An explosion sounded in the basement, and a blazing fireball suddenly flew over from the side - but before the fireball got close, Duncan had already reacted.
His perception was much faster than his body. He realized something was wrong the moment the abnormal energy appeared in the basement. At this time, he didn't even have time to think about it and subconsciously raised his hand to block it!
A slight burning sensation came from the fingertips, but the next second, the gushing spiritual fire was swept into the fireball with the momentum of recoil and explosion. Duncan grabbed the fireball shot from the corner of the basement out of thin air. The blazing fire was almost immediately dyed with a layer of dark green, and the explosive energy instantly became docile and began to burn quietly in his hands.
Duncan just held onto the fireball that had turned into a dark green spiritual fire and slowly turned his head to look in the direction where the attack came from.
And just as he turned his eyes away, the Deep Hound named "Agou" suddenly jumped back, and a crack filled with countless shadows and black mist appeared out of thin air where it landed. It jumped in without hesitation, while the black chain dragged Shirley with it. Before flying into the crack, the latter spat hard to the side, and several bloody bullets were spit on the ground by her.
The next second, the man and the dog disappeared into the basement.
When Duncan heard the noise, he looked back in surprise, but he only saw the last scene of the girl's skirt falling into the crack - this strange human-dog combination ran away in the blink of an eye.
I still have a lot of questions I haven’t had time to ask!
And all this was due to a sudden attack by a cultist with unusually strong vitality.
Duncan's mood subtly became unhappy. He looked in the direction where the fireball came from again and saw the cult priest wearing a sun mask leaning against the wall crookedly, holding on to his last breath with his arms raised. He seemed to be shocked that the fireball he summoned with all his strength was not only caught out of thin air, but also had its authority usurped. Even through the golden mask, he could see the dull state of his eyes.
"Not finishing off a kill is not a good habit..."
Duncan's face was gloomy. He was muttering about a dog-swinging girl who didn't know how to finish off the enemy after a fight while slowly walking towards the cult priest who was seriously injured but not dead.
He still held the quietly burning green fireball in his hand, and the power emanating from the fireball was quietly spreading in the basement.
With every step Duncan took, the oil lamps and torches installed in various places in the basement seemed to be inexplicably inspired. The dancing flames were dyed with a layer of dark green one after another. Under the reflection of the approaching gloomy firelight, the masked sun priest finally felt a fear stronger than ever before.
He felt that his connection with the Sun God was rapidly weakening. As one lamp after another was "usurped", the Sun God's gaze was leaving his soul as fast as ice and snow melting in spring!
In great fear, a trembling voice finally came from under the mask: "You... you are not an ordinary heretic, what exactly are you..."
The last light turned into a dark green soul flame. Duncan stopped in front of the priest and lowered his head slightly. His face looked particularly gloomy under the reflection of the soul fire. "I was interrupted by you before I even finished asking. This is very rude. Didn't your mother teach you that?"
As he spoke, he noticed the state of the Sun Priest.
He felt that he had wronged Shirley - half of the cultist's chest had been completely deflated, and the broken ribs might even have pierced his heart and lungs. This was undoubtedly a fatal injury, and theoretically there was no need for a finishing blow.
This priest is still alive because a more powerful and strange force is hanging on to his life, which may be the "Sun God" mentioned by these cultists.
But even so, Duncan could still clearly see that the vitality was rapidly draining away from the priest's body. His every breath was getting weaker and weaker, and he would die sooner or later.
Although the reason was unknown, it was clear that the blessing of the Sun God was rapidly fading away from this priest.
"It seems that the blessing from the sun god is not very reliable," Duncan shook his head and said with emotion, "Your master has left you."
He just sighed casually, but he didn't expect that this sentence would stimulate the dying priest. The latter's eyes suddenly turned red, and driven by huge anger, he burst out his last strength, and suddenly took out a bloodstained cloth from his sleeve under Duncan's unexpected gaze!
"I offer my body to the Lord! May the holy shroud purify the heretics before me!"
