# Reassembly of Faith (5)
Erpen Adamberta.
The time he had spent among humans, having left the elves' residential area behind, totaled three hundred years.
Over that long stretch of time, he had arrived at a single conclusion about humanity.
— They are rationally foolish.
At first, even he had thought humans were simply foolish in a straightforward way.
They felled giant trees that had lived for a century just to make a chair.
They sold their friends for a handful of gold coins.
Their patients would refuse rest and go back to work the very next day, letting their illness worsen.
But as those years passed — ten, twenty, a hundred at a time — Erpen had no choice but to revise that opinion.
They felled the giant tree.
To enjoy their power to its fullest within a short life that wouldn't even last a hundred years.
They sold their friends.
So that the gold could make their families more prosperous.
They returned to work the very next day after treatment.
Because their bodies would fail them soon enough anyway, and they wanted to put one more coin in their children's hands.
Through those countless cases, Erpen came to understand why humans behaved as they did.
It wasn't that their vision was narrow.
Unlike elves, who lived for what was nearly an eternity, their lifespans were short — and so, within those brief lives, in order to enjoy and pass on as much as possible, they made choices that were rational in a different way from elves.
And now, at this moment.
Erpen could not help but sigh as he looked at yet another foolish, rational human before him.
"Germ theory is... a far too dangerous theory. It may bring harm to the prestige of the Order."
"...This doesn't seem like the sort of conversation to be had standing in a hallway. Let us find a better place."
The two made their way out of the auditorium and toward the reception room that had been assigned to the Mencia Sect.
Inside the reception room.
While they waited for tea, Erpen spoke first.
"Archbishop Dormund... the prestige of the Order, you say. What do you mean by that?"
"Surely you understand. If it comes to light that the Saint's germs were the true cause of disease all along, the public will demand the Order take responsibility for every treatment carried out until now."
Dormund turned his rosary over between his fingers.
"Humanity today barely manages to breathe, caught between the darkness beyond the Black Iron Wall and the poverty within it. In an era as dark as this, should we not avoid anything that might cause the Order's prestige to crumble?"
"..."
Erpen regarded the aged priest without a word.
The ash-colored eyes of an elf who had lived for centuries moved slowly across the face of the priest appealing to him.
After a long moment of consideration, the elf spoke.
"So you're saying we should keep silent?"
"That would be ideal. But the flow of the times cannot be stopped — surely you know that. So I am only asking that we delay it. Ten years, or perhaps fifteen. With your help, Lord Erpen, it would be well within our reach."
Erpen gave a slow nod.
Erpen was the second-in-command of the Adamberta Sect.
And the Dormund standing before him was the third-in-command of the Mencia Sect.
If the two of them joined hands and persuaded the elder-rank priests, delaying the public announcement of germ theory would be no great task.
"I see. Fifteen years — that would indeed be an appropriate length of time for people to grow ready to accept it."
The expression on Dormund's face brightened considerably.
But the cold voice that followed from Erpen made Dormund's complexion stiffen.
"Fifteen years. That would be just enough time for you to retire and be sufficiently forgotten by the public."
"..."
The rosary bead stilled between Dormund's fingers.
His dry lips parted and closed twice, struggling to shape some defense.
What little reason remained held him back, telling him that anything he said before the living history of the healing arts would be nothing more than an excuse.
Silence fell between the two men.
From somewhere far beyond the corridor, the lone call of a late-returning dove drifted into the room, the only sound to fill it.
"Lord... Erpen..."
Dormund finally wrested his voice out to break the silence.
But the elf raised a hand lightly, stopping his words.
As if to say: do not make yourself any uglier than this.
"Do not misunderstand. I am not here to reproach you. I can imagine what it must feel like to watch everything built over a lifetime of theology and doctrine collapse before your eyes."
Erpen's gaze rested briefly on the back of Dormund's hand.
The blue veins raised beneath thin skin hinted at how much time remained to Dormund.
"If my own lifespan were as short as yours, I might have made the same choice. The wish to protect one's final sliver of honor is a primal desire that belongs to all living things."
And that was precisely why it grieved him all the more.
Even after three hundred years, Erpen had more than a hundred yet to come.
But the man before him had fewer than ten years left as an active healer.
"Even so, I still have far too many patients left to see. The knowledge that remains to be discovered piles up like a mountain. And so I cannot give you those fifteen years."
