(Laom Discipline book)
A book that Lorina had been given as a textbook at the temple caught her eye.
‘Oh, wait…!’
The moment Lorina saw the word ‘discipline’, a solution to her troubles immediately came to her mind.
‘A Laom believer cannot marry someone who has been excommunicated from the temple, and an excommunicated person is usually kicked out of the house.’
In this country where religion was important, the nobility had to be Laom believers without exception, and those who were not Laom believers were virtually excluded from social circles.
If Elaine were excommunicated, she would not be able to marry any nobleman and would be cast out of the Newt family.
Even if, by some chance, Lark had feelings for Elaine, Lorina was confident that the Lark she knew wouldn’t risk losing everything for Elaine.
‘If only Elaine could be excommunicated, everything would be resolved!’
She will no longer be a saint or a chaplain and will be cast out of the Count of Lindell.
Getting rid of a woman who has become nothing is a simple matter that can be solved with just a few pennies.
Lorina’s face began to glow with joy.
‘I need to meet High Priest John!’
Lorina immediately requested an audience with John.
Fortunately, Count Dardil had been giving him many personal gifts in addition to donations, so John immediately accepted Lorina’s request.
“Oh, welcome, Saint Lorina. What brings you here in such a hurry?”
“I have an urgent favor to ask of you. It’s something that no one but you, high priest, can do for me.”
“If it’s a request from our Saintess Lorina, I must oblige. So, what is it?”
John smiled kindly, thinking that if it was a request from a saint who hadn’t yet completely shed her girlishness, it would probably be something like a trivial matter, a letter of recommendation, or permission to go out.
However, what Lorina asked with her sparkling eyes was not something to be taken lightly.
“Please…excommunicate Elaine Newt.”
“Yes? Just now, you said excommunicate? Did I hear that correctly?”
“Yes.”
John was speechless for a while and just stared blankly at Lorina.
Lorina, who had expected that, lowered her voice and confessed Elaine’s ‘sins’ that she had racked her brain for days.
“That girl…is a witch. Not only did she hide the fact that she was a witch and lived off Newt, but she also became a saint. This is no different from deceiving God.”
“Do you have any evidence that Saint Elaine is a witch?”
“There is no evidence, but there is too much circumstantial evidence. The mother of that child was a witch. They say she bewitched Count Rubaine Newt with her magic. They say she also used the missing Newt’s Dragon Stone to gain power.”
Lorina brought up the story that Countess Newt had been blabbing about as an excuse. At the time, she wondered who would believe such a thing, but at the moment, she had to present it as the truth.
Of course, she didn’t really believe Elaine was a witch.
If Elaine was a witch, Rubaine Newt wouldn’t have just died, and Martin and Lorina wouldn’t be safe either.
But Lorina left out all that talk and started turning Elaine into a witch.
“Elaine, who inherited that blood, is trying to seduce Lark to take over the Newt family. She is trying to fulfill the dream that her mother could not.”
“Isn’t that a bit of a guess?”
“Shall I tell you something that will convince you? If that girl is not a witch, How could she have become the top scorer in the designated Chaplain exam, reciting all 65 prayer texts, in less than two years of joining the temple? Do you think that makes sense?”
Even John paused at that story.
When Elaine took first place on the chaplain exam with an unprecedentedly high score, there was quite a bit of talk in the priest’s meeting room.
However, since the oral examination for reciting the prayers was conducted under strict supervision, there was no chance of cheating—especially for someone like Elaine, who lacked the resources to bribe the examiners.
“Well, that’s true, but it’s not entirely impossible…”
“Then what about this? At the meeting to select a chaplain, the Count of Lindell family chose Elaine, who was not chosen by anyone else. Do you think that Count Lindell’s family has a reason to take an illegitimate child as a chaplain?”
