Hell Mode: Volume 7, page 6
“This crowd coming together must mean that all the monsters in the city have been beaten.”
“Thanks to you, Keel, and everyone else, things worked out so well.”
The residents’ attention was focused on Keel, who was flanked by Krena and Dogora, as he conversed with several of what seemed to be the city’s priests. Even from a distance, it was clear that something was off about him. Maybe he was thinking about what it meant to defeat the daemonic incarnations, or perhaps he was explaining to the priests what they had to do going forward, but whatever the case, people were paying close attention to Keel’s serious demeanor.
Now that I think about it, in the Church of Elmea, a Cleric is seen as a healer who performs miracles to save the believers.
Allen thought back on his religious studies back at the Academy.
According to Elmean teachings, God of Creation Elmea watched over those who willingly underwent Trials. In order to support and guide those who did so for the sake of others, he began to bestow the power of healing upon them. If it was discovered at an Appraisal Ceremony that someone had a healing Talent, they would be admitted to the Elmea Church as a child of miracles. One such child had been found during Allen’s Appraisal Ceremony.
Huh, come to think of it, they had initially referred to Keel as the “youth in gold.” Something tells me this is pretty important information.
“Oh, Allen, you’re back. It looks like they’ve been expecting us.”
Keel had noticed Allen and called out to him. When he did, the group surrounding him suddenly turned to face them.
“Are those your allies, Sir Keel?” one of the priests asked.
Originally, healing roles were considered sacred. Thus, Keel, a healer who had also destroyed the monsters attacking the city, must have been some kind of miraculous figure. Keel shot an annoyed look at Allen and Cecil, who were smirking at the difference between this perception of him and his actual character.
“Correct. As I mentioned previously, they’re members of my party. The black-haired boy is our leader, Allen.”
“Allen? The Rank S adventurer known as the Summoner of the Beginning?”
Whoa, they know who I am? It had only been ten days since the announcement via magic tools that he had been granted the status of Rank S adventurer.
Allen approached the priest who had mentioned him. “Are you perhaps the one who sent out the call for help?”
Compared to the other elderly priests surrounding Keel, this man was much younger, appearing to be in his forties. He had long, bushy eyebrows and chiseled facial features. He was quite good-looking, if not a little too distinct, and seemed to hold a rather high position within the Church.
“That is correct; it is I who issued the order. You may call me Krympton.”
“Issued the order”? In that case, he must be pretty highly ranked within the priesthood. Y’know, I recall learning about a high-ranking priest named Krympton at the Academy.
“Ah, Krympton, one of the cardinals of the Church of Elmea, correct?”
“You are correct. Given the crisis we found ourselves in, I took control of the situation. Putting that aside, allow me to offer my sincerest thanks for making the journey here. I never imagined you would have made such haste. This is truly as was told in the revelation from Lord Elmea,” the shocked cardinal replied. While it was true that many of the priests surrounding Keel were of high rank, they were more reserved than the cardinal. As such, they had tasked him with handling Keel, Allen, and the other party members.
Cardinal Krympton Dampla was the second-highest-ranking member of the Church of Elmea. Though a man of his station would almost certainly have been in Teomenia for the execution where the fire had broken out, here he stood, by all appearances safe and sound.
It was just before noon the day prior that the cardinal had sent out the distress signal. Normally, rushing over from the nearest continent by high-speed magic ship would take no fewer than five days. Even one of the fastest magic ships in the Empire of Baukis would need two to three days to make the trip. It was unthinkable that Allen had evaluated the distress call, decided to send aid, and made the necessary preparations for departure in just a single day.
“‘Revelation’? You mean to say that you had a premonition of these events?”
“Not exactly, but the pope mentioned that he had received a revelation just prior to the carrying out of the execution. He requested that a youth in gold be summoned...”
The cardinal, overcome with emotion, leaned in and pulled Keel into an embrace. Allen and the rest of the group simply watched on, making no attempt to assist their friend.
“Wha— L-Let go of me!”
Sounds like it wasn’t some kind of vision of the future, then. Judging by the situation in Teomenia, it wasn’t enough to call off the burning at the stake, but Elmea had still alerted them of danger.
Either way, it seemed that there was grounds for the Church to request help from the rest of the world. The pope, who had received a divine revelation of a youth in gold rushing to their aid, had ordered the cardinal to send that request, and in answering it, the Gamers now found themselves here.
After Keel had taken cover behind Allen’s back, Allen carried on the conversation on his behalf. “Sorry, but I think it’s too early to start getting emotional. The danger isn’t completely gone yet, so could you please tell us a little more about Daemonism and what’s going on now?”
“Y-Yes, you’re right. I trust you’ll continue your efforts to protect us?”
“Of course. We may only be one party, but I promise we’ll do our best.”
The Demon Lord Army had initiated an invasion from the north, and Allen wanted to reassure the cardinal that there was no cause for concern, even though his party had fewer than ten members.