Sip.
Erpen drank a single mouthful of the tea that had finally arrived, then rose to his feet.
Click.
The sharp sound of his cold shoe heels stopped at the door.
"Archbishop Dormund."
"..."
"Do not cling too tightly to the years gone by. Even I cast aside three hundred years of my own. Pride and lust for power are separated by a paper-thin difference. It all comes down to what one is willing to let go of."
The elf tipped his hat slightly and left his final words.
"There are times when one must learn to let go of reason and simply empty oneself. You are a sturdier person than you believe yourself to be."
With those words, Erpen set his hat on his head and left the room.
— Click.
The door shut.
Left alone in the reception room, Dormund stared down at his teacup in silence for a long while.
Dormund Mencia.
From birth, with his family's support behind him, he had risen to the rank of high-rank healer at an unusually young age.
And after over a decade of that —
he now stood as third-in-command of the Sect, the position of Cardinal nearly within reach.
To let go of what he held now, after all this time — the cost of everything accumulated was simply too dear.
Having steeled his heart, Dormund murmured toward the empty air.
"Forgive me, Lord Erpen."
His fingertips trembled.
"I forgot how to open my clenched fist when I was still a newborn."
A short life, in the end.
The star within reach shone far too brightly to give up.
***
Several days had passed since the germ theory presentation.
During that time, daily life hadn't changed in any particularly dramatic way.
The public went about their days without the faintest idea that some new hypothesis was making the rounds in the field of healing arts.
Which was, perhaps, entirely expected.
Germ theory was still premature to be shared with the general public.
Not because people wouldn't be able to accept germs as a concept.
'Before making the antibiotic, I decided to keep knowledge of germs limited to elder-rank healers.'
Because this was a world where germs could be misused.
Think about it.
This was a world where black magicians, without the first idea of what actually caused smallpox, went around spreading Curses of Pestilence using pus as a catalyst — guided by nothing more than rules of thumb built from experience.
Sharing the knowledge of how to find and cultivate germs in a world like that?
'If some lunatic started scattering anthrax bacillus around, it would be the end of humanity that very day.'
It was a good thing people didn't know yet.
Knowledge of germs was, for the general public, knowledge that carried a certain level of danger.
Which was why the plan had been to make the announcement only after the antibiotic was completed.
'That was the arrangement I made with Teacher as well.'
As a result, the field of healing arts had been thoroughly upended — but my personal daily life hadn't changed in any dramatic way.
"Letters for you, Lord Yulian."
"Thank you, Perisia."
On days when I had lectures, I stayed at the Academy.
On days I didn't, I flew out to the capital to see patients.
That cycle repeated, day after day.
If there was anything that deviated from the ordinary, it was that the number of letters arriving in my name had increased considerably.
"Lord Yulian. What shall I do with the letters from students?"
"Please sort any inquiries related to black magic separately."
"A Marquis family has sent a letter inviting you to their upcoming birthday banquet."
"I'm afraid I'll be too busy that day. Please convey my regrets."
"Understood."
Perisia, for her part, spent her days in a blur somewhere between bodyguard and secretary.
Then, one particular day.
— Blub.
The liquid in the flask bubbled up once, and a thin wisp of reddish steam curled from its surface.
I pressed the stopper firmly into the mouth of the flask to seal it, when Perisia's voice came from beyond the door.
"Lord Yulian."
"Come in."
The door opened, and the cool-featured beauty stepped inside.
Perisia, her golden hair gathered and draped over one shoulder, set a letter on the desk.
"A letter from Father Simeon."
"It seems the Order has finally reached its official stance."
A few days prior, I had asked Simeon to compile the Order's position on germ theory and send it to me.
I was busy enough as it was, and I had always been weak on news from outside the clinic.
Simeon served as the ears in the field of healing arts on my behalf.
『To Lord Schnabel.
The season grows long in the shadow of the sun. I pray that the Saint remains in good health.
As the 12 Sects' Joint Conference reached its conclusion at noon today, I write to inform you.
Of the twelve sects, ten have resolved to adopt the Saint's hypothesis as the Order's official view.』
'So in the end, two sects chose not to accept it.'
The 12 Sects all share the same roots in the healing arts, yet each has grown into something more like a separate sub-specialty pointing in a different direction.
