Cazerose, surprisingly delighted by the decision to accompany me, expressed her joy.
However, moments later, as we returned to the room to discuss future matters, she wore a face full of discomfort and spoke up.
“But… to think we have to hand over this house and all of Santana’s property to the Archbishop just like that. It breaks my heart no matter how I think about it.”
“Haha, with that reaction, it feels like Cazerose is the one losing money! There’s no need to be so upset. Money can always be made again.”
Even though we were in the same boat, somehow Cazerose was showing a more heartfelt reaction than I was.
I smiled lightly at her, but Cazerose slowly shook her head at me.
“Of course, Santana is more than capable of handling this. But… I’m worried about the people left behind. If it goes this way, what will happen to the lives of those who have been living with Santana’s help until now?”
“…Huh?”
Cazerose brought up a thought I hadn’t considered.
I began to show some embarrassment, and she continued with a bitter voice.
“I’ve been pretending not to know all this time, but I knew that Santana has been buying homes and land to help so many people. Charging only a small rent for the farmland and providing houses at lower prices for those in need…”
“Umm… well… that’s…”
Cazerose’s words made my face feel a bit flushed, and I struggled to figure out how to respond.
Meanwhile, regardless of my feelings, Cazerose spoke with genuine anger.
“It’s really… really infuriating. Santana has been helping the needy just as a Paladin, and he gathered his wealth in somewhat unique ways. Yet the archbishops are trying to excommunicate him and seize his property…”
“Mmm… mmm…”
Cazerose, as a Paladin devoted to the God, truly felt sorrow for this dirty reality.
Zelos.
However, as I watched her in this state, I was feeling quite strange about it all.
‘No… I didn’t really mean to help poor people or anything…’
As she said, it’s true that I had bought a lot of houses and land and lent them out at low costs.
However, that had nothing to do with Cazerose’s idea of charity or paladin-like benevolence.
The biggest reason was simply that, as a Korean, I liked land and houses.
And another reason was that this was the best way for me to save money in my current situation.
Although it varied by region, paladins, as a type of clergy, had tax exemptions on the land and houses they owned as part of their noble status.
This was because you couldn’t tax assets that belonged to God.
Of course, underpinning this was the principle that clergy were not supposed to have children, so if the individual died, the property would ultimately return to the lord or ruler…
Anyway, thanks to such perks, I chose to stack my assets this way rather than leaving them in a bank with lower credit in this world.
‘So, as I ended up with land and houses, I thought it was a bit of a waste to just leave them idle, which is why I rented them out to tenant farmers at low prices…’
As a clergyman, I had to maintain my dignity, and I wanted to avoid any notoriety that might hinder my future work.
Besides, this was primarily for saving, not for exploiting profit, so I wasn’t particularly attached to it and was casually managing it.
There was this background to why I lent land and houses to people at low prices…
But Cazerose in front of me seemed to interpret this simply as my pure goodwill.
She thought I was doing all this just to help the poor.
‘No wonder she reacted a bit sensitively for someone else’s affairs; there was a background to it. Well, Cazerose always had a pious personality anyway.’
“Well, Cazerose has always been a devout person.”
Thinking back, the reason she unexpectedly decided so willingly to follow me likely had a lot to do with this misunderstanding.
From her perspective, the current situation was not just a simple money issue, but rather interpreted as, “The Archbishop expelled the paladin who was doing their best to do good out of personal greed.”
From her standpoint, having lived with the pride of being a paladin, this must have been a great disappointment to the Church.
Amidst this, the paladin in question reached out to her, suggesting they leave this place filled only with disappointment together.
And in such a situation…
The answer was painfully obvious.
“For Cazerose, there wouldn’t be any reason to stick around a place that’s lost its appeal and the Church as a faction… There must have been this background to her surprisingly easy acceptance of my proposal.”
As I began to understand the anger Cazerose expressed and the reason she willingly chose to throw everything away to follow me, I couldn’t help but feel a bit embarrassed.
“To think my actions were being perceived in such a grand way, like the compassionate deeds of a saint, even though I didn’t intend to do anything good…”
However, separate from this tangled misunderstanding, I felt there was no need to tell her the truth about it.
It wasn’t really a problem, anyway; ultimately, my intended action started from the desire to save many precious lives, so there wasn’t much difference if you looked at it closely.
And more than anything, at this moment, I didn’t want to disappoint Cazerose, who was looking at me with admiring eyes, by overly complicating the situation.
“Well… Good things are good, so let’s just gloss over it.”
“Let’s just move on.”
After organizing my thoughts on this matter, I spoke to the still upset Cazerose with a calm smile on my face.
“Thanks for your concern, but Cazerose, there’s really no need for you to be so upset. There are always ways to handle things.”
“…Excuse me? What do you mean by that?”
“Hehe… You’ll find out the details if you watch closely from the sidelines.”
She looked surprised by my unexpected words.
But in this moment, my words weren’t just simple reassurances; they were sincere.
In a situation like this, normally the best option would be to abandon the house and land that couldn’t be salvaged and quickly leave with cash in hand.
Both time and the law were on the Archbishop’s side, and the Archbishop was aware of this fact, which is why they initiated this offensive under the guise of excommunication.
The fact that Nune and Tine were afterthoughts in this relatively ‘light’ disruption was also for this reason.
However… it would truly be unfortunate for the Archbishop.
Sadly, I wasn’t someone who would easily be pushed around.
In the scriptures that the Paladins read, it said if someone slaps your right cheek, you should turn the left one.
But when the very Archbishop teaching this was already throwing the first punch, following it was downright foolishness.
If the opponent slapped your right cheek, the right response was to twist their wrist and break it.
“Now then… how about we make that trashy Archbishop’s eyes well up with tears of blood?”
There were still six days left. It wasn’t a long time, but it was more than enough for me, especially with Cazerose by my side to help.
Without any hesitation, I began to execute my plan immediately.
To give the Archbishop, who had spectacularly wasted the opportunity for salvation for this city, this country, and even the entire church’s influence, a big surprise.
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