20demayo Chapter 344 The Mystery of the Shadow Church
Chapter 344 The Mystery of the Shadow Church
Chapter 344 The Mystery of the Shadow Church
Tang Zijun had never entered a church before, not even once.
It's not that he has any prejudice against such places, it's just that he usually doesn't have any compelling reason to go there. At most, he might occasionally visit a temple on the mountain to take a picture or offer incense while traveling.
At this moment, after stepping through the doors of the Storm Church, Tang Zijun was still quite nervous.
Unlike Chang Lei, whose motivation stemmed from fear of the gods, his motivation was a kind of ambition towards the unknown.
A strange world, strange gods—everything in this world is a threat to Tang Zijun. Before she can ascertain the specifics of the other party, Tang Zijun doesn't want to have too much contact with them. But right now, perhaps only this place can provide her with some clues.
The interior of Storm Church is very spacious. In the center of the hall is a fountain, and it is hard to understand why they would build an indoor fountain here. Around the fountain are more than ten rows of seats, making it look like a huge theater hall.
The woman in the blue robe calmly led the two to the fountain and bowed slightly to the statue above it.
The statue is that of a handsome man with a pair of huge wings on his back. Water flows from every feather on his wings, cascading into the pool below like a sprinkler.
Tang Zijun had misunderstood. When he heard that this was the Storm Church, he subconsciously thought that the gods worshipped here would be half-human and half-fish or something similar. But when he saw the statues, he realized that Gloriand had just reminded him that this was a branch of the faith of the Feathered People.
Judging from this deity who looks like a man, the winged people are probably also beings with wings on their backs, just like him.
After bowing, the woman in blue slowly turned around. "Gentlemen, I hope you can find inner peace here. The Feather God will bless everyone with a kind heart, no matter where you come from."
"Thank you, Herrscher." Gloriand bowed her head sincerely.
Tang Zijun nodded quickly. He wasn't very familiar with the etiquette here, so he didn't bow rashly.
After seeing the woman in blue robes turn back to pray to the statue, he whispered to Reginald beside him, "Why did you call her the Herrscher? Shouldn't church members be priests or something like that?"
Upon hearing this, Gloriand replied, "Herrscher is a respectful title used by non-church members to address church members, much like mercenaries. As for priest, that's a professional title, and non-church members wouldn't use that term."
Tang Zijun nodded thoughtfully. "Is 'Herrscher' an honorific title? It sounds strange..."
When Grelando heard this, she was startled. She was afraid that Tang Zijun's unintentional words would displease the woman in blue. Just as she was about to say something, she heard the woman speak calmly.
"In the beginning, the gods manifested. Whether it was heaven and earth or nature, there were laws governing the operation of all things. The gods held authority and wielded the power of these laws. As servants of the gods, we should naturally practice the laws."
"I understand." Tang Zijun stepped forward. "You are called 'Herrschers' because you observe and abide by the laws of nature. You can understand it that way." The woman in blue robes slowly stood up, then looked at Tang Zijun with a calm expression. "This is Lord Feather God's territory. You don't need to hide anything."
"Hidden?" Tang Zijun was taken aback. "I didn't hide anything."
"I'm not talking about you, but the one in your pocket," the woman in blue said softly. "The God of Nature and the Feather God belong to the same lineage, so you don't need to worry about encountering danger here."
Upon hearing this, Tang Zijun frowned, exchanged a glance with Gloriand, and then flicked her pocket. At that moment, Hyacinth poked her head out.
"Phew! I'm so suffocating, I'm almost falling asleep just sitting here." Hyacinth yawned, then slapped her forehead—wait a minute, wouldn't that turn into a dream within a dream?
"Can you sense the presence of the hyacinth?" Tang Zijun asked.
"To be precise, I noticed it as soon as you came in," the woman in blue robes said without hiding anything. "Ordinary people might not be able to detect it, but to a Herrscher, the energy on a fairy is unusually obvious, especially in this polluted land, where her life force is like a firefly in the dark."
After a pause, the woman in blue robes sighed softly again. "I thought the fairy race had all perished in the fire of the Elf Forest, but I never expected to see fairies reappear in my lifetime. You... must be a nobleman."
Although the question was phrased as a question, the blue-robed woman spoke with absolute certainty. Since the great fire in the Elf Forest, the only fairies left in the world today are those that were plundered and purchased by various nobles back then.
