“I heard a little about demons during my days at the Valaies Holy Kingdom,” Hartwin said as he fiddled with his lute. “You need the holy element to kill them.”

  “Yes.” Taneva nodded. “Well, to be precise, the effect depends on the demon. Imps for instance, you really need the holy element to kill them to weaken and stop their regeneration. While others, you need the holy element to easily slash through their skin.”

  “Oh wow. Then what did the princess fight exactly?”

  “An imp.”

  “How did you know?” I asked Taneva. “You checked the corpse?” I mean, he wasn’t even there during the fight.

  “No need. I killed one when they took you.”

  I groaned quietly, directing an annoyed look at the asshole. “You really just watched me get taken away, huh?”

  He casually shrugged. “Hey, my task at that time was only to observe.”

  I still hated the fact that he had been watching me for a long time, and I never realized. This was why I never liked people stronger than me. So irritating. I like it most when I’m above them.

  “Speaking of which, you used your blood to defeat the imp, right?”

  I nodded with a smile. “Took a lot of trial and error.” I threw a whole lot of magic at the bastard, just to figure out which one would do some real damage. “But I realized mid-fight that my blood affected him badly.”

  “You enchanted your weapons with your blood. Lucky you learned how to do that. I didn’t even know that you could.”

  “What can I say, I’m a genius.”

  Taneva chuckled. “Still, quite cold hearted of you to use those prisoners to experiment on ways of handling a demon.”

  I frowned. “Is that so? It’s their punishment, the least they could do was help me.”

  “Heh, whatever you say. I had imagined that some part of you carries divine properties. But to be quite honest, I had hoped your magical spells already possessed the holy attributes, guess that wasn’t the case.”

  “Is that how it should be?”

  “Not sure. Not like I see a god killing some demons every day.”

  I tipped my head, fair point. “Since you killed a demon, my guess you know how to cast holy magic?”

  “In a way, it’s not like how your church does it.” He turned to Hartwin. “You learned any holy magic?”

  Hartwin shook his head. “I didn’t stay long in the Holy Kingdom to learn any holy magic. And, well, I was not interested in learning any of that. It would be pretty pointless if there’s even no demons on the continent.” He looked around with an awkward smile. “But, I never could have imagined that my situation could shift so drastically.”

  Well, yeah. One day you were just cruising down the street and suddenly you found yourself amidst an entirely different world. Demons, gods, monster land, etcetera. Like me, I was just supposed to stay as a Pure Princess doing nothing much in my palace. But something just gotta fuck it all up.

  “Well, things were relatively… to put it in a word, boring, before this girl right there popped up.” Taneva pointed at me.

  I frowned and crossed my arms. “Don’t blame the victim.”

  Taneva chuckled, amused. “At any rate, you guys need to at least learn to cast holy magic.” He said to the two guys. “Wouldn’t want you to be defenseless. True that some demons are way stronger than you, but at the minimum, you could at least hurt them.”

  Velar glanced at me for a moment. “Are all demons as strong as the one the princess fought? From what we’ve seen, I don’t think I could even stand a chance.”

  “How did you see the fight as?” Taneva asked.

  Velar and Hartwin looked at each other before the latter spoke out. “Like a battle of gods.”

  “That level of battle, I would be but a speck of dust,” Velar added.

  Taneva glanced at me. “The demon stressed you out that much?”

  “The bastard turned to his true form or something, and he suddenly got way stronger. Throwing out flames all over the place.”

  “ From what I recall he had wings, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “He must be a high-ranking demon. Indeed, humans would be hard pressed to defeat a demon. They are naturally stronger than you. However, like how humans have the weak and strong, demons have them too. You should be able to defeat demons unless they’re high up there. If there are strong ones, you best avoid them.”

  The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  Velar nodded. “I understand. Even if they’re way stronger, if it helps fulfill my job, I’ll learn holy magic.”

  “Good!” Taneva clapped his hands once. “So tell me, how religious are you?”

  Velar and Hartwin once again looked at each other with baffled and conflicted expressions.

  “Um, why?” Velar asked.

  “What do you mean, why? It’s holy magic. Divine. So I’m asking how religious you are.”

  Hartwin scratched the back of his head. “I don’t really think about that.”

  “... Eventon doesn’t have a particular god to worship,” Velar said.

  We got a couple deviants here, I see! Tsk tsk tsk, heretics before me — me that is a god. The unfaithful, nonbelievers. Unbelievable… We should string them up or something. Hehe, kidding!

  “Oh… Well, good to know.” That was all Taneva said.

  “Wait,” I said to Taneva. “What’s up with that faith thing? You said you can cast holy magic, but you’re pretty much anti-gods.”

  “Heh. That’s why my holy magic is different. I just want to know where these two stand.”

  “Meaning?”

  “My holy magic is an enchantment to my weapons. Unlike the holy magic that your Church uses.”

  “You mean their magically made weapons?” From what I recalled, the church members could conjure weapons made out of golden light. Which was quite convenient and interesting. But too conspicuous, though, when it shines so brightly.

