Chapter 8
“…want to.”
The child mumbled something.
Not hearing it clearly, Roite bent his knees a bit more.
“Pardon? I’m sorry, I didn’t hear you well.”
“I want to go home.”
The child’s lips moved again.
It seemed her heart, which changed several times a day, had once again sunk.
Her face was still full of tears, and she looked so unsteady it wouldn’t have been strange if she collapsed at any moment.
Before long, another tear ran down her already-soaked cheek.
Roite simply watched without wiping it away.
“I… I don’t want to do this anymore. I don’t care if I starve… I don’t care if I get scolded really badly… I just want to go home. Can’t I just not be the Saintess?”
“…”
The child began sobbing again.
She had cried so much that Roite thought she might actually collapse if she cried any more. She looked as though she might break apart.
That small child was trembling as she pleaded.
Roite pressed his lips together, furrowing his brow.
The child lifted her small hands to her chest and began to desperately beg Roite.
“I want to go home. H-hic… I just want to stay with R-r-r-Reno. I just… want to be with Violetta. Hic… This place is too cold and scary, and I don’t want to do this…”
Her pitiful sobs grew louder.
Roite kept his lips tightly shut.
A hot, choking feeling welled up from his throat.
In that moment, he remembered a time when it felt like there was an enormous, insurmountable wall before him.
He remembered his own childhood — a time he had been too afraid to even bring such memories out into the open.
“Please send me home! I just want to go back!”
“This place is too cold and scary! I’d rather starve to death!”
Roite had been an orphan.
He couldn’t even remember his parents’ faces.
The orphanage where he had lived had been wiped away overnight in a monster attack, and the friends he’d stayed with had been scattered.
Children over ten years old were taken into any poorhouse in the region that had an empty spot.
At the time, Roite had just turned five.
At first, he went with another child of the same age to a different orphanage.
But even that place soon filled up, and Roite was sent away once again.
While traveling a long distance to yet another location, they stopped for the night at a small temple — and that was what led him to the path of a priest.
In that small temple, an elderly priest had asked him if he wanted to become a priest like him.
That man was now the High Priest, though he had not been at the time.
Priests who had served a long time and possessed strong holy power could roughly sense the holy power in others.
The old priest had recognized the holy power in the young Roite.
He told the boy that if he lived for the god, there would be no more cold, no more hunger — all he had to do was live for the god.
Roite had been enchanted by those sweet words.
Even at that young age, cold and hunger were terrifying, so he had immediately agreed.
And so, holding the priest’s hand, he went up to the capital for the first time in his life.
But life at the Central Temple was nothing like the sweet heaven he had imagined.
Just as the priest had said, there was no more hunger.
Instead of cold, there was the warmth of candles.
But there was no affection — the one thing he had thought would be the least important.
He had to run errands for the other priests and pray several times a day.
Even if he wanted to play, he couldn’t.
Even if he was hungry, he could only eat at fixed times, and he had to get used to food that didn’t suit his taste.
Even when he was drowsy, he had to rise before dawn.
Because he served the god. Because that was his role.
Even if he wanted to throw a tantrum, there was no one to throw it to.
Later, he began to wish for pity at the very least.
Crying or causing trouble — all of it was handled strictly under the temple’s rules.
That was when he learned:
Indifference was scarier than cruelty.
He had realized that at the age of five.
Even grown adults couldn’t endure it and left the temple, but Roite had endured, enduring until he rose to the position of Head Priest.
He had believed himself to have grown solid and unyielding.
But now, before him, was the image of his own wounded childhood self, crouched down.
It felt like his knees might buckle.
“…”
Roite carefully embraced the sobbing child.
“Huaaah…”
At that moment, the child cried so hard it sounded like she might lose her breath.
Her hiccups made her small body jolt with each sob.
Roite gently stroked her back.
“It’s all right. Everything’s all right. Everything will be fine…”
He had never once embraced the young devotees who came to pray.
Enduring that loneliness and fear was part of a priest’s path.
He had always avoided forming attachments.
He was merely the priest who served Bescherian most closely.
It wasn’t his place to shoulder the Saintess’s great responsibilities. His role was only to assist.
But… was that truly the wisest course?
Wasn’t it actually a foolish choice?
Why had he thought it was for the Saintess’s sake?
Now, seeing the small child trembling in his arms, all those thoughts melted away.
Yes, the mark on her hand was Bescherian’s mark — but the one bearing it was just a small, small child.
That was a fact that couldn’t be defined by the title of “noble Saintess” alone.
He had been the same.
He had longed and begged for the affection of adults — and yet had forgotten it completely, acting just like them.
Because he had endured, he had assumed this child could simply endure as well.
He had thought she only needed to grow accustomed to the place where she would be for the rest of her life.
Serving the god was a mentally grueling and lonely task.
Roite thought now that maybe, in this place ruled only by strict rules and restrictions, he could be different — at least one person could be different.
He could be the Saintess’s — no, the child’s — shield.
Even if only a small place of rest.
“I hate Violetta… I hate everyone…”
The child cried in his arms for a long time.
His neck and shoulders were soaked with tears and mucus.
Where her skin touched him burned — likely from the fever caused by the mark.
The child’s temperature spiked and fell dozens of times a day.
Until the holy power settled in her body, it would likely continue.
And since Priest Guba had earlier tested his strength against her using his own holy power, her holy power had reacted.
Like dew collecting on a cold cup, her holy power had begun to flow more quickly.
At this rate, her holy power would be fully released within a few days.
Roite wasn’t sure whether to be glad or worried.
As her sobbing subsided, the small head that had been resisting so stiffly finally dropped against his shoulder.
She had cried herself to sleep.
Even asleep, occasional pitiful sounds escaped her lips.
Roite stood for a long time, stroking her back even after she had fallen asleep.
He didn’t stop until the sniffles faded and only the sound of steady breathing remained.
My eyes stung and hurt, so swollen that I could hardly see.
I had opened them because I felt like I was moving up and down.
But… I was floating in the air.
“Eek!”
At first, I thought this was another ability of the Saintess, but then I realized Roite was carrying me.
When had I fallen asleep?
Then I heard his voice.
“You’re awake?”
He gently stroked my back.
That woke me completely, and I quickly pushed at him with my hands.
“Ah, um, p-please… put me down.”
“Yes, understood.”
He set me down carefully on the bed.
I averted my gaze, rolling my eyes to avoid meeting his.
You must never show weakness to strangers — yet I had bawled my eyes out.
And even fallen asleep in his arms!
While I was still reeling from the embarrassment, Roite told me to wait a moment and disappeared somewhere.
When he returned, the only thing that had changed was that he held a wet towel in his hands.
“I’ll wipe your face for you. Is that all right?”
Nod, nod.
My courage had gone somewhere far away, so I just nodded instead of answering.
The towel was warm and damp.
He carefully, very carefully, wiped my eyes, nose, lips, and cheeks.
“There, all done.”
The sting in my eyes eased.
But he didn’t stop there — he lightly brushed the area around my eyes with his fingers.
Maybe it was just my imagination, but I felt a refreshing sensation flow in, and I blinked.
“Do your eyes still hurt?”
“Huh? Ah… no, I think they’re fine now…”
Now that I thought about it, the swelling that had been making me uncomfortable seemed to have gone down.
How had he done that?
When I looked at him suspiciously, he only smiled.
“Saintess.”
“Yes. Ah? No, I’m not the Saintess…”
After hearing “Saintess, Saintess” for days, I had answered without thinking.
“I also came here when I was five years old.”
