The Nippon Budokan in Tokyo’s Chiyoda-ku was a massive building.
Its large roof, with its octagonal shape, was reminiscent of the base of Mount Fuji.
It had to be something like a hundred feet tall.
The Chiyodaku Kingdom’s cathedral had completely repurposed the building inside and out.
The three of us entered through the west entrance…
“Tsukasa, Laman, over here!”
I guided them as I ran ahead.
When I had infiltrated the church as a new member, I had come to the cathedral almost every day. I had a good sense of the geography.
But…
“What is this, an obstacle?”
In the path, a barricade of tables and chairs had been suddenly set up in our way.
And…
“Akky! Behind you!”
As soon as I turned around to my sister’s voice, there was a huge rumbling sound like falling rubble.
Someone had set up the road behind us to be blocked and covered with rubble.
“He really doesn’t want anyone but us showing up.”
I realized that we had been isolated from the outside.
Then there was a sudden bzzzt! as the lights went out. Everything was pitch black.
“This seems like something the high priest’s son would think up. Secretly setting up traps for us to fall into.”
As he spoke, the old hero raised his hands and began generating a fireball.
“I’ll burn it all. We can simply smoke him out.”
His dependable figure was illuminated by the light of his flames.
But we were here to conduct a trial.
“Wait, Laman.”
I took the Shard of Judgment out of my pocket as I spoke.
“We don’t need to smoke him out. We’ll bring the courtroom to us!” I grabbed Tsukasa’s hand. “Stay close.”
“Got it!” she answered as she clung to me. Her soft, warm body was pressed up against mine.
Okay, not that close…
But I didn’t have time to poke fun at her right now.
“We’re not letting Gilvert get away!”
Open the court session? YES / NO
Faced with the text floating in the air before me, I forcefully tapped YES.
Rrrrrrrrrrrumble…
The ground began to shake and rumble. The cathedral’s ground, walls, and ceiling all took on the appearance of a wriggling liquid.
This was the Judgment Spell’s basic ability: the Trial Spell.
The Scales of Judgment appeared, and me and Tsukasa were suddenly wearing court robes.
A window that had popped up beside me was displaying Courtroom Auto-Generation Mode and a mini map of the area.
With this, we’ll be able to see the high priest’s location.
The mini map allowed us to know who was where in relation to the trial. But something about the current display had me dumbfounded.
“There are ten thousand people in the gallery…”
The map displayed a donut shape that was composed of people, with an open space in the middle. The number of people in the gallery was over ten thousand.
The wall before us opened up. And what we saw…
“Akky… What on earth is this?!”
Church members, more church members, and more and more…
Inside the cathedral, the arena seating on the first and second floors had over ten thousand seats.
Every single seat was filled with a church member wearing a white robe and holding a candle.
In the darkness, we were surrounded by thousands of floating faces, illuminated by the candle flames. Not a single one of them made a sound.
But something was off. More than being mystical or mysterious, the sight was eerie.
“Court of Divine Punishment—commence trial.”
A voice echoed around us. I knew instantly it was the high priest.
Rrrrrumble…
The sound of another transformation began accelerating.
Damn it, so this is his strategy? This is bad…
We were on the enemy base. The smell of the tallow of the candles combined with the damp air made me feel like I was inside the belly of a beast. The Holy Scourge hadn’t been the only sacred artifact in his possession…
Swoosh—the sound of something cutting through the air. Then next to me:
“Graaagh!” The old hero groaned.
“Laman!”
The fireball he had been generating over us was snuffed out, and in an instant Laman was dragged away and disappeared into the darkness.
This must have been the work of the Holy Scourge. I had forgotten that Laman’s defense was his weak spot.
“Arson,” said the high priest. “I see you are attempting to light fire to my cathedral, reckless old man. Someone as obsolete as you has no place here today.”
“Hmph, I see you take after your father, Gilvert!” said Laman. “You love looking down on people.”
“Oh, what a pitiable sight. A foolish old man, who believes his wife and friends died in an accident, crawling around and howling like an animal.”
The high priest’s response made me do a double take.
Wait, does the high priest know the true cause of the Hero’s Party Homicide Case?
The case, in which three people had died, still had some suspicious points surrounding it. If the man with Black Scales who attacked the hero right before the incident was connected to the high priest, we might be able to find out the truth through him.
“What?! Are you saying that you know the cause of the fire that killed Fiona—? Guh, urgh!”
But it sounded like the high priest had restrained the Hero without giving him an answer.
“After this is over, I’ll sentence you to death for the crime of humiliating my father.”
“Damn it, where are you?! You’ve got no right to—”
“Ah, how good it feels to judge the people!”
