Chapter 375: What Ifs

Aldric closed his eyes and prayed in silence.

He raised his hands, walked forward, and gently placed his palm directly onto the baby’s small chest.

Aldric’s eyes instantly flared in a blinding, radiant golden color, and his entire body began to glow. The divine light slowly moved down his arms and transferred directly toward the baby, entirely enveloping the small infant in a sphere of pure golden energy.

Right in front of the high-ranking priests and nuns who had been gathered there to help set the ritual up, the baby suddenly opened its mouth and began to cry.

As the loud wails echoed through the room, Aldric slowly took his hands off the baby and stepped back.

With his pupils still glowing a brilliant gold, he watched as the infant began to grow at an increasingly accelerated rate.

In just ten minutes, the tiny baby had grown to the size of a ten to twelve year old child.

Another thirty minutes later, the blinding golden glow around the body finally began to subside. Right as the light faded from the stone slab, the golden glow in Aldric’s pupils completely disappeared as well.

Aldric blinked his normal blue eyes and looked down at the man lying in front of him.

It was a devastatingly handsome, blonde-haired man. He didn’t look like a teenager at all anymore. He looked much more like a man who had trained his body extensively for years, and he looked like a young man in his early twenties.

The blonde-haired man slowly sat up. He casually looked around the stone room, not caring about his complete lack of clothes.

He finally looked at at Aldric.

"I am here to fulfill the job that the Goddess has given me," the man said, his voice deep and echoing. "But while I did manage to successfully descend, this body really isn’t a great vessel. A massive portion of my power is heavily suppressed by the limits of this body and the world. Specifically, my physical capabilities and everything related to my mana."

Aldric immediately bowed his head in deep respect.

"My deepest apologies, O great Apostle," Aldric said smoothly. "But this infant was the best vessel we could find within the time limit."

The Apostle nodded in understanding.

"You can call me... hmm..."

The Apostle paused. He casually looked down at his own private area, inspecting the anatomy he had been given, before looking back up at Aldric.

"You can call me Gabriel."

Adrian watched as Gabriel slowly floated back down from the sky with his golden mana shield still active.

But as soon as Gabriel’s feet touched the dirt, the mana shield completely disappeared. The Apostle immediately began walking directly toward Adrian.

"So," Gabriel taunted. "Do you still actually believe that you can win this fight?"

Adrian just looked at him. He didn’t say anything for two whole seconds.

"Well, if I kill you, then I will win, right?" Adrian replied bluntly. "The answer seems pretty simple to me."

Gabriel let out a condescending chuckle.

"Do you actually think you can kill me?" Gabriel asked. "Haven’t you already seen what I am capable of doing? Here is my suggestion for you. Just give up right now and sacrifice yourself for the greater good of this world."

Gabriel stopped walking.

"You are a total anomaly," Gabriel said coldly. "You simply shouldn’t exist here. Your soul is not of this world, and it never will be."

Adrian immediately frowned.

Gabriel’s words had hit the bullseye, but as Adrian stared at the Apostle, a wave of confusion hit him.

’I can never be a part of this world?’ Adrian thought to himself. ’What the hell does he mean by that? These people actively summon so many random people from Earth as ’Heroes’. So why the hell am I considered the only anomaly?’

Unable to hold it back, he asked Gabriel the exact same question.

"What about all the other Heroes?" Adrian asked sharply. "They have literally been summoned from a completely different world too, right? What about them?"

"They were properly summoned," Gabriel corrected easily. "They went through a process. You didn’t. And your continued, unchecked existence is causing a massive disturbance in the mortal realm."

Adrian just stared at him, his thoughts racing in a dozen different directions.

"What do you mean I’m making things unstable?" Adrian demanded.

Gabriel looked at Adrian closely and felt some hope.

’Looks like I can actually talk him into this,’ Gabriel thought to himself. ’He’s not just a mindless brute... I guess I was wrong about him.’

"The threads of fate belonging to many people have been unnaturally weaving themselves around you," Gabriel explained smoothly. "The universe demands perfect balance. If there is good, there must be bad. If there are gods, there must be devils. If there is heaven, there must be hell. If there is happiness, there must be sadness."

Hearing this, Adrian bit his lower lip.

"What exactly do you think would have happened to these people if I didn’t come to this world?" Adrian asked quietly.

"Well, things would have been drastically different, of course," Gabriel answered casually. "A lot of the useless peasants in your territory would have starved to death. A lot of them would be currently suffering from poverty. They would be taken advantage of by the other nobles right now. They would see their family members die pointlessly, and most of them would have never even dreamed of becoming knights."

Hearing this cold, twisted logic, Adrian just let out a dry, wry smile. He shook his head and chuckled bitterly.

"And the other Heroes might not have been summoned at all," Adrian added, his voice suddenly growing cold. "Oresfall wouldn’t have been attacked by monsters. It wouldn’t have even come under my name in the first place. I would have been completely banished from the empire."

Adrian took a step closer to Gabriel.

His gaze turned incredibly serious, and Gabriel suddenly sensed a heavy, oppressive pressure radiating off Adrian’s body.