One Hundred Nights with the Devil - Chapter 16

There were several attempts. She ran, and she was caught. She ran again, and was caught again.

Eventually, as the price for repeated escapes, the mark of an Exorcist was branded onto Elena’s body.

A terrible brand that leaves a trace beyond the skin, even down to the bone, with a heated iron. It stripped Elena of all hope.

She begged and pleaded miserably and desperately, but the Pope did not help her, citing that ‘your becoming an Exorcist is God’s will, and as a priest, I can never go against God’s will.’

Not only had he abandoned her mother, citing God’s will, but now he was abandoning her too. Left with only despair and anger, Elena wanted revenge no matter what.

And she wanted to live.

<I-I’m sorry for being so immature until now. I’ll follow an exorcist’s duty in Esslingen, but until then… could you… could you treat me just a little… like a father?>

For three months before she was dragged to Esslingen, where the Devil awaited, she stayed by the Pope’s side, meticulously mimicking an obedient daughter. The Pope bestowed wealth upon the daughter who would soon die, as if buying an indulgence, and even opened the library encompassing all sorts of information.

Thus, the escape route was perfect.

However, in Esslingen, wrapped in black fog, a land where thousands were trapped and screaming, Elena was put to the test.

She could feel how absolute the Devil’s Authority was. And so, she was captivated.

Disillusionment, anger, and a desire for revenge led her to the Devil. Since she was going to die someday anyway, she chose to use herself as kindling rather than live her whole life as a fugitive. She thought that if even a small spark could fly from that and dirty her biological father’s hem, it would be some small compensation for her tattered life.

“This wretched thing dares to try and use me. Well then, prove it. If you please me, you shall receive my mercy.”

She gave up running away for revenge, but the passion for revenge kept Elena alive.

“It is a gift. Young Exorcist. Use this to cut off your biological father’s life.”

Elena, who exorcised the Devil of Esslingen, stood before the Pope as ‘the Exorcist blessed by God Eclard.’ With a sword hidden in her embrace.

But the Pope’s trick was more cunning than the Devil’s whisper.

As soon as he heard the news of Elena’s survival, he actively led the effort to elevate her as a Saintess. In doing so, he consolidated all of Elena’s followers under his power, preemptively blocking the Grand Temple’s power from fracturing. Consequently, the first thing Elena encountered on the day she entered the Grand Temple was people consecutively chanting the Pope’s name and her own.

Elena was frustrated by their fanatical shouts. The Pope welcomed her, who was steeped in grief, with open arms.

What he presented to his surviving daughter was her mother’s remains wrapped in a white cloth.

Elena screamed. She wailed that she had clearly built a grave, and how could he have dug it all up? At her appearance, the Pope chattered with a face full of pity.

He said that the grave, which a seven-year-old child had made haphazardly, had been completely dug up by animals. So, he had to find the head, which had looked at her so kindly, deep in the mountains, and the arms that had embraced her, from a den dug by a beast.

She wanted to kill him.

The moment she recalled her mother being torn apart because of him, she wanted to die. Before her mother’s tomb, which was beautifully decorated for all to see, the mere eighteen-year-old Exorcist could do nothing.

‘Why did I even try so hard to live?’