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Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: FusionX
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The gaze was filled with malice and the eyes of the person, whose gender I couldn’t discern, were fixed on me.
Luna pointed at the other children and shouted,
“Mister! Aren’t they in danger?! They’re too close to that person!”
“…”
She was right.
If the person near the children decided to attack, Hare, Saten, and Estia were at considerable risk. They could even be fighting for their lives.
I hadn’t even sensed their approach.
“…This is a pretty serious situation.”
“R-Right?! It’s dangerous! There’s no other choice…! Mister, please allow me to draw my sword!”
“Stay put, Luna. It doesn’t seem like they have any hostility towards you.”
The situation was still dangerous. However, the unidentified person’s hostility was directed solely at me.
I slowly started walking towards them and called out,
“Hey, I don’t know who you are, but if you have business with me, how about we talk?”
As I gradually approached, the person’s outline became clearer.
‘A skilled bandit, perhaps?’
Their face was hidden by disheveled hair, and their body shape was concealed by a cloak.
Just as I was unable to determine their gender, the person chuckled and replied,
“Talking sounds good. But those are words you shouldn’t be saying.”
A woman.
The voice was delicate and feminine. And I’d definitely heard it somewhere before. If I remembered correctly…
“A priest. Are you a relative of the one who died?”
“You remember. You heartless bastard. You’re alive in my brother’s place, and you dare show up here?”
…I didn’t know that.
How was I supposed to know you were here?
I wanted to say that, but I held back because the children were near her.
‘I never imagined that Daniel’s older sister would be here…’
Daniel, the priest who had died at the hands of the Demon Lord of Envy.
His older sister, ‘Danuel,’ was a powerful adventurer ranked ‘Topaz.’ And she deeply resented Irina and me for surviving in her brother’s stead.
Danuel, who could be considered a ‘fated enemy,’ glared at me fiercely and muttered,
“I was disappointed that we couldn’t have a proper conversation back then. Shall we have a nice, long chat now?”
“…”
Luna, seemingly oblivious to the atmosphere, chimed in beside me,
“Let’s talk it out! That’s right! Talking is always good!”
“…Luna, ‘talking’ doesn’t refer to using your mouth in this situation.”
“Huh?”
“It’s a conversation with our bodies. A physical conversation.”
As soon as I finished speaking, Danuel crouched down, ready to pounce.
Behind her, Hare, Saten, and Estia tried to pull her back and stop her, but it was useless. Her nickname from her adventuring days, ‘Fanatic Danuel,’ wasn’t given for nothing.
I spoke to Luna, who was standing blankly beside me.
“Luna.”
“Yes?”
“Run over there right now.”
She was coming. Danuel’s target was me, and only me.
The moment Luna moved to the side, out of the danger zone…
“You could have saved my brother, couldn’t you?! You heartless bastard! You killed my brother, and now you dare trespass on my territory?!”
“…You’re not in your right mind.”
Danuel started running towards me at high speed like a crazed lunatic. Her entire body was enveloped in a blinding divine power.
‘Is it that only crazy people believe in the Goddess Church? Or is it that believing in the Goddess Church makes people crazy…?’
Which one was the correct answer? I didn’t know, but I felt like Minerva would have said this,
‘It’s just that the Goddess Church is crazy? The people are innocent!’
I didn’t know where things had gone wrong, but first, I had to save my own life.
I drew the sword from my waist, just in case.
“Since the children are watching, I’ll go easy on you.”
With those words, the battle began.
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Fanatic Danuel.
According to her younger brother Daniel, who had been in my old party,
‘My sister is strong. She’s called a fanatic because she fights with divine power surrounding her body. The problem is that she’s hot-tempered and crazy… but she’s a good person who protects me.’
Thinking about it now, it would be best to retract the “good person” part.
Currently, Danuel, throwing punches infused with divine power, didn’t seem good at all. Each blow had enough destructive power to put me out of commission for at least a month.
“You squirmy little bastard. You dodge well, just like you dodged my brother’s funeral?”
“There were circumstances back then.”
“Those aren’t my circumstances. I need to avenge my brother.”
“…Why are you taking that revenge out on me?”
“Because there’s a chance you killed my brother! Even if it’s only a 1% possibility!!”
KWAANG-!!
Danuel, with whom words didn’t work, slammed her fist into the ground. If I hadn’t dodged, my body would have been shattered.
I reversed my grip on the sword and swung it towards Danuel’s abdomen.
“Aagh-!!”
Danuel screamed, seemingly in pain.
However, I was puzzled. She hadn’t dodged, even though she had enough distance to do so.
‘Could it be…?’
