A long siege is the biggest blow to morale and cohesion, and this is true for everyone, even church priests with firm beliefs and positions.
When the situation is stable and there are no major differences of interests, the church can still maintain a balance and unity within the church. Although there are many factions inside and outside the cathedral, priests and priests at all levels have conflicts of greater or lesser interests. But at least everyone will still see that maintaining superficial unity for the sake of fellow church members is simply to give Shengguang a face. If you have any conflicts, try not to bring it to the table, so as not to affect the interests of the church as a whole.
However, after the church has no interests to gain, and even the church itself has become a cause of threat, the apparent unity will be split from the inside out.
Not everyone supports the order from the Plain of the Holy Spirit. Although the former southern bishop Lemont has the highest authority in the Luan Cathedral, he cannot make all the priests of the Holy Light monolithic as the diocese on the border of the kingdom. The southern church From the start there was a great deal of internal disintegration.
The local priests have always resisted the orders from the Plain of the Holy Spirit. In the past two years, in order to expand the influence of the diocese, the newly promoted young priests have had conflicts with the elders in the cathedral. The land gets more autonomy, and the upper-level priests are always worried about those "barbaric, rude, and uncivilized" country priests preaching at will and tampering with the classics. Among them, there are even more conscientious priests. The increasingly bad behavior is full of resistance...
Under the circumstances of many contradictions, the former southern bishop Lemont took almost all the top forces in the church to participate in the war against the Cecil family, which was actually a helpless move.
If he can defeat the oldest family in this land in this war and gain higher prestige in the combined force of more than forty nobles, then Bishop Lemont will undoubtedly greatly consolidate his position in this diocese. Status, most of the undercurrents in the Luan Cathedral will be subsided. If it weren't for Cecil's place full of immortal players, his success rate would still be very high.
Unfortunately, he failed.
His failure even caused the entire southern church to stand against the Principality of Cecil, and the belief in the Holy Light was in danger of being forcibly eradicated in this land.
The priests who originally did not support Bishop Lemont's risky move were naturally filled with resentment, and because Lemont was born in the Holy Spirit Plain, a large number of local priests also wavered. The haze began to emerge, and the order in the outer city was getting worse day by day, and a large number of low-level priests also accumulated huge resentment: they couldn't bring their families to the inner city like those high-level priests, and even they themselves lived in and The chaos in the outer city has inevitably affected them, and it is getting worse every day...
The leaflets circulating in the city at this juncture undoubtedly exacerbated the deterioration of all situations.
Almost everyone can imagine that this is a "conspiracy" by the Cecilians, but so what? Could it be that what the leaflet says is false
The upper class holds the right to interpret the classics, and the middle class priests use the ransom money to accumulate massive wealth. The archbishops of the Holy Spirit Plain are full of fat in the land of wealth, but they dictate everything in the difficult southern border. Now something happened, the bishop died, and a large group The knights of the Holy See also died, and the enraged Cecils blocked the entire church, but everyone in the church had to bear the consequences. Who wouldn't be angry
With a gloomy face, Bishop Flambérand rolled up the printed matter in his hand and burned it to ashes with holy light, while his brain was rapidly calculating
Although the propaganda materials of the Cecilians are vulgar, the terrible thing is that almost all of them are true.
Anyone who has close contact with the Church of the Holy Light and has a little contact with the circle of priests can see the authenticity of these contents.
These things are spreading secretly, and it shouldn't be able to spread throughout the city in four days... So these things must be stopped immediately from continuing to ferment.
He looked at the priest in front of him: "Immediately inform the Brothers of the Discipline, confiscate all the pamphlets that are spread among the churches, and let those exiled knights go to the outer city with the knights of the church, and search house to house. Anyone, no matter what The reason is that anyone who holds such a booklet must turn it in immediately, and if they refuse to hand it over, they will all be treated as heretics.”
"yes."
"In addition," Flambérand added, "if there are those who actively turn in or report hiding, they will be rewarded with rations."
The Holy See knights of the Luan Cathedral and the exiled knights who defected here quickly launched operations.
The gate of the long-closed church area was opened, and heavily armed knights rushed out of it, and began to search for "evidence of heresy" from house to house. The priest who was guarded by the knights went to the street and shouted with divine magic, warning everyone who hid the propaganda materials civilians, and in the process, the outer city suddenly became more and more chaotic.
It is impossible for those "experienced" knights to break into houses and search for materials without committing any crimes.
Not only did the outer city become chaotic, but the atmosphere in the church district of the inner city immediately became tense.
Discipline monks in black burqas and tattooed scalps silently walked into small churches and began to question all the monks and low-level priests. A large number of brochures were turned out from the corners of those churches or from the priests. However, the priest who hid the pamphlets was immediately punished, first with uniform confinement, then with whipping and divine punishment.
The supernatural beings of the church cannot be punished in front of the common people. In order to maintain the decency of the church, all priests who are punished must continue to be locked in the confinement room after receiving the punishment, and they cannot be released until they have completed a thorough confession.
In just one day, thousands of promotional materials were confiscated from various areas in the city, some were brochures, some were leaflets. After seeing the huge pile of printed materials, Bishop Flambérand was extremely astonished. He did not expect the number to be so large. .
The printing quality of these printed matter is so exquisite, the text is clear, the layout is neat, it is not at all like those poorly crafted wax plate printing products, he can't imagine how those Cecil people can do such fine printing and print so much many.
