Trapped in a Game That Flopped

Chapter 88

Episode 88

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Nise, who had run up the temple's front steps in a hurry lest he be caught by the kidnapper again, gradually slowed his pace as the entrance drew closer.

As if the unidentifiable sense of elation from just a moment ago had never been, his heart slowly calmed.

Finally, having climbed all the stairs, Nise stopped completely in front of the entrance.

Perhaps because it was late lunchtime, the area near the Temple was quiet.

The large, wide-open door, which seemed to welcome anyone, somehow felt like the maw of a monster today.

'I don't want to go in.'

Startled by the thought that had surfaced without him even realizing, Nise looked around.

It was in case he had said it out loud and someone had heard.

Fortunately, there was no one around.

Nise's face, as he let out a sigh of relief, was colored with gloom.

'Liv must be waiting...'

When he thought of his sister, who would be waiting eagerly just for him, he knew he had to go in, but for some reason, his feet wouldn't move.

Nise peeked back.

"If you don't want to go, you don't have to."

It was because of the hope that the strange kidnapper might still be standing in the alley.

But the alley he had run out of was empty, without even an ant's shadow.

'Then again, who am I?'

I'm not Liv, the Saintess. Why would she take in someone as useless as me?

It was ridiculous to expect such a thing from a kidnapper.

'I should have just left the curse, so she'd have to find the Temple...'

He had impulsively removed the faint trace of the curse remaining on her hands, but Nise quickly felt regret.

If he had just left it, she might not have been able to endure the curse and come looking for the Temple.

Then, maybe, we could have met again, even if just by chance.

Nise found himself, for having such wicked thoughts, unfamiliar and strange.

Nevertheless, he couldn't tear his gaze away from the empty alley.

It was then.

"You, you...!"

Suddenly, a thunderous roar came from the front.

When he snapped his head around, a group of priests was coming out of the Temple.

They were familiar faces. They were the priests who had been part of the Saintess's procession until just yesterday.

While Nise bowed his head in greeting, they quickly approached.

"Wh, where on earth have you been that you're just now coming!"

"Do you know how much the Saintess was looking for you! We thought you'd run away...!"

"Enough. Stop it, all of you!"

The priests, who had instantly surrounded Nise and were rebuking him, shut their mouths at someone's intervention.

An old man, who appeared to be a high-ranking High Priest, recited to Nise with a stiff expression.

"The Pope is looking for you. Hurry to the Fourth Prayer Room."

"...Yes."

Nise bowed and then started walking.

A moment later. Inside the Fourth Prayer Room, located in the deepest part of the Temple.

The dim room, lit by only a few candles, existed for priests who could not overcome worldly temptations to bind themselves and atone.

But from some point on, the purpose of the Fourth Prayer Room had changed slightly.

The heavily wrinkled Pope was already seated in a chair, fiddling with a golden seal engraved with the upper body of the Goddess.

Nise removed his robe with a familiar motion.

And, in his thin underclothes, he knelt on the floor, where the faint smell of blood still lingered.

"...Yes. You're late."

The Pope finally opened his stiff lips to acknowledge him.

Nise answered, his head bowed low.

"...Y, yes. I fainted from the attack, so..."

"Where were you. The Holy Knights said they were looking for you."

"I, I was collapsed in a nearby alley."

"Did anyone see you?"

"N, no one. R, really."

Even while reciting the lie without hesitation, he couldn't hide his trembling voice.

It was hard to tell even a small lie in front of the Pope.

Because when those snake-like, slender eyes looked down on him, he felt as if he was seeing right through everything.

The Pope, who had been silent for a while, finally grabbed the seal he was fiddling with and pulled it out.

At the end of it, connected to a long rod, were small, tough bundles of leather, engraved with an ornate brown pattern.

It was a whip made from skinning a python-type monster that had once appeared in the old temple.

"Lift your head and look me in the eyes, Nise."

The Pope, who had lifted Nise's chin with the gruesome tip of the whip, looked deep into his eyes and asked once more.

"You swear to the Goddess, there is not a single lie in your words, correct?"

Gulp. He swallowed dryly.

A learned fear washed over him as he met the Pope's eyes, which had lost their sharp light due to old age.

But why?

At that moment, did the words of that strange kidnapper come to mind.

"...I was just taking responsibility."

Nise gathered his remaining courage and answered.

"Yes. I swear, it is not a lie."

"...Good."

The Pope, who had been staring into Nise's eyes for a long time, finally withdrew the whip.

