Chapter 370 - False Test

  “The truth is, the task that I was given was to hinder your actions and spy on you!” Naomi said, her bow so deep that her forehead touched the floor, “I was aware of the danger of the Spirit Blight gathered in the Cleansing Well, yet I didn’t even give you a warning. I should have been there to assist against the Corrupted One. Were it not for my hesitation, perhaps we could have saved those three.”

  This confession was not a surprise to Yuzu at all, nor to any of the Chaos Exalted. Naomi had been given the task to observe but not interfere. Yuzu didn’t know whether she would intentionally sabotage the situation, which was why she had left the Nature Priest outside the mines.

  However, it seemed that Naomi was genuinely looking out for the safety of the vilge, and in fact had quite a close connection with it. She had simply underestimated the danger.

  “You didn’t know they were down there.” Yuzu said gently, “It’s not your fault.”

  A shudder went through Naomi’s body as Yuzu said the words that directly targeted the guilt that Naomi was holding onto. Her face flushed red as she could only press her forehead into the floor, “Still… still… I should have done something…”

  Yuzu frowned inwardly as she scanned the tapestry for signs of Yuima, looking for a possible trap by the Nature Goddess. After a while, though, she came to the conclusion that not only was Naomi being sincere in her regret, but that she her admission to spying on Yuzu was in direct conflict with her faith to Yuima. This wasn’t part of Yuima’s pn, this was Naomi trying to make amends for her own personal failures to protect the vilge.

  In other words, Naomi never wanted anything bad to happen to the vilgers. Yuima had tasked her with getting in my way, which would give her an excuse to kick me out of Huan. Even though the Wailing was extreme, as an ailment it is also fairly benign and slow-acting. The vilgers should not have been in imminent or mortal danger. This means that both Yuima and Naomi did not know that a Corrupted One was about to be born here…

  But if that was the case…

  After some consideration, Yuzu asked a question on the strings.

  ~

  “Tell me about the cleansing pool. What is Spirit Blight? Why was a Corrupted One able to form from it in the first pce?”

  “That…” Naomi hesitated. The answer to this question was clearly something that was not to be told to others.

  Yuzu frowned, considering the path forward. She cycled through various lines of Fate, but was unable to reach a clear answer. Interestingly, though, the Nature Priest clearly took each question into consideration, even the ones that clearly trespassed on her duties as a Priest of Yuima.

  That is to say… has her faith in Yuima wavered from these events? This seemed highly unlikely. After all, priests had a special connection to their Goddess, the highest form of divinity and power in a domain.

  But if not that, then what…

  Yuzu paused a moment to think before using Fate Cycling to probe this topic directly.

  “Given your task, you are aware that your Goddess and mine are not on good terms. Why is it that you are helping me?”

  A conflicted expression grew on Naomi’s face as she slowly sat up. After a moment she shook her head with her gaze lowered, not wanting to meet Yuzu’s eyes, “Yuima is wise and loving. She would not wish you to die here. Seeing how you saved Ika, She would understand why I helped you.”

  Yuzu noted the peculiar phrasing of Naomi’s answer, “By ‘would not’… you mean to say…”

  “That’s right…” Naomi’s fists clenched on her robe, “I haven’t prayed to Yuima since that day…”

  After a long period of silence, Naomi suddenly shook her head, mumbling to herself softly.

  “That day… That day after what happened in the mines I prayed to Yuima for help.” Naomi said, “As I prayed I felt Her presence around me. A sense of grief and loss filled me, and I knew that Yuima was grieving the deaths of those three…

  “But when I prayed for Her power to heal you and save you from death, I received no reply. Afterward, I set up a healing ritual but there was no response.”

  The Nature priest shook her head, unable to understand, or rather, unable to accept the truth — That Yuima was unwilling to help the person who had sacrificed her own life to save her people.

  “Perhaps it’s a test for me…” She muttered in the vision, “Perhaps it’s just a test…”

  In the end, Naomi chose to help Yuzu on her own. Unsure of whether this action was correct, but having not received support from her Goddess, she refrained from praying during this time, acting out of her own principles and feelings.