“hmm…”
“That’s because Elaine had already been captivating even Count Lindell’s son with her charms. Sergey Lindell, who never spoke to any of the other young ladies, came to the temple to see Elaine. And you must have heard the rumor about who he brought as his partner at the imperial banquet at the end of last year, right?”
That was actually stranger than Elaine getting the top score in the chaplain exam.
The Lindel family heir, a man of immense wealth and handsome, had not only sponsored Elaine but also brought her as his partner to the banquet. It defied all logic.
It was a situation that made no sense to anyone.
“Thanks to that, Elaine was able to greet His Royal Highness the Crown Prince and His Royal Highness the Crown Princess. How can we guarantee that they won’t be Elaine’s next target?”
Faced with Lorina’s relentless arguments, John began nodding.
“Well, it was really strange.”
“Look at everything Elaine has gained. How on earth did she get it if she wasn’t a witch? She has no money, no power, no reputation, no great looks or eloquence.”
As John’s expression grew more and more serious, Lorina added with a triumphant smile.
“And you know what? Count Rubaine Newt died falling down the stairs.”
“Oh, I heard about it.”
“It was on the stairs leading to the third-floor attic.”
“And what’s special about that location?”
“That attic is the room Elaine lived in.”
John’s face was filled with horror.
After hearing that, it seems even stranger if Elaine isn’t a witch.
“I will immediately send a priest with divine powers to determine whether she is a witch!”
But Lorina, who knew full well that Elaine was not a witch, did not want a fair trial.
“She might not be affected by the witch detection. If she was an ordinary witch, she would have already been caught in the divine power barrier of the Pavelo Temple.”
“Ah…!”
If Elaine really used her magic to take first place in the chaplain exam and used her charm on Sergey Lindell, whom she first saw in the temple, she would have been caught in a divine power barrier. No, she should have been unable to use her magic before that because of the barrier.
However, John, caught up in Lorina’s seemingly logical conversation while creating a serious atmosphere, couldn’t even think of such a simple thought.
Lorina pressed John harder, preventing him from thinking deeply.
“But with such clear evidence, should we just let her go just because she passed the witch identification test?”
“But we can’t excommunicate a saint without a witch test or concrete evidence. I also have to consider the Vatican’s scrutiny…’
“Oh my God! You’re so pure-hearted, High Priest. The answer has already been given, and if you just need evidence, then all you have to do is create the evidence, right?”
Lorina’s eyes were shining more passionately than ever.
“More than anything, if Elaine is excommunicated, the image of the Lindell family will suffer, and that will be good for His Highness the Prince. Then, neither Empress Habron nor His Highness the Prince will ignore the efforts of the High Priest.”
Lorina, who already knew that John was on Sasha’s side, even stimulated his lust for power.
But John was no fool when it came to his own gains.
“Hehehe, well, we’ll have to wait and see…Even Count Dardil’s family wouldn’t just let it go, right?”
“Oh my God! What do you mean, Your Highness? I don’t quite understand.”
For a moment, John’s brow furrowed.
But Lorina, as if she had been waiting for that, took out a small velvet pouch from her pocket and handed it to John.
“What is this?”
John, who had been looking suspicious, opened that and smiled.
It contained four silver ingots, which were often used in temples and could easily be converted into cash.
“I am giving this to you ‘anonymously’ in the hopes that it will be used for a good cause. I would like to ‘donate’ more in the future.”
“Ahaha! I see. ‘Anonymous’! Oh, by the way, what I said earlier was that I hope that Count Dardill will continue to remain faithful.”
“Ah, I see. I’m sorry. I’m still a young child, so I couldn’t immediately understand your profound meaning.”
The two exchanged words that sounded like lines from a play and shared a knowing look.
With that, Lorina’s ‘request for excommunication’ became a ‘report of the witch’, and turned John’s task from a “private excommunicate” into a “righteous act.”
* * *
The girl is actively trying to get away from you and your response is to drag her back to your life. The mental gymnastics is beyond the moon at this point.