Extra Story: The Eyes of the Goddess’s Desperate Battle!

“Kaoru returned to her own world. I doubt she’ll ever come here again. However, she might still visit this world, considering it belongs to her friend, Lady Celestine. But that could be several centuries or even millennia from now, and she might descend in another country or maybe even another continent. It would make more sense to visit places you’ve never been if you were going sightseeing, right?”

“...”

Emile made this rather callous statement to the six members of the Eyes of the Goddess and Layette. He really had no choice. They were going to find out eventually, and it was far better for them to hear the truth directly from Emile rather than through secondhand or embellished rumors. Lolotte was also there, having taken a day off from the workshop.

“Kaoru didn’t leave of her own volition. I suspect she intended to stick around until we could all be independent... That’s the kind of person she is, don’t you agree?”

The other seven nodded. Indeed, Kaoru was that sort of person. Despite being a goddess, she was a strange deity, one who disliked being treated with reverence, and who wanted the orphans to address her casually.

The orphans had been troubled at first, but reluctantly did as they were told when Kaoru started addressing them with reverence and made everyone uncomfortable. They came to realize that it was truly isolating to be the only one being treated differently in the house, and they wanted to do as Kaoru wanted.

“Anyway, because of the unexpected damage to her temporary physical form, Kaoru had to go back to her own world earlier than planned, and her vacation here came to an end. Do you all realize what this means?

The seven nodded.

“We all need to live on our own from now on, and we each have a responsibility. Anyone who sees us will think: ‘Ah, so those are the orphans that Kaoru girl took care of.’ If we were to ever do anything shameful...”

The other seven gulped hard.

“...Kaoru’s name would be tarnished.”

The children all grew pale. That couldn’t happen. They would put their lives on the line to make sure that could never happen.

“Kaoru must have known this was a possibility. That’s why she had us prepare, and why she taught us all sorts of things after returning from her trip. She must have been thinking about what would happen to us if she were to suddenly disappear... And we just poked fun at her and laughed it off...”

“But no one ever thought Big Sis Kaoru would actually get married...”

“Y-Yeah. Well, not much we could have done about that. I thought the same, and in the end, she left without ever getting married here...” Emile said in agreement to one of the orphans’ comments.

They were quite harsh on Kaoru when it came to that subject...

“But putting that aside, the question is, what are we going to do from here? I mean, we won’t have any issues getting by. I mean, other than letting us live in her house, we’ve been doing fine without her financial support... Actually, we were the ones taking care of her, and we even have some savings.”

Lolotte had been chipping in with her earnings from the workshop, and they had no rent, water bills, or electric bills to pay, and that left seven people’s worth of income (excluding Layette). Their only expenses were food and firewood for cooking, and some occasional clothing purchases. Thrifted clothing, of course.

As for their income, these were kids who Kaoru was taking care of (or so people thought), so they had proper jobs. It went without saying that they would never get turned down if they applied for work somewhere. The children often turned down better opportunities, saying “I can’t take care of Kaoru if I get home too late,” or, “I can’t work at places where I won’t be able to gather intel for the Eyes of the Goddess.” Still, they made decent money despite being selective about their work.

Of course, it wasn’t that they got special treatment because Kaoru was taking care of them (or so people thought)... They could have gotten such special treatment if they wanted, but Kaoru and the orphans themselves would have never accepted that. The orphans’ knowledge and thought processes were far above the level of other children in this world, thanks to Kaoru’s teachings, making them each incredibly useful. They could greatly improve efficiency and profits with ease wherever they worked.

As such, there were no issues at all with how things stood currently. They could each work their way up at their places of work, get married, and continue building their careers or maybe even start their own businesses. That would let each of them lead a pretty decent life.

...The issue was, that wasn’t what any of them desired.

“If we don’t do something, Kaoru will be overshadowed by the Order of the Goddess! They claim that Lady Celestine is the one and only goddess, and they’ll solidify Kaoru’s position in history as a normal person with Lady Celestine’s blessing. And...”

“We can’t let that happen!!!” they all yelled.

