The clumsy and heavy wagon creaked away, and Nemo's eyes glued to the cage in the dark until it disappeared behind the growing denser of dead trees.
"Trouble?" He finally came to his senses and turned his face to Vergil beside him.
"The sacrifice will be prepared a week in advance, but there are still two weeks before the new moon." Duran Fergil's voice was low. His complexion and hair were already quite dark, and his white teeth stood out even more in the dark. "If the sacrifice has arrived, the Silent Knight will also come back early. We must hurry up - once the sacrifice officially begins, the Silent Church will be completely closed."
"...What will happen to the sacrifice?" Nemo pressed Shajiaomei to the bottom of his tongue and clenched the staff in his hand.
"I don't know, the practice is different every month." Virgil's voice was flat, "Don't bother, they are dead."
Nemo looked again in the direction where the carriage disappeared, but did not answer.
"It should be too late now." Vergil looked at the magnificent building not far away with a very complicated expression. "There is no sign of blockade, we can probably catch up. After a while at the church... Well, you don't need to pay special attention to anything, I think you are in a very good state now - there are too many types of superior demons, and the alienation of demon warlocks is all kinds of strange. They don't have time to determine the true class of every casual visitor."
"Are there many conflicts among believers?" Nemo confirmed immediately.
"It's hard to say." The tall man sighed softly, "That's what I'm worried about... You are called a demon warlock, and demon believers shouldn't take the initiative to provoke you, but you'd better not conflict with a real demon warlock."
"Got it," Nemo replied simply.
"As for the demon information you want to know... The library is open to everyone, but how much you can see depends on your strength. After sunrise tomorrow, I can guide you." Fergil played with the paintbrush in his hand, "Actually, you Don't be too nervous, Abyss Church is different from ordinary religions... Most of the believers are more egoistic, and they will not love each other happily. Just stay as a visitor for three days, and the possibility of exposure is very-"
"You don't need to say it." Nemo had a bad premonition, and he quickly interrupted the other party's words.
"Remember to call me 'Duri' later." Fergil took care of his clothes, not taking off the strange materials on the belt. "What should I call you? It's not suitable to use your real name here. Since it's a black seal, you must have a familiar pseudonym."
He really didn't. Nemo quickly searched his memory, almost immediately having an idea. "'White,'" he said solemnly. "You may call me that, Fergie... Dooley."
"Mr. White." Fergil nodded solemnly, signaling that he remembered.
However, when they really got to the Church of Silent, Nemo found that his mental preparation was not enough.
Up close, the structure of the Church of Silence appears more grand and twisted. The long steps lead directly to the door of the church, but there are no marble statues that other religions like to place on both sides - there are gallows-like stone platforms on both sides of the steps, and corpses wrapped in white cloth are hung upside down. The corpse was tightly wrapped, with only a pair of blue-white feet sticking out of the shroud, tied tightly by slings. They hang silent and upright in the air, their faint rancid smell masked by a choking incense.
Without any other lighting. Under the faint moonlight, the two rows of white cocoon-like things sent chills down the spine.
Nemo stuffed two whole saffron plums into his mouth, staring at the toes of his boots as intently as possible. But this time his plan didn't work out - after the two stepped on the stone steps, whispering voices instantly sounded from both sides. Nemo's scalp exploded, and the scene he least wanted to see finally appeared—
The two closest to them began to shake, and the rest remained silent as statues. The two things wrapped in white cloth swayed faster and faster, and finally unnaturally straightened towards the two of them, like iron sinkers attracted by magnets. The whispers under the white cloth grew louder, accompanied by the hair-raising sniffing.
"The taste of the abyss." They whispered in sticky voices. "Pass, pass."
Nemo almost stepped down a step. He resisted the urge to ask questions, put part of his weight on the staff in his hand, and continued to move forward as smoothly as possible. Out of the corner of his eye, he caught sight of what he thought was a "shroud" shifted position, wriggling very slowly on the surface of the corpse.
"The watchdog of the church," Fergil explained succinctly, and the thorny corpse bird was sitting on his shoulders, as if it had taken root on it. "No bite in general."
Nemo tugged his hood down, narrowing his field of vision as much as possible. The visual effect of the corpses approaching one by one is amazing. Compared to this, he would rather face ten Seymour worms. He really didn't really want to know how these things could bite.
"No stench of surface magic."
"There is no stench of excess communication."
"… "
"The taste of companions."
When they stepped on the last stone steps, the last two corpses also came to a conclusion. Nemo could feel the undershirt soaking through his back. He shivered and breathed a sigh of relief, looking at the church door in front of him—
The door blinked its countless eyes, looking back at him.
"...I definitely want more money for this task." Nemo gritted his teeth and looked away.
"what did you say?"
