Ch.375Betrayal (1)

Kate, who went to investigate the innocent victim at Issac’s request.

The innocent victim and the perpetrator who created that victim have arrived at the temple in the imperial capital.

This was to receive judgment directly from him, as Issac had repeatedly emphasized.

Public opinion leaned that way too, but everyone knew that Issac wouldn’t easily appear there.

Though an innocent victim had occurred, it could be a trap set by demon worshippers, and above all, the matter had grown too large.

The demon worshippers’ intelligence network was far wider than one might think, so it had surely reached their ears already.

So instead of going personally, he decided to send Kate to express his intentions.

But there was something Kate hadn’t expected at all…

“Is that what a cleric is supposed to do?! Huh?! Does it make sense for someone who should save lives to kill people?!”

“Mother… please calm down and try to—”

“Calm down?! Calm down?! After all I went through raising my child! Tell Luminus right now! Ask him to save my child! Hurry! After everything I did to raise him!! Waaaaaah!!”

A woman’s wailing echoed through the temple. Even the howl of a beast who lost its young couldn’t match her lamentation.

Her wrinkled skin and hands damaged from hard labor showed how difficult a life she had led while raising her child.

But with her entire family destroyed, it wouldn’t be strange for her to resent the world.

“What’s so great about that Xenon!! Why did my son have to die?!”

“Mother, please refrain from such talk, at least here—”

“Why?! Afraid of divine punishment? Why should I receive divine punishment?! Those bastards who killed my son should be punished first!!”

Even the church priests couldn’t help but struggle with the woman’s perfectly logical outcry.

They wanted to drag her outside somehow, but she was too strong for them to manage.

Finally, only after the woman exhausted herself from wailing did they manage to take her away.

And there was someone silently watching this entire scene—Kate.

She had come to see the victim’s family, but was overwhelmed by grief that couldn’t be put into words.

And also anger toward the perpetrator who created the innocent victim. She closed her eyes tightly and regulated her breathing.

Just ignoring Issac’s instructions would be enough to incur his anger, but seeing it firsthand made her blood boil.

“Cardinal Kate. Everything is prepared.”

At that moment, a priestess approached Kate and spoke carefully. Kate slowly opened her eyes and looked ahead.

The victim’s family was already gone, but she needed to proceed with this matter, if only to appease their grief.

Even if it would invite criticism from the public, it was worth enduring.

“I understand. Let’s go.”

“Yes. But are you really going to proceed with this…”

“I have received permission from Luminus. Especially since this matter is deeply related to ‘heresy.’ It is my duty.”

At Kate’s decisive answer, the priestess nodded silently. Indeed, this matter was connected to heresy.

As Kate began walking, the priestess followed behind her.

“What is the criminal doing now?”

“Waiting, as you instructed, Cardinal Kate.”

“Does he show any remorse?”

“He insists he’s innocent. Claiming he merely dealt with demon worshippers…”

“Hmm.”

Kate nodded. On the surface, it seemed like the feared incident had occurred, but looking deeper, it was quite a complex issue.

She could understand the feelings of a mother who lost her only child, but what if that son truly was a demon worshipper?

What if demon worshippers staged this to somehow stop the event, or to tarnish Issac’s reputation?

This makes things quite complicated. If it’s the latter, then they are clearly innocent, but if it’s the former, the case becomes murky.

This is why both the family and the perpetrator were brought to the temple. In the temple, one cannot lie.

Kate moved forward, praying to Luminus that the case would turn out for the better.

“I’m telling the truth! I’m the victim here! I just caught a demon worshipper! I even had a cleric verify it!”

“Don’t be ridiculous! Aren’t you the demon worshipper? You did this to somehow get close to Xenon!”

“Bullshit! You’re saying this to someone who’s read Biography of Xenon from volume one? Want me to pray to Luminus to prove how sincere I am?”

“You’re about to cause the event to end, and you’re not showing any remorse?!”

All sorts of shouting reached her ears before she even arrived. Apparently, all kinds of heated exchanges were happening while they waited.

Kate thought she needed to resolve this as quickly as possible and moved toward the entrance.

When she finally reached the entrance, a space resembling a courtroom unfolded before Kate’s eyes.

Unlike the interrogation room that operated in a dark underground location, this was a place to judge heretics.

At the center sat the main culprits of the current situation, with spectators around them hurling criticism.

Kate took a deep breath as she observed the already noisy scene, then quietly asked the priestess behind her.

“Are these the ones? Who dared to ignore his orders?”

“Yes. That’s right.”

Though it was a quiet conversation, their voices echoed throughout the courtroom. This was because they deliberately amplified their voices with mana.

At this, the attention of everyone in the courtroom turned toward Kate. The noisy courtroom instantly fell silent at her appearance.

The gasps of admiration at Kate’s beautiful appearance were the loudest sounds.

As the courtroom quieted down, Kate looked at the perpetrator sitting in the center and walked to her seat.

“Is that Cardinal Kate? Right?”

“Yes, that’s correct.”

“Cardinal Kate! I’m truly innocent! This is all a trap set by demon worshippers!”

Despite the protest from the man presumed to be the perpetrator, Kate remained silent. Instead, she just looked at him with cold eyes.

But the man was not easily intimidated. Normally, people would be overwhelmed by Kate’s aura, but he remained confident.

Kate showed a surprised expression at the man’s confidence and sat down. She sat at the table directly opposite him.

As the Grand Inquisitor, she had the right to make immediate judgments based on the interrogation results, so sitting opposite was natural.

“Name.”

“Pardon?”

“State your name first.”

Kate addressed him in a relatively polite manner since nothing was confirmed yet. She wanted to call him vermin, but the situation was complex and required caution.

