Chapter 76 - Even a Devil May Serve God

What the viscount wanted from Sherin was mutual cooperation. Now that a passage had opened through the Blade Mountains, which had all but cut their two regions off from one another, he proposed using it to establish exchanges.

More precisely, what he wanted from Shan was to convey this proposal and put in a good word for him. Rather than accept immediately, Shan deferred his answer and relayed the matter to Roden.

“He probably wants to take this opportunity to join our side,” Roden said in a low, almost whispered voice, looking around. “There have been plenty of rumors that we make our own magical devices, but nobody had actually seen our combat devices. Now they’ve seen just how incredibly effective they are.”

Certainly, without the help of the magical devices made specifically for the knights, it would have been no surprise if several of them had died in that battle. Without Shan, they might even have been wiped out altogether.

And since the viscount had seen even ordinary soldiers using magical devices, Roden thought he was probably hoping he might obtain some himself by siding with Sherin.

“Why insist on an introduction from me?”

“He wants you to vouch for him. If he just turned up on his own, he’d have to contend with the established powers in Pales. He’s probably also considered how much influence your opinion has with Her Highness.”

Arranging for a priest to heal Shan and the other knights was essentially a bribe toward that end. He needed to win their goodwill somehow if they were to speak favorably of him.

“Hmm. But I think Her Highness intended to seal the passage through the mountains.”

“That was before we knew Viscount Treva would be friendly. Honestly, I think it’s a good idea. I’ve heard these wetlands might be hard to live in, but they’re home to all sorts of unusual magical creatures.”

With so many mages in Pales, Roden added, those creatures would be a great help in magical experiments.

The Pales faction’s chief weaknesses were its small territory and limited population, so the more allies it gained, the better. Nor were the wetlands difficult to defend at present, unlike the domains immediately downriver.

“You think so...”

“We can control the passage by building a fortress at the exit. And even if things don’t work out, all we’re doing is passing on a message. The decision is Her Highness’s.”

Though Shan found nothing unreasonable in that argument, he felt strangely reluctant to introduce Viscount Treva to Sherin.

He could hardly explain why... Perhaps it was something close to an instinctive aversion. It was not as though the young man who had so recently lost his father was some terrible villain or someone unfit to associate with. No, if anything, the fact that he seemed a rather presentable nobleman made it worse.

When he mentioned this, Roden’s eyes widened.

“Let’s get you healed first. Opportunities like this don’t come along every day! Do you think priests on a cardinal’s level are common?”

He was right: chances to receive treatment from a distinguished priest were rarer than one might think. Back when Shan lived in the capital, he had sought the Wievers family’s help in getting the scars on his body removed, only to be told it would take at least several years.

Shan was nodding when he suddenly gave a brief exclamation.

“Oh. That reminds me, there was something else I meant to tell you.”

“What?”

“I stabbed the hydra with A Thousand Forms and saw something strange.”

“You stabbed it with that? When? I didn’t see you.”

“When I climbed onto its rump.”

Shan briefly explained what had happened: the mysterious vibrations when he faced the hydra, and the vision... no, the hallucination he had experienced the moment he stabbed it to test the reaction.

As Shan went on to describe traveling a thousand years into the past in the hydra’s body, meeting Emperor Baren, and even experiencing the fall of the Alto Empire secondhand, Roden’s jaw dropped.

“No, wait... Shouldn’t you have told me this first? That’s much more important than all this business with the viscount!”

Roden seemed particularly stunned that Shan had seen Emperor Baren in the flesh. Sherin would probably have been more interested in the Alto Empire.

At the revelation that the emperor really had gone about with a halo shining behind him, Roden clicked his tongue in wonder.

“It was probably a function of his armor. The emperor’s armor would naturally be an immensely powerful holy relic.”

“I wonder if it’s still around.”

“Who knows? I’ve never heard of it, but if it is, perhaps it’s hidden in some royal treasury. Everything the emperor left behind passed to his five sons.”

