Chapter – 01
What is a temple in a romance fantasy novel?
It is the very cradle of corruption and decadence.
In this genre, a temple that isn’t corrupt is as rare as a parenting story where the mother is actually alive. If a plot reveals that the temple is the mastermind, readers don’t even act surprised—they just say, “I knew it,” or “It would have been more of a plot twist if the temple were actually innocent.”
And this temple, where I serve as the Saintess, happened to be one of those rare, upright species.
You might ask, “Why use the word ‘happened to be’? Isn’t it good to have a clean temple?” That might be true for the citizens of the empire who enjoy the endless grace bestowed by a clean temple, but it was absolutely not good for me and the priests, who were the Saintess and staff being ground into dust on the front lines to earn money legally while giving everything away like total pushovers.
I used to be a regular reader of romance fantasies, and the reason I ended up playing Saintess in this world involved complex circumstances about a soul coming back after mistakenly flying into another world due to God’s blunder, but that’s not very important, so I’ll skip it.
Anyway, while temples in romance fantasies usually exert powerful divine authority, making even the Emperor walk on eggshells around them, our temple was busy walking on eggshells around the Emperor and the nobles just to scrape together a few donations and sponsorships.
Whenever the Emperor’s shoulders were stiff, or the prince and princess coughed once or twice, or even when they had a scratch the size of a fingernail, I would get called to the Imperial Palace to serve as a “healing shuttle.” In those moments, I desperately craved the “Penance at Canossa.” I wanted to stand those wretched royals in a snowy field with bone-chilling winds for days on end, only to have them beg and grovel at my feet.
The nobles who arrogantly called me to their territories on a whim? Don’t even get me started. My skill in swinging a mace was improving day by day because I had to chop firewood instead of the heads of those royal and noble bastards. Does it make any sense for a temple in a world where you can light fires with magical tools to be living off firewood because we couldn’t even afford the tools? Does it make sense that I was only chopping wood with the holy relic God gave me to protect this land?
Just as usual, I was called to the palace to heal the Emperor’s alcohol-ridden stomach, dreaming of a “Caritas Church version of the Penance at Canossa,” when a very obvious logic flashed through my mind like a bolt of lightning.
“If you have money, land, and power, you can become the one in charge.”
And I possessed divine power. I understood the geographical situation of how the empire was built on top of the Demon Realm, and I knew how the religion had achieved and grown into the position of “divine authority higher than imperial power.”
“Oh, Caritas! So this is why you appointed me as Saintess!”
I wept and blamed myself for being foolish enough not to have seen God’s “big picture” until now. That very day, I locked myself in my room for several days and drafted a grand, ambitious plan for the revival of the Caritas Church.
The heroines of romance fantasies usually reincarnate or possess bodies in other worlds and build businesses by making magical tools based on soap or modern goods, but I was busy creating “indulgences.”
My motto was simple:
“If you’re going to squeeze money, don’t take the pennies from the commoners. Squeeze it big from the people who have money—the nobles and the imperial family.”
And I implemented my motto brilliantly. I collected information by making the nobles confess everything—even the corruption of their great-grandfathers—to obtain indulgences, then either used that information to strike deals or tipped off the imperial family to share the collected taxes. I forced the temple to be designated as a tax-free zone in exchange for healing the Emperor’s hemorrhoids. I gradually expanded the temple’s power and influence by actively utilizing administration, education, and welfare.
Furthermore, our geographical advantage worked in favor of realizing my grand plan. The Archenos Empire was situated right on top of the underground Demon Realm. Thanks to this, if I showed off a bit of showmanship with my divine power to purify a place contaminated by demonic energy, the number of believers skyrocketed.
Occasionally, monsters would emerge from the cracks into the empire, and every time they did, I swung the mace God had granted me to protect our precious “suckers”—no, our citizens. Thanks to this, my mace finally escaped its fate of chopping firewood and regained its place as a holy relic, the symbol of the Saintess.
When news broke that some Demon King had been resurrected, I joined the hero’s party as a healer and raided the Demon King’s castle alongside the hero chosen by God. I only followed along because I was incredibly anxious that the hero didn’t look like he could even get near the Demon King’s castle, though it did feel like I used my mace more than my healing magic, and it felt like I slaughtered more monsters than the hero did. Regardless, I made it a catchphrase that the Saintess did not ignore the suffering of the citizens and personally took part in the subjugation of the Demon King, further elevating the temple’s status.
