When the Pope Becomes Competent - Chapter 195



Only Noblemtl

195. Side story 1-(1) The first human summoned by a spirit
2024.05.13.

“How does it feel to be summoned by someone like a spirit? Most humans don’t have this kind of experience.”

I looked around in confusion at Valeria’s question.

It was an unfamiliar place. It looked like the inside of an old temple.

I could see the white marble pillars supporting the building, and it was a mysterious place with old vines entwined around them.

‘Where is this? Just a moment ago, I was clearly drinking tea in the cathedral garden.’

While drinking tea, I suddenly heard Valeria say, “Summon!” and my mind became hazy after that.

When I regained my hazy mind, I was already in this place.

I had moved here out of nowhere while drinking tea.

I looked at Valeria, who was wandering next to me.

She seemed like the only person who could interpret this situation.

Valeria shrugged her shoulders and said, receiving my bewildered gaze.

“I summoned you here. How do you feel?”

“How do you feel… I’m quite embarrassed… … ? You could summon me?”

“Of course. That’s how contracts between spirits and humans work.”

Valeria explained as if it were an obvious matter.

“If you call me, I’ll be summoned to the finite world and help you. Likewise, if I call you, you have to come to the infinite world and help me.”

“Infinite world… you say? This place?”

“Yes, the spirits’ home in the infinite world, the ‘spirit island’.”

After hearing that much, I looked at Valeria for a moment.

For some reason, Valeria looked very different from her usual appearance.

“Then does the fact that your body grew to the size of a normal person… have something to do with this being the infinite world?”

Valeria chuckled at my question.

“No, I didn’t grow. You just shrank to the size of a spirit.”

“… … .”

“Your body is in the finite world. The Infinite Realm is a space where ordinary matter cannot exist, so you were summoned here with only your soul extracted. A being made up of only a soul… In other words, in the form of a ‘spirit’.” The more I

heard the story, the more perplexed I became.

I felt my head throbbing slightly and opened my mouth.

“Let me summarize. So you summoned me and I am summoned here as a spirit?”

“Exactly.”

“This is the Infinite Realm’s Spirit Island?”

“That’s right.”

Listening to Valeria’s refreshing answer, I was finally able to think of the most important question.

“Why…?”

“Why did I summon you?”

“Yes. There must have been a reason for me to summon you. Just like when I needed help.”

I hoped that Valeria hadn’t summoned me as a joke.

Of course, if Valeria had said that I had only my soul extracted and was dragged here, then my body in the finite realm would have been left defenseless.

There shouldn’t be any danger since I was dragged out while drinking tea in the cathedral garden, but Luciana, who was with me, seemed quite surprised.

That’s why I asked why, and fortunately, it didn’t seem like she had called me for an unnecessary reason.

“I need your help. And it’s really urgent.”

“… … Did something bad happen?”

“Something really, really bad happened. If we’re not careful, the aftereffects could go beyond the bounds and even reach the finite world.”

Valeria clapped her hands after saying that.

Then, two spirits who seemed to have been standing outside came in, and Valeria immediately gave them an order.

“Bring that.”

The two spirits who heard Valeria’s order nodded and disappeared somewhere, then reappeared. They

were holding an old jar in their hands.

Valeria sent the spirits out again and showed me the jar.

“Take a good look at this. Do you know what the problem is?”

After hearing Valeria’s words, I took a good look at it.

Not just its surface, but also its information.

[Sealed Jar of Five Thousand Years (??)]

―A jar that Lucid Miller sealed the primordial evil in.

―The seal will remain for five thousand years from the day it was sealed.

*Time left until the seal is lifted: 2 days, 12 hours, 23 minutes

I opened the information window and checked, and as expected, it wasn’t just any ordinary jar.

I read the listed information carefully and then opened my mouth.

“Primary evil… …? What seems to be a sealed jar? The problem is the time left until the seal is lifted―”

“Yes, there are less than three days left. Until the seal is lifted.”

“If the seal is released, will something ‘dangerous’ that was sealed here come out?”

Valeria nodded in agreement to my question.

“What is trapped inside here is the primordial evil… In other words, it is an age-old evil that has existed since the day this world first opened.”

“Evil… What exactly is that?”

“It literally means something evil. A mass of negative energy that withers life, dries up the land, and colors the hearts of intelligent creatures with anger and greed.”

“A mass of energy… … Are there such things in the Infinite Realm?”

Unlike the finite realm, the Infinite Realm had many beings made of spiritual energy. Like spirits and gods.

This so-called primordial evil seemed to be one of those beings.

Feeling that things were quite difficult, I asked Valeria.

“Then that primordial evil has no substance?”

“I heard that it originally has no substance, but it can materialize. When it raises its head, it materializes in the form of a snake so large that it can cover the sky.”

“Lucid Miller sealed it himself five thousand years ago, and now it’s about to be released. You want to do something about it before that happens.”

“That’s right. That’s why I called you. I need your help.”

After hearing that far, I was able to think of one question.

“There’s something I don’t understand… Is this really dangerous? Then why are you only trying to do something now? There’s only three days left. Why didn’t you prepare something in advance… … .”

