You Are Dead – Chapter 77……………………………………
There was a large mountain at the back, and I hadn’t expected this to be a place with an altar.
It was much smaller than the altar in the Melissa Shrine, and its shape was different as well.
It wasn’t a tall, elevated altar. There were no steps, and the altar table itself had a raw, unfinished feel.
I walked along the stone path leading to the altar.
This place was one that only the Pope and the Berche Shrine Master could enter. Perhaps a divine oracle truly descended here.
The Pope, whose every step was heavy, would have no reason to come to this small shrine with no followers—otherwise, it made no sense.
Up close, the altar was made of unpolished stone, rough just to the eye.
The stone placed atop it was also long and flat.
Maybe it was because I was already assuming that an oracle descended here.
If the oracle were to appear, I felt certain it would be inscribed on this stone.
I touched the coarse stone.
What could be so special about this place?
In truth, I was a saint who didn’t even know how an oracle came down.
I didn’t know if it could be heard by ear or seen by eye.
It was said that the oracle would reveal one’s daughter, but I had no idea how the Pope knew the method.
Sometimes, I wondered.
Did the deceased Pope hear the voice of God, or were letters somehow engraved in his and my prayer rooms?
I never asked anyone, worried they might call me a false saint.
Afraid they might say I wasn’t qualified, I swallowed my curiosity inwards.
Eventually, even my curiosity faded, leaving it outside my attention.
Now, the thought that what had been buried might finally be revealed gave me a strange feeling.
I recalled a conversation I had just heard.
“Your Holiness came here? What do you mean by that?”
“Whenever you attended the Grand Shrine council or came to Melissa for foreign affairs, you always passed through here.”
“Yet, even the Shrine Master doesn’t know the reason? Could it be this?”
“Yes, that’s correct.”
Even until his death, the Pope hadn’t told Fabivan.
The reason he came here. Whether he never had the chance or whether it was his will, I didn’t know.
That gave me even more certainty.
At this point, it seemed far more likely that the oracle descended here, not in Melissa, and that the Pope sought it here.
I quietly gazed at the stone, too narrow even to place the grain offerings to God.
Suddenly, I sensed movement behind me. Before I could turn my head, a voice called my name.
My shoulders, momentarily stiff thinking it might be those people from earlier, relaxed at the sound.
“Saint.”
He had guided me when I arrived at the Berche Shrine.
He was also the one who gave me the key to enter this place.
He looked at me and smiled gently. Had he known I would be here?
“You came looking for me?”
Walking along the stone path, he approached and looked down at the altar.
“I thought you might need guidance. Did I disturb you?”
I looked away from him and slightly lifted the corner of my lips.
“No, I actually needed guidance just now.”
I had many questions, and it seemed he was the only one who could answer them.
He placed the candle he was holding on the altar.
“So you place candles instead of grains?”
“Yes. This is the way to offer prayers to Lady Gloria. It’s an old ritual from the early days.”
Although no formal ritual was being performed now, it seemed candles were placed whenever prayers were made.
“Has this method continued here?”
The Shrine Master nodded lightly.
The gentle night breeze flickered the candlelight. My gaze lingered on the dancing light.
“By the way, did you visit the Scripture Vault?”
Though he seemed already to know, I answered without asking further.
“Yes. Thanks to that, I could look around. Oh, Cardinal Melissa was trying to enter, but Sister Marsha stopped her.”
He said nothing, perhaps already aware.
“Was that at your request, Shrine Master?”
“I told them not to allow anyone into the building who would disturb the saint’s time.”
I rolled my eyes and watched his hands.
He lightly clasped them, a gesture of reverence to God.
Before hearing about the Pope, I thought him simply kind.
Now, with Melissa in the picture, I hesitated to speak.
What if he asked me about the oracle? How should I answer?
A saint who does not receive the oracle.
No one knew this; I had never spoken it aloud.
In this life, I had even pretended the oracle descended, so perhaps it was even more necessary to hide.
I silently watched the wax drip from the candle.
The silence was broken by the Shrine Master.
“I heard the sisters spoke about His Holiness’ visit and the oracle.”
“They said it was a rumor.”
“Do you think so?”
“I guessed it wasn’t just a rumor, since you were shown this place.”
He said nothing, yet that silence was a clear answer.
“…So He responds.”
I felt hollow. Without realizing, I spoke my emotions aloud.
Fortunately, the Shrine Master didn’t seem to mind.
My God, who had never responded and seemed absent, had been harsh.
Why wouldn’t He answer? Still, I comforted myself recalling that no one else ever spoke of the oracle during my saintly life.
I wasn’t the only one abandoned by God.
Clearing my thoughts, I asked him:
“How does the oracle descend?”
“The oracle that comes from Berche is inscribed on this stone.”
“Can you read it?”
He answered affirmatively with silence.
How many could read God’s language? I had never seen it myself, and I lacked confidence.
Perhaps he realized what I was curious about, for he spoke.
“It is not a power. It is Lady Gloria’s grace.”
“Lady Gloria’s grace?”
“Yes. She opens your eyes at that moment so you can read it, though you cannot copy it.”
“Does this apply to others as well?”
I was told only the Pope could enter—could others not read it?
“I don’t know why, but His Holiness could not read it. Others were the same.”
The Pope could not read the oracle?
Following the candle’s shadow on the blank stone, my gaze wavered.
Filling the silence, the Shrine Master spoke again.
“When His Holiness came, the former High Priest read the oracle beside him.”
He had grown weak over time, yet came all the way here to know the saints to come.
Before we had self-awareness, the Pope brought us to Melissa and shaped us as he wished.
Nothing was coincidental.
“Then you knew the former High Priest could see the oracle?”
He nodded briefly.
“I was the one to inherit his role, so I knew.”
The former High Priest was already gone.
After his death, the current Shrine Master should have taken the role, but the Pope, bedridden, could not come after him.
The timing suggested the Pope already knew from the former High Priest who would become the next saint.
And since the current Shrine Master also said he could read the oracle…
That meant there was an oracle only the current Shrine Master knew.
An oracle even the Pope did not know.
What kind of oracle had it been?
I looked up at him and asked:
“Was the oracle you saw about the next saint’s whereabouts?”
Judging by his expression, I was certain he hadn’t just seen an oracle revealing the saint’s location.
That meant a different kind of oracle had descended.
The candlelight flickered, and I shone brightly in his eyes.