“Kids, if you have any conscience, make my death anniversary a holy day…….”
I gave my whole life to the revival of the temple and closed my eyes without regrets. The only lingering regret I had, squeezed out with all my might, was that I had broken up with my ex-boyfriend, who was the hero, on bad terms.
And when I opened my eyes, 500 years had passed.
I was able to see the golden age of the temple, which I had pioneered, with my own eyes. And my reaction to facing that brilliant golden age, which was essentially my own achievement, was…
“I’ve never seen such wretched bastards!”
The Caritas Church is currently the state religion of the Archenos Empire. To be recognized as a believer, one must receive baptism at the age of 18, the year one reaches adulthood. Naturally, the baptism fee, disguised as a donation, is separate.
Of course, I have no memory of creating such a law in my previous life, so it must be a law that those later generations made up as they pleased. When I first heard about the mandatory baptism ceremony, I was so dumbfounded I couldn’t even laugh. Since when was baptism essential to be recognized as a believer? I was certain that in my previous life, I had clearly stated that one could be recognized as a believer just by coming to the temple and praying.
I realized they were doing all sorts of things just to scrape together money. Looking at how it had become a textbook example of a corrupt temple like the ones I had read about in countless romance fantasies, I could only sigh.
In this current life, I turned eighteen, the age at which I had to receive baptism this year.
“Do you think that holy water will cure illnesses, too?”
“Isn’t there a reason the baptism fee is so expensive?”
“Perhaps if we receive God’s protection, we can rise to high positions in the temple immediately, even as commoners.”
A group of girls waiting for baptism with me at the temple, which only opened once a year, whispered in low voices. If holy water were that useful, I would have just stayed locked in the temple manufacturing and selling it in my previous life instead of running around on my own feet. That holy water only had effects on monsters or contaminated land; to humans, it was just water—water that made you feel “holy.”
I didn’t want to believe that I had to offer two months of hard-earned wages to receive a touch from that meaningless water. I had to leave the orphanage after becoming an adult this year, and I had been working three jobs a day, sweating and breaking my back to save up the baptism fee, when I didn’t even know how I would survive afterward. My hatred toward the later generations who were snatching my blood-like wages for something like this only grew.
Finally, after a long wait, my turn arrived. The moment the priest standing before me, kneeling at the altar, mechanically rubbed his thumb soaked in holy water on my forehead, my vision flashed, and an intense light, as if the world were turning upside down, surged in.
Ding—
A clear bell chime rang in my ears. It was definitely indoors with not a single window open, but a breeze blew. At the same time, a burning sensation bloomed from where the holy water touched and gradually spread outward.
A sensation so hot it was cool, and so dazzling it was overwhelming. The moment my breath hitched, a pure white halo shone around me. My hair, which had been golden, was being dyed the same silver-white as in my previous life.
The chalice containing the holy water fell from the hands of the priest who stood before me with a vacant face and rolled on the floor. No one picked it up. Everyone was looking at me as if bewitched. It was a silence so profound that even the flickering candlelight of the altar seemed to have stopped.
And—
Thump.
My heart beats.
No. This isn’t my heart… it is the heartbeat of this world.
Even I, in my previous life, did not possess divine power capable of shaking the world. If so, the owner of this divine power, to which the world responds, is…
A bell chime, not of this world, declaring to everyone to listen. A brilliant golden beam of light pierced through the ceiling above the temple and poured onto the statue behind the altar. The priests, who hastily clasped their hands, muttered prayers and fell to their knees one by one.
The crest that must have been engraved on my forehead in my previous life heated up and flared again. A single revelation, inexplicable in any language of this world.
“A divine revelation…!”
“……No, no way. The Saintess, the Saintess is…!”
One priest, who had lost his mind and was rambling, had his mouth covered by a holy knight and was dragged out of the chapel. Seeing that, I felt like I knew why God had gone through the trouble of reincarnating me and appointing me as Saintess again.
Oh, Caritas, I understand your intentions very well!
You’ve set the stage so that I can legally deal with these wretched later generations, who left behind books full of things they should uphold but ignored them all to busy themselves with filling their own bellies, making my own hardships go to waste, and ultimately creating a textbook corrupt temple, right?
If that was the intention, I could return very happily.
