.

Eyes full of shock.

Eyes full of weeping.

Some had even fallen to their knees.

“Thank you.”

The bereaved.

Just moments ago, a woman – she’d been clutching the charcoal corpse in front of the factory, spewing tears – edged her way to me, cautiously took my hand, and bowed her head.

I could feel the heavy *thud-thud* of her tears hitting the ground.

And it wasn’t just her, was it?

Dozens of impoverished, sickly slum-dwellers pressed in, trying to touch me.

Clutching at my legs, seizing my hands, my arms and shoulders, my waist and sides, they looked like they hoped to absorb some sort of holy aura.

I didn’t feel disgust.

“What do you think you’re doing! Get away from the Saint…”

The police rushed forward, trying to restrain them, but I raised a hand to stop them.

Anyway.

They were people I wouldn’t be seeing much longer.

I needed to help them as much as I could while I was still here.

Just as I was about to raise my hand to heal the sick…

“Why is life so goddamn hard!”

The bereaved mother, still holding my hand, let out a scream that tore through the air.

“Why did my daughter have to die by the hands of such vile men! Is this also the goddess’s will? Then it’s too cruel. Why doesn’t the suffering ever end in life? Saint…”

The mother collapsed to the ground, sobbing with a sound that no animal could ever make, repeating her questions over and over.

Everyone fell silent, subdued.

And then they looked at me.

As if they expected me to say something.

I scanned the faces around me.

A body withered, not properly fed.

A face etched with exhaustion.

Skin, bruised and damaged, dull and lifeless somewhere.

People with hollowed eyes, they look at me, clinging to the feeling they call hope.

And I couldn’t refuse their gaze.

So what if I’m impersonating a saint?

So what if I’m a fake?

Offering solace to folks who look this beat-down, surely I can manage that much, right?

This goddamn hard world.

In this fucked-up world, if they can find even a moment of comfort…

Since I’m already hated by the goddess Lilia, might as well play the fake saint for a little while.

Jesus.

Forgive me.

Going to borrow a little again this time.

I climbed onto the roof of the car the factory boss had used to bring me all the way here.

Naturally, everyone’s eyes lock onto me.

I raised my hand.

And tossed out a single line.

“Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.”

The age of children toiling.

An age where three-year-olds, instead of gleefully playing, are exploited as tools for the profiteering of capitalists and entrepreneurs.

“Blessed are those who show mercy, for they will be shown mercy.”

An age where a worker’s fingers are severed, limbs twisted, bodies injured and ruined, only to be discarded and replaced with something new.

“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.”

An age where young girls, faces disfigured by burns and chemical poisoning, cling to rotting ropes to find sleep.

“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will witness the Grace of the Goddess.”

An age where entrepreneurs take tours of the slums, wondering, quite naturally, how can those b*stards be so vulgar and stupid? Perhaps they’re an entirely different species, only superficially similar?

I was speaking of blessings for those most afflicted and in pain.

“Blessed are those weary of aimless existence, for they shall find reason to live. Man cannot craft this. Only the Goddess can grant it. The finest of Graces She bestows upon you is peace of mind.”

I also hawked the Goddess a little.

Since I’m going back to Korea anyway.

I hawked her boldly, openly.

“Today. A sorrowful event has transpired. Someone has been lost, felt bitterness, been driven to despair and frustration. But yet, you live. Those departed are no longer at your side. They will now be guided by the Goddess, not as humans, but by her hand.”

I gaze at a mother who has lost her child.

“What was your daughter’s name?”

“Ellie. It was Ellie. Holy One.”

“Recall Ellie. Remember all the scenes of her, what she wore, how she spoke, the chatter she made.”

She begins to weep anew.

“I remember. Holy One. I remember. So vividly… I remember so vividly.”

“Now, picture her resting easy in the bosom of the Goddess. Her smile. Picture her finding peace in a world free of all pain, all misfortune.”

Sobbing trickles out from here and there.

“Did Ellie go to Heaven? Did the Goddess of Grace take pity on her?”

My mother asks, spilling tears.

I don’t know.

How would I know that?

I’ve never spoken a single word to the Goddess.

So I lied.

“Surely. The Goddess would never abandon the sick, the weary, the heartbroken.”

I was trying to tell these people to keep living.

But to explain, detail by detail, to those lost in profound grief, the reasons they must live takes too long, and their wounded hearts are hard to console.

So I mobilize religion.

Because only religion can.

I consoled them with an act that only religion makes possible.

“Ellie is resting in the bosom of the Goddess. As will all those who passed today. They will all rest easy with Ellie, in a place free of pain, free of sorrow. So grieve no more.”

My mother collapses.

I slowly step down from the roof of the car I’d been standing on, and approach her.

I embraced her.

“Ellie is at peace now. So now you must focus on bringing peace to yourself. Cry when you are sad. Laugh when you are happy. Eat well, sleep well, and strive to be happy. You must live your life. That is what remains for you now.”

“Saint!”

I held the woman weeping in my arms for a good long while, helped her wring out every last drop of feeling.

So many people watched those tears and wept along with her.

“Goddamn it. Fucking dust, it’s…”

Even some of the cops, the ones managing the scene, took off their caps and wiped their eyes.

I let them all weep.

And I did what I could do.

I treated the injured among the people gathered before me.

“Yodel, sir.”

“Yes, Holy One.”