As if my uneasy premonition had come true, I couldn’t pull my sword out of Danuel’s abdomen.
“Y-You nimble bastard… You can’t move now, can you…?”
Drip, drip-
Blood dripped from Danuel’s palms. She had endured the pain and grabbed my sword. She wasn’t called Fanatic Danuel for nothing.
Danuel channeled divine power into her fist and shouted at me,
“I got you, you son of a bitch…”
“…”
This was bad.
Danuel began to unleash a punch infused with all her divine power. If I got hit at this range, it would be instant death.
However, I didn’t move.
I trusted Minerva’s prophecy.
As I watched the approaching fist, feeling the shadow of death creeping closer, a seed of change blossomed from Danuel’s hand.
“…Don’t touch Mister. Stop right there.”
“Using the blood dripping from my hand… A child using blood magic. You’d better cancel that spell right now.”
“Before that, withdraw the divine power from your hand.”
Saten used Danuel’s blood to cast blood magic.
Thorns sprouted from Danuel’s hand, immobilizing her.
Saten was dripping with sweat, seemingly struggling to maintain the spell.
Thanks to that, she was able to save my life.
“Thanks to you, I’m alive, Saten.”
“You little rat!”
Thwack-
I abandoned my sword and ran towards the children.
In my current state, with one eye missing, I had no chance of winning in close combat against a ‘Topaz’ ranked adventurer.
“Kids.”
“Yes?”
“Let’s run.”
Pitter-patter-!!
I lifted Saten and Estia, one under each arm, to run faster.
‘I can’t win in this state.’
If the children weren’t here, I could have used wide-range magic, but today’s objective was a picnic. Even if something unpleasant happened in the middle, it would be enough to end it on a happy note.
“You, you bastard!! Stop right there-!!”
“If it’s not a physical conversation, I’ll stop.”
“You crazy bastard-!!”
Who was calling who crazy?
I didn’t look back as I ran down the mountain with the children.
“Wah, waah! Run away!!”
“We’re running, Mister…! That person isn’t normal…!!”
Stampede-
We ran down the mountain as if we had encountered a wild animal. Loud rumbling sounds came from behind us as we were pursued.
It seemed like she had no intention of giving up.
“Uh, uhh… Oh Goddess, please watch over me, Estia, and smite the wicked person chasing us…!!”
In the midst of this urgent situation, Estia clasped her hands together and prayed. She closed her eyes tightly and her hands trembled, showing how desperate she was.
Did she hate the thought of me dying that much?
Just as I was starting to see Estia in a new light…
“The Mister who gives me holy water can’t die, Goddess…!! If Mister dies, who will give me my holy water…!!”
…That new light was extinguished.
Estia definitely saw me as a holy water vending machine.
However, her prayer seemed genuine, as a choice appeared before my eyes. Estia’s prayer seemed to have worked to some extent.
There was no time to consider my options. I immediately opened the answer sheet in my mind and checked the two options.
‘1. Send the children away first… and I die. This is close to a wrong answer.’
Option 1 was the typical sacrificial ending. It was a wrong answer that appeared quite often on the answer sheet.
Since option 1 was confirmed as wrong, I opened the answer sheet again and checked option 2.
‘I don’t know how Estia will be useful, but… I’ll show her.’
If I held Estia up like a shield and showed her to Danuel…
…This was the correct answer.
I acted according to the answer sheet without hesitation.
“Estia.”
“Huh? Why are you calling me! In this urgent situation! Just hurry up and move!”
“Excuse me for a moment.”
“W-What are you doing!! Let go of me-!!”
Struggle, struggle-
Estia, lifted into the air, struggled and demanded to be put down. Danuel was approaching, and Estia, held in my arms, had to look at her.
“Eek-!! You’re using me as a shield-!! You kidnapper-!!”
I’m going to die!
Estia screamed in surprise. But there was no need for that. Danuel’s reaction, as I had seen in the answer sheet, was…
“Gasp- This rat… He stopped and used a child as a shield? This trash… Wait a minute. This divine power…? The S-Saintess…!?”
…Perfect.
The Saintess.
To Danuel, a fanatic who believed in the Goddess Church, Estia’s existence was akin to the Goddess herself.
Thud-
“…I greet the Goddess’s representative.”
“W-What! Mister! She’s kneeling!”
“Looks like we can finally talk.”
Danuel looked like she’d been living in the mountains for who knows how long.
I quietly muttered to Danuel, who seemed to have finally come to her senses after kneeling,
“…Let’s wash up first and then talk. You smell.”
It seemed like I needed to have a conversation to find out why she, the older sister of my former party member and a top-tier adventurer, was acting like this here.
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