My Childhood Friend Became an Inquisitor

“Louis… don’t you dislike me?”
“What’s wrong again? Who is it, who’s been talking nonsense to you? Is there still someone in the village who hasn’t come to their senses?”
“It’s not that… I’m a crybaby, I’m too clingy, and I feel like I’m always being a burden to Louis.”
“That can’t be true!”
*

You couldn’t have missed the desperate, almost pleading emotion contained in it.

Anne was silent for a long time. Her expression as she looked at me was ambiguous, impossible to distinguish whether she was smiling, crying, or angry. It was rare that I couldn’t read your expression.

Perhaps Anne’s face was as usual, but my confused heart couldn’t understand even after reading it.

“Louis.”

The name calling me briefly. A name that could be repeated thousands of times and never grow tiresome for eternity.
Not because it was mine, but because you were the one calling it.

“How could I think that way?”

Soon, a gentle touch cupped my cheek. As if blessing a newborn child, Anne embraced me, frightened like a child, and lightly kissed my forehead.

A slight fever that felt ticklish yet not unpleasant. Whether I gave it to you or received it from you.

“That’s right, that…”

“Ailim is merciful, so if you don’t give up on atonement, the gates of heaven will remain open to you until the very last moment.”

Ah.

“I’ll help you too, Louis.”

Pure and one-sided kindness that feels solely for me.

How could one not be moved by receiving such feelings? It’s not hiding dirty intentions to use others, nor is it looking down on or pitying while helping others according to the sad nature of humans.

What I feel is only worry and kindness so white and innocent that it would be sinful to measure. People who don’t know Anne well might say she’s cold or heartless, but.

“So that you can be saved.”

I alone knew. How warm a person Anne was.

That’s why it might be even more sorrowful now. Despite all the atrocities and cruelties you committed, in this narrow space, the only hope I could lean on was ultimately just one.

“Salvation…”

“Yes, definitely.”

I no longer feel anything from our clasped hands. Neither warmth nor discomfort.

“It will surely be a difficult and arduous path, but I’ll always be by your side. Sometimes you might not understand or it might be painful. But in the end…”

“…In the end, you too consider me a heretic.”

“That’s not true, Louis.”

A gentle voice like when I, who had lived avoiding books, was first led by your hand to a bookstore. As if by habit engraved in time, even in this situation, I was listening to your words.

“There’s Rowe in everyone’s heart. If you listen to that dark voice, it might sound sweet at first, but in the end, only ruin remains.”

Come to think of it, even then, the book you read with the most sparkling eyes was the Bible.

If Ailim is the god who created the world, the first good who fell asleep for his children, then Rowe is the opposite. He was the first human who resisted God and made him sleep, the first ruler, and also the first executed criminal. The world becoming chaotic and stained with sin was also his doing.

“But, it’s ultimately up to one’s own choice to reject the touch of darkness. Even if you lose your way, even if you step into the wrong place… for anyone.”

It was more of a pronoun for evil itself rather than referring to a specific being.

“The possibility to retrace your steps and return to the light is open to everyone.”

“I’m… not evil.”

“Of course not.”

She nods with a gentle smile, but in the end, my words don’t reach her.

“It wasn’t Louis’s will to fall into darkness. I know. Yes, even if no one else does, at least I…”

“…Anne?”

“Right? Because Louis’s feelings for me couldn’t have changed.”

The words she muttered were closer to repeating to herself rather than addressing me.

“Don’t worry, Louis. I’ll save you from the clutches of darkness. Yes, definitely.”

“I don’t really understand what you’re saying.”

Our gazes meet at a distance close enough to be bewildering. The pale grayish-blue eyes still unchanged in color.

But her temperament had changed. The gaze that once seemed able to embrace everything like the sky was now frozen solid. Firmly, so that no flame could melt it, no hammer could break it.

Something that could be called a belief built in the midst of anguish and wounds, different from mere stubbornness or lingering attachment.

It was too much for me to look into that mental image like a massive glacier, but for a moment, I thought I saw something glinting inside.

“That’s right.”

“Uh, yes?”

“Louis accepting the engagement, yes. It was all because you were bewitched by that Rowe-like woman…”

If I were to forcibly name that.

The only happy memory in her life, the brilliantly shining childhood she spent with me.

“If we drive out the darkness, surely Louis will return to his original self.”

“Original self” meant several things.

For instance, when you run to embrace me, I stretch out my arms to hug you back, or when you do something good, I pat your head in praise.

When you’re away even for a moment, I can’t hide and show a bit of disappointment.

“Are you hungry? Wait a moment. I’ll bring something to eat.”

“……”

And those had nothing to do with darkness.

