Astein’s eyebrows went up and down. His eyes were full of doubt.
So he answered, “They have no reason to aim me at all…”
“It’s the Emperor.”
Astein stared at me again. It’s hard to believe even though I sold God’s name, right? Would it be better to bring up about my father, Marquis Futor?
“I understand.”
I opened my eyes to Astein’s answer, he answered easily. He believed what I said.
“I will strengthen my guard, but if I say that I am a paladin, His Majesty will not be wary of me.”
Why was he so relaxed? The Emperor wanted him dead. I shouldn’t have left it like this. To be alert, I had to tell the truth.
“In fact, my father is also aiming at the Grand Duke.”
I closed my eyes and spit them out. Leading his actions with lies, let’s finish with just what a real saint should do.
Astein had always trusted me.
“Is it because of yesterday?”
I quietly nodded. And the answer that followed was creeping into guilt.
“I’m sorry. You shouldn’t get involved, it’s my fault…”
“The Emperor had a lot of antipathy towards me. So I came here… it’s never Lady Freya’s fault.”
“Yes?”
What did he mean? No, did he believe my words again? Without a single doubt?
“Anyway, don’t worry. Blue Rose can’t hurt me.”
They couldn’t? Before I even realized the meaning, I flinched at Astein’s actions. He looked around, bowed his head, and whispered a sweet word in my ear.
“Don’t worry, I’m not going to die before I become a paladin of the Prospective Saint.”
His tenderness, unlike yesterday, couldn’t prevent my face from turning red. A blunt, faithful, diligent knight was a gentleman today. As he was like before the reversion.
“From now on, not here, I will hide in the prayer room of the prospective saint. They’re going to kill me if I meet you in a public place like this… Then, I must go.”
Astein bowed to me and left. He left me a sweet lilac scent.
I was fascinated to watch his back as he left. Later, I realized that the robe he put on my shoulder was still there. The robe I wore was full of his scent and warmth.
༻✿༺
First, I returned to the prayer room. Astein’s robe was finely folded and placed in a corner.
Just then Sir Solar returned. It took time because the Saint was busy.
“The Saint said if you come now she’ll have time for tea.”
Fortunately, he didn’t seem to know that I had gone outside.
“I get it.”
After hiding the robe further, I went to drink tea with the Saint.
After I was taught by the Saint for a long time, the lunchtime passed. The Saint looked pleasant, but I was slightly exhausted. I couldn’t wait to lie in bed.
“I’m going back home.”
“Yes, My Lady.”
I leaned back comfortably in the carriage. Somehow, I felt Astein’s lilac scent hung around me.
Thanks to his efforts to help me, the search for Ellaner went smoothly.
Now it was time to think about how to persuade Ellaner when I found her. If she also blamed her father for abandoning her and her mother, things would be easier.
As I was thinking, the carriage suddenly stopped and I heard a loud voice from the horseman.
“Be careful! Do you know whose carriage is this?”
“I know! Isn’t she the Prospective Saint? Please, please save my daughter!”
What was she talking about? It looked like she’s looking for me.
At the moment, I hesitated to go out. I realized what the Marquis said. This was the reason why I shouldn’t go outside.
People who wanted miracles from the Saint. It shouldn’t be revealed that I was a Prospective Saint who couldn’t work miracles in contact with them.
“My daughter was dying of a freak. Not just my daughter, but all the children in the slums!”
What? Why were the children dying?
I couldn’t pretend I didn’t know. I was also from the slums. I was a child who barely saved my life in an orphanage sponsored by my father while wandering the slums.
I didn’t have any good memories of the slums, but it was a home for me.
“What is happening?”
I opened the carriage door and went out. I could just have to call the Saint.
“Oh, Saint, help me. Save our children.” (Sometimes, the people called her the Saint)
“Lady, the Marquis is waiting for you.”
The knights who escorted me seemed displeased. Even though I was a Prospective Saint, I had been thoroughly ignored by the Marquis.
“Is there anything more important than a person’s life?”
The two knights’ dissatisfaction subsided from my resolute attitude. I looked at them and then turned to the woman.
“Please explain the situation.”
The woman in old clothes gave me a tearful cry.
The fact was the children suddenly collapsed in the morning with bubbles in their mouths. When the woman called a doctor, he didn’t come to the slums. So she came to the temple in a hurry and saw the pattern of the Futor family. And my blue hair was seen through the window of the carriage.
“Please help me. There is no place to ask.”
I was convinced that I asked the woman a few more symptoms. Even without divine power, I could save the children.
“I’m going to the slums right now.”
༻✿༺
There was still a shadow of unhappiness in the slums. The children used to laugh full of hope. But today, only the children’s cries were heard.
“Hwaa… mother!”
“It’s all right. I’ve brought you the Saint.”
Honestly, I was nervous. I was afraid if I did something wrong. Then, I thought again if only I had divine power.
Still, I had the only gift God gave me, reversion, instead of divine power. I went through a similar thing before the reversion. So I could do it.
“Did the kids go to the mountains this morning?”
“That’s right.”
“Hasn’t she eaten anything at home yet?”
“Yes, my daughter said she wasn’t hungry, so she ran around, and suddenly she broke down with a cold sweat and vomited.”
It’s like then. This wasn’t a freak. I quickly glanced through the garden near the slums. Fortunately, they grew up a lot.
“It’s spring, and you probably didn’t expect there were poisonous mushrooms. First, let the children sit down in the right position and help them get rid of what they ate. But don’t allow the vomit to go through the soil.”
After I quickly explained, I ran to the garden and squatted in front of the plant with purple buds. Exclaimed to the people by digging the soil with bare hands.