However, before he could even feel relieved, a stern voice continued.

"...Nise. You, like Liv, have received the sacred teachings of the church, so you must know well."

"...Yes."

"When the Goddess creates a human, she bestows upon them a single purpose."

It was a doctrine he had heard to death.

But, ridiculously, no such words were written in any scripture.

While he moved his lips, unable to refute, the Pope got to the main point.

"This Father believed that you, too, would not be unaware that this procession was for you to fulfill your purpose."

"...Y, yes."

"Yes. Having followed the procession route, what was the outside world like? Had the world changed at all compared to six years ago?"

The Pope asked, feigning the role of a benevolent father.

What the world he'd seen for the first time in six years was like.

The world had changed a lot.

The Imperial Palace had been turned upside down overnight, and the Temple was in an uproar, but the people welcomed the Saintess as if nothing was wrong.

Perhaps because the long famine was over, the streets were more vibrant than six years ago, and although he didn't know if they had intentionally chosen only such places, there were no villages that looked particularly destitute.

The outside air he breathed for the first time in six years was so fresh and good.

He learned for the first time of a place called a hotel, and that its food was so delicious.

So much so that he didn't want to come back to the Temple.

But Nise knew all too well the answer the Pope wanted.

"...N, no. Almost nothing had changed."

When he answered that, the Pope nodded with a satisfied smile.

"That's right. Just like the place where you twins lived six years ago, the world outside the Temple is still full of desolate and barren places. Many people desperately long for the Goddess's touch. Because of that, the Temple is busy every moment, and every second passes by regrettably."

"..."

"Having eaten the Temple's food for that long, it's time you knew that much, Nise. But..."

The Pope's gaze, which had been trailing off, sharpened in an instant.

As if he had never worn a benevolent smile, he looked down at Nise with an expressionless face.

His cold eyes held a trace of disgust. As if looking at an insect.

"You couldn't even properly manage that one cursed ability you have, and you've caused great harm to your sister and the Temple."

"I, I'm sorry. I, it's all my fault."

"Why did that one gargoyle run rampant?"

What was bound to come had come. Nise squeezed his eyes shut.

Even though he knew it was unavoidable, a distant fear washed over him.

"...I, I failed to do it properly. I, I'm sorry."

"The fact that you failed to do it properly is a matter the Goddess is already aware of. My question is, why did that one gargoyle spew an ominous energy?"

"I, if a monster's corpse decays quickly... s, sometimes th, that can happen."

Nise, while trembling, faithfully gave the answer he had prepared.

It wasn't an entirely unheard-of thing when resurrecting a body that was too decayed.

Although, the gargoyles were fresh ones, captured alive by mercenaries hired by the Temple the day before the procession.

And a rotten corpse would typically explode, not have its head severed.

Even at Nise's answer, the Pope narrowed his eyes, as if not quite convinced.

"What about the curse?"

"Th, that also... o, occurred... during the process of m, me resurrecting the monsters..."

He was so nervous that his stutter was even worse than usual.

"Nise."

The Pope, unable to listen anymore, frowned and stopped him.

"Your sister returned with a red rash all over her body."

"..."

Nise's head dropped powerlessly.

'She said she was fine...'

The kidnapper hadn't told him that, so he hadn't known at all.

The Pope, immediately noticing Nise felt guilty, skillfully began to tear him down.

"No one welcomes a disfigured Saintess. As it is, your sister's position is precarious because even her one and only healing power is insignificant..."

"..."

"As her only older brother, you should be helping, not ruining your sister's future. How could you?"

He remembered Liv, who had come to him the day before the procession, begging for help with a desperate face.

At that moment, Nise felt his breath catch, as if someone was choking him.

Watching him, the Pope asked with an overbearing smile.

"Among the doctrines I taught you, what happens to one who fails to fulfill their purpose?"

"Th, they must at, atone until their purpose is fulfilled... a, and if they still can't..."

"..."

"Th, they must return to the Goddess's embrace."

"Whether today ends with your atonement, or with you returning to the Goddess's embrace. It seems we will have to pray to the Goddess for her blessing."

Chwaak!

The Pope swung the whip through the air once and stood up from his seat.

Even though he was clearly older and smaller than him, Nise couldn't understand why he seemed so impossibly large.

The deep wrinkles on the Pope's brow deepened further as he looked down at the trembling Nise.

"Take off your upper garments and lie flat."

It was an order he could not defy.

Nise, as always, resigned himself.