Chapter 1. Candidate and Candidate (9)

“Next time, try hiding some canned goods too.”

Even though I shared half of the emergency rations, which were like blood, Ria said something so ungrateful.

No, but anyway.

“Next time?”

As I looked intently at Ria and asked, Ria’s hand, which had been moving her chopsticks, stopped.

“Uh… well, you know, there might be a next time when we eat like this in the middle of the night. Wouldn’t it be nice to have meat? Or, well, fruit. Raw meat or fruit would spoil, but canned goods wouldn’t spoil even if hidden for a long time.”

She’s saying such strange things.

“There won’t be a next time, so what do you mean by next time?”

I said that and slurped up a mouthful of ramen.

Ah, as expected, one is not enough. Even if I drink all the broth, I don’t think I’ll feel full.

Sip, I resent the hero candidate in front of me.

“…There’s no next time?”

Ria said something incomprehensible again. No, more than that, Ria herself looked like she didn’t understand my words, so I sighed deeply and put down the remaining ramen and chopsticks.

“Alright. Since it’s all been discovered anyway, I’ll just be honest. I said there’s no God in front of you, and that’s right. I did that to make you stay here.”

“……”

“To be precise, the Nun Superior set a condition. If I could somehow persuade you, we could stay at this convent for about a year or two.”

“Did… did she?”

Ria asked in a slightly awkward voice, and I nodded.

The flashlight was quite bright, but unfortunately, there was nowhere to hang it on the ceiling, so I placed it on the table. Of course, in the opposite direction of the door.

It was much better than having no light source at all, but a flashlight is made to illuminate the front, unlike a lantern.

The LED light source emits a sufficiently bright light to distinguish the surroundings when shone in the dark, but because the light source is small enough to be hidden in a nun’s habit, it doesn’t show the surroundings very clearly when laid on its side.

Ria, no, Lee Chae-eun’s expression, seen beyond that subtle light, looked strangely guilty, but I just assumed I was mistaken and continued speaking.

“But my plan is useless now that you’ve seen through it?”

“No, it’s not entirely like that-“

“Besides, the reason I wanted to stay here is gone too. I thought there were seven potential stalkers, but I found out that all seven of them were just people waiting to scout me? Because of you.”

It’s just my misunderstanding, and therefore, it’s not Lee Chae-eun’s fault.

But did she have to present reality so starkly? Honestly, if I hadn’t had to use divine power today, I probably wouldn’t have been able to sleep until this hour and would have just kicked the covers.

Seeing Lee Chae-eun’s gaze shift slightly to the side, I took a deep breath.

And I picked up the cup noodles and the slightly uneven wooden chopsticks again.

Now that I think about it, the wooden chopsticks Lee Chae-eun is holding are perfectly uniform in size and shape. I wonder if extreme swordsmanship training allows one to split even wooden chopsticks so perfectly.

“Anyway, so, there’s no reason for me to stay here, and you don’t really have any intention of staying either. …I don’t know why you came here, but you’re going to be an adult this year anyway.”

Even if the convent tried to forcibly keep us, both I and Lee Chae-eun would have reached our limit by the end of May. That is, assuming we have the will to ‘leave.’

I… well, I didn’t really intend to stay here my whole life.

Although I said otherwise, I know the reason Lee Chae-eun is here, but that reason doesn’t become a reason to stop Lee Chae-eun, who will soon become an adult.

In the original work, although they bickered and fought, the relationship between Lee Chae-eun and the Saint was described as quite good.

Actually, rather than ‘quite good,’ they gave the impression of being best friends who fought every day but trusted each other implicitly.

I don’t know how they became so close, but judging by the indirect descriptions, Lee Chae-eun actually viewed the Saint quite favorably. She was kind, and she worked hard to fix people… Well, she was a bit extreme about heresies, but other than that, she was a thoroughly good and kind person. Unlike me.

Whether I have the will or not, the Nun Superior and the church have offered me one of two options.

Either I secularize, or I live as a Saint my whole life.

If it’s one of those two choices, I plan to choose the former.

“Uh… well.”

Lee Chae-eun, who had been staring at me blankly for a moment, opened her mouth.

“Hey, you thought about it well. After all, you’ve been saying that kind of thing. Hmm, maybe you don’t fit well with the church.”