“I talked to the Commerce Guild. They said that as long as we’re just selling ingredients and not actual medicine, we won’t need any apothecary-related licenses or permissions. We can register as a small, family-owned business that way.”

“Good, it’s just as I heard from Master Gruber, then. Let’s rent out the house next door, under the condition that we can do construction work on part of the building, then ask a master carpenter to help us turn it into a storefront. Then we’ll secure a supply route, and the older group will register as hunters to gather our own herbs. Then...”

Emile’s gaze turned to a notice board nearby. It read, Head Temple of the Goddess Kaoru.

Indeed, the objective of the orphans was to carve Kaoru’s name and achievements into history.

“We must establish an economic infrastructure so we don’t have to rely on believers, donations, missionary work, or expansion. We’ll create an organization that only serves to record facts and historical information to be passed down into the future. All so that one day, when Kaoru descends upon this world again, we can show her all the good that came of her actions, from how she had saved us all... Let’s do this, guys!”

“Yeeeaaah!!!” they shouted in unison.

“I heard you started something interesting...”

“Why are you here, Fran...?”

“Let me have a bite!”

“You too, Roland?”

“What’s this I hear about a religion giving praise to Lady Kaoru?”

“Who are you...oh, you’re Carlos’s owner... Your eyes are so similar to Kaoru’s, you scared me for a sec...”

“We owe much to Lady Kaoru. If a new religion has been founded in her honor, we would not be opposed to converting...”

“Who are you guys...wait, what? Admirals of the Aligot Imperial Navy? And you’re the chairman of the shipowners’ association?”

“Things are getting real here...”

“Yeah. But I doubt we’ll get any more people than this. We should be good as long as we have enough authority to repel anyone from Lady Celestine’s order that tries to give us flak...

“All right, the Order of the Goddess Kaoru Head Temple is officially up and running!”

The orphans had suddenly started a new religion. The religion claimed that Saint Kaoru, a messenger of the Goddess who had saved orphans and prevented a war between nations by sacrificing herself, was a goddess herself. The religions of this world had split off into many sects, but it treated the Goddess Celestine as the one and only deity. In other words, worshiping any other god was seen as heresy.

...However, even believers of the Order of the Goddess Celestine couldn’t take too strong of a stance against this new religion. Kaoru was the Angel of the Goddess Celestine, and was now praised as a saint after her passing. Plus, Kaoru had saved the lives of the orphans who had started the religion. In their eyes, she was indeed akin to a goddess. No one dared deny their beliefs or brand it as heresy. Priests, especially. That is, any priest who cared about their reputation among the people...

Not to mention, it was backed by the great hero and guardian of the continent, Fran, and the brother of the king, Roland, and their support wasn’t just from aristocrats from their own country. A noble girl from another land who was known for being loved by the Goddess, members of the Aligot Imperial Navy, and owners and crews of merchant ships had put their full support behind the movement. Considering they had no intention of spreading their influence and showed no signs of ill intent, it was pointless to get burned going after such a small religious group.

Indeed, leaving them alone was the best option. They figured the best way to resolve this without making waves was to treat them as one of the many small sects that had splintered from the Order of Celestine...

And a few years later...

“We have a package from Beliscas!”

“Good. The merchant ships from the Aligot Empire will be entering the ports next week. The cargo being carried in the battleships should be arriving even sooner. I want the harvesting team to stop their work after today and give them some backup. I’ll put in a request to the Hunter’s Guild to take care of the harvesting instead.”

“Roger that! Hehe, we’re a ‘family business,’ so we don’t have any overhead, the empire’s navy accommodates us in exchange for giving them some alcohol, and the merchant ships take care of shipments for a small fee, so there’s no way any merchant can compete with our prices. Maybe we can monopolize the supply routes of the royal capital’s apothecaries...no, I guess we can’t...”

“Haha, right...” The young boy came to his own conclusion without Emile having to say it.

