The Seven-Year-Old Village Chief in Exile - Chapter 28

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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 28
“I-Ian…!”
Molle Rebus’s eyes trembled violently.
‘W-what is this? A nightmare? An illusion?’
Yet denying reality was impossible—the crisp air and warm sunlight streaming through the window felt far too vivid.
Even as fear gripped him, Molle Rebus felt anger rising in its place.
“Why, why…!”
Why had he grown stronger?
Ian, who should have been suffering in exile in shabby rags, looked perfectly sound at a glance.
In fact, he was far stronger than Molle Rebus remembered him to be.
A man who had survived by reading the room, Molle Rebus grasped it at once.
That fact alone ignited his rage.
And Ian, reading that foolish jealousy and malice in an instant, let out a hollow laugh.
“Well, so our village chief is here after all.”
Ian’s voice was impossibly cheerful.
Yet his eyes were ice-cold as he stared at the traitor who had falsely accused him, and his fists, clenched with enough force that the veins stood out on his wrists, radiated barely contained fury.
“How thoughtful of you to invite such a distinguished guest as our village’s first visitor.”
But Ian was a man who knew how to master his own emotions.
“Allow me to show you to the guest room our chief so kindly prepared. Fortunately, we finished the renovations just before I went out.”
“W-where! Where are you dragging me to kill me…!”
“Why would I kill you?”
Ian tilted his head with genuine curiosity.
“I’m keeping you alive.”
…
“There’s much I need to learn.”
Ian struck Molle Rebus hard in the abdomen, knocking him unconscious.
* * *
The plan was simple.
‘Use my ability to send Molle Rebus to the village.’
First, I poured Tomato Juice over Herb Merchant Grandfather and asked him for a convincing seizure performance.
Next, I had Berity dress Pex in the Imperial Knight Uniform I’d obtained as a Wish, then sent him to bring Molle Rebus back.
Of course, I also gave him a Brooch enchanted with Protection Magic for his safety—another thing I’d secured from Berity, my demon servant.
Ribi, Elba, Berity, and I hid in the corner and waited for our moment. The instant our target opened the prison door, I activated my ability.
Click.
The moment Molle Rebus vanished, I sealed the passage connecting to the Exsilium village hall once more.
‘I hope Ian will be okay.’
I was worried hearing Ian’s voice through the phone, but he was a wise man—he’d handle things exactly as I’d instructed.
I just hoped Ian wouldn’t be too hurt by it all.
“Phew…”
Using my ability to the limit had drained me, and exhaustion washed over me.
As drowsiness crept in and my mouth fell open in a yawn, I felt something warm trickling down under my chin.
I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand, and crimson blood stained it.
‘Oh no, I’m bleeding again.’
Still, I was bleeding less than before.
This power really did seem to grow stronger the more I used it.
“Hold still now.”
Elba soaked a handkerchief with a hemostatic salve and stuffed it up my nostril to stop the bleeding.
“Are you alright?”
“Yes, I’m fine.”
“…Every time you use your power, you bleed like this?”
“A little nosebleed won’t kill me!”
Though I flashed a grin to reassure her, Elba’s stern expression didn’t soften easily.
Meanwhile, Ribi, who had been staring in amazement with her mouth agape, lit up with delight.
“Hebenia, you’re incredible!”
“Hehe.”
With a handkerchief still stuffed in my nostril, I gave a crisp thumbs-up.
Ribi clenched her fists tight at the sight of me.
“I’m going to train hard. So next time, let’s fight together for sure!”
“You got it!”
“So what should we do next?”
Pex adjusted the unfamiliar Imperial Knight Uniform and asked me directly.
“You’re thinking of using that ‘one year’ the Chief Chamberlain mentioned, aren’t you?”
I nodded.
“I’m trying to avoid the Chief Chamberlain as much as possible. He frightens me more than anyone.”
When I’d eavesdropped on the conversation between the Chief Chamberlain and Molle Rebus.
None of us had said it aloud, but we’d all reached the same conclusion.
The one person we needed to be most careful of wasn’t anyone else—it was the Chief Chamberlain.
‘He said he’d come in a year.’
So within that time, I either had to secure the Deste Estate firmly in hand, or find a new base to replace it.
I asked Berity.
“What kind of person is the Chief Chamberlain?”
“I don’t know the details myself.”
Berity’s brow furrowed.
“But he’s definitely no ordinary person. I’ve already made a separate request to the organization to gather information, and I’ll pass it along once I learn more.”
“If I fought the Chief Chamberlain, who would win?”
“Even with ten of you, it wouldn’t work.”
“Sigh, if only the Emperor and the Chief Chamberlain loved each other so much they decided to have a public mating display from a distance and then ruined themselves together, things would be so much easier…….”
“Let me revise that. Judging by the way you talk, you’d win even alone.”
I drove the point home by jabbing Berity in the ribs with my fingers, reestablishing the hierarchy once more.
“So then, we’re all done……?”
Herb Merchant Grandfather, who had been silent the whole time, asked.
Though Elba had given him emergency treatment, his visibly exhausted complexion worried me.
What he needed now was proper medical care.
“We just need to do three things.”
I ticked them off on my fingers as I spoke.
“First, we have to subdue Molle Rebus’s remaining followers in the mansion.”
“I can handle that.”
