732 Alliance Destined to be Broken (1/2)
The pope was so annoying… What I meant was that the Holy Church was one of our biggest potential competitors, and as Pope Caloma was the messenger of the God of Holy Light in the mortal plane, he was the most authoritative and respected person in the world. Pope Caloma was a tall wall that was impossible for us to go around.
I had previously imagined if some assassin wouldn't do me a major favor getting rid of him, or maybe Pope Caloma would someday suddenly choke to death while eating a walnut. That would be quite nice for me.
Still, it would be unrealistic to think that would actually happen.
Since Pope Caloma was able to stand at the very peak of the Holy Church, which was filled with talented individuals, it was obvious that Caloma was someone who was both incredibly powerful and intelligent. While there were many popes in history who had died of old age, very few popes had ever died in combat.
Being able to reach this position meant that he would have to be at the peak of combat power possible in the mortal plane. Even though popes in history always looked like doddering old men, a pope would hold power for 170 years on average. Pope Caloma was a recently ascended pope who had only been in power for about 10 years so far. It was likely that he wouldn't die of old age even by the time that all the current Cardinals were dead.
Back when Caloma had still been Cardinal Caloma, there was already a record of him personally slaying the God of Ocean Waves. Now that he was the pope, it was a definite that he was one of the strongest mortals in the world.
Still, when I saw the faltering old man in front of me, I was quite delighted at his current condition.
”Hey there, old man. You're still not dead?”
Although Pope Caloma still looked mostly the same, his complexion was much worse than before. He no longer had such a kindly appearance nor aura of unfathomability. Now, he was emanating an astonishing amount of power, but I felt that it was only comical. He was just like an old lion king whose authority was being challenged due to weakening in old age, which meant that he needed to show off his power all day long in order to express his existence.
I laughed quite happily at his plight, not even trying to conceal my delight at his misfortune.
”R… Roland? Roland!”
He squinted at me, but then his eyes suddenly widened with surprise and disbelief, followed by unconcealed hostility.
”Yep, it's me. You recognize me, right? That's right, I'm now a Level 4 individual. Without you guys pressuring me so much, I wouldn't have needed to rush and take this step.”
I was filled with evil delight as I looked at the old man in front of me. Just two months ago when I last saw him, he had seemed to be incredibly steady. But now, he was just like a frightened bird. Seeing his wrinkles and fatigued expression, it made him appear like he had aged by more than a decade in these two months.
What would make me happier than achieving great personal progress? Naturally, that would be seeing that my enemy had taken a huge step backwards after I sprinted so far forward.
For any Divine Arts practitioner, mentality would be the most important. In this world where Will could be expressed with a number, having a resolute will was the most important statistic of all for any divine job class member. If your belief was shaken, or if your soul became fallen... Those would be the biggest sins possible. Any powerful priest or Cardinal would always be the stoical type who could remain calm in any situation. But as the pope, Caloma's mentality was quite obviously in an imbalance. It was a definite that he would lose lifespan because of this, and it was also highly likely that his power level had significantly decreased.
”Why haven't you died yet? It would be so much easier on me if you simply died.” I made a snarky comment.
”Heretic!!” the pope's personal guards all shouted in anger. The rashest of them all directly unsheathed his sword and charged at me.
A black shadow flashed. A black wind blew past, and the warrior instantly vanished. His angry roar continued to echo in the air, yet he was now nowhere to be seen.
This abnormal scene caused the pope's bodyguards to all stop in their tracks as they automatically arranged themselves in front of Pope Caloma.
I had no intention of explaining to them what just happened. I simply brought out a nail file and casually lowered my head while filing my nails, not even glancing at them. Everyone fell silent for the time being.
”You're not here to just enjoy the show, are you?”
Of course I wasn't here simply to watch the Holy Church. I had plenty of my own affairs to be busy with. I had no free time to simply watch others.
Pope Caloma also realized that if I had come here with hostile intentions, I wouldn't even waste time with words. I would simply attack them directly.
Since I kept speaking and insulting them, this actually meant that I was here with sincerity to negotiate with them.
