By the time we got back to Bao City, the sun only had about a quarter of its light left.

Passing through the central plaza, I saw the place in complete disarray, like it had just gone through some kind of riot or wild festival.

So while we were risking our lives in the wilderness, the city folks sure were having fun…

The draft-beast wagon carrying me and Ink River stopped in front of a four‑story building.

I hopped off and took a look from outside. It looked like an inn. Not exactly luxurious, but definitely tidy, and you could feel how much care the owner put into it.

Our room was on the fourth floor, the top, a small twin room. Even so, it was way better than what the Pioneer Team gave us.

Once I went in, I didn’t even think. I just threw myself onto the bed and passed out.

These past two days had piled up way too much fatigue, both in body and mind.

Having a break like this… isn’t bad at all…

Everything else can wait till tomorrow…

……

The next day.

Cleaned and prepped vegetables were brought to our room as breakfast, and the tangy-sweet dressing made them really tasty.

One night of rest seemed to have wiped out every ounce of exhaustion.

But… I don’t wanna get up.

It’s like the first morning of vacation after finals—just don’t wanna get out of bed.

I turned my head and glanced at Ink River in the other bed. He was sitting up by the headboard, reading a book.

Seventh Ju: …Where’d you get that?

Ink River: The server who brought breakfast gave it to me. Said it was to kill time.

Ink River: He probably thinks we’re some kind of convalescents who can’t get out of bed.

Seventh Ju: After spending the night with a man, not being able to get out of bed… that’s a terrifying image…

Ink River: What do you mean?

Seventh Ju: No… doesn’t mean anything.

Seventh Ju: So what’re you reading?

Ink River: Guess you’d call it a pulp adventure.

Ink River: The male lead’s stupid but crazy strong, doing whatever he wants, driven by dirty desires…

Ink River: The female lead’s hot and pretty but stupid, and just throws herself at him and offers up her body for free…

Ink River: The supporting girls all have these stacked traits but no brains, spending all day orbiting the guy or getting saved by him in different fancy ways…

Ink River: The villains look impressive but are idiots, just spouting “you filthy peasants” lines and yelling move names before the hero smacks them down…

Seventh Ju: You’ve said “stupid” like four times now…

Ink River: …Do you humans all like reading this stuff?

Seventh Ju: Don’t just label the whole human race like that.

Ink River: I’m done with it. You want it?

Seventh Ju: You know I can’t read and you’re saying that on purpose, right?

Ink River: Good… If you’d said you liked this kind of story, I think our friendship would’ve ended here.

Seventh Ju: This is my first time feeling a friendship threatened by a single book…

Ink River: There are some other useful books here besides this kind of trash.

Ink River patted the space by his side, where almost ten more books were stacked.

Ink River: Like this one, “An Introduction to the Divine Temple and Divine Officers.” It’s suitable for anyone.

Ink River: You not gonna take a look?

Before I could answer, he flicked it at me with a sharp slap, and it thumped against my chest.

Seventh Ju: I told you I can’t read! You’re doing this on purpose!

With a whoosh I flung the book back, but Ink River’s wolf tail suddenly swept up, blocking it right before it smacked into his face.

Ink River: This book explains the will of the gods. Throwing it around like that is, on some level, blasphemy.

Smack—comes flying at me.

Seventh Ju: Using enough force to kill someone just to slam a holy book into my chest isn’t blasphemy?

Whoosh—goes flying back.

Ink River: You just missed catching it the first time and now you’re mad and trying to get back at me, aren’t you—

Seventh Ju: So it’s my fault now? Blame me, huh?

Ink River: Just hold on to the book like a good boy—

Seventh Ju: That’s the third time, and I still can’t read!

Smack—

Whoosh—

Aibin: ………

Aibin: …

Aibin: Hey. You two…

Seventh Ju: …

Ink River: …

Thud—

The book fell right between our two beds.

At some point, Aibin—built just as big as Ink River—was standing in our doorway, staring blankly at what we were doing.

Aibin: ………

Aibin: You two go on playing. I’m… gonna head out…

Ink River: …

Seventh Ju: What’s with that “I don’t want to kill the mood” vibe—get back here—!!

