Deity

“Did you do wrong, or did you not?”
“…I did wrong.”
“Are you reflecting on it sufficiently?”
“…I am reflecting on it sufficiently.”
“Then why are your hands coming down?”

“…”

Aiden knelt with both hands in the air and looked up at Noelle, his eyes soaked in melancholy.

He had never taken a punishment like this even from his father as a child, and he’d certainly never imagined doing it as a grown man long past being wet behind the ears…

“…It’s just that something struck me as a bit strange.”

Noelle paid his expression no mind at all. She narrowed her eyes.

“Honestly, you let yourself be kidnapped on purpose, didn’t you.”

“…”

“It isn’t as though you can’t fight for yourself.”

“…”

Found out.

Aiden kept smiling awkwardly, so Noelle let out a sigh and swept back her hair.

“And what would you have done if it had really blown up into something serious?”
“I figured from the start that you’d come to save me. I had faith in you, Dame Noelle—”

…He got a knock on the head.

If she’d hit him with her full strength, he’d have blacked out at the very least, so it was more of a rebuke for talking nonsense than anything. But painful was still painful.

While Aiden rubbed his head, Noelle spoke coldly, the glare still in her eyes.

“Who in all the world draws up a plan that starts from wearing his own body down? You ought to value yourself a little more—”

…A good deal more sermon followed.

By the time the feeling was draining out of his raised arms, Noelle had fortunately recovered enough of her reason to let him sit down.

“…Well, perhaps wearing yourself down like that was not entirely in vain. We did arrest the whole band of criminals who had their base over there. That is a relief.”
“And the evidence?”

That was what mattered: proof that they’d done all of it on the orders of the Prince and the Administrative Minister.

Fortunately, judging by the faint smile on Noelle’s face, there was no bad news.

“You needn’t worry. It felt like striking a gold mine.”
“If I hadn’t got myself caught to draw their attention and called you in, Dame Noelle, you’d never have rounded them up that clean—”

The instant he felt the warmth drain out of Noelle’s gaze, Aiden shut his mouth.

It was a bit of worldly savvy worthy of his long, accident-free criminal record.

“…In any case.”

Noelle put a hand to her forehead and went on.

“The hearing date has been set. We need only lay it all out properly there.”
“How many days out?”
“Two days.”

They’d set it good and short, which meant they intended to meet this head-on, boldly, without giving an inch.

“Aiden. This is probably a trap.”

“…”

“There’s no way they don’t know we’ve obtained evidence like this. And if they still agreed to the hearing date this casually, they have surely dug another pit somewhere.”

He couldn’t help but agree.

And the window that popped up in front of him just then backed that hypothesis up.

Between the main quest and the matter tied to Dame Noelle on top of it, there wasn’t a single thing he could let slide.

Two days from now, during the harvest festival, in a place packed with people, the Lord Protector’s spirit would show herself again. There was no doubt about it.

“…”

Aiden tapped his chin and sank into thought.

He didn’t know what form it would take, but given the place and the timing, it was bound to spread wide. Knowing the Prince’s habits, it wouldn’t be a method that cost many lives, but it would surely be aimed at putting Aiden and Noelle in a bind.

“Tell them we agree to the date as well.”

“…”

Noelle blinked at him blankly.

“Did you actually hear what I just said?”
“Yes.”

There was nothing so stupid as walking into a thing you could plainly see coming.

But.

“I know it’s a trap. I’m going to break through it head-on.”

“…”

“They’re not the only ones who can prepare in advance.”

He would simply assume all of it beforehand and get ready on this side too. Besides, dragging things out only helped them, since it gave them time to churn out rebuttal after rebuttal to the evidence this side had collected.

If there was a problem.

…It’s this person herself.

Swallowing a sigh, Aiden stole a glance at Noelle, who was watching him with worried eyes.

He’d seen for himself not long ago just what level her strength was at, yet getting her help against the Lord Protector was effectively impossible. If anything, he’d count himself lucky if she managed to keep hold of her own sanity. So the subjugation battle would have to be fought without her.

Katya will help, at least…

On base specs alone, the Lord Protector was a monster only a shade below Noelle, and the real problem was that she would come leaping out even stronger thanks to the quest’s effect. He didn’t know how big the boost would be, but he had to expect a horrific level of hardship.

…The saving grace.

Was that he’d thought up one method of dealing with her, and there was someone he could ask about it, too.

