I Became the Patron of Villains (Novel) - Chapter 91 - Artificial (2)

Chapter 91 – Artificial (2)

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Translated by Jinmu

Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

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Two days later.

With only about two days left before the chief cardinal was due to emerge from the temple’s two-week prayer vigil, Alon was eating at a restaurant near the temple when he spoke.

“Evan.”

“What is it, my lord?”

“You used to go out often whenever we stayed somewhere. This time you have not.”

At the question, Evan shrugged and said,

“I already went out.”

“Did you?”

“Yes. But there was almost nothing to see or enjoy. If you go out toward the outskirts, it looks similar to any other territory, but it does not feel like it has any real character.”

Alon nodded and thought,

The Holy Kingdom is a bit like that.

The capital looked beautiful from outside the walls.

Even leaving the outskirts aside, the long rows of white buildings within the city made it obvious at a glance that this was the Holy Kingdom of Rosaria.

But beyond that, unless one was a traveler devoted to Sironia, there was not much to enjoy in keeping with the image of the Holy Kingdom.

“Evan.”

“Yes?”

“This is just in case, but is there something behind me?”

“Behind you?”

“Yes.”

At that question, Evan showed his confusion and said,

“…I do not know what you mean.”

“Is that so?”

“Yes. But you have been asking the same thing since yesterday. Did something happen?”

Ever since he came out of the Holy Spirit Chamber, the reaction the goddess had shown and the reaction Heinkel had shown had been so similar.

Realizing he had asked Evan the same question yesterday as well, Alon shook his head lightly.

“It is nothing serious.”

“Still, there is something behind you.”

“? What do you mean by that?”

“The saint.”

“The saint…?”

At that answer Alon turned his gaze, and there he found Saint Yuman looking at him with a very serious expression.

“…?”

When their eyes met, Yuman turned his face away slightly.

It was a very unnatural movement.

…Why is he acting like that?

Of course, it was not impossible to guess the reason.

As someone who was not even a priest of Rosaria, he had entered the saints’ room, where he should not have been able to go, through Yutia.

Naturally Yuman would have disliked that.

But even while Alon could guess that much, what puzzled him was Yuman’s current attitude.

“My lord, did something really happen between you and the saint?”

“We have only crossed paths once.”

“Then why is he following you around that much? Has he not been practically glued to you for two days now?”

At Evan’s words, Alon made an odd face inwardly.

That was in fact the very reason Yuman’s behavior felt so strange.

Since coming out of the saint’s room two evenings ago, Yuman, with whom he should have had no further point of contact at all, had been following him for two whole days.

And quite openly at that.

Yet he only followed him. He did not speak to him.

Did he notice that I took the Necklace of the Eye-Devourer out of the room? No, that should not be possible. It did not even have tracking magic on it, and it had been hidden.

While Alon was trying to deduce some other motive,

thud.

Yuman, who had been sitting until a moment earlier, suddenly stood as if he had made up his mind, walked over, and stopped in front of him.

“May I borrow your ear for a moment?”

“…My ear?”

“Yes.”

When Alon nodded in bafflement, Yuman looked around subtly, then whispered in a low voice.

“It would be best for you to be careful around Cardinal Yutia, Sa… no, Count Palladio.”

“…Pardon?”

“She is not one of us who believes in God.”

“…?”

He said it with complete seriousness.

Alon looked at Yuman with even greater confusion.

Yuman, as though his resolve was already complete, stared at him with eyes blazing with some grand sense of mission, then said,

“Then I will be going.”

He bowed his head once and turned away.

And then,

“…What was that, my lord?”

just like Evan, who looked dazed after seeing Yuman walk away,

“…I have no idea either.”

Alon could only answer in confusion.

* * *

While Alon was standing there flustered by Yuman’s sudden change in attitude, shouting was ringing through the Blue Tower.

“I said no, you idiots!”

“Get out!”

“Y-yes, ma’am!”

Watching the mages startle and run out like arrows at that shrieked order to get out, she huffed angrily, then let out a heavy sigh as though her head were throbbing and sat back down.

Why in the world am I dealing with this…!

Penia pressed a hand to her aching head and let out another deep sigh.

That was only natural, because she had been under tremendous strain lately.

Because of the rumor that had spread this time.

The utterly worthless rumor that Penia Kraisinne admired Count Palladio was causing her enormous pain.

Even today alone, that had been the case.

One of her assistants, and one of the mages who had shut himself inside the tower and done nothing but research for more than ten months, had come in carrying a cake that said, Congratulations on your marriage, Vice Tower Master.

“Haa…”

From Penia’s point of view, if she bent over backward a hundred times, she still could have laughed off a few such incidents with nothing more than mild irritation.

The reason she was reacting so strongly was the nature of mages themselves.

Mages often locked themselves into laboratories for months at a time, or even years, and because of that they kept hearing the rumor late and showing up every other day to congratulate her on her marriage.

