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🕑 Added 2025-06-04 08:07:24 +0000 UTCA simple priest... Or so I thought
Chapter 1 – The Strange Church
In Pennsylvania, in its largest city—Philadelphia—all kinds of people from around the world would gather.
This city was a key tourist destination, where one could encounter followers of almost every religion imaginable.
Here, in this diverse city, on the northern edge, stood an old building in a community area. Despite its worn appearance, it was the only nearby church where people could go to seek guidance for matters of the heart.
For many, preserving a church like this wouldn’t make much sense. However, the locals believed the Church was a moral society, meant to realize and preach moral principles—a congregation of all who joined efforts to combat evil and spread morality.
At that very moment, in the open space in front of the church, stood a boy accompanied by a girl visiting the place.
They weren’t locals, which meant they had come from far away.
“Henry, is what you said true? I don’t think there’s a real exorcist here who has faced paranormal events,” said a girl named Judy Warren, tying her hair into a ponytail with doubt in her voice.
As the daughter of a famous demonologist and a clairvoyant medium, she had learned from her parents that not all priests had real abilities to face dark forces. And if there really was one in this church, the odds of him being good at it were slim.
According to the records her parents kept at home, only the Pope’s right-hand man, Gabriele Amorth, had the power to face true supernatural events and come out victorious every time.
Naturally, the young man walking beside her—Henry, a redheaded boy—vigorously nodded when he heard Judy's doubts and then shared everything he knew. “He lives here. I heard it from my dad’s cop friend.”
“Just look at this place! There are tons of traps outside the church for catching werewolves, vampires, and witches.” Henry was fascinated by the priest, who seemed to be everything but a normal one.
Judy hesitantly followed the stone path leading to the church door. The distance was short, just a few dozen steps.
However, the path felt longer because of the wooden stakes driven into the ground—an odd sight, to say the least.
On some of the wooden stakes, small bells chimed with the wind, producing a melodic sound.
Judy, who felt a strange sense of peace upon hearing those sounds, soon arrived at the door with Henry, who had been enthusiastically talking about how amazing the priest was the entire way.
Henry volunteered and knocked on the door.
“Is anyone here? We’d like to hire an exorcist,” Henry tried to raise his voice, but being a quiet, thin kid who barely spoke at school, he felt a bit embarrassed under Judy’s odd stare.
No one responded after a while. However, behind a small window on the second floor of the church, a rifle scope was trained on them.
“They didn’t react to the wooden stakes, weren’t affected by the holy water near the path… They also don’t seem to mind the smell of garlic. That rules out vampires for now…”
“They can walk under daylight with relaxed expressions, so ghouls are out too… They wouldn’t have approached so calmly if they were possessed.”
“The runes didn’t work either…”
Once the whispering voice completed its preliminary analysis of the two young visitors, the rifle’s barrel was withdrawn from the wooden window.
Setting the weapon aside, a man named Jonathan Belmont muttered, “Based on my analysis, the chances of them being human are very high. Still, letting my guard down would be foolish—caution is essential.”
Recognizing that these two kids weren’t his usual clients meant their origins were unknown. Still, he couldn’t rule out that someone who knew what he did might’ve let something slip while drunk.
“Everyone knows I only work on weekends. How did these two end up at my church door?” Jonathan narrowed his eyes and thought deeply while ignoring the sound at the entrance.
As a visitor from another world—an unfortunate soul who arrived here after dying during an intense online debate about a supposedly paranormal video—Jonathan became a young priest after discovering the corpse of the previous clergyman, who had been the mentor of the body he now inhabited.
At first, Jonathan believed he had time-traveled to an era completely different from the Earth he came from. But after a while, the signs everywhere told him this world wasn’t exactly normal—something smelled terribly wrong.
“A masked man with human skin went on a killing spree in Texas. A mysterious witch was spotted…”
From time to time, Jonathan would see news like that in the papers, all echoing the horror stories from the films of his previous life.
