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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 9
Chapter Title: A Rain of Gold
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"You... you...! How dare you...!"

Noah rushed at me with the force of an enraged horse.

At that moment, the mysterious rectangular window appeared before my eyes again.

[Message from Heaven]

(Notification) Quest successful!

Congratulations. You have been awarded 50,000 Heaven Coins. Would you like to claim them now?

[Yes/No]

The moment I thought, ‘Yes!’...

Ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch!

Gold coins began to pour from thin air like a torrential downpour.

Right above Noah's head.

"Agh!"

Noah, who had been charging at me, screamed and flailed his arms as a staggering amount of gold coins rained down on his head.

But his desperate resistance was no match for the assault (?) of coins falling at a tremendous speed.

"Ugh! What is this! Ahhh!"

Flailing about as he tried to bat away the coins, Noah eventually lost his balance and tumbled to the floor.

Even after he fell, the downpour of coins didn't stop, continuing to pour and pile up on his body.

"Ack! Ugh! Gak!"

My jaw dropped at the absurd scene.

It was baffling enough that a shower of gold coins had suddenly appeared from thin air, but for them to attack and completely bury a person was another thing entirely.

'Is this what they mean by punishing someone with money...?'

Ah, no.

I don't think it was supposed to be this... physical.

As I blinked and watched the ridiculous sight, Noah's hand emerged from the mountain-like pile of gold coins.

"He... help... me..."

And then, as if he had actually died, it went limp.

I crept over to the pile of coins and crouched down.

Poke.

Poke, poke.

I carefully prodded Noah's motionless hand, but there was no response.

'What should I do?'

The maids who said they would bring my meal would be back soon.

They might faint from shock if they saw the precious young master passed out under a pile of mysterious gold coins.

'First, I should get rid of these suspicious coins!'

Having made my decision, I began tossing the coins into the folds of my skirt.

My plan was to gather as many as I could at once and hide them under the blanket.

Thanks to my hurried movements, my skirt was soon full of coins.

'There!'

They were suspicious coins, but seeing my skirt full of them gave me a strange sense of satisfaction.

I grabbed the hem of my skirt with both hands and shot to my feet.

I intended to run straight to the bed and hide them under the blanket, but the skirt was much heavier than I had expected.

It was a weight an adult could have handled easily, but it was too much for a child.

Besides, wasn't I especially frail, even for a child?

'Ugh!'

The moment I realized my mistake, my body gave way under the weight, and I toppled forward.

Crash!

As I fell with a loud noise, the coins I had painstakingly gathered in my skirt scattered across the floor with a clatter.

In trying to fix the situation, I had only made a bigger mess.

If Axel had seen this, he would have looked at me with those eyes that said, 'How can I ever save this pathetic, half-witted creature?'...

"What in the world are you doing?"

At the familiar voice, tinged with a dry laugh, I quickly turned my head to see Axel standing in the doorway, looking at me with the exact expression I had just imagined.

"Falling over seems to be a habit of yours."

The moment our eyes met, Axel clicked his tongue, "Tsk," as if something deeply displeased him.

Yes!

That condescending gaze of a cynical young master, looking down on others with his arms crossed!

He always treated me like that when we were adventuring together.

'He's so consistent it's almost scary.'

As I brushed myself off, feeling a strange sort of admiration, Axel strode over on his long legs and picked up one of the scattered gold coins.

The thought, 'Shouldn't you worry about the person who fell first?!' didn't even cross my mind.

After all, if Axel had taken an unsightly tumble, I would have just clutched my stomach and cackled.

"This is..."

"They're called Heaven Coins."

"Heaven Coins?"

Axel, who had been carefully examining the coin, front and back, furrowed his brow as if he'd noticed something and held it out to me.

He wanted me to take a look.

I was also curious about the identity of these strange coins, so I quickly took the one he offered.

Looking closely, I saw it was very different from the official coins minted by the empire.

The empire's gold coins were engraved with the emperor's portrait, but this 'Heaven Coin' bore the image of a branch with six leaves.

It was a familiar symbol.

I looked up and met Axel's gaze.

"It's a holy sigil."

"It's a holy sigil."

The same words came from both my and Axel's mouths at the same time.

A holy sigil.

Both Axel and I knew it well, as the quack priest Bael had this symbol engraved on his chest.

According to Bael, when one is officially registered with a temple and receives a divine name, a mark of the gods—a holy sigil—manifests on their body.

At a glance, it was a very simple design, which might make one think anyone could impersonate the mark of the gods, but humans could not create this symbol.

Not because the central church forbade it, but in the literal sense that they 'could not create it.'

Anyone could recognize the sigil with their eyes, but if they tried to copy it, their hands would not move.

This was due to a restriction placed by divine power.

Therefore, only a god could engrave such a sigil.

'Which means...'

"So this is currency made by a god."

Axel stared at me, his eyes seemingly asking why on earth it was here.

I shrugged and pointed a finger toward the ceiling.

"It poured down from up there."

"..."

"Weally."

"..."

"I got it for doing a Heaven Quest."

"What was the quest?"

"To punish Noah Elpinade."

"..."

Even though I repeated myself, Axel narrowed his eyes and scanned me from head to toe, as if he couldn't possibly believe me.

Feeling wronged by his suspicious gaze, I thumped my chest with my fist.

"It's true! Why would I lie?"

"Do you really have to ask?"

Axel scoffed.

Truth be told, back when I was the black mage Greslin, I used to trick Axel with all sorts of trivial lies.

Teaming up with the spirit master, Servian, to tease the naive young master was one of the few joys in our bleak expedition life, you could say.

"Ahem!"

His words hit a little too close to home, but I puffed out my chest as confidently as I could.

After all, shamelessness was a virtue among black mages, and since I was telling the truth this time, I had no reason not to be confident.

I planted my hands on my hips and defiantly lifted my chin.

"I'm not a kid! I don't tell dose kinda lies anymore."

"Anyone can see you're a kid right now."

Axel grumbled and flicked my forehead with his finger.

In any case, he seemed to believe me.

As I pouted and rubbed the spot on my forehead he had touched, I could feel him slowly looking me over.

"Well... you look much better, at least."

"Right?"

My face brightened, and I spread my arms wide, spinning in place.

The maids had sighed, saying there was still much to be desired, but I was quite pleased with how I looked.

It was my first time being so carefully dressed in such pretty clothes, so much so that I could let Axel's blunt tone go in one ear and out the other.

"I said better, not that you look presentable. The shoulder line is off, and the skirt is too long. The problem is that it's not custom-made."

Axel pointed out the same things the maids had.

Wondering if it looked that strange, I fiddled with the hem of my skirt, and he let out a small sigh.

"Forget it. The dressmakers will be bringing new clothes soon. For now, let's deal with these suspicious gold coins."