Shan wanted to rampage about with a magnificent halo shining behind him, just like Emperor Baren. Better still if it also let him fight tirelessly, using his spirit without restraint—though he did not know whether that ability came from the armor.

Looking at his own armor, melted in places after being drenched in the hydra’s venom and blood, made him want it all the more.

“It made me want to find it and try it on. It looked amazing.”

“You never know. It might be hidden in Pendia’s royal treasury.”

“I doubt that.”

If it were, Sherin could hardly have failed to learn of its existence. Through her spiders, she had secured access to every secret passage in the palace.

Of course, Roden knew nothing of this, and his expression seemed to ask how Shan could be so certain.

“If we go to war with another country someday, I’ll have to empty out their royal vaults and look for it.”

“If it were that easy to find, I’d think someone would have found it already.”

“Well, if I hang all their royals upside down, surely one of them will talk.”

“... You’re joking, right?”

Shan answered Roden’s question with a broad grin.

* * *

After finishing his conversation with Roden, Shan sought out Viscount Treva and accepted his proposal. Delighted, the viscount reached to clasp his hand, then looked embarrassed as he realized what a mess the blood and venom had made of it.

They then set about making preparations for an extended stay, pitching tents beside the hydra’s carcass. Skinning a creature so enormous and tough was not a task they could finish in a day or two.

Even with specialized tools, the soldiers strained and struggled to peel away its scaled hide, until a nearby knight would sigh, take the tool, and use spirit to tear off a long strip.

Naturally, the work consumed antidotes. Blood kept seeping from the hydra’s corpse, filling the air with poisonous fumes. Fortunately, with Shan himself joining the work, they managed to remove all the hide just before their antidotes ran out.

Of course, skinning it was not the end. They also had to apply neutralizer to remove the poison and scrape away the flesh clinging to the underside. Making proper use of it would require a special tanning process, but without the facilities or experts here, this was all they could do.

Several days passed as they worked on the stripped hide. Then a party arrived from Viscount Treva’s seat in response to his message: some twenty heavily armed professional warriors and roughly a hundred conscripts, armed as best they could and serving as both fighters and porters.

Among them, a woman with her hood pulled so low that it concealed her face approached the count.

“I came because you sent for me, my lord.”

“You’re here, Priest Asha! Thank you for coming all this way.”

Unexpectedly, the priest the viscount had spoken of was a woman. Since the Old Faith taught that only men could become priests, she was probably a follower of the New Faith. Her voice was notably low and husky for a woman.

Viscount Treva, who forced himself to speak in an old-fashioned manner to conceal his youth, was quite familiar with her. They seemed to have known each other since before he became lord.

“It was my lord’s command. Naturally, I obeyed.”

“‘Command’ sounds so stiff. Let’s call it a request. A request! Allow me to introduce Priest Asha, Sir Shan. She is the most capable priest in our domain.”

“It is a pleasure to meet you. I am Shan Barendil.”

Shan greeted the priest respectfully. Those who served the Goddess were owed at least a measure of respect, even by nobles and knights.

Priest Asha nodded.

“I have heard much of your renown, Sir Shan. Your face appears to have been injured in this hydra hunt. Do you wish to have it healed?”

“Yes. Though I’m not the only one who needs treatment...”

“I will treat everyone in turn. My lord?”

“Everything is ready.”

A short while later, Shan entered an empty tent with Asha. She instructed him to undress and lie on a bed made of wild grass covered with cloth.

Revealed beneath the light of a magical lamp, his body was in as horrifying a state as his ruined face. Burns covered nearly half his exposed skin, and some of his fingers and toes had even fused together. Someone with a weak stomach might well have vomited at the sight.

“The injuries cover too much of your body. It will be difficult to heal them all at once.”

“Will it take long?”

“With daily treatment, perhaps five to seven days. Of course, it might be faster if I concentrated solely on you.”

