Chapter 28

Under normal circumstances, I would have just tuned the situation by giving them a good beating, but my state right now wasn’t normal. It was the difference between lazily swatting away a buzzing housefly or crushing it completely, depending on the scale of my irritation.

If I went too far, things might get prickly with the Temple, but that would be the extent of it. The life of a mere acolyte—not even a Holy Knight—didn’t hold much weight compared to ours. Besides, they wouldn’t have expected saintly treatment when sparking friction against a group like ours.

Furthermore, this wasn’t just a matter of mood; from our perspective, there were times when you had to commit when the situation called for it. If we just bowed our heads after being treated unreasonably, the entire group would look like a joke.

We might look like a disorganized group of gray-area mercenaries, but in reality, that wasn’t the case. This line of work requires its own set of skills, and sometimes you have to play tug-of-war with force in the field. It was a separate issue from business trust.

The best impression to leave on a client is: “They’re a troublesome bunch to handle, but they always complete their contracts.” Since the Temple wouldn’t want to make an enemy of us—the ones who take care of the tasks they can’t do openly—I felt that killing the acolyte here wouldn’t be a major issue.

If my prediction was wrong and I lost the Temple as a client, then I would just take jobs from those on the opposite side of the Temple. It’s a chaotic world, after all; there were plenty of jobs that required moral gray areas.

Of course, the leader’s pride might sting a little, but they wouldn’t scold me too harshly. Being perceived as a pushover who can be controlled simply by applying pressure is just as fatal in this business as losing trust.

It wasn’t as if there weren’t clients we had to unconditionally cater to, but if the Temple were that type of client, the leader wouldn’t have entrusted this mission to me in the first place. Putting the right person in the right place is the leader’s role. Therefore, it meant my methods were considered appropriate for this job.

As I stared at the acolyte, waiting for them to draw their sword, the Saint raised a hand toward them and restrained them gently.

“I am fine, so please refrain.”

“Understood.”

The acolyte immediately stepped back with a disciplined posture. I thought they were putting on a show, but I felt the need to cool my own head, so I relaxed the tension in my hands. The Saint fell into thought for a moment before looking at me.

“Could we talk alone, the two of us?”

Before I could even answer, the acolyte stepped forward again.

“That is not allowed! It is dangerous!”

Irritation surged within me. All my efforts were in vain; my head, which had barely cooled down, boiled over again, and I couldn’t find any reason to endure this any further.

I had been going through nothing but dog-like days lately, so my sensitivity was at its peak. I let out a long sigh and tried to suppress the momentary murderous intent, but the conclusion I reached was simply, “Oh, screw it. Let’s just kill them.” I had already finished assessing the situation, noting that the risks involved were low, so I didn’t need much patience to overcome my hesitation.

The moment I was about to put my hand on my sword, my colleague, Leo, stepped in front. I hesitated for a split second because I couldn’t slash at a colleague’s back, and Leo didn’t miss the chance to lash out at the acolyte.

“Hey, cut it out. Who’s the one making the Saint dangerous right now, anyway?”

“What?”

“If you’re a low-level subordinate, act like one and follow orders from above. The Saint is your superior by a long shot, so why do you keep butting in and failing to distinguish when to speak and when not to? Could you pull this stuff with other high-ranking priests who aren’t the Saint? You seem to be taking her kindness for granted, so you’d better know your place.”

“I am merely intervening to protect the Saint as her escort!”

“Protect her from whom? If there were something going on, our guy would have asked first. Look at the situation. The Saint is the one asking to talk to our guy separately. Yet you’re acting like our guy did something horrible to her. If you’re going to act like that, you shouldn’t have brought her here in the first place, you fucking asshole.”

However, Leo was quick-witted but also hot-tempered. He clearly intended to intervene to stop a fight, but he grew more heated as he spoke, his face twisting.

“If the Saint is in danger because of our guy, that’s entirely on you. You’re the one inviting danger by pissing people off. Huh? If you understand, get back, you moron. You looking to die, shithead.”

