"That is precisely why I ensure the mountain of corpses I have piled up does not go to waste."
The Pope's words, etched into my ears.
That old man had followed his own unwavering resolve, going so far as to take the lives of the very humanity he was supposed to protect.
To sacrifice the few in order to save the many.
He possessed both the resolve and the power to carry that out without a moment's hesitation.
Killing people is wrong.
Why? How so? Questions like those are meaningless.
The reason you must not kill is not something you explain with logic.
What is wrong is wrong.
That is all there is to it.
It is not logic — it is an action that people recoil from precisely because they are human.
But then, what if there was something you wanted to protect so badly that you would do what is wrong?
What if, knowing it was wrong, there was simply no other means available?
What the Pope was doing was rewriting the world as he saw fit, reshaping it to suit his purposes.
But it was not an act driven by self-interest — it was born from a genuine concern for the world.
To kill himself as an individual, to sacrifice many, and in doing so save an even greater number of the Human race.
Was that action justice?
Or was it evil?
The act of trying to save someone — that must be justice.
The act of killing someone — that must be evil.
When both were present at the same time, which one was the correct answer?
I didn't know.
Whether it was the right thing or the wrong thing.
But there was one thing I did know.
The Pope would never change his path, no matter how many people stood before him and told him he was wrong.
That old man, who wore such a gentle expression yet harbored a conviction behind his eyes bordering on madness— I could say with certainty that nothing, no matter what, would make him stop.
The only times he would stop were as he himself had said: when the world was saved, or when his body and soul had rotted away to nothing.
Was the Pope's path the right one or the wrong one?
Even if it was wrong — even if it was proven wrong — he would use that as nourishment and rise again.
Until his body and soul crumbled to dust.
Terrifying.
That excessive conviction was an enormous power that no Status or Skill could capture.
If we fought head-on, I would win.
But that victory would mean nothing.
He would die and rise again.
Over and over, no matter how many times.
Nothing is stronger than an unbreakable spirit.
What about me?
In that sense, I was incredibly weak.
So weak that I couldn't endure the sins I had committed, that I longed for death even for a moment.
And yet, the moment I was saved, I clung to a wretched desire to live — that was how weak I was.
My Status and Skills were probably quite high, even by this world's standards.
I had been reminded that there were those above me, but even so, I was well above average.
And that power belonged to someone with an absurdly feeble heart.
The balance was all wrong.
I needed to become stronger too.
I could never reach the Pope's level of madness, nor did I intend to.
But even so, I had to carry the past I had walked until now on my shoulders, and act so that it would not be wasted.
That was my reckoning.
The excuse I needed in order to forgive myself — me, with my weak heart.
My Status had fully recovered.
Enough lazing around this mansion.
I had to act.
In order to find out how I should be going forward from here.
I would speak with Shiro.
About where Shiro intended to head.
And about how to get there.
If that path overlapped with my own, I would gladly cooperate.
If it didn't… then I would hope it didn't.
Having made that resolution, Shiro — who was rarely so — did not return even when mealtime came.
In her place,
I imagined she too had been forced to confront a great deal during her meeting with the Pope.
The emotions churning inside her must have been complex beyond anything I could fathom.
She had been born in a nation that worshipped the Goddess Faith, only to hear that her homeland had been destroyed by the Divine Word Faith.
I too knew the experience of having a Goblin village wiped out by humans, so I understood that feeling all too well.
The fury and hatred so overwhelming they threatened to consume you whole.
In my case, I had carried out revenge with my own hands.
But Sophia could not.
Not that she couldn't — but she probably wouldn't.
Because during that audience, she had learned of the Pope's resolve.
Because his apology had been far too sincere.
And because, having seen that unwavering conviction on full display, she understood that even killing the Pope on the spot would accomplish nothing.
Was revenge justice?
I didn't know.
But I did know — because I had lived through it — that without settling that score, you could never move forward.
Sophia had lived her life without ever carrying out her revenge.
And perhaps that was precisely why she had so easily crossed the line that should never be crossed as a person, spiraling into cruelty.
The flames of revenge that had been smoldering inside her had twisted her personality.
That was what I had come to believe.
And yet, when the moment finally came to face the object of that revenge head-on, she realized there was simply no way to achieve it.
For a normal person, killing the body of their enemy would be enough.
But the Pope was an exception.
Killing him would mean nothing.
If she truly intended to exact her revenge on him, she would need to break his spirit.
And Sophia could feel just how impossibly difficult that would be.
Still barely having touched her food, Sophia rose from her seat.
"Why not eat a little more?"
The words slipped out before I could stop them.
The moment they left my mouth, I thought: *I shouldn't have said that.* Because in Sophia's eyes, I could see an irritation she could no longer hide.