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A harsh scent of disinfectant alcohol wafts through the air.

When I open my eyes, the first thing I see is an unfamiliar ceiling.

The sharp aroma grabs my nose, and I feel pressure throughout my body.

Is this a bandage?

“……”

I want to check my condition, but I can’t muster the strength to move my fingers. The sensation of the blanket wrapping around my fingertips is vivid.

As I struggle to look around with my throbbing head, I hear Lucia’s voice nearby.

“…You’re awake.”

With great effort, I manage to turn my head and meet her blue eyes. Her weary gaze and gaunt face greet me.

It’s a different side of Lucia, staring at me with a fatigued expression.

…While lying next to me.

—

Episode 12 – The Strongest Magician in History

—

This is a room I’ve never seen before. I find myself lying with Lucia in a room I’ve never encountered.

I feel a bit disconnected. Is this what you would call a lack of reality?

Confusion and an indescribable sense of unease swirl in my mind. I can’t even properly grasp the situation.

I try to push the blanket off and get up, but a pain in my abdomen prevents me from moving an inch.

“Ugh…”

As I bounce back onto the bed, Lucia’s reprimand returns.

“Your injuries are serious. Please lie still.”

“…Where am I?”

“In the Cathedral.”

So this is the Cathedral. That means the Cathedral of Saint Basil.

Lucia, sitting at the side of the bed, begins to explain in a weary voice.

“I was going to move you to an intensive care unit, but there were too many eyes, so I had no choice but to bring you to my room. There was also a request from Priest Rebecca to keep this incident quiet.”

“Priest…?”

“Priest Rebecca.”

Upon hearing the name of Priest Rebecca, I began to understand my situation to some extent.

I had engaged in a confrontation with two Inquisition Officers and a suspecting Inquisitor, and I was defeated and injured. It seems that Priest Rebecca and the Inquisition Officers who arrived late brought me to the Cathedral.

Has the operation failed?

“How long have I been lying here…?”

“About six hours. Since you were unconscious from the moment you arrived at the Cathedral, it has likely been much longer than that.”

“……”

“Don’t you remember anything?”

“…No.”

“…You truly can’t recall anything?”

Lucia asked with a worried gaze, and I momentarily lost my words as memories abruptly resurfaced.

Bullets lodged in my body, piercing through brown tunics. An Inquisitor tracking me with intent. A bright beam of white light pouring from the sky. An indescribable force gripping my legs. A longsword slicing through a haze of dust, its blade extending far below the grip of a staff.

Like a swollen river during the rainy season, memories flooded over me.

“……”

Lucia quietly stared at me as I lay without saying anything.

“It seems something has come back to you.”

“……”

“You don’t have to say anything. Right now, you need to rest and recover.”

Though Lucia muttered nonchalantly, there was no hiding the worry etched upon her face.

Choosing silence for the sake of stability, I inquired about my condition.

“Is it really that bad…?”

“…It’s faster to tell you where your condition is acceptable than to list all the bad spots.”

So it’s the worst.

Lucia explained just how serious things were from her spot beside me as I continued to gaze blankly at the ceiling.

“There are multiple lacerations on your abdomen and chest. Given the nature of the wounds, it seems you were injured by a longsword, a dagger, a rapier, and a longsword. You have a penetrating wound on your right thigh and lower abdomen, and if the blade had moved just a few centimeters, it could have been fatal. The bleeding was severe, and we had to provide a transfusion with the help of the hospital.”

“……”

“It’s a miracle you survived. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to call it one.”

Lucia’s face, muttering these words calmly, was heavy with worry.

“What about Priest Rebecca?”

“She met with the Archbishop as soon as she arrived at the Cathedral and is currently busy informing the Inquisition of the situation.”

“Is everyone alright?”

“……”

Lucia chose silence in response. Her tightly closed lips revealed no signs of parting.

However, I could grasp one undeniable fact from her silence.

“…It seems someone isn’t alright.”

In a low voice, I asked Lucia, “What happened?”

“……”

“Saint.”

“…There are those who have gone to God.”

There were casualties among the Inquisition Officers.

“How many?”

“Four.”

Four casualties. Among the two Inquisition Officers I initially confronted and the Inquisition Officers who rushed in to assist them.

According to the regulations of the Information Agency, there can be variations depending on the nature of the operation, but typically, an operation squad of an information agency consists of no more than five members.

My colleagues from Information Command commanded three employees, while I had five employees under me. Although I’m not familiar with the Inquisition’s organization, it appears one operational squad has faced destruction based on Information Command’s standards.

I pressed my palm to my forehead, feeling a throbbing pain.

Lucia’s voice pierced my ear.

“…Now is not the time to worry about others. You’re in the most critical condition.”

What does that mean? I pulled my hand away from my forehead and looked at Lucia.

