WeTried Translations
Translator: [IncomeElastic]
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◈ I Became an Undetected Priest Impersonator ◈
Chapter 29
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I Became a Teacher (3)
Sean, whose skull had been caved in, shot to his feet the moment the treatment finished and boasted triumphantly.
"Priest! Listen to this! I took down three of them!"
-Whoa! 3 kills 1 death? I'd have been proud of that too!
At that, the goddess murmured in admiration.
My own reaction was simple.
"..I'll have to stop by the Earth Church soon."
-Ah, noooo!
The goddess's scream burst out.
But the goddess wasn't the only one who needed a scolding.
"No more Stone Fights from now on."
"Huh?"
"Think about how shocked the innkeeper must have been."
But Sean's next answer left me speechless for a moment.
"Mom actually encouraged it, though?"
‘..This won't be easy.’
Then I noticed something off and asked back, a beat too late.
"Wait, you took down three?"
"Uh.. maybe four? We were throwing each other at the end so it's kind of fuzzy, but it might've been four."
The number had actually gone up.
But it wasn't the higher number that raised my question.
It was that many people had been hurt, yet Sean was the only patient brought in.
The reason became clear soon enough.
"Strange that there are so few patients?"
"It is puzzling."
"Those lunatics just think of the clinic as some kind of respawn point, that's all."
"..?"
It wasn't hard to guess what that meant.
It meant there was no reason for them to come to the clinic until they'd passed out.
-Tsk, so that's 0 kills 1 death in the end?
The goddess's disappointed voice drifted by quietly.
I couldn't bring myself to agree, and only sighed.
"..Please look after Priest Malja. I'll go to the scene."
But it seemed to have sounded graver than I'd intended.
The reactions of the people listening turned oddly solemn.
"..Priest Flowie, please come back alive."
"If you put it that way, it sounds like I'm going off to war. Stop it."
"Come back safe and sound, without getting hurt."
"Not you too, Priest Margaret. As if I'm going to my death."
"It's a death trap, that's why I'm saying it. When citizens get hurt, we can just treat them, but when a priest gets hurt, who's going to treat us?"
"…"
It was a fair point, and I had no choice but to shut my mouth.
The city square I arrived at looked nothing like it had in the daytime.
The factions had split apart and shouts flew back and forth, while the citizens hurled stones as if they'd turned themselves into catapults.
On top of that, the stalls that had definitely been selling bread and vegetables until morning now had baskets of stones set out on them, for some reason, complete with price tags.
"Did you come to enjoy it too, Priest? Here, take some stones! For you, Priest, I'll give them free!"
The one offering me a basket of stones was a merchant with a familiar face.
This was the greengrocer who always threw in something extra whenever I did my shopping.
"I'm fine."
When I declined the stones, the merchant looked puzzled.
Then the merchant seemed to guess the reason and put on a sheepish look.
"Ah! Did you come to treat the injured participants, by any chance?"
Treatment was a secondary matter.
"..No. I came to end this war."
At that same moment, a dazzling light that lit up the surroundings filled the square.
The people who'd been injured and slumped on the ground recovered and pushed themselves to their feet.
"The festival is over. Please go home."
The reactions of the citizens who witnessed the almost awe-inspiring sight were, on the whole, the same.
"Whaaat?! So now even if our heads get cracked open, the Priest will bring us back?"
"Go get the kids too, right now! It's a Stone Fight party!"
The citizens actually cheered.
It was quite different from what I'd expected, that they'd be afraid in the face of a miracle and leave obediently.
I couldn't help being overwhelmed by the citizens.
‘..Isn't this practically setting the stage for them?’
Faced with madness, all I could do was rescue the children.
Of course, the children didn't react much differently from the citizens.
"Aww, Priest, can't we just throw stones and play? I want to throw some too."
"Throwing stones will only get you hurt. Let's find a more wholesome game."
"But Knight Charlotte also strongly encouraged it, saying it helps with defense training! And Knight Charlotte throws stones super well!"
‘Haa.. Lotte, I mean, Sir Charlotte.’
My head was spinning a little, but thanks to that I could understand.
‘So it's a kind of training and play in one.’
No wonder the citizens didn't care even in the face of a miracle of faith they usually feared.
For the citizens, the Stone Fight wasn't just a barbaric event but a game closer to siege-defense training.
