Ch.1313. Punk City and the Human Boy

    Three years had passed since one of the most dynamic years of Amon’s life.

    Three years since discovering Sonia’s talent, and Amon’s talent too, and that year when they had scuffled with the possessed Jimmy and the psycho gorilla.

    It had been three years since that year of incidents worthy of being featured in radio stories, even by the standards of this world where all kinds of accidents never ceased.

    In the meantime, Amon and Sonia had been preparing for their approaching graduation.

    “Thank you for everything until now, Master.”

    “Are you leaving?”

    “Yes.”

    “Reconsider my offer.”

    “Thank you, but we want to see the wider world.”

    Before graduating from the orphanage, Amon and Sonia first settled matters at the sword training hall.

    Upon hearing they were leaving, their master expressed regret and offered them positions as assistant instructors with room and board, but they politely declined.

    In their hearts, they would have liked to continue their training peacefully at the dojo.

    But they were orphans.

    They had no one to support them from behind, no connections.

    It was time for them to forge their own path.

    …that was the surface reason.

    The bigger reason was that they were both Divine Power holders.

    Amon knew how this world would stop at nothing to secure Divine Power holders, so they couldn’t stay at this dojo.

    Though it was quite large by city standards, if there were two Divine Power holders here, it wouldn’t be surprising if corporations suddenly sent ninja squads to the dojo.

    Naturally, this wasn’t what Sonia and Amon wanted.

    So the two had no choice but to bid farewell to their master with proper respect.

    On the final path seeing them off.

    The master earnestly implored the two.

    “Right. No need to obsess over fame, just survive for a long time. Remember what I always say?”

    “It’s not the strong who survive,”

    “But the survivors who are strong. Right?”

    Amon and Sonia answered as if reciting from memory.

    At this point, their master didn’t care about promoting himself through them.

    He had no interest in them proving his teachings to the world.

    There was only a master who wished his disciples would survive long and live happy lives.

    In this materialistic world, such love was too precious to be measured in money, so Amon and Sonia maintained their respect for their master until the end.

    ***

    Afterward, the two settled their relationships with everyone they were indebted to, except their master.

    It wasn’t that they were ignoring these people, but the two lived in a different world.

    More precisely, their very existence was like poison to ordinary people.

    It meant that just by being near them, people could be harmed.

    Amon and Sonia hid their regret as they made their farewells.

    “What even is Divine Power…”

    Sonia muttered dejectedly.

    She already knew her secret.

    With only a year left until graduation, the Mother Superior had told Sonia the secret of Divine Power.

    Originally, it was meant to be kept secret until graduation, but her brilliant talent was too obvious to hide until then.

    Her talent shone so overwhelmingly that even she could notice something unusual about herself, so the Mother Superior had no choice but to teach her the truth.

    Fortunately, Amon and the Mother Superior’s character education hadn’t failed, as Sonia didn’t become arrogant after realizing her talent.

    Instead, she reflected on how blessed she was and became even more humble.

    The Mother Superior couldn’t help but smile like a proud mother at how admirable she was.

    – But how did you already know?

    Incidentally, there was an incident where the Mother Superior questioned Amon about his underwhelming reaction despite knowing the secret, but somehow they got past it.

    Anyway, they lived with this secret for a year.

    Now they had to settle their relationships with people before the secret was revealed.

    Normally, one might be happy about their special nature and willingly end relationships, but Sonia was too emotionally attached to do so easily.

    When it came time to say goodbye, she would choke up and be unable to speak.

    So Amon would calmly settle relationships on her behalf.

    Seeing Amon’s composure, Sonia felt curious.

    “Doesn’t it bother you at all?”

    To her question, Amon answered with his usual kind smile.

    “I’m sad too. It’s painful having to end relationships with people because of this Divine Power. I resent this world for it.”

    “Then why are you so calm?”

    “Because I believe this won’t be forever.”

    Amon’s eyes shone brighter than neon signs as he said this.

    “Someday when I reach a position where no one can interfere with my relationships, and beyond that, when the world becomes a better place to live. We’ll be able to return someday.”

    Sonia couldn’t respond to Amon’s confident answer.

    Sometimes Amon would guarantee the future with overwhelming confidence.

    – You’ll shine brighter than anyone! I guarantee it!

    How many children at the orphanage who were barely surviving had been captivated by him showing them the beauty of hope.

    Sonia was one of those children captivated by him.

    His guarantees always came true, even if they took time.

    When no one believed his declaration to make the dreary orphanage more lively, by the time he graduated, the orphanage was filled with a brightness incomparable to ten years before.

    So this time too, Sonia couldn’t help but believe Amon’s declaration.

    Beyond belief, she had somehow become certain.

    Somehow she found herself determined to follow Amon and see the bright future he would create.

    She could hardly contain her excitement for that future.

    As her thoughts reached this point, the gloomy girl disappeared and she returned to her usual self, beginning to discuss dreams.

    “Then for that dream, I should pay more attention to the priest’s lesson this afternoon.”

    On the way back to the orphanage, Amon agreed with Sonia’s words.

    After the Mother Superior’s Divine Power coming-out, the two began training to control their Divine Power.

    The instructor teaching them was the squinty-eyed priest.

