I stepped back, trying to avoid the saint of the lux church, as I had some unpleasant experiences with the church of lux.
In one of my past missions, I had to defend a carriage, protecting a sick noblewoman.
At that time around, there was a war between the church of lux and the church of Diablo, which made the church of lux wary against any potential threats.
On the way from the Kingdom of Celist to Albion, we crossed the main church of the lux devotes, which resulted in them wanting to investigate our carriage.
However, as my client was still sleeping at that time due to her exhaustion, I refused to let them investigate our carriage, which, admittedly, was kind of suspicious.
As such, they deemed us to be spies of the Diablo church and called a paladin to threaten us.
Still, I didn't budge, and as a result, a battle was initiated.
If one could even call that a battle.
It was over within mere seconds, ending in me crippling the Paladin.
After that incident, the church of lux began to condemn me, reaching out to the mercenary guild multiple times to try to punish me.
While I could understand their anger, it was he who initiated the battle, not me, so their large hatred toward me was unjustified in my eyes.
However, that didn't matter to them. The church of lux started to call me a pawn of Diablo and spread the word around that I was someone they had to eliminate.
Although the Saint, Aria, was largely known as being a kindhearted woman due to her good deeds and all the other public speeches she held, I was sure that she also was under the impression that I was a member of the Diablo church.
After all, how should a sheltered woman who never met me know that I actually wasn't the evil Diablo spy, that she always believed I was?
I knew that the chances of her noticing who I am was were low, but I didn't want to take any chances.
Taking another step backwards, suddenly a voice spoke to me.
"Aren't you going down?"
The big bald-headed man spoke to me from behind when he noticed that I was hesitating.
"..No, that's not it.." I whispered, trying to be as quiet as possible as to not get noticed.
However, my plan failed when I heard the voice of the saint coming from below.
"Is there someone?" she asked in a hopeful voice, thinking that maybe a mercenary had arrived.
Sighing, I realized that there was no way for me to escape this predicament, as not saying anything would just seem weird and suspicious.
"Yeah."
While I had accepted there was no other way than revealing myself, that didn't mean that I had any intention of helping her for whatever reason she was here.
With heavy steps, I went downstairs, facing the saint.
"But that doesn't mean that I can help. I'm just here to register as a mercenary." I continued in a cold voice, trying to cut off any shot of starting a new conversation or refuting my points.
However, that didn't work.
Aria seemed to ignore my attempt, rushing toward me and grabbing my shoulders. With an ecstatic expression, her face was terrifyingly close to mine.
Although I had a mask on, it still made me worry about her finding out my identity.
"Please! It was a mission that was given to me by lux itself!"
Seeing at her face up-close, I realized that the rumors about her beauty were not exaggerating.
Skin as fair as the clouds, eyes as blue as the ocean, and blonde hair that seemed to be made of the light of the sun itself.
Without any doubts, many men or even women would do anything to switch positions with me.
However, I wasn't 'many men or women', and as such, I didn't bulge.
"That seems to be a problem of the lux church."
It wasn't a rare occasion that the saint would hear messages of the goddess of life, lux, so it was not exactly surprising that she was on the second layer due to such a reason.
What surprised me, however, was...
"Why aren't there any paladins or guards here? Shouldn't they be guarding you?" Crossing my arms, I took a step back, finding her intimacy to be uncomfortable.
"No, they can't be here." Aria shook her head. "Lux told me that they would just scare off the 'key' to solving this problem."
"I see."
It wasn't surprising that many people had problems with the church of lux. While publicly they were known for being kind people, it was a completely different story inside.
Even though she probably didn't know it, as she was raised and trained to be a saint since she was a kid, many of the priests, bishops and cardinals were actually corruptly exploiting their believers in all possible ways.
I would even say that the church of lux was even worse than the church of Diablo. Although the church of Diablo was filled with battle maniacal members, at least they were transparent with it.
After all, Diablo was the god of destruction, so their love for violence wasn't really a surprise for anyone.
"So, please!" Aria clasped her hands together, begging me to help her.
However, I never intended to help her in the first place, thus responding with a shake of my head.
"As I said, I am only here to register myself as a mercenary."
After repeating myself, I gently shoved her to the side, approaching the receptionist, to register myself.
I didn't have any time to waste, so I couldn't help her even if I wanted to. After all, I had to search for clues about my mother's disappearance.
"..but the guardian.." standing frozen in place, she muttered, her voice weak and quiet.
I froze up when I heard her mentioning the guardian.
There was just no way in hell that this situation would end up like this, right?
What even were the chances of such things happening?
Slowly, almost mechanically, I turned my head to her, mentally creaking, as I did so.
Perking my ears, I tried to overhear her murmurs.
"..if we don't stop the problem, then the second layer will collapse..."
Under the mask, a strained smile formed itself as I started to question the realness of the situation.
While some people did call fate 'cruel', I never believed in such a thing as fate, or more precisely, refused to believe in such a thing.
Accepting the existence of fate would just be like admitting that I had no free will, and everything was just decided from the beginning.
That each of my struggles and successes were just something that happened, just because it was supposed to.
Almost like I was some character in a novel.
However, while I still didn't believe that fate existed, gods existed, and thus, such ridiculous situations could be created.
With a little bit of unluck and the interference of a god...
Sighing, I approached her again, grabbing her by the shoulder, as I turned her around.
I had already accepted the reality, as the similarities between the mission of her god and my own were just too obvious to ignore.
"I changed my mind. I'll help you."