Ice Vapor Goddess

Chapter 27 Joseph (Part 1)
Joseph's hands, hidden inside his robe, trembled slightly. He didn't know why he was acting this way; reason roared madly in his mind: "Say it! Say it! Say you support the bishop, or else! Like before! Even if you want to betray him later, you have to support him on the surface!"

But he opened his mouth wide, yet couldn't utter a word, only revealing an expression more painful than crying.

“I won’t force you, Joseph,” Siren said. “If anyone ostracizes you because of this, you can tell me.”

“No…no…I…” he answered, his right hand trembling as if in a seizure.

Siren's eyes narrowed; he knew this was a manifestation of a mental problem. Although he didn't know exactly what had happened to Joseph, he couldn't ignore it when it involved real-life suffering. So, holding the crucifix, he loudly proclaimed—

"Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted." (Matthew 5:4)

This is [Pain Soothing], a low-level divine spell that most priests can master. After the light fell on Joseph, he seemed to feel a little better, but he still stood there blankly.

Siren walked over and grabbed his shoulder: “Look at me, Joseph, you can confess to me, and do not hide anything from God.”

He gestured for the others to leave, so Aldridge carried Sam upstairs, and the six of them began to talk quietly in the room.

"Ten minutes," Aldridge said quietly, pulling four shillings from his pocket.

“Seven minutes.” Fafnir pulled out a gold pound, the gleaming gold attracting everyone’s attention.

“Five minutes.” Kyle also took out a gold pound, then thought for a moment and exchanged it for five silver shillings.

Sam looked at them blankly: "What are you talking about? What minutes?"

“We’re betting on when Joseph will be persuaded,” Fafnir said, shrugging.

"Uh?"

“He can make even stones believers,” Aldridge asserted.

“Three minutes, I bet three minutes.” Mathilde gritted her teeth and pulled out a gold pound.

"Why?" Fafnir exclaimed in surprise, "Even the devil wouldn't be this fast!"

“The devil is out of the question, but Siren is,” Mathilde said.

"Isn't that a bit disrespectful..." Logan, who always had a stern face, protested helplessly, "Besides, what's about to happen is a sacred confession..."

"So, are you going to bet?"

"I bet!" Logan immediately pulled out three shillings. "Five minutes."

Kyle, who was standing next to him, punched him.
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At this moment, in the restaurant, Joseph barely regained his senses. He looked at Siren, at the young bishop's clear eyes, his curly black hair slightly obscuring his eyebrows, who was holding his shoulder with concern. It was as if light was shining behind him, carrying the halo of saints from the scriptures.

“God,” he said.

He shakily pulled something out of his pocket, and then, before Xilun could react, suddenly—Bang!

The gunshot shook the small building, and people rushed downstairs like madmen. They saw Siren lying on the dining table, his black bishop's robe and pale hands soaked in blood, which flowed from the gunshot wound in his right chest. Joseph sat trembling in a chair, holding a revolver in his hand.

"I'm alright!" Siren shouted, enduring the excruciating pain. "Stop him!"

People then realized that Joseph had already pointed a gun at his chin, and just as he was about to pull the trigger, Mathilde kicked his hand hard.

With a cracking sound, Joseph collapsed to the ground in agony. Then Mathilde's Healing Touch activated, and the bleeding from Siren's wound gradually decreased. "Jehovah Rafa," Siren said, casting Healing Touch on himself again. Then, seeing the soldiers rushing towards Joseph and binding him, he said, "Just help him up."

Fafnir and Logan held his hands down, glaring at him hatefully, while Siren sat up with Mathilde's help.

【Holy Healing】can only heal external wounds, but the bullet still seems to be inside his abdominal cavity. Xiren endured the pain and looked at Joseph.

"Why don't you kill me! Why don't you kill me!" Joseph couldn't face Siren's eyes and roared, his face flushed red, but he was held down by two soldiers. His voice was full of despair.

“God will not abandon anyone.” Celen placed his hand on his head. “I forgive you. See, it has healed.”

Tears streamed down Joseph's face. It was hard to imagine someone crying like that, with desperate wails, like a child who had lost everything.

“She’s crazy,” Mathilde whispered, while Aldridge beside her shook his head, indicating he didn’t know either.

Siren looked at Joseph with unwavering determination.

Psychoanalysis is usually a long-term process. He had previously conducted long-term analyses that lasted for several years, during which patients would suffer, try to avoid the process, and call repeatedly to say, "Dr. Gu, I don't want to come anymore."

He has experienced too many instances of avoidance and refusal of treatment, and overreactions are common.

He pressed down on Joseph's shoulder, looking down at him coldly: "As my patient... believer, you can decide when to begin confession, but only I can decide when it ends, understand?"

For the first time, Joseph calmed down. Looking at Siron's indifferent, condescending, and ruthless perspective, he felt safe and comfortable, as if he were back home.

“I’ve looked at your file specifically,” Siron said. “You were a landless peasant who rose through the ranks from gatekeeper to priest.”

Joseph did not speak.

"It wasn't easy, was it?" Xilun said.

Tears streamed down his face again, and Joseph's whole body convulsed, his obese body shaking with visible lines of fat. He had answered with his actions.

"You are most likely illiterate and can only read a few passages from the Bible, so you learned it later. You may be ridiculed, insulted, cursed, and ostracized... But you learned to read and write in such an environment. What kind of belief supported you?"

Xilun pressed his head down, his words gentle, but his hands pressed down on him firmly.

This wasn't because he wanted to, but because he knew Joseph liked it; it was his comfort zone, the posture of the Other that he had become accustomed to.

This was precisely his initial problem.

He had experienced too much suffering, whether it was losing his land or struggling within the organizational structure of the church; the traumatic events shattered his understanding of the symbolic world.

He then internalized social rules into a cruel Other—an Other who only recognized flattery and obedience. He firmly believed that the operating rules of the power world were mutual trampling and pandering to superiors, which became his stable framework of fantasy.

Even his obesity might be a sign of hedonism, but this hedonism is not the kind of "happiness" we usually talk about; rather, it is a distorted pleasure obtained through self-deprecation.

He completely submits to the "approving, flattering, and violent Other" he imagines, even making himself the target of the Other's desires. He acts like a dog without any bottom line, even smiling and saying "You did a good job stepping on my face" when someone steps on his face, because he feels that the Other's desires have been satisfied and he has gained "self".

Yes, his entire "self" is constructed from the desires of the Other. Every time he flatters or fawns, it seems to be to please his superiors, but in reality, it is to prove "who I am".

Every superior is a spokesperson for the Other, and "I" am the one who satisfies the Other's pleasure. Thus, in the eyes of the Other, he obtains the coordinates of "self".

(End of this chapter)