The Demon Lord's Bride (BL)
Chapter 612: What can I say? We are all a tool to preserve this world

Chapter 612: What can I say? We are all a tool to preserve this world

I hadn’t thought about it much before, perhaps because I rarely met anything that reminded me of Valmeier’s parents, but...if the deities went as far as sending Natha’s soul to see me, they must have done something to make sure Valmeier’s body was born with two high-quality essences.

And then, it occurred to me: what kind of order, mandate, oracle, whatever it was the Goddess conveyed to him?

"Oh, no," the Bishop shook his head. Huh, seemed like I was wrong. "The druid princess was found by us," he smiled at me in a mix of regret and shame. "The one who received the mandate to find your mother was the murdered High Priest."

"Ah..."

So, it was still by the deity’s design that the two met. Now that I thought about it, the baby princess would be much older than the priest, right? The war was around eight decades ago, after all. She must have been picked up by someone at some point, otherwise, how could a baby survive running away from a war?

"So...you’ve been raising her here?" I asked.

"Yes."

That was why she could survive for a long time. "And they knew each other here?"

"That is so."

"And Va--I was born here?"

"...yes."

"But..."

I glanced at him, and I could see his expression turned awkward the more my question led to the inevitable. His gaze wavered and he picked up the teacup; I let him wet his throat before driving into my next question.

"Why did he send me away, then?" I looked out of the window, where a tall stone cliff could be seen beyond the garden. "This place seems to be safer than anywhere else."

This place was a strong fortress and a tight prison. Even if the whole church was looking for them, wouldn’t it still be better than the church where Valmeier grew up? At the very least, he--we--wouldn’t have to live apart from our parents. It did not disturb me much before, but now that I had Shwa, I couldn’t think of letting my child away from me for more than a week.

No--if I could help it, I wouldn’t ever let him away from me for more than a few hours.

So, excuse me if my tone and gaze were rather accusatory.

"I am ashamed to say this, but..." the Bishop smiled wryly. "We had discord in our midst."

Discord? Like traitors? Ugh...again--everything was ruined because of a traitor again? Were they a plague or something?

"Why? Did you find a spy sent by the church?" I asked curiously.

"No, they..." the Bishop made an uncomfortable expression, as if someone spilled his dark history on social media. "They thought the mandate was a lie."

...huh?

"Your father’s mandate...it was to have a child with your mother," he smiled wryly as my expression faltered. "To have you."

"Ah..."

So, it was still as I thought.

"However, some thought it didn’t make sense," the Bishop explained further. "The Goddess did not explain why a child was needed and thought your father was being succumbed by lust. After all, it had been so long since anyone heard Her voice, so when someone said they did, doubt easily arose..."

I couldn’t help but exhale heavily. Between this reason and a full-blown betrayal, I couldn’t decide which one was worse. But then again, if it was a simple betrayal, all they had to do was kill the traitors and move to some safe houses or something.

This kind of internal strife, however...

"Oh, Mother..."

The exclaim came out by habit, and the poor Bishop was startled because of it. Well, I guessed calling out another race’s patron deity would feel like I was jumping religion, so I would give a pass for his little gasp.

"Ahem," the Bishop quickly cleared his throat when I was glancing at him. "At any rate, we didn’t think it was safe for you to stay here, but your mother couldn’t survive out there, so..."

"So you send only me to my church."

"Your...yes, I supposed so," the Bishop looked surprised again, although he collected himself quicker this time. Well, for Valmeier, he only ever had the one church as his home, so I just followed suit. And it seemed like the Bishop understood, fortunately. "We tried to solve the internal problem here, and while doing so, we got careless and exposed the hiding place to others."

Ah, so it ended up in a situation that was no different from having a traitor in their midst. I guessed it was the right decision to get this body out of there.

Or was it also the Goddess’ mandate? Who knows, since the Bishop did not mention it, and it didn’t really matter anyway.