Was that all?

They did not even come merely to offer congratulations.

They judged, Since this is such a good occasion as a marriage, maybe today I can slip in a comment or two,

and then started spouting nonsense like,

You should try softening your personality a little now.

If you keep getting angry like that, even the count will run away from you.

Thanks to that, Penia felt like she was going out of her mind.

“Why do I have to get tangled up with that…”

She wanted to shout, that bastard, but stopped halfway through and instinctively glanced toward the tower window.

It was a height no person should ever have been able to cling to, but because of the performance Radan had shown at the Laxas royal castle the last time, nowadays whenever Penia was anywhere with a window, she found herself checking it on instinct.

Click.

Only after opening the window and checking up, down, left, and right to make sure there was no one there did Penia slump weakly down.

“…”

She looked exhausted.

In truth, that was not the only thing tormenting Penia these days.

Of course, not to this extent, but lately she had been strangely unlucky as well.

For example, among the magical goods she ordered from the merchants, only hers kept somehow getting left out.

Or among the magical materials being brought in from outside, only hers kept somehow getting lost.

That sort of accident had happened five times in a row already.

So,

“…Why has my luck been so bad lately?”

Penia muttered weakly with a miserable face, then,

“It is all because of that…”

she started to curse with a fierce frown, only to look at the window and clamp her mouth shut.

…Unlike Penia’s depressed mood, the sky was clear.

* * *

Inside the temple in Rosaria, in the office used by the saint.

“Haa.”

Yuman, who had been speaking with Alon just a short while earlier, recalled Count Palladio’s utterly impassive face.

…Count Palladio is a saint.

Of course, Count Palladio had not formally become a saint.

In the first place, rather than going through a public ceremony, he had only received a sacred relic unofficially.

But unofficial or not, the fact that he was a saint was certain.

A saint was one who had received a sacred relic from the goddess Sironia as a sign of recognition.

What was more, when Yuman had prayed in order to seek the answer directly, even the goddess Sironia herself had acknowledged that she had personally given him a sacred relic.

So there could no longer be any doubt that he was a saint.

What Yuman had not understood was why Sironia had chosen to appoint him in secret without carrying out the formal rite, but by now even that question had been answered to some degree.

“…”

Yuman lowered his eyes carefully to the book in his hands.

The ancient text, passed down only to the saints of each generation, contained the following passage.

[Even the great nation established by the goddess cannot save all people, and evil fears the dawn of the goddess and hides itself deep within darkness.]

[Thus the goddess sent down the Hidden Saint to save those whom even the nation cannot save and to cut down the evil that buries itself in shadow.]

[The Hidden Saint is the blade of dawn that, within the shadow cast by the goddess’s dawn, saves those whom the light does not reach and cuts down the evil buried in darkness.]

[Within the unilluminated dawn, they are the ones who bestow the goddess’s grace.]

“The Hidden Saint…”

Yuman murmured the words Hidden Saint from the old text and thought of Count Palladio.

If Count Palladio had been appointed as the Hidden Saint, then it explained why he had received only a relic from the goddess without any formal rite.

And so,

If Count Palladio really is the Hidden Saint, then I have to separate him from Cardinal Yutia.

A small sense of mission sprouted within Yuman’s heart.

He did not know why the goddess Sironia had chosen Count Palladio as the Hidden Saint.

But Yuman knew one thing.

What he ought to feel was not doubt, but acceptance.

That he must not commit the foolish act of objecting to the goddess’s choice.

And,

that since Alon had been appointed the Hidden Saint, he could not be left beside Cardinal Yutia.

The Yutia that Yuman knew was little different from a corrupt person who, rather than revering the gods, merely used power as she pleased.

Therefore,

I have to help the Hidden Saint walk the proper path. I myself…!

With resolute eyes, he closed the old book.

…A very strange set of gears had begun to turn.

* * *

Two more days passed, and at last the day of Alon’s investiture ceremony arrived.

Alon began moving early in the morning to attend the ceremony, which would start at dawn.

“?”

Soon he wore a puzzled expression.

Because there were many holy knights escorting Count Palladio on the way to the temple.

Of course, that part itself was not particularly strange.

The men whose armor and shoulder guards were marked with dark colors were all holy knights directly attached to a cardinal, in other words the knights escorting Yutia, who was currently walking at Alon’s side.

The reason he felt puzzled was the group walking on his left.

Holy knights in white armor with blue shoulder guards.

They were not attached to a cardinal, but directly to Saint Yuman.

And now, just like Yutia’s holy knights, they were moving along with Alon.

More precisely, they were moving along with Yuman, who was walking at his side.

And they were doing so far too naturally.

“…?”

Alon gave Yuman a questioning glance once, then turned his eyes back to Yutia.

But,

“…??”

when he confirmed that Yutia herself looked just as baffled, with the sort of face that seemed to say, What is wrong with this bastard?

…What is this?

he could only grow more confused.