On top of that, from the standpoint of the Lord and the knights, the citizens were training of their own accord, so if anything they'd encourage it, with no reason to stop it.
That was the reason Priest Margaret had kept failing to abolish the Stone Fight all this time.
‘In other words, even I can't abolish the Stone Fight, huh.’
I fell into thought for a moment.
No matter how I thought about it, no way to abolish it came to mind.
But I could at least come up with a means of gradually reducing it.
I'd found a clue in my memories of the past.
‘The key is providing education and amusement that even the Lord would be satisfied with. This should fit that, at least well enough.’
Of course, what I remembered was closer to a scam than wholesome education.
"Everyone."
The gazes of the children fiddling with stones all gathered on me at once.
"Have you heard of something good called Talents?"
It was the moment the Talent system, once used at the church back in my hometown to reel in kids, was revived.
…
The next day.
A poster with pictures and numbers on it was hung on one wall of the church.
For the children who couldn't read, the Talent point system and the prizes had been drawn out as pictures.
Of course, small writing was also included below the pictures.
Weekend Study Class attendance: 1 point
Church service attendance: 1 point
Earth Church service attendance: 2 points
Caught taking part in a Stone Fight: minus 10 points
…
"By the way, Priest Flowie."
"What is it, Priest Malja?"
"I don't quite understand, so why is church service 1 point but Earth Church service 2 points?"
It was a sharp observation.
It was a signal meant to say that, preferably, they should attend services at the Earth Church rather than the Flower Church.
‘Honestly, services are a pain.’
But I couldn't say that in front of Priest Malja, so I had to come up with a suitable excuse and brush it off.
"This city has served the Earth Goddess for a long time. Forcing a new religion on people through points wouldn't be right."
"Ahh."
Fortunately, Priest Malja accepted it without suspicion.
The troublesome question came after that.
"By the way, when did you get the prizes? I remember you being busy all day yesterday."
"..I was lucky enough to receive donations. The donors are anonymous, so I can't tell you."
It was true, even if they weren't people from the city.
Though I wasn't even sure they were people, to be honest.
[Finally done with the education! Starting today, goblin naked Zero-Two dance livestream, here we goooo!!]
[Made a fucking huge pretty serpent today]
[But no matter which Earth's stories you listen to, there's no tale of Armored Taejong swinging a beam saber]
[Fuck, do some work, armband..]
Ignoring the posts coming up, I went and found the one I'd written yesterday.
Title: Please donate any items you don't use.
Author: ㅇㅇ(123.123)
I need prizes for the proper education of children.
Preferably rare prizes rather than common ones that can be easily found nearby.
If I like a prize, I'll waive the Item Transfer fee to some extent.
Parents who actually have children get bonus points.
[Donation (coerced) ㅋㅋㅋㅋ]
[Queue]
ㄴ[We're not receiving, we're the ones giving, you dumbass]
The commotion had only lasted at the start.
Now, with some time having passed since the post went up, it was full of donation comments from people angling for the fee waiver.
‘But I'm not sure these will actually be popular.’
The comments had all been confident, at least.
[Just trust me and put it up as a prize. Little boys go fucking crazy for this. Currently a father of three sons.]
[Girls under 10 are obsessed with stuff like silk dresses. They'll insist on wearing one out even in midwinter. Mine outgrew them and don't wear them anymore, so use them as prizes, go for it]
[How about a bladeless sword? I made it myself, it's great for practice and looks cool too, ya know.]
‘Silk dresses and bladeless swords aside.’
I looked at the huge model that was a pain even to store.
It was the model sent as a prize by the user who called himself a father of three sons.
‘I wonder if there are any kids who'd actually want this 1-meter transforming mecha dinosaur model.’
Maybe in the modern world, but for kids here who knew nothing of robots, let alone dinosaur fossils, I couldn't really imagine there'd be any demand.
Sure enough, the 1-meter transforming mecha dinosaur model didn't even get a glance from the kids.
"…"
The adults' eyes had rolled over to it first, so the kids hadn't even gotten a chance to look.
‘Are robots and dinosaurs some kind of instinct?’
I didn't understand it, but as a result the Talent shop had become a hit, so it wasn't a bad thing.
The real problem was elsewhere.
"..The Weekend Study Class is run for the children. Fully grown adults, please, for the children's sake, give up your seats."
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