“We believe in the revelation from Lord Elmea and thank you for your efforts. As for what happened...” The cardinal seemed to believe that this was somehow the intention of the God of Creation—something akin to fate. And though Allen did not know the specific details of the revelation, he figured it would be best if the Church entrusted him with carrying it out.
The cardinal began to describe what had happened. In the morning three days prior, throngs of people had filled the central square of Teomenia to the brim. They were members—so-called disciples—of a group called the Church of Gushara, and they had come knowing that their leader, Pontiff Gushara Selbirohl, was to be executed at noon.
“Did the disciples try to stop the execution?”
“Yes, they did. We of the Elmea Church, with the cooperation of Shia from Albahal, had captured Gushara and publicly tried him for his crimes and the terrible events his actions wrought. Our intention was to convince the disciples to abandon such terrifying, heretical teachings, but it only served to bring them together.”
Gushara had been guilty of many misdeeds within the Union over the past several decades. He had sweet-talked the people while skillfully increasing the number of his disciples by freely distributing alms. Behind the scenes, he gave his followers quotas for recruiting other disciples, and those who failed to meet them were severely punished or made examples of by being sacrificed to the evil god. Additionally, in order to maintain salvation without charge, he had made his disciples raid the homes of wealthy, noble, or otherwise influential people, many of whom had disappeared in the past few years.
It was only after the Church of Elmea had investigated and interrogated Gushara that all of this had come to light. The Church of Gushara had managed to keep such actions secret until then, even from most of its followers.
After it was decided that Gushara would be executed, the Church of Elmea had tried to convince his disciples that their pontiff had covertly perpetrated crimes deserving execution. Over time, this information reached every corner of the Church of Elmea; because not every city had magic tools for communication, the only way to explain the situation had been to gather believers of the Church of Gushara at a temple. As a result of these efforts, the execution has been delayed by more than a month.
“During that one-month period, the disciples of Daemonism gathered in Teomenia. It soon became clear that they intended to stop Gushara from being executed, so we assembled soldiers and kept them on standby.”
On the day of the execution, only mere days ago, followers of the Elmea Church who believed that the Pontiff of Daemonism deserved to be burned at the stake had gathered in the plaza, but there were an even greater number of Gushara’s disciples. A fence had needed to be set up to keep people from approaching the execution platform, and more troops had been stationed there. However, when the temple bells sounded at noon and Gushara was dragged to the platform, guarded by multiple soldiers, the cardinal and the priests had been surprised to find that Gushara’s disciples neither went on a rampage nor made any effort to save him.
Meanwhile, the pope had tried to persuade Pontiff Gushara one last time. If he were to change his mind and guide the disciples of Daemonism down the righteous path, he would be saved from being burned at the stake. In defiance of the merciful pope, however, Gushara had pulled what looked like a large silver plate out of his clothes. The next moment, pitch-black flames had overflowed from the silver plate, and the disciples were first to let out their cries of anguish. The pope did everything in his power to remedy the situation, but he had been unable to stop it and told the cardinals and other priests to escape from Teomenia.
“And was that the last you saw?” Allen asked.
“Yes. I beg of you, please save Pope Istahl. He has done so much for so many. I trust he is still safe.” The assembled priests began to sob at the cardinal’s words. Allen had heard at the Academy that Pope Istahl Kumes was a virtuous man who had led the Elmea Church for more than fifty years.
Prompted by Allen’s gaze, the cardinal continued to explain what had occurred. In the end, around the time the cardinal had left the plaza, pitch-black flames had covered the area, engulfing a large number of the disciples of Daemonism who had refused to flee.
“I can still hear the cries of those we were unable to save. Alas, thanks to you coming to this town’s rescue, I realize that this is what I was called to do.”
“I understand. Thank you,” Allen said to the pained cardinal.
Does this mean that the pontiff consumed his disciples in the flame to turn them into daemonic incarnations? Were the trolls and ogres also transformed disciples? Or were some other monsters and demons at work?
“What do we do, Allen?” Krena asked.
“Right, so we need to head to Teomenia, but we also need to protect the other towns and villages. However, before we can do any of that, there’s still one more thing I need to check.”
“Huh?”
Allen turned to the group that had gathered around them and shouted, “Excuse me, but are there any disciples of Daemonism here?!”
“What do you think you’re doing, Allen?”
The group gathered around them started looking around at each other with suspicion. Krena and the others were still unsure of exactly what Allen was doing.
“Any believers of Daemonism, step forward now!” Allen shouted again.
“I-It’s not Daemonism!” a young woman called out in response.
“Hmm? And who are you?”
A woman holding a baby stepped out from the crowd in front of Allen. “I’m a disciple of the Church of Gushara!” Allen inspected the woman.
Huh, so there were disciples here.
The reason Allen wanted to see if there were any believers was because he thought that no matter how much they had wanted to stop the execution of their pontiff, not everyone would have been present for it. He figured that if there were any such people, he could find out from them how one became a daemonic incarnation.