“I don’t fit well, do I?”

I sighed softly.

Yes, honestly, I didn’t like studying the Bible, so I did it carelessly, and I often dozed off during classes or lectures. It’s like a student who chose the wrong major in college. Although I didn’t exactly have a choice.

But that doesn’t mean I hate it here.

There’s no one I can openly call a friend, and there are nuns who don’t like me, but there are also many nuns who treat me well while teasing me. Especially the nuns who saw my divine power firsthand treated me a little more carefully.

And, although it’s a bit embarrassing to say it openly, the Nun Superior has been like a mother to me for 15 years.

She often spoke harshly, but she always took care of me to the best of her ability, and she actively protected me when I did something outrageous like sending a letter of protest directly to the Cardinal. The priest is also a good person.

…If I secularize, that relationship will be completely severed. Even if I visit occasionally, I won’t be able to enter the place where I grew up.

Yes, perhaps I just wasn’t ready. Even though I wanted to leave, I might have just been stubbornly trying to stay by making various excuses.

“If you leave, should I look for a job for you?”

Lee Chae-eun said, somewhat flustered. Whether she had finished her cup noodles or not, she just put them down.

“A job?”

I picked up the ramen again and asked.

“I’m a hero candidate, and my dad is a hero. Even if I don’t work at the Hunter Association, there are many collaborating organizations.”

Well, that’s true. In the novel, Lee Chae-eun’s name was actually used like a cheat key. When the protagonist got stuck trying to ask for help from someone, they would contact Lee Chae-eun, and she would pave the way.

Because she was in the convent, her connections actually widened as the novel progressed, and later she even introduced people from the church.

Anyway, she’s such an extrovert.

“Are you saying I should work at the Hunter Association? I don’t know how to fight at all.”

Saints also learned how to fight, but it was only to swing a mace and block attacks with a shield.

However, the Saint’s role was still very important. The Saint’s true ability was not combat prowess but her game-breaking divine power.

“Hey, you know what I’m talking about, don’t you? You’ve already received scouting offers like that.”

Lee Chae-eun said, as if it were absurd.

“You don’t have to go into combat. You’ll make a fortune just by being in the association headquarters.”

“Ah, really?”

“…Really? You can do the math to this extent too.”

At my indifferent question, Lee Chae-eun tilted her head as if it were strange.

I shrugged and took another bite of ramen. This was the last bite. Feeling a little regretful, I stirred the ramen broth with my chopsticks and continued speaking.

“But that’s not my ability.”

“…What?”

“That’s the ability of some being you call God, up there, not my ability.”

Slurp.

After answering, I drank the broth again. Mmm, salty. Ramen is best not too spicy at night.

“No, no, no. Wait a minute.”

Lee Chae-eun waved her hands as if she couldn’t understand my words at all. It seemed like the first time I’d seen her so flustered. Well, we haven’t known each other for that long.

“If you’re not going to eat that, can I eat it?”

Leaving Lee Chae-eun as she was, I pulled the cup noodles, which had been left unattended in front of Lee Chae-eun for quite a while, towards me.

Oh, there’s quite a bit of noodles left.

“Your ability, it’s a gift from God, right? Then it’s naturally your ability. You received it as a gift.”

I picked up the ramen, blew on it to cool it, and looked at Lee Chae-eun, who was saying something absurd.

“How is that my ability?”

“What?”

“Look, mages study magic, right? Very diligently. Magic doesn’t just happen by waving a wand and reciting spells.”

“……”

“Alchemy is said to be almost as complex as quantum mechanics, and even the marksmanship of soldiers guarding gates is something they can’t obtain without effort. Chae-eun-ssi, you know this, right? Because you have excellent swordsmanship skills that you’ve acquired through so much effort since childhood.”

Well, it should be okay to say this much. It’s written in the novel that Lee Chae-eun’s skills, as a hero candidate and the daughter of a hero, were famous since childhood.

“But what about divine power?”

I asked, looking intently at Lee Chae-eun.

“My divine power was obtained without any such study. I have ‘never’ made an effort in that regard. If you have time later, grab anyone in the convent and ask them. No one has ever seen me properly studying with the Bible in hand, right?”

That’s also why there are people in the convent who don’t particularly like me.

Even though they diligently study the Bible and pray, they have less divine power than me, who does nothing and falls into a deep sleep while praying.

