Ch.384Episode 15 – Life is Beautiful

After the olive oil was poured on his forehead, Raphael sat on the holy throne prepared in the Medius Cathedral.

The former Inquisition Chief, who had once been under intensive surveillance by intelligence agencies worldwide and was known publicly as the leader of the Nicaean faction, thus became Pope.

At the tail end of winter, the gateway to spring.

The season of budding life brought new turmoil.

Five months had passed since then.

Episode 15 – Life is Beautiful

People care less about others than one might think.

Unless they’re relatives or have developed deep friendships over time, there’s no need to pay attention to others.

Also, people are surprisingly fond of formalities.

Even if you open your chest, you can’t see the heart—only countless blood vessels and muscles that make up the body. People tend to focus on what’s visible rather than trying to understand others’ inner thoughts.

Status, education, occupation, and so on. These outward appearances are the symbols that represent humans. They may be formulaic, formal elements, but aren’t they intuitive?

For those living in the rapidly moving forest of buildings, concepts that are intuitively understood without much thought are precious.

That’s why my colleagues always address me like this:

“Section Chief.”

“What is it?”

“The materials from the branch office have arrived.”

An employee appeared from beyond the partition, holding out a folder. I concluded our brief encounter with perfunctory pleasantries like “Thank you. Please leave it on my desk.”

I opened the folder placed on the metal table to check the documents. It was a report sent by an intelligence officer stationed at an embassy overseas.

White paper with black letters, and the large text at the top caught my eye first.

“Report on the United People’s Party and Independent National Alliance activities… An intelligence report.”

I peeked over the partition and called my subordinate.

“Pippin.”

“Yes, sir!”

“Work’s here. Take it and analyze it quickly.”

“What kind of report is it?”

“Rebel movements in the Mauritanian continent. Supplementary materials related to the United People’s Party.”

Five months had passed since the coronation.

Much had happened during that time. The biggest change was Raphael’s ascension as Pope.

There was considerable backlash to the news that a conservative figure from the Inquisition had seized full authority over the Church, but the resistance wasn’t beyond what had been anticipated. Everyone had expected Raphael to become Pope from the moment Cardinal Raul, Lucia’s guardian, died.

Diplomatic officials well-versed in political affairs weren’t surprised at all. They simply waited for Raphael’s coronation while calmly contemplating the future of their countries and the Church. Their judgment was that if they couldn’t stop the flow, they should at least avoid getting swept up in it.

But the situation was different for intelligence agencies.

Any seasoned veteran would vividly remember the antics of Raphael during his time as Inquisition Chief (this was Chief Pedro’s second term), and intelligence officials were alarmed when they heard that “that bastard” had been designated as Pope. They couldn’t remain calm when a madman had a weapon in his hands.

And it’s a universal truth in all organizations that when superiors have a fit, subordinates suffer.

Thus, the past five months remained in my memory as a beautiful (euphemism for “fucking awful”) time.

Even now.

As I sat in my chair tapping on my terminal, welcome news reached my ears.

“Section Chief, on my way here, I heard from people in the next department that the Inquisition has caused trouble again.”

Those were the first words Jake uttered instead of a greeting when he returned to the office.

He was holding an ice cream in one hand and a plastic bag in the other. Inside the translucent bag was a pile of snacks he had bought from the commissary at Military Intelligence Headquarters.

Jake placed the snacks on Pippin’s desk. They were jellies she had requested before he left for the commissary (bizarre confections from the Magic Tower with packaging that read “Explodes in your mouth!” and “Wriggling worm jellies with a lifelike texture!”).

Even cold water has its hierarchy, but this tanned, blond rascal with no manners took care of his colleague first, then spread the bag in front of me as if to say “help yourself.”

“You disrespectful punk. You take care of your girlfriend first?”

“Come on, why are you like this? It’s not like this is new.”

Jake grinned while eating his ice cream. He meant I should be used to it by now. It was also a joke we shared in the office.

I chuckled and picked up a snack from the bag.

“So what happened this time?”

“Apparently, a warlord recruiter operating in Kumirak was assassinated at a hotel.”

“And?”

“The assassin caught at the scene was a Church believer. From the underground church.”

“Just wonderful.”

*

The season of budding life had returned, but peace had not.

The new Pope advocated for the values of peace, harmony, and love.

The coronation had just ended. Having begun his term by publicly advocating for peace, harmony, and love, many people thought, “That bastard who used to want to tear heretics apart has finally calmed down now that he’s Pope.”

Not so.

The temperament of Raphael, notorious for his hardline stance, was impervious even to the weathering effects of time.

Though one might have expected him to temper his nature and remain quiet for a while, given his position as a religious leader…

Raphael announced to the world that he was still a complete bastard by filling the Inquisition director positions with hardliners on his very first day in office.

The results soon became apparent in tangible outcomes.

