Chapter 109-108- Requiem Sacrifice
Climbing up the steps, like an ordinary foreign tourist, Yvette walked through the archway and into the interior of the black church.
The interior of the church is a vast, darkened space, illuminated only by thousands of candles burning along the walls. Beneath the stained glass dome, the orange light radiates over everyone, creating a solemn atmosphere that even tourists from other parts of the city find themselves drawn in, refraining from making any noise.
At this moment, in front of the rows of benches in the church, on the bone altar carved with skull patterns, a bishop was preaching doctrine, and the believers below were listening attentively in silence.
Yvette took a look and roughly determined the identity of the bishop. He should be a "requiem priest."
Through the information collected online and combined with the small notebooks distributed to tourists here, Yvette already knew the hierarchy of clergy within the Holy Spirit Sect.
The lowest level is the "deacon", which is the ordinary clergyman wearing black hoods.
Then there are the "priests" and "high priests". The former is responsible for the daily ritual activities of the church, such as mass, preaching, guiding believers to understand the doctrine, etc. The latter is the director of a single church and will only come out to preside over the ceremony on special days.
Above that is the "Requiem Ceremony", which belongs to the middle and high-level of the Holy Spirit Sect and the highest leader of the city-level diocese.
Next up is the "Reincarnation Priest." If the Requiem Priest can be compared to the mayor, then the Reincarnation Priest is the governor. Due to the Rustbone's limited territory, there are only five Reincarnation Priests, and the vast majority of the sect's affairs are handled by these five.
Finally, there are the three "Holy Priests" and "His Holiness the Pope", the four most mysterious and terrifying giants of the Holy Spirit Sect. Each of them is an unfathomable necromancer, known as the incarnation of the god of death on earth.
Rumor has it that these four have even comprehended the core mysteries of necromancy and become immortal beings. That is why New Eden, as one of the world's top two superpowers, has been reluctant to fight the war on terrorism with the Rusted Free State. They are worried that they will not be able to kill the four super wizards, but will instead anger them and bring continuous disasters to the country.
Of course, this statement is not true.
…
Since she was there to gather intelligence, Yvette did not do anything special. Like other tourists, she stood in a specific viewing area, watching the believers performing mass there, and took a few more glances at the requiem priest on the altar.
The other person had a very kind face, like an ordinary, honest uncle, which made people feel friendly. But when she thought of the evil spirit that flashed by outside the church, Yvette had to be alert. She guessed that this requiem priest was most likely an evil necromancer, and maybe the evil spirit just now was summoned by him.
Gradually, she had some ideas in her mind.
It was impossible for her to obtain necromancy through formal channels. Six months was not enough time for a new clergyman to be promoted to the rank of Requiem Priest, and she did not think that the Soul Fire Church would approve her application for employment.
The only options left were to steal or rob, but this presented another problem - whether stealing or robbing violently, it would inevitably attract the attention of the Holy Spirit Sect. What if it attracted a certain Saint?
That is the incarnation of the god of death, a true walking nuclear weapon, even countless times more terrifying than nuclear weapons themselves!
So, after some thought, Yvette made a decision - in the early stage, just collect some intelligence and deepen the understanding of the Soul Fire Church, and in the last half month, carry out sneak theft and even violent robbery.
In this way, even if a certain saint is attracted to come, she only needs to hide in Fusjiang for a few days, and leave the dream when the time comes. No matter you are the incarnation of the god of death or the incarnation of the witch of the end, you will never find her again.
After noting down the layout of the church as one of the basic intelligence information, more than ten minutes later, Yvette no longer lingered and turned around to leave.
But as he approached the door, a deacon wearing a black hood suddenly approached and asked politely, "Excuse me, are you Miss Wuming?"
"...It's me." Yvette stopped and narrowed her eyes slightly.
"Mr. Kos sincerely invites you to stay for a moment. I want to talk to you about something...if it's convenient for you."
