In Another World With My Smartphone_Volume 5 Read online

  The townspeople began to cheer, which was only natural. God himself and a band of angels had just appeared to fight their enemy.

  Alrighty, time to move. I made myself disappear with [Invisible], and dashed across the rooftops, making sure to keep an eye on the God illusion I had projected up into the sky.

  Man, at times like this I could really use a flight spell... Wonder if it’s wind magic... or maybe it’s a Null spell? Yeah, if it was Wind then Leen would be able to use it easily... It’s gotta be a Null one.

  I finally arrived before the temple, and got a real sense of how big the Dark Spirit was.

  I erased the illusion of God in the sky, and, while maintaining the illusion of God on my own body, took out a two-meter-long sword from my storage.

  I’d reduced the weight of the blade using [Gravity] so I could wield it in one hand, and it was created from a Phrase fragment. The material the blade was made of kind of made the surface sparkle and dance with light, like the surface of water. I decided it was sufficiently mystical enough to pass off as a Godly weapon.

  The Spirit of Darkness turned and glared down at me. Well, I said glared, but it had no eyes. Sure felt like a glare, though. A few of its back-tentacles whipped towards me.

  “Hup...!” I jumped to the side and made a horizontal swing of the sword. I cleanly cut the tentacle, and the dark mass fell to the ground. A foul black fog began leaking from the sliced-off tentacle. ...Gross.

  But I didn’t have any time to react before the tentacle vanished, and a new one took its place on the monster’s body. Wait, this thing can regenerate as well? That’s irritating!

  As a (fake) God, I couldn’t let anyone see it give me a hard time, so I needed to kill it fast. I briefly considered using [Slip], but it was so big that it’d definitely destroy a chunk of the city if it fell over. Maybe I should crush it!

  “Target lock. Spirit of Darkness. Invoke [Gravity].”

  “Acknowledged. Target acquired. Invoking [Gravity]. The Spirit of Darkness immediately began to fall, it couldn’t support its new, increased body weight. With a scream, it fell on to its side.

  The area of the city beneath it was, naturally, completely levelled. Ah crap! I pretty much got the same result I would’ve if I’d used [Slip]! Welp. God did it, not me. At the very least, the people in the immediate area should’ve evacuated by that point, so nobody would get harmed.

  This is pretty bad though. I think I may have overdone it with the flashiness...

  There was nothing I could do, so I focused on wiping it out with an overwhelming show of force. I amplified the effects of [Gravity] on the creature, but couldn’t be sure if I’d even changed much. It didn’t have a face, so I couldn’t gauge how it was feeling, either. Regardless, it seemed that I had it pinned down. Now, for the finale!

  “Strike true, Light! Sparkling Holy Lance: [Shining Javelin]!” The spears of light drilled their way through the beast’s body, and... The holes left in the creature didn’t regenerate. It stood to reason that a Dark Spirit would be weak to light magic.

  “Target Lock. Launch an additional... one hundred... no, two hundred [Shining Javelin] strikes at the Dark Spirit!”

  “Acknowledged. Target acquired.” It was time for this monster to get a taste of (fake) God’s (two-hundred-javelins of) wrath!

  “Fire!”

  “Acknowledged. Launching attack.”

  BOOM, CRASH, RUMBLE, SHAKOOM, BADABOOM!!!

  The ground began to shake, which was natural, those Shining Javelins were really doing a number on the thing. The Dark Spirit’s body split repeatedly, fragmenting as each new blade of light fell down upon it. As the volley ended, there was little left of the creature itself.

  The fragmented pieces of the spirit spread across the area like a blackened fog. I figured that it was probably still alive, in some base form. I couldn’t have that, though, it’d be a real pain if it resurrected or something. Therefore, I decided to annihilate it entirely.

  “Come forth, Light. Radiant, Exiling Light: [Banish]!” I cast a purifying spell over a large radius, scattering light everywhere. The wicked fog quickly scattered and dissipated.

