PATH OF THE STAR HUNTER

In essence, neither of them really detested the other person, but they could not share their views, leading to many lingering minutes of silence between the two.

Desmond had fulfilled his role as Cecilia’s bodyguard for the last three days, following the holy priestess everywhere, though Cecilia had barely left the tower given the recent assassination attempt.

Because Cecilia spent most of her time inside the tower and Desmond was more or less sure that no one would be stupid enough to try to make a move in broad daylight, Desmond ended up with a lot of free time on his hands.

Of course, this being Desmond who was being talked about, he didn’t waste his time. He immediately tried to get a read of the atmosphere inside the church by wandering around and interacting with a few people he met along the way.

It is worth mentioning that by this point, Desmond was no longer wearing his black armor, nor was he carrying his bow and daggers, Not after getting a taste of how well equipped the people of this world were.

Desmond returned to his room after his encounter with the assassins four nights ago. He used the Analysis function on the armor and sword were given to him as part of his equipment as a knight of the holy priestess and was pleasantly surprised by it.

Even though the church would not give its best equipment to a man who protected the woman they sought to get rid of, the church still had to keep up appearances. And for the sake of it, they had given Desmond the same equipment that it would be given to a high-ranking gentleman of the church; equipment would only be below that given to holy knights.

Thus, Desmond had been wearing church armor ever since, while strapped to his waist was a longsword in its elegant-looking sheath.

.....

The plate armor was a pure white color with gray ornamental details. The craftsmanship was of a very high level. It was almost unbelievable to Desmond how easy and comfortable the armor was.

If one particular detail stood out about Desmond’s armor, it would be the vast gold four-pointed star in the center of his chest, a symbol that belonged to the holy priestess Cecilia.

The elegant armor only served to increase Desmond’s natural charm. His obsidian black hair made a beautiful contrast to the white of the armor, accompanied by his calm smile and sapphire blue eyes; they gave Desmond the image of the tragic knight.

God only knows how many priestesses and maids felt their hearts skip a beat when they saw the handsome knight smile in his direction, added to his always kind and gentle attitude; the blushing and shy girls around Desmond were a pretty common sight.

Of course, Desmond would never do something as useless as flirting with passing the time. The poor girls who grew up in an isolated environment were oblivious to love issues; they didn’t know that Desmond was playing the strings of their emotions like a musical instrument. The melodies Desmond most wanted to hear were related to the church’s internal affairs.

Bishop Morpeth would probably die of rage if he knew how easy it was for Desmond to get information on him. Desmond only had to gently and tenderly seduce one of Morteth’s personal servants to obtain the bishop’s itinerary for the next few days.

Holding the long straight hair of the girl in front of him in her fingers, Desmond flashed the girl a warm smile that completely melted her heart. Seeing that the girl’s blush had almost covered her entire face, Desmond pulled away from her with a sense of mock neatness and the same friendly smile. Desmond said goodbye to her to continue faithfully fulfilling his task of protecting the helpless Cecilia.

The conviction is shown by Desmond to protect someone like the holy priestess Cecilia did nothing but gain even more favor from the girl he left behind, who could only sigh at the thought of the tragic fate of a woman she admired.

Desmond ran into Nana in his room, who seemed to be waiting for him. At first, Desmond didn’t understand why Nana would be there, but the girl’s following words clarified it.

“Looks like you’ve been having quite a bit of fun. Did you find another cute girl to cheat on?”

“You seem to be better informed than I thought,” Desmond responded without changing his expression.

Upset by Desmond’s attitude, Nana replied, “That’s to be expected; I just didn’t think you would spend all your time here looking for young nuns to cheat on.”

Knew that his actions would be misunderstood if he didn’t clarify things and that this would only lead to his relationship with Cecilia getting worse. Desmond replied, “Well, I was looking for the right girl to manipulate. It wasn’t easy to find someone related to Bishop Morteth, and it was even less easy to approach the girl naturally to not cause suspicion.”

Nana was, after all, someone very good at reading people and she was well versed in politics. So she immediately understood that both she and Cecilia had misunderstood Desmond, who was all this time looking for an entry point to gain access to Bishop Morteth.

However, Desmond’s words were still quite surprising because unless he was lying, Desmond had accomplished this feat in just three days.

Now with another kind of mistrust in her eyes, Nana turned away from Desmond holding her body shyly as if she was afraid of being assaulted by him, and commented: “How used are you to taking advantage of women?”

Unfortunately, Desmond didn’t have an answer to that question; it couldn’t be helped, Nana’s words weren’t entirely wrong, and it was a subject Desmond wasn’t proud of.

During the last few days, due to how tense things were between Desmond and Cecilia, Nana was the one in charge of dealing with Desmond almost daily, so it wasn’t uncommon for the two of them to talk and joke around; At least that’s how it had been until now.

Seeing that Desmond didn’t react to her little joke, Nana looked at him, confused for a moment; She was slow to realize that this was perhaps a sensitive subject for Desmond.

Uncomfortable with the silence generated, Nana tried to change the subject to other issues that Desmond should be careful with, according to her.

“For now, the matter with Eria is finished. Cecilia already made arrangements for the girl to be taken out of the city safely, although I must admit that your idea of ??making the girl pass for dead helped a lot.”

Beneath Nana’s ever-watchful eyes, Desmond’s expression did not change; he showed neither anger nor pride. He didn’t seem upset that Eria had managed to get out of her alive despite everything, nor was he proud that her plan to make her pass for dead; Nana even had the impression that the whole thing was of no importance to Desmond.

Getting no response from Desmond, who just listened patiently, Nana continued, “For now, I didn’t think anyone would try anything in the dark; Not when they know we’ll have our guard up against those kinds of attacks.”

“So this time, we can expect them to try one of two things. The first would be to openly attack Cecilia with soft methods to undermine her authority and prestige little by little; the other, I guess, would be an information war.” Surprisingly Desmond was more interested in this part of the conversation and even gave his opinion before Nana finished speaking.

But Desmond had forgotten one minor detail; this was not the earth, and the term information warfare was entirely foreign to Nana. Luckily, the girl focused more on Desmond’s other words.

“You are correct. It is most likely that they will try to attack things or people related to Cecilia, so it is not unreasonable to say that you will be one of the main targets; you made a whole scene in the tournament where Cecilia chose you as her knight.”

Desmond’s expression remained calm even when he was informed that he had a target painted behind his back. This quite disconcerted Nana, who didn’t know that this was Desmond’s original intention when he made such a ruckus during the tournament.

Since Desmond was more adept at crashing head-on into his enemies, he would lure his enemies to do just that; at least when it came to fighting, Desmond had confidence that he wouldn’t go down quickly.

But the confidence shown by Desmond was not well received by Nana; she was worried that Desmond would underestimate his enemies just because of his encounter with those assassins, so she quickly tried to explain to Desmond the danger he was in.

And it was during that conversation Desmond would again hear the name of the holy knights, the best of the best among the knights of the church; real walking weapons, according to Nana.

“I see, so do you think any of them are likely to make a move against me?”

“Holy knights are very proud and normally don’t get involved in church politics, but it’s still not impossible for them to make a move,” Nana explained.

Desmond couldn’t help but smile at the girl’s words. “For my part, I think it is certain that I will meet one of them; you should know better than anyone, Nana; nothing is incorruptible.”

Desmond’s words echoed deep inside Nana’s mind, causing the girl to smile wryly, a smile that suddenly froze when she felt the wild aura Desmond was exuding. Like a hungry beast, Desmond’s thirst for blood was almost palpable, and Nana had the inexplicable thought that even a holy knight would be out of luck messing with Desmond.