The next morning, the Ardis and his twin brothers and guides decided to visit Elmer.
One big building near the center of the village was taken to Din who walks at the top. It was a tall one-story house that was a little more polite than the house where the residents lived, but did not give a simple impression. Din and Karina each pull the double door, and the outside light shines into the building.
"Is there Elmer?"
"Oh, that voice is Din. Do you have any help?"
A male voice returned from the back of the building to Din's question.
"Good morning, Elmer. I've brought you in to listen to the story."
"I don't care. Please enter."
Din who hears a reply and enters as it is. Prompted by Karina, Aldis and others went behind.
"Do you mean customers who came to the village yesterday?"
The Lord of Voices appeared.
A short, old man. Wrinkled round face, pure white mustache, eyes are slightly droopy, and if you laugh, it is so thin that it disappears. Wearing a robe with a long hem that looks a little ritual, although not flashy. The atmosphere looked like a teacher or a priest.
"Yes, the mercenaries I and Karina brought yesterday."
Aldis opens his mouth following Din's words.
"Aldis. She said to Sarah," Listen to Elmer. Are you Elmar? "
"Yes, you're Elmer, as you said. Is it apparently a jig to bring twins?"
"No, Jig brother doesn't seem to matter."
Din answers a question from an old man named Elmer from the side.
"well well……"
Next, a dialogue popping out of the old man's mouth, which cannot be ignored by Aldis.
"Surely the guidance of the goddess"
"Goddess!?"
At that moment, Aldis's expression changes completely. The old man responded with a calm expression, despite his glaring glance.
"Ho-ho-ho. Don't make that scary face."
He dispels Aldis's energy in soft words to reassure him, and shakes his head lightly as he was convinced.
Your angel, "I see, I understand what you are asking of me. I'm not going to harm you without being vigilant. If you do, you can solve the misunderstanding.
When he tells him and turns his back, the old man walks deep into the building.
Din follows the old man, and Karina suddenly stops trying to follow it. With a mysterious look, he noticed that Aldis was standing up and called out.
"Don't you go?"
"……Oh"
With a short reply, Aldis follows Elina with Carina. This is followed by Philia, Liana, Nere, Shar, and Rona.
Although it is a large building, it is a remote village. There was not much depth, and the end wall soon appeared. The center of the room is a one-way aisle leading from the entrance, with poor chairs lined up on either side. The back of the center is one step higher, and there is an integral statue on the wall that is slightly larger than a human being.
"Please go to the right place."
Elmer, standing in front of the statue and turning around, says so, but I don't know if it reaches Aldis's ear. Because Aldis's eyes were nailed to the statue behind Elmer.
"Nele ... No, Sarah?"
The appearance of the statue in Aldis's eyes was Nere, Sarah, and a gourd.
Aldis suddenly turns to Nere. But Nere, looking down and silent, seemed unlikely to explain anything about the matter.
"It's a long story.
"Sit down properly."
"Oh, that chair is a bit dirty, so you should stop it."
Once again encouraged by Elmer, and then his twin brothers, Aldis finally sat down in a handy chair. Philia and Liana flank to the left and right, Nere sits diagonally behind Aldis and Shar is a little further away, close to the entrance. When Rona squats down on her sleigh and her feet, Aldis asks that she can't wait.
"What is that image?"
Elmer's answer to it is a simple word.
"The goddess."
"That is ... a goddess?"
The statues in the churches of Tria and the Imperial City are hatred and enemies of Aldis. It may have been driven by the urge to smash the figure he saw at the church, which had to go to the church on account of his request.
"I would like to say, but ... in fact, I have denied myself, so for now I just believe that I and the villagers believe so. I will not impose it on you. Please don't worry "
"Is it Sarah?"
"Yes, you are an angel."
In response to Elmer's unquestioned answer, Aldis looks back at the statue and recalls Sarah's face she met yesterday.
"She's a goddess? It seems to be completely different from the goddess I know."
"There is a lot to talk about to answer that question."
Elmer sits down on a chair in response to the confused Aldis and says, "Let's talk about the old church first."
