Episode 43. Doubt

‘Be pure.’

It is the teaching of Elma, who enjoys the joys and sorrows of creatures and contemplates destruction and birth.

‘You will realize that you are pure.’

One of the three rules of the Goddess left in the Bible that has covered Karin’s eyes until now.

According to his words, the saintess had to be infinitely pure. She had to be ignorant of everything except the words of the Bible, and she had to embrace everyone, not knowing how to hate people.

Has she ever come out of the Tower of Silence, the symbol of Stica Cathedral?

Innocence became ignorance, but people praised her trapped inside the bars.

“You must always be pure, saintess.”

Listening to Tizan’s voice, Karin recalled her childhood for the first time in a while. It wasn’t that she was a saint from the beginning.

In her village, poisonous dandelions bloomed a lot. No matter how hard the villagers pulled them out, the dandelion would eventually sprout seeds and cover Karin in pure white in one blow.

At that very moment, the villagers whispered that the goddess fell in love with Karin.

From the day the cathedral notified to take Karin, the villagers didn’t pick or touch the dandelions, so the bright yellow dandelion field was able to remain.

It was the scenery of her hometown she looked back on for the last time.

Afterwards, as soon as Karin arrived at the unfamiliar cathedral, the priests of Sainteca forcibly put Karin to sleep.

When Karin opened her eyes again, three days had passed, and a knife mark remained on her neck. After that, Karin couldn’t raise her voice no matter what.

At the age of 9, Karin, an ordinary girl, lost her voice at the touch of a goddess.

“As Sharp taught, you must not be shaken by the roar of the world. You must cover your ears and close your eyes. That is the best and best effort the saintess can show the goddess.”

Tizan, who had awakened Karin at that time, continued to speak in an earnest voice.

“We canceled Professor Ian’s lecture separately. Sorry for the inconvenience. This school is overflowing with more malice than we expected, so if you allow it… . From now on, we will be closer to the saintess-”

Kiruna School, which allowed theological students to learn, had a separate worship hall for believers.

In the stillness, Karin ignored Tizan and stared Darr in the eye.

In Karin’s memory, his purple eyes never wavered. However, in front of Professor Ian, his eyes clearly trembled with anxiety.

“… You are shaking, saintess.”

At Dar’s direct words, Karin shook her head.

Karin’s faith in Lord Elma has never wavered.

However, to his eyes, it might seem that her heart is wavering. Because she was shaking with her own hands what the priests had taught her.

‘Be pure, you will become pure and realize.’

Does that really mean to accept everything without question and live?

Does the goddess really want to be white, unable to hear, see, or think?

As a pure white saint, what did I realize as I closed my mouth and accepted all the teachings without a single refusal?

What do you take to heart when you turn to ignorance?

Enlightenment came first, breaking that innocence.

Doubting for the first time, she was finally able to realize one thing. It doesn’t make sense to get enlightenment from innocence.

What can we learn from looking at a blank page?

Wouldn’t Elma’s second teaching be to break the white world and move forward?

“Saint… ?”

Karin left the seat without answering. Her heart skipped a beat at the first break.

‘I will give you this world. I will leave you with endless freedom, so take all responsibility as well. Hope and despair, good and evil, and order are not me, but you.’

Recalling the goddess’ first teaching, Karin walked towards the man called the devil.

I will face and judge good and evil. I will take all responsibility for that.

‘I will baptize him, save him or destroy him.’

* * *

It’s only been a day since I defeated the Saintstica Exorcist Priests, but there was no time for me to indulge in the afterglow.

“Hey, make a proper Bible, what is it?”

“Are you going to keep blaspheming?”

“No, this is a bit harsh. According to you, the interpretation of 15:27 is… .”

“jellyfish-!”

“yes! What is this!?”

“Jellyfish are cute. It was the prettiest thing I’ve ever made.”

Teaching life was busy. Although he was busy enough with class preparation and pond research, there was one more major task that he couldn’t leave out as a professor in the Department of Magical Linguistics.

Bible Interpretation.

Since the magic language is the word of the Bible, the higher the interpretation rate of the Bible, the more diverse the magic languages listed in the dictionary. The richer the magical language becomes, the greater the possibilities of magic formulas will be.

Thanks to the efforts of the priests and magic linguistics professors, about 70% of the current Bible has been interpreted.

If we can decipher the 30% of the unknowns that still remain, we may be able to write more efficient and diverse proofs than existing magic formulas with the newly listed words.

The problem is that the remaining 30% of the wall was so difficult to overcome that it felt like a limit to scholars digging into the Bible. Research is still ongoing, but it was at a level where a new word would be registered every three years.

Obviously, the number of people and assets invested in deciphering the Bible is increasing, but as for why there is so little progress in excerpting words… .

“When there is context in a text, you can look at the words before and after and infer unknown words. Why are you suddenly making jellyfish on top of a mountain? How do people know this!?”

“I feel bad too! It was just a diary!”

“Why did you throw away the diary… .”

“Human beings are a species that needs to believe in something to unite and live. I don’t know now, but at the time it was like that.”

When the world was just born, in the age of savagery.

When the different races unite without disagreement under their guardian spirit, and root their faith in the land with mighty authority. People who had no trust in God fought among themselves.

The same goes for the persecution and contempt of the alien races who called humans an abandoned race.

When it was not enough to unite and respond to the enemy, humans doubted each other and cursed themselves.

At the time, human extinction seemed obvious, but Elma, who was still working on the world, did not want humans to disappear too quickly.

It was the first and last time she extended her hand to humans.

“I gave my diary to a wise man. I did it on purpose because I was afraid that if I gave him a book full of my teachings, he would just live on.”