  As the light faded and the darkness of the spirit swirled into nothingness, a single skeleton clattered to the ground. In an instant, it crumbled to dust and blew away in the breeze...

  I wondered if that was Ramirez. After a thousand years, he was finally freed. I honestly felt a little pity, but he fell victim to his own misdeeds in the end.

  Alright, now was the time... I had to work hard and deceive everyone.

  ◇　◇　◇

  I looked across the streets as cheers resounded from every corner. Even amidst the dark of the night, I could hear people far and wide.

  “Amazing! He did it!”

  “Lars, thank you o Lars! The God of Light has vanquished the wicked one!”

  “Take that, you monster! Feel the wrath of our lord, you fiend!” The citizens cheered and jeered with enthusiasm, but I was just left feeling irritated.

  I didn’t know if it was just due to the residual brainwashing, but they were yammering on about Lars. I decided I’d show them the wrath of God they were cheering so much.

  It seemed a feat wouldn’t have been enough, so I had to preach to them directly.

  “Target Lock. Effective range, within the city’s borders. Invoke [Lightning Javelin] in random locations, ensuring that there are no people within ten meters of the spell. Repeat three hundred times.”

  “Understood. Target acquired. Invoking [Lightning Javelin].” All of a sudden, three hundred bolts fell from the sky and struck the city. Screams and shrieks broke out, and the townsfolk were sent into disarray.

  I used my Smartphone to project my image high into the sky, ensuring it could be seen at a distance.

  “Do not speak so carelessly of justice, wrath, and indignation. It was the warped justice of your people that created this beast to begin with!” Then I decided to spice things up a bit. Using a [Gate], I brought the pope to my location. Her image too, was projected into the sky, and the citizens cheered in admiration. I gave the pope a knowing nod, and she kneeled before me, bowing her head.

  “Is it you, Your Divinity? Lars, God of Light?”

  “I am not, my child. I am indeed God’s Light, but I bear not the name of Lars. There is no such God named Lars.” The people watching broke out into confusion again. That was natural, though. I’d just denied their God through-and-through.

  “Step forth, young one. I’ve a message for you all.” I placed my hand on the pope’s forehead, and a dazzling light engulfed us both. I was a little tired by the charade, and tried to speed it up a bit. It’s not like I had actually imbued a message into her mind, it was just dramatic effect.

  After the light faded, the pope fully prostrated herself before me. Frankly I thought it was a little bit of overkill on her part.

  Either way, I simply moved on to the next part.

  “One final matter. I must bestow divine punishment upon those who accumulated sin, and allowed many crimes to be committed under the fraudulent guise of justice and light.” I used my portal once again in a similar fashion to bring forth the assholes who had shown themselves to me earlier on. Cardinal Zeon, his sister Kyurei, the other cardinals, and the Templars who had hassled me all bowed before my divine might.

  “Confess your sins to me.”

  “W-We’ve committed no crime, indulged in no sin! I-I’m a devout follower of your radiance, the light of God is my shepherd, I p-p-promise!!” Zeon began blabbering like an idiot, his face mashing into the ground in reverence. I couldn’t believe he’d even try to worm his way out of the situation in front of God. It didn’t matter that I was pretending, he didn’t know that! This guy really was an idiot if he thought he could fool the divine.

  “You miserable whelp. Claiming an innocent girl to be a vampire, going so far as to plan her death... Confining your very pope to a dingy jail cell?! You thought such things would escape my o
mnipotent gaze?!”

  “Th-That was just...!!” Both Zeon and his sister went pale. The citizens, who were still looking on, began murmuring amongst themselves. The cardinals, the Templars, and everyone else present couldn’t seem to contain their shock and horror.

  “And you know as well as I that they were not your only crimes. Shall I disclose your other transgressions? One by one?!”

  “N-Ngh...!” Zeon fell silent. I had asked the perfect leading question. I had no doubt in my mind that he had done all manner of terrible things under the banner of God, but I wasn’t entirely certain of what they were. But now I knew he and his sister were beyond salvation.

