Primel watched as Saint Theodore approached the corpses of the men, which were cut in half. Not just that, the buildings directly behind the men also suffered several large gashes.

'Is this...' Primel gulped in nervousness. '...Saint Theodore's power?'

Whatever that was that Theodore used, it wasn't related to Storms at all. That meant the power he had just displayed was his own's, and that he gained it himself.

'...Unlike me, who got all my power from the church.'

As Primel was thinking that, Theodore finally reached the corpses.

'Is he praying?' Primel thought as she saw Theodore kneeling down. However, she was disillusioned when she saw him rummaging through the corpses' pockets.

As she was about to march up to him and confront him, Theodore suddenly spoke without even turning back to face her, "you're wondering why I'm looting the corpses, correct?"

"...Yes," Primel replied with a much calmer voice than she had expected. It seemed that her shock that Theodore knew what she was thinking overwhelmed her rage.

"I see," Theodore chuckled, "trust me when I say that I have no intention to disrespect the dead. I'm merely giving them a chance to atone for their sins."

"...What?"

"You're familiar with your church's 'Holiest pardon,' correct?"

"I do." Primel nodded. Holiest pardons were pardons that were granted to people who paid a hefty sum of money to the Church of Light. Unlike normal pardons, which only absolved people of minor sins, Holiest pardons forgave even the vilest of sins—treason against the Church.

"This is something like that, letting these men atone for conspiring to capture a Saintess of Light on her pilgrim," Theodore said with a matter-of-facty tone, "but instead of Goddess Lumaria, I'm collecting Holiest pardon fees for Goddess Lyra. Though this amount of offering is... much less that what your Church would normally accept, Goddess Lyra is generous. For her, it's the sincerity and thought that counts."

"...But why are you putting all the money in your own pockets?"

Theodore's body stiffened for a second before he resumed going through the corpses and pocketing money again. "You see, my Goddess is a relatively minor one compared to yours, so she doesn't have that many Celestials— or any," he muttered the last part under his breath. "—serving her. Thus, she and her aides are busy, and don't have time to receive the pardon fees directly, at least not right now."

Finishing looting the corpses, Theodore patted his pocket and stood up. "So that's why I'm putting them in my pockets." He then smiled stiffly. "Temporarily, of course."

"Mm..." Primel let out a non-committal hum of understanding. Although she wasn't entirely convinced, she knew better than to question another Saint—who was also the one who saved her.

'Well, I have to listen to his orders now. I was somehow reverted back to a Priestess after all'

"Saint Theodore," Primel called out, "I have something to tell you.

"Not right now," Theodore quickly replied with a frown, "I have to get rid of the evidence first before the guards arrive."

Then, he rushed toward every corpses and lightly touched them. As soon as he did so, space seemingly distorted, before the bodies were nowhere to be seen.

"Saint Theodore, what—"

"The bodies are fine." Theodore quickly interrupted Primel. "Let's get back to the church first. I don't want to get caught by the guards this early."

He rushed through the twists and turns of the alleyways, with Primel following close behind, still confused.

***

'Shit! Why didn't I just put the money in [Alternate storage]?' I cursed under my breath as I ran through the alleyway.

Aside from being really fucking heavy, the money clinked loudly every time I took a step, making inconspicuous travel really hard. Eventually, I decided that I had enough of it, and shoved my hands into my pockets.

[Alternate storage]

Feeling my now-much-lighter pockets, I heaved a sigh of relief. 'I swear, my greed's going to kill me one of these days.'

But that was a problem for future Theodore. Right now, I was busy evading the guards, who I saw marching the streets and eyeing everything earlier. I could probably go out in the streets without any issue—though not being a Dark elf or Beastkin would definition draw much attention to me—but my main concern was Primel. For obvious reasons, she couldn't just go out in broad streetlight. Not to mention, she was running after me like a man with a limp leg.

Unable to contain my frustration, I stopped dead in my track and snapped my head around. "What's up with you?! Why are you so slow?"

Primel similarly halted her steps. Hunching down, putting her hands on her knees, and catching her breath, she answered, "S-sorry... I... haaaah... am out of... haaaah... energy."

My frowned ceased as I observed her more closely. She definitely looked a bit thinner than before... and a lot dirtier. It was obvious that the past couple of days did a number on her. Normally, I'd have just carried her back to the Church like I did with Evelyn, but I was also feeling my strength waning because of the Mana I used to execute the Fourth movement earlier.

