Chapter 64: Chapter 61: The Saint Willingly Leaps Down from Her Pedestal (Not Really, She’s Just an Idiot)
After dumping—um, I mean, entrusting—Alfrea to my trusted collaborators at the saint's castle, I headed to a certain village.
Remember Terracotta, the place where Eterna and Verner grew up? Well, I was heading...to another village located pretty close to that one, Lurf.
You might be wondering why I was bothering going to such a tiny village. There was, in fact, a very good reason—Lurf was actually a rather important location in the game.
I'd mentioned before how Eterna would turn into a heinous witch because a mob would attack her village, kill her friends and family, and cause her to lose her faith in humanity, right? A heart-wrenching story, really.
As always, the main culprit in the game was the original Ellize. She'd pulled so much shit that the saint's image had been at an all-time low. On top of that, she'd caused extra suffering and a famine in the village the angry mob originated from. After suffering silently for a while, they'd lost it and decided to murder the saint's family for revenge.
Sadly for my dear Eterna, they hadn't attacked Ellize's family, but hers. They hadn't known that Eterna, who'd recently taken back her rightful position, wasn't the same saint who'd made them suffer. In their minds, the saint was the saint, and that's all there was to it.
You may be thinking these guys were total idiots. Well, you'd be right! In most cases angry mobs were idiotic.
Allow me to illustrate. Let's go back to modern Japan for a minute here. Imagine that Yamada-san, a store owner, goes on TV and says something absolutely outrageous. Naturally, people will start trashing our dear Yamada-san online and review bomb his shop.
Now, imagine that there's another Yamada-san who owns a similar shop. He's completely unrelated to the first dude, but his social media platforms get trashed all the same. Obviously, that second Yamada-san hasn't done anything wrong. He's a victim who simply happened to share the same last name.
If that stuff could happen so easily in the modern era—where a quick internet search could tell you that you were messaging the wrong guy—it was pretty easy to picture it happening in this world, where access to information was incredibly restricted. It was no wonder most villagers couldn't tell the difference between Ellize and Eterna.
Anyway, that was how Eterna's family was murdered, leading the kindhearted young woman to go mad.
Of course, Eterna would have turned into a wicked witch either way after killing Alexia. All this incident did was speed up the process by a couple of years. That said, I still wanted to spare Eterna the pain and nip that terrible event in the bud.
After a bit of digging around, I'd finally figured out that the village from where the mob originated was Lurf. How, you ask? The hint that had started me on the right track was the fact that the village was part of Viscount Fox's territory.
According to the original scenario, Viscount Fox should've confronted Ellize about her tyrannical ways. She would then have stripped his status away from him and destroyed his house, leading him and his family to commit suicide... Well, except for Aina, that is.
The Fox family was quite beloved by their people, and seeing them die such a pointless death only spurred resentment toward the saint. If you took the distance between each of the villages of their territory and Terracotta into consideration, the most likely place for the uprising was Lurf.
"We have reached Lurf, Lady Ellize. May I ask why you wanted to visit this place? I'm sorry to say, but...there's nothing here."
A young girl stood next to me and looked at me curiously—Aina Fox, the daughter of Viscount Fox. Her red pigtails and her determined, slightly slanted eyes were as cute as usual.
I didn't really need anyone to show me around, but since I was technically in her family's territory, I'd asked her to tag along to guide me.
"We're here precisely for that reason," I answered. "Your father has served as my knight for years, and now he is doing his best as the headmaster of the academy for the future generations of knights. I'm very thankful, of course, but if we look at it from a different perspective...it means he's been forced to leave his territory behind. I believe it's time I gave back to the people of the viscounty."
It went without saying, but this was just an excuse I'd made up on the spot. I just wanted to make sure the people here knew who I was so they wouldn't confuse me with Eterna later on. Even if an uprising broke out, I wanted them to come to me with their grievances.
I initially thought that since I'd been hunting monsters, taking care of the sick and wounded, and doing my best to keep the people fed, everyone would like me and there'd be no riot at all. Unfortunately, it seemed like I'd overestimated my own popularity. I mean... I would never have expected all the royals and all of my knights to turn on me so suddenly. How can I be so damn unpopular? I really did my best, you know?
Anyway, what had happened last time made me realize that I'd been way too optimistic. I couldn't count on my not-so-stellar reputation to bypass this event altogether. What I could do, though, was make sure that the anger was directed at me and not Eterna.
As soon as we entered the village, a group of villagers greeted me. They bowed all at once.
"Welcome to our humble village, saint. I never thought we'd ever get to meet you in person..."
"How do you do? I'm Ellize. Viscount Fox always takes such good care of me that it made me want to visit his land," I said with a smile.
