Pilgrimage Ark - Ever since the day he saw these "giant ships" that looked like small city-states with his own eyes, and ever since he learned about the actions of these behemoths that were constantly "patrolling" on the sea, Duncan had doubts about these amazing creations.

What exactly does the pilgrimage ark mean? Their special "pilgrimage" behavior... are they just "patrols"?

People in the city-state often say that the Pilgrimage Ark represents the power of the Four Gods. They are the symbol of the church's highest military force and also the "palace" of the four righteous gods in the mortal world. The church ordered the Ark to patrol the Infinite Sea in order to deter heretics and to protect the city-state from being polluted by some malicious existence in the warp space. Duncan had no doubt about this statement at first, but as he came into contact with the Church of the Four Gods more and more, especially after learning more and more inside stories about the church from Vanna, Morris and Agatha, he discovered doubts.

The ones truly responsible for combating heresy and evil are the inquisitors and guardians of each city-state; the ones truly responsible for intercepting pagans and rescuing sailors at sea are the regular fleets of the Four Gods Church; the ones truly responsible for guarding against warp pollution and consolidating the city-state's defense are the church bells, the bishops' prayers, and the strictly planned church-bell tower system; and the four majestic pilgrimage arks... in fact, never get involved in anything having to do with the world.

They spend three quarters of the year patrolling certain secret routes that are invisible and unpredictable to the mortal world, as if they are located between the cracks of the real dimension and far away from any city. The rest of the time, they take turns patrolling near the "Eternal Curtain" at the border, only having minimal communication with the church's border fleet and not dealing with any city-state - they will even deliberately avoid the patrol fleets of border city-states.

Only in very rare cases would these arks dock in a city-state - for example, after a major event like the Black Sun of Plande, they would appear before the world.

Other than that, these arks will no longer have any connection with the mortal world. Even within the four major churches, they are always shrouded in a layer of mysterious mist. Most priests will never have the opportunity to set foot on the pilgrimage ark in their entire lives. Only those selected as "saints" are eligible to be taken to the ark during their apprenticeship period, but they can only move in designated areas, and after completing the necessary learning and training, they will be sent back to their original city. These "saints" will never have the opportunity to come into contact with the true secrets of the ark from beginning to end.

All these clues indicate that the existence of the "Pilgrim Ark" itself is full of huge doubts - their true purpose has always been hidden.

Now, Duncan finally has the answer.

"...The four current pilgrimage arks were built several decades ago. Before these 'giant ships' were put into use, the four major churches actually had an earlier generation of 'arks', but they are completely incomparable to the four church ships today..."

Frame had a low voice, and his words seemed to flow out of rock, with a calmness that made people subconsciously relaxed and convinced.

"The church's 'arks' of the previous generation were actually just some large ships. At that time, they were just part of the Vatican's patrol fleet and a part of the armed forces. They were not as mysterious as they are today, nor were they as...isolated from the world as they are today.

"Today's 'church ships' are something on a completely different level. Rather than being four 'big ships'... Strictly speaking, they are more like four 'anchor points', used to anchor the gods' sanity at a 'balance point' outside the mortal world."

Duncan did not speak, but just looked at the opposite side with a serious expression - he knew that Frame's explanations were specifically for him, and the other popes and bishops attending the meeting here were all from the Pilgrimage Ark. These people were obviously "insiders" of the truth.

"...It is impossible to verify who first discovered the truth... It was a series of 'revelations' and 'inspirations'. We heard the whispered truth in prayer, and saw darkness and corruption in the illusion brought by incense. The four of us felt the 'pulling' from outside the world more than once. The gods led our thoughts to a chaotic and vast place, allowing us to see their death and haze... And in this process, the connection between the earthly priests and the four gods began to be frequently interrupted... That was probably around 1822."

Frame paused briefly here, and Lucrecia, who was sitting not far to Duncan's right, seemed to suddenly think of something: "1822... the 'Cold Harbor Silence' incident?!"

"Yes, the Cold Harbor Silence incident - it's very famous, but it's actually just a microcosm, a microcosm that has the greatest impact in a series of deteriorating situations and has been left behind because of the inability to fully deal with the aftermath."

The person who answered was not Frame, but Banster who was sitting next to Frame. The Pope of Death, dressed in a black robe, had a hoarse voice and his old face was as pale as a dead person.