But in any case, these things must be destroyed immediately.
All the confiscated pamphlets were gathered and sent to the large square outside the church quarter for public burning, and orderlies in livery and burqas ran three times around the city, driving all the civilians from their homes Come out and let them go to the square to watch the burning scene.
The large square was crowded with people, and those who were driven to the square were thousands of numb, sallow and emaciated civilians: due to the lack of food supply, people in the outer city had been half-starved for almost half a month, gnawing at the hunger all the time. In everyone's heart, they actually don't want to come to the square at all and lie on the bed at home, maybe they can reduce some physical energy consumption, but gathering here... everyone can only become more and more hungry.
But the swords of the knights and the spells of the priests cannot be disobeyed, and they have to come if they don't come.
The wooden platform in the center of the square was set up, and a large number of confiscated brochures were packed and carried by strong soldiers and thrown on the wooden platform. A tall man wearing a priest's robe came to the stage. This tall priest Sweeping across the entire square with a stern gaze, the holy light surged around him, slowly spreading the coercion of the Transcendent.
The civilians in the square were frightened and fell silent immediately, a wordless dead silence permeated the square.
The tall priest looked at the scene in front of him with satisfaction and contempt, and then raised the staff in his hand high: "You confused and stupid people! Without the guidance of the Lord, you would never know that you are slipping into the abyss of danger and evil. !
"The Cecilians were bewitched by the devil, and they spread the power of the devil's bewitching into this city!
"Look at these blasphemous papers they've been searched from your back yards, from your neighbor's homes, from your own bedrooms! Your eyes aren't bright enough, your wisdom isn't enough, so you don't even realize, These things are actually the contract signed by Cecil and the devil.
"They sent these contracts to the city to harm you! You were originally favored by the Holy Light, but these devil's contracts polluted you, and the Holy Light will stay away from you.
"Only flames can purify these blasphemous documents. You handed over these documents on your own initiative, and watched the purification ceremony here, so you are still saved. The most hopeless among you must accept the purification with these devils. !"
A few more strong soldiers came up and pushed a man who was bound all over to the stage. There was a little commotion in the crowd gathered under the stage, but more people just watched numbly, almost Nothing happens.
The tall priest looked around at the numb crowd below, and then looked at the man who was tied up. It was a man in ragged clothes, and he had been beaten to the point of unconsciousness, his nose was bruised and his face was swollen.
It was just a homeless man who was caught near the city gate. He was arrested because he recklessly ran into a soldier and found a brochure on him.
The biggest advantage of this kind of tramp is that no one will know him, let alone complain for him.
"This man has hidden a lot of documents from the devil, and he refuses to hand them over!" The priest raised his staff and pointed at the man who had lost consciousness, "He also spread the contents of the documents everywhere to confuse him. People around you, let everyone question the Lord and the church!"
Finally, there was some commotion in the crowd again. It seemed that someone was really frightened by the words of the priest, but the man who was tied up suddenly struggled. He stretched his neck hard, as if he wanted to shout something, but the soldier next to him immediately A punch hit his stomach, and the severe pain immediately made the weak man fall into a semi-conscious state again.
The priest frowned at the accident at this moment, and waved his staff: "Push the blasphemer into those devil's documents!"
The soldiers immediately dragged the bound man to the center of the stage, and then pushed him into the "hill" of promotional materials. Another discipline monk in black robe stepped forward and pushed Yi Burning grease poured over books and men.
There were whispers in the crowd, some people backed away nervously, some prayed in a low voice, and some people showed distorted and excited expressions on their faces, stretching their necks to watch the movement on the stage.
Someone suddenly heard a whisper from behind: "Isn't that Old Sam... Old Sam can't read!"
The person who heard the muttering immediately turned to look for the speaker, wanting to find out more details, but only saw a leaving figure.
Someone next to him became curious and asked in a low voice: "What's wrong?"
"The man above who is going to be burned to death seems to be called Sam, and he can't read."
A few people in plain burlap were shoving and shoving among the crowd. Wherever they passed, whispered discussions gradually began to spread:
"The person on the stage seems to be called Sam, who can't read!"
The commotion grew from small to large, and the low-pitched discussion turned into a buzzing rumble. Although the scale was still small, the priest standing on the stage finally noticed these unusual movements, and a strange feeling rose in his heart , In this vague sense of unease, he resolutely gave up the originally planned mission, and immediately raised his hand to summon a ball of holy light.
"Those who violate the will of the Lord should be purified!"
The scorching holy light ignited the grease, the brochures and leaflets that publicized the dark inside story of the Holy Light Church, and Sam who couldn't read.
The bound people writhed in the fire, screaming fiercely, and the crowd onlookers in the square took a step back in front of this terrible scene, and there were voices of discussion from all directions. Wearing a sackcloth bag, a man dressed like a farmer stood at the nearest place to the burning place. He seemed to be frightened by the scene of the burning, and stood there in a daze until the crowd around him began to back away. He staggered and retreated.
The priest standing on the stage had a gloomy face. The scorching smell in the air and the turmoil of the ignorant pariah below made him extremely annoyed when he was already in a bad mood. At this moment, a very, very slight wave of magic power suddenly came from under the stage. passed in a certain direction.
The priest immediately looked over there, but he found nothing except a group of terrified and foolish civilians retreating in a panic.
Maybe it's just an illusion.
The priest waved his hand irritably, then turned around and left here surrounded by attendants and guard knights.