728 – I Came Again Without Dying – 2

My head hurts.

I was able to keenly feel how difficult it is to support a person’s weight with just one head, and how thankful it is that a person can stand on two feet.

“Tanian.”

“Yes… Master.”

I barely opened my mouth when I heard Master’s voice right in front of me.

Because he is a senior cardinal and a member of the Secretariat, he is a teacher who cannot waste every minute of his time. Thanks to this, although it is not easy to even have a meal with the teacher, the teacher took the time to come visit me.

“Why did you do that?”

“I’m sorry.”

My unexpected behavior. To rebuke my deep karma.

“I don’t understand.”

Master let out a small sigh and placed another water bottle on my waist.

‘Three of these.’

I gritted my teeth and gave strength to my whole body.

With only his head and feet touching the floor, and because he was leaning backwards, it was difficult to maintain his center of gravity, and the glass bottle came up. If I stumble even a little, the bottle that Master put up would shatter.

You have to hold on. If you drop this, you will be greeted with even more corporal punishment than now.

“When you were young, you annoyed this teacher quite a bit, but I thought it was just a child’s complaint. Moreover, as time passed, you grew up to be a worthy priest, so I thought I had a good disciple.”＜ Br﹥

“Wow, that’s too much praise, Master.”

“That’s right. Looking at your thick-headedness and your outbursts, I can’t praise you too much. Wouldn’t you have had an accident when you were younger? Then I would have educated you properly from then on.”

I couldn’t give any answer to Master’s words.

Even in my opinion, the accident I had this time was an accident that I had nothing to say about, no matter what I heard from the teacher. On the contrary, it is a miracle that such minor corporal punishment is being disciplined.

“Did everything seem light to you because you were the next saint? Did you think that if you became an official saint, you would be treated on an equal footing with the Pope, so it would be okay to do anything?”

“Oh, no!”

“Then that is a good thing. If your heart had been filled with pride, I would have suggested to His Holiness your excommunication.”

The words were hard and cold, but I did not dare to blame my teacher.

The reason I point out so harshly is because the Master is disappointed. He was upset because he had expectations from me, and he was still having expectations from me.

Truly, if Master had wanted to kick me out, he wouldn’t have done this. Instead of being a teacher and a disciple, he would have had a ceremonial conversation with his assistant and the next saint, and he would have immediately insisted on my excommunication to his Holiness.

“The Lord did not hinder the love of the priests.”

As I remained silent, Master continued speaking in a somewhat subdued voice.

“If priests maintained their faith and did not forget their duties, it was acceptable for them to have families. Among the past popes and saints, there were quite a few who had families.”

After saying that, Master sighed for an unknown number of times.

“So, if you had your heart set on someone. If you had decided to get married, everyone would have celebrated…”

‘Oh my.’

The voice, which had calmed down at first, began to become passionate again.

Ruined. Soon there will be a roar that will make you have to cover your ears, but if you put your hands down now, you might end up in a duel with your teacher.

“The next saint! A premarital pregnancy! And against a cardinal!”

At that moment, I felt like blood was flowing from my ears.

Master. You’ve definitely aged a lot compared to when I was young, but you still correct yourself a lot.

“You damn thing! What? Going on a pilgrimage to ease the burden on the Holy Father!? Going around the continent to share the interest in the results of the Council!? Anyway, the attention that was drawn to the Council was dispersed thanks to the Inspector General! Blessed One quickly gained attention because he dealt with his oldest worries and sins. If that were the case, he would just go see the shrine and come back quietly, but in the meantime, don’t cause such an accident!”

“I’m sorry…”

I endured the wrath of the corrected teacher with my whole body and kept repeating that I was sorry.

My hearing won’t get much better for a while.

The loud admonition was completed after about two hours.

“Get up.”

“Yes.”

And the head that had been greeting the floor for two hours was finally able to find freedom.

It was a time when I could feel the fragility of the head and the importance of bipedal walking. Let’s be careful so something like this doesn’t happen in the future.

“…We cannot undo what has already happened. His Holiness also said that, except for the premarital pregnancy, it is purely a matter of celebration, so as a teacher, I will stop scolding you here.”

“I’m sorry to disappoint you.”

“The guy who knows that.”

I slowly lowered my head at the sight of my teacher clenching his tongue.

Still, I’m glad. Thanks to the storm of anger just a moment ago, it seems like he has calmed down now.

“So, when are you planning on getting married?”

“Yes?”

“Yes? What do you mean? Then, were you planning to quietly pass over the union of the next saint and cardinal? I’ll say it again, the problem is that you guys are fast, the fact that you made love itself is not the problem.”

I felt touched by those words.

After all, there is no one who thinks of me like my teacher. For me, who lost my biological parents at the hands of a pagan, the person who became a new father was my teacher.

“If it’s okay, around the middle of next year—”

“We’ve already set a date for the end of this year, so please know.”

