East Road Quest

Chapter 13: Cardinal Lorenzo

Lorenzo woke up from his sleep.

“I can’t believe it. I fell asleep.” He felt an impulse to check the time. For the past few years, he hadn’t cared about the time from sunset to sunrise. During that same period, he had never fallen asleep.

Many people believed Lorenzo to be diligent and sincere, thinking he worked tirelessly for the Raphael Order and Rotican, day and night.

That was somewhat true. He worked at night and during the day. However, it wasn’t because he worked without sleeping, but because he worked since he couldn’t sleep.

He found no pleasure outside of work. In his youth, he had a burning sexual curiosity and a deep interest in alcohol and tobacco. He had been passionate about delicious food and had frequented concerts by his favorite conductors. But now, he was indifferent to everything. The only thing that gave him pleasure was the achievements from his work.

Lorenzo didn’t overrate himself for this phenomenon. He thought of it as similar to how people addicted to alcohol crave it the next day; he was just the same.

However, he didn’t stop people from overrating him. It was convenient to assert authority when people thought that way.

“Come to think of it, it’s been a long time since I saw a burnt-out candle.”

The tightly enclosed attic allowed no moonlight to enter. He usually secluded himself in the attic at night to work, so as not to show others that he didn’t sleep. This was because some fool might spread rumors that he used the power of demons to stay awake.

When he worked, he had no choice but to light more than two candles, lighting another immediately when one went out, so two candles rarely went out simultaneously.

“This is not something to be overlooked.”

He lit the candle again and, folding his arms, fell into thought. He, who hadn’t slept for years, had just fallen into a deep sleep and even dreamed. The dazed state upon waking wasn’t a bad feeling. Instead, the content of the dream was serious.

In the dream, Mount Vesuvius erupted. A rain of stones fell from the sky, and lava engulfed Pompeii. The ash of death covered the sky of Rome. And out of the smoke, unidentified monsters crawled out and devoured people.

The forms of the monsters were bizarre. Lorenzo had no choice but to use a word he never used to describe them.

Demons.

“Is it a prophetic dream?”

Lorenzo didn’t believe in such things. He hadn’t believed in the dream the Pope claimed as a reason for reclaiming the Holy Land. That had been a strategy prepared for years to increase Rotican’s finances, a strategy devised by Lorenzo himself. Yet, this dream bothered him.

“That person was definitely Benklaus. The emperor appeared in my dream.”

The emperor had been there when Mount Vesuvius erupted, and at the Trephin Fountain in Rome when the monsters roamed the city. The emperor hadn’t seen Lorenzo, but Lorenzo had been able to observe the emperor throughout the dream.

“Did my obsession lead to such a strange dream? Or is it a dream intended by someone?”

Lorenzo looked up at the palm-sized star cross hanging on the attic wall. The cross part was made of wood, but the star part was silver, reflecting the candlelight and glittering.

Lorenzo waited for “someone” or “something” to appear, but nothing happened.

After sitting in his chair for what felt like either a minute or an hour, Lorenzo finally made a decision and stood up.

He didn’t believe in the dream. However, he wasn’t one to ignore feelings of unease.

Lorenzo lifted the floorboard door. Wooden stairs led down from the attic to the lower floor. Originally, there had only been a ladder, but as he grew older and climbing ladders became difficult, he had built the stairs himself.

His house had no notable furniture besides old wardrobes and bookshelves, and no high-priced or antique items.

People praised his frugality and revered him like a saint. However, he wasn’t suppressing a desire for wealth or pretending to be poor. He simply had no interest in such things.

When some believers gave Cardinal Lorenzo gold crosses or statues of saints as gifts, he would immediately donate them to Setina Cathedral. The more he did, the more people respected him. Yet, Lorenzo inwardly found it annoying when believers gave him such heavy and cumbersome items.

Having such golden items in his shabby house meant having to hire unnecessary guards. Not to protect the ornaments, but because thieves might see the “unnecessary things.”

Dealing with witnesses was always a troublesome matter.

Lorenzo wanted only one person in the house who could act as both an errand boy and an assistant. Preferably, someone who was dull enough to not notice when Lorenzo got up because they were too busy sleeping at night. Right now, that person was asleep.

“Benoya, wake up.”

Lorenzo knocked on the door of the small room on the second floor. A twenty-year-old young man, who had been sleeping soundly, was startled awake and fell out of bed. He got up quickly, not even noticing the pain.

