“Hello—”
The monastery’s great doors were flung open with such force that the deafening crash almost shook the dust off the windowsills.
Sunlight surged in like a tidal wave, bathing everything inside in a blinding white glow.
On the neatly arranged benches in the hall, over a dozen monks clad in white robes turned their heads toward the uninvited visitor.
She was a girl in a white dress, with silver hair and violet eyes.
She stood bathed in light, yet everyone present could clearly see her features as if sculpted by the gods themselves.
The holy aura radiating from her made people instinctively want to kneel, to prostrate themselves before her and fervently pray for forgiveness for their past sins.
But these were monks of the Caesarne Inquisition.
That meant they were more fanatical, more devout, and more rigid than ordinary people. So even though the girl before them was the Saintess—the very embodiment of divine punishment—no one dared behave with a lack of decorum.
They rose from their seats, faced the entrance, and silently saluted the girl with a formal gaze.
“Greetings to everyone at the Caesarne Inquisition branch.”
Selulu smiled and raised one hand to greet the crowd.
With the other, she grabbed the neck of a headless corpse and tossed it onto the white carpet covering the aisle.
The fluid oozing from the neck stained the sacred cross with a scarlet smear, a mark of defilement on the symbol of purity.
No one reacted; it was as if the girl had carelessly discarded a wad of crumpled paper.
—But perhaps this was already the cleanest place within the monastery.
Looking around, all that could be seen were marble walls covered in blasphemous writings and symbols, stained glass saint images with mutated horns and tails, and the altar, once holy, now toppled and desecrated.
It had become a filthy shrine.
A small mound built from piled corpses.
At the center of this mound stood a wooden scepter pointing straight to the dome.
The top of the scepter, which should have been inlaid with jewels, instead held a single eye.
A living eye emitting a pale blue light, continuously spinning like a curious child scanning its surroundings—
Finally, it stopped, reflecting the girl standing at the doorway.
From deep within the soul, a malicious and cunning laugh echoed faintly.
“Lord of Fate.”
Selulu met that eye’s gaze with disdain.
“Of course, every misfortune is tied to you.”
The defilers’ beliefs were varied, but none was more favored than the Lord of Fate.
They believed that by offering the most devout service, this great lord would grant them the power to control their own destinies.
What they did not realize was that the moment they accepted that power, their fate ceased to belong to themselves.
“Your Highness, the Saintess.”
A figure dressed as an inquisitor stepped out from behind the mound.
…but judging from his appearance, it was hard to still call him human.
Blue wings, sharp claws, and where a mouth should have been sprouted a sky-blue beak.
He waved lightly, and the wooden scepter with the eye flew into his hands, releasing a vast yet chilling power.
“Oh, shut up. Hearing ‘Saintess’ come out of your beak just makes me think my hands should start growing feathers.”
Selulu shook her head and made a disgusted face as if she wanted to vomit.
“Head of the Caesarne Inquisition, First-Class Inquisitor Morrison, aren’t you going to explain what’s been unleashed here?”
“It is my honor, Your Highness.”
Morrison knelt on one knee and bowed to the Saintess—the monks inside the hall followed suit.
Selulu suddenly felt a wave of unease.
These deeply corrupted fiends had long lost their sanity.
They lived in their own world, their souls already the property of the great lords, yet they still believed themselves “normal humans.” Even Selulu’s mockery was only taken as a harmless joke.
Just look at them.
Ugly and twisted, they had long lost any trace of humanity, becoming nauseating monsters—
Such was the nature of the defilers.
No human soul, no human flesh.
They were slaves of the sea of souls, monsters devouring souls, indistinguishable from demons, nothing more.
“The Lord of Fate has revealed to us the future where divinity and order descend upon the world.”
“…You actually believe that?”
“I only believe what I see, Your Highness.”
Morrison’s gaze was resolute.
“The masters’ kingdom will eventually come to the mortal realm. The holy light will purge all defilers and cast out those accursed evil gods, so humanity can finally break free from endless chaos and achieve a bright and happy future.”
“…Honestly, I do believe in that. Maybe the day when everyone can be happy will really come.”
Selulu smiled.
Pure white chains poured out from the void behind her.
The monks who once belonged to the Inquisition, when caught in the light, all screamed harshly and began rapidly retreating toward Morrison.
“But that sentence should never come from your bird’s beak.”
“Your Highness?”
“Look in the mirror and see yourself, Inquisitor Morrison. Defiler! Repulsive! Just a puppet of flesh deceived and toyed with by fate!”
“Ho-how is that possible?”
Morrison was shocked and reached to touch his own face.
In an instant, he understood something.
“…Ah… why… why has it come to this—”
“Saintess, Your Highness, I understand now. You have become a fallen defiler! The defiling power radiating from you has harmed our devoted monks to this extent!”
The inquisitor showed a tearful expression, gently touching the face of a monk whose skin had corroded and boiled under the radiant light.
Selulu coldly watched the ridiculous scene unfold, squeezing out a single word trembling with excitement through her teeth.
“Kill.”
*****
Loki looked up.
A slight tremor caused some soil and debris to fall, like a light drizzle.
“Hm? Loki, what’s wrong?”
Noticing Loki’s slowed pace, Ina looked at him with curiosity.
The two of them were currently beneath the monastery, in a passageway leading to the Truth’s Hand base.
As the face of Truth’s Hand, Loki naturally knew the entire underground facility intimately. Even after five years, he still remembered the locations of every exit leading outside.
So after briefly parting ways with Selulu, who was going to “work,” and agreeing on an approximate time and place to meet again, he and Ina entered one of the entrances near the monastery.
These passages were designed as contingency escape routes. Should the base’s main section be breached, most of Truth’s Hand’s members could use the labyrinthine underground roads to flee in various directions.
Few had expected that they would be torn to death by the very watchdog who should have been loyal.
Because Loki had intended to kill everyone, he had preemptively created accidents blocking all escape routes… Fortunately, with Ina’s help, clearing those obstacles wasn’t too difficult.
“Nothing.”
Loki shook his head.
“I just hope Selulu is having fun up there.”
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