"It was hard to capture everyone who knew, erase their memory, and hide this place even further," the Bishop continued with a heavy voice. "We couldn’t make our move freely anymore because of that, and...during that time, your father was killed."

"And no one told us?"

"We did, and we meant to bring you back here, but..." his sigh this time was the heaviest. "He did not let us."

"He?"

"Father Damian," the Bishop smiled bitterly. Ah--Valmeier’s old ’father’. "He thought that...if we couldn’t prevent your father’s death, how could we be sure we were capable of protecting you?"

Couldn’t really argue with that logic, could we? In the end, Valmeier did live and was well-hidden until the old priest couldn’t move from disease and passed away.

"Hmm..." I patted my lips in contemplation. "So that’s why he trained me so hard."

He probably had an inkling that I would be sought by the church faction. Or perhaps, he just felt that Valmeier needed to survive because the Goddess had a plan for him...me--us.

"It must be," the Bishop nodded. "And I guess...he hadn’t been able to tell you the truth before passing away."

"Yeah..."

Unfortunately, his illness came suddenly. It wasn’t due to aging but an accident. Although...if he had a journal, couldn’t he write a letter or something to explain stuff? Or perhaps...he planned to, but death came first. Well, no one would be able to know--and once again, it didn’t matter anymore, so let’s just focus on what was more important and urgent.

"But...how exactly did they manage to get rid--uhh...imprison the Goddess?" I asked, returning to my initial question before this whole history lesson.

"We still didn’t know, but..." the Bishop took out a pouch from behind his vestment. With widened eyes, I saw him take out a familiar-looking bead from the pouch. "This was a relic left a long time ago--did the Hero show you his?"

"Ah, this..." I nodded, deciding to keep the one inside my storage ring a secret for now. "What exactly is this?"

[Jade, don’t tell the priest that we have one, okay?]

[Okay!]

"We believe it is some kind of emergency measure," the Bishop placed the bead on top of the pouch, which he flattened on top of the table so the bead wouldn’t roll away. "Perhaps She foresaw that Her subjects would betray Her, and scatter her power in precaution."

"Her power?" I tilted my head. "I did feel her power, but isn’t this too small?"

No offense to the Goddess, but...I already felt the power of Mother and the Demon God, so I knew how massive theirs were. But the one inside this bead, even after we conjoined the two that night, wasn’t that big. While the divinity was thick, the amount itself was meager at best--and that was me being generous after calculating at least five beads.

Unless...we had to collect like a hundred? A thousand?

Crap! No way...right?

Thankfully, our dear Bishop gave us good news. "Because each one is a part of a sealing formation."

I gasped in happiness. "To seal the real power?"

"Yes, it is a seal that only a priest or someone blessed by the Goddess could activate," the Bishop nodded. "I believe...she left one with us so we could have a lead. Or..."

"Or?"

"This is just my wishful thinking, but..." the Bishop made a forlorn smile. "She probably wanted us to unite by scattering Her power."

Ah...of course, a mother would want to see all of her children living in harmony instead of killing each other. Or...killing others, for that matter.

"Probably," I smiled in sympathy. Perhaps because I, too, was a parent. "She must have been disappointed."

"Indeed."

Again, the atmosphere became gloomy. Even the priests waiting outside and hiding on the second floor seemed sad. Well, at least it meant that they wanted to unite and live in harmony rather than dreaming of supremacy.

The Bishop returned the bead inside the pouch and put it back inside his vestment.

"So...do you know how many we have to collect?"

I leaned forward and asked with utmost seriousness because this would determine how feasible my seventy-day plan was. Please...please, please, please don’t say a hundred. It wouldn’t be, right? It was only a ’seal’ after all.

"Looking at the size of the seal fragment that we and Lord Jin have, probably..."

I waited with a drumming heartbeat. Even Jade held my hand because he felt my nervousness. Please, please, please--

"...seven," the Bishop said, and I had to hold back from jumping out in joy. "No--I believe it is seven."

Fucking finally! A piece of good news! Surely, seventy days should be enough to find four beads, right?

Right?!