Aren’t they neglecting me too much?
I’m just eating, sleeping, and defecating now?
Because I’m living very regularly, Joanna’s life has become more relaxed. I’m really like a wild animal meta, if you just feed me, I take care of everything else myself.
Fortunately, it wasn’t boring.
Because the number of people I can see increased by three more. Wide, Isla, and Tis.
As soon as Hieronymus parted from me, he took the children to the area used for training people. Through long corridors and wide spaces that appear in between, all the way.
The reason I called it an area is because it’s not just a wide open space. This place where the Future Hope Church is located is divided into quite diverse zones.
I’ve made a map of about 1/3 through the memories of 6 people in total.
First, the space where I was summoned, which is at the deepest underground. Rooms and passages spread out from there like an ant colony.
Moreover, perhaps to make people who don’t know well get lost if they come in, there are frequently strangely winding paths.
And inside, there’s a huge chapel, and perhaps to allow people to live in case of emergency, there’s an area for living inside. Joanna has been to almost all areas in such underground.
However, she knows almost nothing about the areas outside the underground.
Because it’s only the village she used to go out to bring food supplies. Before that, she was in a different village.
But what’s concerning is that this underground is too big. Even if it’s a world with magic, did they make such a huge underground lair in just about 10 years?
It’s strange.
Maybe something will be visible if I examine the place with the altar in detail later. It’s not strange if they’re occupying and using a place that already existed. In the world I was in before, there were places like catacombs or Petra.
Thinking about that, it’s not strange that there’s such an underground city.
It’s just that the time is too fast.
But it might be difficult to find other traces. Because when someone occupies someone else’s temple, they thoroughly destroy traces of the previous god.
Like in Egypt, where they shave off noses or cover with soot by lighting fires because it’s too huge.
The reason I’m thinking about this is simple.
There’s a possibility that there are places that even Hieronymus doesn’t know, let alone Joanna.
If you consider various possibilities, you can make different choices when necessary. If you don’t think about anything, there are cases where you only have one option at that crucial moment.
If you have a lot of time, you have time to think.
And while thinking, I check how the Future Hope Church moves with the children.
They walked for a very long time. In other words, they walked far enough to leave this underground lair.
After passing through complex winding places, they came out to a cave entrance where a village could be seen in the distance.
It’s a place disguised like an animal den.
It’s the first time I’m seeing outside with eyes, not through someone else’s memory. It’s midday so the surroundings are clearly visible. Looking around through the three people’s gazes, it’s more desolate than what I saw in memories.
There are trees, but they’re very sparsely distributed, and even those are plants similar to cacti.
It’s that kind of barren place often seen in American Western movies.
While Wide and Isla are admiring the outside scenery, Tis looks around and his body slumps.
Oh.
Did he perhaps think he could escape?
Well, he did have an unusually strong aversion. This is innate. A personality that can refuse things he judges as not right according to his thinking.
People’s personalities are diverse, and most can be corrected through physical abuse in the name of education, but.
There are exceptions.
In such cases, they usually kill them.
But Tis lived until the point where he gained the wisdom to adapt himself to the heterogeneity around him. That’s how he survived.
This is very interesting.
Anyway, Hieronymus took them into the village.
And as soon as they entered the village, a man called Witga came out to greet them. He’s the highest among the instructors.
While doing so, he verbally builds up their self-esteem, saying they’ve received a blessing, they’re chosen beings.
What’s hard to hold back laughter at is that neither the man called Witga nor Hieronymus thinks that way at all.
It’s obvious at a glance, but Wide, Isla, and even Tis don’t seem to notice. Though Tis just seems to dislike the fact of being chosen itself.
Yet they don’t understand well about others’ coldness. Is it because they’re looking at objects, not people?
Or is it because they’ve only seen such eyes?
Witga, looking at them with such eyes, took them to some place.
There were several big men there. One of them is the person who brought the boy called Isithur la Planja before.
In other words, he’s a person of the warrior class.
Witga brought the children in front of them and shouted loudly.
He bestowed that power on the child first. Therefore, there’s a reason why you receive the blessing late.
He talks like that.
