Chapter 593
“Grrk.”
With the sound of blood, Spil toppled over.
His body, like the other Paladins, crumbled away like sand and vanished.
- He doesn’t even leave a shadow behind.
“He was a ghost to begin with.”
Leaving Jack behind, who sounded disappointed that there was not even a shadow left, Su-ho approached the Paladin Stone they had held up like their heart.
He had never seen it before, but the Paladin Stone, an enormous stele reminiscent of the stele of King Gwanggaeto’s tomb, had a presence that strangely made his chest swell just by facing it.
Su-ho placed his hand on the Paladin Stone, which was filled with unknown letters.
“.......”
There was no reaction.
It seemed simple contact was not enough.
After thinking for a moment, Su-ho drew up True Demon and began sharing it with the Paladin Stone.
Then Su-ho’s True Demon began seeping into the letters carved in intaglio, and the stone gradually began to respond.
Hwaaaak!
At last, when light filled every letter all the way to the one at the very top, the Paladin Stone vibrated and began resonating with Su-ho in earnest.
The letters that had begun glowing from the top slowly descended as if draining downward, transferring light into Su-ho.
The light he received was unexpectedly cold.
That was when it happened.
Crack!
The sound of something splitting.
When he turned his head toward the source of the sound, it was coming from the Paladin Stone.
The sound grew louder and louder, and cracks began forming from the very top of the stele until it broke apart completely.
Kwa-gwa-gwa-gwa-gwa!
Stone fragments poured down, raising a cloud of dust.
Su-ho was not hit.
Because Jack had spread his shadow and protected him.
Before long, the dust cleared, and a large hole had appeared where the Paladin Stone had stood. Inside it, a staircase leading downward was revealed.
- That is one grand invitation.
“Seems like it, right?”
Still, even though the inside should have been visible because of the Vampire Blood effect, the underground below was extremely dark.
Su-ho thought for a moment, then decided to just go in.
Once Su-ho had fully descended into the staircase, the entrance seemed to wriggle, then closed completely as if it had been flat ground from the start.
Thud!
At the sound of the ground closing, Su-ho briefly looked back, but soon shook his head and continued down the stairs.
He had expected his vision to brighten quickly thanks to the Vampire Blood effect, but everything before his eyes remained dark.
Strangely, however, he could see outlines like thin lines, so even in the pitch-black darkness, going downward did not pose much of a problem.
Soon, he reached the end of the staircase, and Su-ho asked,
“Can you see anything?”
He was asking Jack.
But no answer came back.
“Jack?”
- .......
Still silence.
‘Is he messing with me?’
Just as he thought that and was about to ask another question, an unfamiliar voice rang out.
- You cannot meet that friend here.
At the unfamiliar voice, Su-ho raised his head and looked around, then asked cautiously,
“Are you perhaps the Paladin Stone?”
At that moment, the surroundings brightened, and an old man wearing a shabby, faded black priest’s robe appeared before his eyes.
He had white hair and a deeply wrinkled face, and a single sword hung at his waist, sheathed in a black scabbard.
The man who had revealed himself greeted Su-ho.
“It is a pleasure to meet you. I am Roland of the Paladin Stone.”
‘As expected.’
An unfamiliar space and an unfamiliar voice.
On top of that, Jack had been sealed away as well, so Su-ho had suspected it might be the case, and it was.
Su-ho asked,
“Are you a Master too?”
At that question, Roland answered with his distinctly dry gaze.
“Rather than a Master, I would call myself a ghost. My body has already died and was used to form the Paladin Stone.”
“Used to form it? Don’t tell me they mixed in your bone powder or something?”
“I will leave that to your imagination. More importantly, I have been watching your actions all along. You are an interesting person in many ways.”
“I hope you mean interesting in a positive sense. What did you find interesting?”
“Ruinberg’s trial was interesting.”
‘Ruinberg’s trial was interesting, huh.’
Su-ho’s eyebrow rose slightly without him realizing it.
“In what way?”
“The fact that you distinguished good and evil according to your own philosophy.”
“I see. Then what do you think, sir?”
He had been told the name Roland and knew the man was a Master, but since it did not yet feel familiar, the title “sir” came out naturally.
Roland did not seem to care much either.
“I believe your choice was correct.”
“Pardon?”
“I said your judgment was right.”
“......?”
For a moment, Su-ho doubted his own ears.
From Silen to Ruinberg to Spil, every Paladin Su-ho had met had shown behavior bordering on fanaticism.