  Even while knowing there was no God of Light, the two of them still conveniently used the image for their own ends. I couldn’t afford to let them off the hook.

  “Repent, mongrels!”

  “Ughaah!!” I used my trusty paralyzing spell on everyone before me, except the pope of course. I then turned to Her Eminence, and spoke thus.

  “I entrust their punishment to you, my child.”

  “Of course.”

  “Light and Dark are two sides of the same coin, forever indivisible. Justice, injustice, both are creations of human hands. If you commit to one side, you will ultimately tip into the other. Do not allow this.” I faced the citizens and made my final declaration. That being said, I don’t really think I made a very good speech. I decided to bail before I slipped up any more and got caught out.

  I had the Valkyries come from behind me and scatter across the city.

  “Farewell, children of man.” The Valkyries all shone in unison. I took my opportunity to get the heck out of dodge through a portal, and hid away from sight. After the light faded, I created another illusion of beautiful feathers falling from the sky. I felt like I was directing a movie.

  The pope then rose to her feet.

  “God has left! From now on, we will take full responsibility for our actions! We will repent as one, for betraying God’s will! As He spoke, we should all have taken in a message of accountability! We will work hard and seize what is right with our own hands! Pray to Him in gratitude and peace!”

  The voices of the people roared across the night, they were elated. That’s about what I expected, but... She definitely had more charisma than me, that much was for certain.

  I figured that would be enough to let everything work out. As I watched the excited townsfolk and the pope’s speech, my Smartphone began to vibrate. I seemed to have an incoming call.

  “Hello! Is this God?”

  “That it is, my boy. Ahaha... it seems you have put the situation to rest! I am quite relieved, thank you.”

  “Yup, seems like we’ll be fine now. Any weird stuff that was interfering with their minds should die down soon enough, if not already. Now the people should be able to make rational decisions for themselves.” In a sense, you could say that I had driven a divide in the people’s minds about the concept of God itself. The influence of Ramissh was likely to decrease after this, but... In turn, the people oppressed by their wicked justice would go down as well.

  There would surely still be those who believed in Lars, God of Light, but that was fine by me. Believing or not was ultimately their choice, and that just meant they were human. All I had done was prevent people from abusing that belief and imposing it upon others through force or trickery.

  “I do apologize for leaving the matter to you... Do apologize to the young priestess and that charming young popess for me, would you?”

  “Don’t worry about it. Just pay me back by looking in on their country now and then, just in case things get weird again.”

  “Very well, then! I’ll be sure to pay attention.” I hung up on God, and moved back to Phyllis and Kohaku through one of my portals.

  “Thank you, Your Majesty... Thank you so much.” Phyllis was moved to tears the moment she saw me, and respectfully bowed her head. I didn’t really do much to deserve that level of appreciation though, if you’d have asked me, I’d say I was the one responsible for the mess to begin with!

  “God told me to apologize to you and the pope on his behalf. I think there’ll be tough times ahead, do you think you’ll be okay?”

  “I do. After all, God is always watching.” Phyllis nodded, there was no hesitation in her eyes. It seemed I had nothing to worry about.

  Since it was through my own magic that various buildings and the grand temple were annihilated, I quickly decided to rebuild them with another of my trusty spells. However, the pope appeared and stopped me in my tracks. She said that showing my power like that in public, especially after everything that had just happened, would be a terrible idea. She had a point, I didn’t want to expose the truth behind that God.

  I watched over the pope beginning her new type of sermon, and I smiled. I had decided that my work here was done. Though, just in case, I gave Phyllis a Gate Mirror for quick and easy communication. Then, after a short goodbye, Kohaku and I portalled our way home to Brunhild.

  Some days later, rumors finally began flowing through various countries that a God had descended in the Ramissh Theocracy, slaying a wicked Dark God in the process. Irreligious countries laughed off the story as propaganda. That aside, the Ramissh Theocracy officially changed their following from Lars, God of Light, to simply preaching the word of “God’s Light.” Their motto of it all being in the name of light and justice was also stricken from the record.