Valeria scratched her cheek with an embarrassed expression after hearing what I said.

“Well, there was actually a countermeasure… but it disappeared.”

“… … ?”

“When this monster was sealed, there was a prophecy left by Lucid Miller.”

“Prophecy?” When I asked, Valeria nodded and said.

“After five thousand years, the evil will be released. If you want to seal the released evil again, you must obtain a sword sharpened by a thousand years of time. “That sword was soaked in the tears of the primordial fairy king and if you stab the evil, it will be annihilated forever—that was the prophecy.”

I nodded to continue, and Valeria continued.

“That’s why we prepared a sword that we had been forging for a thousand years according to that prophecy. It was a sword that we forged and forged every single day during that long time. We were going to use it to annihilate the evil that was released from the seal—”

“But it was?”

“It was stolen yesterday. The sword.”

“… … .”

I was speechless for a moment.

Something so important was stolen.

Valeria herself looked somewhat embarrassed after saying that, and lowered her gaze to the ground.

“So you’re saying that there was a plan and then it disappeared.”

“The reason you called me… … .”

“I need someone to get the sword back. The thieves who stole it fled to a place that ordinary spirits can’t enter. That’s why I need help from someone who isn’t a spirit.”

Now I thought I understood the situation.

I sighed deeply and asked Valeria.

“Just find the sword? You said you had to soak the sword with the tears of the Fairy King of the Beginning. Do you have the tears of the Fairy King of the Beginning?”

“Oh, I have that. I’m keeping it,

so just find the sword.” As Valeria said that, she grabbed my hand.

Normally, Valeria’s two hands would have felt as small as a hamster’s, but not now.

Now that our bodies were similar in size, Valeria’s hands seemed no different from the hands of an ordinary human woman.

Valeria said, holding my hand tightly.

“I have a favor to ask, Contractor. The fate of our spirits is at stake. No, it’s not just the fate of the spirits. That monster called the Evil of the Beginning won’t be satisfied with swallowing small spirits.”

“… … .”

“You’re the only one who can go to that ‘forbidden area’ where the thief ran off to and get the sword back. It’s not a place that just anyone can enter. So… will you help me?”

I asked Valeria, feeling a little bewildered.

“Is that really something you need to ask?”

“Huh?”

“There’s no need to ask if I’ll help you. I’m your only contractor, and more than anything, this is something that could affect the finite world.”

After that, I placed my hand over Valeria’s hand that was tightly holding mine.

Even though she had shrunk to the size of a spirit, Valeria’s hand was still small enough to fit inside my hand.

Holding her small hand, I said firmly,

“Then of course we should go find that sword or something.”

* * *

Inside the cathedral’s treatment room.

So many people were gathered there that the large space felt cramped.

They had gathered after hearing the story of Nickelus suddenly collapsing while drinking tea in the garden.

First, they laid the fallen Nickelus on the treatment room bed, but no one knew why Nickelus had collapsed.

Thinking that he had suddenly fallen asleep, Elodie tried using the dream demon race skill, “Dream Invasion,” on Nickelus, but―

“Wrong. I can’t invade dreams at all. So Nickelus right now… isn’t asleep.”

The dream invading skill didn’t work at all.

That meant that Nickelus wasn’t asleep.

If he had just fallen asleep normally, Elodie, a dream demon, would have been able to somehow sneak a tiptoe into his dream.

After hearing Elodie’s words, Luciana continued to ask,

“Then did he faint?”

“That’s possible. But it’s also a bit hard to understand why he suddenly fainted… … .”

After hearing Elodie’s words, an ominous thought crossed the group’s minds at the same time.

If he hadn’t fallen asleep or fainted, there was only one thing they could think of.

“Someone might have cast a curse skill.”

Dionik blurted out what everyone else had been thinking.

A curse skill.

Since Nickelus, who was healthy, couldn’t have suddenly fainted for no reason, the most likely guess was that someone had cast a curse skill.

After Dionik’s guess, the group fell silent.

If Nickelus had really been cursed, he wouldn’t be able to get up easily.

At that moment, footsteps were heard outside the door, and Luciana, who heard the sound, informed the group.

“Let’s hear what the therapist has to say. It seems like he’s just arrived.”

The therapist opened the door and came in at Luciana’s words.

He was briefly surprised by the crowd of people in the treatment room, and then he approached Nickelus.

“I’ll use the diagnosis skill. Everyone else, please step back for a moment.”

The group stepped back after hearing those words.

The therapist immediately activated an L-rank diagnosis skill on Nickelus.

The group’s expressions brightened slightly as the therapist activated the skill.

If Nickelus was sick or cursed, he would have been able to find out right away with that skill.

However, unlike the group who were relieved, the face of the healer who had used the skill became increasingly hardened.

“This… this is ridiculous… .”

The healer who had been mumbling like that while using the diagnosis skill finally turned around to the group.

Then, he barely revealed the shocking truth he had discovered.

“The soul… there is no soul. His Majesty has disappeared with his soul.”