The old man poured himself more tea and took an uneasy sip. His mind was obviously trying to think something over before he finally opened his mouth.
“That’s a tough one. It took a lot of arguing to bring about, and maybe a bit of me pushing my status around, but I managed to get them to agree to naming you ‘Count Noct Kieran’. It took a lot of weeding through some mean-spirited suggestions, but I managed to convince them to stick with that one since you have such deeply black hair like the night sky… although none of them know about those orange tips that your angel managed to infect you with. I’m sure if they did they would've had even more rude names in mind. It’s probably best you prepare yourself for when they find out about that. But as for the title, well…”
The prophet’s face grew a tad bit more disgruntled.
“I wasn’t able to stop that one from happening. It was, of course, the pope’s doing.”
It took Noth a little longer than it probably should have to understand why becoming a Count should be a bad thing. Shouldn’t it be completely amazing that he was being conferred a noble title at all? But as he thought it over, the realization eventually dawned on him. What was the new [Gift] that the God-dess was telling all the priests he now had? [Heavenly Monster Slayer]? Sure, it may have sounded doofy and embarrassing to Noth, but at the end of the day it was still the highest tier that a [Gift] could possibly reach. Such an amazingly high tier would usually equate to an amazingly high status as well, and yet he had only been given the rank of a Count, the third lowest title possible. Hell, even being a [Slayer] of anything should denote a higher level of [Gift] than just, say, a [Hunter] or [Warrior]. His father was only a [Superior Warrior] and yet he was an Earl, the third highest conferrable title. Perhaps it had to do with the fact that his father was carrying on a long lineage of Earls, but with that being the case, wouldn’t it also make sense that his only son, who had been given an insanely amazing [Gift], be at least a Marquise if not a Duke?
But that brings back what the prophet had just said.
The pope was the one who’d made him a Count.
Didn’t it make sense that the person who hated him the most wouldn’t want him to have such a grand status?
Especially not one that could stand so close to his own.
“I suppose the only saving grace was that he didn’t have the ability to make you the lowest noble status, a Baron. The only reason he could get away with making you a Count in the first place was because of your late approval into noble-hood, and the fact that most nobles who are [Slayers] are sent to a territory at the southern front, regardless of what exactly it is that they slay.”
Noth nodded along. The prophet’s words sounded accurate to what he’d been taught in some of his lessons, so of course it would make a plausible enough argument. And yet he truly didn’t think that becoming a Baron would have been such a bad thing. His mother had been conferred a Baronage, and although most other nobles tended to treat her as lesser, she was still completely happy with the station. It seemed to have made her feel closer to the average person despite her nobility, and she truly cared about the people under her watch. Noth would have been happy with such a life. If he was going to be given a land to care for, he’d rather have felt like he was just one of the people, rather than some far off and untouchable existence.
“Yes, so my land will be in the south, bordering the demon infested mountains. Will there be any towns in my territory? Hopefully with people in them?”
“There will be, in fact, although just the one that’s next to your estate. But if you were expecting anything large then I’d have to tell you not to get your hopes up. It being as close to demon territory as it is, there’re very few that are willing to live so close to danger. Perhaps only less than 100 people still live in the ravaged town. Just stubborn people who’ve been through too much and yet aren’t willing to leave the homes they have. Of course, stubborn as they are, you’ll have a big job ahead of you trying to get them to accept you.”
The thought of having so many lives to protect, people that might just completely reject him and not listen to a word he said, even if they were in danger, was scary. And yet it was all just so thrilling to think about. He could be a lord of a territory, just like his father and mother were. It was one of the many childhood fantasies that he’d had to give up on once before, coming back to him once more. His own people. His own land. And he could do whatever he wanted with it to make it all prosper. Who cares about the neighbouring demons when he had an angel on his side! Perhaps it might be tough sometimes, but there’s no way he’d ever let any danger befall any of his people once the land became well and truly his! He’d be sure to keep everything nice and safe. He’d make it the safest and happiest territory in the world! With a look of excitement and impatience shining in his eyes, Noth leaned forwards towards the old man.
“What’s the town’s name?”
The prophet took a look at the teens sparkling eyes and let out a hearty laugh.
“It’s called Sleekka, my boy. Seems no one was clever enough to come up with a new name, so they kept the one that the demons they fought off had for it.”
“Sleekka…”
The name sounded so foreign, and yet so interesting and full of mysteries. Noth’s eyes twinkled as he imagined what it might look like. Would the weather be overcast and dreary since it was technically placed in the demon domain? He’d always imagined the demon mountains as looking inherently evil, so would that same look be cast over the town? And what would the estate he’d be moving into look like? What’s the first thing he should do once he gets there? And how much of his true powers should he show to the locals? They were quite cut off from everything else, so would they even know what his new [Gift] was supposed to be? Would someone tell them? As Noth churned out question after question, the prophet just smiled and watched, but after 5 minutes of silence had passed, the old man decided it was time to speak up.
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“I’m sure you must have had other questions for me, right? The God-dess told me that you were the inquisitive sort, so I’m sure you must have a bunch of them for me.”
