Several days later, Zenjirou returned to Capua, albeit later than originally planned. Soon after his arrival, he found himself speaking with Aura in their living room. The upheaval in their plans had made it unclear when he would get back, so his safe return had led Aura to cancel all of her official duties for the day and head back to the inner palace herself.
While part of that was concern for her beloved spouse, it was also the correct thing to do as the country’s queen. Although the events might be unfolding on the distant Northern Continent, she needed specifics as quickly as possible.
As soon as Aura had sat down opposite him, Zenjirou launched into an explanation. “Honestly, the information I can give you isn’t much different from what Yngvi already relayed. There wasn’t anything new over the following days.”
It was an obvious fact, but outside of a few exceptions, information traveled extremely slowly in this world. Zenjirou had teleported himself to Logfort to fulfill the king’s request, but there was no new information there. It made sense; the information was coming from the middle of the continent, so it would struggle to get all the way to the northernmost reaches in just a few days.
“Yet it still seems you have news to report?” Aura prompted him, her eyes sharp.
Zenjirou’s face remained stiff as he answered. “I do. It might be too little time for information to come from overseas, but it was plenty of time for conversations to happen within the country. The local leaders have compiled a list of predictions for what will happen next. Priest Yan and the church—in this case, the Church of the Claw, which arrested him—will both refuse to concede, and he will be executed according to their traditions.”
His voice shook as he spoke. It had been several years since he had come to this world, but his views on life and death were still the norm for modern Japan. He didn’t have the nerve to remain calm when he heard that someone he knew had been arrested and would likely be executed. It was only Aura and him there, so he didn’t have to feign strength or endure alone. It would be worse than pointless to do it, it would be detrimental. Aura wouldn’t misunderstand the kind of man he was.
“Hm, that is far from pleasant. I understand why the church would not concede, but it makes less sense to me why Priest Yan would not when execution is the consequence. Does that mean the church is forcing the execution by making unreasonable demands?”
The dialogue could have been meant to create a veneer of acceptability, but the demands being something the priest could not meet would make execution the only option. Such events were by no means a rarity in the political world that Aura had spent her life in.
Despite the queen’s feeling that this could be one of those instances, Zenjirou shook his head after a moment. “No. Assuming that Uppasala is correct, at least, the church would accept either outcome. If anything, they might prefer to persuade him.”
He then began to explain the circumstances. Yan had publicly called the church’s methods wrong, challenging the very basis of their faith. The church had previously condemned him and ordered him to follow the will of the church as a whole, but he had used his positions both within the institution and the university to circumvent that, as criticism of the status quo was allowed through academic research.
His arrest was due to the church finally having had enough and forcing the matter. It was likely a difficult decision even for them. Yan was both a priest and the dean of the dracology department, so many people respected him. Executing him would certainly cause pushback. Therefore, having him publicly admit that he was wrong was their ideal outcome rather than his execution.
Of course, even then, there would still be pushback based on the church forcing him to change his position. But threat or no, compromising would hugely weaken his stance and reduce public anger.
Zenjirou’s explanation of all of that seemed to satisfy Aura.
“I see, then this priest is stubborn enough to choose death when the choices are execution or compromising his views.”
“That’s how the leaders of Uppasala see it.”
“What are your thoughts, Zenjirou?” she asked him.
Zenjirou recalled his meetings with the priest and eventually shook his head. “I’m not sure. I saw him as a logical, peaceful person. I couldn’t tell you whether he was so firm in his beliefs that he’d pick death over betraying those values, though. I just don’t know. I didn’t interact with him enough to be sure. Marquis Pomorskie of Złota Wolność said, ‘For better or worse, he is simultaneously like a mountain and a storm.’”
He had immediately been able to see why the lord called Yan a mountain. Large, calm, and unmoving described his personality well. The latter part hadn’t been something Zenjirou had seen personally, but the lord and priest clearly had some history, and Yan’s stubborn defiance of the church so far, coupled with Uppasala’s view that he would choose execution over compromising his beliefs, made the moniker much more likely to fit.
“I see. Still, we are too distant, so all we can do is gather information or perhaps make our move first.”
The second half of her statement was mostly Aura talking to herself, and it prompted her to fall into thought. People, goods, and information: all of those things were limited in speed, so it was extremely difficult to act decisively against a distant nation. In that respect, the teleportation that Capua possessed could be considered unfair, although there were limits on the number of times it could be used, the number of people it could act upon, and the destinations it could reach, so it was not an absolute trump card.
That meant that, as Aura had just said, interfering with chaos and conflict in distant countries meant they had to assume their predictions were correct to some degree and strike preemptively. After all, Zenjirou or Aura could go to and from a place and collect information within a few days, but for anyone else, teleportation would be a one-way trip.
Zenjirou knew that she was talking to herself and quietly waited to hear what she had to say. Eventually, she had thought everything over and spoke.
“Now that I think about it, you mentioned a mercenary by the same name. You spoke rather highly of him as a commander and said that he was concerned for the priest. How would he react, do you think?”
It made sense to be more concerned with the free and strong fighter than the already arrested priest. Uppasala had spent more time focusing on the mercenary’s actions than the priest’s.
“The church kept details like that in mind as well. They carried out the arrest when Commander Yan had finished his contract with Princess Anna of the commonwealth and was on his way to see the priest.”
“I see. So they kept damage to a minimum.”
The mercenary had been hired by Princess Anna of Złota Wolność and had practically been their commander in chief for the battle of Tannenwald. The battle itself had ended in the commonwealth’s victory, and once Yan had dealt with the aftermath, his contract had ended and the church had picked that moment to strike.
As Zenjirou said, that showed just how seriously the church was taking him. If they had waited until after the mercenary had reunited with the priest, they would not have captured the priest so easily. Conversely, if they had attempted it while Yan was still in the princess’s employ, he would have taken his forces and potentially rescued the priest.