"Who is Koth?"
"It's the gentleman on the altar." The deacon raised his head, revealing a young face from under the shadow of his hood, looking behind Yvette.
Following his gaze, Yvette looked at the requiem priest whom she had carefully observed before, and saw that he smiled at her from afar.
Yvette was a little confused, wondering if this was a gesture of goodwill, of reconciling past grievances, of writing off the evil spirit's attack?
But she decided to see what the other party was up to, so she nodded and said, "Lead the way."
…
Following the black-robed deacon, Yvette came to a reception room on the side.
After waiting on the sofa for about ten minutes, Yvette saw the requiem priest push open the door and walk in. He said with a brisk smile, "Miss Wuming is just as the rumors say. Even without a photo, I can recognize her at a glance."
"My name is Hoyle Koss, and I'm the requiem priest of the Soul Fire Church in Fosjiang. Nice to meet you, Miss Wuming. I've heard a lot about you!"
Yvette felt a little strange because the tone was too enthusiastic.
After a moment's silence, she asked, "Are you here to reconcile?"
"Reconcile?!" Hoyle's smile froze on his face. After a few seconds of stunned silence, he said in confusion, "Miss Wuming, this should be our first meeting... Is there any misunderstanding?"
"You didn't control that evil spirit?" Yvette asked.
"Evil spirits? What evil spirits?" Hoyle's expression became even more confused. "Although I do have some knowledge of necromancy, I only know a few simple ones, not anything related to evil spirits..."
Because Hoyle's expression was real enough and didn't sound like acting, Yvette frowned and asked a noncommittal question: "What do you want from me?"
"Um...it's like this, Miss Wuming, you...struck the base of those two human trafficker gangs in the suburbs of Fusjiang two days ago, right?" Hoyle became serious.
"Um."
"That's wonderful," Hoyle said sincerely. "I've actually wanted to eliminate those two evil bases for a long time, but the forces at hand weren't strong enough, and I wasn't strong enough either, so I couldn't do anything about them. Miss Wuming, you're doing justice for the people, and I want to express my gratitude to you first."
“…”
"Miss Wuming, this gratitude comes from the heart and is absolutely sincere! But I have taken the liberty of inviting you today to a more important and unwelcome request... That is, I would like to present a commission to you on behalf of the local Soul Fire Church."
"you say."
"I hope you can investigate the true identity of 'General,' the mysterious leader behind the criminal organization 'Ghost Hand Society,' and ideally, kill him directly," Hoyle said. "If the investigation is successful, I'm willing to pay you 1 million digital coins. If you successfully behead him, the reward will increase to 5 million... Miss Wuming, what do you think?"
After a moment of silence, Yvette did not directly answer whether she agreed or not, but asked, "What do you know about evil spirits?"
She suspected Hoyle had deliberately given her the mission in order to create a false impression and dispel her suspicions about his relationship with the Ghost Hand Society. However, she also felt that if this was the case, Hoyle wouldn't have had to resort to such unnecessary actions, as it would only make him appear to be trying to cover up his own guilt.
In short, ask first and see the other party's reaction.
"There are two kinds of evil spirits, those born naturally or through undead magic... Miss Wuming, have you encountered an evil spirit?" Hoyle asked seriously.
Yvette described the evil spirit in the human trafficking camp and the evil spirit she had just seen in the church, and then asked, "How can you prove that the evil spirit has nothing to do with you?"
Hoyle was silent for a long time. After a while, he said somewhat frustratedly, "I'm sorry, I can't prove it, Miss Nobody."
He paused, a look of hesitation on his face, and lowered his voice, "In fact, I also feel that there must be someone within the church who is colluding with Ghost Hand... There may even be such a person within the Soul Fire Church, but I don't know who it is... So you must be careful of everyone here."
Yvette asked, "Including you?"
Hoyle was stunned for a moment, then nodded and said, "Yes, that includes me."
(End of this chapter)
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