Chapter 486

Even a 0.1-second interval felt like an eternity to me. “Ah—” Narke opened his mouth as though bursting the air inside his lips, and instead of calling out the coordinates, he recited the warp spell for the Italian coordinate system first. All kinds of formulas tangled together in my mind before falling into orderly sequence. Twelve numbers came pouring out in rapid succession. Twelve instead of nine?

Narke had figured out the exact coordinates of the spot where he was standing. How? His Insight had done it. I knew perfectly well that this was beyond his usual range. I could almost smell the scent of Narke’s blood lingering in the park’s air by now.

Damn it. He knew my plan all too well, and to carry it out, he had to push his ability until he overloaded himself. Naturally, that only made the risk greater. But there was no other choice.

For now, all I could hope for was that the worst-case scenario wouldn’t happen—that I wouldn’t overlap with Narke, that the particles making up our bodies wouldn’t be forced into one, and that the warp spell wouldn’t automatically drag the two of us to the same place.

“Now!”

I stomped my foot and shouted. The last thing I saw was a servant in the hallway turning around after feeling the vibration. When I opened my eyes, I twisted my body backward a quarter turn and raised my right arm toward my chest.

Narke wasn’t here. He had vanished somewhere else in Rome, somewhere I didn’t know. Instead, I was wearing Narke’s face, staring into the eyes of the priest who had been holding Narke 0.1 seconds ago, right where I now stood.

Matteo Orsini. Just like Simone Savelli, this one had a rather striking appearance too. Had they all undergone genetic modification together or something? It was ridiculous to think that way about people who had already been modified long ago and had become close relatives of Homo sapiens.

I didn’t laugh. I looked into the neat-looking priest’s eyes and opened his status window. No Trait. No Insight. No Precognition, either. He didn’t even have any mental-type ability like Discernment. All he had was divine power. And yet he recognized Narke despite having none of that?

“Your Eminence…”

Matteo Orsini pulled back the arm he had reached out, his face filled with surprise. Narke was a secret cardinal, but the clergy of the Papal See knew that he was a cardinal. This person was a priest of the Archdiocese of Rome, which meant he was closely connected to the Papal See. He also had members of the Papal clergy among his family, so there was no reason he wouldn’t know.

Narke had been wearing the appearance of a stranger earlier, so the 0.1-second gap created when we warped at the same time could be passed off as something that happened while the illusion magic was being dispelled. That was my first intention. My second was to keep Narke safe.

The reason I had to take Narke’s face was because Matteo Orsini would be absolutely certain of what he’d seen. If he was confident enough to grab someone whose appearance he didn’t recognize and call him ‘Your Eminence,’ then even if I switched places with Narke and told him, ‘You’ve mistaken me for someone else,’ he would never believe that he could have mistaken Narke.

When you completely shatter the convictions of someone who is that certain of themselves, they tend to become hostile rather than accept that they were wrong. And we knew for a fact that Matteo Orsini’s guess had been 100% accurate. So instead of bringing that accuracy all the way down to zero, adjusting it to fifty percent was clearly the better choice. That way, I wouldn’t give him more reason to grow suspicious.

The moment I revealed that I was someone with absolutely no connection to Narke, not even a superficial one, he would stop being fooled by our warp-and-illusion trick and immediately start turning Rome upside down to find Narke. If word got out that someone believed to be Narke had entered Rome, we would have no choice but to withdraw. In that case, it was more efficient for me to let myself be caught and limit his movements.

So. Let’s see how far this works.

With Narke’s face, I felt the wind outside whipping through my hair. I covered my nose and tilted my head. Fortunately, the smell of blood Narke had probably spilled moments ago hadn’t filled the air yet. Even if the overload had caused the blood vessels in his nose to burst from the sudden rise in blood pressure, it would take some time for that blood to spread its scent through the air.

Matteo Orsini stepped back with a bewildered expression, though he was still smiling brightly.

“How long has it been since I last saw you? I never expected Your Eminence to be in Rome. Shouldn’t you be in Germany?”

As believers who revered the clergy of old often did, he bowed and held out his hand. I was supposed to place my hand over his, but I had no intention of doing so. As I looked down at him with a cold gaze, Matteo Orsini raised his head.

“Or perhaps not.”

