#155

‘What the…’

Even though these are the memories of someone already dead, is it possible to nullify Oblivion?

No, more importantly, why were they subjected to ‘Oblivion’ in the first place?

[Brother! No, Saintess! Saintess, Saintess. I was wrong. I will never call you by that name again. I will forget who you are. No, I have already forgotten. So please, just don’t use Oblivion. I will never ask for your help again. Forgiveness, please, forgiveness…]

‘What the fuck.’

What is this.

What happened?

What kind of mistake did she make to be pleading like that?

[Those who devote themselves to Order must sever all ties with their family.

Condemnation shall fall upon those who speak of severed ties to make impure requests.

The punishment is to forget those ‘severed ties’ forever.]

‘…Impure requests?’

Did she ask something of Pell, who had devoted himself to Order, and as a result, end up forgetting Pell’s very existence?

Just what did she ask?

[…Mother warned me many times.

That from the moment he devoted himself to Order, Brother was no longer my blood relative.

At first, I really believed it and felt incredibly hurt.

But once we were alone, Brother smiled playfully first and lifted me up, saying, ‘My cute Peppa!’

“Just call me Oppa like before! Who cares about that stuff? If someone referred to their mother as ‘the woman who birthed this body’ instead of ‘Mother’ when talking about family, everyone would just laugh at them.”

When I asked what would happen if he were punished, saying I didn’t want to fall into hell, Brother burst out laughing.

“You hate hell? Alright, I got it! I’ll tell the Lord that Peppa is absolutely innocent!”]

‘Uh…’

Wait, how many years ago was this?

It seems like it was before Pell became the Saintess.

‘So what was the impure request?’

[Brother Pell is six years older than me. He grants me whatever I ask for. He even ate all the food I secretly left behind!]

‘I’m asking what the impure request was.’

[I told him it was such a shame that his hair would turn white once he became an apostle, so he secretly cut a little bit of his hair for me. He told me it had to be a secret from others.]

Only heartwarming anecdotes keep coming up.

Were the two of them close?

At least until he became the Saintess, they seemed to have a very close relationship.

‘What happened after that?’

[After Brother became the ‘Saintess,’ I couldn’t meet him even once.

No, we met, but there was never an opportunity to be alone.

When I accidentally called him Brother, he scared me in a soft voice, saying that if I made such a mistake again, I might face condemnation… I actually teared up back then…]

I frowned slightly.

‘This memory system is fucking inconvenient.’

The structure is such that if you say a keyword, it just randomly brings up anything that roughly fits.

What a piece of trash user interface.

At least put a date on it. That way I’d know the chronological order.

‘What should I say to get the scene that connects to that pleading situation from earlier? Request? Pleading?’

[There is only one way left for me.

I will go to Brother Pell and ‘request.’

To please save me.]

‘…Save her?’

Is someone trying to kill her?

[I found a will that I never wrote.

The promise that I would be granted Ordination was a lie.

I am going to be murdered here.

It will be disguised as a suicide, and I will be buried in a shameful death.

Mother, and everyone in the family, are trying to kill me.

I couldn’t trust anyone.

Clutching the will, I ran out barefoot and knocked on the doors of the Church.]

‘Oh boy.’

A sigh escaped me automatically.

I didn’t even need to see the rest to know what happened.

The priests of the Church were probably in on it too.

‘If things had been resolved here, the scene of her pleading with the Saintess wouldn’t have appeared.’

[The Bishop welcomed me warmly.

He asked why I had come dressed like that on such a cold day and provided me with a winter coat and socks.

Tears welled up in my eyes.

Told to rest and warm my body, I must have let my guard down without realizing it.

I shouldn’t have.

“Perpetua. Your mother has come to take you.”

I will never forget the face of the Bishop as he said those words for the rest of my life.

With a benevolent expression, the Bishop advised me that slander spoken in a state of delirium is not subject to condemnation, but to be careful from now on.

The will was in Mother’s hand.

The only evidence that I wasn’t insane vanished just like that.]

‘Dear me.’

Still, seeing as she met the Saintess, it seems she managed to escape to the Capital Church.

How did she get all the way to the Capital Church?

The Opia family estate and the Capital Church are quite far apart…

[Lorenzo, the stable boy, believed me even though I had no evidence.

‘Then let’s go meet the Saintess together.’

Lorenzo said as he wiped away my tears.

‘She will know everything! Of course, she is the agent of Order. She will punish the wicked Head of the family! A bolt of lightning will strike—KABOOM!’]

‘So she decided to escape by stealing a horse.’

More importantly, is Lorenzo okay?

Maybe it’s because I’ve spent so much time as a serf, but every time I see stories like this, I empathize with the extras.

Seeing as Perpetua’s end wasn’t good, I doubt Lorenzo fared well either.

[‘Lorenzo’ pressed a pillow over my face.

As my breath gradually ran out, it became hard to endure.

Screaming, I kicked Lorenzo and ran away.

I heard a desperate voice calling me ‘Miss,’ but I didn’t look back.

I didn’t want to die.

And I didn’t want to make Lorenzo a murderer.

Lorenzo was hanged the next day.]

‘?’

What.

Lorenzo died?

No, what?

What happened in between?

Why was Lorenzo trying to kill Peppa?

What about the Saintess?

What was Brother Pell doing?

[Pelagia! Pelagia! Ah! Brother Pell! I knew you would come! I knew you would! Pell, my brother. I know all worldly ties have been severed, but if any affection from the past remains, please grant me one request. I do not want to be murdered. I don’t want to die. Brother Pell. Please save me. Anything is fine. Grant me Ordination and take me into the Embrace of Order. I don’t care if I become a nun who performs a lifelong penance of silence, so please…]

Reading the sentences drenched in desperation made me feel slightly nauseous.