“You seem to have some scheme up your sleeve again. Are you planning ahead this time as well?”
“If you want to do anything safely, you’ve got to prepare properly.”

You couldn’t even dream of living as a criminal without a single accident unless you were this ready for everything. To him, it was nothing special.

He answered as if it were nothing at all, and Noelle let out a deep, exasperated sigh.

“If you had put that kind of effort into something enterprising, I rather think you would have made it big long ago.”
“…I don’t particularly want to make it big.”

Earning a living alongside his family was good enough. He wanted nothing beyond that, now as always.

While Aiden muttered this to himself with a wry smile, Noelle spoke up as though something had just occurred to her.

“Oh, Aiden.”
“Yes?”
“…Erm, what sort of inclinations do your family have?”

Aiden blinked blankly.

“Inclinations?”
“Things they like, things they dislike, that sort of thing…”

The way she trailed off strangely and avoided his eyes was decidedly suspicious, so Aiden tilted his head.

“…And why exactly are you asking?”
“…A-A gift, I thought I might send them a gift or something.”
“Ah-ha, a gift…”

…Out of nowhere?

“My father will be happy with any decent drink at all, and my little sister… she’s still young. Anything children like, she likes.”

That was what crossed his mind, but he narrowed his eyes and answered readily enough all the same.

She isn’t going to do anything bad with it.

At least, judging by the way she’d treated him so far, the odds of that were tremendously low.

“…So if I want to score points, that’s where I should aim.”
“Points?”
“Ah, it’s nothing.”
“…?”

What on earth was that about…?

— Let’s lay it out.

Meyer spat the words out curtly inside the Mental World, as he went on pounding Aiden to a pulp in their ‘sparring’, which was as pastoral and harmonious as ever.

…Honestly, Aiden wanted to stop dying already. But the man turned up in his dreams every night to beat him, insisting that this sort of thing was worthless the moment you lost your feel for it, and watching him at it, you had to wonder if he ever got tired.

At least it meant Aiden could ask him how to deal with the Lord Protector.

— So what you need is a means of attack that can somehow land an effective hit on a Knight whose capability counts among the best even at the level of the Empire.

“Yes. It has to be able to put it down in one go.”

‘Supernatural power imbuing’, which synthesized ki, divinity and dharma power and drove them all in together, had been strong enough to knock out even Katya with a single blow the other day. But that alone wasn’t enough, least of all when the goal was to subdue the thing in one stroke.

Come to think of it, even then it had only worked because she’d been worn down by a long fight with Noelle, and a hellfire bomb had gone off on top of that, and only then had he landed the blow on a vital point. In a boss fight, that by itself was nowhere near enough. He needed far stronger ‘firepower’ to pull off something like that.

— There definitely isn’t one.

…So it was no surprise that Meyer declared it outright, but it was stifling all the same.

Meyer said it with a snort, and Aiden grumbled back sulkily.

“Come on, Sunbae.”

Holding a conversation with everything above his nose beaten to mush was a fairly remarkable experience in itself, but what the other man had just said mattered more.

“Weren’t you one of the strongest wielders of supernatural power of your whole generation? Help me out a bit.”

— Strongest of a generation doesn’t make a man omniscient and omnipotent. Have you got a conscience?

Meyer snorted and flicked the blood off his blade.

— Your skill may have gotten usable, but that only means you can carry one person’s share by the standard of an ‘ordinary’ superhuman. The ones who’ve rolled around on battlefield after battlefield could carve you up with their eyes shut.

“…I beat several regular Knights one-sidedly not long ago, you know.”

— Ah-ha. And has the fellow who did that landed a single attack on me yet?

“…”

— And I’m not even using any supernatural power to speak of.

…A truly damnable ancestor.

And all the more infuriating because he never once said anything wrong.

Feeling the part of him that had been sheared away above the nose slowly regenerate, Aiden pushed himself up. The timing suited him, since it let him put on a more earnest face.

“…Even so, I’m in a spot where I have to squeeze something out of nothing.”

Unless he brought that thing down, there was no way out of the main quest, and right now this was the only corner he had to cling to. After all, this man was the only one who shared Aiden’s trait of being able to handle several supernatural powers.

— To begin with. Even if I somehow made you a means of attack that lands an effective hit and put it in your hand, could you even drive it in?

It wasn’t a badly aimed worry. The moment his opponent carried the title of Noelle’s master, the problem wasn’t just the means of attack but landing it at all. There’d be more than a gap in the specs of their techniques; there’d be an enormous gulf in combat skill as well.