It took him thirty seconds to realize that the person wearing Narke’s face wasn’t Narke. Even if I’d managed to bluff my way through it, he probably would have noticed through mana. At the moment, I was subtly letting mana leak out to conceal my divine power.

Now that he had figured it out, it was time to move on to the next step. I turned around. I took two steps, and just as I was about to take the third, he grabbed my arm again. His manner of stopping me had been relatively gentle, but his expression was terrifying.

“Special Ability? Or divine power?”

“What?”

I spoke in English, and Matteo Orsini nodded before switching from Italian to English as well.

“Why are you going around imitating His Eminence’s face?”

“I never imitated it.”

“If this isn’t an imitation, then what is it? How do you know His Eminence?”

Matteo Orsini ran his eyes over Narke’s features on my face, his grip on my arm tightening little by little. Good question. I irritably shook his arm off and answered.

“I don’t know who this ‘His Eminence’ is, but that’s only how you see me. Why don’t you ask the people passing by? Ask them what face I was wearing.”

Matteo Orsini nodded confidently, his expression making it clear that he had no intention of backing down, then grabbed me by the back of the neck. Like a neighborhood thug dragging some kid over for a scolding, he hauled me toward the passersby.

“Excuse me, ma’am. What does this person look like?”

An elderly woman with a round face and thick eyebrows opened her eyes wide and answered.

“He’s a handsome young man. What else would he look like?”

“No, I mean more specifically. What does he look like?”

“He looks just like my husband did when he was young.”

Matteo Orsini stared at me with a blank expression.

Of course. That was because I had taken certain features from the old woman’s face and layered a new illusion over them. Narke had done something similar before when changing his appearance, applying the illusion only to the passersby and not to me. I was doing the same thing, giving each person a different illusion to see.

That was exactly what I was counting on.

How was I supposed to answer his question about how I knew Narke? If I told him the truth, he’d discover that we were members of the 101st Unit, who had come from Germany to find the traitor within the Papal See. But if I made something up, from Matteo Orsini’s perspective, how would a complete stranger who had never even met him before could possibly know Narke, a secret cardinal?

Whether I told the truth or lied, there was no way to answer without leaving questions behind. So this time, too, I decided to shift the blame. I would make it seem as though it wasn’t me who had summoned Narke’s face, but Matteo Orsini’s own subconscious.

“What color is his hair?”

“Brown. Why? Has this young man done something wrong?”

At the word ‘brown,’ Matteo Orsini slowly turned to look at me, his face stiffening. He must have been wondering what was going on. The person he was seeing right now—the original Narke—had black hair.

I looked back at him coldly. Matteo Orsini met my glare, then hurriedly looked away, as if his stern expression from before had never existed. Even so, his answer was firm.

“Yes. He has.”

It took two more identical questions before Matteo Orsini finally accepted the reality before him—that everyone he met was seeing me as a different person. He dragged me to the church. I sat in a dim little cell lit by a single candle, turning my head toward the opening in front of me.

“Confessionals aren’t exactly meant for this sort of thing, are they?”

“I suppose not.”

I suppose not? I sighed, resting a hand against my forehead. Matteo Orsini had opened the window of the confessional and was sitting across from me, stroking his chin as he watched me. I leaned back against the wall and clicked my tongue.

“Father. I know this isn’t exactly a place where you’re supposed to talk face-to-face. What is this, an interrogation room?”

“Enough of that. Is this a Special Ability? Explain it in detail.”

“…Fine. It’s a Special Ability. Everyone sees me differently. Some see the face of an enemy, others see the face of a close friend, or even a family member. But they don’t always see the face of someone who exists on Earth. Sometimes I look like someone they’d never want to become, and sometimes I look like their ideal self. Personally, I’d like to try having an eagle’s head someday, but there hasn’t been a case of that yet, so I’m still waiting.”

I was getting more and more careless with my words, though Matteo Orsini didn’t seem to notice. He nodded seriously before asking, “Does it always happen?”

“Would it? It doesn’t always happen. There are periods when it does, but it’s not something I can control, so I can’t prepare for it. And of all days, it had to happen when I came to Rome on a trip…”

Unable to contain my distress, I repeatedly brushed back the hair falling over my forehead and pressed down on my scalp. When I let out a hollow laugh out of habit, Matteo Orsini’s eyes widened. I looked at him as if asking what was wrong, and he said quietly, “That expression just now was a first.”

“…….”