The priest shouted, his golden mask stained with dirty blood and internal organs. He raised the "holy shroud" in his hand high and offered the most thorough and crazy sacrifice to his Lord.
He sacrificed his everything just to ignite the Holy Shroud, wanting to die together with the heretic who usurped the fire!
However, Duncan just calmly watched this final crazy sacrifice - although he was indeed frightened when the priest suddenly took out something from his sleeve, after seeing clearly what it was, he calmed down.
That was exactly the strange piece of cloth that the other party used to verify their "compatriot identity" when they had just entered the assembly hall - but they did not expect that this piece of cloth had such an extraordinary name as the "Holy Shroud Cloth".
Just as Duncan had expected, the Holy Relics remained silent and unresponsive, and the cult priest's most extreme sacrifice before his death did not bring about any miracle.
The eyes beneath the mask revealed a trace of bewilderment. The cult priest tried his best to support his body. In despair, he looked at the holy object in his hand that did not move at all. He coughed up blood again in disbelief: "I offer this body to the Lord..."
"I guess this is what you want."
Duncan couldn't bear it anymore. He shook his head and pointed at the blood-stained cloth.
The next second, a cluster of dark green flames exploded!
The spiritual fire ignited the holy shroud, the foul blood coughed up by the cult priest, and the flesh and blood of the crazy man. The priest screamed in shock and anger in the spiritual fire: "No, no, no... It shouldn't be like this... The Lord will not betray, the Lord... The Lord will punish you... Who are you?!"
In the raging fire, the voice of the evil cult priest finally faded away. The vitality supported by the extraordinary power was ultimately unable to allow him to withstand the flames that directly burned his soul - or it could be said that it was precisely because of the existence of the extraordinary power that he was reduced to ashes in the backlash of the spiritual fire.
The fire of the spirit body finally died down, and the Sun Priest leaning against the wall had been completely burned to ashes, leaving only a set of scattered clothes and the golden mask that imitated the shape of the sun.
Even the so-called "holy cloth" was burned to ashes in the flames because it acted as a "medium".
Duncan frowned.
To be honest, this was not the first time he had seen a corpse - the "sacrifices" he had seen in the underground cave before and the priest who had been "sacrificed" had already trained his nerves. He was just a little surprised at this moment.
Under normal circumstances, his spiritual fire only works on extraordinary objects. He had tested this with various objects when he was on the Homeland Lost - extraordinary objects burned by flames would be "usurped" and become Captain Duncan's property, but if it was not an extraordinary object, even a piece of paper would not be affected by the spiritual fire.
Just now, the spiritual fire produced the actual burning effect. This was his initiative. He was worried that the cultist would really do something with the holy cloth, so out of caution he ordered the holy cloth to burn itself. From the results, it can be seen that the holy cloth did faithfully carry out the order.
But he didn't expect that the spreading flames would burn the cult priest to ashes - this was inconsistent with the conclusion he reached after completing the test.
It is normal for the Holy Shroud to be burned, because it is a supernatural object and will be affected by the spiritual fire;
It was normal that the cult priest's clothes were left intact, because those clothes were obviously "mortal objects", and the spiritual fire was like an illusion in a parallel time and space for mortal objects, and would not have the slightest effect - unless the clothes themselves were possessed by magic, or some extraordinary materials were mixed in the weaving process;
It was normal that the golden mask was left intact, because Duncan was very interested in this obviously extraordinary object, and he immediately gave orders after the flames began to spread to prevent the mask from being damaged in the fire.
Then... why was this cultist burned to ashes by the spiritual fire
Duncan squatted down in confusion and carefully examined the gray-black ashes.
It is similar to the ashes after the Holy Shroud is burned.
Duncan had never tested his spiritual fire on living people, let alone actively used this fire to take people's lives. This evil cult priest should be regarded as the first real victim of his fire.
At least, the first real victim under his conscious control.
Slowly, a bold idea suddenly popped up in Duncan's mind.
Could it be that... these "mortals" who have received "blessings" because of worshiping specific gods can also be regarded as "supernatural objects"