A [Saint]’s duty

"Is the new saint here!? We need to talk!"

In a split second, Lizzy's fox-like smile disappeared as she stood up, drawing the attention of the headmaster herself before she looked at Tom.

"Sorry kiddo, It seems like we need to leave your girlfriend for the moment."

Although she was still joking around a bit, Tom recognized Lizzy's tone as the same one she had used when they were ambushed by trolls in the middle of the night, moreover, Lizzy's eyes were cold as ice when she glanced at Tom. Lizzy's entire body now seemed like she was cloaked in ice, she was ready to kill on a moment's notice.

"Sure then, let's go."

Sensing his instructor's state of alert that she put on to protect him, Tom blamed himself for his own incompetence.

Feeling like he needed to be protected was extremely frustrating for Tom.

Seeing the sudden change in Lizzy and Tom, Elizabeth managed to snap out of her daze. Something inside Elizabeth made her feel like this was a critical moment, seeing Tom and instructor Lizzy leave together like they were heading into war made her chest hurt.

If there was a moment to lay everything bare, now was the time. Elizabeth had never been more certain of anything else in her life.

"Tom!"

Slightly surprised by how loud and crackly her own voice was, Elizabeth felt everything else in the entire world fade away as she watched Tom turn his head, looking slightly mysterious and slightly confused at the same time.

"You said you weren't able to fall in love, as the heiress of the Warren family I take personal offence to that! Mark my words, I will make you fall for me so hard that you'll be begging on your hands and knees to marry me soon enough so be prepared for that!"

With a confident and slightly haughty looking smile on her face, Elizabeth confidently declared her intentions to charm Tom in front of the entire school, not that she realized that in the moment of course.

That would come to haunt her later.

"Ah, okay. See you later miss Elizabeth."

Although Tom looked calm on the surface, Elizabeth could tell that he was flustered, although it was properly due to secondhand embarrassment.

"Good for you kiddo~"

Although Lizzy was repeatedly clapping Tom on the back to tease him while wearing her usual looking fox-like smile, she still remained alert in a combat-ready state.

Her eyes were still ice cold.

"Who are we meeting exactly?"

As the two of them were on the way to the headmaster's office to meet with the outsiders who had suddenly barged into the Laurance mage academy, Tom figured he needed all the information he could gather beforehand.

"Most likely the church. If we're lucky it is just a few low-level priests that want to shake your hand and that will be all…"

Falling silent mid-sentence it seemed like Lizzy was busy going over all possible scenarios ahead of time, whatever the church wanted it seemed like Lizzy was dreading it to some extent.

(... Well, nothing good ever comes of associating with the church anyway.)

Breathing a sigh to calm down, Tom's face turned bitter as he thought back to how he had been treated by members of the church in the past.

"I am pleased to meet you, saint… You can leave now, Miss instructor."

From the first meeting with the church representatives, Tom's mood soured more than it already had. The representative from the church was a man in the golden years of his life, wearing pure white robes with golden embodiments; it was clear that he held quite a high status in the church. With short grey hair and a full beard, the representative's golden eyes seemed to look straight through Tom without much in the way of real interest as he once more asked for Lizzy to leave.

"You can leave now in-"

"I don't think so, this is Lizzy, she's my teacher and the only reason I became a saint. If you want to talk with me, she stays."

Putting down his foot, Tom tested how much leeway he had at the same time. It was clear that the church's representative was of high rank, that itself told Tom something about how important Tom was to them as a [saint].

"... Lizzy isn't really a normal instructor at this academy, she's trustful."

With the headmaster also giving in to Tom's demand, the church's representative breathed a heavy sigh before caving with slight annoyance.

"Fine, let's get down to the matter of hand."

Moving the conversation over to a pair of sofas facing each other with a table in the middle, the church representative introduced himself.

"I am a bishop from the church, you can call me Macwell or bishop Macwell, saint."

Introducing himself as a bishop, Macwell hardly showed any kind of courtesy towards Tom, it seemed he simply didn't care for such formalities.

At least when it was him having to do them, receiving respect was an entirely different matter for bishop Macwell.

"It is nice to meet you bishop Macwell, I am Tom, a bastard from the Laplace family."

Figuring that it might be a good idea to mention his family name although he honestly hated the idea of even being associated with that house, Tom figured it might give him some leverage.