‘And then?’

How did the Saintess react?

[Brother Pell opened his mouth.

‘Perpetua, you have violated the Doctrine. Sins committed knowingly are heavier.’]

‘What?’

[I knelt and looked up at Brother.

I couldn’t understand what Brother Pell was talking about.

‘Conspiring to murder is also against the Doctrine, but there is no evidence. Therefore, only the sin of making an impure request remains for you. Did I not warn you before? That if you made a mistake with the title once more, you would face condemnation.’]

‘Wait, his sister is pleading for her life and that’s the reaction?’

Don’t make impure requests?

Is he insane?

[I realized.

That is not Brother Pell.

The Saintess will not save me.

Rather, she will try to erase my memories.

Behind the Saintess’s snow-white hair, a Halo flickers.

Before that, I…]

I cursed inwardly.

‘Why did the Saintess try to revive these kinds of memories?’

It’s not just that my Affinity for the Saintess is dropping; I feel like I’m looking at a boss monster in human form.

So what happened to Perpetua?

[‘Oh dear. Suicide is forbidden by the Doctrine. Perpetua, have you been negligent in your study of the Doctrine? Those who take their own lives cannot enter the Land of Order.’

I screamed.

That I wouldn’t go to such a place.

That I never wanted to go to the heaven where Mother or you would go.

That I’d rather fall into hell.

At that moment, the smile vanished from the Saintess’s face.

‘That cannot be, Perpetua.’]

‘Fuck.’

[In that instant, a light flashed so brightly it felt like I was going blind.

‘I shall bestow a Blessing upon you. This is not a punishment, Perpetua. The moment you attempt to take your own life, you will forget what you were trying to do. No matter what means you use, you will be unable to commit suicide. No matter the hardship, you will not be able to choose death.’]

‘Isn’t that a Curse?’

In that state, not being able to die sounds like a total Curse.

No, if you want to save a sister attempting suicide, you should resolve the cause of her wanting to die.

What’s the point of just blocking the ‘suicide’ part?

Is this some kind of absurdist play?

[…Did I think everything would be miraculously resolved just by coming to the Capital Church?

I am so foolish.

I hugged Lorenzo and wailed.

‘Since it’s come to this, the only way is to die.’

But I failed.

Failure, failure, failure, failure…

‘There are things even the Miss cannot do.’

In the end, I decided to borrow Lorenzo’s hand.]

‘Hmm.’

Knowing how it ends left a bitter taste in my mouth.

It wasn’t particularly surprising.

‘Because that’s the image people who believe in Loclem have.’

Bloodless, tearless law-obsessed freaks.

The kind of person who would stop an ambulance to issue a parking ticket while someone’s life is on the line.

The kind of bastard who would stab their own parents or savior if they violated the Doctrine.

It’s actually more surprising that Pell seemed quite human before becoming the Saintess.

‘Could the order of events be reversed?’

Not that a devout person becomes an apostle, but that becoming an apostle makes you devout?

Then on what criteria are apostles chosen?

‘…Face?’

That was surprisingly persuasive.

The probability that every Saintess in history was beautiful by chance, while being chosen solely on divine power or piety, is lower than the possibility that they were chosen based on their looks and then had their other stats boosted via Blessings.

Even if beauty wasn’t the only criterion, it certainly carried a very high weight.

‘If there’s one thing I don’t understand…’

Why did the Saintess leave the Opia family alone?

Perpetua wasn’t murdered.

After a fake funeral was held, she had been alive all along, imprisoned somewhere.

There’s no way the Saintess, who forbade suicide, didn’t consider that possibility.

‘…Then why didn’t she condemn them?’

Isn’t pretending someone is dead when they aren’t a clear ‘sin’?

Even without evidence, she could have moved to ‘investigate’ the suspicious circumstances.

Just a single passing word would have rescued Perpetua.

But why…

“Fabio.”

‘Fuck.’

My heart hammered rapidly, as if I were a criminal.

‘Since when was she standing there?’

“Have you finished organizing your thoughts?”

“…Yes. Saintess.”

I answered, returning the scroll to the Saintess.

“I don’t think I’m ready to know the truth yet.”

“I see.”

“I, uh, really didn’t read that scroll. It unfolded because I dropped it, but…”

“Then you still don’t know that Perpetua and I were blood relatives?”

“…What?”

‘What’s the point of saying it with her own mouth?’

No, I told you I didn’t want to know.

That I wasn’t ready.

And more importantly, why the fuck?

She used Oblivion on Perpetua, who clung to her like that.

“Did you know?”

“Ah, no! This is the first I’ve heard of it. But from what I know, those who devote themselves to Order do not cling to their origins.”

“Wonderful! Fabio, you are studying the Doctrine diligently!”

Looking at the Saintess speaking in such a bright tone, I felt a dissonance that was hard to describe.

It felt like I was looking at a being that had the form of a human but was not human.

My stomach churned slightly.

“…There is one thing I want to ask.”

“Ask away.”

“When did you find out that Perpetua didn’t actually die?”

“When did I find out? What a strange question. I can feel where the souls of those who have met death head. Therefore, I have always known that Perpetua did not die.”

‘She knew.’

“Then why…”

It was so absurd that I momentarily choked up.

“…Why didn’t you go to save her?”

The Saintess tilted her head slightly, as if she didn’t understand my question.

“Because physical pain is not a sin?”

“What did you just…?”

“If she were committing a sin, I would have condemned her before she could commit more. But that child was an innocent victim. A soul that dies after suffering such pain heads to the Land of Order. In that case, has she not already been saved?”

‘…Is she saying this in her right mind?’

“That is why it is all the more regrettable. To seek salvation from the Being Beyond the Starry Sky while the Land of Order was right before her eyes…”