The Sun and Moon – 7

Two pairs of green eyes and two pairs of purple eyes alternately stared at the staff in my hand and then at me. They seemed truly astonished.

“Th-that… Honored Guest-isiyeo…?”

Floretta creaked like a broken robot, her mouth gaping towards me. Her face looked like she had a lot to say, but her tongue seemed stiff and unable to move properly.

“Honored Guest-isiyeo, is that…?”

Luna stepped forward in place of the creaking Floretta. However, Luna’s condition wasn’t much better. She could barely manage to open her mouth.

“What I told you. So… for now, it’s a Holy Relic.”

My conscience pricked at calling a weapon a Holy Relic when, in terms of performance, it was even more trash than a broken straight sword, with nothing left but its appearance.

Even with Faith 99 and Divine Power 99, in a full-buff state, casting the highest-tier divine spell on a demon couldn’t extract three-digit damage from this kind of trash. Why was this thing a Holy Relic? It was just a cool-looking flashlight.

Looking at the damage alone, it felt like an item that had a negative scaling rather than a positive coefficient. The first time I used it, I genuinely doubted my eyes, thinking I had misread the damage numbers.

But from the Holy Nation’s perspective, it was indeed a Holy Relic, so what could I do? I had to call it that.

“A Holy Relic…”

Luna, with her head bowed deeply, mumbled something. The volume lowered so much towards the end that it was impossible to tell if she was speaking or just mumbling.

I calmly received the gazes pricking from four directions and approached Floretta, extending the staff in my hand. Floretta’s eyes widened at the sight of it.

“Take it, Floretta. It’s yours.”

“…Are you saying, me?”

“Is there another Floretta here besides you?”

I lightly shook the arm holding the staff, signaling her to take it quickly.

Floretta carefully extended both hands, joined together. Her hands were trembling severely. It was doubtful if she could even properly grasp it like that.

I placed the staff on her palm and firmly pressed her finger joints to make her clench her fist. I did this because I felt she would drop it the moment I took my hand away.

Floretta, who had been staring blankly at the small, glowing sun placed in her hand, transferred the staff to her left hand. Her freed right hand reached out towards the small sun.

Her right hand, which had approached right up to the sun, hesitated for a moment, then seemed to make a decision and slowly began to caress its surface, which glowed with the color of sunset.

Luna, Stella, and Selene stared at the sight as if enchanted.

“It’s not… hot…”

That was the first thing Floretta uttered after caressing the sun for a long time.

It looked exactly like the sun in the sky, yet it wasn’t hot at all, which seemed to amaze her. Floretta caressed it with moist eyes, then raised her head.

My eyes met her green eyes, where a complex swirl of emotions raged.

“Honored Guest-isiyeo. How did you find this… this Holy Relic?”

“Well. Did God tell me?”

I answered with a slight smile, in a joking tone.

The four people here would easily realize that my words just now were uttered to gloss over the situation. They would also realize that I was avoiding the answer.

“…Is that so?”

That is, as long as they didn’t take it so seriously.

“The Sun-께서…”

Floretta’s expression was extremely serious, as if she hadn’t noticed my joking tone, playful expression, and the sentence ending with a slight upward inflection, “Did God tell me?”

Of course, the Pope of the Moon, the Inquisitor, and the Inquisitor were no exception. All four of them were taking my words quite seriously.

“If you can hear the voice of God… then of course…”

‘I knew it.’

It was something I had fully expected, so I wasn’t surprised at all. In fact, if Floretta or Luna had taken my words as a joke in this situation, that would have been far more surprising.

Anyway, thinking like that wouldn’t cause any particular problems.

Considering my relationship with the Popes, adding one more Holy Relic was like sprinkling a cup of salt into the ocean. It meant that even if I did something like this here, the relationship wouldn’t dramatically change.

Hearing the voice of God? The Popes do that all the time. Someone other than the Popes heard it for the first time? I was already the first to capture a creature abandoned by God, so why the fuss now?

‘It’s not like this is the first or second time I’ve done something like this.’

Looking back, I had done many surprising things.

Interpreting divine revelations, conquering an abyssal dungeon alone and returning, capturing creatures abandoned by God, receiving God’s blessing, hearing God’s voice.

I had caused quite a few incidents so far. Finding a Holy Relic, while a tremendous achievement on its own, was just average when listed after those other things.

Moreover, I had firmly stated that they shouldn’t announce our relationship until I allowed it, so what more could happen here?

It’s not like I did this without thinking.

“Luna.”

“…”

“Luna?”

“…Yes, Honored Guest-isiyeo?”

Luna, who had been staring at the small sun enveloped by angel wings, shining in Floretta’s hand, as if enchanted by something, snapped out of it and turned to look at me.

Her eyes were still half-dazed.

“Can you tell me when the full moon will rise?”

“Today.”

Upon hearing my question, Luna answered immediately without a moment’s hesitation. I wondered if it was because she was the Pope of the Moon.

“…Oh.”

I hadn’t expected this. I didn’t think the full moon would rise today too.

Just as ‘noon’ was required to activate the “Long Live the Sun” Easter egg, ‘full moon’ was needed to activate the Moon-side Easter egg. To put it bluntly, a full moon.

In the game, both were one-time events that appeared when specific triggers were met, so the activation difficulty was about the same, but it was different here.

Compared to noon, where you could just wait until 12 PM, for the full moon, you had to wait for the full moon cycle. So, I was about to comfort Luna, thinking I might not be able to give it to her right away.