  Yuzu nodded, casting her eyes on the tapestry to check for Yuima’s thread. As expected, the thick white thread of the Nature Goddess was nowhere in sight, not in the present or near future. Though she couldn’t check the past few days, she had no reason to doubt Naomi’s answer.

  Most people had no interactions with gods. Even priests, monks and bishops who were higher up in the hierarchy did not have direct conversations with their gods, but received insights and communication through dreams, visions and signs.

  Not only that, but these interactions were also rgely reliant on establishing a connection through prayer, rituals or other special means, they weren’t omnipotent.

  Without these methods and without their followers to serve as conduits, gods would have limited awareness of what was happening even within the borders of their own nds.

  For example, Deka, the Prince of Life, had the devileye pnts that were used as his eyes wherever they grew. Jun Yi Kong used the residents of Ying Zhen to spy on what happened outside his chamber, but he was very limited in his control over those creatures. Going even further back, Argus was able to see and hear everything that went on in the basement of the import shop, but that was a special pocket dimension of the Knowledge Domain.

  A skill like being able to read and interact with the Tapestry of Fate was truly exceptional and rare.

  Thinking about Naomi’s actions and words, then, this low-ranking priest of Yuima had had her faith challenged by recent events. The horror of having a Corrupted One spawn out of vilgers that she knew and cared for did not make sense given what she knew about her ‘wise and loving’ Goddess.

  Why did Yuima not prevent the Corrupted One from showing up? Why did she not smite it the moment it appeared? Instead of the Goddess dealing with the Corrupted One directly, it fell onto the shoulders of these strange visitors from another nd.

  Was this all part of Her will? Perhaps Yuima had intended for this to happen from the start, and Yuzu really was sent there to cure the vilge and prevent disaster.

  These doubts all pyed out to the situation today.

  Naomi had prayed to Yuima on the day of the battle, so the Nature goddess was fully aware of the situation. Yuima must have been aware that Yuzu was on death’s door. Surely if Yuima wanted Yuzu dead, she could have come down to the vilge herself to see the situation for herself or finish the job with her own hands.

  But after a moment Yuzu had an inkling of why she had been allowed to live.

  Yuzu was only a Disciple, not even an immortal. From Yuima’s perspective Yuzu was surely expendable, but such a direct action would definitely incur the White Maiden’s wrath. Since Yuzu was simply a pawn in the game between gods, it was not worth the risk for Yuima to take direct action to kill her. Better to let ‘nature’ take its course. If Yuzu died naturally from her injuries in the battle, Yuima could deflect the bme. Then, Yuima could destroy the Corrupted One directly and She would have successfully taken care of the White Maiden’s intrusion into Her realm.

  If the Nature Goddess knew Yuzu’s true identity as the White Maiden, Yuzu had no doubt that she would already be dead.

  Golden threads glimmered in the depths of Yuzu’s eyes as she finished Fate Cycling, fully understanding the situation.

  ~

  “Thank you,” Yuzu said with sincerity, “I won’t forget your kindness.”

  A short while ter, Yuzu gathered her entourage in one of the rooms on the second floor of the house. The room was furnished for small gatherings, with several artisan cabinets around the room with various trinkets and art pieces. The walls were made of bamboo and paper, with sliding doors on opposite sides of the room leading to the hallways and tatami mats providing soft flooring underfoot.

  In the center of the room was a low square table, rge enough for them all to sit cross legged around without feeling cramped. Yuzu, Char Char, Firuzeh and Kai each sat on one side of the table with teacups next to them and a teapot and a map of Huan in the center. They were alone in the house for the time being, with Naomi, the Chief and his staff away for various reasons.

  “This room is safe for us to discuss private matters.” Firuzeh said as she activated her Conspire ability.

  “Good.” Yuzu nodded, looking at each of her companions in turn, “Let’s discuss where we’re at.”