“There’s no need for that. Please give the others their fair share of treatment.”

“But you must be suffering.”

“Everyone is, I imagine.”

Asha stared at him for a moment, then nodded. He could not be certain, but something about his answer seemed to have moved her deeply.

“I will begin.”

With that, she began murmuring a prayer to the Goddess.

Strangely, Asha’s prayers seemed to resonate more deeply than those of other priests. It felt as though the sound seeped straight into his chest rather than reaching him through his ears...

Was this another way her extraordinary skill made itself felt?

Before long, sacred light flowed from the priest’s hands into his burn-covered body. As they had agreed beforehand, she began with his hands, which caused him the most difficulty.

“Ah...”

He could see fresh skin beginning to grow over the places where it had melted away. The fused skin on his fingers healed and naturally separated, while the nails that had fallen out after losing their supporting tissue grew back.

Not only did the stiffness from muscle and nerve damage vanish, but the burning pain that had tormented him constantly began to fade in an instant.

As the viscount had confidently promised, Asha’s abilities were beyond comparison with those of ordinary priests. She healed not only the burns but even the many scars he had acquired as a child, leaving his hands and forearms as smooth as a newborn’s.

“That concludes today’s treatment.”

Shan nodded. If she could achieve this much on the first day while saving strength for the others, he really did seem likely to be fully healed in less than a week.

“Thank you so much.”

“I have merely obeyed my lord’s command.”

Answering stiffly, Asha reached inside her hood, removed the mask she had been wearing, and wiped away her sweat. Though the treatment had been brief, performing such a powerful healing miracle seemed to have tired her considerably. Like knights and mages, priests expended stamina when exercising their supernatural abilities.

Watching without any particular thought, Shan let out an involuntary exclamation of surprise.

“... What is it?”

“No, it’s just—”

For a moment, Shan wondered whether he should have pretended not to notice, but then answered honestly.

“I didn’t realize you were Altoan.”

“How did you know?”

“My eyes can see through darkness.”

A moment earlier, Shan had clearly seen Asha’s face beneath her hood. She was perhaps in her mid-to-late twenties. Her features were neat yet somehow strong, and distinctive markings like cracks ran down the lower portions of both cheeks. Judging by the way they moved like blood vessels, they certainly were not tattoos.

After a brief silence, she sighed.

“I never imagined you would be able to see that... I was careless. Would you please keep it a secret?”

“Of course. If that is what you wish.”

Shan nodded without hesitation. Even if she had come on her lord’s orders, he did not want to cause trouble for someone who had come to heal him.

Asha breathed a quiet sigh of relief and thanked him.

“Thank you very much, Sir Shan.”

“Does the viscount know you’re Altoan?”

“Yes. But few people even within this domain know. As you can imagine... there are far too many people who would be uncomfortable to hear that a mere Altoan priest possessed exceptional abilities.”

According to the original doctrine of the faith of the Goddess, Altoans were descendants of the devils who had betrayed her. For such a being to borrow the Goddess’s power—and wield it with skill far surpassing that of ordinary Western priests—made her very existence blasphemous.

That was why she remained an obscure, lowly priest despite possessing abilities that might have made her a candidate for pope had she belonged to the Old Faith. If not for circumstances like these, she probably would never have used her powers so openly.

“Come to think of it, I’ve hardly ever seen an Altoan priest.”

“It is difficult for our people not to resent the Goddess.”

In developing a priest’s abilities, unblemished faith in the Goddess was as important as personal spiritual aptitude. Yet given the circumstances in which Altoans grew up, they were bound to harbor an instinctive resentment of her, or doubts about her. They did occasionally produce priests, but those priests struggled to attain exceptional skill.

This was also why priests of the Old Faith were generally more capable than those of the New Faith. Unlike the New Faith, with its relatively lenient rules, priests of the Old Faith were raised from childhood to serve the Goddess under all manner of harsh restrictions. With neither families nor property, their devotion to the Goddess alone was bound to run deep.

