Chapter 792
Serne suddenly stepped into Farahan’s house.
She grabbed a chair nearby, dragged it next to the table where Simon and Farahan were seated, and joined them.
Crossing her legs with a sensual gesture, she swept back her disheveled platinum-blonde hair with both hands, and cast a fox-like smile toward Simon.
Simon looked at her with eyes full of wariness.
“Serne, what are you doing here…...”
“How did I know? Well, I’ve long known that Simon has been in contact with the professor of Defense Against Holiness here.”
Simon quickly glanced at Farahan. Farahan shook his head a couple of times.
“If you’re trying to think of an excuse, it’s no use. She already knows everything. That you use holiness. That you’ve been taking White Magic lessons from me.”
……A stalker, huh.
Simon rubbed his forehead and glared at Serne, but she only blinked innocently. The most naive yet cunning face in the world.
“Rather than that, continue with what you were saying. I’m curious about the rest.”
He had been so startled by her sudden arrival that he forgot what they had been talking about.
But Serne took the lead.
“When mana permeates a dead corpse, that mana becomes trapped within, grows murky, and flows in reverse, forming a kind of ‘Core’. That is Darkness, and it becomes the driving force that raises undead. Now it’s your turn to explain holiness, professor.”
A neat summary.
‘……Did she really come because she wanted to hear the lecture?’
Farahan cleared his throat lightly and began speaking again.
“Indeed, the origin of holiness can be traced back to a place that is now burned away, once called ‘Paradise’.”
“That’s the first I’ve heard of it.”
Serne’s eyes sparkled, while Simon calmly spoke.
“You mean the ‘Holy Land’ claimed by the Holy Federation, don’t you?”
“That’s right, though it was later consumed by a mysterious fire, it did truly exist.”
Paradise was a frequent subject in prayers and hymns of the Goddess Dave faith.
Simon had often heard of it from Anna in his childhood, and when he followed Lete to the Holy Federation, he had even studied it while pretending to be a priest.
Farahan closed his eyes and fanned himself leisurely.
“Paradise was the most mysterious place on this continent. From afar it seemed as though pure snow lay over it, shimmering in radiant white. Leaves bore drops of white dew, rains of light fell from the sky, and clear springs welled up in the valleys. No impure energy could enter, and all creatures that dwelled there knew neither death nor change, living in true eternity. It was, in the truest sense, paradise.”
Farahan fell silent for a moment, as if recalling the vision, then opened his eyes.
“And into that place, humans entered.”
Simon, listening intently, flinched involuntarily.
……Humans entered? That already sounded foreboding.
“Humans admired the mystery and beauty of Paradise, and wished to become part of its ecosystem. To return to their primal state, they cast aside their clothes, ate the fruits of its trees, drank its waters. Most humans who entered could not endure the monotony, or were repelled by its alien aura, and fled. But a devout few endured day after day. In time…”
Farahan opened his palm.
“That same white radiance seen in Paradise’s creatures began to flow through human bodies. They truly became part of Paradise. That was the birth of the first ‘Saints’.”
Simon’s eyes widened.
“Wait a moment! Then the power flowing through Paradise was…!”
“Holiness. The true nature of Paradise was an ecosystem not founded on mana, but holiness. And humans who remained exposed long enough could transmute mana into holiness, becoming priests. Paradise was the origin of it all.”
The Saints who thus obtained holiness rejoiced, and wished to become part of the place that had accepted them, giving thanks to the ‘god’ who allowed them entry.
But one Saint thought differently.
He believed that they could not monopolize the power of Paradise. He believed they must share the will of god and spread this power to many.
So he pulled up a young holy tree from Paradise and carried it with him down to a village.
He planted and nurtured the tree at the center of the village, proclaiming the will of god. At the time, the villagers were dying from a plague. But when the saint laid his hand and raised holiness, the plague was completely healed.
Wounds pierced by blades closed, the deaf could hear, and even the dead were raised again. In awe of the saint’s miracles, the villagers all fell prostrate and worshiped him.
— I am but a creature serving the great Goddess Dave, and this power is but borrowed from the great goddess.
As time passed, the holy tree he had planted grew tall and bore fruit. The saint fed the fruit to his disciples.
The disciples ate the fruit with gratitude to the goddess. Some accepted it calmly, but others writhed in torment, or even died from shock.
<The master hath said, those with irreverent hearts shall suffer, but those who revere and truly accept the will of the goddess shall also accept her power.>
Among the disciples who partook of the fruit in training, some, astonishingly, began to manifest white power throughout their entire bodies.
They too could heal the sick and rescue the wounded, just as their master had performed miracles. Once more, the villagers fell prostrate in reverence to god’s power and will.
Overjoyed, the saint bestowed upon these disciples alone the title of ‘Evangelists’, instructing them to spread the goddess’s will to more people.
Like their master before them, the evangelists set out for Paradise to obtain a holy tree. But following their master’s teaching, that no irreverence could remain even as small as a speck, they deliberately underwent trials, passing through thorny paths, fasting from food, walking barefoot across burning sands beneath the sun.
This tale later became the foundation of the Holy Federation’s famous ‘Nineteen Tribulations’.
