My Childhood Friend Became an Inquisitor

“I’ll become more reliable, someone you can depend on. So, will you marry me when we grow up?”
“…Yes, I’d like that.”
*

Meeting you after so long, you were still beautiful enough to make my heart flutter.

The day you left for the city, how much I cried after returning home, pretending to be fine. Your face was already red even before that.

After you left like that, I couldn’t even hear any proper news about you. Adults teased that you’d be completely absorbed in the glamorous city life and would have long forgotten about someone like me, but I, still young, stubbornly insisted that couldn’t be true.

And time passed.
Enough time for even a naive child to accept reality.

“It’s been a while.”

“It’s been… a… while…”
Unlike the adults’ bold claims, you hadn’t forgotten or changed.

But now I knew. Why they had acted so mischievously. It was their way of hoping that a boy’s first love would end with as little pain as possible.

A child who went up to the city, led by the hand of someone who looked noble at a glance, would never return to this manure-smelling countryside. I realized as I became an adult that it’s easier to give up rather than suffer from hope.

The one who forgot and changed was me.

“What’s that… beside you…?”
Pale platinum blonde hair, grayish-blue eyes like an overcast sky.
An outstandingly aristocratic appearance that seemed to shout that we were of different species, living in different worlds.

But you were still you. Fragile yet kind, hard to approach yet familiar. The expression as you looked up at me was also the same.

An expression that looked like it would burst into tears at any moment. Clouds of sadness gather in your sky-colored eyes.
“Anne.”

If I were just a bit younger—no, if it weren’t such an inopportune moment, we might have had a touching reunion.

But you and I were adults now. I could no longer rush to embrace you like I used to.

If I did, I’d end up getting dirt on your white and elegant robe.

“Louis. That person… beside you…”

“She’s my fiancée.”

Looking into your wavering eyes that wanted to deny reality, I cut it off cleanly.

In a small village, labor was scarce. By the time my peers were having their second child, I couldn’t keep being stubborn forever.

No, those are all excuses. I simply gave up and abandoned hope.

“Now, she’s the most precious person in the world to me.”

Once upon a time, you were my world.
But now, even reaching out to you felt like a sin to me.

I had dressed somewhat neatly for a good first impression while peddling, but it was incomparable to your attire. If we stood side by side, we’d look like a princess and a servant, not lovers.

Inferiority complex? That’s right. The sense of distance is also correct. But the village elders would say this:

You need to know your place.

“You… promised…”

Unable to hold back any longer, rain falls from your moist eyes. You’re still a crybaby, I see.

But I can’t wipe away your tears, and with one arm held back, I can only stare blankly at your figure.
“I’m sorry.”

That was the only thing I could say.

From the moment our eyes first met, and the moment your expression crumbled, I could tell. Unlike me, you hadn’t changed at all. Still the same country girl Anne that I knew.

But your appearance no longer suited the countryside. The golden cross embroidered on the chest of your robe, and the fabric still dazzlingly white despite having traversed the underdeveloped roads. It looks like a luxury item that would be hard to buy even if we sold the entire village.

Your once clumsy gait that used to stumble while running is now graceful, and even the simple gesture of lifting your sleeve to wipe your eyes is filled with elegance. If I hadn’t recognized your face, I might have prostrated myself immediately upon meeting you.

In this small and musty town, your existence stood out like a lone lighthouse on a night sea.

“I’m sorry…”

It doesn’t suit. It doesn’t fit.

It’s impossible for you to follow me down to the countryside, and it’s impossible for me to follow you up to the city and cling on. Our paths have already diverged and can never reconnect.

So it was right to let you go. So that you could forget about someone like me and move on, even if it hurts for a while.

You’ll be able to do that. Because I know that despite looking fragile, you’re actually stronger than anyone.

The figure that had come close to the village quickly recedes. Only after the fluttering white clothes disappear from view does the grip on my right arm gently loosen.

I sit down on the dirt road and stare blankly at the sky for a long time. The sky that resembles your eyes.