……

Aibin: I’m recuperating at a hospital nearby, so I thought I’d drop in on you.

Seventh Ju: Hospital?

Aibin: Yeah. I took too many Sudden-Numb hits. My body needs several days of assisted treatment to fully flush out the toxins.

Aibin: I heard you two got three days of rest, right? If things go well on my side, we can probably head back together.

Aibin: Also…

Aibin: …Putting you in that kind of danger—that’s on me.

Aibin: Please forgive me…

Seventh Ju: …

Ink River: I feel like… there’s something in there I could be mad about, but I just can’t get angry at all.

Seventh Ju: Yeah, I’m getting the same feeling.

Seventh Ju: Aibin, our first meeting was pretty awful, right?

Aibin: That? That’s just how I get when I’m drunk.

Seventh Ju: But from the second time on, it always felt like… something was stopping me from disliking you.

Seventh Ju: Don’t tell me… that’s your Wish Power?

Ink River: If it is, I’d like to know what it does. Tell us, and we’ll call it forgiven.

Aibin: ………

Aibin: …

Aibin: Fine… but don’t tell anyone else.

Seventh Ju: Of course, I’ll keep it secret!

Seventh Ju: Ink River, is there any salad dressing left from breakfast? My tongue’s not slippery enough yet, I’m still not at the “accidentally blurt it out” stage.

Ink River: ………

Aibin: Stop messing with me…

Aibin: I’m from the Lightdark Corridor, a long narrow country that borders the Divine Temple.

Aibin: Tourism’s big there. My family’s run an inn for generations, all the way down to my generation.

Aibin: The heir was supposed to be my big brother Aiton. But once he became an adult, he secretly ran away from home. By the time we found out where he was, he’d already become a high-ranking officer in the Sincere Kingdom Pioneering Squad.

Aibin: My family had no choice but to make me inherit the inn, and they half-forced me to make a wish for a certain ability…

Aibin: “The ability to make guests feel happy in spirit.”

Ink River: ………

Seventh Ju: That’s… a very professional Wish Power.

Seventh Ju: So why aren’t you still running the family inn?

Aibin: I snuck out two years ago too… Then I met my brother, and he said they’d already found someone else to inherit the place…

Seventh Ju: ………

Aibin: You think I built this body just to be an innkeeper? If I didn’t have such terrible drunken rampages, I’d be a full Pioneer Team soldier right now!

Seventh Ju: Yeah, yeah, got it, don’t get so worked up.

Aibin: Anyway! I just came to say hi. They’re giving me another injection soon, so I’m heading back to the hospital.

Aibin: Hmph!

Ink River: Take care…

Seventh Ju: ………

Ink River and I silently watched Aibin’s back as he left.

Seventh Ju: Hey… doesn’t he look like someone sulking because his secret got dragged out of him?

Ink River: Yeah… but with that build, acting like that is kinda weird.

Seventh Ju: Right? That kind of move is only cute when a girl does it.

Ink River: Speaking of which, us throwing books back and forth just now was pretty much little-girl behavior too, wasn’t it?

Seventh Ju: Yeah, can’t argue with that.

Ink River: ………

Seventh Ju: ………

Ink River: Read?

Seventh Ju: If you read it to me, sure.

……

……

“An Introduction to the Divine Temple and Divine Officers.”

Ink River: Divine Officers in the outer circle mainly deal with believers. They don’t have individual specialties. They’re the foundation of faith in the gods.

Ink River: Divine Officers in the middle circle shoulder important duties. Normally, each middle-circle officer represents the god’s will in one specific field of the world.

Ink River: For example, crop harvests, disease, climate, and so on. You could say middle-circle Divine Officers are already the gods’ spokespersons.

Ink River: The more important the domain they represent, the heavier the weight of that Divine Officer, and the more they need someone virtuous with a lot of Wish Points to fill the role.

Seventh Ju: I remember Priestess Hilcaly is from the middle circle, right? Aiton mentioned it when we departed that day.

Ink River: Hilcarrie… I wonder if she might be the Divine Officer representing “sin.”

Seventh Ju: Sin… It actually fits. Medicine, weapons, blood—those all tie into sin somehow.

Ink River: Under normal circumstances, regular believers never see middle-circle Divine Officers. Those officers serve the Divine Temple directly, not the believers.

