Rewinding a little.
“This Baptism Rite's rookie is Lian Ludersk!”
““Whoaaaaa—!””
The moment I came out the mission rankings were announced and I got some cheering, and facing the highlight reel in the edited footage was fairly enjoyable. Even to me, my showing was pretty sick.
Mm-hm. Truly, this is the flavor of reincarnation, I thought.
So when the baptism, the true main event of the Baptism Rite, came around, my only thought was: at last I get a holy power crystal, hurry up and give it to me.
By that point I had in fact forgotten all about the prophet's mark and the Sacred Flame and Elysian. I was far too tired to hold a complicated thought.
Was that the seed of the disaster?
The instant Archbishop Nagrim dabbed the Sacred Flame on his finger and began the baptism procedure of touching it to my forehead. An angel descended.
“Hhk!”
The sound of someone swallowing a breath came from right beside me. Oh dear.
'You damned angel. Now is not the timing, is it? And was a wing-angel truly the only kind available!'
What had descended before my eyes was a wing-angel, differing only in color from the wing-demon I had faced in the labyrinth a short time ago.
The angel, shamelessly, spoke to me with perfect composure.
[-I understand your dismay, prophet. But the matter was urgent, so forgive that I could come only in this form.]
Yes, understood. So would you kindly state your business quickly and disappear?
Lumiel is hiccuping and Adrian's eyes have gone round with shock. Corin, well. He swallowed several enormous breaths a moment ago and has already fainted.
[-I intend to bestow the prophet's mark upon you.]
'Now?'
[-Just so.]
Left neglected for five years since the Naming Rite, and only now do I receive it.
'Wasn't the point that demons and Inferlim mustn't find out?'
[-That is also so. But your body is the greater concern, hence I had no choice but to descend now.]
My body is the greater concern? Surely not.
'Is it because of the demonic energy?'
[-It is.]
Damn it. So it was a time bomb after all.
Behave itself as it might, demonic energy is still demonic energy. It must have been serious enough to warrant a hurried descent.
[-With the prophet's mark you will be able to perceive demonic energy. And as a secondary effect, you may purify demonic energy and use it as energy.]
'So from now on, if I destroy a demon, I can absorb the demonic energy too?'
[-It is so.]
Oh, sweet.
I'd thought the prophet's mark would be a nuisance, dragging Inferlim and demons around behind me like the Pied Piper. But with an advantage like that, taking it isn't bad at all.
Given they came storming in at the Naming Rite and at the Baptism Rite alike, hiding it seems to have been a lost cause from the start anyway.
[-Still, it would be inconvenient for your status as prophet to be plainly displayed, so I shall inscribe it somewhere unseen.]
It was an answer that seemed to anticipate my worry. Well, if it's being inscribed somewhere unseen, there was no need to refuse.
My power is still badly lacking, so drawing further attention here would not be good.
While I kept up my comic routine with the angel, the gaze of Nagrim Hilloriven, presiding over the baptism, grew steadily heavier.
Rather a lot of pressure? And the thought that everyone in the arena — no, every citizen of the Empire watching the broadcast — would be sending the same look made a cold sweat run down me.
'Leaving aside the prophet part, by tomorrow the entire nation will recognize me.'
First in the overall rankings, Baptism Rite rookie, and an angelic descent on top. I was devouring every talking point going.
-If you're going to have a debut this spectacular, isn't that something you have to accept? Heh heh, I like it. It's like a huge new idol's debut.
No, never mind you liking it, Elly. I didn't want a debut this grand.
I swallowed a sigh inwardly. Right, if the talent is this closely watched, the inside collaborator won't be able to move on me openly either. I suppose.
I had resigned myself, but there was no helping the swimming in my head.
Angel, please, finish quickly.
FWAAAASH—!
My wish must have reached it, because light poured from the angel and wrapped around me.
'Isn't this a bit... too flashy?'
At this point I've given up.
[-Henceforth I shall convey your missions through the prophet's mark.]
