The Cowardly Baby Saint Sees Ghosts - Chapter 39

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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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# Chapter 39.
The landscape beyond the window began to shift. As we ventured toward the city outskirts, the buildings themselves seemed to shrink.
Just as I’d seen when I first arrived at the Temple, crumbling houses and wanderers drifting through the streets in search of scraps passed by in a blur.
For a moment, I heard the Pope’s voice again—the one insisting he wanted to show me only good things.
Yes, any ordinary five-year-old would have been shaken by this sight.
But I was hardly an ordinary five-year-old, so I managed well enough.
I kept my eyes wide open, determined not to miss a single detail.
The uneven roads made the carriage wheels catch repeatedly. After sitting still for so long, nausea began to creep in.
‘Carsickness, perhaps….’
Becky’s steady hand on my back helped me hold on, though if the ride had lasted much longer, something unpleasant would have been inevitable.
Fortunately, the carriage stopped just before disaster struck.
We’d traveled in a shabby carriage to avoid drawing attention, which worked—though the few lingering onlookers made clear that outsiders rarely passed through this village.
I pulled a tattered cloak over myself and covered my face.
Liam, too, had traded his usual armor for the plain clothes of a commoner.
He lifted me down gently, and once my feet touched the ground, I surveyed our surroundings.
Dust billowed into my nose and mouth, and I hurried after Becky as she rushed toward a small house.
Her pace quickened.
“Wait for me, Becky!”
I panted as I chased after her, my lack of stamina becoming painfully apparent.
Becky reached a small cottage and, with trembling hands, opened the door.
“Roben!”
She called out her brother’s name, but her movements froze.
“Ro—Roben?”
“Becky. Come outside for a moment.”
“Ah—ah, oh……!”
“Just a moment.”
I gave Liam a subtle nod, and he gently led the stumbling Becky back outside.
Her muffled sobs grew distant as she stepped into the street.
The reassuring expression I’d maintained for Becky’s sake crumbled in an instant.
‘The smell….’
The stench of rotting flesh filled the entire house.
Bile rose in my throat, but I forced myself to move calmly through the space.
Dust had accumulated over scattered debris—the kind that gathers when few visitors pass through.
In a clouded frame, Becky and her younger brother smiled brightly.
……
A faint, labored breathing reached my ears.
With each step I took, the floorboards creaked and shifted beneath my feet.
Between the haze of dust, I saw a small mound of blankets rising and falling gently.
“You there.”
I called softly, but received no answer.
“Hello.”
Pressing myself to speak louder, the steady breathing halted. The figure coughed hoarsely—a dry, painful sound—before propping itself up.
“Roben?”
“Who… who are you…?”
A boy emerged, his voice cracking like someone unused to speaking, coughing harshly before dragging himself upright.
After coughing for a long moment, the gaunt child pulled back the blankets with skeletal arms.
He had the same gentle bearing as his sister.
“I am Diane, a Holy Maiden who serves God alongside Becky.”
“Your Holiness…!”
Roben bowed his head hurriedly, clearly unprepared for such an identity.
He bore no visible wounds, yet at a glance, his condition was unmistakably grave.
Mana was, in essence, like the particles that composed a person—deplete it, and this was the inevitable result.
‘This is the first time I’ve seen it firsthand, so I’m more unsettled than I’d expected.’
“Your Holiness, how could you come to such a humble place…?”
“Becky has looked after me with great kindness.”
A hint of color returned to Roben’s face.
“And… is my sister well?”
“She is.”
“But you look so young….”
At this point, I figured it was simply the default question anyone seeing me for the first time would ask, so I laughed softly.
“Yeah, yeah. I hear that a lot. Anyway, let me check you over.”
Thinking we’d broken the ice well enough, I approached him with long strides and yanked his arm toward me.
He made a small noise of surprise and came along easily.
“Close your eyes and just sit still for a moment.”
Roben really did remind me of Becky in temperament. He’d obey instructions without hesitation, even when someone burst into his home uninvited and grabbed his arm like that.
I sent my Sacred Power flowing into his body and circled it through.
As I felt the movement of his vital energy, I could sense something trying to devour my Sacred Power wherever empty space existed within him.
It was definitely a different sensation from other people.
Compared to Damian, he was like a simple vessel being filled—water poured into an empty cup, that sort of concept.