“Show yourself, Gilvert!”
But the one who responded to my demand was not the high priest.
The Scales of Judgment floating above our heads started moving heavily toward the center of the sky above us.
There sat another set of scales—the one generated by the high priest.
The two scales began to combine in the air.
The floor shifted. Tsukasa staggered with a yelp; I felt her body that I was holding close to me getting hotter.
Tsukasa has already passed her limit. I need to do something about him while protecting her.
As I decided this, the floor under us moved and brought us over to the middle of the arena.
“All men are not created equal. Man creates man above man itself.”
Gilvert Trinity stood in the arena and spoke as if spellbound.
“Those who stand above others and judge humanity cannot be allowed to make mistakes. Only he who is absolutely righteous may conduct trials for this kingdom.”
The ten thousand people in the gallery all agreed with Gilvert in unison: “The high priest’s words are right and just.”
“You and Tsukasa are not the same.”
The words rushed out of me, without thinking.
“High Priest Gilvert Trinity…your righteousness is corrupt.”
In my arms, I held Tsukasa’s feverish young body, drenched in sweat.
Even if the whole world turned against us, I would protect her.
“How foolish. There’s no way some average young boy summoned from another world could even begin to understand the will of our God in this world. Yet you make such gross accusations.”
The head of the church was surrounded by his followers as far as the eye could see.
“I am God’s proxy. These two hands are the sacred hands of God. It is unthinkable that they could be sullied by evil deeds…”
He spoke, opening his hands, which glowed bluish-white with luminol.
“You poor, unenlightened Japanese people. Allow me to teach you the error of your ways. To doubt the proxy of God is a sin.”
Bwonnng—a set of huge golden scales had appeared above our heads.
The pans were about the size of a house; each one hovered above my and the high priest’s heads.
And under that, black text was displayed:
Accused: Akuto Satou, Tsukasa Wagatsuma
Charge: Blasphemy
“I hereby sentence the brother and sister to death,” Gilvert announced.
Then the words Verdict: Death Penalty appeared.
I had never heard of blasphemy being a punishable crime. Gilvert must have made this up himself.
A crap trial following crap laws. But still…
The gallery didn’t show any signs of doubt. All I could see were nods of agreement toward the high priest.
“The Shards of Judgment are fragments of what used to be whole. Since ancient times, when the holders of a divided sacred artifact were in conflict with each other, a decision would be made to determine the true holder.”
The high priest, being knowledgeable about the nature of the sacred artifacts, must have deduced how the Judgment Spell would act in a situation like this.
“Based on the system of the Scales of Judgment, the one to settle the dispute would be a third party: the gallery.”
In my arms, Tsukasa whispered, “What is that? It looks so gross…”
She was staring above us where black particles were swirling in the air. They had been emitted from the gallery members’ bodies.
“Ah, what a beautiful sight…a black ballot to determine the sinner,” said the high priest. “Let us call this decision the Trial of the Great Scales.”
Each body in the gallery produced a black particle, which moved up toward the pans of the scales.
“Now, my most devout disciples, tell us who it is that must be judged.”
As if responding to his call, the black particles all flew over to our side of the scales.
C-creeeak—it sounded like the whole world was creaking as the Great Scales began to tip.
“O sinners, come from afar from otherworld Japan. You will be punished!”
In the center of the arena, the high priest folded his hands as if in prayer.
“PUNISH! PUNISH! PUNISH! PUNISH! PUNISH!”
The church members surrounding us began to chant together.
I thought I heard a familiar voice—but there was nothing I could do about it right now.
I hadn’t expected there to be so many… This will take some time to reverse.
I wouldn’t be able to quickly reverse all ten thousand people’s brainwashing while standing here in front of the high priest.
As for the punishment…I guessed being deemed the “sinners” here meant that we would have our bodies transformed so that we could never again stand in the courtroom.
But that wasn’t all. This was the church headquarters. The high priest would add us to the Purgatorial List and have us brought to the Compost Room and turned into soil.
What would happen to the kingdom after that? If it were up to the church, the princess, Ileana, and anyone who helped spread foreign culture could be deemed sinners as well. Or maybe he would simply brainwash them, too.
I was overwhelmed with imagining the most hopeless outcome. Just then—
“Akky, look!”
Where Tsukasa was pointing, I saw one lone red particle floating in the air.
“The Rust of Doubt.”
With even just one particle of the Rust of Doubt present, the tipping of the Great Scales had started to slow.
“Whose is it?!”
The high priest raised his voice as he walked over to the red particle. In the seats surrounding us, there in the front row of the first floor of seats…