"My name is Lizzy, I am currently Tom's personal instructor and have been so since before he became a saint."

"Is that so? Please do tell me why you're even here?"

Still ever rude towards Lizzy, bishop Macwell's expression seemed to constantly change from neutral when looking at Tom to outright destain when he looked at Lizzy. In response to Macwell's clear provocation, Lizzy glanced at the headmaster who eventually gave a quick nod.

"Although I am currently an active reserve, I still belong to the royal knights of the Laurence kingdom. I am also a former member of the Royal Laurence intelligence bureau, having served for quite a while.."

"I-I see, can I ask what your specialization in the bureau was?"

Surprised that he was sitting down with a former member of the infamous intelligence bureau, bishop Macwell took out a white and golden handkerchief and wiped the sweat off his brow while asking a question he properly shouldn't have.

"What was my specialization in the bureau? Let's see…"

Forming her usual fox-like smile, the air inside the headmaster's office suddenly turned cold as Lizzy reminisanded, remembering the good old days like it was yesterday. Fetching a cigarette from her stained cloak, Lizzy quickly lit up a smoke and took a deep puff of smoke before answering the bishop, breathing out ice crystals as she did so.

"I was in counterintelligence, and I was very good at my job."

"C-counterintelligence you say?... Fine, you can stay."

Although Tom really had no idea what working in counterintelligence involved or even signified, judging by bishop Macwell's reaction it seemed to be something worthy of respect. Faking a cough, bishop Macwell returned to topic after wiping the sweat off of his bow.

"Allow me to introduce my subordinate who first learned of your anointment in a divine oracle. This is Eve, please allow her to confirm that you are indeed a [saint], Tom."

Drawing attention to behind him, bishop Macwell finally made Tom aware of the nun which had been quietly standing behind the bishop, perhaps in an attempt to blend in with the wallpaper.

"Ah, yes! I am Eve, please excuse me."

With a light shock, Eve straightened her back to quickly introduce herself before she went over to Tom. Kneeling down at Tom's side as he sat on the sofa, Eve lightly grasped his hand with an almost inaudible 'excuse me' before closing her eyes as she started concentrating. After the nun closed her eyes, a minute quickly passed in silence. As Tom's patience eventually started to wear out, he was just about to open his mouth when the nun spoke out.

"There's no mistake, Tom is the new [saint]."

Opening her eyes once more, Eve now bore a look of reverence when she looked at Tom, although the person in question receiving such a stare was less than pleased by it. As Eve confirmed that they had indeed found the right person, bishop Macwell's expression softened up slightly before he addressed the new [saint].

"From now on, the church will take care of you, Tom. We will teach you how to use your power and guide you to become a pillar of intelligent life."

Reaching out his hand across the table, bishop Macwell expected Tom to quickly grasp it, after all, being recognized by the church would be a major boon for any bastard like him.

"No thanks, I already learned how to use my new [skill]'s and [title]."

"Eh?"

Not comprehending what just happened, bishop Macwell's hand remained outstretched as his expression froze.

"Besides, I still haven't learned everything I can from Lizzy, she's the best possible instructor for me at the moment."

While Lizzy suddenly looked very proud for some reason, Eve's had frozen up in the same manner as Macwell, only her expression had tangible fear written all over it.

As Macwell finally realized what Tom had just said to him, Macwell retracted his outstretched hand as anger flashed over his face.

"I think you've misunderstood the situation, this isn't a suggestion, you're coming with us whether you want to or not."

Starting to move mana throughout his body, Macwell made it clear that he wasn't joking, but in retrospect, such a reaction might have been a mistake.

The first one to react to such a brazen threat was Lizzy, the very second Macwell started moving mana throughout his body she grasped her [catalyst] and rushed forward.

"Threatening my student right in front of me was a mistake."

Having stopped just shy of decapitating the bishop, Lizzy spoke in such a low tone that it could almost be confused about a growl from some sort of monster. At the same time, the headmaster who had been quiet up until now leaned forward on the sofa as he radiated bloodlust.

"Is going against the will of a [saint] what the church stands for now? In that case, I'll be sure to inform my associates of the change in policy."

With both the headmaster and Lizzy applying a not so subtle amount of pressure on the bishop, Macwell quickly went through a variety of emotions, eventually settling on repressed anger. Although this was a somewhat good result for Tom, antagonizing the church was not smart in the long run.