“Who’s ‘our guy.’ Call me ‘Captain’.”

Or a leader, or at least use my name—why were their word choices always so weird? Leo changed his expression as he looked at me.

“It’s a term of endearment, a term of endearment. We’re trying to set a mood, so let’s not break it, okay?”

“Shut up. I don’t want to be called that by you.”

Besides, the moment they called me ‘our guy,’ any chance of setting a mood went right out the window. I was so dumbfounded that my head forcibly cooled down. Leo probably aimed for this, but I wasn’t happy about it.

The acolyte wasn’t worth the effort. In reality, my calming down didn’t matter. This time, it was the acolyte’s turn to feel choked up, and they grabbed their sword again. Leo looked at them with pity.

“If you draw that, there’s really no turning back, so think carefully.”

“Do you think I would just endure such an insult!”

“And what are you going to do if you don’t? Weren’t you sent here as the Saint’s escort? What in the world is more important to you right now than the Saint’s will? Restoring a bit of bruised ego? Is your head completely empty? You have no sense of judgment.”

“Grrr!”

The acolyte gritted their teeth, putting more force into the hand holding the sword. That was when the Saint spoke calmly.

“Acolyte, Scala. Stand down.”

“Saint! But…!”

“Stand down.”

The Saint didn’t add anything else and just stared at the acolyte. Even then, the acolyte didn’t back down easily, only detaching their hand from the sword after a long moment. It seemed they finally realized that if they obstructed her any further, the Saint might impose some sort of sanction on them later.

Even I, an outsider, understood that instantly, but that guy was truly hopeless. They were slow on the uptake, and since the Saint’s outward words and demeanor didn’t feel overly oppressive, they must have thought she was easy to push around.

In truth, that guy wasn’t the only one suffering from that delusion, so there were many people around the Saint who would act up without knowing their place. Therefore, whether I endured or not, friction like today’s was a frequent occurrence whenever I was in the same place as the Saint.

The Saint actually exploited such situations. She would select only the disobedient ones as escorts, tame them to a certain degree, and then repeat the process of swapping them out. It seemed she would then assign the ones she had already tamed to other suitable places, and in the end, that guy would likely end up the same way.

The Saint herself seemed to think she was guiding them, but no matter how I looked at it, it was just taming fanatics. It made me feel dirty to be used in such a disgusting scheme, but for the sake of the contract fee, I was letting this much slide. It might not be my place to say this, as I had been the one intending to just kill them this time, but the Saint didn’t seem entirely sane either.

The Saint said to the acolyte, “The conversation we are about to have concerns Felix’s personal life, so it is not something to be discussed in front of many people. Do you understand?”

“I understand. However, Saint.”

“You do understand, do you not?”

Whether they understood the “however” or not, the acolyte turned pale and lowered their head, sensing that she would tolerate no more.

“I apologize.”

Only then did the Saint return her gaze to me and point to a spot well away from the others. She chose to keep distance within her line of sight rather than entering a tent, seemingly out of consideration for the acolyte’s anxiety.

I didn’t want to be the subject of an unpleasant misunderstanding either, so I didn’t raise any objections and walked along with her. As soon as we were finally able to talk alone, the Saint bowed her head to me.

“I am sorry, Felix. I apologize on their behalf, so please forgive the acolyte’s rudeness.”

“Just explain.”

I wasn’t in the mood to lighten the atmosphere with useless small talk. When I demanded we get straight to the point, the Saint nodded.

“Before I explain, I would like to know the situation more accurately.”

I briefly listed the misfortunes that had occurred since I received the blessing prayer—everything except for the issue with Iel. Although the Saint’s aura seemed quiet and she appeared the type to not spread rumors, no one could know what her true personality was. It was best to be careful about everything.

Besides, I had already experienced a terrifying side of the Saint myself, so I didn’t want to say a single word regarding Iel.