Still, if any of them intended to point their sword at me, I had no objections to taking back some of the interest that the Holy Church owed me.
I continued to remain silent as I patiently filed my really long nails. I had been so busy on the road these days that I had neglected the length of my nails.
After a long period of silence, I finally spoke up first.
”I'm here as a representative of the Mist Alliance and the Southern Sect to establish a new alliance with you. Be happy, since I'm here to help you out.”
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Who in this world had the biggest grudge against the Holy Church? I would probably be somewhere at the top of the list.
Who in the mortal plane wanted to see the Holy Church's eradication more than anyone? I would definitely also be somewhere at the top of this list.
There was my personal grudge, the Mist Kingdom's destruction, Estrada's death, the grievances that the Northlands People of the Mist had suffered, and the recent schemes, both obvious and hidden. Not to mention, the Holy Church had recently just tried to assassinate me with Seraphim Winton. All of these added together meant that my grudge against them was as deep as the ocean.
I truly wanted the Holy Church to be eradicated as swiftly as possible, but if I instead looked at it in the context of the entire world's current situation, it definitely would be a terrible thing right now if the Holy Church was swiftly eradicated.
Those who were the most powerful would always attract the most attention. Right now, the most powerful Order Faction allied faction in the mortal plane was definitely the Holy Church without a doubt.
It was only natural that the Chaos Faction would furiously attack the Holy Church. Even if the Chaos Faction didn't try to attack the Holy Church in some way, then they would create trouble for other countries and organizations in Eich.
The current situation was doubtlessly a gigantic pitfall that Sophocles had devised for the Holy Church to fall into.
If the Holy Church continued to involve itself in San Antonio's civil war, not only would the Holy Church's reputation be damaged, they would also be forced to continuously send reinforcements to battle here, weakening the Holy Church's combat strength like a leech constantly draining blood from a giant.
If the Holy Church instead abandoned San Antonio, their reputation would similarly be damaged as well, and they would be greatly weakened by losing San Antonio, one of their greatest supporters.
Normally, not only would I not help them, I would have to be in a really good mood not to attack them as well.
But right now, the Holy War had only started a short 10 years ago. It was far too quick for the Holy Church to be collapsing right now. Even in the game's history, the Holy Church had persisted for almost 200 years after the start of the Holy War before it was truly destroyed.
Even though the Holy Church had so many countless useless Cardinals and priests who hurt the Holy Church more than they helped, the Holy Church's foundational strength was truly phenomenal. That was why it had taken nearly two centuries for the Holy Church to die. But now, the Holy Church was in a far more dangerous position than it should have been in the game's timeline only 10 years after the start of the Holy War.
If you looked at why the Holy Church met with danger so much quicker, it was of course because I had constantly been chipping away at the Holy Church's support, making them accrue countless small losses. They also no longer had the full support of all of humanity. When compared to the game's history's Holy Church, which was the mega faction that led all of the human mega empires, this Holy Church was obviously far weaker in influence, if not overall strength.
The Holy Church could collapse. I even hoped that they would collapse. The God of Holy Light deserved to die. I would curse him to die as quickly as possible. However, their deaths weren't something that could be permitted to occur within the next 20 years.
It was quite simple to extrapolate what would happen next if the Holy Church was to collapse right now.
For ordinary people, they would lose everything that they had believed in. It would be as if the sky itself had fallen. They would also lose all confidence in being able to win this entire Holy War. This would be a chain reaction affecting confidence and morale. Although such things sounded vague and ethereal, they would definitely concretely affect battles all over the world.
While a flag that had been knocked over could be replaced with a different flag, if the Holy Church's flag was knocked over so quickly, the Chaos Faction would never give us enough time to establish our own flag to lead everyone.
In my planned timeline of events, the Holy Church was supposed to gradually decay and die slowly. During this process, new heroes from everywhere, along with new Gods, would gradually establish their own new factions and organizations. The entire world would be filled with new factions, so the major Holy Church faction's dying would no longer be as important.