And yet from the mouth of Roland, the Master of the Paladin Stone they regarded as most sacred, came an answer Su-ho had never expected at all.
Of course he could not help being surprised.
“Are you serious?”
“What reason would I have to lie to you?”
“I’m honestly a little surprised. The holy knights I’ve met so far were all desperate to treat me like a heretic.”
“A heretic......”
At the word heretic, a troubled look settled over Roland’s face.
“How did the Paladins end up in this state......”
What was this?
It seemed there was a story he could not tell easily.
Su-ho asked immediately.
“What do you mean by that?”
“The Paladin Stone is a sacred relic of the Pantheon where teachings have been gathered for later generations of Paladins. Those who were called the strongest among all Paladins in history all received my teachings.”
“Ah, directly from you, sir?”
“Yes. That is also my role. But how should I put it... at some point, I stopped being able to communicate with these fellows.”
“You stopped being able to communicate?”
“How should I say it... Their eyes seemed a little crazed......?”
“Crazed...?”
“Yes. Even things I said without much thought seemed to be received in an extremely grandiose way. They would say everything was according to God’s will.”
“......?”
What was he talking about now?
The more Su-ho listened to Roland, the more his head tilted to the side.
Because Roland felt quite different in disposition from the Paladins he had met so far.
Roland continued.
“What do you think a Paladin is?”
“An executor of God who judges evil in God’s place and annihilates evil... or so the other Paladins said.”
“Well, it is not entirely wrong, but... haa......”
Roland rubbed his face with one hand.
“I am not a Demi-Constellation or a Constellation, so I cannot watch every situation. Still, I can see and hear everything that happens within the sanctuary. For reference, sanctuary refers to the Pantheon as well as every domain connected to the Pantheon.”
“And?”
“So while watching you all along, I was also able to see and hear what the other Paladins said. And those fellows were definitely crazed. Not subtly crazed, but very clearly so.”
A spark gradually began catching in his dry-looking expression.
“Originally, Paladin referred to the finest knights among the knights who served the master I served. However, my master, the Great Emperor, worshiped God, and because of that, we too followed our master, believed in that God, and came to follow God’s teachings. Then, as my master’s nation gradually grew larger and more prosperous, people began calling us sacred knights who served God, and Paladin came to mean knight of God.”
“So that was the story behind it. Then, sir, do you not believe in the chief god Quai?”
“I do believe. However, separate from believing in God, we were not God’s servants, but our master’s swords. In other words, we believed in God, but the master we served came before God. Yet as time passed, that meaning seemed to become distorted, until the tail began wagging the dog.”
“The later holy knights began placing greater meaning on serving God rather than serving a master.”
“Yes. And as the meaning of Paladin became distorted in that way, even the knights who protected temples began calling themselves holy knights, and thanks to that, the meanings of Paladin and holy knight seem to have become completely warped.”
“Good grief......”
My god.
He had not known there was a story like this behind it.
Roland continued.
“It is frustrating. No matter how much I believe in God, I believe living humans are more important than God. My master was human as well. This is also what my master and my other fellow knights believed. Yet listening to what my juniors say, that causal relationship has now been completely reversed. So to be honest, when I watched Ruinberg’s trial, it was extremely satisfying. I thought a proper leader had finally appeared in the Pantheon.”
“Then, sir, are you supporting my will rather than the junior Paladins’?”
“Of course. I never supported my juniors’ will in the first place.”
“But you taught them, didn’t you?”
“Standing in solidarity with someone’s will and giving instruction are separate matters.”
“Oh......”
Su-ho’s eyes flashed.
It was because he felt he had finally met the first proper person in the Pantheon.
Then a thought suddenly occurred to him.
“By the way, sir?”
“Yes?”
“You are still a holy knight who uses sacred arts, aren’t you?”
“I am. And?”
“Then how exactly are you using them?”
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t know much about it, but aren’t sacred arts fundamentally manifested through faith in God? Even if they are divine magic based on mana. But you’re someone who believes humans come before God. So how are you able to use sacred arts?”
“......?”
At Su-ho’s question, Roland narrowed his brow.
“I said humans should take precedence over God. I never said I did not believe in God... And while my master’s will comes first, that does not mean I completely ignore God’s will either.”
“Ah, then as long as you believe, you can use sacred arts?”
“Yes. In any case, sacred arts are divine magic based on mana.”
“Ah?”
All of his questions were answered.
At the same time, a smile began forming on Su-ho’s face.
Because unlike what Spil had said to frighten him, he thought he might be able to obtain the power of Paladins more easily than expected.