The Villainess Lives Twice - Chapter 113

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 113

Divine power has real strength.

Lisia possessed the ability to heal diseases. She could cure thousands of patients in a single day just by holding their hands.

Saint Olga from 200 years ago is said to have healed all the patients in a small city with a single burst of divine power.

Not all divine power manifests as healing ability.

Among the saints before Olga, there was one who turned his own body into a shield like a mountain to protect humans from Karam.

Artizea had not believed such records from the temple. However, considering the power of the healing force that Lisia emitted, most of it was probably true.

Father Colton said that becoming a saint meant being someone who could change history.

In Artizea’s opinion, conversely, the moment one possesses divine power, a saint becomes someone who can change history.

If used efficiently, it was enough power to save a nation.

But Artizea’s case was somewhat different.

Artizea’s divine power could do nothing. Just in case, she even made a small scratch and tried direct contact with divine power. However, there was no healing power at all.

Wondering if it was a power that worked in a different way, she even went so far as to search through the records of temples and churches anew.

However, Artizea’s conclusion was that her divine power had no effect whatsoever.

Divine power is a force of the same nature as life force.

After trying to use divine power weakly several times, Artizea concluded that this power was something that extracted and used her own life.

She didn’t particularly care about her lifespan being shortened. Rather than the cost being the problem, it was just completely useless in itself.

It might be because she lacked faith. Just knowing that this power could heal people seemed insufficient.

‘Is it because I don’t have the desperate wish to heal?’

If she really tried to use it, she could probably use magic.

Because drawing magic circles requires blood, and activating magic requires human sacrifice—in other words, human life.

Divine power could probably substitute for that.

The saying that God watches over everything might be correct in that sense. God might have given her such power after seeing Artizea use magic.

It even felt natural that since she had kept alive someone who deserved to die, she should repay by extracting her life.

Originally, Artizea should have died when she used the magic to turn back time.

This life she was living was surplus.

However, magic at the level of extracting part of one’s lifespan could not change the world at once.

She couldn’t place value on its high versatility either. The absolute amount of power was too small.

Even if she used magic for healing power, at most she could only heal wounds from a letter knife.

Whether it existed or not made almost no difference to what Artizea could accomplish.

To use great magic, she would have to die. And if she was going to throw away her life, there was no need to extract life through divine power.

Artizea had lived one life without magic.

Even now that she could use small magic, she couldn’t think of where it could be useful.

Rather, revealing it would only provide grounds for attack.

Whether divine power or magic.

The temple denies magic. The history of human sacrifice made it so.

There was such a reason why ancient languages had become virtually extinct. They remained only in the research of a few scholars, and people forgot the existence of magic.

However, basically, magicians were regarded as murderers.

‘I wonder what would happen if a saint used magic.’

Artizea thought blankly while looking out the window.

She still couldn’t guess what the oracle to ‘restore’ meant.

It probably didn’t mean to restore the age of magic.

The fact that God personally punished magicians who tried to invade the divine realm through mass slaughter was content that appeared quite early in the scriptures.

If God wanted to do something by taking her life, it would have been better to give specific instructions instead.

‘I’ll know when the time comes.’

If Father Colton’s words were correct.

But why should she follow that will?

Perhaps God had saved her life, which should have died, and sent her back to the past in order to make her do something.

If so, it would be understandable that this life was composed of divine power.

However, even if it was God who gave her this life, Artizea had no intention of understanding and following that will.

She had already made Cedric her lord. And she had sworn to protect Lisia.

Keeping her own oath was more important than becoming a piece for God’s grand design.

The future she knew was only a ruined empire.

If she restored that future with her own hands, wouldn’t there be no reason for returning to the past?

So Artizea told Father Colton.

“I will not become a saint.”

Artizea didn’t need popular support or high reputation.

Rather, the more she was dragged into the sunlight, the greater the risk became. Her hands and feet would be tied too.

She didn’t want to associate the name Artizea Rosan with the name Duchess of Evron in people’s memories.

It would be a different matter if she could at least completely control the temple.

But a saint was not the head of the temple.

The temple had a bureaucratic system with well-organized hierarchies even more than the imperial government. And the saint was not included in that system.