When the Gamers had defeated the humanoid monsters surrounding Neel, the log in Allen’s grimoire had noted that they were called “daemonic incarnations.” Many of them had looked both in appearance and dress to be normal humans, with the only difference being the paleness of their skin. They had not started life as monsters, so they were probably humans who had been turned into monsters. If he could figure out the cause, he might be able to turn them back—or at the very least prevent their numbers from increasing.
“I’m sorry; I got a bit ahead of myself and accidentally referred to it as Daemonism,” Allen said to the woman holding the baby when he noticed that she was glaring at him, tears in her eyes.
“N-No, it’s fine.” Though she seemed to forgive him, she still watched Allen with caution and held her baby tightly to protect them. The woman said nothing further as the crowd watched on in silence.
I’m impressed she could be such an ardent believer.
Allen did not have the same devotion to God of Creation Elmea as the rest of the world. He was grateful that he had been brought to this world and that he had been able to devote his life to it, but that was not faith. That being said, he had never believed in gods or anything, even in his previous life. He had played many games where good and evil clashed, where angels and demons fought, but he had done so because he had enjoyed those games, not because he had wanted justice to prevail or to defeat the devil.
In his previous life as Kenichi, he had played a certain online game under the username Kenpy. In that game, he had chosen the Holy Knight class not because of any overflowing sense of justice, but because he could acquire many skills that would prove effective against monsters. Holy Knight and the Dark Knight were two of the strongest warrior-type classes, but he had decided against Dark Knight because it had a lot of skills that were only useful in player-versus-player combat and could not be used against monsters. None of that was necessary to him since he had intended to level up by hunting monsters.
Once Kenichi had become an adult and started living on his own, Christmas was nothing more than a day to play games while eating fried chicken and cake from the supermarket. There would be fewer players online because it was a holiday, but that was all that crossed his mind. While that was Allen’s way of thinking, he had no desire to criticize other people’s beliefs. He felt that people were free to believe whatever they wanted.
However, if the Church of Gushara was killing people indiscriminately, he could no longer tolerate its existence. Though he might have apologized to the woman, he deemed the Church of Gushara to be an evil religion.
“So then, if you’re a follower of the Church of Gushara, what are you doing here? You didn’t go to Teomenia?”
“Well, you see, my child is still so young,” she responded.
Hmm, I see. There must still be quite a few disciples like her who were unable to go to Teomenia for personal reasons.
There was probably a whole slew of people who had not gone, such as those who could not leave their small children, elderly parents, or grandparents; or those who had given up because it was too far away; or even those who tried to go but did not make it in time. There were also almost certainly those who were too poor to make the trip.
There don’t seem to be any serfs here in Elmahl. Its population is probably as large as it is because their travels aren’t restricted
Elmahl did not have a class hierarchy and had no slaves. First and foremost, any country that joined the Union had to abolish serfdom. While criminals were treated like serfs in that their movements were restricted and they were forced to perform farm labor, they were released once their sentences had been served. In addition, with the exception of theocracies such as Elmahl, the vast majority of Union nations were republics. The Union founders had been a group of influential people who had either declared independence or been exiled from the Empire of Giamut. They may have been against serfdom and the slave system.
Perhaps the reason the Church of Gushara had spread on this continent was due to the freedom of movement between countries. In that case, it seemed that the ringleader had long planned to carry out his scheme on this continent, specifically in Elmahl.
“All right then, I’d like to ask you one more thing. Were there any terms or conditions for entering the Church of Gushara?”
“Well...”
The woman hesitated, so the cardinal spoke up in her place.
“I’ve heard that believers of Daemonism must drink something referred to as ‘holy water’ when joining the Church.” That he referred to the Church of Gushara as “Daemonism” right in front of one of its believers demonstrated how he considered Elmea and Gushara to be in conflict.
“Holy water?”
“It’s some sort of liquid that the pontiff referred to as such. All anyone had to do was drink it and they could become a disciple.”
“You’re rather well-informed.”
“We conducted an undercover investigation prior to arresting the pontiff. The Church of Elmea was unable to turn a blind eye in the face of such a dangerous cult as Daemonism.” Cardinal Krympton fixed the young mother and her baby with an angry glare. She returned his gaze with teary eyes.
“Did the priests conducting the undercover investigation by chance drink the holy water?”
“Most likely. However, we used magic to inspect it and found nothing out of the ordinary.”
I see. But still, this so-called holy water seems pretty suspicious. Maybe it seemed safe but actually contained something that was responsible for turning these people into daemonic incarnations? And yet, this woman isn’t a monster, so maybe you had to be near the flame for it to take effect?
“Keel, is there any kind of poison that a Cleric’s magic couldn’t discover?”
“Hmm, I’m not sure. But I guess it wouldn’t be able to find anything that didn’t cause any direct injury when ingested. The poison can only be uncovered by a Cleric’s magic if it harms the person at the time the magic is cast.”
Allen finally voiced his theory. “So, if there was a poison that wouldn’t turn you into a monster when you drank it but would when combined with something else, then...”