“Yes, Cardinal Lorenzo. I’m awake. I wasn’t really asleep, just resting my eyes. My eyes have been poor lately, and when I keep them open for too long…”

If Benoya had one flaw, it was that he was too talkative. But as long as he didn’t reveal internal secrets to outsiders, Lorenzo could tolerate a bit of noise.

“We have somewhere to go.”

“W-where to?”

Benoya wiped the drool from the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand and looked around.

“Now? Maybe it’s because my eyes aren’t good, but everything seems dark these days. Is it morning already?”

“First, wake yourself up and get dressed. In the meantime, I’ll have a late-night snack.”

“Yes, Cardinal.”

Benoya hurriedly changed his clothes.

Lorenzo went down from the second floor to the kitchen on the first floor. It was more of a barn than a kitchen. The wooden floor was scattered with dry straw and dust, and mold grew in the corners of the walls.

While Benoya kept the second floor clean and Lorenzo did the same for the attic, they couldn’t manage the first floor. If he asked the Raphael Order, about thirty people would come to clean, but he left it alone. He disliked other people coming in and out of his house.

Lorenzo took the bread from the shelf and placed it on the old table, slicing the cheese in a bowl with a butter knife. It would have been nice to have a cup of milk, but there was no place to get it at this hour.

“Not needing sleep is convenient, but how nice it would be if I didn’t need to eat as well?”

Lorenzo thought as he barely managed to swallow the dry bread.

Benoya came thumping down the stairs.

“All ready.”

“Have something to eat. We might not have time for breakfast.”

Lorenzo handed him half a torn piece of bread. Benoya hastily bit into it, choking and thumping his chest with his fist.

“Where are we going now?”

“I’m still thinking about it. I was planning to go to the Imperial Palace, but it might be too late now.”

“Is it about the Holy Grail?”

Realizing his mistake as soon as he spoke, Benoya quickly corrected his words.

“Are you talking about the olive sack?”

Lorenzo had instructed Benoya to use the term “olive sack” when referring to the Holy Grail.

When kidnapping someone, they would say they were picking olives; when killing someone, they would say they were pressing olive oil. Since Lorenzo owned a small olive grove, this would confuse anyone eavesdropping. Although there was no one to overhear in his house, using the same terminology from here made conversations outside more natural.

Benoya swallowed the bread and spoke.

“There’s no news about pressing olive oil yet. Wouldn’t it be better to wait and trust them? It would be dangerous for you to move personally, Cardinal.”

“I’m thinking about that too. They probably already suspect that I’m behind it. If I do nothing in such a situation, they’ll think I truly am powerless and didn’t take any action. Instead, it might be better to show myself. That way, they’ll be flustered, make mistakes, and expose their weaknesses.”

Originally, the Caitlix Church had been one, but now it was split into numerous sects and denominations, almost like different religions. However, at the core, there were ultimately only two powers. These were the Rome Priesthood centered around the Emperor of Rome and the Raphael Order centered around Rotican.

These two forces had opposed and competed with each other for the past five hundred years, sometimes reconciling and then fighting again. The relationship strained during the last Holy Land reclamation war had seemed to briefly recover over the past decade, only to become entangled again because of the Holy Grail.

Pope Dionysius used the two kingdoms under the influence of the Raphael Order, Gliten and Farenz. Emperor Benklaus remained silent. Dionysius hastily concluded it as his victory.

“Benclaus isn’t a fool. He’s different from his grandfather, who only knew how to fight, and his idiotic father. He must know that the knights of the two countries have embarked on the Holy Grail expedition. He knows, yet he remains silent.”

If the Emperor had opposed or supported the Holy Grail issue, Lorenzo could have responded accordingly, but the Emperor chose silence, even as citizens mocked him as a foolish emperor.

Lorenzo was bothered by the Emperor’s silence. About a month ago, Father Daniel had disappeared after meeting the Emperor. And then, conspicuously, Bishop David had used this to cancel the excommunication and banishment of his disciple, Father Jade. It was clear he had obtained a pardon from the Emperor.

For Lorenzo, the most troublesome figure had moved into action.

There was a knock at the front door on the first floor. Benoya, with his hand on the dagger at his waist, approached the door cautiously. He opened the door and exchanged a few words with the visitor outside.

Benoya returned to the table and said, “It seems the wine intended for the Imperial Palace has been returned.”