(Lizzy and the headmaster ought to know that too, in that case why do that? Am I really worth that much or is it something else?...)

Realizing that he had a chance to bridge both extremes and gain from both sides, Tom formed a smile as he stood up, making himself the centre of attention at the same time.

"Lizzy please relax, I'm sure the church wouldn't ever do anything that would hurt their relationship with the goddess of war, or the goddess of fate for that matter."

"... Fine."

Realizing that Tom was doing something, Lizzy drew back as her claws retracted. Meanwhile the bishop and nun seemed to be stuck on something else.

"The goddess of war and the goddess of fate? Have you been blessed by two gods?"

With his face now radiating nothing other than pure reverence, bishop Macwell seemed to forget his earlier annoyance and anger all at once.

"Yeah, I was blessed by those two goddesses, thanks to the grace of those gods my life has changed. The dreams which seemed so far out of reach all my life have suddenly become possible, although I won't let the church take those opportunities away from me with training I don't need, I will be supporting the church that is so close to those gods when the opportunity arrives in the future."

Taking a deep breath followed by a somewhat resigned sigh, bishop Macwell seemed to calm down and compose himself before answering Tom.

"I see, the church will be looking forward to that then so let's just leave it at that for now. Tom, will you walk me out?"

"... Sure."

Glancing at Lizzy for her approval, Tom quickly agreed to the bishop's request as he and the nun got up and prepared to leave.

-

"It still is honestly impressive that you managed to kill such a monster on your own."

As Macwell and Tom reached the training fields, the bishop and nun glanced at the massive corpse of the ground dragon that Tom had killed doing his trail. The now decomposing ground dragon was currently being worked on by a group of about 20 skilled specialists from the adventurers guild. Using ice affinity magic and specialized tools to slow down decomposition and extract the more valuable parts of the kill that could be used in the creation of potions, armour and medicine.

"Yeah, I am honestly surprised I managed to do that too, although if I'm honest it was mostly due to my magic affinity and the training I have received that I was able to barely pull it off."

Having resigned himself to stop with the politics for the day, bishop Macwell diligently listened to what Tom had to say, in an attempt to provide the best possible advice he could for the new [saint].

"I'm sure that there's more than just those aspects at play, most people put in such a situation all of a sudden wouldn't be able to fight. It takes more than just [skill's] and the right affinity to win in battle, battlefield tactics and the ability to keep calm in battle are what separate the advantage from the bad and the great."

"... More than just skill, huh?"

With a natural lull in the conversation from Tom absorbing Macwell's advice, Macwell and Eve arrived at their destination. Parked a bit away from the ground dragon corpse, a massive beast welcomed her master back with a happy sounding squeal.

"A griffon?"

Looking at the massive magic beast prancing around like a mix between a horse and a god, the eagle-headed, winged lion the size of a warhorse seemed like a pet that impatiently welcomed its master back from work.

"Yeah, isn't she sweet? This lady here has been with me almost 10 years now."

Walking up to the griffon, Macwell was immediately assaulted by the magic beast as it bit his head with another happy-sounding squeal.

"Sweet? Sorry, I don't really see that…"

Not yet used to magic beasts, Tom had a hard time seeing the imposing sized, natural aerial killing machine as 'sweet'.

"Yeah everyone has that response at first, but once you get to know these creatures a bit closer you start to see their personalities a bit more clearly. Although they still have a magic core, these magic beasts are far easier to get along with than monsters."

Inspecting his saddle on the back of the griffon, Macwell took the reigns as he jumped into the saddle. After prancing around for a few seconds, Macwell pulled Eve up on the passenger seat behind him and prepared to take off, but as he did Macwell seemed to remember something.

"Ah, right. Come see me sometime in Alime, if you want to find out why the gods chose you as a [saint] praying at our temples there is the fastest way to do so."

Moving the reins slightly, bishop Macwell commanded the massive griffon into a gallop that quickly transitioned into flight as the beast's massive wings filled with mana and carried it to the sky.

(The reason why I was chosen as a [saint], huh?)

As the representatives from the church took their leave, the parting words of bishop Macwell seemed to stick with Tom, at least for a little bit.

(... I can find out all that later, for now, I need to recover from mana sickness, then get back to training.)

If the visit from the church had taught Tom anything it was that he needed to become stronger, with clear motivation now all he needed was a goal.