The disciples who reached Paradise returned with young holy trees and other plants, dispersing across the regions, spreading belief, and creating more wielders of holiness.
This was the origin of the Holy Federation and the priests.
Holiness and the faith of Goddess Dave were far more than religion offering mere spiritual comfort. In a continent lacking medical facilities, it healed the sick and wounded, and with its nature of dispelling death and impurity, it destroyed undead. Its power and reputation spread swiftly.
Especially when necromancers rose to dominance, holiness grew rapidly as their nemesis, culminating in the foundation of the Holy Federation, an empire spanning half the continent.
“To summarize, holiness began as an indigenous anomaly of the place called Paradise. Strangely enough, it possessed ‘transmissibility’. Animals exposed long became divine beasts, humans became priests. That power spread across the continent, giving birth to priests, and the founding of the Holy Federation.”
“My, what a splendid analysis.”
Serne beamed with a bright smile.
“Imagine, holiness being called an ‘indigenous anomaly’! I’ve never met a priest who spoke of their history and roots that way. They always revere their myths endlessly, shouting blasphemy at anyone who doubts them.”
Farahan smiled.
“I have experienced both the Holy Federation and the Dark Alliance. And as a professor here, I can read necromancers’ academic analyses of priestly scriptures. Federation and Alliance, theology and scholarship, my conclusion comes from combining both.”
Even to Simon, it was a frightening theory.
If such knowledge spread, what chaos would engulf the Holy Federation? Yet he also thought, in a nation that suppresses rumors and media so thoroughly, such stories would never spread far.
“If you look through our research, rather—”
Serne smiled faintly and continued.
“Wouldn’t the professor’s faith be shaken? You might even come to the conclusion that the goddess never existed.”
“Serne.”
Because it was a rude remark, Simon shot her a warning look.
But Farahan only chuckled, tracing a cross with his fingertip.
“On the contrary, this old man’s faith has only grown fuller. The Goddess created Paradise to save the continent’s people who suffered from disease and the torment of the undead, and she granted transmissibility to its power so it could spread widely across the land. In all this process, there were countless coincidences and inevitabilities impossible to explain by human biology.”
Serne shrugged her shoulders. This time, Simon spoke.
“But nowadays, they don’t eat holy fruit, they enter the Holy Chamber instead, don’t they?”
“That is correct. That way, more people can awaken to holiness.”
To maintain the vast empire of the Holy Federation, many priests were needed.
The Holy Chamber could take even relatively ordinary people, and by rather crude and forceful injection of holiness, turn them into priests.
“The story has strayed too far. Seems this old man got carried away telling tales to young friends, forgive me.”
Farahan put down his fan and clasped his hands on his knees.
“Let us return to the question at hand. Theoretically, how can the corpse of a dead paladin become a Death Knight and use Darkness? That was your question. Having heard all this, do you now understand?”
“……”
Simon fell silent in thought for a moment, then spoke.
“In the end, Darkness and holiness are both based on mana…… no, merely altered forms of mana. Which means that even the body of a paladin, after all holiness has drained away over time, can be made into a Death Knight. And if you force it to use holy techniques by exploiting remnants of old thoughts—”
Simon’s eyes narrowed lazily.
“Then it would use Darkness instead of holiness as energy, and reproduce holy techniques with Darkness. I understand completely.”
“Exactly so.”
Farahan smiled with satisfaction and covered his eyes with one palm.
“Our continent’s people are so firmly convinced that Darkness and holiness are absolutely different. If one strips away such prejudice, one can gain eyes to truly perceive things.”
“In that case—”
At that moment, Serne slowly rose to her feet.
“Would you like to see me, too?”
With a graceful motion she spread her arms wide. At once, dazzling light flared, flooding the dark room with brilliance. Behind her, a pair of pure white wings like snow unfurled.
Simon found himself unconsciously entranced.
Her wings, glowing with the hues of sunset, evoked the image of an angel from scripture.
So beautiful, so sublime, for a moment he could not think at all.
She made a small gesture, and her wings flapped upward, scattering in every direction.
The room was filled.
White feathers fell, like snow.
“I don’t know my past. My memories are cleanly erased. All I know is that my foster father, the former Master of the Ivory Tower, picked me up from somewhere.”
Beneath the rain of fluttering feathers, Serne smiled sweetly.
Then suddenly, the atmosphere shifted.
Sssk—
Her eyes gleamed.
“……!”
The peaceful, sublime world inverted, and the feathers turned pitch-black.
She had added Darkness to her ability.
Where once her presence seemed to ring with white chimes, now it was dark, oppressive, as if screams from hell would echo forth.
The feathers dissolved into Darkness, forming magic circles, and soon transformed into hideous eyes.
Bloodshot eyes roved in every direction, searching for prey.
“You said, Darkness and holiness are essentially the same, didn’t you, professor?”
She looked at Farahan.
“What if I had been a priest?”
Farahan looked at her in silence.
After a long pause, as if pondering deeply, he closed his eyes and spoke heavily.
“You would not be, ‘if you had been a priest’. You should have been a priest. That power is, indeed……”
“In that case.”
Her face emptied of all expression, she fixed Farahan with a terrifyingly calm stare.
“Then who, exactly, am I?”
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