The Saint’s Manual for Redemption - Chapter 40

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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 40
I caught Vivian as she crumpled and hurriedly channeled Healing Holy Power into her. The advantage—and disadvantage—of Healing Holy Power was that it could cure any illness and injury.
So what makes that a disadvantage?
You can’t determine the cause of the illness. That’s why patients coming to the Temple for healing needed a physician’s diagnosis.
Not that we offered personalized treatment or anything. It was more about showing evidence that healing was genuinely needed.
For what it’s worth, this was a system I’d established back when I was the Third Saint.
I’d even funded physician training programs and provided subsidies so poor people could get diagnosed easily. Now, though, it’s become a corrupt racket where they extort money from commoners—a truly lamentable state of affairs.
In any case, that’s why the Church also hired a physician for this spectacle. Since the Temple can’t diagnose the cause, they needed one for appearances.
I picked up the green apple that had rolled from her hand. Vivian had no apple allergy.
Which left only one explanation.
“Was it poison, sister? Did I really eat poison?”
Vivian, having just regained consciousness, asked me with wide, startled eyes.
“Most likely, yes.”
I bit into the apple, taking as much as Vivian had eaten, and answered while chewing.
Vivian smacked my back in protest, but without a poison detection kit, the most reliable way to confirm poison was for me—someone who’d tasted every toxin sent by heretics in my past life—to sense it. My palate was my best tool.
A faint bitter taste registered. It was the same type used at the coronation ceremony, but diluted, probably to increase the quantity. That’s why Vivian hadn’t coughed up blood.
So they’d tried to kill me with a Poisoned Apple? Even giving me a Snow White experience—how thoughtful. I felt like hitting someone with an apple.
Now I’d have to purify every bit of food I ate, one item at a time.
At least Holy Power recharged after a good night’s sleep, so the three times daily I’d been wastefully expending it before was fortunate.
My successors really did have a habit of giving and taking away like this. They even provided me opportunities to drain my Holy Power without having to deliberately venture out and scatter it everywhere, lest it overflow.
“Now you understand? When I’m settled in, I’ll give you a heads-up. For now, take care of yourself and clean other areas.”
At my words, Vivian nodded with a serious expression.
This left one crucial question.
Was Sub-deacon Rilette involved in this attempted poisoning?
After Vivian left, I summoned Sub-deacon Rilette to my chamber.
“Sub-deacon Rilette, did you happen to put poison on the fruit?”
When I asked so bluntly, Rilette’s expression didn’t change one bit. He formed a circle with his thumb and forefinger—his signature gesture—and attempted his usual request for payment.
A typical culprit would be anxious here, maybe desperate. But the fact that he was demanding money just to answer meant this man wasn’t the culprit.
I handed over a purse. After checking the amount, Rilette spoke confidently, his gruff face unchanged.
“It wasn’t me. I received too much for the answer alone, so I’ll go catch the real culprit.”
For the first time, Rilette felt genuinely trustworthy.
***
A full month had passed since I’d been assigned this chamber, and I remained perfectly fine.
In fact, better than fine—with each passing day, I could feel my Holy Power accumulating. Despite the rumors that anyone entering this chamber slowly weakened and died, I was thriving, brimming with vitality.
Purifying poison from the fruit and every meal three times a day had drastically improved my Poison Purification skill.
Since I showed no signs of dying, the Church hierarchy must have been in a panic.
With good reason. After safely completing the coronation ceremony, the only hope they’d had left was the curse dwelling in this chamber.
To the Church’s upper ranks, who didn’t know the truth about this room, it was less a Saint’s chamber and more an execution cell disguised as confinement.
If the curse wasn’t activating, their entire plan was falling apart.
But the month known among the people as the “Curse Cooldown” had passed. Nothing had happened.
So they chose the simplest method.
“There is a place that requires the Saint’s mercy, Your Holiness.”
They were reassigning me to a danger zone.
Without dirtying their own hands, they’d use a mission as pretext and hope I’d die on my own. Yes, exactly. This was their style—the Church’s favorite approach.
I accepted the dispatch order, which was tantamount to a command, and laughed silently to myself.
If I died, it would be God’s will. If I returned alive, I’d have fulfilled my duty as Saint. Either way, they lost nothing. Truly the Church’s way of thinking.
Sub-deacon Rilette, listening to my request and packing my travel supplies, muttered with a note of regret.
“Tsk, I was about to crack the culprit’s identity… and you leave just when I was about to prove my worth…”
“I’ll tell you who it is when I return. Sound fair?”
“Don’t you dare try to recoup the money by saying they fled.”
“I just need to know who it is.”
I accepted the travel pack from Rilette—packed thoroughly yet kept light despite its completeness—and handed him a gratuity. There was no way around paying him.
Thus I set out for a Territory I knew all too well, accompanied by my guard knight, Arden.
To be precise, it was the land I’d purified during the Third Saint era on the way to raid the Demon King.
After five hundred years, it was about time for Miasma to accumulate again.
Perhaps “cooldown” was the most accurate way to describe it. Since the Demonic Realm existed beneath the earth, there was no such thing as permanent purification in this world.
No matter how much Holy Power you poured out, Miasma would eventually rise again.
That eternal cycle was precisely why the Caritas Church’s authority could endure.
Just as it had been then, five hundred years later, the point of most severe Miasma corruption was still the lord’s castle.
They’d built the fortress right atop the land closest to the Demonic Realm. Tsk, tsk.
On top of that, they’d dug a canal so deep around the castle that it was practically an offering to speed up the miasmic corruption.
This territory held unpleasant memories—or rather, memories I had no desire to revisit.
The moment I glimpsed the bridge connecting the canal to the castle entrance in the distance, a sense of dread settled over me.
It was too familiar a landscape to dismiss as mere feeling.
“That is the Sierra-Valente Grand Bridge.”
The administrative guide spoke with obvious pride.
“Five hundred years ago, the Third Saint and the Hero fought ceaselessly on this bridge, striking down demons that burst from the earth without end, and thus preserved Lebon Castle.”
……Ah.
The moment I heard the bridge’s name—bearing mine and my ex-boyfriend’s side by side—keeping my expression neutral became genuinely difficult. It had been so long since I’d heard that name.
Valente. I never imagined his name would be etched into a monument so casually like this.
And right alongside mine, no less!
What’s more, five hundred years ago, this bridge had been famous in the town for something else: a legend that if you kissed here under the full moon, you would become eternal lovers.
So we went there and @$%&*!
“And this bridge is also famous for the legend that if you kiss here on a night when the full moon rises, you become eternal lovers. Nowadays the legend has gotten slightly distorted, and people say any night with a moon, so couples visit on other moonlit nights too, but the real legend is specifically the full moon.”
As I listened to the guide, I calculated rapidly in my head whether I should turn around and flee this very moment. If this story had survived this long, maybe I ought to.
‘That story’ hadn’t come up yet, so apparently it hadn’t been passed down?
This place too must have heard about our falling-out, and wisely redirected the narrative toward the Saint and Hero as comrades. I exhaled silently in relief.
But relief was short-lived.
“In particular, after the demon invasion concluded, it’s famous that the Third Saint and the Hero shared a kiss here on a night when the full moon shone.”
……O Caritas, why do you visit such trials upon me? Can’t a woman live her life and occasionally grab a man she fancies by the collar and kiss him if she pleases?
Do you really need to have that moment cemented as a tourist attraction story for five hundred years, of all things?!

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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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