Residents wept, overcome with emotion.
Priest Eizar spread his arms to embrace and soothe them.
“Mister. I think my conscience stings every time I come here.”
At Arin’s words, Sinhyeok replied brazenly.
“Endure it, no, enjoy it. Enjoy it while they like you.”
When light fell upon them, the residents returned home in relief.
“It’s okay. Ariel will protect us now.”
“Amen! Even if the world is in such a sorry state, Ariel will lead us to paradise!”
Watching the departing residents, Sinhyeok felt a strange sense of déjà vu.
‘Paradise? And it seems they know about the outside.’
Once the residents withdrew, Priest Eizar entered the temple.
The door closed, and he immediately collapsed to the floor with a thud.
“Priest!”
He smiled with difficulty and said.
“That seems quite effective.”
“No, what do you mean effective? Damn it!”
After saying only that, he fainted again.
“This is driving me crazy.”
Sinhyeok first checked whether the barrier was maintained.
‘Fortunately, the barrier is intact.’
“Let’s lay him back in his room.”
“W-we will help support him!”
One of the male residents who had awakened holy power picked up the priest.
He looked at him with eyes full of worry.
Seeing this, Sinhyeok spoke to him.
“What is your name?”
“I’m Leon.”
“I’m Marina. For your information, I’m Leon’s older sister.”
She introduced herself with a smile.
Seeing the cheerful appearance of the two, Sinhyeok asked on a hunch.
“Did the priest tell you?”
The two nodded silently.
“Ah.”
“Ah.”
Marina smiled and spoke to the three.
“Thank you. Thanks to all of you, we received grace and great help. I sincerely thank you.”
Arin made an awkward expression.
“I’m very sorry. We didn’t mean to deceive you with bad intentions.”
Leon, who was holding the priest, spoke in a bright voice.
“It’s okay. In our hearts, you are still angels.”
For some reason, those words pricked the consciences of the three.
After laying Eizar down in his room, Sinhyeok asked the two about what had happened so far.
Leon spoke with him in the chapel.
“Truthfully, it had been peaceful until now. Everyone believed strongly in the priest, and the barrier was firm. We lived only waiting for the day when things would return to normal.”
Just hearing these words, he felt that there had been no problem.
Sinhyeok recalled what had happened a few days ago.
‘The shortening of the Brake.’
“Did abnormalities start happening a few days ago?”
Leon looked at Sinhyeok with surprised eyes as he had strangely guessed correctly.
“Yes! Starting a few days ago, the barrier shook every night.”
“Ah.”
This place had been affected as well.
“So every night, we fought and fought again.”
“Goodness.”
So for those past few days, Priest Eizar had been fighting without sleep.
“We rotated shifts, but the priest couldn’t rest for days. Fighting at night and comforting the residents during the day.”
He had been going through an insane schedule.
“You two don’t look fine either. Go and rest.”
Looking at Leon and Marina’s faces, Sinhyeok suggested they rest.
‘They said they rested in shifts, but their dark circles are distinct. Their skin is cracked, and their lips are parched.’
Arin reassured the two.
“We will stand guard. Please rest, even if only for a moment.”
When even Arin stepped forward to speak, the two got up.
“Then we’ll leave it to you for a moment.”
“We’re counting on you.”
The two headed toward their prepared space in the temple.
The three remaining in the chapel looked at each other.
“Shall we rotate watch duty for now?”
“I’ll do it. Just stay on standby.”
[Mapping initiated.]
‘One unit in the village, one unit outside.’
It began exploring both places simultaneously.
‘Hoo, every time I do this, my head spins.’
Smack!
He slapped his own cheek.
“Come on, focus.”
Two to three hours passed while keeping watch using Mapping when a presence was felt from the priest’s room.
“Hm?”
The priest came out of the room in relatively decent shape.
“Hm? Priest, are you already up?”
“I know, right? My body is very energetic.”
He jumped up and down in place, throwing punches forward with swishing sounds.
“Like this! My body is just so energetic! Ugh!”
He twisted his waist, and it cracked.
He put his hand on his waist and trembled.
“K-kuh!”
Priest Eizar infused his waist with holy power and forced a smile.
“I-I’m fine.”
“Please be careful. Vigorous exercise at your age is dangerous.”
“Haha. Still, thanks to you, Brother, I’ve recovered. That thing you gave me earlier is truly miraculous. My fatigue melted away in an instant.”
‘So that’s what vitality surging means?’
Rapid fatigue recovery had occurred.
It seemed not all of the potion’s efficacy was listed in its description alone.
‘I need to remember that separately.’
Priest Eizar looked out the window and said.
“It seems you are using that strange technique again?”
“You can feel it right away?”
He smiled gently.
“Because I can see everything.”
The priest sat beside Sinhyeok.
He gazed out the window without a word.
“Priest.”
Sinhyeok brought up the words he had been putting off to the silent man.
“You’re going to say we have to leave, aren’t you.”
“You won’t be able to endure it anymore now. The calamity of the end has drawn one layer closer.”
He closed his eyes and clasped his hands together.
“I felt it too. The veil of the world is splitting, and all sorts of vicious things are invading through the gaps. It seems the day it returns to primordial chaos is drawing near.”
“It will be difficult for you to remain here any longer.”
At the reality handed down like a death sentence, Eizar trembled.
“Please give me a moment to think. I will answer you before long.”
Sinhyeok got up, leaving him deep in thought.
When Sinhyeok came out of the chapel, Ichan was looking around.
When Sinhyeok saw Ichan, he overlapped with Priest Eizar.
‘If it’s Ichan. Maybe he can convince him.’
He approached Ichan and spoke.
