On the empire's outskirts,
the Soren Plains — sketched only faintly on any map — were a place that held a different light with every season.
In spring, young grasses spread like a carpet of pale green. In summer, even the faintest breeze sent them rippling like waves.
In autumn they turned to gold, painting the landscape as though it burned at every dusk. In winter, white frost descended and the world fell still, as if holding its breath.
One dawn, before an elderly couple who had lived their quiet, contented lives, a small wicker basket appeared on their doorstep. Inside, wrapped in swaddling cloth, a pair of twins breathed softly in sleep.
For years they had longed for a child, yet their hair had gone white before that wish was ever granted. Countless hours had passed staring at an empty cradle.
Those twins felt like a gift from God.
Devout believers both, the couple took the children in, certain that the Lord had answered their prayers at last.
They gave the children names drawn from their own family name.
For the elder — Tiana Pilrn, with the hope that she would grow as bright as a clear sky.
For the younger — Taibeon Pilrn, with the wish that he would flow as steadfast as a river.
Not a drop of shared blood, yet the couple cherished the twins as their own.
Every night they pressed their lips to the children's foreheads and held their small hands in prayer.
"You are our children — but you are also children of God."
They always said it that way.
Young Tiana Pilrn did not understand.
She could not fathom who this God was, or whether such a being truly existed in the world.
She could not see why anyone would love so deeply something that could neither be seen nor touched.
Call it the rebelliousness of adolescence — Tiana Pilrn did not believe in God.
"I am Mama and Papa's daughter. Not the daughter of some God whose face I've never seen!"
At fourteen, Tiana's words had grown sharp edges, and she treated her parents with a cold indifference.
Perhaps it was because she felt they loved God more than they loved her.
How could they put some invisible deity before their own daughter…!
It made her blood boil.
That autumn of her fourteenth year, Tiana had shot up in height.
Her bright wheat-gold hair fell to her waist, and her eyes were clear — though stubbornness lived in them.
It was a day of relentless rain.
A late-autumn downpour swept across the Soren Plains. Dark clouds hung low, draining the fields to grey, and a cold wind rattled the windows.
Her parents told her it was dangerous and not to go outside.
Tiana let the words wash past her.
Pure defiance, nothing more.
She slipped out of the house and stood in the pouring rain, face tilted up toward the sky.
Cold rainwater streamed down her cheeks. She spread her arms wide and screamed at the heavens.
"Let my Mama and Papa go! I am the one they love. Far more than You ever could!"
Shhhhhh.
The downpour hammered the plains without mercy.
The grass rippled like the sea beneath the howling wind.
Tiana's hair and skirt lashed wildly around her.
She stood alone in that vast field and poured her fury at the sky.
She might well have been overwhelmed by the sheer force of nature — yet in that moment, strangely, she felt no fear at all.
See? God was nothing after all!
Whoooooosh!!!
No lightning came, but the wind answered with a howl of its own.
A fierce gust came tearing down the slope and slammed into her.
Her body lifted off the ground — then crashed back down onto the grass with a thud.
"Kyaaah!"
She tumbled and rolled across the wet turf. Damp blades of grass clung to her face and arms.
The rain-soaked ground cushioned her fall.
Tiana could not get up for a long while. Her breath came in ragged gasps, and her tears ran together with the rain.
Then, at some point, the downpour that had seemed ready to swallow the world stopped — as suddenly and completely as if it had never been.
As though some enormous hand had parted the storm clouds, they slowly split apart.
A single shaft of sunlight fell directly onto the place where Tiana lay.
She lay there for hours, staring up at the sky.
"…"
The anger had drained away without her noticing, leaving only a hollow she could not name.
Her parents and Taibeon found her toward evening.
The Soren Plains were a landscape of gentle slopes and winding contours; lying in a low hollow, she had been easy to miss.
"There you are! My darling. Thank goodness. Thank goodness…"
"Mama…"
She came down with a terrible cold.