His words successfully broke Noth out of his trance. Right, he was wasting time just sitting here and giggling about the future like this. Hadn’t he come to find out the answers he’d always wanted to know? He scrambled to remember what he’d wanted to ask before he’d learned all of this new information, and after sifting through the more unnecessary questions, he finally thought of a more pressing one.
“Right! Ummm, what’s the pope like? If he already knows so much about me, then I should probably find out more about him.”
“That old fool? Well… Let me see. His name is Octavius, no last name, he’s 167 years old, and he’s actually quite a lazy man.”
It was odd to Noth to hear such an old looking man call another person ‘old’. The prophet had noticed the face that the teen was pulling, and with a chuckle he gave him the answer to his unspoken question.
“I’m already a little over 200 years old. It’s just another 50 years for me and the other prophets before the God-dess takes us home and replaces us. I was already here in this church when the current pope was born, and I was certainly in attendance when it was announced that he’d been given the [Gift] for it. I’ve seen him all these years, growing into the sluggish man that he is today. I was even there when he made the decree 150 years ago that ruined your life.”
Those words hadn’t made a lick of sense to Noth. He wasn’t even born 150 years ago, why would something that the pope did then have an effect on him now? The teen frowned and tilted his head, trying to comprehend what the prophet might have meant. What had ruined his life? Well, the pope most assuredly fell into that category, but besides that it would have had to have been getting his initial [Gift]. But there’s no way that the pope had tampered with that, right? So what could…
And then it dawned on him.
“No…You’re not saying he…”
“Yes, Octavius is the one that made the decree. He’s the one that told the masses that [Choose Your Own Path] was a blasphemous [Gift]. As if the God-dess would allow such a [Gift] to exist if it hated it. They’re the one who hands out everyone’s [Gifts] in the first place! How absurd. And yet, I wasn’t allowed to stop him. I’m only allowed to say things to the masses that the God-dess tells me to say. And unluckily enough, the God-dess didn’t speak a peep to me about any of it.”
“But how does that make sense? Why does everyone believe it so hard if the pope just one day said so without any proof? Why aren’t there more people who question it?”
“Well it’s been 150 years now, hasn’t it? Just because the clergy live long lives doesn’t mean that they typically make it far past 100, and the ordinary everyday person has a much much shorter lifespan. It’s been about three generations for most of the population since the decree, each teaching it to the next. It’s too firmly ingrained a thought for it to just be questioned so easily without a reason why to.”
Noth’s face fell like a sack of rocks. So it was that easy then? The pope says a few words and suddenly everyone turns against a portion of the population without even a speck of proof? But sadly enough, it made too much sense for him to question. Of course the average citizen would listen to the pope. He’s in the number one position of power, one given to him by the one and only almighty deity of the world. Whatever he said must surely be the truth.
Perhaps Noth would think he was biased to think that the pope was wrong, if the teen didn’t have so much proof backing him up.
“...And he did all this just because he didn’t like someone having a better [Gift] than him?”
The prophet looked off to the side at Noth’s mumbled statement, seeming like he was looking into the distance at something he didn’t care for that had caught his eye.
“Well, when people have a cozy spot that they don’t want to let go of, they tend to fight pretty harshly to keep hold of it. That lazy man doesn’t want something to come along and remove the cushy position he’s found himself in, and that includes even people with the potential to do so. It doesn’t matter to him if they don’t even want to try and steal it, the fact that they even possibly could is just too much for him.”
The old man let out a little sigh, and his gaze drifted down into his cup of tea.
“The only reason that he never tried to pull anything with me, despite knowing that I actually hold a much greater amount of power than he does, is the fact that I can’t act without the God-dess's say so. Otherwise who knows what sort of stunts he’d pull? I didn’t used to live in such an out of the way branch of the church, you know? I used to live in the room right down the hall from him, until he decided that it was messing with his languorous lifestyle.”
It felt like any minute Noth might just see the prophet break out into a speech about the old days, so he quietly thanked the man and desperately searched his mind for yet another question to bring up, one that he didn’t think might backfire and make the old man look even more upset than he already did.
“Ummm, ah, right, so… The ‘God-dess’s Love’ flower! You don’t get, um, cursed or anything for eating it, right?”
The sudden random question seemed to successfully do its job, as the old man’s face quickly turned to confusion at how out of nowhere it was.
“No, not that I’ve ever heard of. It should just give you a boost of power, although many people can grow out of control because of it. Past the addictive nature of power, there shouldn’t be any other side-effects. If you’re experiencing any, then perhaps it has something to do with your bond?”
Unbeknownst to Noth, his face was slowly forming into more and more of a smile. Sure, he was happy that the old man no longer seemed upset, but more importantly he was finally managing to get some of the answers he’d been craving to know for such a long time. As the teen scrambled to think of what he should ask next, the prophet’s face changed once again to his previous calm look. He poured Noth a fresh cup of tea and pushed it over towards him.
“Drink up, I can tell you’ve got a lot to discuss with me.”
And he did. The teen asked question after question, growing more and more ecstatic as he received answer after answer. Yes, this was exactly what he came for. Finally he felt like he was being included in all of the secrets his angel had kept from him.
However, Noth was wrong about that.
He was very, very wrong.