I nodded at Berity’s words.
“I’d like you to make it a Wish. Subdue them all and lock them in the underground dungeons here.”
“I’ll make sure it’s done.”
Next, the second thing.
“A replacement to fill Molle Rebus’s position.”
Fortunately, I had already given this some thought.
“I’m going to ask Mister Modi.”
“Mister Modi?”
Pex’s eyes widened in surprise.
Then Ribi snapped her fingers with a sudden “Ah!”
“The Proxy of the Absolute!”
“Yeah, that’s it.”
Modi’s Aptitude—the Proxy of the Absolute—sounded like it was tailor-made for the role of a replacement.
In fact, wasn’t that the very reason I’d asked him to serve as village headman in proxy?
“……Mister Modi’s Aptitude is actually far more remarkable than that.”
Berity murmured regretfully, but I didn’t budge.
“It’s not urgent right now, so when we get back I’m planning to have him hone his Aptitude by getting worked over in the Primordial Forest.”
“Look at her, that’s downright evil……!”
Herb Merchant Grandfather shuddered, breaking out in goosebumps.
“……The elder sister isn’t really hurt, right?”
“Cough! I’m coughing up blood……!”
“I’m half-tempted to just leave that old geezer here.”
And then.
Finally, the third thing.
“The temple.”
The temple?
Everyone tilted their heads in confusion at my final words.
I smiled slightly and explained the last plan simply.
“Since it’s a temple where an angel actually descended, any Miracle that happens would have more than enough plausibility behind it, wouldn’t it?”
* * *
Due to the Princess’s critical health condition, the Imperial Family purchased more than half of all medicinal herbs produced in the Empire.
Yet no one could criticize this abnormal situation.
“If only Clavis had been here…….”
Even Clavis, that all-powerful figure before whom even the birds would descend to bow and take their leave, had vanished like that—so who on earth could stand up to the Emperor?
“I had no idea Clavis was such a crucial person…….”
“Turns out the educational support our company was providing to employees’ children—it was actually being funded by a foundation Clavis was running.”
“There are quite a few people who only learned the truth after Clavis’s annihilation, just like you.”
“I naturally assumed the Imperial Family was the one providing it……!”
“So now all those things…….”
“Hush, mind your tongue.”
It was during one of those hushed moments.
An angel descended.
Those who heard the news were drawn to Deste as though under a spell.
Deste Temple could not turn them away.
The priests worked day and night welcoming those who came, tending to the sick with Healing Magic.
“……Maybe we’re being punished.”
Saker murmured bleakly.
In the cramped break room, the blue-haired priest lay on a makeshift bed cobbled together from three chairs, his hair spilling messily across his face.
Saker quickly corrected himself.
“I, I don’t mean helping people is a punishment……!”
“I know, Saker.”
The red-haired priest on the opposite makeshift bed, lying in the same posture, murmured back.
“You mean this moment of frustration at not being able to help them feels like divine punishment.”
“Cherdo…….”
“I feel the same way…….”
On the day the angel descended.
A single sacred feather fell upon the temple.
The priests searched the entire temple for evidence of the Miracle.
The feather was found in the central prayer chamber where the young Second Prince had been staying.
The young prince, who had fulfilled his duties alone in that cramped, shabby stone chamber, willingly placed the feather in the priests’ hands.
“I have completed my task, so I shall take my leave now.”
That day.
The priests understood their own limitations.
“We who must serve the divine from the lowest place—how could we be so disrespectful as to leave a young prince in such an old, narrow place out of mere prejudice, we……!”
Saker gripped the white priest’s robe he wore.
The fist holding the hem trembled violently.
Regret and shame were painted across his face, creased like the fabric itself.
“And the High Priest……!”
“Oh.”
Hebenia rounded her lips.
“So they were the type to reflect on their actions.”
“……Huh?”
“What?”
The two priests, lost in their self-recrimination, scrambled to their feet belatedly.
A chair clattered over; a hem caught beneath a foot, nearly sending one of them tumbling forward—the sight was quite a spectacle.
Saker, barely keeping his balance, hastily swept his fallen hair back from his face.
“W, who are you……?”
There was a girl.
At first glance, she was lovely and charming.
Especially her round cheeks and slightly protruding belly gave off that characteristic healthfulness of childhood, drawing an involuntary smile.
Her deep copper-colored hair, like rich earth, was crowned with striking lime-green eyes, standing straight like trees from fertile soil.
And the tip of her nose was slightly reddened.
As if a nosebleed had only just stopped.
‘Who is this?’
‘Did she get lost?’
Saker and Cherdo mistook the girl for a lost child of one of their visitors.
“My name is Hebenia Clavis.”
But at the girl’s self-introduction, both priests fell silent.
“I’ve come to negotiate with the temple.”
One corner of the child’s mouth lifted in a smirk.
“Fetch your commander.”
“The, the High Priest…….”
“Since the angel’s descent, he has been convalescing under a Curse.”
“……Huh?”
Hebenia squinted with one eye.
“An angel descends, and you say he’s cursed?”
“He suddenly dropped his trousers to expose his undergarments, and he appears to be afflicted with an obsession for piercings. He’s also taken to jabbing a short blade through the front of his pants.”
Saker the High Priest found himself spilling the confidential details before he could stop himself.

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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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