Viewed in that light, Asha’s aptitude and faith were truly remarkable.

As Shan left the tent, a thought suddenly occurred to him.

‘Can even a priest like her not cure the king’s illness?’

No one knew what illness afflicted Giselle III, the king of Pendia currently in Prince Elvin’s care. Still, the royal priests should have abilities comparable to Asha’s. If even they could not cure it, it must truly be a dreadful illness.

* * *

After the first day’s treatment, they left their well-appointed campsite and headed southwest. With the newly arrived conscripts serving as porters, they could now transport all the hydra hide, so there was no reason to remain.

Even as they traveled, Asha treated the knights burned by the hydra’s venom and blood every day. Everyone marveled at abilities greater than those of any priest they had ever encountered.

“Good heavens. I thought I’d have to spend the rest of my life with half my face ruined. To think it could be healed so easily...”

“Oh! My hair is growing back!”

“Are you quite sure you wouldn’t consider coming to Pales? With abilities like yours, you could easily become a bishop—”

“Hey, that’s rude! Viscount Treva is standing right here.”

“Ahem.”

Viscount Treva looked somewhat uncomfortable with these recruitment attempts, but did not immediately rebuke them. Since he needed to make a good impression on Princess Sherin, he apparently did not want to antagonize her knights.

“Thank you for the offer, but I owe my lord a great debt and intend to remain in his service.”

Fortunately, Asha’s firm refusal gradually put an end to the offers. Shan saw the viscount heave a sigh of relief some distance away.

During their journey, she showed a keen interest in the Altoans serving the Pales faction. Besides the Altoan knights Shan and Ravana, there was Shan’s squire Biko, as well as several Altoan mercenaries among the accompanying soldiers. The fact that all of them carried newly manufactured magical devices seemed to impress her deeply.

As the only one among them who knew her identity, Shan earnestly answered her questions about how Altoans were treated in the domain and what their future prospects were.

He asked questions of his own, too, about the doctrines of the faith of the Goddess. Like other Altoans, the persecution and humiliation he had endured had naturally eroded his faith, so he found it remarkable that a fellow Altoan could retain such profound belief.

After they had talked for some time, he would feel someone glaring at him. Turning his head, he would find Viscount Treva hastily looking away in surprise. Apparently, the viscount was keeping watch because he thought Shan was trying to lure Asha over to Pales.

It took them about two full days to reach the cave in the Blade Mountains. With so many more people and so much more baggage, their pace had slowed to nearly half what it had been, and they had no particular reason to hurry.

At the sight of the cave set into the mountainside, the viscount let out a quiet sigh.

“So this is where the hydra emerged...”

“Yes. We originally intended to divert the water on the far side and block it off entirely, but if our two regions establish exchanges, it will become an important passage.”

“Indeed. We could build a fortress here—no, perhaps an entirely new town. With the western fortress destroyed, we have lost control of the surrounding area in any case.”

Leaving some of the viscount’s soldiers to guard the entrance, they went inside and encountered various monsters. Fortunately, only a few days had passed since they had cleared the place out on their way through, so there were not very many.

“Out of the way, you things!”

“Heave-ho!”

Growing accustomed to their magical devices, the soldiers expertly cut down the monsters and cleared a path. Marsh goblins shrieked as the soldiers’ leather boots mercilessly trampled them.

Watching, Shan thought he ought to inspect the cave’s side passages later. They were using only one broad passage for now, but more monsters might be hiding in the many smaller tunnels branching off it.

After several hours, they emerged from the cave to find the palisaded fort they had built earlier waiting for them. The guard rotation must have changed during their absence, for a knight other than Yurk was now in charge.

Startled to see roughly three times as many people as had departed, the knight opened the gate only after Shan vouched for them.

“I’m back, Arwin!”

