For a while, there will be two chapters per release. Until I find something interesting to translate in place of the translated "The Forsaken Saintess and her Foodie Roadtrip in Another World".
Chapter Two Hundred and Six: The Stage for Assertion 6
Harald had been loved by the goddess—then what about everyone else? Karen thought that couldn’t possibly be true. But if by any chance Karen’s concern was correct, she might come to hate the workings of this world.
So while believing it must be different, just to be sure, Karen looked up at the sky raining down rainbows with the elation being granted to her and asked:
“Harald certainly made efforts! But I can’t believe he was the only one who made efforts! There must have been many other people who desperately challenged difficulties, right?! Why couldn’t those people climb the ranks!?”
The guidance from the goddess to the higher ranks.
Karen threw her question at the sky, prepared even for that guidance to be interrupted.
“You’re not going to tell me you discriminate based on likes and dislikes, are you!?”
In Karen’s field of vision, looking up at the sky, only Harald was barely visible, and his eyes widened in shock at Karen’s manner of speaking.
Whether the goddess could hear or not, the rainbow’s radiance didn’t subside.
“I understand that you’ll love the powerless if they overcome trials! It’s just that the trials are so difficult that few people can overcome them, right!? So it’s okay to say that Harald, who overcame them, is amazing, right!? You love all the more the sight of someone crawling up from having no magical power, right!? Even if they’re magicless, you’re always watching from the sky, right!?”
The intensity of the falling light particles didn’t slacken, as if affirming Karen’s words.
If this truly was a sign of affirmation, then perhaps that was precisely why Karen alone had arrived at this understanding. No one in this world believed the magicless were loved by the goddess.
However, perhaps the goddess simply couldn’t hear Karen’s voice in the first place and was just pouring down the guiding light as usual.
But the people watching Karen would be sufficiently deceived. That the goddess was affirming Karen’s words.
“You also love people who try to help those attempting to climb the ranks, don’t you, Goddess!? They just don’t reach the point of climbing the ranks themselves! You love all people living desperately, don’t you!?”
The momentum of the falling light particles didn’t stop.
“Then! Back then, I may have supported him while thinking of settling for a convenient man! But I was still supporting him! You love me too for doing my best to support him, right!?”
She felt like the momentum of the light raindrops weakened slightly, but Karen decided it was her imagination.
Removing the voice-amplifying magical tool from her throat, Karen asked in a voice probably no one but the goddess could hear.
“Why didn’t you love the man called Horst?”
She couldn’t believe that Horst had lived his life without ever making an effort. Those people in that research facility in the blank zone who put their bodies on the line to try to block the pegasus’ intrusion. She couldn’t believe that they, who had the resolve to throw away their lives, hadn’t made desperate efforts.
What exactly did they lack? She hadn’t expected an answer to her question to come. But the next moment, an image flashed in Karen’s mind.
Horst and his companions were going down the steps.
—Descending into a dark, gloomy, and murky place.
Right after seeing that image, the light particles began to disappear. At the same time, the magical power that had been bringing elation was completely drained from her body, and Karen was stunned.
—The rank ascension had been cancelled.
The moment she realized that, Karen broke out in goosebumps. She had known she was doing something that might incur the goddess’s displeasure. Karen had talked back to the goddess, after all. But when she actually incurred her anger, Karen’s heart shrank.
“Y-Y-You…”
Eventually, Marian called out to the standing Karen in a trembling voice.
Karen’s shoulders flinched.
What would the people of this world think of someone who tried to climb the steps and failed after angering the goddess?
Too many people had witnessed it.
Karen’s figure being turned away from by the goddess—Karen waited for Marian’s words with bated breath, and Marian said:
“Could you stop having a debate with the goddess while leaving me out!?”
Karen’s eyes widened.
Marian apparently hadn’t noticed that Karen’s rank ascension had been cancelled.
She looked around lightly, but no one seemed to have noticed that Karen had been lowered from the ranks she had started to climb. Was it just that they didn’t know because they weren’t used to seeing people climb the ranks?
Karen raised her voice, partly to cover her agitation:
“Um, so according to the goddess, people without magical power are also loved by her!”
The rainbow particles’ brilliance didn’t fade, and their momentum didn’t drop during the confirmation Karen had made with the goddess up to that point.
What exactly had incurred her displeasure?
—What exactly was that vision?
“In other words, even those without magical power have the potential to become great warriors who protect the nation.”
Marian raised her voice, sweeping her gaze across each face in the gathered crowd, pressing her words upon them until they sank in. On the faces of the audience floated the color of blind faith that had gone beyond understanding and acceptance. Karen’s words had gotten through.
But what they led to was the conclusion that they should change their tune because these people might become strong someday. In the end, they had arrived at the kind of argument Karen disliked most, and despite having convinced everyone, she sighed deeply. She had wanted to say that people deserved respect even if they weren’t strong, even if they had no chance of ever becoming so.
Still, to settle this situation, she should probably wrap things up at this point. A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. Stairs were meant to be climbed one step at a time. Skipping two or three steps would be ideal, but it was better than stumbling and falling. At least she should be satisfied that she hadn’t ended up descending.
—Remembering the ominous image of Horst and his companions descending the ranks, Karen shuddered.
She simply hadn’t been able to ascend; Karen hadn’t descended. But perhaps Karen had done something irreversible.
“Then we mustn’t exclude people just because they lack magical power.”
Marian said this with an air of being convinced from the bottom of her heart.
“I’m sorry, Karen. I—no, we were wrong.”
With even a faint smile on her lips, Marian admitted her defeat.
In a sense, it was Marian’s victory.
Because from the moment she had devised this plan, this was surely the conclusion Marian had wanted to reach.
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