Chapter 8
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“You want to take that lifelong vow?”
“Yes, that is correct.”
At the request the young Vice Commander suddenly laid out, High Priest Callas’s white eyebrows twitched.
“After taking my vows, I wish to become a monk and devote myself to ascetic practice on Mount Ator.”
“Hooh…”
At those words, the priest fell into a long silence, accompanied by an inscrutable murmur.
With a gaze that seemed to measure something, he scrutinized Bjorn’s outward appearance, the very appearance everyone praised without end.
It was not unheard of for a paladin, particularly one with deep faith, to take vows and become a monk.
However, the High Priest’s intuition told him otherwise. In this young man he had watched since childhood, he saw no such piety. Rather, what reflected in the priest’s eyes was some dangerous fixation that clung to Bjorn.
This young man is not a person suited to devote his entire life to faith. Drawing on experience, the High Priest reached a swift conclusion.
“Well… becoming a monk is not as easy a matter as you seem to think.”
Ascetic practice on Mount Ator meant isolating oneself on a remote peak, praying alone, and completely entrusting oneself to God.
It was an endlessly noble and solitary path, one far too severe for someone like Bjorn, who had yet to overcome himself.
In short, he was unqualified.
“This is a conclusion I reached after much deliberation. I have fulfilled my duty in the holy war, so please grant me permission.”
Was it not obvious just from the way he was stubbornly insisting like this.
“Vows and asceticism are not things that work just because you insist. Think it over once more. Can you truly say you have not a single shred of lingering attachment to the secular world?”
“I can.”
“Anguish over all things, resentment toward fate, sins committed against someone, karma you have not erased. If even one of these remains in your heart, you are not qualified to even stand at the entrance of Mount Ator.”
“……”
For the first time, Bjorn, who had been unshakably confident even in the High Priest’s chamber, was left speechless. A sudden stray thought had seized his ankle.
“To become a monk, you must also sever every bond you have created. Friends, lovers, even family. When you believe all of that has been settled, then come back.”
With that, the High Priest dismissed Bjorn’s hesitation outright and mercilessly sent him out the door. However, Bjorn, having encountered an unexpected obstacle, was left only in confusion.
‘Anguish over all things, resentment toward fate, sins committed against someone, karma you have not erased…’
It was because of the person who had surfaced in his mind along with the High Priest’s words from moments ago.
‘Of all times…’
Of all times, why did the face of that woman, who had confessed that her feelings had not changed, come to mind now. The inexplicable sense of crisis was enough to make cold sweat run down his back.
The ‘lingering attachment to the secular world’ the High Priest mentioned must have been a phrase that encompassed precisely such remnants of connection. Indeed, leaving her behind like this and departing was something that felt deeply unsettling even to him.
Leila Bailey, that foolish woman, had ultimately blocked his path. Bjorn swallowed down a resentful reproach toward her.
Yet at the same time, everything became clear. She was precisely the karma he had to completely settle before taking his vows.
Perhaps this was an evil deed Bjorn had committed without even realizing it.
No matter how insensitive he was, he could not help but feel a sense of responsibility toward the sight of a girl of eighteen continuing to cling to him even as she became a woman of twenty eight.
The sin of leaving that heart unattended until just before he departed for the battlefield, assuming it would surely grow weary, was a heavy one.
Recalling that fact, Bjorn made his decision.
As a man, and as a faithful servant of God, he could no longer stand by and watch a lost lamb wander.
At last, it was truly time to draw his blade.
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