Chapter 87
As was typical of countries founded around religion.
The Holy Kingdom generally didn't send high-ranking priests to other countries if it could help it. In most cases, it was handled by a meek, pretty saint instead.
Nevertheless, there were sometimes cases where a high-ranking priest appeared on the international diplomatic stage.
What usually happened then?
- You heretic!
- Hm... I smell black magic...
Right.
In general, it had something similar to the prelude to ‘Wanna throw down?’
Which is why.
“Here... a High Priest, all of a sudden?”
“The Republic or the Kingdom wouldn't be a problem. Surely the Holy Kingdom isn't crazy enough to fight the Empire one-on-one...?”
“The Grand Duke of the North! He must have sold out the country!”
The Empire's political circles fell into chaos in an instant.
No matter how they thought about it, there was no reason at this point to dispatch not even an ordinary priest, but a High Priest.
Which is why.
“Priest, could you perhaps at least give us a hint about what's going on...”
“Hoho... By the goddess's name, it's a matter I don't know either.”
The officials went to the priest dispatched from the Empire, who served as the Holy Kingdom's ambassador, and shook him down, but nothing satisfying came out.
So it only became more mysterious.
The Empire was the one at the forefront of suppressing black magic.
It was also the Empire that guaranteed freedom of belief, and even went a step further by using religion to control the masses.
And yet, why were they coming?
It was obvious that if they could uncover that fact early, they could immediately strengthen their footing in politics.
So everyone mobilized every connection they had, and even those they didn't, to try hard to catch the Holy Kingdom's movements.
“You, perhaps... have you heard anything from Saint Roseline?”
“Nope.”
“You're lying! I clearly saw with my own eyes the saint call you over and the two of you whispering together, desuwa!”
“Ugh.”
Before long, Kim Yul, who was already being treated as half the saint's kept man in imperial politics, couldn't escape the commotion either.
At a highly uncomfortable meal with none other than Duke Schnaisen, Chloe's father.
Kim Yul had to endure the urge, more than six times over, to grab Chloe's soft ear-tail and yank it hard.
He wanted to shout for them to catch the one being held here and ask her, but.
Unfortunately, Saint Roseline herself.
- Hmm, the High Priest makes me a little uncomfortable too. Please take good care of your health for now, all right? And, happy ending, you know?
had already vanished from the imperial capital.
So poor Kim Yul alone had to be pushed around for the sin of daring to become acquainted with high nobles.
It wasn't just Duke Schnaisen, either.
“Cheon... Ulysses, long time no see.”
“?”
Duke Vertus's third son, Regios, whom he considered at least somewhat familiar, had also been loitering in front of the publishing house for about three hours before meeting Kim Yul.
“By any chance, did the saint──”
“The saint said that anyone who torments poor Ulysses should be written down in the Death Note and reported, and that heavenly punishment would come the day she returns.”
“......”
At least they were easy to deal with.
Unlike the elves of the Wisperaud family, who were considerate, slipped him bribes, and even arranged a near-interest-free home-purchase loan.
From the start, Kim Yul's favorability toward Duke Vertus and Regios was practically scraping the bottom.
Of course, if he had known they had sponsored quite a bit of money for the ‘Hold a Concert’ incident, his attitude might have changed a little.
- This is! A voluntary investment, you know?
Why do a dragon's misdeeds never become public knowledge?
They live longer than any long-lived species.
To publicly expose the misdeeds committed by a being more powerful than any mortal?
It'd be no different from dancing the Ssaldafam dance in the square and begging them to wipe out your entire clan through the ninth generation.
So the matter of "voluntary investment" never properly reached Kim Yul's ears.
It was a pity for Regios.
* * *
“That's troublesome.”
“That's troublesome indeed.”
Kkangtong and I looked at each other and let out a deep sigh at the same time.
The many complicated political circumstances had gotten tangled together, so there was no way to diagnose exactly what the problem was.
But there were two things we knew for certain.
One was that the Empire I belonged to had, in a slightly serious sense, ended up in an internationally dangerous situation.
The other was.
That my name was also written on that hit list.
And what made it even more ridiculous was this.
- I-I heard that pirated copies of Novelpia have spread to the Holy Kingdom too. Um, they say the ideas are a little subversive. Of course, I did my best to smooth things over, but...
These fucking bastards.
Not only do they read my novel illegally, now they're talking about how subversive its ideas are?
Want me to throw Nietzsche at them?
Want me to show them an Übermensch?
“Kim Yul's anger is justified. However, please calm down. If an ordinary individual fought a giant religious organization, it'd be like Galileo screaming, 'I'm bald!' three times──”
“Turn off the community database. Galileo never said that...”
“Ah, what information contamination.”
After calming Kkangtong, who was rattling off things like the sound of King Sejong throwing a MacBook Pro at Kim Daebung,
we put our heads together and thought about how to resolve this situation.
In fact, the perfect answer had already been found.
If there's a problem in the gallery, you throw in the old man and old woman.
To update it a bit, it's like dropping Gojo and Rengoku in.
Wouldn't the situation be neatly solved if, with tears in my eyes, I signed a contract with Nureongi and then delivered one Gaja Esgrace body blow to the pope's head somewhere in the Holy Kingdom?
“You're very agitated, Kim Yul. Isn't this partly Kim Yul's own fault to begin with?”
“That much?”
Nevertheless.
Without dealing with the incident where Napoleon kidnapped the pope and unleashed a second Avignon Captivity, how could one possibly capture the chaotic social climate of that era?
Honestly...