“I need the leaves and roots of Belladonna grass, so we have to dig as much as possible.”
The people of the slums came to my cry. I gave a command to the escorts who were standing next to me.
“Make a fire! Quickly!”
In a hurry, they set firewoods under a pot prepared by the poor and started a fire. When the pot was heated, people poured Belladonna’s leaves and roots into it.
I crushed it hard.
“I need clean water.”
“There’s a well outside the village, but… I don’t know if there’s water.”
“Ride the carriage quickly! If there is no water, go to the neighboring villages!”
After a certain amount of juice, I used my handkerchief to filter it out. The people’s clothes in the slums were dirty.
Just in time, the men from the slums came with clean water. In there, I put the Belladonna juice and diluted it about a tenth.
“Slightly pour it little by little in the children’s mouths. However, you need to share a cup by tomorrow morning. Feeding at once is dangerous because it’s Belladonna’s poison and can causing trouble and is dangerous.”
Before reversion, I couldn’t use my divine power, so I studied herbal medicine in the hope that it would help in an emergency. But those were later used as evidence of me being a witch.
So I had a fear of doing this. I felt nervous as I watched the children took my medicine. If it didn’t work, people would misunderstand me.
“The convulsions are decreasing!”
“Uh, mother, I’m thirsty.”
Fortunately, the medicine worked and slowly they showed better conditions. I sighed deeply at the sight. I was glad, really.
But I could hear something bad came to my ears.
“Isn’t it faster if she treats them with divine power?”
Same as before the reversion. Such doubts piled up and then I was driven as a witch. I was short of breath for a moment. But soon, I gave my hands strength and opened my mouth.
“I can’t always use divine power freely.”
I always wanted to help those who were in trouble, but I wasn’t able to. Even if I had a little divine power half a year later, it was the same.
The people of the temple and my father had always been against me to use divine power for the poor. It was only for the aristocracy and the royal family, not the poor.
“I can’t come to the slums every time and save people, right?” I spoke a little coldly.
I had to do that to teach those who live outside everyone’s interests how to stand on their own feet, they had to.
“That’s right, it’s not that Lady Saint is always free, we must keep our kids ourselves.”
Fortunately, my message was passed on to people.
“So, I’d rather give you a variety of useful herbs. I cannot always save you.”
I taught them how to use herbs, just like witches. Using poisonous herbs as medicines were against people’s common sense.
“Can everyone remember?”
“Yes! We will try our best!”
“Good. I will come again before summer, so remember it well.”
“Thank you, Lady!”
The children’s parents grabbed my hands and bowed their heads.
“Thank you for saving our children, Saint.”
I was a little nervous. It was true that I helped them, but it was completely different from what a real saint did.
“You are the first Saint who does this for the poor.”
It was uncomfortable to hear that I was a Saint.
Yes, I was called a Saint now, but later, I would be called a fake Saint.
“I have to go, so I hope you remember my warning.”
However, the guard knights and the horseman’s gazes changed. I turned my head because it was a bit burdensome.
“Wait, that…!”
Red hair passed by. It was a face I knew. There was only one person who came to my mind.
Ellaner, the real Saint.
She was so close!
I got up from my seat to chase her. There was a disrupter who tried to track the trail of Ellaner with his eyes.
“Lady, it’s really too late now. The sun is already setting, the Marquis will be worried,” said Sir Solar as he blocked me.
In the meantime, Ellaner’s traces disappeared.
What did she think while watching me? If she knew that she was a Saint with real divine power, she would look and misunderstood me.
I needed to see Ellaner quickly and cleared the misunderstanding that might happen.
“Step aside, the work is not done yet.”
I pushed Sir Solar and walked forward. I hurried all over the slums, but I couldn’t find Ellaner.
“Lady, I think you can stop looking at the slums.”
I barely turned to Sir Solar’s request who had misunderstood my intentions. Even if Ellaner was found, it was hard to talk freely to her in front of Sir Solar.
Since Astein was also looking for her, I would wait.
“Let’s leave.”
After being forced to climb the carriage, I was afraid of what might wait for me. Maybe my father would reprimand me for going to the slums again.
On the surface, he was a benevolent aristocrat who built orphanages and supported it. He was also respected as the brother of a Saint and the father of a Prospective Saint.
However, he terribly ignored and despised the slum people. When he threatened me, he took the children of the orphanage as hostages because he didn’t see them as human beings in the first place.
“Haa…”
After I arrived at the mansion, I got out of the carriage with a little determination. For some reason, my father never showed up when I came back.
Then, I took a bath and hid my ominous feeling.
“Lady, your dinner is ready.”
Soon, Selemion prepared a lot of food for me. She said that I was so skinny. But I didn’t have the appetite. However, I still, barely, put soup and bread in my mouth
Then I asked Selemion, “Where is my father?”
“I don’t know. The Marquis is out, but I don’t know when he’ll be back.”
I thought I had known why he went out. It’s for the Blue Rose.
“Doesn’t the butler know?”
I didn’t want to ask. My father’s closest attendant was a man who despised me as if I was a worm on the day I came to the family. Especially before I decided to be a fake Saint and went to the temple, he didn’t even come to say farewell to me, unlike others.
“Where’s the butler?”
However, because of the inconvenience, I couldn’t avoid him every time. I hardened my heart and went to the butler.
“What can I do for you?”
As always, a hard answer came back, he didn’t even give a title at the end of his sentence. He said that with cold eyes like before.
However, I wasn’t overwhelmed by it and chose to ignore it.
“Where did my father go?”