    The same squinty-eyed priest who had come to the orphanage to exorcise Jimmy’s evil spirit, and who occasionally visited afterward to check on their silver anklets.

    The priest gladly agreed to teach them, saying it was a chance to win their favor.

    Afterward, the two learned how to handle Divine Power under the priest, and in less than a year, they reached the level of skillfully concealing their Divine Power.

    Regarding the priest with whom they continued their relationship, Sonia thought quite well of him.

    “At first I thought he was a bad person based on his appearance, but he turned out to be a good person.”

    Amon responded to her assessment with a smile.

    At a glance, it seemed like agreement.

    But inside, he was disagreeing.

    ‘Of course anyone is kind while trying to win favor.’

    In this world, you can’t trust appearances, or even past actions.

    The only thing you can trust is yourself.

    In such a world, he couldn’t judge the priest as good based on kindness alone.

    Just that, for now, the priest was being good to them in this situation.

    Ah, for reference, Sonia was always a trustworthy friend, so she was an exception to this logic.

    ‘Though he does seem like a complicated adult.’

    Amon knew the priest bore the mark of the Vatican’s Inquisition, so he was certain the man wasn’t clean.

    But he couldn’t call him purely evil or hypocritical since he showed kindness to everyone he met.

    There was no way to define this complicated adult in one word, so Amon just responded to Sonia’s assessment with a smile.

    As they headed to the orphanage where the priest would be waiting, with Amon’s ambiguous evaluation.

    Sonia brought up a new topic.

    “So. Where should we go?”

    “Well…”

    Though the sentence lacked a subject and much was omitted, Amon understood her intention.

    She was asking where they should head after graduation.

    As if their status as Divine Power holders had become an open secret, love calls had been pouring in from various groups since a year before graduation.

    The government was among the candidates, but as is typical with civil servants, the harder and more honestly you work, the harder it gets, so they excluded that option.

    After filtering through numerous candidates, they narrowed it down to two main options:

    Corporations and the Vatican.

    First, with corporations, the money is certain.

    The structure clearly rewards hard work, providing clear motivation.

    They even promised support for the orphanage.

    But like the government, it would be a painful place if you couldn’t turn a blind eye to corruption.

    No, it would be far more painful than the government.

    In contrast, the Vatican offered less money but stability.

    As an organization where strangely many Divine Power holders are born and gather, it could still raise its voice in this world where religious influence had hit rock bottom.

    To what extent? While not on par with top-tier Megacorps, it could play power games with lower-tier ones.

    Moreover, being a religious organization, it wasn’t pushed around by corporations and corruption wasn’t at its worst.

    If one wished, they could even use doctrine to clear corruption right before their eyes.

    The slightly lower income was an issue, but for Sonia and Amon who weren’t particularly greedy for money, it was perfect.

    However, there was a reason Sonia couldn’t readily choose this place.

    “I mean, what does serving the Mother have to do with marriage?”

    The marriage issue.

    Vatican clergy are forbidden to marry according to doctrine.

    A doctrine so absurd that even Sonia tilted her head when she first heard it.

    Amon also shook his head saying “That can’t be right…” when he heard it.

    But there was no way to change a doctrine that had persisted for over 1000 years.

    When he heard that doctrine, Amon mockingly said:

    “The region with the highest concentration of orphanages in the world.”

    Ironically, the Vatican had the highest orphan ratio in the world.

    There was a tragicomic joke that if a devout nun in the Vatican started gaining weight one day, she would disappear the next day and reappear about 8 months later.

    Because of this, the city somehow had more orphans than children with parents, and strangely high adoption rates.

    The priests claimed they adopted children to practice their faith, but well.

    Amon could only look at them with cynicism.

    To return to the story, the reason Sonia and Amon were reluctant about the Vatican was because of this doctrine.

    Amon was disgusted by their contradictory doctrine, and Sonia disliked it for various reasons.

    But the drawbacks of the other two options weren’t trivial either, so they couldn’t bring themselves to cross the Vatican off their list.

    “If nothing works out, we could always be a mercenary duo, you know.”

    Amon nodded at Sonia’s suggestion.

    Although they were considering mercenary work as a last resort, it truly was the final option.

    Even for Amon, who was overflowing with talent and confidence in the future, it was too unstable a choice to make readily.

    That’s how dangerous, unstable, and difficult the path of a mercenary was.

    Still, it wasn’t a path they absolutely couldn’t take.

    “Me in the vanguard, Sonia in the rear, fighting together as a duo…”

    It felt like an extremely powerful duo would be born.

    Imagining such a future naturally brought a smile to Amon’s face.

    (Mainly in a gamer sense.)

    However Sonia interpreted that contented smile, she returned an equally bright one.

    Before they knew it, the two were envisioning their future with mercenary life as their escape.

    “We’ll probably get scammed a bit as beginners?”

    “We should worry about getting scammed on housing first.”

    “What about rooms? Two separate rooms, or the same suite with different rooms?”

    “The latter.”

    “Living together?”

    “Is that a problem?”

    “Not at all.”

    Though mercenary life wasn’t decided yet, it felt like they could overcome any adversity with a childhood friend.

    As the two envisioned their hopeful future.

    Their happy imagination continued until someone blocked their path.

    “…Jimmy?”

    Jimmy, who should have graduated long ago, appeared before the two.


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