  Officially, the founder of Ramissh was still Ramirez, and the one that aided him was the God of Light. That part of the story remained consistent. All I and the pope had done together was remove any mention of Lars, and his twisted justice.

  “Geez, I never expected you to pretend to be a God, Touya... you’re gonna get punished from above!” Elze nudged me in the side, laughing at my tale. I had, naturally, explained to my family what had happened in the Theocracy. I just cut out the parts about the real God.

  Cardinal Zeon, Cardinal Kyurei, the Templars, and the others who had actively abused the pope were stripped of land, position, and property. They were excommunicated from the church and jailed. The confiscated wealth ended up being vast, it seemed that all their fearmongering and donation-begging had paid off well for them. The pope kindly returned that money to the people, compensating the victims of years of oppression.

  All of those imprisoned also happened to be those that knew the truth behind the Ramissh religion, but it was unlikely they’d be believed even if they did blab. After all, they were all personally judged by God himself before a great crowd.

  And, after a short time, an envoy from Ramissh came to greet me in my castle. My halls were graced by the presence of the youngest cardinal in history, Phyllis.

  “You seem well.”

  “As do you, Grand Duke.” I took a look at the letter she had brought with her. To be blunt, the letter stated that they were sorry about the previous envoy, and wished to establish good terms with Brunhild.

  There was no outlandish demand like forcing me to adopt a state religion, or baptize myself. It was simply a letter of good faith, asking that my duchy maintain a friendship with the Theocracy going forwards.

  Naturally, I accepted. In order for my country to grow, good diplomacy was necessary and welcome. I had no desire to connect with bad nations, but I had made good friends within the Theocracy.

  “Hm, I was somewhat worried just now, but it seems to have ended well... I wonder if the God who appeared in Ramissh intended for this to happen...” After Phyllis left, old man Kousaka let out a small sigh of relief and gave me that comment, along with a sidelong glance.

  I didn’t tell him the exact details of what went down that day, but I did tell him I was there when it happened. As far as he knew I was visiting the Theocracy, then God happened to descend. It was mighty convenient, but that was the story I stuck to.

  “Do you believe in God, Kousaka?”

  “Who can say... He exists within the hearts of those who believe, and does not within the h
earts of those who do not. That is what I believe, at least.” James Barrie, an English writer, wrote in “Peter Pan” that whenever a child says “I don’t believe in fairies,” a single fairy dies somewhere.

  Kousaka had a point. To believe in something, was to give it life. I don’t think anyone could get in the way of that.

  “And what of you, Grand Duke? Do you believe in God?”

  “I do. I do.” Somewhere, off on the breeze outside, I thought I heard the gentle chuckling of the divine old man himself.

  Chapter IV: Improving the Duchy

  “I wanna soar through the sky!”

  “That’s a little, uh...” Leen and I sat on the balcony. As she sipped her black tea, she raised an eyebrow at my statement.

  I’d been thinking about what happened in Ramissh a few days prior, and also what had happened during the coup before that. Both of those events had involved airborne enemies, and it’d make a world of difference if I was freely able to fly around on their level.

  Sure, I could just summon a Griffon and ride it around, but flying myself was way cooler than just fighting atop the back of a mythical beast. That’s why I decided to ask Leen if she knew anything about it.

  “I mean... you can make yourself leap through the sky using wind magic, but... You wouldn’t be able to soar or fly freely, nothing like that. It’s more of a spell for blasting people away, so you’d just be using the knockback. Less flying, more being blasted away.”

  “Hrmph... in that case, isn’t there a Null spell or something?”

  “It’s possible. But it’s not a Null spell that I know.” Hrmph... I guess fairies wouldn’t need flight magic, so none of them bothered memorizing which spell that might be.

  I quickly considered another angle as well. Null magic was personal magic. It’s not like most people would be able to use it, even if it was shared. That’s probably why looking into it would end up being fruitless.