Nothing good came from going too far with anything. What would happen if a business claimed the sole supply chain of an important resource, then suddenly went out of business? No matter how steady a business might be, a key product could suddenly become unavailable due to unfavorable weather, war, or some other unexpected reason. Moreover, a company that one was doing business with could suddenly shut down before they paid off their balance, or a thief could break in and steal the money or the products. Even worse, bandits could kill all of the workers and even set the shop on fire...

These might be bandits who just wanted to steal something, or those who were hired by someone. For example, by the owner of a large business or major shop who had their market share taken by an up-and-coming store that had undercut their prices... And if a business that monopolized the supply suddenly went bankrupt, distribution of that product would stop completely. This wouldn’t be an issue if it was a non-essential or luxury item, but anything related to human lives was another story... And, of course, ingredients for medicine fell into that category.

...It was best to make “just enough” in business. Going too far would be asking for trouble.

“Well, we’ll make some decent earnings with the ingredients for medicine. And if we ever stop making money, we can always change course...”

...Some time later, the house next to the orphans’ house on the other side of the apothecary was purchased outright. Yes, they had already earned and saved enough for such a major acquisition. They had already purchased the apothecary several years ago, after all.

Business was going smoothly. This was no surprise. After all, they had powerful weapons in their arsenal:

Kaoru’s name value.

A powerful sense of unity and familial love that far surpassed that of a real family...

And the knowledge and business tactics from Earth that Kaoru had ingrained into them.

No one could possibly compete...

“Huh, there’s a new shop two buildings over from the apothecary. Let’s see... ‘The Eyes of the Goddess Souvenir Store’? That apothecary also had ‘the Eyes of the Goddess’ in it, and I think it’s run by those former orphans...”

No one called Emile and the others of the Eyes of the Goddess “orphans” anymore.

These days, they were referred to as “former orphans,” “the boys/girls from Kaoru’s place,” or “those Nagase boys/girls.” The last one was because the children had given themselves the last name Nagase, and the townspeople assumed it was their shop name or something. The actual shop name was “The Eyes of the Goddess”... Besides, the former orphans were considered adults now that they were over fifteen, making them too old to be referred to as just “orphans.”

And at the new store, there was a notice that read, “Get your Lady Kaoru rice crackers here!”...

“Rice crackers?”

Rice crackers, known as senbei in Japan, were already being made in the Jomon and Yayoi eras, but it seemed they either weren’t being made here or weren’t commonly known, judging from the man’s unfamiliar tone.

“Guess I’ll take a peek inside...”

There were various items featured in the shop.

The “Lady Kaoru Wooden Doll,” the “Lady Kaoru Stuffed Doll,” the “Lady Kaoru Mask,” the “Lady Kaoru Evil-Warding Doll,” “Lady Kaoru Rice Crackers,” “Lady Kaoru Charms,” “All About the Order of the Goddess Kaoru,” “The Lady Kaoru Diet”...

The harsh look in the eyes of the mask and evil-warding doll were extremely accurate to the source material, and were said to be very effective at keeping evil at bay. The two books, which could also be found in libraries, had been written by Emile and Belle, respectively. The diet method was indeed effective at losing weight, but it mainly reduced weight from one’s breasts, making it not so popular.

Belle was quite upset at the complaints and shouted, “It does say it’s the ‘Lady Kaoru’ Diet, doesn’t it?!”

In any case, these products had been in stock for a long time, and were still being sold by the time Kaoru was resurrected. It was a good thing Kaoru happened to walk into the apothecary instead of the souvenir store...

“We’re going to live. We’ll have descendants, who will continue to protect Kaoru’s legacy. Let’s trust in the possibility that Kaoru will one day come to see it all with her own eyes...”

“Yeah!” they all yelled.

“...And for now, Belle and I have had our first descendant between us...”

“Teehee!”

“Tch!” the others said. “Achille and I have a child as well...”

“Tch!” came even louder from the childless ones.

“We’ll fulfill Kaoru’s unrealized dream of living a happy married life...”

“If Big Sis Kaoru heard that, she would probably shout...”

“Sh-Shaddap!!!” they all cheered together.