The Empire wasn't exactly a great country.
Kim Yul had felt that painfully even back when he was a day laborer living hand to mouth outside the capital region.
And after he came up to the imperial capital, said to be the most prosperous city in the country, that thought didn't change much.
Of course, it wasn't as if I were some great novelist or thinker about to overturn this rotten world.
I'd not gone that far with such extreme thoughts.
Even if I was from the proletariat.
If you only counted connections, wasn't I best friends with a duke's daughter and the author the Empire's Second Prince was obsessed with?
Being obsessively fixated on by a guy is kind of a turn-off, though.
Switch it to the Second Princess instead.
Is there no TS magic?
“I said calm down. Actually, TS magic does exist. But the casting conditions are complicated, and it requires a lot of materials.”
“Why on earth does such a terrifying magic even exist? This world is truly terrifying...”
Anyway.
I had not forgotten the essence of my writing.
Even when focusing on a character, wanting to include the historical backdrop too was my greed.
The Enlightenment, the French Revolution, Napoleon, Goethe, and the exchanges with the countless artists and men of letters of the day.
How could one possibly depict the life of a single man named Beethoven while leaving all of that out?
If I were going to leave all that out, I'd be diligently writing works like Coward's Blade, Fried Dumplings Spit-Out, or Death Notebook by now.
“Those titles differ from the works in my database, though.”
“Just roll with it.”
“Om nom.”
I stuffed a chocolate bread into Kkangtong's mouth, which had been nitpicking nonstop, and sorted out my thoughts.
I had originally been an atheist, but.
after falling into this fantasy land, I came to acknowledge the existence of God.
After all, unless there were transcendent beings like gods, there was no way I'd be given a cheat-code second life like this.
Even if I granted a hundred concessions, Roseline's healing ability was divine power itself, something magic couldn't explain.
So, it was a showdown.
The High Priest, was it?
Could those people really revere God as much as Beethoven could?
I don't think so.
* * *
As the day of the High Priest's visit drew closer.
As the work unfolded and went further along.
Beethoven fell in love again, then parted again.
He composed again, performed again, read, pondered, and immersed himself in other writers' works to such a degree that readers were starting to ask, 'Who on earth is Shakespeare? Goethe?'
- ...Kim Yul. Have you gone mad, desuwa?
- Hey! I've even eaten with the Second Prince! Gone traveling with him! Done everything! Hng! I did it all! Hng!
Emperor and dictator Napoleon finally fell.
Around the same time, Beethoven completely lost his hearing.
## ====== ##
…….
…….
Beethoven slammed the keys down and watched them, as if screaming, sink into the depths of the sea before rising again.
Though surely it should have made a loud sound.
Nothing reached his ears.
Like someone alone at the bottom of the deep sea, swallowing solitude, the world around him was endlessly muffled and silent.
“Now... completely...”
Even his own voice could only be felt as a vibration in his chest.
At last, God.
That cruel God had completely taken his hearing away.
No.
This too must be God's will.
For a while, Beethoven sat before the piano, blankly tapping the keys and sinking into an endless, perfect silence, wondering whether this had been the sound, whether this was what it had sounded like.
…….
…….
“──, ──!”
The servant moved his lips as if to speak, but Beethoven merely cast him a glance and returned to the mansion with the stolen saw in hand.
And then.
Scritch, scritch...!
As if possessed by something, he cut off all the piano's legs.
The servant who had followed him in watched impassively as the piano's legs were cut off, and Beethoven sawed away like a madman.
The piano, which had originally stood firmly on four legs supporting it on the earth, was now almost glued to the floor.
That much closer.
The vibrations drew closer to the earth.
After the dust that had scattered everywhere was swept away, and the servant took the saw Beethoven had set down and left,
he lay down facing the piano.
Come to think of it.
It was the first time he'd ever looked at a piano like this.
But when you think about it.
Feeling closer to the piano than ever before, Beethoven laughed like a madman.
And then.
He pressed his ear to the floor.
The cold feel of the wooden floor and the roughness of the sawdust that had not yet been cleaned away brushed against his cheek, but.
Unbothered, he reached out with trembling hands and pressed the lowest bass key on the piano.
Thoom...
He heard none of the sound that should have flowed through the air into his ears.
But the vibration from the hammer striking the strings was conveyed intact to his ears and body, and soon it shook his skull.
He pressed the keys again.
This time, a little harder.
Thoom- thoom- thoom-
The vibrations, rolling in like waves, began to create one note after another that had been sleeping inside his body.
Beethoven closed his eyes.
He tried pressing each key one by one, memorizing all the vibrations that touched his body.
“Yes, here it was.”
Still lying there facing the piano, with only his left hand.
he began to shape sound with the piano again.
So utterly quiet,
yet enough to feel ecstasy.
## ====== ##
In the end, households that are good at simmering misery stew have one thing in common.
They each hold a trump card that can neatly wrap up the hymn to humanity revealed at the end of despair.
After handing the manuscript he had written over to Chloe, Kim Yul asked casually.
“Rehearsals are going well, right?”
“Probably so. Wouldn't it be better if you went to see for yourself?”
“Hmm, maybe I should.”
Rather than ten or more lines of delicate, sensual description of a female character's looks, a single AI illustration gives a more immediate jolt below the waist.
Still unable to shake his world-class syndrome, Kim Yul prepared for the concert again today.
But this time, there was also the matter of cultural dissemination and fan service.
It was fair to say this was a head-on showdown with the High Priest who was coming to shout, ‘You heretic!’
The choir was drawing near.