But if today was the full moon, there was no need to comfort Luna. I could just get it and give it to her. And I wouldn’t have to visit the Popes again according to the full moon cycle.

For reference, ‘Praise the Moon’ was no different from ‘Praise the Sun.’ It was only differentiated by whether the back of the hand faced outwards or inwards.

‘I’ll just wait until midnight, give the staff to Luna, and then head back.’

It was a perfect plan, even to me.

Luna stared blankly at the staff in her hand. A Holy Relic with two pairs of angel wings, and a full moon floating above them, casting a subtle moonlight.

It was as if her throat was completely choked; she couldn’t speak at all. It felt like if she opened her mouth, something other than words, some other emotion, would burst out.

Floretta was much the same. Floretta, holding the Holy Relic in her hand, also stared blankly down at the small sun floating between the angel wings.

Luna’s slender fingers began to caress the full moon floating at the tip of the Holy Relic. Her fingertips trembled slightly.

It wasn’t cold.

Just as the sun wasn’t hot.

“…Sister Seraphica.”

A familiar voice was heard. She slowly raised her head. Her sister stood where her sparkling purple eyes, illuminated by moonlight, were directed.

“Can we… really accept something like this?”

It was a reasonable question.

Because the Popes hadn’t even fully repaid the cost of their own lives yet.

At most, they had only promised to provide the utmost convenience by hosting a farewell banquet, but even that utmost convenience had hardly been used, except when obtaining holy water imbued with light.

They hadn’t even properly repaid the debt of their lives, yet they had suddenly received a Holy Relic that wasn’t even recorded in the history of the Holy Nation. Now, they were at a loss as to how to repay it.

What had the Holy Nation done, what had Floretta and Luna done, to be bestowed such favor? What was the Holy Nation of Raphaela to Honored Guest-nim?

He hadn’t even given them this Holy Relic expecting anything in return.

He had rejected their temptations and abruptly went outside, then returned a few minutes later, opening the door and saying there was something to find and asking them to go out together.

“…I don’t know either.”

Luna, too, found it impossible to answer properly. There was no way she could know Honored Guest-nim’s thoughts.

The Popes, who had been looking at each other for a moment, simultaneously unleashed their divine power as if they had planned it. As the divine power, so clear and transparent it sent shivers down one’s spine, flowed into the staffs, the sunlight and moonlight grew stronger.

White light and silver light pushed back the darkness and illuminated the surroundings.

“He told us to cherish this.”

As Honored Guest-nim returned to the Empire with Selene’s help, he had told them not to use this for anything else, but just to hold onto it. He said there was no need to catch heretics or slay demons with it.

However, Floretta and Luna knew. The hidden meaning of those words was simply that he wanted them to cherish the gift he had given. Perhaps he was too shy to say it directly, so he had subtly hinted at it.

The Popes knew.

“Even if you hadn’t said that… of course we would.”

Both of them hugged the glowing Holy Relics tightly to their chests.

Even if he hadn’t said those words, they would have cherished it. To the extent that they resolved to choose the Holy Relic without hesitation if they had to choose between their life and the Holy Relic.

Not to use the staffs, which recognized the Popes as their masters the moment Floretta and Luna grasped them, and whose usage God himself had personally taught, for slaying demons and heretics? It was nonsense.

No one else, not even Honored Guest-nim, who was abundantly loved by the Sun and Moon, would be able to properly use these staffs.

It was obvious. These were Holy Relics that the Sun had created for the Pope of the Sun, and the Moon for the Pope of the Moon, from the very beginning.

No one other than the Popes could properly draw out even 1% of their power. This was a fact they realized from the knowledge that flowed into their minds from the Holy Relics.

“Honored Guest-nim would have known that, wouldn’t he, Evangelina?”

“He certainly would have, unnie. Yes. He definitely would have.”

If the omniscient and omnipotent Honored Guest-nim surely knew this fact, then what would be the reason for telling them to just hold onto it, if not to ask them to cherish his gift?

For a while, the two stared dazedly at the sunlight and moonlight, then, without either of them speaking first, they opened their mouths simultaneously.

“Evangelina.”

“Sister Seraphica.”

And then, as if they had guessed what the other was about to say, they smiled brightly.

They couldn’t just keep receiving. This grace must certainly be repaid, even if it took their entire lives.

But by what means?

If it was women, they had already offered them. They had brought the bodies of the most noble and pure women in the Holy Nation to him.

And was that all they offered? On the contrary, Floretta and Luna themselves became deeply immersed in that pleasure, even tempting the Honored Guest-nim, who had visited the Holy Nation after a long time, at every opportunity.

At this rate, it wasn’t serving, but merely enjoying together.

As for offering him power and status, Honored Guest-nim didn’t seem to desire that either.

If he wanted to, he could take control of the Pope of the Sun, the Pope of the Moon, the Inquisitor, and the Inquisitor, and seize the entire Holy Nation right now.

If the laypeople didn’t follow, that would be one thing, but if it were revealed that he was someone who heard the voices of the Sun and Moon despite not being a Pope, they would vie with each other to bow their heads before him.

Being able to do something but not doing it meant he had no interest.

Then there was only one method left. The sisters looked at each other once more and smiled brightly.

“Unnie, you’re thinking the same thing as me, right?”

“I probably am.”

The sisters still understood each other’s thoughts.