Huh? Then it sounds like they volunteered to receive the blessing? But because there was a situation where even well-trained warriors might fly away, they made excuses and pushed the children in.
That’s how it looks.
But lying is bad. He should have given me a hint before telling them. Otherwise, it’s a lie that might be exposed someday.
Of course, he could thoroughly control the meeting between simple believers and me, but.
How long can such control that shakes the subjectivity of faith last in this kind of church?
Let’s plant this seed a bit later, and first watch the scene of experimenting with the three children.
Of course, they say it’s to show how powerful the blessing is, but in reality, it’s an experiment.
I’m curious too.
And the result.
It was quite surprising.
Tis really got beaten up badly and collapsed, but Isla and Wide were different.
First, Isla.
She took down more than five opponents alone. Later when two people rushed her at the same time, it seems it was indeed too much for her as she got hit and collapsed.
The one who changed the most was Wide.
He attaches purple flames to his hands. Then everyone’s gaze changed, and one warrior who faced him instantly burst into flames.
And then the next warrior also burst into flames, and finally a warrior who could use magic came out. He wrapped light around his sword and floated an ice chunk in the air.
But when purple flames enveloped Wide’s entire body, all of those couldn’t touch Wide and burned away.
And when the enemies disappeared, the purple fire vanished.
It’s a flame that doesn’t burn himself but burns the opponent.
Wide boasts about this loudly. Saying it’s the power given by Miss Rebecca. That she didn’t give it to these two, only he was chosen.
No, I didn’t particularly give it differently?
I proceeded with exactly the same procedure as far as I could tell.
If there’s a difference, it’s that both the light and warmth were very big here. But that was the same for Isla.
Rather, only Tis had unusually little warmth compared to the similar size of light.
Anyway, using the purple flames as an indicator, Wide further strengthens his legitimacy. Especially regarding faith.
He says he received such a gift because he believed the most earnestly.
There are exactly two people watching this with frowning expressions.
Hieronymus and Witga.
Other people thought this was the answer to the faith they believed in, so they offer prayers while looking at that flame.
They’re chanting for a long time the name Cruxshibal that sounds like a curse.
It seems like a name that doesn’t suit the name Future Hope Church.
And in the meantime, there’s something interesting. Isla, who’s looking up at Wide with a jealous expression, is in pain all over her body right now.
Because she was hit for quite a while when fighting 2 vs 1. Her whole body is aching and she’s feeling more anger than that pain. That’s towards the opponent in front of her. And there’s a faint despair about why she wasn’t chosen.
She said that while grasping the dirt on the ground.
But this child isn’t the interesting one.
The interesting one is none other than the boy named Tis.
He’s the only one among them who didn’t grow taller, and his skin color didn’t change. Only his hair color changed.
But he did gain an ability. Because nowhere on his body hurts anymore. I don’t know to what level, but he was hit so hard during the fight that something must have really broken, but there’s not a single place that hurts.
After being hit and flying away, he’s lying still on the ground without moving his body, but he wasn’t unconscious. He’s holding his breath and quietly observing the situation.
And just before Wide’s speech ends, he gets up and quickly goes behind Isla and prostrates himself.
Why does he go there?
But I soon understood the reason. Wide started making comparisons. First, he pointed at Tis and mocked him for not gaining any power despite receiving the blessing.
Then he immediately looked at Isla and persistently insisted that he was above her.
Hmm. My prediction was slightly twisted. I thought if the three had similar powers, Wide would pick a fight with Tis based on the order they received my blessing, but now that’s difficult.
Rather, Isla harbored resentment towards Wide. And it seems she’s feeling a faint sense of defeat too.
Although it’s said their skills are similar, in reality, Isla was slightly above, but this overturned that.
I like Wide too. My goodness. I got warmth equivalent to five people! Isla didn’t kill anyone. Tis was defeated by getting hit by the first opponent.
The harvester is performing to its full capacity!
Hehe.
Warmth is seeping in. It’s like when you’re shivering in a cold place, and a warm breeze sweeps over your whole body briefly.
I was able to obtain warmth while figuring out how much the people I gave myself to changed.
Today is a good day.