“Go and convince him for me.”
“M-me?”
“Yeah, you’re the only one. You absolutely have to do it.”
Ichan looked around with a flustered face.
“...H-hyung?”
He looked at Sinhyeok, who had already left, in bewilderment and panicked.
“H-how.”
Having no other means, Ichan just looked around and waited.
Sinhyeok left him behind and went out to look around.
“I should make a report. The time is up.”
Sinhyeok headed for the portal.
‘It’s time to collect these spells here too.’
When they first discovered this place and left, Brigadier General Igangyeol had cast an area-wide translation magic and a magic to conceal the portal in the vicinity.
“Let’s quickly report and come back.”
* * *
A quiet chapel.
Ichan simply watched Eizar, who had been praying silently.
He opened his eyes after a while. He leaned his back against the chair with a resigned expression.
Then his eyes met Ichan’s.
“H-hello?”
Eizar smiled brightly.
“Hello.”
He beckoned Ichan over.
“Y-yes? Me?”
Ichan approached reluctantly with an uneasy expression.
“I called you because I simply needed a conversation partner. Is it very burdensome?”
“Ah, no.”
Eizar looked at Ichan and asked.
“I was curious when I saw you last time as well; why are you wearing a mask on your face? You seem to be a Dark Elf.”
“Huh! Y-you can see?!”
Ichan touched his face.
“It’s perfectly fine though?”
“Hehe. That’s because we’re inside the barrier. Here, I can see and do almost anything as long as I have enough of this.”
He curled his finger into a circle.
“Ah, not money but faith?”
“Yes.”
Ichan quickly looked around and fiddled with the necklace he was wearing.
The disguise disappeared, revealing his protruding ears and dark skin.
“On Earth, people get scared and feel burdened when I go around like this. And it’s dangerous too.”
Eizar looked at Ichan, who had taken off his disguise for the first time in a while and had a refreshed expression.
“Why are you wandering about?”
Ichan made a bitter expression.
“I left my homeland. Now I’ve settled on Earth.”
“You left.”
He made the same bitter expression as Ichan and said.
“One always ends up leaving.”
At his question about the memories of his homeland, Ichan’s expression stiffened.
“No, I couldn’t leave of my own accord.”
“Then why?”
“My family, my Father Tree, expelled me.”
Priest Eizar looked at his expression full of regret.
Looking into his eyes, he asked.
“Could you return to your homeland?”
“No, my homeland has already disappeared. I’m sorry, but your world will end up the same way, Priest.”
Ichan had no eloquence to persuade the priest. He could only confess the truth.
“That is this world’s fate, isn’t it?”
He smiled bitterly as if facing reality.
Priest Eizar looked out the window and said.
“Do you know why I cannot leave this world?”
“Ah, no. I haven’t heard.”
“I suppose I’m saying this for the second time. Only Ariel, whom I served, knew. My daughter, my wife, my mother, and my father remain here.”
“Ah?”
Ichan’s head grew complicated at the words that the priest had a child despite being a priest.
“A daughter? A wife?”
Seeing Ichan’s thoroughly complicated expression, he chuckled.
“You can think of me not as a priest, but as an apostle. In other words, a Hero.”
“Ah! No wonder you used holy power so freely!”
“Kuhuk, that’s also the reason I could fully inherit Ariel’s Sun. I received a portion of her divinity from the beginning.”
“Aah, so that’s why. You’re similar to me.”
The two had many similarities.
“My entire family is here. They are already dead with no souls remaining, but all their traces are in this place.”
The priest touched the chair in the chapel with his hand, recalling memories.
“A few years after my daughter was born, I was chosen as a Hero. I was so foolishly happy back then. I loved my family and daughter so very much. I shouldn’t have done it. I shouldn’t have said a word, and I shouldn’t have left calling myself a Hero.”
He muttered much regret as he recalled the past.
“When I returned, nothing remained. Just a burned village. I searched and searched inside it to find my family’s remains, which couldn’t even be distinguished.”
“...”
“In the end, I couldn’t find them. So I rebuilt the village here again. With a heart of atonement.”
Priest Eizar clasped his hands together and prayed toward someone.
“I still, I still haven’t begged them. Begged them to forgive me. I haven’t been able to beg them to please forgive me.”
Tears streamed down both his eyes.
“I’m sorry. Could you tell your Brother? That I cannot leave.”
Ichan silently watched the priest in that state, then got up.
When he came out, he saw Sinhyeok.
“The priest said he won’t leave, right?”
“Ah, you knew?”
“More or less. The Battalion Commander told me before. He had told me what the priest’s circumstances were.”
Sinhyeok looked at him sitting alone in the chapel and sighed.
“It’s impossible, right?”
Looking at him, Ichan spoke with a surge of emotion.
“No! We have to! No, we have to resolve it!”
Sinhyeok looked at him making such bold claims with puzzlement.
“How?”
“W-well, because hyung will help me well?”
In other words, what Ichan meant was that there was no clear-cut solution.
“Stop joking.”
“There is a way. I’m good at necromancy, right?”
“You?”
Ichan’s mood almost soured at Sinhyeok’s questioning reply.
“I’m good at it. Even among us Dark Elves, I was rumored to be a necromancy prodigy.”
“You’re kidding.”
“Ah! Really! Anyway! I know how to perform a spirit summons!”
“Hm?”
“The priest is like that because he couldn’t meet his family. I’ve seen it a lot. People who can’t let go of their regrets. I can resolve that.”
“Oh! Then what are you doing? Why aren’t you doing it right now!?”
“...”
Ichan silently scratched his chin.
“For that, I needed some kind of potion, a potion.”