The price of standing defiant against a storm that had swept the plains.
But the price was steeper than she had imagined.
The fever would not break, and her cough only deepened. Even after a month, her condition showed little sign of improving.
Tiana lay in bed, barely able to move.
Every few hours her mother wiped away the cold sweat and carefully spooned tomato soup into her mouth, yet her face remained pale.
Deciding something had to be done, her father sold the sheep he had tended like his own children — at a loss — and made the journey to the city for medicine. When he returned, his shoes were caked with mud from the long road.
Still, she did not recover.
Her skin was ashen and her body cold as ice.
Half of every day she spent in sleep, and even when awake her mind drifted in a haze. Her head burned and throbbed like a coal.
"Mama…"
"Yes, yes. Tina. Mama's here. Mama's right here."
Her mother clasped Tiana's hand in her weathered fingers. The grip was rough, but warm. She kept her vigil. She never left, not for a single moment.
Tiana could no longer tell whether she was sleeping or waking.
Her sense of time had come undone; day and night blurred together.
"…Merciful God. Please, let Your gentle hand reach down to this child…"
Her mother's low, murmured prayer continued through the dark.
"Tiana is truly a good child. She has done nothing wrong."
She held her daughter's hands in both of hers, pressed them to her forehead, and prayed.
"She grows cross sometimes and troubles my heart, and she does not believe in You. But even so — even so, she is Your child."
The prayer meant for her came through with perfect clarity.
"…Truly, truly. In Your almighty power, please hold this little lamb close."
The corners of Tiana's eyes grew hot.
"I love you. Tiana, I love you so very much."
Her mother knelt beside the bed every single day and prayed.
Day and night, she entrusted me to the God I had hated.
How much time passed, she could not say.
Tiana's fever began, slowly, to come down. Her breathing steadied little by little, and the faintest flush of color crept back into her pale face.
A few days later, the sunlight filtering through the gap in the curtains felt warm against her skin.
She did not know why she had recovered.
Whether it was the rest, or the medicine, or her mother's prayers.
But one thing was certain.
She no longer hated God the way she once had.
Whether that being was real or not, she still could not say —
But perhaps, just perhaps, in the tears of a mother who had knelt for her sake, that God had been present in some small measure.
It was the first time Tiana had ever thought so.
* * *
It was after the conflict with Matyos at the Cathedral of Saint Berce.
Cardinal Teo had proposed dinner with Tiana.
Tiana, who genuinely liked him as a person, accepted without hesitation.
She would have liked Matyos to join them, but she sensed he would refuse, so she never brought it up.
For now, she simply wanted to talk with Cardinal Teo about God.
"This is a restaurant I frequent."
The place Cardinal Teo led her to was one of the most celebrated establishments in all of Porca.
To dine here, one normally had to book a week in advance — yet the moment the manager spotted the Cardinal, he came rushing over, beaming, and immediately showed them to a table.
"Ha ha. There was really no need for all this."
"Not at all~ How could we do any less when the Cardinal himself graces us with a visit? Please, make yourselves comfortable."
"Well then, I won't refuse."
The Cardinal smiled pleasantly.
He knew his place in the world.
The rank of Cardinal was the equal of any high-ranking noble.
Claiming a table at a restaurant without a reservation was, to him, a perfectly unremarkable thing.
He was rather fond of the red mantle draped over his shoulders.
"Wow… I've never been anywhere like this."
"You'll be coming to places like this with me often enough. Think nothing of it."
"Often…?"
"Before that — it seemed as though you had some conflict with a friend of yours, Sister Tiana."
"…That's…"
"I would rather not pry, but I couldn't simply look the other way when I could see you were troubled."
Cardinal Teo poured wine with practiced ease and offered the glass to Tiana.
"Ah — you're a student, aren't you."
He withdrew the glass with a charming smile.
Women invariably melted at that smile of his.
A guileless country girl would be no different, he assumed.
"…Yes. Mati and I had a disagreement."
