I Quit Being a Priest

A morning lighter than I expected greeted me. When I opened my eyes, the day had already brightened into morning, and it seemed the spell had succeeded, as I could see my previous body lying on the ground.

A tall man with silver hair that was somewhat long for a male, touching the ground and disheveled by the wind, entered my field of vision.

Though I described him as a tall man, it was just how I looked before igniting the spell formula, so I didn’t feel particularly moved, but seeing myself from a second-person perspective for the first time was a strange feeling.

I raised my body, which felt a bit lighter than usual, and looked around a bit.

With that much holy power covering this place, I needed to check if someone had attacked me in the meantime, or if any wild animals had come and gone.

Fortunately, the scenery I was seeing now didn’t particularly differ from how it looked before proceeding with the spell.

Since I had included clothes to wear when drawing the circuit with creation as the subject, no embarrassing scene occurred for others to see.

If I had to pick out something that felt off, it was that my viewpoint was strangely lower than before.

The scenery I saw when I stood up looked somehow lower.

Is the newly created body shorter in height? No, but this seems a bit extreme.

“…Ah.”

At that moment, the cool breeze ruffled my hair.

Only then did I strongly feel that something was off about my appearance. The silver hair fluttering in the wind was unreasonably long.

That wasn’t all. The short gasp I let out when my hair fluttered was too thin to be considered mine.

“Fuck, don’t tell me…”

Even the curse mixed with surprise that I just uttered came out in a thin, delicate voice.

I frantically felt my body with my hands. As a result, there were many problems with my body.

What should have been below was missing, and up above, what shouldn’t have been there was quite large to the touch.

I tried to deny this unbelievable reality by feeling my body several more times, but the soft sensation on my hands and the pure white, delicate skin confirmed without a doubt that this was a female body.

“Ah, no, wait…”

Finding it difficult to accept this unbelievable reality with a clear mind, I pressed my forehead with my hand.

As if the headache from holy power exhaustion wasn’t bad enough, it felt like it had gotten worse.

I checked the spell circuit drawn on the ground again to find the cause of the failure. I was sure I had drawn it accurately. It was a set of characters in precise arrangement without even a margin of error.

The arrangement of the circuit wasn’t wrong. Of course it wouldn’t be; someone like me wouldn’t make such a beginner’s mistake.

I briefly recalled the content of the holy book I had seen before. There was no mention in that record of the king who received the spell having his gender changed.

Given my memory, which rarely forgets something once remembered, it was probably correct.

So there must have been some kind of reason, I thought, looking at my hands that had now become too small.

Actually, I had some inkling. The area around the mouth of my former body, now collapsed powerlessly on the ground with the soul gone, was stained red with blood.

Headache and coughing up blood, the main symptoms of holy power exhaustion. Would it be right to think that the amount was slightly insufficient to create and build a male body with holy power?

It seemed easier to understand for now if I thought that it had become the most efficient body that could be formed with the total amount of holy power given.

“…”

For a while, I was so dumbfounded that I just stared at my former body lying on the ground.

I had just lost my pride as a man for such an absurd reason.

“Really, fuck…”

Feeling as if I had been unfairly treated by the world, I let out a coarse curse.

But in fact, that wasn’t the only real problem. Whatever the result, I had succeeded in constructing a new body and transferring my soul.

Judging by the concentration of holy power slowly regenerating in my body, it didn’t seem like the total amount of holy power I originally had changed just because my body changed. Only the holy power in the original body had disappeared.

But what was troublesome now was how to deal with the original body.

Naturally, the previous body from which the soul had departed no longer breathed, and its heart had stopped.

In other words, Illis, the priest of the hero’s party known to the world, was dead. That was also why I couldn’t return to my previous body.

To try the same method again, I would have to wait until my holy power built up, and if I transferred my soul more than twice, the strain on me would be severe.

This spell was ultimately a type that wore down one’s own soul.

Even in the records in the holy book, the king’s greed was endless, and it was written that he eventually perished as a soul while attempting a second transfer.

So that meant I had to accept this body whether I wanted to or not.

Plus, I had to deal with the somewhat uncomfortable task of disposing of my dead body.

‘…Should I burn it with fire?’

It wasn’t impossible if I converted and ignited holy power. It would just drain twice as much holy power.

Normally, I would have burned it even if it meant accepting such a loss, but after forcibly performing one major spell, holy power wasn’t gathering properly.

‘Or, should I dump it in the river?’

No, this was absolutely not an option. I couldn’t rule out the possibility that an acquaintance might discover my cold, dead body.

I didn’t want to advertise the fact that I had died far and wide as my body floated downstream.

Moreover, to get to the river from here, I would have to walk a bit further, and I wasn’t confident in carrying a corpse bigger than my current self.

Of course, this would also be possible if I used holy power, but as I mentioned earlier, the holy power remaining in my body was very minimal.

So the conclusion I came to was…

“…”

I decided to leave it as it was because it was too troublesome. If I left it like this, they would process the death on their own.

At first, I felt somewhat averse to the idea of someone seeing my corpse, but it didn’t seem like there would be anyone who would mourn my death anyway.

If I had to count, I couldn’t think of anyone besides Karnel or the people from the church in Katlea, my old hometown.

So I took the important items from my pocket and shoved them into my backpack.

My wallet and magic stones that I had kept in case I might need them.

Today, the continent’s best priest died here.

I roughly packed my belongings with my smaller body. The physical skeleton was noticeably different, making the luggage feel unusually heavy today.

Even the staff I used to draw spell formulas felt somewhat heavy to hold in my hand.

Due to the nature of my profession, which rarely required physical muscle, I wasn’t particularly strong even before turning into a woman, but at least I was stronger than Iris or Yuria.

Some might think I’m bragging about being stronger than two women despite being a man, but that’s because I feel like I’m weaker than those two now.

“Sigh…”

Even to myself, my fate seemed truly miserable. If I had known this would happen, I wouldn’t have messed with an ancient spell formula alone.

Would it be better to be cursed wherever I go as the insect who was kicked out of the party, or to have a free status not belonging anywhere, even though I had lost my pride as a man?

Actually, both options seemed awful, and if I had to choose, I would absolutely want to avoid either, but now that the situation had turned out this way, it couldn’t be undone.

I could only console myself by internally repeating that it would be better than a dishonorable life as a man, claiming a psychological victory that was nothing but wounds.

I just decided on my first destination. Actually, there was only one village within walking distance from here.

The central city at the heart of the continent, the most developed metropolis.

An impressive size and facilities incomparable to other villages, and the place with the most residents proportionate to its size.

The Central City. The capital of the Empire and where the current generation’s king was enthroned.

The Central City was also the hometown of that fucking Iris. The Battle Magic Department of the Academy was so large that it was almost a symbol of the Central City.

I wanted to return to my hometown too, but to do that, I needed to visit any village first to buy travel supplies.

I didn’t have any food when I left the party, and I didn’t want to sleep outdoors, I thought, as I removed the grass stuck to my long hair one by one.

Well, doesn’t the old saying go that before planning work, one should sort out food and lodging?

And so, I turned my somewhat heavy steps due to the luggage toward the Central City.