“……Tower master?”

Surprisingly, it was Tower Master Chester. He looked around as he entered and quietly closed the door.

“Count Sharofe, Duke Celsior.”

“Oh, what brings you here?”

I looked at him in bewilderment as he quickly approached us.

Carl had also relaxed his tension and had a similarly puzzled expression like me.

“I heard from Deborah. That you two are looking for the holy sword.”

He answered calmly and continued.

“So I came forward to help you both. Have you found the holy sword by any chance?”

“Ah, no. We were actually troubled because it wasn’t showing up easily.”

I added an explanation that we hadn’t found it in all three locations that were likely candidates for where the holy sword was hidden.

“Then I’ll find it for you.”

“You will, Tower Master.? How……”

“You may have seen it at the magical tool exhibition before, but the magic tower recently invented a holy power detector.”

The tower master took out a long silver rod from his jet-black uniform pocket.

Oh, it looks just like a water divining rod.

“If this detects holy power, it will point in that direction.”

“Ooh! It’s really fortunate that you came, Tower Master.. We two were about to return empty-handed with no choice.”

When Carl nodded in agreement, the tower master let out a small embarrassed cough.

Soon he operated the holy power detector with a serious face.

Hum hum.

The silver rod began to vibrate strangely. We all focused and stared at it together.

Even though three pairs of eyes were focused on it, which must have been burdensome, the detector worked well.

Whirrrr.

The detector’s vibration gradually grew louder, then suddenly bent at ninety degrees.

When we turned our heads to where the tip of the rod was pointing, we saw a statue.

“It’s pointing at that right now, isn’t it?”

“Yes, did you also check the statue?”

“We checked underneath it but……”

I trailed off as I approached the statue. This time Carl even lifted the sculpture slightly, but as expected, there was nothing.

Yet the holy power detector kept pointing only at the statue.

“Doesn’t the statue itself have holy power?”

“That’s possible. It’s a holy power detector, not a holy sword detector after all.”

“How about operating it facing the opposite direction?”

At Carl’s suggestion, the tower master nodded and turned off the detector briefly, turned his body, and turned it on again.

Then the detector vibrated small like before, grew larger, then bent in the complete opposite direction to point at the statue.

Seeing it be this stubborn, there seems to be something in the statue.

I crossed my arms and slowly walked around the statue once. The pure white stone statue modeled after the sun god had no particular peculiarities.

‘Is there really holy power in the statue so it coincidentally reacted……’

It was the moment I placed my hand on the leg part of the statue and let out a regretful sigh.

Click.

“……?!”

Suddenly I felt my hand being pushed inward. In my widened eyes, I caught sight of part of the statue being pressed in like a button.

Huh, what’s this?

“Carl! Tower master! Come here and look at this.”

“What is it, Shailyn.”

“What’s the matter?”

The two men strode to my side and their eyes widened like mine.

“There was…… a special device in the statue.”

“Should we try pressing it all the way?”

“It might be dangerous, so let me try it.”

Carl pushed me back and directly touched the statue. Drrrr. The part of the statue that had been slowly pushing in stopped with a thud.

Clunk.

With a sound like something fitting together from inside, the statue split in half.

‘……Is this okay to do?’

I was very flustered because if we made a mistake, we could damage the statue and be misunderstood as committing sacrilege.

Carl and the tower master seemed to have similar thoughts as me and froze for a moment.

Then Carl readily spread the split statue wide open to both sides.

“……!”

In the very center of the statue that was hollow inside like a shell, a blue-black sword hung.

The last time the holy sword had shown itself was 100 years ago.

Even though time had passed for mountains and rivers to change more than ten times, the holy sword was sharpened as if it had been made yesterday.

“This…… is the holy sword, right? Right?”

“I think it’s correct.”

The tower master affirmed in a slightly dazed voice. Carl just stared at the holy sword silently without answering.

Just like someone bewitched.

“Carl.”

When I carefully called him and grabbed his sleeve, Carl looked at me and smiled faintly.

Then he reached out and picked up the holy sword. Fortunately, the holy sword accepted his touch without any particular resistance.

