AN: Aaaah, I just barely kept my promise lol! Here's the chapter I owe you guys, as promised!

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The lady paladin turned the feather over in her hand, repeatedly stroking the edges of it with the lightest of touches, almost tickling it against her fingers.

 

“...Where did you get this?”

 

“As I told you, I was once the servant of the bird god.”

 

“So you said. A demi-god’s feather, eh...? …Hmph. I see.”

 

She held it for a bit longer, staring at it for so long and so intensely that I couldn’t believe her eyes didn’t hurt. Eventually, however, she simply sighed and handed the feather back to Kale, looking a bit displeased about something.

 

“...Fine then. I'll take you for your word. The only true way to discern if someone is a demon lord is to have the archpriest in the main church test them… so I’ll delay my judgment until the test has been done.”

 

Having said her piece, the lady paladin hurried away from us like she’d been burned. I couldn’t help but sigh in relief as I watched her rocket away, happy that I’d been saved from my predicament. Soon my eyes gravitated back over to the feather, however. For all that I was thankful, my curiosity was going absolutely wild.

 

“Hey, Kale? What’s with that feather?”

 

“It’s true that it belongs to the bird god. I picked it up when it flew away, and hid it amongst my feathers.”

 

He handed the feather over to me, and I gratefully accepted it like the special thing that it was. It was light, subtly shining, and gave off an odd, overly warm feeling, like I was being baked in rays of summer sunlight. In a way, it reminded me of how it felt whenever I healed myself, although the feeling from the feather was at least 100 times more concentrated than anything I’ve ever pulled off. I suppose… this must be the way that all ‘divine’ energy must feel, huh? It's amazing that I can feel it just from touching this feather alone, no magic or skills necessary, you know?

 

“So this is why she was convinced…”

 

I guess Kale’s argument makes sense, although there’s still plenty of ways I could think of to argue against it… Still, I doubt any other feather in the world could feel nearly as divine as this one does. The lady paladin must not have been able to say anything back, knowing that Kale owned something so obviously ‘holy’; I doubt she’s ever been so close to something as irrefutably divine as he has. If anyone was going to be able to tell that I was good, it would definitely be someone like him, with a feather like this.

 

Really, I can't get over how lucky it is…

 

“...Is it really 'luck', though...?”

 

I looked up from the feather to Kale’s stoic face, searching it with my eyes.

 

Kale. Karnis. This existence that’s anchoring me to this world. I hate to admit it, but there’s been far too many ‘lucky coincidences’ happening to bring us together, hasn’t there? This bird god of his just so happened to run away towards the town I was going to show up in, and Kale just so happened to pick up the feather that one day helped me like this. He just so happened to be enslaved in the exact church that the Goddess dumped me next to, and just so happened to look exactly like the man I loved and lost…

 

Honestly, it’s all so suspicious that I want to scream. It’s like this second life of mine is all just some kind of setup or something. I wonder if every saintess has had such a written up pairing… or if it’s just me, for whatever reason.

 

...Well, not like I’d even know what to do if that’s actually the case anyway.

If anything, I'd probably just shut my eyes to it until it finally became a real problem.

 

Maybe I’m just a coward, but I’m too afraid to even question what all of this suspicious stuff might mean. Even if it’s all some kind of scam, I’d rather be with a setup Kale than absolutely no Kale at all. If this is all some kind of ploy or plot against me by the Goddess or that shadow thing, then kudos to them, because they really knew what to pick to make me play along.

 

“I think it’s quite lucky, though.”

 

Kale gently took the feather, holding it up and looking through it at me.

 

“Without everything that happened, I wouldn’t have been able to be by your side right now.”

 

…See? You see how kindly he treats me? How could I possibly give up this sweet Kale that always sticks so close to me…? How could I give up getting what I always wanted, even if it might just be fake?

 

Before I could stop myself, I launched myself at Kale. Despite how I must have been crushing his precious feather, he still quickly wrapped his arms around me, giving me a firm, reassuring hug. The way the many feathers on his arms tickled me competed with the itchy feeling that was rising inside of my heart.

 

When was the last time I felt this happy?

And why don’t I feel sad at all, even though I know this is probably all just fake?

 

~~~

 

It was much faster to make it back to the town than it was to go searching up the mountain. The lord of Tarsus immediately offered for us to stay in his castle once we made it to his town, but I ended up turning him down and opting to stay in the same inn that we previously had. Idunno, it just felt like taking him up on his offer while I was still trying to come up with how I was going to judge him would be some kind of bribery or something. Just didn’t feel right.

 

Plus, ya know, at this point who knows what the guy would be willing to pull, right?

I’ve already been threatened enough over the past few days, thank you!

 

For now I just wanna get a good night’s sleep for the first time in a long time… Although honestly, with this whole decision still looming over my head, I doubt that I’ll get a very good one. If only I was sure what I should do…

 

This would all be so much easier if that silly secret quest just told me the right answer to choose here!

Why’s the darn description gotta be so freaking vague?!

 

…You know, that swap button will be unlocked again by tomorrow… Should I really just change my attack back to [Judgment] and let the Goddess make the final decision like I thought of before...? It feels like a bit of a waste, since I never really got to use my [Righteous Holy Fire] after taking it because the lord’s knights were such proactive escorts, but if it means that I won’t have to be the one who chooses the lord’s fate in the end, then-!

 

Ugh, wait, no. I can’t do this… I’m getting too impatient and making hasty choices again! That never works out right for me! Never, not even once!

 

…But even with all this thinking, I still can’t figure out what to dooo…

 

“Kaaale… Help meee...”

 

I clung on to my emotional support Kale, knocking him over from where he’d been sitting with how hard I flung myself at him, and burying my face into his chest. Even with how sudden and violent my glomping of him was, Kale still unquestioningly hugged me back, as if nothing odd had ever happened.

 

“What do you need me to help you with, Saintess?”

 

Ah... When you say it back so obliviously and sincerely like that, I can’t help but feel like an idiot for even asking…

If anything, I’m just gonna feel like a complaining toddler.

 

Well, it’s not like I can help it if my natural reaction is to turn to Kale for help like this, right? Since I’ve never been one to make my own decisions, Kale’s almost always been the one to make them for me, you know? It’s nice having someone smarter than you, someone that you can lean on to think through all the difficult stuff for you and tell you what you need to do…

 

I mean, isn't that why people pay professionals to do their taxes?

 

The few times that I did make my own choices in my last life usually all turned out absolutely terribly. I think the only really good decision I ever made was to move out and emancipate myself from my dad, and even then I had to get Kale to help me with most of the harder stuff…

 

I thought I’d gotten a bit better since coming to this world, but now this is starting to show me once again how dependent I still very much am... It’s kind of really sad to realize, actually. Still, considering this is such a big and important thing, is it really so bad if I get a bit of help on it? I mean, this is literally a choice that could ruin the lord of this town’s life, if not also bring an end to the already struggling town itself! Isn't that secret quest called 'the downfall of Tarsus'? What if I somehow bring that about by making the wrong decision here?!

 

“Um, you see, Kale, I-!”

 

“Oh my. Your Holiness, please… This scene is indecent!”

 

Right at that moment, the guy paladin had made his way back to the wagon that Kale and I had been waiting in. What with him and the lady paladin off to get things ready now that we’d made it to the inn, I hadn’t expected either of them to be back yet so soon. And with the way that I had practically draped myself over Kale, and how tightly we were hugging…

 

Yeah, it’s no surprise that the scene looked a bit bad to him.