After being expelled from the delegation, Father Paul returned to the Silver Ring and plunged into his former post—the Third Inquisition. No one knew or cared what he was doing there; people only knew two things.
First, he, who was originally a leading candidate for the next bishop, was completely alienated by Bishop Fabian.
Second, his colleagues who accompanied him on the trip gave him very negative feedback.
Today, to everyone's surprise, the bishop actually agreed to his request and was willing to have a ten-minute private talk with him, which gave the church staff a new idea.
Paul, who had entered the chapel, looked thinner, with his jawline deeply sunken. Of all his features, only his eyes remained remarkably bright.
The bishop glanced at the priest and gestured for him to sit opposite him.
In the old man's memory, Paul was a very talented person, but this talent was limited to his thinking and action abilities. His terrible level of interpersonal skills caused Fabian a lot of headaches time and time again.
However, Paul's disdain for factionalism was precisely what Fabian admired most about him. After all, in this world, there is no shortage of capable people, but truly loyal and reliable ones are few and far between.
Even though Paul hadn't told him the reason for the incident involving the delegation, Fabian could guess the gist of it. The latter's original intention was for the former to rest and calm down. But judging from the burning flame of revenge in the other's eyes, the priest ultimately couldn't overcome this hurdle in his heart.
"Paul, you've disappointed me..."
Bishop Fabian's words made the person involved grit his teeth, lower his head, and say bitterly, "I made a serious mistake regarding this delegation."
The fact that he felt ashamed and then became courageous was another reason why the bishop admired this man.
The old man leaned back in his chair and slowly said, "Tell me, let me hear what you've discovered."
The priest took out a large bundle of cloth bags and several notebooks from his pocket and spread them out on the table.
This inexplicable action left Fabian completely baffled.
“At first, when I met Brother Todd, I thought he was just a hypocrite whose soul was dominated by greed. But I was wrong; the evil he hid was far more terrifying than I imagined.” Paul pulled out a piece of paper covered with dense notes and a model of a refining furnace.
Fabian glanced at him, then looked up at the person opposite him, waiting for further explanation.
A slight chilly breeze blew into the room through the cracks in the window. The priest hunched over, tucked his hands into his sleeves, and said in a low voice, "After I was relieved of my duties as head of the delegation, I spent a day at the camp tidying up some things that I found strange."
Paul placed a hand on the paper and continued, “First, there’s the silver refinery at the foot of the monastery hill. This piece of paper contains information I bought at a high price from a craftsman. It records the silver refining process, so complex and sophisticated that it’s beyond the imagination of ordinary people. And according to him, all of this was made by Todd.”
Bishop Fabian touched his head: "It's nothing. That boy named Todd has a monk master, and perhaps he learned from him."
"Perhaps..." The priest took out a second piece of paper, on which many times and notes were recorded.
“I found the person in charge of the monks’ quarters at the monastery and asked him to write me Todd’s daily routine. I compared the records for about ten days and found a strange coincidence.” Paul said, tracing the records and time points with his finger, “From 12 noon to 5 pm, Todd disappeared for nine out of ten days. He was not in the dormitory, the library, the church, the meditation hall, or the classroom. In other words, he disappeared during this period of time…”
The old man shook his head: "Perhaps he left the monastery and went down the mountain or somewhere else."
The priest immediately dismissed the hypothesis: "The monastery gatekeeper also confirmed that Todd was rarely seen leaving the monastery in the afternoon."
“There’s just one last thing…” Paul carefully opened the small paper packets on the table. Some contained powders of different colors, some contained crystals of different sizes, and some contained some strange metals.
The old man put on the crystal glasses and examined them carefully, his face full of confusion.
The priest began to explain each item one by one: "This yellow powder is sulfur, this white crystal is salt, this black metal is heavy iron (Fe3O4), and as for the other contents of the paper package, I asked many people, and none of them knew. But they were certain of one thing: only a master alchemist could refine alchemical materials of such high purity and in such variety."
The bishop heard a familiar word and looked up in surprise: "Alchemy?"
Within the Church of the Father, alchemy is viewed as a monstrous threat, considered one of the "arts of the devil." The most important reason for this lies in the pressure exerted on the Church by the alchemist Sutherland a thousand years prior.
The priest carefully wrapped each paper packet and asked the person opposite him, "Sir, do you know where I found these things?"
"where?"
"The monastery's cemetery. Someone buried them underground as waste and covered them with soil. Unfortunately, they forgot that the new soil was too different in color from the surrounding soil, and the difference would be noticeable upon closer inspection. According to the gravedigger's testimony, these things had never appeared in the past few years and were only buried there in the last two months."
Paul supported himself on the table with both hands, facing Fabian, his voice low: "A fifteen-year-old boy, born into a peasant family, uneducated, mediocre and unremarkable from a young age. After entering the monastery, he quickly learned the scriptures, created a complex silver refining technique, survived a fire, sailed north and returned safely, and may even be a master alchemist... If all of this is explained by coincidence, it's far too far-fetched."
Bishop Fabian rubbed his forehead and asked the other person, "So you mean...?"
“A demon dwells within Todd, a demon from the depths of hell! I propose that he be put on trial for heresy immediately!”
After seeing Father Paul off, Bishop Fabian sat in his chair, looking at the sunlight streaming in through the window, his mind wavering and uncertain.
In his view, whether Todd did those things or not was unimportant; whether Todd was a demon was also unimportant. What mattered was whether the monk was useful, how useful he was, and whether he could be used to his advantage. That was the key.
The knocking interrupted Fabian's thoughts. Without waiting for the bishop's permission, the deacon unusually rushed into the room, his face filled with urgency: "Your Grace! Her Majesty the Queen has arrived!"
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