Like olives, “wine” and “grapes” were also coded terms. Unlike olives, Lorenzo didn’t drink wine at all, which made the term usable.

When the Holy Grail first appeared, Lorenzo had referred to the Emperor as “grape” and planned to say that the wine had aged if the Emperor took action. However, it had never been used.

Now, “wine” had come to refer to someone else.

Father Daniel!

“If Father Daniel went somewhere other than the Imperial Palace, where could he be heading at this hour?”

Lorenzo finally made a decision and stood up.

“We need to go to Saint Vesta Cathedral.”

“Now?”

“Now.”

Benoya set down the bread he had been eating and stood up. When Lorenzo made a decision, he followed without question or comment. This was why Lorenzo kept him as an errand boy, despite his dullness and talkativeness.

“It’s a more meaningful place to set the olive sack than Setina.”

Lorenzo muttered to himself.

Over five hundred years ago, when Caitlix was not yet recognized as an official religion, Saint Vesta had built a small sanctuary where he preached. It was just called “Vesta’s School” back then.

During the late Rotin Empire, the Emperor burned the school and Saint Vesta alive. Coincidentally, not long after, the empire fell, and people still referred to the fall of the Rotin Empire as either Vesta’s curse or Vesta’s blessing, sometimes even as divine retribution.

After Rome replaced Rotin as the new empire, the first thing the Emperor did was build a cathedral on the site of Vesta’s school, naming it Saint Vesta Cathedral. The first Emperor of Rome, Galius, was regarded as a protector of Caitlix and venerated as a saint because of this.

Now it was grandly packaged, but back then, the construction of the cathedral was a highly political decision.

After the fall of the Rotin Empire, Caitlix had already begun to dominate the world. Upon the death of the last Rotin Emperor, the Bishop of Rotin declared himself the Holy Pope, the highest bishop of Caitlix. He designated the small village of Rotican as holy land and built Setina Cathedral there.

Emperor Galius needed a building larger and more significant than Setina Cathedral to reclaim the attention lost to Rotican. But simply building a structure wouldn’t attract followers, so he founded the Rome Priesthood around Saint Vesta Cathedral.

Thus, the Rome Priesthood was born.

The priests of Caitlix were loyal to the Holy Pope of Rotican but also united around the Rome Priesthood. This was a matter of pride for the Holy Pope, so he gathered priests who would follow his wishes and formed a new priesthood centered around the city of Raphael.

Thus, the Raphael Order was established.

This consolidation had happened slowly over the past five hundred years, so it couldn’t be simply said that the two priesthoods were in a competitive relationship. In fact, Cardinal Pietro, the current head of the Rome Priesthood, was quite close to Lorenzo. During the last Holy Pope election, Cardinal Pietro had even voted for Dionysius.

Bishop David of Saint Vesta Cathedral was somewhat afraid of Lorenzo, but that was more due to Lorenzo’s intimidating presence than any power dynamics. Anyone who faced Cardinal Lorenzo tended to feel intimidated.

Lorenzo was well aware of the friendship between Father Daniel and Bishop David. If Daniel hadn’t entered the Imperial Palace, there were only two places he could have gone.

Saint Vesta Cathedral or his own home.

“At the very least, I’ll meet Bishop David at the cathedral. If I’m lucky, he might tell me where Daniel is. Either way, it won’t be a wasted trip.”

Lorenzo asked Benoya, “Do you have your knife?”

“Of course. Are you worried we’ll need to press some olive oil?”

“We need to be prepared. The wine is fine. It’s always been fine. The problem is the olive oil. We must press it at the first opportunity. If the chance arises, don’t miss it. Without any witnesses, there’s no need to worry about cleaning up afterward.”

“My memory’s a bit poor, but could you remind me one more time?”

Another problem with Benoya was his memory. Although it hadn’t caused any issues yet, it was a concern for the future.

Without blaming him, Lorenzo asked patiently, “The name of the olive oil?”

“Yes.”

Lorenzo wanted to ensure Benoya clearly understood before leaving the house, so he repeated the name one last time.

“Jade.”

“Jade is the olive oil, olive oil is Jade…”

Benoya muttered it several times to avoid making a mistake. This was another aspect Lorenzo appreciated about him.

“If there’s an opportunity, press it… Yes, I’ve memorized it for sure. I won’t forget now.”