"…"
Tiana, however, seemed entirely oblivious to his handsome smile, lost in thought.
"Cardinal."
"Yes."
"Mati doesn't believe in God. What should I do?"
"How did you come to believe, Sister?"
"Me?"
Tiana paused.
Then she quietly turned her thoughts back over her own life.
The child who had once disbelieved, just as Matyos did. The girl who had stood in a rain-swept field and screamed at the sky. The mother who had prayed for her through a fever.
"…I'm not sure. B-but I do believe, clearly and truly. I don't doubt His omnipotence for a moment!"
"I am not questioning your faith. You said you had a conflict with Brother Matyos."
"Yes…"
"Sister. I know. It is not only Brother Matyos — your own faith is wavering as well, is it not?"
"N-no, it isn't…!"
"Do not deceive your own heart, Sister. God sees into every soul with eyes of truth."
"…That's…"
"When faith wavers, it means you are ready for it to grow deeper."
Shk.
As he said it, Cardinal Teo drew a folded paper from inside his robe and held it out to Tiana.
"…Cardinal? What is this…?"
At her questioning look, Cardinal Teo smiled and explained.
"It is the path to God's embrace. That is my letter of recommendation."
"…?"
"It is simple. You leave behind the corruption of the secular world and come to belong, truly, to God's fold. You become a nun."
"A nun…"
Tiana turned the Cardinal's letter of recommendation over in her fingers.
To set down everything of the world and go to God's embrace.
Her mind wanted to say yes at once — but the words would not come.
The happy days at the Academy. The friends she had made. The kind professors. Matyos.
As she sank into thought, Cardinal Teo added softly,
"Tiana. Every person has a destiny bestowed by God. No human can escape that destiny. Matyos is no different."
"…Then what am I supposed to do?"
"Pray for him. Draw closer to God, and pray."
"Pray…"
"One week. That is all the time I have left here. I return to the Holy See next week."
Cardinal Teo rose lightly to his feet.
"Take your time until then, and give me your answer."
*
Tiana's thoughts grew heavy.
She could not focus in class, her mind drifting elsewhere.
Her head was a tangle.
It had been just over a month since she enrolled at the Academy. One month. Brief as it was, this place had become something she knew she would never forget.
Did she truly have to follow Cardinal Teo to the Holy See?
Ding.
"…Taibeon?"
A message came in from Taibeon during class.
She tapped her watch to check it.
Taibeon: hey
What a rude little brother. Even in a message, 'hey' to his own sister.
She replied immediately.
Me: what
Taibeon: you going to church again this week?
Me: you coming too?
Taibeon: no
Me: then why
Taibeon: don't go
Me: out of nowhere?
She blinked at Taibeon's out-of-the-blue message.
Taibeon didn't believe in God.
But he had never dismissed her faith.
He simply accepted it with a 'huh, okay' and moved on. They didn't keep tabs on each other's business.
A perfectly ordinary sibling relationship.
So for him to suddenly meddle in her religious life was less infuriating than it was puzzling.
'He's not the type to do this.'
More messages kept coming.
Taibeon: just don't go
Me: why?
Taibeon: just don't
On a hunch, Tiana sent this:
Me: did Mati tell you to say that?
Taibeon:
No reply.
The messages that had been coming back instantly went quiet for over ten minutes.
Taibeon: no he didn't?
Me: yes he did
Tiana switched off her watch and squeezed her eyes shut.
Her heart was a mess.
Why did Matyos take such issue with her faith?
She wanted to go find him and ask — but she couldn't summon the courage to meet his eyes.
She let the time slip by, doing nothing.
That evening, too, she was heading back to the dormitory after finishing her assignments late.
As she passed in front of the theology faculty chapel, the cross above the entrance was shining with unusual brightness.
As if drawn by something, she pushed open the door and stepped inside.
In the quiet sanctuary, before the cross, a boy stood in prayer.
It was Matyos.