“Yes.”

The only problem is that his father is a bit dogmatic and eccentric.

‘At the end of this year.’

I smiled without knowing. If you have a wedding at the end of the year, you couldn’t be happier to end the year.

Moreover, this year, Brother Erich and Brother Ainter had a wedding, and Brother Laterer’s wedding is also scheduled to be held this year. Of course, Brother Ryutis’s wedding is next year, but the engagement was this year, so if we were to be unreasonable, we could say it was this year.

Additionally, the last member, Sister Sarah, is said to be getting married in the summer. How auspicious this is.

‘If you have the same person in mind, do you get married around the same time?’

It couldn’t be anything else than a strange and subtle coincidence.

“Then I’ll just leave. Take your water bottle with you.”

“Oh, yes.”

While I was thinking nonsense for a moment, I hurriedly came to my senses as Master was getting ready to go back.

For a teacher who boasts a workload second only to that of the Pope, a two-hour gap is a fatal gap. Since you wasted precious time because of this poor student, you should at least make sure to send him off.

I thought so.

“Huh.”

“Hmm?”

Until suddenly my and Master’s communication spheres vibrated at the same time.

Master’s eyebrows furrowed slightly at this unexpected signal. If only Master’s communication port had rang, I would have thought it was a desperately sought-after message from the Secretariat, but if the message came to me as the next saint, it would have been a message to all high-ranking officials in the church.

Unstable. During this period, there is no particular schedule that is considered important by the denomination or church. There is no way there is news like this that needs to be shared with all high-ranking officials.

So, with an uneasy feeling, I checked the communication port,

[Observing fraud from the northwest direction of the country. The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and the Annals of the Church estimates that it is the energy of the Death King, who was subdued 800 years ago. ]

It just hardened.

‘Death King?’

Death King. A disaster on the continent that was subdued about 800 years ago.

At the time, the church’s saints were such a powerful being that they personally stepped forward to subdue the Death Kings, and after the suppression of the Death Kings, the church’s saints did not get involved in human wars. Unless there is a crisis of the level of Death King, there is no need for a saint to step forward.

However, the energy of such a being was observed again. In this era, 800 years later?

‘It’s not an illusion…’

Unfortunately, there is no chance of it being an illusion. This is the testimony of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the successor to the Congregation for the Inquisition of Heresy, and the Annals of the Church, which recorded the entire history of the denomination. It must have been after they had already thoroughly researched the data, and they must have sent the message because they were confident.

“Tanian.”

“Yes, Master.”

“…I might have to ring the bell again.”

I nodded silently at Master’s words.

***

For a moment, I couldn’t believe my ears.

“Your Majesty. I am sorry, but Soshin has just come here after hearing his youngest child cry, so his hearing is still not good.”

Therefore, he asked the emperor to speak again.

More precisely, he asked me to say that what I heard was wrong.

“Is that so? I hope my hearing isn’t as good as it is now.”

However, the emperor betrayed my expectations.

“I received news from the Holy Church that the Death King has reawakened. I don’t know if it is the Death King who fell 800 years ago or a new Death King.”

My head stopped thinking at the emperor’s words.

Death King. In this era, you suddenly become the Death King. Even if you look at a history book, that’s a name you have to look at the very front page to see. It is a monster that appeared in the early or middle Apels period, let alone the Kpelopen period.

‘What is this?’

It was so absurd that I couldn’t even laugh.

In fact, in terms of wonders, it is more surprising that the gods (who were) created during the Trika Empire were reawakened than the Death Kings who were active during the Apels Empire. The Death Kings are only 800 years old, but they existed 2,000 years ago.

But at least they fell asleep and woke up again. It’s not that he died and was resurrected.

‘I heard the continent is in chaos.’

Before I knew it, cold sweat ran down my spine.

The Death King is a monster that even the mainstream religion on the continent, the Church of Dawn, put forth their best effort to subdue. I heard that a saint took the lead and beat down the Death Kings, and that a large-scale purification holy method was used in the Death Kings’ stronghold to uproot them. So that the Death King will never be resurrected again. So that a disaster like this never happens again.

To that extent, the Death King left deep scars on the entire continent, including the Church of Dawn. It was because of the Death King that cremation, the traditional funeral method of the Dawn Church, spread rapidly throughout the continent. Because that b*stard raised all the corpses.

…Wait a minute.

“Well, Your Majesty.”

“Speak.”

“As far as I know, I heard that the place where the Death King fell was the old Apels area. Where was the Death King’s energy observed again?”

In response to that question, the emperor looked into my eyes without saying a word, and then sighed heavily.

“Southeast of the Empire.”

“Fuck.”

It was a curse that came out instinctively so I quickly covered my mouth with my hand.

The emperor also looked at me as if he was surprised, but he wasn’t particularly angry.

“The minister speaks for Jim about his feelings.”

I just laughed and moved on.