To Yodel, who had stood silently by my side since before I preached from the car, I made a request.

“Compensate everyone who lost family in today’s factory fire. Make it plentiful enough to be a comfort. Bodily wealth won’t erase spiritual grief completely, but it can at least ease it. Do it in the name of Grace.”

“As you command. I will inform Jonathan Karma.”

Yodel bowed his head respectfully, his eyes shimmering with tears.

I smiled bitterly.

Sorry, old man Yodel.

I’m a con man.

Soon I’ll be cursed and heading back to Korea.

But the words I said.

Don’t forget them.

They’re pitiful, aren’t they.

If you have the ability to help, you ought to help.

Lugging my weary body, I turned to head back to the Magic Tower Temple, and the countless factory workers who’d listened to my sermons trailed after me.

As if on some pilgrimage, a multitude of laborers began to slowly follow in my wake.

Glancing back, I saw they were all silently shedding tears, dripping onto the cobblestones as they walked.

It looked like a struggle to suppress grief, to bury feeling and let go of those who’d gone.

This was a funeral.

How could I tell them to leave, seeing them like that?

I just walked on, dragging them along behind me.

Until we reached the Magic Tower Temple.

They followed, walked and walked.

*

The reputation of a Saint was truly something grand.

Jonathan Karma didn’t simply hand out compensation and call it done.

“You have two choices. Either raise the treatment of your workers to the level of District Three’s poor, and receive the elixirs you need to operate your factories at a low price from Karma Company. Or, face eternal trials in the Pantheon on charges of abusing your workers to harvest resentment for an evil god. Which will it be?”

When Jonathan Karma met with the owners operating the factories on the outskirts of the capital, he was said to be smiling.

But the faces of the priests and holy knights flanking him on either side were twisted like the Mozguses of some hellish beyond, I heard.

As a result, every factory on the capital’s outskirts accepted Jonathan Karma’s terms.

“A worshipper of evil gods emerged from the Baron Hanson family? Such disgrace!”

His Imperial Majesty was furious as well.

As a result, at lightspeed, Baron Hanson was stripped of his title. A public burning awaited him as his final ending.

All the workers in the capital heard his scream and felt a certain… catharsis, they say.

*

“The Collector is dead.”

“Dead?”

“She was one of the most powerful in the Order, save for the Chosen One. How could someone like that just… like that?”

“The Saint of Healing himself uncovered her sanctuary, it is said. She met her end by his hand.”

Silence falls, all at once, in the room.

Terror.

Surely, the Collector’s dwelling was protected by the miracle of concealment, airtight.

How in the world did he find it??

He must have some ability to see right through the miracle of concealment.

There’s no other explanation.

And naturally.

One conclusion rises in everyone’s minds.

“The Chosen One is in danger.”

“The One With a Thousand Faces, too, stands a good chance of being discovered before long.”

“With the Saint frequenting the star palace where Princess Iomene resides… sooner or later, he’ll see. He’ll recognize her true form, that’s plain to see.”

“We must form a plan.”

Opinions tossed back and forth, but no pointed solution surfaced.

The Saint of Healing.

A sudden apparition, utterly ruining all their plans, like a monstrous impediment.

Not the kind of enemy they’d faced ’til now.

Clearly, a being intent on obliterating the Evil God cult, possessed of abilities bordering on the absurd and detection skills that reeked of cheating.

How to deal with this one?

They knew nothing of the adversary, yet the adversary seemed to know them intimately. No countermeasures could be devised.

“We can no longer risk the exposure of the Chosen. We accelerate the plan. Awaken the fragment of the Evil God implanted within Princess Iomene’s body.”

“That will weaken the fragment’s power considerably compared to what we had originally planned.”

“Furthermore, the fragment will become extremely unstable. Even the slightest shock could shatter it immediately.”

“Even so, it’s the best we can do for now. We must prevent the Chosen from clashing with the Saint.”

An opposing opinion surfaced.

“The Chosen has been chosen by the Evil God and possesses multiple lives. Even if they die, they are not completely annihilated.”

“The point?”

“Even if it means risking the Chosen’s death at the hands of the Saint, I believe we should continue to assist the fragment’s growth as we have been, remaining by its side. Remember the immense sacrifice made to obtain that fragment of the Evil God. To awaken it halfway and fail would be a devastating loss.”

“The Saint of the Order of Grace is a Saint whose miracles remain unknown.”

The Saint of the Order of White.

The Saintess of the Order of the Sun.

The Saint of the Order of Silence.

And so on and so forth.

The Evil God cult knew very well what powers most of the orders’ Saints and Saintesses wielded.

But the Saint of the Order of Grace was new.

The first Saint to ever appear.

Information simply couldn’t exist.

“What if the Saint of Healing can shatter all of the Chosen One’s multiple lives at once? And according to the Chosen One’s report, they seem to be trying to move a shard of the Evil God into their own body – doesn’t that mean they have a way to deal with it?”

At the slightest misstep, we could lose both the Chosen One and the shard of the Evil God to nothing.

Once everyone reached this conclusion, no objections were raised.

In the end, the conclusion was set.

“As the price of pushing the plan forward, the shard will be severely unstable. Its power will be much weaker than we planned for. But even so, we have no choice but to do this.”

Everyone falls silent.

Agreement.

“For the One Who Drinks Blood…”

A weak rallying cry, shouted out.

The candlelight was snuffed.