Even if she was formally the one who conveyed God’s words, it was the same. The system would reject a suddenly appeared foreign body.

Believers, monks, and ordinary priests truly believed in and served the saint.

Nevertheless, ordinary priests and volunteers who handled the temple’s administrative affairs could not readily follow the saint’s commands.

As individuals, they could follow her even by throwing their bodies, but the temple could not move in such a way.

Moreover, the current bishops were those who had compromised between devotion and realistic power.

They were also the huge wall that Lisia first encountered as a saint.

The bishops respected and revered the saint. However, rather than regarding her as God’s representative and listening carefully to her words, they only thought of her as a symbolic existence that would enhance the temple’s authority.

In the end, they were the ones who accepted bribes and participated in manipulating oracles.

They manipulated oracles primarily because they wanted to influence secular power by making the saint an empress.

But it was also because lower priests and monks who realized they could not follow the saint’s will within the temple continued to defect.

The imperial court and temple had essentially imprisoned Lisia in the Empress’s Palace under agreement.

She couldn’t move while embracing such a temple.

She didn’t think she could control the temple with such meager divine power, and she didn’t have time to waste on it.

The power she could gain was small, but the responsibility would only become heavier. Enemies would increase, and grounds for attack and reasons for restraint would be created.

The name of saint wasn’t even a variable. It was a negative constant.

Fortunately, Father Colton nodded at Artizea’s request to keep this fact secret.

“You may do as you wish. I am merely a monk. The temple imposes no obligations on me.”

Saying so, he spoke with an empty face.

“I know what you’re worried about. The temple will not follow you to carry out oracles, but will try to use those oracles and you for the temple’s power.”

“Thank you for understanding.”

“God probably had such reasons for entrusting me with the role of bringing you here.”

Father Colton said so.

Artizea let out a small sigh. Then she suddenly asked Lisia.

“Lisia.”

“Yes.”

“Do you believe in God?”

“Pardon?”

Lisia looked confused.

Since Artizea suddenly called her with a serious face, she thought she had done something wrong or that it was about family matters.

“Just curious.”

Artizea said, lowering her eyes.

It was an impulsive question. She wondered what she would have been like when she first received an oracle.

Lisia was devout, but she wasn’t someone who put God at the center of her life and lived according to the temple’s teachings like those who relied on faith or monks.

Artizea didn’t know Lisia before she became a saint in the past. She had only vaguely thought that she must have possessed all the character, ability, and devotion worthy of becoming a saint.

Lisia’s face turned slightly red.

“I’m not sure. I’m not a non-believer, but I don’t go to the temple often…”

“You’ve never even read the scriptures to the end, have you?”

Hailey interjected. Lisia’s face turned even redder.

Artizea chuckled softly.

“If someone who reads and memorizes the scriptures is a true believer, then I would be the most devout of all believers. What about you, Hailey?”

“I’m an atheist.”

Hailey blurted out, then her face reddened slightly. She thought she had spoken too radically.

“To be precise, I think whether God exists or not, He doesn’t seem interested in human affairs. Otherwise, He wouldn’t have made the world this way.”

“I still think God exists. Though I don’t believe everything the Church teaches.”

Lisia mumbled in rebuttal.

“Even with all the hardships, I believe there’s some benevolent will that guides the world in the right direction.”

“…”

Artizea quietly looked at Lisia. Then she turned her gaze away.

Thinking once again that God had chosen the wrong person.

Hailey asked.

“Why did you become curious about such things?”

“Just because. I remembered my conversation with Father Colton.”

Artizea only replied that much. This was something she couldn’t discuss with anyone.

* * *

It was that evening.

Artizea bathed early, had dinner, and went to bed.

There was much to do, but rushing wouldn’t help.

She had already given Ansgard a list of people to meet the next day. She planned to discuss the Western Region grain relief project with the Empress, even if only formally.

She had just gotten into bed and was wiggling her cold toes with a warm water bottle to thaw them out.

Alice quietly entered the bedroom.

“Is something wrong?”

Artizea opened her eyes and asked. Alice was wearing an outdoor cloak.

Alice spoke carefully.

“Countess Camellia has come asking to see you in secret, my lady.”

“I see.”

Artizea closed her eyes briefly and shook off her drowsiness.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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