As such, I plopped down to the ground and leaned against a building with a sigh. "Fine then, rest for 15 minutes. We'll resume after that." Then, I reached into [Alternate storage] and took out some food and a flask of water. After drinking the water, I threw the flask and the food toward Primel. "There. Can't complain now."

Primel received the items with a grateful nod. "Thank you..."

In response, I merely waved my hand dismissively and rested my eyes for a few minutes. But before I could even rest, Primel suddenly asked, "how many days have it been since I escaped the governor's mansion?"

'Is this her attempt at small talk?'

If so, then she was miserably failing. I never thought that I'd see someone who was worse at social interactions than me. I decided to humor her a little and then go back to resting.

"5 days, more or less."

Suddenly, her voice took on an urgent tone. "WHAT? SAINT THEODORE, YOU HAVE TO LISTE—"

"Nope, don't care," I immediately shut her down as she was practically screaming in my ears. "Wait until we get back to the church. I don't care what you want to talk about right now."

And with those worse, I promptly closed my eyes shut and ignored everything else.

...

Although our speed was faster than it was before the rest, it still took us about an hour or so before we got get back to the Church. As soon as we did, Primel called out to me, "Saint Theodore, can I talk to you for a moment?"

"Just get into the building first."

The first thing I saw after kicking the door of the church open was Maria braiding Evelyn's hair, and Evelyn trying her best to talk to Kevin and Jacob, who were scared shitless for some reason. But I didn't have any time to take in the scene further as Primel suddenly pulled me down to a nearby chair row and spoke with urgency, "please, it's important!"

"No need to push me down like you want to rape me," I stood up, ignoring the redness slowly creeping up Primel face, "tell me, what's so important that you deemed it necessary to annoy me about it as soon as I rescued you?"

"F-first of all, sorry for irritating you," Primel stammered, though I could tell that her apology wasn't too sincere, "but this is really important. It concerns what I saw in the governor's mansion."

"..."

Taking my silence as a sign of approval, Primel continued, "the governor... wasn't the governor. I-I know it sounds weird, but he feels like a different person! I've met him just a few months before on an official church business, and although his lecherous attitude was the same, he doesn't remember, or at least recognize me at all! Not just that, I saw him performing a Void ritual. His aura was that of a Void lord, not a normal person!"

"As expected," I sighed, "[Jealousy] is controlling the top brass of the city."

"Y-You knew?"

"I did as soon as I found out that the guards are ignoring the missing children reports. Now, is that all?"

"No!" Primel raised her voice desperately. "Please don't cut me off again, this is the most important part! The ritual I saw the fake governor performing, it's [Circulus inanis], and the ritual will be completed in a day!"

"WHAT?!" A loud exclaim of shock rang out, not from me, but from Evelyn, who naturally detected our presence and sneaked up on us.

Luckily for me, since Primel attention was temporarily on Evelyn, I was about to mask my surprise in time. Clearing my throat to get Primel's attention, I asked in a cold voice, "are you absolutely certain?"

"I'm sure," her voice then turned grim, "I would never forget the circle formation of that horrible ritual, especially not after the fall of Segdius."

Although I was surprised that Primel was allegedly there was Segidus city fell, I tried not to let it show on my face. "You were there?"

"Yes, I was 12 at the time, Priestess-in-training."

After a few moments of gathering my thoughts and processing what she had just said, I could only let out a surprisingly monotonous statement.

"Well, that sucks."

"Yes, I'd know," Primel frowned at me. "Now can we get back on topic?"

"R-right," I stammered, not expecting such an icy look from Primel.

"You're the only Saint here right now. What do you think we should do?"

Being burdened with the role of the leader without any chance to refuse, I fell into thoughts.

If what Primel said was true, then Kerudark was about to become a second Segidus—that was, all of its inhabitants would be turned into Void fiends. The only reason why Segidus wasn't a bigger of a tragedy than it already was was because duke Daniel Harugs—an ranker and the duke of Humans—had been visiting a nearby town by complete coincidence.

However... there were no dukes anywhere near this city, I was pretty sure, and there sure was no grandmaster-under-disguise nearby who could take on a city full of Void fiends. As such, if the Void lords succeeded in converting this city, half of the Southeastern part of the Empire could be lost before any top-brass of the Empire could notice something amiss.

Thus, I was torn between two option. To do the sensible thing and bolt the fuck out of here, or to...

"Fuck! I can't believe I'm doing this..." Turning toward Primel, who was surprised that a curse slipped from my mouth, I ordered, "get out of here."

"W-what?"