But.

“Yes.”

He could land it. He had at least that much conviction.

— And what makes you so sure?

“I’ll manage it somehow.”

“…”

“I’m the type that’s strong in a real fight.”

Meyer looked at him as if to ask whether he was joking, but Aiden met his eyes just as boldly.

Well, it was do or die. If he couldn’t land it, he’d fail the quest and die anyway.

…And being strong in a real fight isn’t empty talk, either.

Given the skills he had, that was a plain fact too. With this or that condition attached, it wasn’t even hard for his specs to shoot up explosively.

— Well, confidence is a fine thing. Still, the way I see it there’s no method.

“Ah, don’t be like that. I looked at your records, Sunbae, and you always grew by leaps and bounds at a ridiculous speed. At least tell me the secret.”

— I was simply a genius. I covered it with talent.

“…”

The self-praise came out without so much as a blink, and for a moment Aiden was lost for words.

No, it was too early to give up. He knew how to handle people, if nothing else.

“Right. Which is why I’m asking you.”

“…”

“You’re a genius, Sunbae.”

“…”

“The greatest genius there is. The kind who pulls off what nobody else can, easily, one after another.”

“…”

“Ah, honestly, you can do it, can’t you. Hm? The Knight of Dawn, surely—”

— Just how much lip service are you going to pay, exactly?

“…”

Yet even as he said it, the corners of his mouth were twitching.

…It wasn’t that he didn’t realize Aiden was coaxing and flattering him with all this talk. He just set such store by that word, ‘genius’, that he went along with it anyway, knowing full well. That was all the clearer when he took a good long while to think it over, unlike when he’d first heard the request.

— If it’s a back-door trick, there might be a way to use one.

“A back-door trick?”

— But there are conditions attached.

Meyer’s voice was grave.

— Do you know how the ones who use multiple supernatural powers manage it?

“How would I know…?”

— Neither do I.

“…”

Was this man playing games?

But the explanation that followed made it clear that wasn’t all he’d meant by it.

— It’s different for every one of them. Some break through on nothing but pure talent, like me; some are born to a noble bloodline; some borrow the power of a holy relic. Each one has his own grounds for it. A trait of his own that the others don’t have.

“And so?”

— I can’t hand you any enlightenment, but if you can just… ‘dig into’ that side of it, some way through might turn up.

Then Meyer scratched his cheek and added something.

— The thing is, you’re a bit peculiar.

“Sorry?”

— With you it really feels like you handle that kind of ability by sheer accident.

“…”

— Handling several supernatural powers is a privilege of the chosen. It means being granted their authority by several gods. So the ones you see using it are all… ‘great’ enough that it wouldn’t be the least bit strange for them to handle it.

Meyer steadied his breath and sighed out his conclusion.

— Why a fellow with not a damn thing to his name, like you, can handle it, honestly, I can’t even guess. That’s why I’m saying I can’t help you.

“…”

…Setting the rudeness aside for a moment.

Aiden could see why the man was struggling with it. Fortunately, he could think of one way to explain it to him clearly.

“…There’s one person.”

— What?

“Someone who can explain why.”

There really was. Someone had told him about it not long ago, and now a voice brushed through his head.

“It isn’t widely known. But they do exist. Beings that can be more dangerous than the ‘gods’ up in heaven who hand supernatural power down.”
“You’ve been marked out by one of them as ‘mine’. And the power you handle now comes out of there.”
“And recently, because of the karma you took on, you can’t run from it anymore. Poor thing.”

…Some time ago.

He’d heard those words at the banquet in the Imperial Palace, from a certain Shamaness with an eyepatch.

“If I go and find her, how should I ask her to help?”

“…What’d you just say?”

Rania A’shan’s voice was dazed.

She was the Shamaness who served Urgan, the God of the Supreme Vehicle, with thick pink hair, an eyepatch and a pipe. Her usual air matched that very distinctive look; she always came across as brash and unyielding.

Yet right now that same woman was asking him to repeat himself with a vacant face, probably because the sentence the human in front of her had just produced had shocked her considerably.

“…I know it sounds strange, but it isn’t actually anything strange.”

“…”

“…It’s because there’s someone I want to show you to.”

Aiden brought the words out with an expression that said this was hell on earth for him too. It was the look of a man who’d never dreamed he would live to say something like this to someone like her…

“Would you sleep with me, just for one night?”

“…”

“…I can explain everything, okay?”

Rania stared at him blankly.