[The Church’s Justice Department has announced restrictions on the use of religious facilities in its territory. While worship at religious facilities such as Al-Yabd and Nirvana has been suspended, church services have been exceptionally permitted. Nations across the Mauritanian continent have issued statements demanding an end to religious oppression…]

[Church authorities arrested three women yesterday morning on fraud charges. Despite no reports from victims, the arrests have sparked major controversy due to the women’s history of involvement with other religious organizations. An Inquisition spokesperson emphasized that the investigation was lawful, stating that the women had been confirmed to have illegally embezzled funds from their workplace and transferred them to foreign religious organizations…]

[A man hurriedly leaves the scene surrounded by citizens. Around midnight local time on the 3rd, the man, who was attacked by an assailant in front of his home, is known to be a professor at Magriya State University who has been giving lectures critical of the Church.]

With hardliners in power, the Inquisition literally began to run amok.

They had always been notorious for their reckless behavior, but these days they were stirring up trouble everywhere like an unbridled colt.

Thus, intelligence agency officials would habitually say while watching the Inquisition’s disruptive activities:

“This is all because of Raphael.”

“Sigh. There you go again, Chief.”

Of course, the Inquisition’s antics had nothing to do with me.

I wasn’t assigned to the Church, and since most of the Inquisition’s nonsense was related to religion, there was virtually no chance of conflict with them unless you were in the department handling the Mauritanian continent, where Al-Yabd was the mainstream religion.

If anything, I had a familiar relationship with the Inquisition. After spending months together in the Magic Tower and the Empire, there was no reason for the Inquisition to dislike me, who had fought demons in the north alongside the Saint, a companion chosen by the Oracle.

The problem was…

“Seriously. Why dump this on me?”

I got screwed by those bastards.

*

I lamented as I looked at the Mauritanian continent-related documents delivered to the office. They were sourced from the Inquisition.

Getting paid by the Church but pushing work onto civil servants of another country—they were nothing but tax thieves.

“Ah, I want to be a salary thief too.”

Just as I was voicing a wish that would never come true…

Charnoi, who was slurping chocolate milk through a straw, put her hands on her hips and spoke as if it were obvious:

“Fredericknoi is Lucianoi’s companion… To find a new friend, we must go to the Mauritanian continent, so we need to understand the local situation in advance…!”

Shortly after the major events of the canonization and coronation, the Church delivered information about a new companion chosen by the Oracle to Abbas and the Magic Tower.

‘The new companion is a person from a foreign land.

The individual is believed to be male with a robust physique.

He is understood to be in the Mauritanian continent.’

The fragmentary information listed was abstract in content.

It seemed too flimsy to be the result of months of intelligence gathering by the Inquisition, but their officials unanimously claimed this was a remarkable achievement.

Unless a celestial deity directly reveals it, even the Pope cannot fathom God’s will. Therefore, to human eyes, the Oracle containing God’s words can only appear as vague prophecies.

The content of the Oracle was barely deciphered through the combined efforts of archaeologists, clergy, theologians from other religions, and mages.

They claimed they had collected as much information as possible based on this small clue, but in the end, it meant they didn’t know much either.

It must have been maddening for the Inquisition to search the entire world with such limited information, but their misfortune brought me no comfort.

If the Inquisition couldn’t find him, it meant we had to personally search for our companion. And in a team consisting of three civilians and one spy, the information gathering would inevitably fall to the spy.

In this situation, Military Intelligence pulled me out of my break and placed me in a new department. The idea was that if I had to go to the Mauritanian continent anyway, I should prepare in advance instead of lounging at home.

But there was a critical problem with this decision.

The Mauritanian continent, where the Oracle-chosen companion was supposed to be, is much larger than Africa.

And we didn’t know exactly which country this companion lived in.

Abbas intelligence officials fell into serious contemplation. The committee pressed for solutions, and with each passing day, the hair of the intelligence officers gathered in the office withered like drought-stricken rice paddies.

If one tactless major hadn’t blurted out nonsense like “Can’t we just monitor the entire Mauritanian continent?”, the intelligence officers would probably have been busy buying hair dye to cover their balding spots.

I remember the terrible silence that fell over the office the moment those words were uttered.

The assembled intellectual elite of the intelligence agency stared blankly, and the director of the Royal Intelligence Bureau overseeing the Mauritanian continent firmly grasped my hand. He was the very man who had lamented that he might get beaten by his wife if he returned home late on the eve of their wedding anniversary.

The director, holding my hand, even shed tears. How could I make such a decision, he asked. Since I knew well about the Inquisition and Imperial Guard operating freely across the Mauritanian continent, I was trustworthy enough to handle this.

He even added, “I never knew the country had such a patriotic talent.”

It was only natural.

That major who had uttered such idiotic words was none other than me.

“Damn it…”

I sighed, looking at the documents piled like towers throughout the office.

“I want to retire.”

My subordinates, who had been watching me intently, whispered to each other while pausing from their snacks:

“The Chief mentioned retirement again. Who bet it wouldn’t come up today?”

“Hieek…! Charnoi’s reverse betting has failed…!”

“Pay up quickly. I’ll treat you to dinner with today’s winnings.”

Hearing their whispers, I covered myself with a blanket and slumped over my desk.

I can hear everything, you brats…