Chapter 49: If You’ve Got No Money, Don’t Pretend to Be Rich

“Almost perfect—no… it should be called the highest elemental affinity in history.”

Hidden in the shadows outside the window, Caroline gazed thoughtfully at Peleti’s figure.
Her slender fingers unconsciously brushed along the window frame, and a complex glint flashed through her eyes.

“Hey, it’s almost over in there. Why are you still hiding here?”
She turned toward Feiye, who was curled up in the corner, her tone tinged with helplessness.
“I really don’t understand you.”

Ever since Feiye branded Peleti with that special mark, she had released Caroline from the Shadow Domain.
Olivia was still trapped inside, but after receiving Feiye’s assurance that she would not be harmed, Caroline finally relaxed a little.

“Do you think… my sister will hate me?”
After a long while, Feiye spoke timidly, her voice so light it was nearly carried away by the wind.
She buried her face between her knees, revealing only a pair of reddened eyes.

Caroline sighed and raised a hand to rub her brow.
“If a dog bit you, would you still like that dog?”
“Of course not!”
“Most people like gentle, cute little dogs, not dogs that bite.”

Feiye understood the implication in Caroline’s words, yet only buried her face even deeper and did not reply.

At this moment, Feiye’s heart was filled with regret and fear.
She was afraid Peleti would loathe her because of this.
She was afraid she would never again be able to cling to her sister as before.
She was afraid that even if she forcibly kept her sister by her side, what she would receive would only be hateful gazes…

Why couldn’t she just listen to her sister and stay calm?
If she had been able to control her emotions back then, would her sister still hate her?

This thought made her unconsciously shift the blame onto Olivia.
It was all because of her appearance that she lost control.
It was all her fault.

A dangerous thought sprouted in her heart:
Why not just kill her outright?

“You’re not talking again.”
Caroline shook her head helplessly and leaned tiredly against the wall.

“I’ve worked continuously in the lab for a whole month and never felt as tired as I do today.”
“You two problem children are really a headache.”
“You’ve got such huge conflicts, can’t resolve them yourselves, and still refuse to say what the problem is.”
“Isn’t saying it out loud better than bottling it up?”

Her gaze lingered on Feiye for a moment.
Seeing that she still did not respond, Caroline continued.
“You’re like this, and Olivia is like this too.”
“The conflicts just keep getting bigger, and when I ask, neither of you says a word.”
“What’s the point of keeping it all inside?”
“Or is this about the survival of an entire race?”
“Don’t joke—how could that be possible?”

“I really give up on you two.”
Caroline rubbed her throbbing temples.
The matter of the Light Witch alone was already enough to give her a headache, and she still had to carefully consider this child’s future path.
Yet under such circumstances, Isabella had sent her two more problem children, as if things weren’t already messy enough.

“Not just one…”
Feiye muttered softly.

“What did you say?”
Caroline keenly caught her whisper.

“N-Nothing.”
Feiye hurriedly denied it and buried her face completely in the crook of her arms.

“Tsk, there you go again.”
Caroline turned her head away angrily.
“You won’t say anything at all.”
“What was Isabella thinking, sending you to stay with me?”
“I really can’t understand that woman.”

---

At the same time, inside the examination room, Peleti’s expression was stiff as the bishop tightly clutched her arm.
She could feel his body trembling slightly with excitement, which made her even more uneasy.

“The bearing of a saintess!”
“The bearing of a saintess!”
The bishop’s voice rose in rapture.
“Heaven bless our Church—another new saintess candidate is about to be born!”

Qiaosuna frowned in displeasure and stepped forward to pull the bishop away from Peleti.
“Bishop, please mind your image!”

Only then did the bishop realize his loss of composure and covered the awkwardness with a series of coughs.

He truly had not expected that the person Qiaosuna found would possess such astonishing affinity with holy light.
In his original expectations, having medium affinity would already be quite good, and high affinity would be the absolute limit.

Yet the testing crystal ball being cracked by the resonance was something he had never seen in his long career.

This unexpected joy had come far too suddenly.

“Hurry!”
“Go report to the Archbishop at once!”
He issued the order urgently.

The examiner instinctively wanted to carry the testing equipment away, but after a moment’s thought realized it was inappropriate.
In the end, he left the runes and crystal ball in place and hurried out of the room.

Qiaosuna nodded in satisfaction.
It seemed that Peleti in her previous life had indeed been discovered through a resonance test of light-element affinity.
Her judgment had not been wrong.
With this, the next steps would be much easier.
Without the interference of witches, Peleti was already in her grasp.

“Um… that is, may I not become a saintess?”
Peleti spoke cautiously.

“What do you mean by that?”
Qiaosuna’s blazing gaze immediately locked onto her.
Halfway through speaking, she realized her tone was too urgent and quickly changed it.
“Miss Peleti, could you tell me your reason?”

Coming to the Church in the first place had never been Peleti’s intention.
From beginning to end, she had never thought of seeking a high position within it.

After all, her true identity was that of a witch.
Even though the Church’s internal testing devices were of dubious quality, what if?
What if there was one that actually worked?
Then her identity would be exposed.

Moreover, once her status within the Church became too high, it would be difficult to escape.

By then, forget about leaving human territory—she might not even be able to leave this city.

“Becoming a saintess means almost completely abandoning the secular world, right…”
“Actually, compared to studying scriptures, I’ve thought about it, and I feel that earning a little money in peace might be better.”
“And there are also many things in the secular world that I don’t want to give up.”
Peleti chose her words carefully.
The Church’s way of speaking was really hard to imitate.

“Making money isn’t such a big deal,”
Qiaosuna tried to persuade her.
“Once you become a saintess candidate, the Church’s monthly stipend will far exceed anything you could earn at any job.”

“That may be true, but… does the Church’s monthly stipend reach 30 gold coins?”

“How much did you say?”
“How much?”
Qiaosuna asked in disbelief.

“Thirty gold coins, Miss Qiaosuna.”

Qiaosuna felt her scalp go numb.
She had guessed that Albena would offer Peleti a generous salary, but she had not expected it to be this high.

Thirty gold coins a month—
even going out to work yourself, you couldn’t earn that much in a month,
not to mention that Albena was running a perfectly legal coffee shop.

This was simply running a business at a loss.

Qiaosuna finally understood that there really were people in this world who opened shops just to lose money.

“…Alright, I understand.”
In the end, she could only accept it helplessly.

Peleti was instead a little surprised.
She had thought the other party would try every possible way to make her stay, but she let go so quickly.

The bishop seemed to see through her confusion and explained gently.
“As the saying goes, a forced melon is never sweet, and this is even more so in matters of faith.”
“If you are not yet willing to abandon the secular world and join the embrace of holy light, it only means that the time has not yet come.”

There was an air of knowing in his eyes, as if he had long since seen through the struggle in this young girl’s heart.