  “Yes. Theirs require genuine faith in their gods. If these two don’t have any true faith in a god or two, well, they won’t be going that way.”

  “And what exactly is your version of holy magic?”

  Taneva suddenly pulled out a short sword from a dark hole in the air. “Mine is a replication of divine faith. So instead of faith in the gods, my faith is in the weapon in my hand — the faith that it will be my salvation.”

  Salvation.

  I guess one of the most common things in faith and religion was salvation.

  He pressed his finger on the blade as a golden glow radiated at the tips. “It’s more of an enchantment spell than a direct holy magic.” He slid his finger on the blade, and the blade glowed golden. “Almost like how you use Armament Magic.”

  “And all you need to have is faith in the sword?” Hartwin asked.

  “Yes. However, the intensity of the imbued holy magic depends on your mana. If it’s feeble, the demons might just laugh at you. It’s unlike how a genuine holy magic the church uses, those will burn right through them. That’s why the demons avoided the church at all costs.” He grinned. “It’s too dangerous for them. Especially for imps, they don’t like that.”

  Yeah, I quite noticed the imp I fought panic a little when his regeneration weakened. However, how effective the holy element may be, raw power was still something humans have to consider about demons. If the demon I fought faced the church members, they would definitely suffer heavy casualties unless they landed a fatal hit on the demon early on. I mean, that bastard still fought hard while he was being burned by my divine blood.

  “I’m quite glad I got to cast this, at least I can kill demons,” Taneva said with a smile. “Learned it from a bunch of monks that didn’t serve the gods.”

  “Oh? What were they about?” Hartwin seemed interested in that part.

  “About the universe and we’re all interconnected, some inner peace, something like that. But they’re long gone now. Lost in time.”

  “Ah, that’s a shame.”

  “Anyway, I can teach you this. That being said, there is another way.”

  “And that is?”

  Taneva casually pointed at me. “Be faithful to the useless goddess over there.”

  “Who are you calling useless?!” I was not useless! Sure I was weak as shit, but I was not useless… Wait, was I? Ugh, whatever the case, I didn’t like being called that. I mean, it wasn’t my fault my body gets wrecked whenever I use my powers…

  But Taneva disregarded my outburst and chuckled. “That should work, because in the end, she is still a divine being. So you can have faith in her, maybe start with a prayer. Like, right now.” He grinned.

  I looked at the two men, but for some reason, they were looking at me with weird faces. Like they were hesitant or something.

  “W-What? Why are you looking at me like that?”

  Hartwin formed a weird smile showing teeth. “Eeeeh, well…”

  Hey, what’s with the hesitation? Pray!

  “… I, um, I don’t knoooow if I can do that right now?” Hartwin shifted his eyes away.

  I looked at Velar with a hint of hope. However, that was betrayed a second later.

  “I… I may need some time for that…”

  Goddammit, Velar! You’re my knight! Why can’t you do that?

  What a heartbreaking experience. To think these people were O so little faith.

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” I said, with a hint of annoyance. “Am I not godly enough for you? Is my world-class beauty not enough? You want me to float in the sky under the ray of light? Speaking in fancy metaphors that no one would understand?!”

  How rude of them!

  Hartwin shrugged. “... Well… Sssshhh, it’s kinda weird.”

  “Mmm.” Velar looked down at the floor.

  I looked at them with utter shock. Like my soul just got sucked out of my body. How heartbreaking. The betrayal! The lack of faith!

  “Hahahahahaha!” Taneva just laughed, slamming his hand on the wall. He rubbed the moist coming out of his eyes, still cackling. “You really should up your game, Estelia.”

  “S-Shut up!” I pouted.

  How humiliating.

  They’ll see. When I get that power, I’ll show everyone how godly I can be! Hmph!

  “Hehe… That was hilarious.” Taneva took deep breaths. “Guess I’ll be teaching you guys my kind of holy magic. Better have something than nothing.”

  “Wait, what about Nira?” Velar asked.

  Taneva placed a hand on his chin. “Personally, I have never seen Cursed Children use holy magic. I don’t even know if they could.”

  Nira lowered her head with visible sadness.

  “But you’re originally servants of the deity of blood. We can try, she just has to have faith in a god.”

  Nira’s face rose up with a bright expression. “I-I have faith in the goddess!”

  Aaaaaw. See? It’s not that hard! This girl is better than these two!

  “Good one, Nira!” I said with excitement. “I like you the most now.” I reached out to her and gave her a good rub on the head. “Good girl. Be more like Nira, guys.”

  Nira subtly chuckled with a lowered head, as if hiding her face. But I noticed the redness on her face.

  “Right, right, whatever you say.” Taneva waved his hand in dismissal. Which was both rude and mean. “We can start tomorrow while we travel.”

  “Oh yeah, what about me?” I asked. “No need to teach me about it?”

  “I don’t think as a god you’d need it.”

  “... I guess I already have my blood. Whatever, that’s fine.”

  Not like I was in a position to train any magic, anyway. I had to avoid using my mana as much as possible. Quite annoying, really. There were still some spells I wanted to learn. But now, I had to postpone it.

  Being stagnant is not ideal.

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