I didn’t have the strength to speak properly, so I could only stare, but Lucia quickly understood the questions hidden in my silence.

“……”

With a soft rustle, the sensation of the blanket that had been pressing down on me disappeared.

The blanket that Lucia pulled aside revealed the state she and I were in for the first time.

Surprisingly, Lucia was underdressed. I hadn’t noticed because she was covered with the blanket, but she was lying in bed with only her underwear on.

It was important to note that I was dressed similarly.

The suit from Dvok was nowhere to be found. I was lying in bed with Lucia, covering only the important parts with my underwear.

A foreigner. The shocking fact that I was lying almost naked in bed with a saint didn’t faze me, nor did I even think to drape any discarded clothing over myself.

Not that I had the capacity to think about it.

Only after the blankets were removed did I finally realize my current condition.

“……”

I could see the ghastly scars all over my body. The aftermath of a major surgery that must have required at least a hundred stitches. The puzzling wounds scattered here and there were just extras.

However, what was more crucial was the fact that the skin around the wounds had turned black.

“Wh-what is this?”

Forgetting the pain as I examined my body, Lucia delivered the grim news that felt like a death sentence.

“Your flesh is rotting.”

*

The operation had failed.

I came to from a faint to find that the operation had been a failure, and there were casualties among the Inquisition officers.

I had self-inflicted wounds all over my body.

And they said my flesh was decomposing.

“No. This, this speed of necrosis, it doesn’t make sense…”

As I stammered at the sight of my blackened skin, Lucia began explaining in a calm tone.

“It is indeed necrosis. What you’re seeing is the stark reality.”

Skin necrosis. So necrotizing skin infections are more common than one would think.

Bacteria can invade through injuries and spread along the fascia, deep into the skin, making one susceptible if the wound isn’t properly cared for after being hurt.

I knew this from personal experience. I had a few occasions where I stitched up my injuries roughly in the Middle East and Africa without being prescribed antibiotics.

But this situation was…

There was something oddly off about it.

“We’ve administered antibiotics via injection. There are also oral antibiotics available. You can take them with peace of mind since they are properly prescribed medications, but…”

As Lucia gazed at the rotting skin, her words trailed off.

“I can’t be sure if they will be effective.”

Skin necrosis doesn’t progress in a few hours. When bacteria invade and infect the skin, the afflicted area should normally become red and experience pain and fever over several days.

Yet these injuries had originated just a few hours prior.

I looked at Lucia with a bewildered expression.

“What happened?”

“I don’t know either,” Lucia replied flatly.

“I sought a doctor’s opinion, but they said they’d never seen symptoms like this. It is a phenomenon that cannot be explained by modern medicine.”

I stared at Lucia with a dazed expression. Lying next to her, she cautiously propped herself up, alternating her gaze between the rotting skin and my face.

“You are experiencing symptoms difficult to explain by modern medicine or the Cult’s Healing Arts. Hence, I took it upon myself to heal you. As you can see, it has failed.”

“……”

“What exactly happened?”

Lucia’s blue eyes, filled with questions, were fixed on me.

Her face was deep in thought, but there was a firm resolve in her gaze that insisted I answer her.

“Four Inquisition officers died. It seems they were investigating something with Priest Rebecca, and I’ve heard similar things before. But this has crossed the line.”

“……”

“Please tell me. What did you go through?”

Though her voice remained unchanged, it felt oddly dissonant.

It seemed she was angry, or perhaps worried. At a glance, it looked like she was fuming.

I had no idea why she was angry, but I had no choice but to tell the truth. There was no way to quietly cover up a situation that had spiraled this far.

So I laid everything bare.

A child caught using sorcery in the village.

Suspicious information I had obtained from interrogating the child.

The visit to the village where the child lived for the investigation.

Encountering the Inquisitor there.

Everything the Inquisitor had done and how the villagers treated him.

The moments spent quietly observing, trying to imbue the amulet with divinity.

And the battle with the Inquisitor who had caught onto my intentions.

I omitted the story about Hormoz, but it was enough for now.

Lucia, who had been listening to me, seemed to drift off into her thoughts, shutting her eyes for a moment. Suddenly, she opened her eyes and sat up.

She draped some discarded clothing over herself and spat out,

“I need to see the Archbishop. Wait here.”

“What’s going on?”

“This isn’t something that can be resolved by an Inquisition officer. You didn’t realize who that Inquisitor was, did you?”

“It’s an inquisition officer, isn’t it? Who exactly…”

“The stench of death emanating from a living person, the strong perfume trying to mask it, the keen sensitivity to divinity that allows them to sense the faint divinity in the amulet, and the power to withstand an attack from an Inquisition officer and counterattack.”

“……”

“That Inquisitor is not human.”

 

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