As expected, the people here called me "saint." I needed to get them to remember my name.
Listen up, guys! I'm Ellize. E.L.L.I.Z.E. Got it? Good! So don't you go attack Eterna's house!
"What are you doing?! Why are there so few of you here to welcome Lady Ellize?! Don't you realize how rude you're being?!" Aina scolded.
I panicked when I heard her harsh tone. Stop, stop, stop! Could you not act like a mafia boss's henchman? They're gonna have such a terrible impression of me!
"Y-You're absolutely right, my lady..." the mayor said, an apologetic expression on his face. "But there's a good reason—"
"And what is it?" Aina demanded, cutting him off.
"Well... The villagers who aren't here are all sick. A child drank from a river the monsters poisoned and contracted an incredibly contagious disease. Those who approached the infected all got sick..."
Aina's face went pale.
Poisoning rivers was one of the monsters' favorite tricks. Because of that, accessing clean water used to be a huge issue, and regular bathing had never really taken off. I thought we were over the whole hassle, but considering the timing, I could only assume some monsters had poisoned that river on their way to the capital.
"Wh-What about my mother?!" Aina exclaimed, flustered. "Is she all right?!"
"Rest assured, my lady. Your mother is fine," the mayor reassured her. "We realized what was happening fairly quickly and were able to isolate the sick to stop this illness from spreading further."
The old man's family seemed to be doing okay. I was also glad to hear that the spread of the disease was under control.
A contagious disease, huh? If memory served, the original Ellize's go-to way of dealing with them was to burn down entire villages. I would obviously purify the river, but I also had to figure out how to handle the victims. If I simply nodded along and left without doing a thing, my image would take a serious blow.
"Dear saint, I'm terribly sorry to ask this of you after you made the trip here, but could you please leave? We've isolated the sick, but I wouldn't know what to do if you were infected..." the mayor said with a contrite tone.
"Could you lead me to the isolation site?" I asked.
"B-But..."
"It's all right," I reassured him. "We've only just met, so I know this won't be easy for you, but please put your trust in me."
To put it bluntly, poison didn't work on me. I was constantly purifying and detoxifying myself with magic, just to be safe. Ah, but there were some exceptions, obviously—I didn't destroy the useful bacteria that lived in my body. The point was, no poison, harmful bacteria, or even a speck of dirt stood a chance against me.
After some more convincing, the mayor led me to a small shed. It had been reinforced with additional wooden planks to cover any gaps, and the door was also carefully secured with a makeshift barricade.
Oh boy... They were planning to let them die in there, weren't they?
"What is...all this?" Aina asked in disbelief.
"We took the necessary steps, my lady," the mayor answered. "The people inside accepted their fate."
His voice was steady, but I could see the hurt on his face.
I could see where they were coming from. If anyone entered this shed to help them out of pity, they'd suffer the same fate. It was heartless, but isolating them and leaving them to die alone was the best way to limit the number of casualties. Well... The second best way, actually. Now that I was here, it was an entirely different story.
I took apart the barricade and opened the door. A putrid smell immediately assaulted my nostrils. To speak candidly, I'd never seen such a disgusting place. Aina groaned and took a few steps back, covering her nose. I wasn't too surprised. I didn't think a teenage girl could handle that.
The shed was a veritable hell. Excrement and vomit covered every surface, and the pungent smell was honestly difficult to bear.
It was no big deal for me, though. I simply extended the range of my purification spell and walked in.
"L-Lady Ellize!" Aina screamed, trying to stop me, but I paid her no mind.
My purification spell currently had a range of about fifty centimeters. I couldn't step on filth because it would disappear before my foot touched the floor. An unnatural clean patch appeared as I walked. It was as though someone was using the eraser tool on a pitch-black monochrome screen.
I made eye contact with a few people so I smiled at them. For some reason, it reminded me of something a friend of mine, an American, had once told me.
"You know, Niito, in the US, we don't bow to greet people. We just smile when we meet someone's eyes!"
I still didn't know if he'd been telling the truth, or if he'd been trying to make a joke, but I liked the sound of it. It was a nice custom, I thought, so I'd decided to learn from it.
When I reached the back of the shed, I found an emaciated kid.
She... Or is it he? I can't tell anymore.
The child had lost so much weight that their bones showed through their ashen skin. They also had purple spots all over their body.
"S-Saint? Y-You...shouldn't come...to such a dirty place... Don't bother...with us... We don't have...much longer...anyway..." the child struggled to sob out the words when they noticed me.