The man was startled at first but soon exhaled sharply and spoke.

“Roy. Roy Hendenson.”

“Are you an adventurer?”

“Yes, I am.”

“You know why you’re sitting here, right?”

At Kate’s question, the man, Roy, nodded vigorously. His attitude showed he had nothing to be ashamed of.

At this attitude, Kate stared at him for a moment before turning her gaze. Next to Roy sat the cleric connected to this incident.

The cleric was surprisingly young, and his gentle appearance gave a general idea of what kind of person he was.

“Brother, what is your name?”

“Beigis Hall.”

“Can you explain the situation in detail?”

At Kate’s question, Beigis nodded. However, he glanced at Roy once, as if feeling this wasn’t right.

But Roy still maintained his confident and upright attitude. His expression also showed that he believed he was innocent.

At this, Beigis hesitated, then sighed deeply and quietly began to speak.

“Before I explain the situation, as a servant of Luminus, I declare that everything I’m about to say is the truth, and if I speak falsely, I will gladly accept divine punishment.”

“I understand. As Luminus’s sword, I will hear all of brother’s testimony.”

“So what happened was…”

Beigis’s explanation was roughly this: Roy is an adventurer who has been making significant contributions since the event started, and recently discovered a brainwashed village.

Furthermore, he defended Roy by saying that if nothing else, his passion for Biography of Xenon was more sincere than anyone’s.

Kate listened to this defense silently while looking at Roy, when suddenly she felt a sense of familiarity and showed a puzzled expression.

She hadn’t recognized him earlier due to her anger, but she had seen that face somewhere before.

“You said your name was Roy?”

“Yes, that’s right.”

“Your face looks familiar, perhaps…”

“Ahem. Ahem.”

As Kate trailed off with her question, Roy cleared his throat.

After checking the reactions of the spectators, he answered in a much more careful voice than before.

“You might know me as… the person who received Xenon’s autograph last time.”

“Ah. That person?”

As if suddenly remembering, Kate exclaimed with an “Ah.” At the same time, the colored glasses she had been wearing were almost completely removed.

Someone so fanatical that he would risk his life for an autograph wouldn’t disobey Issac’s instructions. Something must have happened.

While Kate was thinking this, Roy again checked the reactions around him.

As expected, as soon as the spectators heard that he had received Xenon’s autograph, they began whispering among themselves.

“I’m asking just in case, but what happens to my belongings? They won’t be confiscated or anything…”

“That depends on the outcome of the trial. But judging by Roy’s character, I expect there must be a reason.”

“Thank you. I repeat, I really just caught a demon worshipper.”

At Roy’s words full of indignation, Kate showed a positive reaction. However, this made the mother’s situation even more pitiful.

To her, her child was the most precious and good person in the world, but in reality, that child was a demon worshipper who contributed to pushing the world into an abyss of evil.

Kate considered the increasingly sad situation and shifted her gaze to Beigis.

Despite the situation turning favorable, Beigis still looked uncertain for some reason.

“Brother. Is there something else you wish to say?”

“Yes… there is. There is, but… sigh…”

Beigis sighed deeply as if something was troubling him. Kate looked at him with a puzzled expression.

Eventually, Beigis looked at her cautiously and emphasized once more.

“…I repeat, I hope you understand that there is not a shred of falsehood in my words.”

“I’m getting more curious. What is it?”

“First, the best way to identify a demon worshipper is to use holy power. But there are limitations. A cleric’s holy power might be insufficient, and it has no effect on demon worshippers whose souls haven’t been corrupted. That’s why we usually interrogate them in the interrogation room.”

Holy power is not omnipotent. Depending on individual circumstances, it may or may not identify a demon worshipper.

To put it bluntly, if Kate injected holy power, a demon worshipper would turn to dust, but an ordinary cleric would easily withstand it.

Therefore, most demon worshippers pretend to be fine on the outside, and as seen in the corrupt cardinal incident, their know-how has accumulated for a long time.

“And Issac said it’s better to let 10 demon worshippers go free than to have one innocent victim.”

“I’m well aware of that. That’s why we also interrogated the demon worshipper Roy caught. Judging by the circumstances, he was definitely a demon worshipper. He was a slave trader involved in human trafficking and connected to big players. But…”

Beigis hesitated for a moment, then spoke as if unsure if this was the right thing to say.

“I barely touched him.”

The testimony that followed from his mouth was:

“He died immediately.”

“…Pardon?”

It was truly an unbelievable story.

Just as everyone was looking at Beigis’s testimony with expressions that said “how is that possible”…

“Ca-Cardinal Kate! Cardinal Kate!”

A very urgent woman’s voice echoed through the courtroom. At that sound, everyone’s attention, including Kate’s, turned in that direction.

The person shouting was the priestess who had followed Kate earlier. Her face was as pale as it could be.

She looked extremely urgent by anyone’s standards. Kate stood up from the table and asked the priestess.

“What’s the matter?”

“The-the victim’s mother…!”

“The mother? Don’t tell me?”

Just as she was about to become urgent, thinking the mother had fallen into a critical condition from the shock of losing her son.

“No! She’s currently fleeing outside the temple!”

“What? Fleeing…”

Not just leaving, but fleeing. As soon as Kate heard those words, she felt the blood in her entire body turn cold.

Beigis’s testimony, he died with just a slight touch. People absolutely do not die from such a minor shock.

But what if the soul had already left the body? What if they sacrificed their own life to create this situation?

Lastly, what if that soul attached itself elsewhere? With necromancy existing, possession must be possible too.

“The mother is also…!”

At the priestess’s continued words.

“Ah, she’s a demon worshipper!”

Kate ran outside without looking back.