"All the priests in the city-state suddenly lost contact with Bartok, the god of death. In the 'silence' that lasted for 24 hours, they heard a continuous and terrifying hollow whistling and roaring in their minds that only they could hear. Then, dirty blood flowed out of the 'holy temple'. The archbishop of the city-state died a martyrdom and melted in the dirty blood to protect the cathedral. Afterwards, statistics showed that a total of 17 priests were martyred in the 'silence', and another 77 people fell into permanent madness, and their minds collapsed because they witnessed things outside the real world...

"According to my judgment, in the twenty years since then, the Silence incident has still had lasting consequences. The temporary disappearance of the power of divine protection has weakened the protection of the reality dimension in the Frigid Sea area, and the influence of the Warp, the Abyss, and the Spirit World has taken advantage of the situation to infiltrate. With Cold Harbor as the center, the number of 'natural psykers' born in the Frigid Sea city-states during that period is almost more than the total number of all other city-states in the world."

Banster paused and set his eyes on Rune.

"Yes, just as Banster said, the Cold Harbor Silence incident in 1822 was just a microcosm," Rune nodded. "The real situation is that for quite a long time, throughout the vast ocean, contact with the gods has become difficult, even... dangerous. Daily prayers often go unanswered, but worse is that they get 'responses' that they shouldn't have. The protection of the city-state is weakening, and more strange things are happening during ocean voyages. Through revelations and illusions... we finally confirmed the terrible 'state' of the gods."

The hall fell silent.

The gods are dead - Duncan knew this, and so did his followers, the four popes, and the bishops on the Pilgrimage Ark. But when this matter was brought to the surface, when all the intelligence and past events were laid out and linked to the Great Annihilation, a strange and depressing atmosphere inevitably spread at the scene.

"...So, you built a huge pilgrimage ark to strengthen the connection with the gods and delay their 'decay' process..." Duncan broke the silence, "I'm not interested in the specific 'principles' of this process. I just want to know to what extent the 'effect' of your doing this has been achieved? Did it really work? Just now, Frame said that the 'delay' effect of the ark has reached its limit. What's going on?"

"It worked, at least at the beginning," Helena nodded. "The Ark is the anchor point of the gods, and the 'death' of the gods is a long and complicated process. Strictly speaking, this death process itself cannot be stopped at all - it is as irreversible as the operation of the laws of the world, but the existence of the 'anchor point' can at least allow the gods to maintain a relatively stable state until they completely 'disappear'. According to our initial estimate... it should work for at least several centuries, or even thousands of years.

"Our initial thought was that if we could have such a long 'buffer time', perhaps we would have a chance to find other ways to further delay the decay of the gods, or even find... find..."

Helena suddenly stopped, as if there were some words that were difficult to say directly, as if even though she and several other popes had taken action for this, she was still unwilling to admit certain "facts".

Rune, Banster, and Frame also fell silent with complicated expressions.

Next to Duncan, Lucretia frowned in confusion, Nina and Shirley couldn't help but look curious, and Morris opened his mouth thoughtfully, but hesitated to speak.

The soft and illusory sound of waves appeared in Duncan's ears, and the faint whisper seemed to whisper to him from behind a thick curtain. He was in a trance for a moment and looked down at the table in front of him.

A faint trace of water appeared on the table and then quickly disappeared.

He looked at the water mark and raised his head to look at Helena opposite him.

"Find a replacement, huh?"

Helena opened her eyes wide and looked at Duncan in astonishment.

Duncan just shook his head without explaining anything. After a few seconds of silence, he whispered thoughtfully, "...but now only a few decades have passed, which is far from the 'several centuries' you expected."

"Yes, the situation has deteriorated worse than we thought," Banster said in a hoarse and gloomy voice. "We thought that the current 'balanced state' of the gods might last for a thousand years, but the power of decay and decline has begun to invade the entire world. The Ark's 'pilgrimage' activities were originally intended to strengthen the connection between the gods and the mortal world, but now, half of our time is spent trying to find ways to 'filter out' the pollution emitted by them during their decay...

"This makes us... doubly sad."

Banster finished his words with a sigh.

Duncan broke the silence after a moment of thought: "So, you have taken new actions - those fleets assembled in the border waters?"