After running for a long time, Anne collapsed to the ground, her strength spent.

At this moment, she didn’t even remember that the robe she was wearing was a quasi-sacred object, bestowed only to a select few even within the church. Only one thing came to mind.

A face that she could never forget no matter how much time passed, reflected in puddles when she opened her eyes and painted in her mind when she closed them.
“It can’t… be true…”
The scene she had just witnessed drove home the truth she didn’t want to believe.

It can’t be, she thought. You, who were more reliable and admirable than anyone else, really…

But no matter how much she tried to cross it out in her mind, the truth wouldn’t change. In the gloomy sky that matched her mood, droplets of sorrow sparkled in the beautiful tears of the girl.

Plop. The fallen teardrop left a small bump in her crouched shadow on the ground. After staring at the dirt floor spotted with tear stains, Anne stood up again.

She couldn’t deny it, but she wanted to.
The one who was by her side when she was sick, who approached her first when she was alone, who got angry as if he had been hurt himself when other children bullied her, who laughed and said “Let’s eat together” when he got something delicious…

“Louis.”

These were trivial, such trivial things.
But to her, they were almost the only human kindness in her life. These trivial things snowballed in the girl’s rosy heart, the gray life of the city, and the bloody trials she endured—

Once it started rolling, now no amount of willpower could stop it.

“Louis…”
The hair of the boy she loved—still loves—was as dark as this very earth.

Like the dark brown soil she was standing on now, Louis was the existence that supported her in her uniquely unfamiliar rural life, which felt so detached. Could ivy grow so large without a support to climb on?

No, even that wasn’t enough to explain their relationship.
A vine that has grown sufficiently sturdy might not fall even if its support is removed, but what tree could stand if its roots were pulled out?

“I’ll.”

After composing her emotions, Anne took off the robe she was wearing.

“I’ll save you.”

The robe, imbued with a special blessing, hadn’t gathered a speck of dust even after sitting on the ground. Just like her heart, which remained straight even after seeing darkness.

Instead of a slender, snow-white female body under the removed robe, there was silver armor that sharply reflected light.

The armor was too fierce and heavy for her small frame to bear. However, the girl’s movements in full armor were as light as if she felt no burden, to the extent that even Louis hadn’t noticed.

At her waist, hidden by the hem of the loose robe, was a mace that shone like the morning star.
A thorny blood-red cross was engraved exactly where the golden cross had been embroidered on the robe.

Finally, she dons a dark silver helmet that completely covers her face.

What stood there was no longer a frail and sickly priestess. Though small in stature, she was now a proud Inquisitor, more than enough to be feared.

With the priestly robe that covered down to her feet removed, the Inquisitor made clanking metal sounds with each step. As an odor that could be either rust or blood spread, birds flew away in surprise and even wolves tucked their tails.

One who practices the law of mercy through blood and violence. The natural enemy of all heretics and devil worshippers.

The place where Inquisitor Anne’s steps halted looked like an ordinary corner of the forest. But when she stretched out her arm, her fingertips collided with thin air, creating ripples in the empty space.

Whoosh-

The holy barrier that conceals the eyes of heretics and sinners opens, accepting the touch of a sister. Inside the barrier, a scene unfolded that didn’t match at all with the calm and peaceful atmosphere of the forest.

The flag bearing a sword-shaped cross is the symbol of the Crusaders. Beneath the pure white barracks that gave off a sense of perfectionism or even obsession, dozens of soldiers waited only for the order to march.

Though pitifully shabby compared to Anne’s, a soldier wearing silver armor engraved with a cross approached her. In those straightforward eyes, there was no guilt or hesitation, only a sense of mission and pride to carry out their duty.

Eyes of a fanatic that would make an ordinary person uncomfortable if they encountered them. But Anne felt no strangeness in that righteous gaze.

“Sister, were there heretics in that place?”

Because she, too, was of the same kind.

“Yes. That land has already become a den of heretics. There was darkness lurking that even I could not handle.”