~Chapter 4~
The spirit of Phelia, leaping out from the mirror, said with a coy expression:
“I still don’t regret it.”
She had been caught having a relationship with a high-ranking priest and was expelled from the temple.
Originally, she was supposed to be executed, but thanks to a divine oracle from the goddess Athenis, she survived.
“[Don’t lay a hand on my child.]”
Those few words were the only oracle ever recorded in the history of the Arthenia Empire.
Some may think of Phelia as a disgraceful saint, but among the saints, she was a hero.
Thanks to her, saints could retire.
Before Phelia, saints remained bound to the temple until their very last breath.
“Saving it won’t do anything but make poop! Haven’t you tried it? Once you do it, you can’t say things like that!”
At Phelia’s scolding, Hannah laughed brightly.
“Hey, thanks to you, I tried it too! After I retired, I did XX with XXX every day, and XXXX!”
When Nora and Bella naturally stopped fighting and listened to Hannah’s story, Phelia suddenly turned to Selen and asked:
“Hey, youngest, isn’t your family rich?”
When Selen nodded, Phelia grinned widely and shouted:
“Perfect! Then quit being a saint! Go to that man’s house! Go and knock him down first!”
“Huh? Knock… down?”
“Come on, youngest, you know it. When a man asks to meet alone at night, that’s the only reason.”
Hannah lowered her voice and spoke with utmost seriousness.
“Youngest, underwear must always be a set.”
That was the cue for a flood of advice from her older sisters.
“Yes! The sexiest, most extravagant one! No cloth, just lace!”
“Is just underwear enough? Take birth control in advance!”
“Use perfume! Rose scent is best.”
“Wear clothes that are easy to take off. Got it?”
Selen, unable to bear the noise, covered her ears.
Then the spirit of the first saint, Eleanor, appeared from the tapestry of lycoris flowers that covered an entire wall.
“Ev-ery-one! Quiet!”
At the command of the eldest sister, the room instantly fell silent, as if doused with cold water.
The first to third saints, who remained virgins until death, had spirits so vivid they seemed alive.
Her sisters said it was their lingering resentment.
Women born with the most beautiful faces, forced to remain pure their entire lives—their bitterness remained.
Perhaps because of that, Eleanor’s voice was so loud.
“Enough of this!”
The former saints kept their mouths shut and listened intently to Eleanor.
“Is he handsome?”
“Uh… what?”
“I mean the man named Kirien. Is he handsome?”
Selen hesitated for a moment, then honestly answered yes.
Eleanor’s tone became solemn.
“Then go.”
Eleanor’s spirit grasped Selen’s shoulder tightly.
Selen felt as if she could sense her body heat.
“Listen carefully, youngest.”
“Yes, sister.”
“In life, if you can’t eat it, at least hit it first.”
The fourth saint, Phelia, expelled for losing her virginity, had changed many temple rules.
One of them limited access to certain areas based on gender.
But as time went on, the rule became largely meaningless.
Those who wanted intimacy found a way anyway.
Ultimately, the only strictly controlled area was the Eleanor Palace, where Selen resided.
And on the first floor of that building, the women-only dining hall remained popular among many female priests.
Partly because the menu catered to women’s tastes.
But mainly because it was the fastest place to hear news within the temple.
The moment a pinkish aura appeared between two people, it was known through this hall that they had become an official couple.
Selen was nibbling at her dinner in the women-only dining hall.
Her mind was muddled from her older sisters’ constant risqué advice.
At that moment, Becky, a regular priest managing the Great Library, ran in.
“Saint, did you hear? His Grace Hiss lost a whole year of his memory!”
Among the four priests who lost divine power, the effects varied greatly.
Some almost lost all their divine power; others lost only half.
The same went for memory.
Some lost a week, others six months.
“A whole year? Then His Grace Hiss must have suffered the most!”
“Exactly. Until now, the record was six months.”
“Did he also lose the most divine power?”
“No, only one-third.”
The truly strange thing about this phenomenon was that losing more divine power didn’t necessarily mean losing more memory.
Selen found this terrifying.
The victims and the severity of their losses seemed random, as if God were playing a trick.
“Next time, someone might lose two years of memory, right?”
“Ugh, two years would be lucky. Some have lost almost all divine power. They might lose all memory too.”
