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As I arrived at the church while greeting the patrols on the way, they had already proceeded with the preparations of items such as desks, chairs, blackboards, and chalk, which were necessary for holding the classes.

“Ah, Miss Illya. My apologies that I couldn’t welcome you.”
“Please don’t mind it. Jumping to the business, here is the year-long syllabus.”
“Thank you for going out of your way to bring it here. Let’s not stand here. Please, come.”

I wanted to refuse for real, but doing so now would look suspicious, so I did as I was told.

Bernard and Sofia who have been assigned to this church apparently have been living in the rooms inside of it.

The church was quite large, with eight classrooms the same size as those in Japan, except for the chapel and dining hall. There were two rooms on the first floor and six on the second floor, with small individual rooms for the church members on the third floor. I can tell that Bernard is enthusiastic about this, as he has prepared blackboards and desks in most of the rooms on the first and second floors. I can only pray that this won’t turn out to be a waste of effort.

I was guided to the cafeteria at the back of the first floor and sat face-to-face with Bernard there.

“So it’s reading, arithmetics, science, social studies, as well as art, physical education, home economics, and morality?”
“Yes.”

Bernard flipped through the pages and checked the contents they would be teaching in each subject.

The ‘reading’ subject was probably what I wrote as ‘national language’. Since it’s about reading and writing, it has apparently been converted into that.

“U-Um… Miss Illya.”
“Yes?”

Bernard asked with a slightly tense voice, and he looked a little pale.

“Will we have people who could teach so much…?”

And here I was wondering what he would ask.

“I’m thinking of teaching this to the teachers too.”
“I see…”
“For art, physical education, and home economics, we could also just request the people employed in such posts. For reading, arithmetics, science, and social studies, we could either hire someone from each field or those who could handle several of them.”

Bernard probably wanted to teach it together, but he got cold feet looking at the volume of information.

I suppose it couldn’t be helped because there were many adults here who have never heard of things that would be included in elementary school education in Japan.

“Perhaps it would be better to dedicate this year to educating the teachers.”
“That… may be true…”

He didn’t seem very keen to accept that.

I’m not sure what is driving him to such lengths, but there are no gains in this, so I think he’s just thinking about the children.

“Then, how about we periodically hold short courses?”
“Short courses?”
“Yes. It would be where we will have the teachers gather there and explain important points related to teaching as well as provide supplementary explanations for the points they don’t understand.”

I could even write some kind of textbook guide. Actually, nope. I don’t have the confidence.

Since I have comprehension and memory cheats, I never had problems with studying, but as a drawback, I can no longer understand what points would be difficult to understand for other people.

I know by heart and body(?) that it’s like a first-world problem, so I can somehow dodge the problem.

“I will leave it up to you which way to proceed. Are there any other problems at present?”
“No. We are currently securing the teachers… If we can’t get the teachers together, we wouldn’t be able to gather the students either.”

Seeing him hang his head I could see his disappointment in the fact that he lacked the strength.

I couldn’t feel any ill emotions.

Supposing he wasn’t influenced by an evil god… I decided to ask what was on my mind.

“It may sound weird coming from me after I proposed this… but I was surprised when you took the initiative to do this.”
“What a strange thing to ask. You should be aware that churches have integrated orphanages and teaching facilities, right?”

I agreed with his words.

“Yes. But that is normally limited to those belonging to the church… I didn’t expect that a pastor would overturn that premise on his own.”

Depending on who you ask… or better yet, about 80% of the people in the pastor positions would’ve taken my words as rude and reprimanded me for them. But as expected, Bernard just smiled wryly in awkwardness.

“I hold great respect for you.”
“Huh?”

I was truly surprised by his counterattack.

He didn’t find my reaction weird and continued speaking.

“It’s not only you. The guide, Lady Aina, or the priest, Sir Jean… I respect everyone who has brought forth marvelous ideas. The reason I am employed in my position is to convey those ideas to as many people as I can… If I were to be completely honest with my feelings… Perhaps it is that I want to follow the example of the greatness of the Lord.”

He smiled wryly, feeling a little embarrassed.

“I admired your thinking which was full of affection, and decided to at least take some part in it. But in the end, perhaps I just wanted to steal the praise you would get.”

He spoke with feelings of regret showing in his self-deprecating expression.

Perhaps his religious teachings aren’t going well just like how he has problems with gathering the teachers.

“Did someone tell you something?”

He shook his head at that question.

Then again, no one would nod at that question, to begin with.

“I sometimes suddenly start thinking about it. That I’m such a miserable human being. And that urges me to be humble and strive to be the cornerstone of the greater will.”

Hearing about that urge, I wondered whether this was an influence of the evil god.

But I thought it would be impossible considering the nature of it. An evil god would instead deprecate him and shame him for doing what he did.

After all, the evil gods that haunted someone’s mind commonly used such means to widen the cracks in people’s hearts to take over them.

Actually, this turned heavy.

They say the more earnest someone is the more they brood over things, but that’s a waste even setting aside the evil god matter.

“No matter how noble the will you talk about is, is it not meaningless if you are unable to spread it?”
“Well…”

Bernard hesitated, but I got what he wanted to say.

“Regardless of how marvelous an idea someone comes up with, if there are no people to realize it, it would end up being no more than a mere delusion. The side that comes up with it, and the side that spreads it… if either side is taken out of the picture, that idea will not take shape, so is it not pointless to think about which side is superior?”

Your religion claims equality after all.

He didn’t object to my rude preaching, but he didn’t show any signs of accepting it either. Perhaps he found it hard to accept it as a devout believer, so I decided to change the topic.

“When it comes to the school, your achievements in it are greater regardless of what anyone says.”

In the first place, I wasn’t the one that came up with it.

“If you hadn’t worked like this, it would have taken a long time to get to where we are. I can’t thank you enough… So please, have more confidence.”

I met his gaze straight and did my best to show that my words were sincere.

“You are doing something wonderful now.”

There was no need to belittle it.

I didn’t know whether he understood all of what I wanted to convey, or whether he was convinced by my words.

But Bernard’s taken-aback expression loosened, and he replied with a smile.

“…Thank you.”