Oral "I don't know how long ago the religion of the goddess has taken place. However, it is said that the church was formed about 700 years ago. An existing record of that time Are no longer true, and most are, if not truthfully, apparently different from today's doctrine. ''
"What is doctrine?"
"Yes ... for example, Grace, the evil god that confronted the goddess Eicera in the War of the Gods"
The expression of Aldis who heard the name is slightly exposed.
"It's a god of worship, but it's only been relatively recently that its name has been written. Grace's name doesn't appear in old books, and the event itself was a war of the Divine World. Is not written. Naturally-"
Elmer glances at Philia and Liana.
"Twin devils are said to have injured the goddess as evil gods."
Platinum blond's head moves to the left and right of Aldis. The twins turned to Aldis, feeling uneasy.
"Of course, there's no such thing as an abomination of twins, and I've found that some of the twins who lost their parents were taken up in church and raised."
"It's so incredible given the doctrine of today, why do you know that?"
"I once used to be a church priest, but it was a small mistake and I was off the career road. I was relocated from the central church to a cold village on the outskirts. ――It's the so-called retreat, the only one who has no priests other than himself, has moved from the center to a place almost forgotten. It was a village, people were poor but naive, honest, religious and caring for others, and preaching the goddess to them, sometimes supporting them Happiness that can't be changed-"
Elmer, who had a distant eye, suddenly noticed something.
"Oops, the story has derailed. When I get older, there are more memories ..."
With an apologetic smile, the story returns.
"Days of praying to the goddess in a building that has been ruined to be called a church. In the meantime, I found a document written about 600 years ago."
"Literature?"
Your hair "Yes, there was such a description in it." Acelas-sama shines like a moon. "
"Month……?"
Suspicion Eldis expressed a gentle expression in Elmer's story.
The appearance of the goddess now reported by the church is consistent with the appearance of a hatred woman for Ardis. The hair color should have been deep crimson. It is strange to express it as a color like the moon.
By the way, "Oh, the moon. Listened to the story told, and in doing so I knew something. ''
With a breath, Elmer continues.
Anniversary "It was about 500 years ago that the goddess' image and doctrine taught by the church were changing drastically. The doctrine of the evil god and the twins I mentioned earlier were also around this time 500 years ago, which coincides with the time when the religious goddess of the church is said to have first descended on the ground, you know what this means. Do you? "
Indeed, if the goddess actually appeared to the earth and preached the teachings, it was natural that the teachings of the statues and churches in various places that had been broken up until then were mistaken, and that they would be unified into the same figure and the same doctrine. It may be something.
But Aldis knows. That the goddess was just a human, living in the same foreign world as her.
So Aldis does not say, "The goddess has corrected the mistakes it has made," but replies:
"The goddess that appeared 500 years ago is not a true goddess."
Elmer nods slowly.
"I was able to come up with the answer just by talking so far. It took me four years to get there."
With a bitter smile, he continued his thoughts.
"Some people may think that the goddess who descended 500 years ago corrected that mistake. However, as far as I can tell, the old literature more than 500 years ago shows that None of them described it as red. However, there are only a few existing documents, such as old documents ... "
Elmer stands up.
"I felt uncomfortable at that time, and after thinking about it, I came to the same conclusion as you. The goddess who have been worshiped by people since ancient times, Maybe it's another existence. ''
He turned his face to the statue installed at the back of the room.
Sentry "Of course, the goddess that the church worships are certainly beyond human knowledge, because the miracles that are transmitted to the church tell us that it is due to God's hands. Isn't it too merciful that the twins of the hostile evil god are all the abominable beings, and the goddess shouldn't be so narrow? Is the pinnacle of this world, and since I realized that, I could only feel the doctrine of the human beings in the church ... In the past, I had no doubts about the twin doctrine. ''
With a voice as if sniffing, he turns his face back to the Aldis.
"But the church would have thought that it would be difficult to spread such ideas to others. After that, I was not only excommunicated from the center, but I was forced to be chased as a heretic. The angel who gave me a helping hand while I was wandering through the wilderness, who had not been able to get anything to eat, and had not reached anything. That's the story before. "