Selen put down her fork.
After hearing Becky, her appetite vanished completely.
Then Becky suddenly leaned toward Selen, lowering her voice.
“Saint, doesn’t it seem strange to you?”
“What? Strange how?”
“Those who lost memory and divine power are all in their seventies or eighties.”
In an instant, information about the four passed through Selen’s mind like lightning.
“That’s right! And they’re all high-ranking priests. None of the lower priests or novices lost anything.”
“Saint, I think this symptom…”
Selen held her breath, waiting for Becky’s conclusion.
After a long pause, Becky spoke:
“Could this be a new type of dementia?”
The day Kirien was supposed to come approached.
Selen continued her usual routine, visiting the Great Library whenever she could.
She wanted to check if there had been any records of priests losing divine power before.
But when she thought about meeting Kirien…
“Ah! Saint! Why are you hitting the book all of a sudden?”
“Ah… Becky, sorry. I thought there was a fly on it.”
The illustrations in the book began to look like Kirien’s upper body.
This was all because of the eighth saint, Daphne.
The night before, Selen had read a novel she recommended.
The story was about a knight who went to a tower to violate a princess, but the princess fell for his large chest and threw herself at him first.
Of course, it was a book unsuitable for minors, and Daphne summed it up simply:
―A man’s large chest is the best.
Ever since reading that book, the murals in the temple looked like lycoris tapestries, and the garden statues appeared as nude men.
Since meeting Kirien in the confession room, Selen had been wondering:
Why exactly did Kirien want to come get me?
No matter how she thought about it, when a man asks to meet at night…
There seemed to be only one reason.
During the rest period after dinner, Selen gazed blankly out the window.
Since entering the temple at age eleven, nine years had passed, yet the view had not changed at all.
Had the princess in the novel, waiting for her savior, seen the same scenery?
Seeing the same scene every day was boring; living in a tower all her life would be suffocating.
Is that why she embraced the knight first?
“Saint, I’ve prepared the bath water.”
“Ah! No, mi… sorry, Joey. I was lost in thought and forgot you were here.”
Clearing her throat, Selen blushed and checked Joey, the novice priest.
But Joey showed no reaction—just a face of impatience from boredom.
“I’ll be going now, Saint.”
“Yes, Joey. Thank you. Go rest well.”
Joey dashed off immediately after the farewell.
Phew.
Selen sighed in relief and entered the bathroom.
Seeing the warm, steaming bath, she heard Hannah’s voice echo in her mind:
―Use perfume! Rose is the best.
Selen hesitated for a moment, then picked up the rose-scented perfume from the shelf.
It wasn’t because of her sisters.
She always used perfume in her bath, given regularly as gifts from the temples in Dillian Province.
Besides, perfume has an expiration date. Waste it, and it’s a pity.
She poured the entire bottle into the bathtub and washed herself thoroughly.
Afterward, she stepped out, only to hear more phantom voices:
―Youngest, underwear must always be a set.
―The sexiest and flashiest! No cloth, just lace!
―Wear clothes easy to take off, got it?
Selen hadn’t followed her sisters’ advice—it was just coincidence that she had plenty of lace underwear, gifts from the Ganyou temple.
―She put on a flowing chiffon dress.
It wasn’t because it was easy to take off; it was light and comfortable to move in.
Sitting at her vanity, she brushed her hair longer than usual, thinking of Kirien’s face.
Black hair that shone blue in the light, long eyes with a teardrop mark, subtly upturned seductive lips, high straight nose.
Hannah, who once compiled a collection of male portraits, had said:
“A man’s nose is important. A straight, well-formed nose is the face’s center. If the nose is large…”
“No! No! I’m not expecting that!”
Unable to bear her embarrassment, Selen collapsed onto the vanity.
Her face burned, almost hot to the touch.
Yet she had to admit:
Kirien’s appearance…
Was exactly her type.
If it were an old, ugly man saying the same, her heart wouldn’t flutter like this.
Because Kirien’s looks matched her tastes so well, even knowing his invitation had impure intentions, she couldn’t refuse.
The moment Selen acknowledged her true feelings, she heard Eleanor’s voice from somewhere:
―Youngest, listen carefully. In life, if you can’t eat it, at least hit it first.
