7. Bishop Barkius (End)
Fourty years ago.
When Bishop Saint Bahrkius was still a commoner named Bahr.
The continent was becoming desolate day by day due to the war between demons and humans, and the number of human soldiers were dwindling.
Bahr, who was the son of a humble farmer, was shocked to hear that soldiers were being conscripted from the neighboring village.
Bahr’s father being dragged into the battlefield as a soldier, died a brutal death.
Having such a memory, Bahr come to despise war, and he hated being drafted as a soldier even more.
Not simply because he loved peace, but because he didn’t want to die in vain like his father.
However, if he refused military service without any special reason, he would be executed for treason, so Bahr had to somehow create that ‘special reason’.
But with even the royal and noble families going to the battlefield under the pretext of ‘for humanity’s sake’, it became difficult to find a special reason.
After days of agony, Bahr headed to the neighboring village, where soldiers were conscripted, covering his body with a cloak to find the answer.
The reason he covered his body with a cloak was because the moment the villagers realized that he was a young man of fifteen who came to find out how to escape military service, he would obviously be beaten.
That’s how it was. In the end, the reason for hiding his face and trying to escape military service was fear.
So, late at night, Bahr went to the neighboring village and wandered around looking for a way to escape military service.
But all he heard were the crying of women who had their beloved children and husbands taken away under the name of duty.
His heart ached with guilt, but Bahr, whose fear of death was held a greater weight, gritted his teeth and wandered around the village more.
But Bahr, who couldn’t find it, dragged his tired body to the vicinity of the village church.
And as a result, was a voice of a young man heard coming from within the church?
Surprised, Bahr secretly hid and peeked inside the church.
In the church visible beyond the window, a father and son who looked exactly alike were having a conversation.
Was there really a way? Just as Bahr thought so, the priest’s son opened his mouth.
-Father… Are you sure this will work?
-Yes. Priests and bishops are those who have heard the call of God and obeyed His will. The duty of military service is…
-No! That’s not it! I neither obeyed nor received the call of God!
-…Didn’t you receive the sacrament of Holy Orders?
-That’s not what I meant! And how can I, who haven’t even been baptized, receive the sacrament of Holy Orders!
Bahr doubted his ears.
If what he said was true, it meant that the priest had received the sacrament of Holy Orders to evade military service.
-Didn’t you say it, Father! To live to protect the weak and powerless! So I tried to become a soldier myself, but why did you take away that opportunity…!!
-War is a dog’s death! Son. Why do you want to throw away your life for such nonsense. Rather, live for God. It’s a hundred times, a thousand times better to live as a servant of God than to die as a nobody!
-I don’t want to live like a coward! Even now, I’ll go find a knight―!!
-Why! Why don’t you understand! You’re my only son. Please, please reconsider once more. I beg you!
As the two exchanged heated words, Bahr trembled with a smile full of ecstasy.
‘I can escape. There is a way to escape. There is a way to avoid being dragged into that hell…!’
He thought as such.
He wanted to roar with joy, but Bahr held it in and returned to the village.
The next morning.
Upon returning to the village, Bahr burned the cloak he had worn the previous night and began to purchase the necessities for a long journey.
A water bottle made from goat skin, sturdy shoes, long-lasting dried meat, and so on.
Friends who were eager to drink and have fun appeared behind him, who was busily moving around the village.
However, Bahr made an excuse that he was not feeling well and returned home.
His friends were puzzled. It was unusual for Bahr, who would drink to death, to refuse alcohol.
Of course, his friends decided not to think much of it.
Seeing the guy who lived and died by alcohol refuse it, they figured he must really be unwell.
But contrary to their thoughts, the reason Bahr refused alcohol lay elsewhere.
‘If I drink and bring up the topic of priesthood… my plan will be ruined…!’
He thought that if his friends who heard his plan went to receive the priesthood together, his plan would completely fall apart.
There was a chance the priesthood could be refused, and more than anything, he thought that the commander who came to conscript soldiers might sense something strange and tell the Holy Kingdom.
So one dark night, without telling anyone, he secretly left the village and headed towards the Holy Kingdom.
He didn’t even tell his only mother.
It was a long journey.
His sturdy shoes tore apart, and his leather water bottle dried up to the point of revealing its bottom.
But he did not give up.
And at the end of a really long journey, Bahr finally arrived at the Holy Kingdom.