"You heard me, get out of this city." Reaching into [Alternate storage], I took out the brooch that Adel gave me. "And show this to an Imperial guard at a nearby city. You must request princess Ad— I mean Eleanor for help, and don't contact any churches."

Although Primel was baffled by the fact that I was basically shoo'ing her away, she was more offended that I was implying that the church wouldn't be of any help. "Why?"

'Because I don't want the lightbulb to find out my plans for you!'

But of course, I couldn't say that out loud.

"Well..." I dragged my sentence out, trying to find a suitable excuse. "...you know the Distritoris agreement?"

"I get it," Primel curtly replied, though she couldn't stop her voice from trembling, "i-it would take too long for the church to do anything, w-wouldn't it?"

"That's correct," I nodded solemnly. "That's why you must contact princess Eleanor on my behalf. Her personal army should be enough to seize this city from the Void lords."

'Hehahahah! Good, her faith in the lightbulb is waning!'

"But Saint Theodore, I'm close with some Priests. Surely, I can convince the—"

"Priestess Primel," I addressed her by her proper title, making her jolt a little in shock, "are you willing to risk thousands of lives just for that Church of yours to be involved? What happened to your determination to help people? Aren't you supposed to put lives before your beliefs?"

Primel turned eerily silent before slowly nodding. "I-I understand... but that doesn't explain why I can't stay and help."

"Oh, that's easy to explain," I chuckled, "just look at your state right now, you're basically useless. Besides... what I'm about to do is very, very dangerous. I wouldn't be surprised if the newspapers said that I was dead the next day."

Gulping at my ominous words, she stuttered, "t-then why are you smiling like that?"

Hearing her words, I touched my lips, which were curved up into a wide smile unbeknownst to myself. 'What the fuck is wrong with me?' Forcibly removing the smile from my face, I continued, "it's nothing. Look, point is, get out of this city right now." I then snapped my head toward Evelyn, who was watching us in silence. "And you too, cat. I can't have anyone of you dying on me right now."

'Especially when I went through hell to make sure you're alive...'

Evelyn furrowed her brows and stared at me in silence before slowly nodding. "...Okay."

'Huh, that went a little bit easier than I thought.'

But that just made my job a lot easier, so I didn't think much about it. With Evelyn now on board with leaving the city, everything had just gotten a lot easier.

"Lead Primel out of Kerudark, Evelyn, and be mindful of the guards. Oh, and say hi to smuggler Kilver for me."

"You know him?" Evelyn widened her eyes in surprise.

"Of course I do."

'Technically, anyway. I don't know if reading about him through Marcos' memories counts.'

Kilver was the smuggler that helped Evelyn and her mother escape the city when she was initially captured as a slave, but very comedically, she was caught by some random group of bandits on her way to the capital and was sold back to the same slave ring by complete coincidence.

Judging by how generous Kilver was to Evelyn, plotting an escape for a slave and all, I was sure that he would help Primel if she told him her story.

...

After I gave my orders, everyone left without much resistance.

"To be honest..." I muttered to myself, "...I'm a bit disappointed that no one convinced me to go with them out of worry."

But of course, I was already expecting this kind of treatment ever since I resolved myself to stabilize the plotline enough so that the world didn't end before I could find my mother. Taking a deep breath, I psyched myself up for the really fucking stupid plan I was attempting. Normally, I wouldn't have taken such a big risk, but I deemed it necessary. Adel was just a backup in case I failed but managed to delay the ritual for a day or two, since I was sure that she could never make it here in time.

"Besides, it's not like I don't have any insurances either," I muttered as I took out a ribbon from [Alternate storage].

It looked like a normal ribbon, but it was actually a very powerful artifact. Frankly, no matter how hard I looked at it, I still couldn't see it as anything but an ordinary ribbon. However, the information at the auction house stated that this would protect the user from one fatal attack before breaking. Then, it would teleport one person that had infused Mana into it; and the person I coerced (begged) to infuse his Mana was Weizer—the so-called strongest necromancer.

Some may call me stupid for not summoning him immediately by trying to kill myself, but I begged to differ. What if I managed to succeed without summoning him? I was betting on that slim chance so that I would not waste such a powerful artifact. Beside... I wanted to test my new powers anyway.

After finishing my preparations, I laid down on the dusty floor of the old church, getting as much rest as I could. Although my plan was, on paper, very likely to succeed—even with the most powerful necromancer helping me if I failed—I couldn't shake off the feeling that something bad was going to happen.

'Nothing is going to go wrong, right?'