How to Survive in a Good Small Guild - Chapter 91
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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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How to Survive in a Small-Scale Guild
Chapter 91
I stood frozen in place, my mind gone blank.
Aria had recognized me as an Experimental Subject from the very beginning. Which meant that from the moment I first entered the Temple….
“Thanks to you, I think I’ll be able to surpass even Matthias soon.”
…….
“He’s always boasted about having the strongest power among us. But in the end, it was I who discovered a Successful Specimen.”
Ah….
“I’ll have to report this to the High Priest. Don’t worry, Odret. In fact, from now on only good things await you. You yourself are proof of the High Priest’s power, so you’ll be able to become a High Priestess.”
…….
“You’ll stand shoulder to shoulder with me. And if you want, you can speak your mind freely from the start. Even if you become my equal, I can accept it.”
She gazed at me with those dark eyes and smiled gently.
“Besides, you were the one who first found yourself, so as long as you exist, my achievement won’t disappear….”
My thoughts wouldn’t come together at all.
My Transmigration might have been caused by the Temple from the very beginning.
Perhaps… if my Transmigration itself were a phenomenon that could be explained as the High Priest’s miracle.
If they summoned me into this world.
Then what am I? Can I really be called an outsider to this world who knows the ‘original’?
Are my memories of Park Geo-seong truthful?
I couldn’t trust anything—not even myself.
I could only ask, my voice trembling.
“Since when….”
“From the very start!”
The answer came back in an upbeat tone.
“You see, I actually don’t like Spicy Rose Cream Pasta.”
……?
“That’s something Olson, the intermediate priest, loves. He’s so fond of it that I specially permitted him to eat this expensive dish.”
Ah, that’s right. Aria and my first meeting.
“You found out beforehand that I like Spicy Rose Cream Pasta?”
I had hidden a letter in the most expensive dish to deliver it to someone important.
And I believed our connection began when Aria discovered it.
“You know I have the Transcendent Ability of Divine Revelation, right? One day, I received a revelation. I ate Spicy Rose Cream Pasta, and I saw myself thriving in the Temple.”
“That was….”
“So I chose Spicy Rose Cream Pasta, and there was a letter from you. That’s when I found out. That you were the key to everything.”
I had been played in Aria’s palm from the very beginning.
Before a group with the impossible power called Transcendent Abilities, I had been helplessly manipulated all along.
‘I am now….’
I’d always thought I held the information, but this time I was the one deceived.
My mind turned white. I stared blankly at Aria.
***
Aria observed Odret Lavandel before her, who had become noticeably flustered.
On a day when she was about to have lunch with the intermediate priests, a revelation suddenly appeared before her eyes.
Aah….
An image of herself eating Spicy Rose Cream Pasta, which she didn’t particularly like.
And when she saw it, the High Priest was praising her instead of Matthias.
The moment Aria witnessed that revelation, she ate Olson’s Spicy Rose Cream Pasta.
“I’ll have this, if you don’t mind? You don’t object, right?”
“Pardon? Ah, yes….”
And she discovered the note.
A note from a contractor Guild Master named Odret Lavandel.
‘Odret Lavandel?’
It was a familiar name. A memory from several weeks prior surfaced in Aria’s mind.
Aah….
Under the overwhelming Transcendent Ability of the High Priest, Odret Lavandel writhed on the ground in agony.
“Stop… Aaaah!”
Under the unbearable pressure of the miracle, she continued to scream.
Odret Lavandel wept continuously, groaning, until at some point she lost consciousness.
“A failure, then?” Aria asked expressionlessly as she watched the scene unfold, and the High Priest gestured. It meant to dispose of her.
Aria transported Odret Lavandel to the Recovery Room.
She was merely one among countless Failed Specimens.
Odret had vanished at some point, but Aria didn’t give it much thought. She must have come to her senses and headed home.
After all, she had signed the Experiment Consent Form of her own accord. The woman lacked even the courage to report it anywhere. She was timid by nature, and broke besides.
Yet I never expected to meet Odret again like this….
“More capable than I expected, aren’t you?”
“Thank you.”
She showed no sign of recognizing me at all.
First side effect: memory loss.
“I’m truly grateful for this. I would be honored to follow your will, High Priestess Aria.”
Second side effect: her personality had changed.
She seemed far more courageous now, far more confident than before.
And afterward, she adapted to the Temple more perfectly than anyone else, even interpreting the Sacred Scriptures on her own.
Watching this unfold, no one could measure the tremendous joy Aria felt.
She had secured a successful specimen! A successful specimen who remembered nothing, held captive right at her side!
Hmph—Seraphine, Etienne, and Matthias wouldn’t dare breathe a word from now on. She had accomplished something this magnificent.
Aria’s eyes gleamed with avarice as she gazed upon the still-bewildered Odret.
Odret Lavender, I know things you don’t.
I know how desperately you signed that consent form, saying you needed money.
And I know the agony you suffered through the experiment.
I know you better than you know yourself.
Therefore, you shall become the proof of my success.
***
“I’ve already told the High Priest. You’ll become a High Priestess soon.”
“…What will I be doing then?”
“Since you’re becoming a High Priestess, you’ll receive a new Transcendent Ability!”
“Is that all?”
“And we’ll work together to summon the Prophet. You seem to have gained an instinctive ability to understand everything related to the Prophet, so you’ll be an enormous help to us!”
Her words felt unreal.
“Take my hand. If you stand with me, you’ll win the High Priest’s trust and gain real power.”
I stared quietly at the hand Aria offered me.
…What would happen if I didn’t take it?
Or had everything already been decided the moment the High Priest took notice of me and chose me to become a High Priestess?
My heart pounded rapidly. The world seemed to spin.
“Take my hand, Odret Lavender.”
As she whispered those words and I felt myself falling into an abyss, teetering on the brink of something irreversible—
“High Priestess Aria?”
A voice cut through the tension. It was Olson, a mid-ranking priest.
“What is it? I told you not to disturb me.”
Aria turned around irritably. The sharp killing intent in her voice made Olson flinch visibly.
“W-Well, something terrible has happened! All the other High Priestesses are already out there, so I thought you should come too!”
“What’s happened?”
When the words finally left Olson’s mouth, they were enough to stun us both.
“The Crown Prince has appeared at the Temple entrance!”
“…What?”
Neither Aria nor I could quite accept the reality of it—the Crown Prince standing before the Temple. Aria’s pupils trembled.
I felt the same shock. How had Sedrian suddenly appeared here?
“He’s asking to meet with someone of high rank, anyone really, since he’s come to the Temple….”
“This is… what on earth is going on?”
The moment Aria’s attention shifted away from me, my mind raced.
Yes, I had undergone Possession through the Temple’s experiment, and Aria knew I was an experimental subject before I did myself.
But there was one fact that hadn’t changed.
She didn’t know everything about me. There was still information Aria remained ignorant of.
First, I was a different person’s soul, distinctly separate from the original Odret Lavender.
Second, I had held the Crown Prince Sedrian’s hand.
…There was a way out.
“Oh—wait, yes!”
I pushed past Aria and bolted from the Archive Room.
Sedrian had created time for me by deliberately walking into danger.
In this window of opportunity, there was something I had to do.
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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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