“Found it.”

“Phew, let’s quickly take it and go back.”

“Yeah.”

Carl wrapped the holy sword in his cloak and fastened it to his waist. We crudely sealed the statue and prepared to leave.

‘I wonder what happened to the square by now? Were the emperor and high priestess captured?’

It was already well past the time when the situation should have been resolved.

Still, it was when we were hurrying our steps to guard our families’ sides.

CRASH!

Before we could even exit the chapel, a tremendous roar came from outside.

It was such a huge impact that even the ground we were standing on shook.

Through the window, black smoke could be seen swirling from the direction of the square.

“Wh, what is that?”

I urgently ran to the window and carefully observed the smoke, then soon covered my mouth in horror.

Because the smoke was taking the shape of a demon.

***

‘During the grand prayer meeting, we’ll offer a sacrifice and hold a ritual to welcome Lord Rudvalt into your body.’

Morphina had explained this plan so briefly.

But Raviel knew that the sacrifice she spoke of was Shailyn.

He had volunteered to be the demon’s host to obtain Shailyn, so what use would it be to offer her as a sacrifice?

‘You still only think of using me.’

I’m not a child anymore.

Following his father and mother toward the altar, he immediately found Shailyn among the countless people.

She was wearing a cape-style dress that looked like a wedding dress at first glance.

Wasn’t it a revelation, no, a gift given to Raviel?

That he could fulfill his dream of running away with Shailyn alone and getting married.

He had been indifferently watching the scene of the emperor and Morphina being accused, then looked up at the sky.

It was clean and deep blue without a single cloud.

‘The weather is nice.’

As if it were for him.

Raviel smiled wickedly and slowly moved his steps.

Morphina didn’t notice this movement, anxiously bit her lips and muttered.

“D*mn, we haven’t captured the sacrifice yet and this is already happening……!”

Originally, they had planned to capture Shailyn while the prayer was proceeding, buy time, and offer her as a sacrifice.

Then when Rudvalt was resurrected in Raviel’s body, they could make the world kneel at their feet.

But Shailyn was nowhere to be seen, not even her shadow, and before they could move properly, they were ambushed by the Diart family and were about to be completely bound hand and foot.

‘It would be better to spirit Raviel away and plan for the future.’

She turned to look for her son and hesitated.

Raviel was standing behind her before she knew it.

Morphina didn’t sense anything strange from her son smiling with a face where light didn’t reach, grabbed his arm and poured out only what she had to say.

“Perfect timing, Raviel. You should immediately leave this place and take shelter. And with the other Rudenians……”

However, her words couldn’t reach their end.

Morphina looked down with trembling eyes at the sudden pain felt in her abdomen and gasped sharply.

Her pure white priestess robes slowly turned red.

“You…… why……”

“Didn’t you say so, Mother? To offer a sacrifice and welcome Lord Rudvalt.”

“The sacrifice I meant was……”

“I know, someone else. But I have no intention of sacrificing that person.”

Raviel supported his mother as her legs gave way and she was about to collapse, and whispered.

“Even without offering the person I love, if we use someone with strong holy power and imperial blood, we can summon Lord Rudvalt.”

“……!”

Morphina had been betrayed by the son she had arrogantly underestimated as someone she could manipulate in her grasp, the son she thought was her limb, and widened her eyes in shock.

Raviel seated her leaning against the altar with a smiling face to the end.

“Farewell, Mother.”

“You, d*mn……”

He held the blood-stained dagger and took away even his mother’s remaining breath without hesitation.

After briefly praying toward his mother dying without even closing her eyes, Raviel rose up unhesitatingly and targeted his next opponent.

The emperor was his biological father but he had never once called him father.

“Wait! Head priest, what are you doing right now—!”

Linus and Benjamin discovered him approaching while dripping blood from his sleeves and hurriedly tried to stop him.

But Raviel was one step faster.

“Ugh……”

The sword pierced the heart of the emperor unconsciously turning around at the sound of footsteps.

He couldn’t even scream and fell backward as he was.

“Have a good journey with Mother, Father.”

Raviel gave a quiet greeting and headed toward the altar.