Arwin, who had been staying inside the fort, gave her master a sidelong look at their first meeting in days, then answered by gently rubbing her head against him. Since she was not being particularly ill-tempered, life here apparently had not been too bad.

When Shan asked the knight, he said they had let her run freely outside the fort each day, just as requested.

“Perhaps it’s because she’s a Horace warhorse, but she even went swimming in the Tessel River. At first, I panicked, thinking she was drowning.”

The knight in charge of the fort laughed as he explained how terrified he had been at the thought of getting into trouble for neglecting the famous Sir Shan’s warhorse.

Stroking Arwin’s mane, Shan whispered,

“Don’t swim here again. We’re downstream from the sewers. It’s nothing but shit water.”

Whether she understood him or not, Arwin merely snorted in reply. He would have to give her a thorough scrubbing on the way upriver.

The workers the viscount had brought unloaded the hydra hide inside the fort, then headed back toward the cave under a knight’s guidance. Unlike professional soldiers, they had livelihoods to attend to, and keeping them mobilized for too long would do more harm than good.

Besides, they were past the marshes and the cave now. Here on the plains, a few horse-drawn wagons could carry hide that had required a hundred and fifty people to lift.

“I’ll be going ahead, then, Sir Shan.”

“Take care.”

Before the party set off for Pales Castle in earnest, Roden rode ahead on his beloved Ripo to act as a messenger and tell Sherin what had happened.

Unlike an ordinary warhorse, this Horace warhorse, a relative of Arwin’s, could cover the distance from the downstream cave to Pales Castle in a single day. Of course, being less capable than Arwin, he would still need breaks along the way.

After seeing Roden off, Shan continued receiving regular treatment from Asha as they marched upriver toward the city of Pales. With the less seriously injured members of the party gradually finishing their treatment, his own recovery accelerated.

After the hands and forearms she had healed on the first day came his face and head, then his feet and shins, his thighs and lower body, and finally his upper body in two sessions. His treatment was complete with just one day left before they reached Pales.

“All done, Sir Shan.”

At Asha’s announcement, Shan looked down at his body, feeling quite literally reborn. Not only the hydra’s burns but every scar he had acquired since childhood had vanished, leaving his body feeling like someone else’s. It was like the body of someone of noble birth who had never known a moment’s hardship.

“Thank you. It would have been awkward if I hadn’t healed before we arrived.”

Sherin would probably have been saddened if he had returned still bearing his injuries. In truth, it felt rather good to have her worry about him, but that did not mean he wanted to see her sad.

Leaving the tent after his treatment, Shan ran into Viscount Treva.

“Thank you, Viscount. Thanks to your kindness, I’m fully healed.”

“I’m glad to hear it.”

The viscount nodded, regarding Shan with a somewhat peculiar expression—a mixture of suspicion and worry, perhaps. He seemed especially prone to that look whenever Shan had been with Asha.

“How much farther is it to Pales?”

“We should be there in about a day.”

“I see. Please do put in a good word with Her Highness—”

Shan was beginning to frown as the viscount seemed about to repeat something he had already said several times when a familiar voice reached him from afar. It was Roden, who had left as a messenger a few days earlier.

“Sir Shan! Sir Shan!”

Turning, he saw Roden dismount and hurry toward him. He must have ridden hard: the bitter winter wind had left his face bright red.

“Hmm? What’s this? Why did you come back? You could have just stayed at the castle.”

They would reach Pales tomorrow anyway. Why go to the trouble of returning all the way here?

Roden was about to hurriedly explain to the puzzled Shan, but glanced at the viscount.

“Excuse us.”

Apologizing for whispering in front of someone else, Roden leaned close to Shan’s ear and spoke rapidly.

“An envoy from Prince Elvin has arrived.”

“Elvin? What for?”

Why had the man who had been fighting Conrad until so recently suddenly sent someone to them?

As Shan wondered, Roden told him something he could never have imagined.

“Apparently, the king regained consciousness not long ago.”