“Then, what are the four or three teachings at the beginning of the Bible?”

“I was afraid that people would distrust me and continue to fight if I gave them a real diary, so I wrote it to look plausible. But fortunately, humans started to unite under the sage.”

That was the end of the creation of the world.

Since then, Elma has not descended directly to the real world anymore.

If, at that time, humans did not unite and perish early, that would have been entirely their responsibility.

“Originally, jellyfish were made to fly in the sky, but the seeds dried up after being eaten by birds, right? So I took refuge in the sea.”

“… Let’s get past the jellyfish for now. Interpret the next verse.”

With Elma’s help, it will be possible to decipher all the remaining 30% of the uncharted territory in the Bible.

Even if I publish only a few words in two years, I will be able to become an authority in this academic world, but I cannot submit a paper to an academic conference based on the nonsense of ‘Goddess directly informed me’.

Therefore, I was spending time searching for valid reasons in various papers and books to explain how I was able to infer the words I found out from Elma… .

“Professor Ian.”

As we were having such a busy time, Rien cautiously knocked.

“Two students want to meet with the professor.”

“… name is?”

“Yuri and… . My name is Karin Huland.”

* * *

‘I’m scared… !’

Professor Ian stared at Yuri in silence, and she froze on the spot.

Yuri didn’t have the confidence to face him yet, but Karin brought her here almost by force.

‘why?’

It had only been a day since I secretly watched Professor Ian’s battle.

After returning to the dormitory yesterday, Yuri told Karin and the other clergy about what we had seen, and we proceeded to follow the professor.

However, Karin continued to shake her head. Despite wearing a white hoodie, the symbol of a theological student, she acted as if she did not believe in the clergy.

‘Even the clergymen call Professor Ian the devil, but it can’t be that?’

‘I’ll show you myself.’

Karin, who wrote a scary word on a piece of white paper, dragged Yuri to Professor Ian’s office without hesitation.

“… .”

However, Karin was just staring at Professor Ian without moving, and Professor Ian was looking at the silent Karin with a complicated look.

Yuri was uncomfortable with the lengthy silence, so in the end, Yuri broke into a cold sweat and spoke in a trembling voice.

“Oh, sorry… . Because he can’t talk… !”

“… Know.”

Professor Ian got up from where he was sitting, and the maid who had let them in also came out of the car and saw him and stopped.

As he slowly approached Karin, Yuri was taken aback.

‘What? what is going to happen Are we going to die here!?’

“As a servant of the light… .”

Professor Ian kneeled gracefully. Having been polite to Karin, who is much shorter than him, he looked at her and said,

“I am in awe of the Saint of Stica.”

There was the sound of a teacup breaking, and that was the final noise that enveloped the office in silence.

In the quiet office, where only the scent of black tea spreads, Karin carefully placed her hand on Ian’s head as he bowed.

And not long after, the purest light began to pour down on him.

* * *

Evenings at San Stica, the Cathedral of Silence, smelled of iron.

In a cathedral so quiet that even the sound of flickering candles could be heard, a woman who received a report from Dar and Tizan was sharpening her sword after a long time.

‘I will give you this world. I will leave you with endless freedom, so take all responsibility as well. Hope and despair, good and evil, and order are not me, but you.’

The first teaching of the goddess. Be sure to keep the good and evil that you have decided.

‘Be pure. You will come to realize that you are pure.’

The second teaching of the goddess. never let go of evil Always be good and pure.

‘Everything in the world is my will and your playground. Everything is ephemeral, but find something eternal in it and enjoy it.’

The third teaching of the goddess. Even in a chaotic world, look for things that do not lose their value forever, such as goodness and purity, and live by looking at them.

The woman sharpening her sword gazed at the tower where the saintess was, and muttered quietly as if in prayer.

“… I didn’t expect it to collapse so quickly.”

Unlike me, who stained myself with countless blood, I hoped that you would live according to the teachings of the goddess.

Now that I know what the intestines look like, and I know where to pierce them to make blood flow even if the hole is plugged… .

Because I can never go back to innocence.

‘So, didn’t you tell me? Holy maiden.’

Innocence equals ignorance.

I liked you ignorant.

Like a symbol, the nobleness of the saintess who accepted that she must always be white led me to this point.

If the saintess’ innocence had not been ignorance, how could she have smiled as she looked at the followers of Saint Stica who had their vocal cords cut out… ?

Hearing that there are people who are trying to stain even you, I even doubt that there really is such a thing as a devil.

“… You, too, are the most beautiful in that tower.”

The followers of Elma, once united under the pope, were now divided into thirteen churches.

At present, it seems as if it is divided according to the sects of theology, but in fact it is not.

The thirteen cathedrals are nothing more than the product of the emperor tearing away the authority of the pope and dividing the powers under him.

The Church of St. Fresen, which serves light and purity, was originally a priesthood under the direct control of the Pope, and the Church of Saint-Ballain, which serves light and spear, originated from the guards who guarded the Pope’s castle, the Knights Templar.

Likewise, there was also the origin of the Silent Chapel Sainttica, which was originally the memorization of the Pope.

The Knights of the Red Hand, alone in the Pope’s castle where everything is pure white, the death god who takes away the voice from those who try to dim the light.

The fear of light that even assassinated the great wizard Niagmin, the founder of light source magic. Knights of Stica.

Many years have passed and many have forgotten their existence… . Even now, the Stica Knights have not let go of their swords.

“May good prevail.”

The reason why the leader of the Stica Knights, Knight Commander Pierre, still called a nightmare to blasphemers, was young was because he had such skill and faith.