Lack of Divinity

"Sir?"

"Tell me if there's anything you'd like?"

"?"

"My mother always said, 'Be kind when you can. But when you're kind, don't be foolish'. Never explained what she meant, but I assume she meant that I need to be kind to the proper people."

Savine guess the Sovereign found her likeable enough. And since he was the country's ruler, he could grant a wish or two no problem.

'Well, I guess I can only ask for Vasas,' Savine wondered.

She was finding herself somewhat pressured to tame her mana.

As she was about to open her mouth, a better thought came to her mind.

'Wait… what if I try that?'

"If there's anything I'd like…" Savine said slowly. "It would be to touch the Divine Tree."

The Sovereign tilted his head.

"The Divine Tree?"

If she could just touch it, she could get a huge jackpot – a seed of a Wisdom Tree.

But it was definitely a risky move. After all, to get the Wisdom Tree's seed was extremely flashy. There was no hiding something like that. But at the same time, it was so flashy, she could definitely act like there was something mystical or even divine about it.

If she touched the Wisdom Tree and just took a chunk out of it as a Vasa in public, she would just get arrested. But if she took out its seed, something that no one in the world would even know about… then, the story might end up a bit differently.

"Yes. I know it's a presumptuous thing to ask, but from young, I was always fascinated by the story of the Divine Trees. I've always wondered what it would be like to touch them," she said calmly.

'Wait, but how should I do it?'

Savine was excited to try it, but she quickly realized that she lacked Divinity. Without Divinity to forcefully bend the rules of the world, she wasn't that confident in being able to do dig out the tree's seed.

'Can I do the same with mana?'

It was theoretically possible… but it would require an ungodly amount of mana. Even if she had 100% of her total mana tamed, it would not be enough. No, it would never be enough. After all, the opponent was something that likely contained at least 10% of all the mana in the world.

Ripping off the Tree's seed from deep inside it... that was simply impossible. To succeed, she would need to spend years preparing for the event: weakening the tree, taking over parts of it, strengthening herself, gathering workers... such work will never be allowed by the Sovereignty. 

And in the first place, the Tree was something filled with mana itself. It also had its own will and intent. If it noticed someone trying to take away its seed, it was definitely going to retaliate.

If it was only a battle of intent, then perhaps Savine would win. But it wasn't something like that, it was more of a battle of resources. And there was no way for Savine to cheat in any way. 

Savine realized she was without options.

'Wait, what if I sacrifice my gift?' she wondered.

It was, after all, a form of Divinity inherent to her. Though its use was somewhat fixed for Savine, it wasn't impossible to destroy it and harness the Divinity.

But Savine had no experience trying something like that. She also never heard of any other angel trying the same thing.

"Though I understand where you're coming from, I'm a mere librarian," the Sovereign said. "I don't have the authority to let you touch the Divine Tree."

Broken out of her thoughts, Savine nodded.

'I guess I won't have to sacrifice my gift for nothing today.'

"I understand."

She didn't feel like it would be possible to destroy her Gift and use its energy for herself anyway. If something like that was possible, the other angels should've said something.

'But I still really want the Tree's seed.'

The surefire way to obtain it was by using Divinity. But it was impossible for Savine to obtain Divinity here. Divinity was something exclusive to heaven and the angels. No matter how hard Savine tried, the act was physically impossible.

Divinity was obtained from the worship of people. But there were three main requirements that needed to be met aside from that.

In the first place, the worship couldn't be a weak one. At the very least, people needed to be willing to literally die for you.

Secondly, one needed a bit of Divinity to start with. Since Divinity was practically omnipotent, it could also be used to gather more Divinity.

The third was that you needed to be an angel. A normal person's soul wasn't strong enough to hold Divinity. Some angels theorized that the thing that allowed angels to contain Divinity was their Gifts, but that was a discussion for another time.

Out of these three requirements, Savine could take care of the 1st and 3rd. But on the second, she was out of options.

'I guess I could borrow it from another angel…'

But no angel was going to come here.

It was depressing to think about.

Savine sighed and said to the Sovereign. "Can I then ask for a spare Vasa?"

The Sovereign tilted his head. "A Vasa?"

"Yes."

'If I can't get Divinity, then I'll just use mana, I guess.'

As for the Sovereign, Savine did not explain herself. Every mage wanted more Vasas, anyway. Especially young ones, who were just learning to tame their own unruly mana. And also, the Sovereign knew Savine's backstory. She was from the Fest duchy, and not only that, she was probably an outside there as well, as she came from the Magicracy.

Logically, it should be hard for her to get Vasas for herself.

"Is that so?" the Sovereign stroked his chin, the non-scarred part. "His Majesty grants a few spare Vasas to his loyal retainers. I happen to be one of them, so yes, I do have some spare Vasas. Wait here."

Savine nodded and smiled warmly.

"Thank you, sir."

"No problem. I've long acclimatized to all my mana. There's no need for me to hoard extra Vasas."

He was gone for a couple minutes before he came back with a small box and gave it to Savine. Savine did not open the box, following noble etiquette. But with her gift, she knew there were 3 Vasas inside. With this and the Vasas from the pope, she'd be able to tame almost 50% of her total mana. 10 more, and she'd have all of it under control.

At that point, she would be peerless in the world.

'Though, I can't really do what I want with it, because of Jibril's seal.'

"Keep it safe and don't tell anyone," the Sovereign winked.

"My mother would not raise a fool."

He made a wry chuckle at that and waved her off.

"Call the person who guided you in on your way out."

Savine nodded.

She arrived before the snobbish-looking man and waited until he was done with an unruly visitor. The man noticed her as well and quickly shooed away the nagging woman and walked up to Savine.

"Did the supervisor call for me?"

"Yes."

"Alright. Oh, is that a gift from him?"

"Yes."

"He must've really liked you."

"Thanks for all your help, sir," Savine bowed deeply.

"Ah, you're making me embarrassed," he waved his dismissively.

Savine shook her head gently.

"How should I address you, sir?"

"…Eh, just call me Kin."

"Alright, mister Kin, it was nice meeting you."

Kin made a lazy nod and walked towards the library. Savine found her way out of the castle and headed to where the Sovereign's teacher was. On the way, she stopped by the place that sold paper and wrote a short letter. Afterwards, she got her Vasa out, and she silently worked on a meeting gift for the teacher.

On the way, a conversation played out in her head.