The coincidences were alarming. He tried to ignore those signs and continued living as a young priest while secretly planning a way out.
However, his time serving as a priest made one thing very clear: paranormal events were no hoax or coincidence.
Everything existed—folklore tales, serial killers, werewolves, vampires. All of them could appear anywhere, anytime, especially if connected to his own narrative.
From that moment on, Jonathan steered clear of such coincidences and avoided any signs of danger.
Still, maintaining that safety required proper weapons—and those couldn’t be wished into existence. He needed money. Since he only had his knowledge and visual experience of how to handle certain problems, he used his ingenuity to work on some cases, earning large sums of money week after week.
And during the very first case he solved, this white thing appeared before his eyes.
Jonathan activated a kind of panel with his left eye again. At that moment, his left eye turned completely white.
He walked over to a basin of holy water and submerged himself for a few seconds.
Immediately, a panel appeared with special features:
“[...
[Name]: Jonathan Belmont
[Occupation]: Exorcist, Hunter, Paranormal Agent.
[General Strength]: 22
[Spirit]: 199
[Talent: Night Vision
[Effect]: You can see more clearly at night and vaguely perceive cursed spirits near you.
[Talent]: Blessing
[Effect]: You can bless both material and immaterial things. Using this talent, you can turn anything into a weapon to fight evil.
[Talent]: Prayer Reading
[Effect]: Any kind of prayer, combined with spiritual power and faith, can be used as a weapon to purify the souls of humans infected by evil. It can also be used to harm supernatural beings.
…]”
Jonathan was surprised to see how much his spiritual power had increased. Each time he helped a believer—whether through psychological counseling, confession, or prayer—he gained new abilities that made him a more capable priest.
He had tested these skills even before thinking about facing supernatural beings to earn enough money for his weapons, and seeing their effectiveness, he took slight advantage of them.
At the same time, he discovered that his abilities were just another weapon to resolve supernatural incidents related to his work as a priest.
One example would be his blessing ability. It helped him create true holy water to give to believers who came seeking it.
He realized that in such a dangerous world, this skill was undoubtedly a very powerful aid.
Although he was the only cleric in the church, Jonathan was self-disciplined to survive and completed his daily tasks every day.
At first, he thought it would be a good idea to save enough money and run off to a safe place to read the Bible for the rest of his life in this era. However, who would have thought he was obliged to stay in this place?
Besides, he felt too excited at the thought that he could gain more incredible abilities by eliminating increasingly stronger supernatural beings.
That last reason made him stay in this old church and start remodeling it, beginning with the second floor, which was obviously filled with blessed weapons.
His favorites were, by far, his magnum revolvers, his silver sword, and his cross without any symbol.
Therefore, to maintain his luxuries, he needed to take on every mission that believers came to bring him.
“Alright, let’s get to work.” Jonathan put on his completely black uniform and hid some discreet weapons under his second layer of clothing.
…
“Priest, are you asleep at midday? Surely you drank all the church’s wine, should we report you?”
The irritating voices on the other side of the door darkened the expression Jonathan wore behind it, and only after calming himself did he open the door.
When the church door opened, Henry could see a priest in a black robe. He looked younger than the rumors, but was extremely serious.
Moreover, the tattoos on his hands told Henry that this priest certainly had a very tough life before dedicating himself to God.
“Shouldn't you be at school at this time? Hmm, are you in trouble?” Jonathan asked these two questions first.
Henry finally reacted and quickly said, "I... We have a commission."
“You?”
“I thought you accepted any commission.” Henry got even more nervous under the priest’s steady gaze.
“Of course, come in, please.” Alan stepped aside and gestured with his hand.
The moment the other person crossed the threshold, he looked up at the top of the door frame.
There was a cross placed there, which is hard to notice for ordinary people entering. Also, the ultraviolet lights that lightly touched their bodies for a few seconds showed no reaction.
Seeing that the two behaved normally, Jonathan smiled and closed the door.