Upon arriving at the Holy Kingdom, Bahr soothed his tired body with the help of a nun and entrusted himself to the Holy Kingdom.
‘What is your name?’
‘I am―,’
Barkius.
It’s Barkius, Sister.
He even abandoned his own name.
“After that, the story of Barkius is similar to what you, Sister, know. He diligently honed himself in the Holy Kingdom, raised the saint there, and received the title of a saint.”
After the short, condensed, story ended.
Sister Rohel looked at me with a shocked face.
Why is she looking at me with such a surprised face?
It’s not like I told a special story.
I tilted my head with such thoughts.
Then Rohel frowned and shouted.
“Lies! It’s all lies!!”
“It’s not a lie. I only told you the stark truth. That’s the kind of person Bishop Barkius originally was. All I did was give him a little push to rediscover his true self.”
So wouldn’t it be closer to regression than corruption?
At that, Rohel slammed the floor with her fist and shouted.
“Don’t joke! That’s not Bishop Barkius!!”
“Why not? Why do you think he only went out once every two weeks? And not even far, just around the church? Because he was busy? Come on, how much work could there be in such a quiet neighborhood. He knew and avoided it. Because when he went out, people would flatter him. They would praise him, admire him, and look up to him.”
He was afraid that his roots would be exposed. That he would become arrogant again.
So he didn’t go out.
He was afraid that if his arrogance was discovered, he might lose the title of saint.
He was so scared that he ran away to that small corner.
“When you cornered the bishop, the reason he got so angry was because ‘poke where it hurt’, even though he had nothing to hide.”
“That man, who served in the barren Barkius for the sake of others! He received the sacrament of priesthood just to avoid military service!? How could such an insult…!!”
“Oh dear, it seems you’ve misunderstood something. Bishop Barkius didn’t settle here to help others.”
From the root, he was a coward filled with selfishness that only cared for himself.
A man like that doing service?
I shook my head and shrugged my shoulders.
“Bishop Barkius chose this place simply because he needed a place to settle.”
“He needed a place to settle…? But… he was rumored to be faithful even in the Holy Kingdom…”
“As the war with the demons intensified, all priests and nuns without a special position or designation were dragged into the war. Ah, of course, for the treatment of wounded soldiers and the morale and spiritual support for the soldiers.”
But does an arrow see a person they fly at, or does the explosion of magic considering human nature?
Those who were dragged to the battlefield, whether they were priests, nuns, soldiers, or commanders, all died equally.
“Barkius knew this well, so he took this place.”
At that time, Barkius was thirty-two, so he could just become a bishop.
A remote place in the middle of nowhere that no one would go to, there was a river, but due to the long war, it was terribly polluted and practically barren.
Moreover, a small slum with no management or work, overflowing with the poor and thugs.
Are you supposed to serve in the midst of such people?
“He had no choice.”
For Barkius, who had just become a bishop, there was no other choice.
If he didn’t secure a position, he would be dragged straight into the battlefield.
“Do you know what he said when he took office here?”
If the church won’t save them, I will.
“Isn’t it funny? He ran away from the village because he was afraid of conscription, and he ran away to this remote village because he was afraid of the battlefield, and yet he says such things.”
He’s a man who’s fundamentally arrogant.
Isn’t that right?
“But… he…”
“He, he, he… Rohel, it seems like you trust Bishop Barkius more than God.”
At my words, Rohel shuddered and swallowed dryly, shaking her head.
Aha….
With a broad smile, I took a quick peek into Rohel’s life.
An abandoned child with nowhere to go, salvation from the bishop, the apostasy of a trusted follower.
“The bishop I know is not like this…! So, you must have thought so. Puhu, you are quite distorted too.”
“No! I, I just…!”
“Pretending to be for others, but in the end, asking them to change if they’re not what you think they are… isn’t that also the sinful pride?”
With a smirk, I patted the shoulder of Rohel, who was staring blankly at me.
“Well, what can you do. Humans are originally like that.”
Without a common enemy, they covet what others have, they stand by if their own lives are not in danger, they kill others for their own greed.
They are such despicable garbage.
“In that sense, Bishop Barkius, who is arrogant but tries to help others, and Rohel, who tries to fix and change him as she wishes while saying he is wrong, are better than others!”
At least they know they’re wrong, right?
At that, Rohel, who had been listening to the story, shook her head.
Thanks.