Chapter 44. Raphael’s Prayer
“Ugh! Hoo. I feel like I drank cognac all day. My stomach is a mess.”
Michael’s eyes looked hollow as he glared at the slowly closing portal.
It was not a properly functioning portal.
He had forcibly torn open a hole in space, so he had been unable to control the destination.
There had also been the risk of unknown side effects.
Still, I had to do it.
Michael had discovered something important enough to justify the risk.
Fortunately, he had escaped Glasya-Labolas’s mirror safely.
The only side effect was mild nausea.
It was already fading.
“Grrrrrk.”
Hearing a strange groan from below, Michael finally noticed the uncomfortable feeling against his hand.
He removed his hand and looked at the demon beneath him.
It was a huge mass of muscle with its face buried in the ground, twitching violently.
Somehow, it looked familiar.
“Hmm? This person… no, it’s a demon.”
The body was so covered in muscle that Michael could not identify who it was.
He had no interest in some demon lying beneath him anyway.
Understanding where he had landed was far more important.
Michael looked around.
“Grrrrr!”
“HISSS!”
“Squeak squeak!!”
Animals bared their teeth threateningly.
There was the demon Michael was sitting on.
Most importantly, Sia was once again being carried away by rats.
Seeing the strange sight of rats forming a moving platform beneath a person, Michael finally understood what had happened.
“…I landed in the right place.”
Now he knew he had not mistaken what he saw through Glasya-Labolas’s mirror.
“So I really didn’t see it wrong.”
What Michael had seen was holy aura spreading outward.
The aura had felt similar to the power released whenever he activated the Authority of Destruction.
There was only one possible conclusion.
“Lady Helena has awakened.”
Michael possessed three Holy Relic crosses.
Their official name was the Crosses of Helena.
Naturally, the authority contained inside them would feel similar to Helena’s aura.
And that power had come from Sia.
“You’re telling me that idiot is Lady Helena in this life?”
From the first moment they met, Michael had thought Sia was too foolish and strange to ever be Helena.
Yet as if directly rejecting his conclusion, a glowing cross-shaped mark remained on the back of Sia’s hand.
A stigma.
“The stigma is already disappearing, so it doesn’t look like a complete awakening. Did it unconsciously activate because she was in danger?”
Michael could no longer sense Helena’s aura from Sia.
He had only felt it while watching through the mirror.
That meant it was probably closer to a partial awakening.
“GRAAAAAAAGH!!!!”
At that moment, the demon beneath Michael started violently struggling.
The sudden movement made Michael lose his balance.
CRUNCH!
“Stay still.”
Michael stomped down on the demon that could not even properly perform its job as a chair.
The demon continued convulsing.
However, a new voice suddenly came from it.
“Guh… P, Priest.”
It was clearly a human voice.
Moreover, the man spoke as though he recognized Michael as a priest.
Michael suddenly remembered the battle between Sia and the demon he had seen through the mirror.
“Ah. I almost didn’t recognize you. So it was you.”
Only then did Michael realize the muscular demon was Yeonhwa’s father.
When someone lost control of their body to a demon, there were usually two possibilities.
Some people completely lost their memories.
Others shared fragmented memories with the possessing demon.
Yeonhwa’s father belonged to the second group.
Michael removed his foot and tilted his head.
“But is this even possible? Demonization progressed this far, yet the human regained control?”
A human had taken back control while being dominated by demons.
Normally, that should have been impossible.
Then a theory flashed through Michael’s mind.
Helena’s aura.
Helena’s holy aura had swept through Yeonhwa’s father.
That must have weakened the demons’ control over him.
There’s probably another reason too.
Even with that, there had to be an opportunity for the human to reclaim control.
Michael turned toward the place where he could faintly sense aura.
That was the direction Heesong and Yeonhwa had gone.
Rub, rub.
Just as Michael expected, Heesong was purifying the mirror she had taken from Yeonhwa.
Her expression was more tense than usual.
She wiped the mirror with a cloth soaked in holy water.
Then she drew a cross over its smooth surface using salt.
“This should be enough as a temporary measure.”
A full purification ritual would require more tools.
For now, this was the best she could do.
Heesong made the sign of the cross with her finger and began praying.
“I, Veronica, child of God, appeal to Saint Raphael the Archangel….”
Raphael, Archangel of healing and purification.
As Heesong recited his prayer, a soft peach-colored aura rose from her body.
“Saint Raphael, arrow and medicine of God’s love, I ask you to make transparent the evil dwelling within this object and preserve it forever,”
Rattle! Rattle!
The peach-colored aura slowly moved and wrapped around the mirror.
The mirror repeatedly trembled as if resisting.
Even though Heesong’s ritual was only temporary, that reaction proved it was working.
Encouraged, Heesong continued the prayer.
“Saint Raphael, together with the angels under your command, help us and pray for us!”
As the prayer reached its end, bubbles began rising from the mirror.
“KIEEEEEK!!”
A horrible metallic screech filled the air.
The moment the peach-colored aura completely covered the mirror, the sound abruptly stopped.
Then,
Splash!
A black hand made of demonic energy suddenly burst from the seemingly calm mirror and reached for Heesong.
“Amen!”
Heesong finished her prayer without panicking.
The peach-colored aura instantly surrounded even the black hand and turned it into bubbles.
After the purification finished, Michael could no longer sense any demonic energy from the mirror.
“It should be okay now. Leave your father to me.”
Heesong gently stroked the unconscious Yeonhwa’s forehead.
She took the mirror, covered Yeonhwa with her outer jacket, then ran back toward Sia.
“The demonic energy from the mirror disappeared. Was that the bug woman’s doing?”
Michael’s question was answered.
When the mirror was purified, the connected demons were also damaged.
That had weakened them enough for Yeonhwa’s father to regain control.
“Guuuh! Priest. I, I have a request.”
Apparently, the battle for control between the human and the demons was still happening inside his body.