'Sorry?'
Before I could ask anything, the angel said only what it meant to say and vanished.
“......”
“......”
Silence fell.
That damned angel?
“Ahem. There is a great deal I truly want to ask young Lian, but shall we proceed with the baptism first.”
“Yes, sir.”
'I'm sure there is...'
It was Nagrim who recovered from the situation first. Lian's turn had not been last, so there were still children waiting behind him to be baptized.
Nagrim transferred the Sacred Flame onto his hand and brought it to my forehead.
I felt a gentle light soak in and move toward the crown of my head. The Sacred Flame's divine power, arriving near the crown, spun round and round and made a center point from which a holy power crystal would form.
The divine power that enters the body during baptism by Sacred Flame builds the foundation of the holy power crystal and then leaves again. The first crystal, thus settled at the crown, becomes a channel connecting god, human and cosmos.
'Feels like it's about time for it to leave... huh?'
But the divine power isn't going up, it's going down? Huh?
“Hm?”
Nagrim noticed the anomaly too.
The divine power slid down toward the left shoulder blade and began spinning round and round once more.
'Could this be... a second crystal?'
What moved at the divine power's guidance was not holy power. The demonic energy that had been hiding itself in my lower belly began to stir.
“Urk.”
Unlike before, the unpurified demonic energy moved as though clawing at my insides, delivering pain.
'Ah, so this is why they said it has to be filtered before use.'
I clutched my burning stomach and waited a moment, and the circling divine power began to burn away the murky quality of the demonic energy that had flowed in.
“Young Lian, what on earth is this...?”
Nagrim was in the middle of being astonished by the aura he sensed from Lian. Neither the demon's infiltration of the labyrinth maze nor the angel's descent had surprised him, since he had thought both entirely possible if Lian was the prophet.
But this time he was genuinely, properly astonished.
'A second holy power crystal.'
What baptism grants is, quite literally, no more than opening the channel for a holy power crystal. The second crystal had to be drawn out by one's own attainment.
Above all, since it is obtained directly after the first crystal, the crucial thing was enlightenment. The wisdom gained by attempting and colliding with many things is what leads to the second crystal's creation.
'And yet he moves to the next stage immediately after obtaining the first crystal...?'
However much of a genius one is, there are domains that remain impossible. Even a child born with the qualities of a Saint, a Saintess or a Holy Emperor finds enlightenment at the tender age of five all but impossible.
Each household did conduct advance education toward attaining the second crystal, which had pulled the timing considerably earlier, but that did not mean enlightenment had become easy.
It was a thing that made no sense by any common measure.
'It is as natural as though he had been down this road once before.'
More than that, in the process of the first crystal forming and the second being made, there was not a wasted motion anywhere.
Lian had, of course, never made a holy power crystal before; he had merely spent a long time with Elly, so that his body was accustomed to divine power. Nagrim had no way of knowing that.
“First, let us conclude the baptism here.”
Nagrim watched Lian's back as he descended the dais with a wistful gaze. It was a look holding a strong yearning — as a cleric and as a researcher — to speak with Lian right this moment.
***
Ah, I feel human again.
I sprawled across the sofa like boiled spinach. On the table before me lay the lace veil that had been on my head until a moment ago.
'To think it never came the slightest bit undone through all that chaos.'
How exactly was it fixed to my head.
I was resting in a lounge located in the annex of the central seat.
Only after every conceivable incident had erupted and I had somehow forced my way through the baptism did I finally get a chance to rest. Not that I could rest right away, of course.
'Lian! Are you truly certain nothing hurts!'
'Lian, first take off all your clothes.'
'Yes si— sorry?'
Both of them were so worried they were out of their minds. I was thoroughly searched all over.
I worried the prophet's mark would be discovered, but there was no chance of that.
'It said it would inscribe it somewhere unseen, and they really couldn't find it.'
-Riiight.
The problem being that I don't know where it is either.
-Maybe it's inside your mouth or somewhere like that?