"It's nothing," Nemo said in a rare sad tone, out of control. "Let's go, Dolly."
Vergil, who was walking in front, did not hesitate, as if the eyes on the door were just ordinary decorative patterns. He directly reached out and pushed the door open—a dim light appeared in the crack of the door.
"Please go first." Fergil pressed against one of the doors and pressed a few eyeballs with his bare hands. There was a strange square mask on his face at some point, and the black mask was painted with a strange symbol with red paint. "Demon Warlock first, Mr. White."
Nemo stepped through the door of the Church of Silence.
The next second he wanted to go out.
He should really cherish the poor but normal time in Lubiao Town, Nemo looked at the scene in front of him, a little bit about to cry without tears. The interior decoration of the Silent Church is normal, the temperature is slightly higher than the outside, and the light is still a little dim. The indescribable fishy stench and incense were even more intense. And the living things inside—
If the nightmares of children could be collected and boiled into a pot of porridge, it would almost be the scene. For a few seconds, Nemo even wondered if the always upright knight commander was deliberately trying to trick him. Right now, he was the most conspicuous one because he was "too normal".
Looking at it, the living creatures inside are roughly divided into three categories.
The first category, low-level or intermediate-level demons that move around their masters, are pure small aliens, with almost no duplicates. The second category is their masters—the demon believers who wear the same masks as Virgil, without showing any face.
The third category has the least number—
The closest thing to him was a cloud of black oil with a half-melted human head floating in it. The tar-like thing crawled past his feet, his head floated up and looked at him, and let out a disdainful hum. And there was a middle-aged man more than ten steps away from him. He looked like a normal human figure, but there were a lot of movable tentacles protruding from the eye sockets, nostrils and mouth, and the facial features were almost invisible. There is a similar situation in the front row, but the back is a lady with a graceful figure. From this angle, only the black gauze hat she was wearing and the unusually large head could be seen.
Nemo can clearly feel the strength gap between these "people" and other creatures in the room, these are real demon warlocks.
… He suddenly understood why Virgil didn’t disguise himself as a Demon Warlock with him. Now he himself felt that he was out of place in this hellish place. And their client may have completely misunderstood his forceful composure, and truly believed that he was well-informed.
Nemo nearly broke the makeshift staff.
"Visitors." The demon warlock standing at the preaching table nodded to them. This one seems to be the most "normal" of the demon warlocks - he just has no facial features on his face, only a mouth. It's pretty normal in comparison.
The masked Virgil bowed his head and saluted, Nemo still stood up straight, but the Demon Warlock didn't seem to mind.
Nemo's full attention was drawn to what was behind the sermon table.
It was a lifelike statue of a monster. Compared to the demons he'd seen, it wasn't a particularly huge type, but the twisted appearance far surpassed everything he'd seen. The nave of the Silent Church is amazing in width and height, but the monster statue fills the entire wall of the nave. For a moment, he couldn't see how many pairs of forelimbs it had. He could only see that the forelimbs that supported the wall were strong and powerful, and the hooks at the end were like the scythe of death. Its head is not large, only the length of an adult, and it hangs slightly. Several pairs of eyes on both sides of the head narrowed slightly, looking like dragon heads eroded by beholders.
The rest of the statue is equally twisted and beautiful, except for a shuddering chill in every taut line.
"That's Ulysses." Vergil said in a very low voice, which was more like a reminder than an explanation. "The statue of the previous demon king, it is about the size of the deity - if I remember correctly."
And those voices didn't really get into Nemo's head. He stared fixedly at the statue, unable to discern the strange feeling that suddenly surged in his heart.
The Demon Warlock at the sermon table looked at the two for a while, then withdrew his gaze as if he had lost interest.
"Doubt everything." The man with only one mouth continued to speak, and the voice expanded by the magic circle was gentle and clear, echoing in the large nave. "Those who move first will always be questioned and persecuted. I believe that you have come into contact with many surface religions. They have stopped in the face of power and interests, and will never further clarify the truth of the world to believers."
"Everything belongs to the belief in God, and everything belongs to the so-called good and evil. Their eyes are blinded, their thinking is shackled, and they measure everything in the world only by their own cognition. When facing superficial doubts, you only need to keep thinking, Suspicion and questioning—"
"Why are demons 'evil'? If it hurts people - beasts hurt people, people hurt people too."
"Why do you call the Demon Lord 'Demon Lord'? There is no evidence to prove that the power structure of demons is similar to that of humans. When did this concept appear?"
"Why is there always at the bottom of the abyss... and there is always only such an abnormally powerful being? Since it is claimed that the Demon King will not come to the surface, why do you want to go on an expedition?"
"Never stop questioning - is the common sense in this world really 'common sense'?"
,Wonderful!
(m.. = )