I had heard Grelando mention before that because of the elves' talent for improving the land and crops, many nobles would try to get their hands on a few elves, either by sending people to capture them or by buying them on the black market. This behavior was one of the reasons for the enmity between humans and elves back then.
Seeing a fairy following a human, the woman in blue naturally assumed that Hyacinth was one of them.
Tang Zijun understood the implication in the other person's words, so she deliberately spoke up. "I am a knight, and Hyacinth is my friend."
The woman in the blue robe simply smiled, ignoring Tang Zijun's explanation, and instead gazed intently at him. "You are special."
"Me?" Tang Zijun paused for a moment, then replied casually. "I'm not a local; I came here by accident..."
"No, that's not what I meant." The woman in the blue robe waved her hand gently and said in a deep voice, "You're different from everyone else. The energy around you is very interesting. You clearly look like just an ordinary person, but..."
As she spoke, the woman in the blue robe hesitated for a moment, then shook her head slightly.
"I'm not interested in your background or your secrets, but I can tell that you came here not to seek refuge like the others."
"So, what is your purpose?"
Tang Zijun listened to the blue-robed woman's question with a low gaze. He glanced at the statue behind her out of the corner of his eye, then pondered for a moment before taking out a black crystalline object from his pocket.
As soon as he took out the shadow fragments, Tang Zijun noticed a subtle change in the blue-robed woman's eyes. Although it was brief, he still noticed it.
However, Tang Zijun did not show it. Instead, she pretended not to notice and showed the shadow fragment to the woman in blue robes in her palm.
"I've come here hoping you can answer my questions. This is something I extracted from some monsters. I can sense the evil power within it. I wonder if you've ever come into contact with anything similar."
The woman in the blue robe stared at the shadow fragments in Tang Zijun's hand with a complicated expression, as if she was recalling something.
After a while, just as Tang Zijun was about to press for more information, she slowly uttered a single word.
"The Church of Shadows..."
"You know this thing?" Hyacinth asked in surprise. She landed on Tang Zijun's head and looked at the woman in front of her incredulously.
Gloriand also perked up her ears; as a mercenary, she didn't get to hear information about the gods all the time.
"That was a long, long time ago." The woman in the blue robe looked on with reminiscence, but she quickly looked at Tang Zijun with some doubt. "Where did you get this?"
From the other party's reaction and those brief words, Tang Zijun knew that she had come to the right place this time.
Although he took out the Shadow Fragment, he did not mention its origin or its relationship with the Shadow World. The fact that she could mention the name "Shadow Church" was enough to prove that she knew something about it.
So, thinking of this, Tang Zijun said softly, "I got this from a black monster. That monster crawled out of the shadows and attacked me, but I killed it."
"Ah... a monster in the shadows, that's indeed a common tactic used by those heretics." A mocking glint flashed in the blue-robed woman's eyes as she shook her head slightly, seemingly disgusted by the other party's actions.
"Heretics." Tang Zijun pondered the other person's words carefully, then asked meaningfully, "So, the source of this thing is those followers called the Shadow Church?"
"You could say that," the woman in the blue robe said, tilting her head slightly.
"No, what exactly is the Shadow Church? Is it similar to the Storm Church?" Hyacinth couldn't help but ask curiously.
Upon hearing this, the woman in the blue robe gave Hyacinth a strange look, perhaps feeling that the little guy was a bit dissatisfied with placing his church on the same level as the Shadow Church.
However, she didn't say much, but simply interlaced her fingers and calmly said, "The Shadow Church, strictly speaking, is not a true sect, nor is it recognized by the world. Moreover, they have long since become history."
After a pause, the woman in the blue robe realized that Hyacinth wanted to ask more questions, so she spoke up before Hyacinth could.
"Long ago, there were some humans who claimed to have obtained power from the shadows. They called themselves Shadow Warriors and were active on the front lines of the war against the orcs."
"Are you referring to the Battle of Kural?" Gloland quickly realized.
The woman in blue didn't seem to mind being interrupted; she nodded slightly. "Yes, it was that war between humans and orcs that lasted for seven years."
"The Battle of Kurar?" Hyacinth blinked, her face full of doubt.
Gloria turned her head and explained, "The Battle of Kural was the largest war in history between humans and beastmen, and also the first major battle after the Great Old Ones retired."
"Do not utter such obscene words in the territory of the Feather God."
Upon hearing this, Grilando shuddered and immediately lowered her head. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean any disrespect, it was just a slip of the tongue."