But Roben was—
“Gasp!”
It felt as though he were a magnet, not just filling the empty spaces but drawing out every last bit of my Sacred Power.
“Wait, just a moment!”
He was pulling in my Sacred Power so aggressively that I tried to jerk my hand away in shock, but he clung fast and wouldn’t let go.
“Liam! Help me!”
My entire vital energy drained away in an instant, and dizziness washed over me.
Fearing I might lose consciousness, I called out to Liam urgently, and he came bursting through the door.
“Are you alright?”
“I—this is—”
Let go.
I couldn’t even finish the sentence before my legs gave way beneath me.
While I was crumbling like this, Roben—who had stolen my energy—was growing more alive by the moment.
The hollow planes of his cheeks began to fill with flesh, and muscle visibly returned to his skeletal frame.
‘What a monster!’
I’d thought my Sacred Power had grown considerably through everything I’d endured lately.
‘And he’s draining every bit of it I’d accumulated!’
How unfair—how utterly unfair!
Unaware of my inner anguish, Liam focused entirely on wrenching me free from Roben’s grip with all his strength.
And then, finally—
“Done! That should do it!”
He succeeded.
Exhausted, I gave a shaky thumbs-up, but my vision spun so badly that I kept dry-heaving.
Then came a voice—no longer the dying rasp from moments before, but bright and youthful, falling down toward me.
“Holy maiden, are you alright?”
As he moved closer to me, Liam drew the Holy Sword he’d been carrying concealed and stepped between us.
“Stop. Don’t take another step.”
Most would have been intimidated by a blade, but Roben showed no fear whatsoever.
Instead, he tilted his head curiously, studying Liam as he gripped the Holy Sword.
The tense moment was broken when Becky came rushing in, breathless.
“S-Holy maiden!!!”
“Priest, please calm yourself. I think perhaps I overexerted myself.”
“Sister?”
“Roben? Oh my goodness, Roben!”
Only then did Becky recognize her brother, and she let out a shriek.
His transformation from a walking skeleton to a healthy child had been so sudden that she’d had no reason to recognize him before.
And yet, Becky—
I was still collapsed here—
“Kyaaa! Holy maiden, your mouth, there’s—there’s foam!”
With Becky’s shriek, I lost consciousness entirely.
* * *
After confirming that Diane, who had fainted and was cradled in Becky’s arms, was safe, Liam recalled Roben’s movements from moments before.
‘It wasn’t mere Mana absorption.’
The speed with which he’d drawn in Diane’s Sacred Power and restored his body was astounding, but there was something that had caught his eye even more.
‘During that brief moment, he was observing me—the one pointing the sword at him.’
Rather than fear, his gaze had been calculating—appraising the stance, the angle of the wrist, the distribution of force in his grip.
These were not the reactions expected from an eight-year-old boy dying of illness.
‘Talent.’
Liam was certain of it.
Over long years in the Temple Knight Order, he had observed countless aspirants. Some possessed natural strength, others exceptional focus.
But never before had he encountered anyone who could absorb pure power and make it his own in the way Roben had done.
‘If that vessel is what I think…’
With enough Mana to fill it, there was no question—this one had the makings of a Sword Master.
While Becky clutched Roben’s hand in a daze, wiping away tears, Liam approached quietly.
“Roben.”
“Yes?”
“How’s your body feeling?”
“Yes, strangely enough… my body feels lighter, actually.”
Roben gazed down at his own palm, murmuring as if in wonder. The arm that had held nothing but bone now bore firm, healthy muscle.
Liam regarded him for a moment, then spoke.
“I’m Liam, of the Temple Knight Order.”
“Ah, yes…”
“I’ll ask you plainly. Would you consider taking up a sword?”
“…Pardon?”
The sudden question made Roben’s eyes widen. Becky, too, turned to Liam in surprise.
“You have talent. Uncommon talent, at that.”
“I’ve never received any training like that, though.”
“You can learn gradually once you join the Order. Your lack of prior training is immaterial.”
His voice carried absolute certainty.
“If you’re willing to enter the Temple Knight Order, I’ll recommend you myself.”
Roben turned to his sister with an uncertain expression.
Fresh tears welled in Becky’s eyes.
This time, they were not tears of sorrow, but of something else entirely.

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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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