In the reception room, Jonathan served cookies and cups of hot chocolate.
“So, please, tell me about your commission in detail.” Jonathan wasn’t one to complain about his clients; he knew that children were always the center of paranormal events.
“Oh, thank you very much.” Both took the cups of hot chocolate.
Henry and Judy looked around curiously after entering, and only looked away at that moment.
“My name is Henry, and she is my good friend Judy…”
After introducing themselves, Henry began to describe the details of the commission. Both were students at a nearby school and came here because of their teacher, Laila.
“I think Teacher Laila might have encountered an evil spirit!” Henry showed concern when talking about evil spirits.
According to him, their teacher Laila is a kind and caring person who has always looked after her students well.
But three days ago, Teacher Laila’s attitude changed. Not only did she seem nervous all the time, but she also often appeared scared.
“Teacher Laila once mentioned that many people around her laughed strangely, and she seemed very frightened by whatever was happening around her. But neither I nor the other teachers had ever noticed people like that,” Henry said as he ate another chocolate cookie.
“The school assigned a doctor for this purpose, but after the examination, the doctor said Teacher Laila was healthy.”
“No one believes the teacher, but Judy and I do, right?” Henry turned and looked at the girl next to him.
Judy had short hair and nodded when she heard Henry call her. She believed in Laila, not only because she had just transferred to the school and the teachers were kind to her, but because she was familiar with many supernatural events herself, being the daughter of Lorraine, who was a medium.
The reason Judy came to the church today was because she was curious. What are exorcists really like?
But she found that the church was remote and in ruins, which was far from what she had imagined.
“That’s why we would like to trust you to protect our teacher Laila.” Henry looked at Jonathan expectantly.
On the other side, Jonathan seemed to be listening attentively. But he thought to himself: “Well, these kids didn’t die after drinking a cup of chocolate and cookies made with holy water. Now I can conclude these two are truly human.”
He nodded secretly and loosened the hand holding a double-barrel shotgun under the desk where he was sitting. Then, with a kind smile, he said, “It’s true that your teacher’s behavior sounds too abnormal, but before moving on, I have a question for you.”
Jonathan, after saying this, leaned forward and stared at both of them, then asked:
“Who told you about me?”
Henry fell silent, thinking. He didn’t expect the priest to ask that, so he said: “Alan Newell, that man is a friend of my dad’s and mentioned that since you helped him, he stopped having nightmares.”
“That was the guy.” Jonathan remembered a black man who received a call from a dying woman, and the doubts in his heart were finally resolved.
The two had worked together before and had a good relationship.
“Well, do you know the price of my commission?” Jonathan began to pull out a calculator to figure out how much he would charge.
“I already know! That man told me when I arrived that it’s 10 dollars for the investigation.”
“God…” Jonathan’s mouth twisted in anger upon hearing that, then he looked at the cookies and murmured: “Just those cookies cost eleven dollars… Damn you, Alan.”
“I hope it will help fix this church; many people are counting on your help.” Henry said as he rummaged through his pocket and pulled out some chocolate wrappers along with coins.
As he searched through the wrappers, four two-dollar bills and a few coins appeared. He had been saving this money to buy toys, but now Henry was using it to help his teacher.
“Looks like I lost a two-dollar bill…” Henry was anxious while searching his pockets.
Judy also searched her pockets but had no money either.
Looking at the somewhat embarrassed kids, Jonathan took a few breaths to control his feelings and said: “I will accept this commission.”
“Really?” Henry’s eyes lit up, and he was ready to thank him.
“Wait by the door for a moment. I’ll go prepare.” Jonathan was willing to accept the commission not only because he admired Henry’s character and was willing to pay tribute, but there was a more important reason.
He looked at the words floating in front of him that appeared in a dark tone.
"[Mission in progress…
Class: Cursed spirit.
Request: Eliminate the cursed spirit disturbing Teacher Laila, purify the school, and calm the restless souls of the children asking for your help.
Reward: mysterious.]"