If I act like a stiff wooden block in front of Anne, the reason was clear. Fear, not shyness; worry, not affection.s can’t help but freeze in front of a beast. Even if it was once tamed, if you know now that it doesn’t fear the sight of blood. Especially if you’ve seen it directly.

In terms of physical abilities alone, Anne had already surpassed ordinary beasts. Wolves can’t break through fences so they jump over, and no matter how strong a bear is, it can’t demolish a house.

Creating gusts of wind, smashing walls, and throwing people with monstrous strength was already in the realm of miracles. It seemed even more mysterious because Anne still had a slender and delicate physique upon inspection.

But, if I truly feared Anne.
Why am I only trembling now that Anne has disappeared?

Anne’s body, which had lightly passed through the loose bars, was hidden beyond the white horizon. The sight of her disappearing like dispersing mist had become familiar after seeing it several times.

When both the ominous and unpleasant man’s voice and Anne’s chirping voice like a lark subsided, in the silence that felt like choking, past auditory hallucinations began to strike my eardrums again.

The screams of the villagers.
The sound of destruction at the moment I was dragged away.
And newly added, the dull crying of iron, the sound of skin burning and smoking, the sound of being finely sliced.

A duet of blood-soaked laughter and screams torn so miserably they didn’t seem to be mine.

When I close my eyes, cruel memories rummage through my mind, and when I open them, sharp rays of light pierce my eyeballs. I am no hero. I am an ordinary person, a commoner.

“Huh… ugh.”

Overcoming painful past with willpower was too much for me. Escaping from the sticky and heavy swamp of despair on my own was impossible with weak will and broken soul.

Just gasping for breath painfully like a fish out of water, waiting for my ‘water’ to return.

Even if a flood swept away loved ones, when the rain stops, people would draw water from that river again. They would quench their thirst and sustain life with the same water that swept away their friends and family.
Having to reach out again to what destroyed you, pitifully, was the same for me.

“Did you wait, Louis?”

Even the sense of time was distorted in this space, and I couldn’t distinguish whether the moment Anne was away felt like an eternity or just an instant.

But one thing was clear. Despite Anne being the start of all this nightmare, I still recalled the past paradise, not the present hell, when I saw you.

It’s not just her who clings to childhood nostalgia.
A boy feeling for the empty space left by parents busy with traveling for trade. Anne always said she was sorry for being a burden as if it were a habit, but I too found comfort in that relationship.

Perhaps even until now.

“…Are you okay?”

Anne’s eyes couldn’t be deceived after all. Noticing that my face had visibly become gaunt in that short time, her gaze was worried.

But what could I say here? Should I beg? To the enemy who massacred our village-
-Please don’t leave because nightmares torment me when you’re not by my side?

“…I’m fine.”

I swallowed the words rising up. It was beyond propriety even before pride.

Anne’s expression darkened, but after feeling the wall I had firmly built in my heart, she didn’t say anything more. Instead, she just carefully set down the bowl she had brought.

White rice porridge. It wasn’t a grand meal even by commoner standards, but the moment food was placed before me, the hunger I hadn’t been aware of for a long time screamed.

As if bewitched, I reached out for the spoon, wondering if the desire to live remained the same even in this situation…

“Oh my, Louis.”

And a gentle hand stopping me. Though her fingers were still slender and delicate, unlike before, an irresistible strength was conveyed.

“We should say grace before eating.”

“…Ah, right. Grace.”

What Anne mentioned was extremely basic, but it was something I had forgotten for quite a long time.

Right, when eating with Anne or other people, we always said grace. I guess since I often stayed alone while traveling for trade, it became a habit not to do it out of laziness.

Of course, even so, I hadn’t forgotten the method. It wasn’t long or complicated enough to forget in the first place.

“Thank you for the waiting you promised.”

Lightly bow your head, make the sign of the cross, and recite the set verse.

Although there was no portion for Anne in the porridge she brought, she led the pre-meal prayer as if to demonstrate. I followed her actions as well.

Lightly bowing my head, reciting the verse, bending both wrists as much as possible to form the shape of a cross…

“Thank you for the waiting… ugh!”

However, I couldn’t finish reciting the prayer and stopped with a sharp groan.

“What’s wrong, Louis? Are you okay?”

I don’t know the reason. Whether it was because I touched the holy barrier of the silver bars when I first came here, or because of the scars from torture.

The moment I bent my right wrist, I felt extreme pain, and the cross inadvertently became misaligned. I frowned and returned my hand to its original position.

The throbbing wrist is perfectly fine as if nothing had happened. But I could be certain that if I bent my wrist excessively again, the same pain would strike once more.

A pain as if someone was driving a nail into my wrist.