  “Well, we finished the job, didn’t we?” Char Char spoke first, “The Wailing is cured, and we took down a monster that would have destroyed the vilge.”

  “The task was, as I recall, to alleviate the woes of the vilgers and cure the disease.” Firuzeh nodded, “Shall we try to make contact with Yuima?”

  “It’s not enough.” Yuzu shook her head.

  “Not enough?” Char Char frowned.

  “Yuima never intended for us to succeed.” Yuzu said with confidence, “And, truthfully speaking, I haven’t completely ‘cured’ the Wailing. I’ve only dissipated the corruption for some time.”

  “You mean the bck stuff in the cleansing pool?” Char Char asked.

  “It’s empty now, I checked.” Kai added, “Whatever that monster was, it absorbed all of that liquid when it came to life.”

  As for the Corrupted One’s corpse, its physical body became inert and like any other corpse. With nothing to hold them together the corrupted energies dissipated fairly quickly into the aether. This was typical of these monsters, which Yuzu had learned from Firuzeh earlier.

  “That’s just a symptom of the problem. The pool will slowly fill again over time.” Yuzu shook her head, “I’ve done what I can to slow it. The corruption is attracted to spiritually receptive objects like gold, silver and crystals.”

  “Which is why you used them as offerings in your ritual—“ Char Char had an epiphany.

  “Yes, but that will only slow it down.” Yuzu said, “The problem is, it’s also drawn in by people. Especially Exalted.”

  “So, if we stay here we’ll only speed up the next Wailing.” Kai said.

  “This isn’t normal.” Firuzeh said, “Corruption, gathering in pces.”

  “Neither is the Wailing.” Yuzu said.

  “Could it be that they’re reted?” Char Char asked, “Maybe one causes the other?”

  “That’s what we have to figure out. I have a feeling that the true reason is reted to why Lord Noga brought us here in the first pce.” Yuzu said, “Which is that something is wrong with Lord Matsuhara, which both Lord Noga and Yuima have been unable to fix. Perhaps the source of the Wailing and the corruption is also what is causing trouble for Lord Matsuhara.”

  “But Lord Noga didn’t say what the problem was?” Char Char frowned.

  Yuzu shook her head. Well, it wasn’t that he didn’t say what the problem was, it was that he assumed that the White Maiden already knew. And even with Fate Cycling, Yuzu had no luck asking for a direct answer. Ironically, she couldn’t find out what the core problem was because she was already supposed to know the answer.

  “If this giant problem is so hard for them to fix, why wouldn’t Yuima want the White Maiden to see if She can help?” Char Char frowned.

  “It’s complicated.” Yuzu didn’t want to get into it.

  “Nature and Fate are enemies.” Firuzeh offered, “One seeks bance, the other seeks to tip the scales.”

  “In other words,” Kai sighed, “Even after all this, we’re still not welcome here.”

  Yuzu nodded seriously, “Yuima isn’t looking for a solution, she’s looking to waste time. Most likely, if we turn in our ‘quest’, we will be asked to go to another vilge to repeat the results again.”

  This wasn’t a guess. Yuzu had already cycled through a few interactions with Naomi regarding their next steps. The results weren’t promising.

  “Busywork.” Kai said with a scowl.

  “The more time she has to observe us, the more intel she has to use against us.” Firuzeh said, “Meanwhile, she’s benefiting as you help solve her minor problems for free.”

  “Speaking of free,” Kai piped up, “We didn’t ask to be a part of this, and from what I can see we’re not getting paid. Why should we stick around?”

  Kai had been clearly thinking of this topic for a while and was looking for a pce to bring it up. When referring to ‘we’, he looked at both Firuzeh and Char Char, the members of the Red Lion Security Company that had somehow been dragged into this mess without their consent.

  “It’s not about pay—“ Char Char started to protest but she was interrupted mid-sentence.

  “Fair enough,” Yuzu said, looking at Kai with a piercing expression, “Name your price.”