Just as the Adamberta Sect could be compared to a hematology department, each sect had its own equivalent — neurology, orthopedics, otolaryngology, and so on.
According to Simeon's letter, two of those sects had decided not to accept germ theory.
'Which ones?'
『The two sects that ultimately did not raise their hands were Mencia and Lafavre.』
Mencia and Lafavre.
The infectious diseases department and obstetrics and gynecology.
'Mencia I can understand, but why Lafavre?'
That was somewhat unexpected.
They had been the most quietly reserved during the presentation.
To think that particular sect would hold out to the very end.
I filed both names in my memory and moved my eyes to the next line.
『Mencia is a sect that has long taught that plagues are divine punishment.
Each time a plague broke out, they cried out for repentance and gathered offerings — and to them, the existence of germs, which denies the concept of divine punishment, is believed to be something they cannot easily accept.』
A gently worded sentence, but the meaning it carried was sharp.
— Those gentlemen who made a tidy profit off prayer meetings for repentance and witch hunts every time a plague broke out apparently find it hard to let go.
That was roughly what it meant.
『The Lafavre Sect appears to fear confronting the wrongs they have committed until now.
The moment it is established that germs are the cause of postpartum fever, they will face the full force of protests from nobles across the empire.』
Oh, my.
An understandable reason, that.
Even nobility was no defense against puerperal fever.
Broadly speaking, assuming a high-rank healer was stationed and on standby in advance, the odds of a noble lady losing her life before or after childbirth ran at roughly ten percent.
If a healer missed the golden time or a sudden premature birth occurred, the death rate leapt to fifty percent.
It wasn't without reason that characters like Cinderella in fairy tales and romance fantasy novels started the story with a dead mother.
And the Lafavre Sect was, for the most part, a sect that dedicated its research to secret techniques of healing puerperal fever through Heal.
But if it came to light that germs caused puerperal fever — and that it was effectively the Lafavre Sect that had been spreading those germs all along...
'The aftermath would be no small thing.'
Before anyone even got around to debating right and wrong, they'd be getting dragged to the guillotine.
It was hardly easy to support germ theory knowing they'd have to weather that, I supposed.
'So in the end, both the Mencia Sect and the Lafavre Sect have decided to stay behind in the past.'
A regrettable thing.
The reason I had announced germ theory now wasn't simply to lay the groundwork for developing the antibiotic.
To bring distinguished healers together in that infirmary, there had been a need to shatter the long-standing paradigm of the healing arts once.
I had needed to instill a sense of crisis — a fear of being left behind if they kept the sect's doors locked shut forever.
But these two sects had chosen to stay where they were rather than move with the flow of the times.
'The Mencia Sect in particular is a regret.'
My feelings about the Mencia Sect were complex, in multiple ways.
As a son, they were a shameless lot who had tried to strip away my parents' research — but seen through the eyes of a single doctor, they were simply a sect that had done its best by the standards of the age.
And so the fact that they had failed to read the flow of the times saddened me — yet at the same time, I found it somehow fitting.
"...Two sects voted against it. What do you intend to do about these two?"
Perisia, having received and read the letter herself, seemed to share a similar impression to mine.
"I don't intend to do anything to them. Only — it seems they will be difficult to walk alongside."
I had no intention of putting any particular pressure on the Mencia Sect.
There were innocent healers within it, too, and those people had simply done their best within their positions.
But by the same token, I had no intention of extending a hand to them either.
Hearing that, Perisia could not conceal her regret.
"To be blinded by past glory... If they had only waited a single month."
"Indeed."
Perisia's gaze drifted to the flask on my desk, the one filled with the red dye.
And beside the flask, a white rat was squeaking as it padded in circles inside its cage.
"And to think the antibiotic has finally been completed..."
What a regrettable thing.
One month.
If they had accepted germ theory and waited just one month, the Mencia Sect could have earned a louder voice than any other sect in existence.
But I had no intention of giving them that opportunity now.
"Perisia. Let's reach out to the Adamberta Sect."
"Whom should I contact?"
"Archbishop Erpen happened to propose a joint research arrangement. We'll reach out through them."
If the infectious diseases department didn't want to handle antibiotics, there wasn't much to be done about it.
The only option was to supply the antibiotic to the Adamberta Sect — the sect most likely to make frequent use of it, at any rate.