Ink River: Unless someone gets a special recommendation to make a pilgrimage to the middle circle to earn extra Wish Points. That’s the only way a normal person might meet a middle-circle officer.

Seventh Ju: Special recommendation?

Ink River: For an outer-circle pilgrimage, all you need is an outer-circle Divine Officer’s approval and a certain donation, right? For the middle circle, besides those basics, you also need an extra recommendation.

Ink River: The recommender has to be the head of a country, or someone who has already made a pilgrimage to the middle circle before. Then the middle-circle Divine Officers will judge the candidate’s character again.

Seventh Ju: So by that logic, the number of people who can go to the middle circle is tiny.

Ink River: Let’s get back to what middle-circle Divine Officers do. If Hilcarrie really represents sin, then her having no public Wish Power is actually pretty scary.

Seventh Ju: Scary?

Ink River: Because if a Divine Officer can represent “sin,” they don’t just have to discern and understand sin. They also need the ability to punish it.

Ink River: And sin here doesn’t mean one particular case. It means sin in the broad, human sense.

Ink River: With power on that level, she might get into the inner circle of the Divine Temple sooner or later…

Seventh Ju: ………

Ink River: Hard to picture? I’ll give you an easier example.

Ink River: Let’s say there’s a Divine Officer representing “language.” First he has to be able to communicate with every intelligent being in the world that has a language.

Seventh Ju: …!!

That ability…

Ink River: At the same time, he has to be able to control other people’s language.

Seventh Ju: …Control their language?

Ink River: Yeah. The ability to control another person’s vocal organs.

Ink River: From facial muscles, tongue, and throat, all the way to the language center in the brain—anything tied to “language,” he can affect.

Ink River: Only at that level can someone become a middle-circle Divine Officer and represent the god’s will in the domain of “language.”

……

……

On a main street in Bao City, Aibin had just left the inn and was heading back to the nearby hospital.

The ankle an adventurer had slashed yesterday, plus the lingering aftereffects of Sudden-Numb, made it impossible for a big guy like him to walk normally.

He could only move slowly toward the hospital, limping a little.

After taking the auxiliary medicine for his treatment, moving around more would spread the remaining Sudden-Numb through his body faster, so the drugs could help flush it out. So Aibin didn’t mind walking a bit extra.

If anything, this might help him recover quicker.

He turned his head with a snort, baring a fierce expression at the bystanders pointing at his limp and snickering, scaring them off.

Recovering faster was nice and all, but those looks were still annoying.

Suddenly, a thin, slender figure appeared ahead of him. The person wore a hood, body wrapped up tight from head to toe.

Her face was hidden in the shadow cast by the sunlight, but a few strands of reddish-brown hair spilling out let him guess she was a woman.

And she was clearly headed straight for him.

Aibin: Huh? What do you want?

??: ………

Aibin: …—!!

Aibin’s mouth suddenly tightened. An invisible force yanked his tongue hard to one side of his mouth, and the pain was so sharp he wanted to scream.

But for some reason, his jaw clamped shut. He couldn’t open his mouth at all, couldn’t even cry out.

His mind went blank with panic, and his sense of balance spun into chaos.

The woman walked up to him and gave his waist a light tap. Aibin staggered and toppled toward a narrow alley by the roadside.

In the dim alley, the woman grabbed the front of his shirt. She was clearly smaller than him and didn’t seem that strong, yet Aibin felt an irresistible force pressing up under his chin.

He couldn’t move… couldn’t fight back.

Aibin: Mmph—mmph—!

He couldn’t form words. No accusations, no pleas for mercy—nothing came out.

??: I don’t need you to talk. Just nod or shake your head. That’s enough.

Aibin: …!?

The woman lifted her head, finally revealing her face.

By all logic she should’ve been called beautiful—early twenties at most, and carrying a poise no prostitute among the Pioneer merchants could ever imitate.

And yet, Aibin thought this woman looked even more vicious than the adventurers he’d seen yesterday.

Because right now, her face was twisted into a truly vicious scowl.

??: First… was it you who got those two workers from the Pioneering Squad killed!?

Aibin: …??

??: One of them… his name was Seventh Ju.