Is divine power a power that cannot be obtained through effort? No, not at all.

The more you study and understand the being above, the more your divine power slowly increases. While there’s no denying the realm of talent, it’s definitely not an ability that can be simply called ‘luck.’

If I were a cheat in swordsmanship and a genius as a mage, I would have understood. I would have made an effort to cultivate that ability. Wouldn’t it be natural, since I wouldn’t be able to survive otherwise?

However, I have never once tried to increase my divine power.

Yet, I can summon this much power.

Therefore, there’s no other conclusion than that this is not my power. It’s probably just a prank by the being up there.

“…So, you’re not going to use it?”

“I will use it. If someone dies in front of me, I have to use it. If a highly contagious disease breaks out, I’ll use it, and if there’s a natural disaster and many people get hurt, I’ll definitely use it.”

“But you won’t make money from it?”

“Look, you keep making me say the same thing, so let me explain it properly again.”

I picked up a mouthful of ramen and looked straight at Lee Chae-eun as I spoke.

“That ability is not my ability. It’s probably just someone up there using their power through my body. I have the choice to decide the target, but that’s all. What kind of money can you get with such power? Since the user isn’t me.”

Before debating whether I’m an atheist or not, such power can disappear at any time.

Seeing that it cannot defeat all the evil in this world, that entity is not omnipotent. I haven’t lived in this world for 15 years without seeing news of murder or sexual assault cases. Although it’s not about our church, there was even a case where a church priest used a nun as a sex toy.

Looking at that, it seems like they don’t have the power to strike someone’s head with lightning and kill them, so they can’t take away my own abilities, which I obtained myself. Abilities obtained through training or study.

However, it’s not that they can’t do anything, not even enough to grant me such abilities. They can at least bring me into this world.

So, it must be just as easy to take back power that isn’t mine.

“So… is that it? Because it’s not your power, it can disappear at any time, and therefore, it’s a bit awkward to sell it for money?”

“Exactly.”

I gave a neat answer to Lee Chae-eun, who finally seemed to understand, and ate the ramen that had cooled down on the chopsticks.

“No, there’s also a way to earn a lot before the ability disappears.”

Well, I’ve heard that some saints or holy women do that. I’ve also heard that there are churches that make enormous amounts of money that way.

And there are people in this church who dislike those who don’t do that.

“Well, it’s also a matter of conscience, albeit a small one. Didn’t I tell you? It’s not my ability. Lee Chae-eun-ssi, do you earn your money with someone else’s ability? I don’t think you’re that kind of person.”

“Hey.”

“Yes?”

“Why are you calling me Lee Chae-eun-ssi, Lee Chae-eun-ssi, all of a sudden?”

“……?”

No, why?

Since I’ll be leaving soon anyway, and she seems to want me to call her that, I’m calling her as she wishes, so why is she annoyed?

“If Sister Ria likes it, I’ll call you that.”

“Well, until we leave, we’re both nuns, aren’t we? Let’s do that.”

I shrugged and drank the broth. Mmm, the broth hasn’t cooled down yet.

“So… then, do you have any plans after you leave?”

“Not yet, but well, I have time, so I’ll think about it gradually. Maybe I’ll get a job… Hmm, preparing for college wouldn’t be bad either.”

As society was on the verge of collapse, job opportunities greatly increased.

And among those jobs, the types that allow one to earn a lot of money without going to college have greatly increased.

Mainly related to gates.

So, many people don’t go to college right away, and many people don’t go at all. There are many more ways to make a living without being so desperate.

The government still wants to consistently foster highly educated individuals. Especially since I was a nun, if I enroll in college, I’ll receive subsidies for tuition and living expenses.

There are also independent subsidies from the church.

“I guess I can get a part-time job and live.”

“……”

Lee Chae-eun stared at me with a blank expression.

Why?

Ah, is it because I took her ramen?

But what can I do? If she regretted it, she should have said so when I took it earlier.

As I placed the empty container down after cleanly finishing the broth, Lee Chae-eun finally opened her mouth.

“…Leave it. I’ll clean it up.”

“Really? Then I’m grateful!”

I am one who knows no refusal.

Especially when it comes to my own benefit, I am an infinitely rational human being.

Before Ria’s mind could change, I quickly got up from my seat.