It took me five seconds to fully process what I’d just heard. Then, all at once, a chill ran down my spine. The fervor in his eyes made my stomach churn. I suppressed the urge to let my expression turn cold and casually shoved my hands into my pockets.

“I’m sure they’re all firsts for you. I don’t know who you’re seeing, but the person you call ‘Your Eminence’ probably makes different expressions from me. I’m just making my own expressions.”

Matteo Orsini stroked the corner of his mouth, never taking his eyes off my face. It was true that I found his attention uncomfortable, but I’d always known what it felt like to be a monkey locked in a zoo, so I could keep myself from getting angry. As long as he wasn’t reading my thoughts or what was going on inside my head, I could tolerate him simply staring at me. After a long while, Matteo Orsini finally spoke.

“You wear the face of someone I deeply respect.”

“So even priests have people they admire.”

“Believers tend to think of priests as extraordinary people, but we’re human too, just like everyone else.”

I knew that well enough. I shrugged and tugged my upper eyelids upward.

“Yeah, I suppose so? So, what does this person do, anyway? If you’re calling him ‘Your Eminence,’ he must be a very important person.”

Matteo Orsini struck the back of my hand with magic and said sternly, “Show some respect.”

“Hey, it’s my face. I can do whatever I want with it.”

“Doesn’t it look like the face of the person I respect to me? He is a truly exalted person. Our wisdom could never hope to match his knowledge. Even Pliny¹ and the Encyclopédistes² would bow their heads in admiration before him. It would not be an exaggeration to say that the Akashic Records³ themselves are laid open before him.”

So that was how he saw him… Whether I liked it or not, whether I wanted it or not, the information he fed me was etched into my mind. An indescribable sense of guilt lay beneath it all. At the same time, I was getting closer to the information I wanted. I closed my eyes and came up with something I could say without thinking too hard. I needed to seem as ordinary as possible.

“What records? I can’t believe a priest is using the terminology of some cult.”

“What an astonishingly inappropriate thing to say for someone of your appearance. It’s almost appalling! It was merely a metaphor, so I suggest you broaden your literary understanding instead of confining yourself to such narrow thinking.”

“Ah…”

He and I had probably read about the same number of books in our lifetimes. I had deliberately said it without thinking, and yet I got this lecture in return. Still, it meant my act was working, so I had no complaints.

Matteo Orsini’s gaze fixed itself on me through the candle standing between us in the confessional. The candlelight clung thickly to his face, seeming to melt down like candle wax. In the silence, I stared at the gloomy wood grain of the confessional, so bleak that merely looking at it made me feel hopeless.

I still hadn’t heard anything from Narke. I had absolutely no idea what Matteo Orsini wanted to get from Narke. And trying to figure out the meaning behind someone’s gaze was something I had never wanted to do, even back in my old world. So I tried my best not to think about it.

Even if I did, my imagination only went so far—at this level of interest, Matteo Orsini was obviously trying to hound Narke into writing a theological encyclopedia. Or perhaps he wanted to squeeze prophecies and insight out of him… There was no way he could be this persistent unless there was something he wanted from Narke.

But his interest seemed to be rooted in something more fundamental than such material demands. The stubborn set of his mouth and the tension around his eyes showed the same kind of single-minded persistence as a child blindly following the adult who had raised him. I parted my lips.

“Father, do you often visit the Papal See?”

“No. There’s a lockdown in place, so I can’t go in.”

“I see. More importantly, you haven’t asked my name.”

“When are you leaving Rome?”

He answered my question with a completely unrelated one. Yet in a way, that was an answer in itself. He saw me as a substitute for Narke, not as a person in my own right. To him, I was nothing more than a statue of Narke Farnese, so there was no reason for him to know what ‘my’ name was. Whatever way he chose to treat me, I didn’t particularly care. But for the sake of loyalty and basic decency toward my friend, I couldn’t keep wearing Narke’s face for much longer.

“I’m thinking of going back before Easter. I’ve seen pretty much everything there is to see. I wanted to spend a little more time looking around the Theatre of Marcellus, but I can’t exactly do that with you keeping me here, can I?”

If I stormed out right now, everything would be for nothing. So I answered patiently, even though he wasn’t really paying attention to my answer anyway.

“What did you do before this?”

“I’m a student studying theology. Though I don’t get to attend school very often.”