'Surely not.'
Still, I need to work out where it is if I'm going to be careful about it.
I stood in front of the full-length mirror and opened my mouth in an ahh with a dubious expression.
'Doesn't seem to be inside my mouth.'
-What about your eyes?
'One look tells you there's nothing there.'
-Who knows? It might be behind the eyeball.
Come on, surely not.
Half doubting, I rolled my eyes back in front of Elly.
-Huh? Huhhh?
'What is it, Elly. What's the matter.'
-Uhh... it's there?
'Sorry?'
-It's here! That prophet's mark or whatever it is!
...Seriously?
The place the prophet's mark had been inscribed was the back of my left eye. Stamped boldly onto the white of it.
'The angel's taste really is niche.'
-Well, it is a spot nobody could find unless you roll your eyes back and faint.
How do you leave a mark in a spot this edgelord.
I tottered back to the sofa and sprawled out again. There was still some time before the after-party.
'Can it even go ahead properly.'
Because the situation had been broadcast live it looked peaceful on the surface, but Father and the senior clergy were in an uproar cleaning up behind the scenes.
At least the party held after the Baptism Rite isn't broadcast, thankfully.
'And outside will be a festival, so it's good cover for scattering attention.'
Once the Baptism Rite held on the last day of the year ends, the whole Empire is swept up in festival heat.
Truly an exquisite situation for containing an incident. Thanks to which both my parents had gone out and had not come back for ages.
'Shall I have a look at things for a moment, then.'
I closed my eyes and felt for the aura of the crystal forming inside my body.
'Oh. The first one looks nearly finished?'
The holy power spinning round and round had come close to a round crystal shape. And a moment later.
FWAAAASH—
A haze of light spread from my whole body and the room went white for an instant.
It was the moment the first holy power crystal was completely forged. At the same time, channels of holy power stretched out from the crystal through my entire body.
“Wow.”
This is genuinely.
Different. On another plane.
If until now I had been moving with sandbags strapped on, now it felt as though my arms and legs were completely free.
Gathering holy power, the sensation of it converging on my fingertips with almost no delay sent a shiver right through me.
Holy power that would previously have scattered at my fingertips was holding its edge properly.
'Now I see why they said the holy power crystal matters.'
-The holy power inside your body has been tidied away far more comfortably.
It felt like being handed back a freedom I hadn't known I was missing. In a satisfied mood, I looked at the second crystal as well.
'Mm, this one is going to take ages.'
The second holy power crystal was forming very slowly.
Whether because what mixed in as the crystal first began forming was demonic energy, the pace was extremely sluggish.
'It did say the prophet's mark acts as a power filter that strains out the foulness of demonic energy.'
However purely it's filtered, does it make any sense for a cleric to absorb and use demonic energy? There's no problem I can feel right now, admittedly.
'Elly, is the demonic energy in my body being purified properly?'
-Mm. Completely clean. One hundred percent pure energy.
So it strains out the nature of the power and leaves purely the energy. But in that case, couldn't I absorb and use any power at all?
Mana, say, or spirit power. It was at least worth testing.
The holy power I originally had came entirely from Elly. That was power I could receive naturally because Elly and I are joined at the soul.
What became usable with the prophet's mark and the holy power crystal is holy power received from Elysian.
And the energy made by filtering the demonic energy that flowed in from destroying a demon.
Unavoidably, three powers were coexisting inside my body.
'In martial arts stories this is where the body explodes or the dantian breaks.'
-Demonic energy feels similar to holy power, too.
'What does that mean?'
-I mean the essential nature of the power looks similar. Maybe demonic energy is power received from the Demon God or something like that?
Aha. So the three powers have different roots but a similar grain.
Knock knock—
My reverie stopped at the sound of knocking.
“Coming—”
Probably my parents, finished with the cleanup. In front of the door I opened with a light heart was.
“Young Lian. Hello.”
“He... hello...?”
The white-haired Saint, wearing a gentle smile.