I clasped their hand to make them stop. You're so noisy, kid. Shut it.I checked how much poison was in their system through their hand. I could feel countless strange bacteria bustling inside their body, and I could tell they were trying to infect me as well. They vanished before they could touch me, obviously.
All good. This is nothing a bit of detoxifying and purifying can't cure.
I'd also throw in a bit of healing magic to give the child's weakened cells a boost. After that, they'd simply need to rest and eat well, and they'd be back to full health in no time.
Victory was in my grasp. I almost started cackling, but I stopped myself at the last second. Oops, I almost let the real me shine through.
"It's going to be fine," I said to calm the child.
Then, I unleashed my super detoxification+purification+healing combo! In a mere second, the shed became sparklingly clean...and the pathogen that had caused this mess disappeared for good.
Aina had come a little too close to the shed, so just to be safe, I'd used my combo on her too.
You'd better remember me, villagers of Lurf! This blonde idiot who just put on a show is called Ellize! Ellize, not Eterna! So remember not to attack Eterna's parents, okay?!
The newly cured patients looked around in confusion. They didn't seem to understand what had happened or what to do. The first to move was the child whose hand I'd been holding. They got up and ran to the mayor, throwing themselves at him as they bawled.
LMA— No, I won't laugh this time.
I knew full well how hard sickness could be on someone.
Wait... I'd just realized that I could've done the whole thing without bothering to enter the shed!
This is why I'm so ineffective! I always waste my time with useless extra steps! I'll need to reflect on that.
◇
After the events in the shed, Ellize purified the river and the entire village before visiting the Fox residence. She was then greeted by the villagers on her way home.
The young boy Ellize had saved, the mayor's grandson, kept his eyes on Ellize's back as she walked away. He'd made up his mind, and so had the other villagers.
"The current saint, Lady Ellize... She's just like they say. No, she's even greater than the rumors," the mayor said with a smile.
All of his constituents nodded. They wholeheartedly agreed.
Up until now, they'd always lumped all the saints together. They were some sort of distant concept that had no bearing on reality.
They'd heard rumors about Lady Ellize, though. People had said that she wasn't like the others, and they already believed that. The world had definitely changed for the better in her era.
Naturally, they remembered her name after hearing it so many times, but they still hadn't made a clear distinction between Ellize the person and "the saint"—that mythical role they'd heard about their entire lives.
"Mayor," one of the villagers started. "I always thought that the saint lived in a different world from us commoners. I thought she looked down on us. But Lady Ellize didn't hesitate to approach us when not even our families would... She... She smiled at me," he said as tears welled up in his eyes.
He'd been treated like a pariah that shouldn't be approached. Of course, there had been no other way, and he didn't blame his friends and family. Still, the fact remained that they'd given up on him. He'd despaired in that small shed, surrounded by blood, vomit, and feces...until she'd opened the door for them.
She hadn't hesitated to enter that disgusting shed when she most likely hadn't even needed to. They'd seen how she'd used her magic—surely, she could have healed them from the outside without approaching their filth. But she hadn't. She'd entered the shed to be by their side. She wasn't the kind of person who looked down on others while perched at the top of her ivory pedestal. No, she'd leaped down all the way to the bottom for them.
"Grandpa," the mayor's grandson said. "I thought that there was no point in me being alive any longer... But Lady Ellize told me it would be fine."
The few words Ellize had uttered without much thought had saved the boy. He'd felt as though she'd told him so much more. He would be fine, regardless of whether he was dirty or not.
(Naturally, it was all a misunderstanding. Ellize had only meant that she could treat his illness and he'd be fine as far as health went. If the person who'd heard it had interpreted it differently and had been saved as a result...well, all's well that ends well.)
"The world is a much better place now than it was in the past, but there are still people suffering who need help. I feel like I've finally understood something important. We need her—not just any saint, but Lady Ellize. We should never allow her light to stop shining," the mayor said.
"Yes. There must be thousands of others who, just like us, need her help desperately. We mustn't lose her...or her smile."
"I've made up my mind. I've died once. My life isn't mine anymore, it's hers. I'll become her strength, I swear it."
Just like that, the people of Lurf arbitrarily reinterpreted Ellize's words and actions in the way that best suited them and became even more faithful to her. For better or worse, the people of Lurf were obstinate. Once they made up their minds on something, they'd never relent. They also had a tendency not to consider the consequences of their actions—just like Aina.
They were the kind of people who could infiltrate a school and plan an assassination to avenge their father, as well as start a violent uprising to avenge their lord. They were as faithful and determined as knights when it came to protecting the person they swore allegiance to.
And so, yet another group of people ready to throw away their lives for Ellize's sake was born. As for Ellize's reputation, it skyrocketed once more.
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