He knew I was a mage, of course—though he had no idea what level of mage I was—so I had to give him an answer that fit an ordinary person of my supposed means. Claiming to be a student was practically a universal excuse in a situation like this. Matteo Orsini clasped his hands together and spoke calmly.

“Then you must possess a certain degree of purity in your soul, Brother. My secretary left his post some time ago, so there is an opening.”

“…….”

“Would you like to work with me?”

I stared at him expressionlessly. His face was full of resolve. Contrary to my expectations, he wasn’t shocked that I wasn’t pleased. I just spoke quietly.

“It’s because of my face, isn’t it? I’ve met many people like you, Father.”

“That’s right.”

Once again, he readily admitted it, contrary to my expectations.

“I wish to recruit you because you resemble someone I deeply respect. When we are with a revered teacher, when we are with a parent we respect, our minds can reach toward something higher. Even if it is only in appearance.”

“I’m not particularly interested. I will have to refuse. And since you seem to have forgotten, as I said earlier, I have no idea when this ability of mine will end.”

“That’s all right. I know you are not that person, but someone else. What do you say?”

“No. I said I’m not interested. I’m going back to England. I don’t want to work as a secretary—”

I turned my head at the sound of something rustling. Then I stared without moving at the object that had come within a hand’s breadth of my eye, sharp as a blade. Without taking my eyes off the wand pointed at my forehead, I slowly raised both hands, the way an ordinary mage would—not a combat mage. Once again, he had defied my expectations.

— Enter through the narrow gate!

“…!”

— …For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it.

For a moment, my pupils went slack and strength drained from my shoulders. Ah, damn it. This bastard… A sickening drowsiness began to eat away at my mind. But I couldn’t completely lose consciousness. Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t.

“Isn’t this a good offer? But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.”

My stomach churned. It felt as though something was coming back up, but nothing came out of my throat. Matteo Orsini pulled my robe’s hood over my head and supported me. He led me out of the confessional and began taking me toward the rear of the church.

My mind kept slipping madly back and forth between consciousness and unconsciousness. A person who possessed power yet used it to satisfy his own selfish desires could hardly look any weaker than this. So he had divine power and lived high on the hog. And what good did that do him? He must have spent his life scheming to obtain whatever he wanted like this. In the end, this was what divine power was being used for—petty, personal matters…

Ah. It was so clear.

Shadows fell across my blurred vision. We had entered an arcade.

“Being with me will be more than enough to help with your religious life. If you wish, I can even have you enrolled at the school here. You’ll be very pleased with my offer. There is no reason for you to refuse, and you have never refused before.”

I heard a door opening. From the sounds and vibrations reaching me, this was clearly an empty room. It was probably closer to a storage room than an actual room… I grabbed my throbbing head with my free arm. In my sluggish vision, I watched Matteo Orsini’s eyes turn toward me.

BANG—!

I twisted my body inward and slammed Matteo Orsini’s head into the floor.

“…!”

The fact that his mental manipulation magic had failed to affect me, even after he had recited it to the very end, made his eyes widen more than I had ever seen before. I flipped him over, pressed his head down, and used my other hand to pull both his arms behind his back and hold them there. Then I moved the hand pressing down on his head and placed my index and middle fingers against his temple.

“What is this—!”

— Enter through the narrow gate.

I forced the divine power I had drawn from around my heart into his head. Matteo Orsini’s mouth fell open, and his pupils dilated in an instant. Watching his reaction, I muttered, “Looks like this is somewhere we won’t be discovered for a while. Thanks to you, I got to a good hiding place without much trouble.”

I raised my head. The wooden door was firmly locked, but it still looked like it would come right off its hinges if someone kicked it. I surveyed the surroundings and spoke quietly.

“From now on, you need to be very quiet. If anyone outside hears us, you’ll be in serious trouble, Father.”

Translator Note

1. Gaius Plinius Secundus, known in English as Pliny the Elder, was a Roman scholar and naval commander who spent his life studying the natural world. He wrote Natural History, a massive 37-book encyclopedia that covered plants, animals, medicine, and geography. ↩︎
2. TheEncyclopédistes were a group of over 150 French intellectuals, scientists, artists, and writers who contributed to the Encyclopédie during the 18th century. ↩︎
3. The Akashic Records are a theoretical spiritual library or energetic database that contains a record of every universal event, thought, word, emotion, and intent of all existence across past, present, and future. ↩︎