The sudden return of the Temple Orb brought a lot of shock to the town. There were not many civilians in this special town, and most of the townspeople were actually clerics and kingdom knights, or at least "militiamen" who had received combat training. After the disappearance of the orb, everyone here participated more or less After a series of follow-up actions, everyone knew the significance of the Templar Orb to this kingdom. Therefore, when a knight ran across the town road at lightning speed, shouting the news of "The Templar Orb Returns", the The sensational situation in the town can be imagined.
Hao Ren and his party entered Layton Town on horseback under the escort of the Knights. Not long after, they saw townspeople lining the road to watch, as well as support teams rushing over from all directions. When they arrived at the intersection of the first main road, the big clock tower in the town began to ring, and the distant and resonant bells rang through the sky, as if to dispel the depressive atmosphere that had been lingering here for more than half a month. Amid the ringing of the bell and the din of the crowd who gathered spontaneously, Hao Ren couldn't help but look back at the knight captain beside him: "Is it okay to just spread the news like this? In theory, even if this kind of treasure comes back, it should be Keep it a secret..."
"This is the territory of the goddess," the knight captain pointed in the direction of the church with a solemn face, "The people who are qualified to stay here are the most loyal servants of the goddess, and the orb has already returned to its proper place when it enters here. And..." At this point, the knight captain paused, with a smile on his face: "People here really need encouragement, nothing good has happened for several months, we need a good news to let everyone know that the goddess is still alive Take care of her people."
The bearded man and the other three ascetics were surrounded by the knights in the middle. They didn't care about the noise around them. The young nun with a strange voice just looked up at the crowd: "...too noisy."
"We finally successfully completed our mission," the bearded man said softly. "A lot of unexpected things happened here. After I go back, I will pray all day and night. Maybe the goddess wants to give us some enlightenment through these events."
The tragic traces left by the stone giant's previous invasion still remained in the town, and the road surface of the main road was obviously repaired urgently recently. Most of the stone slabs on the ground are new, and most of the houses on both sides of the road are damaged. Some places have even completely collapsed. Hao Ren still vaguely remembered the scene of the town he saw when he came here last time, and he found that some buildings in his memory had disappeared, leaving only the wooden piles that had not been fully demolished or the half-rebuilt frame. Simple wooden houses and even tents can be seen on both sides of the road, and the residents of the town maintain the order of life here in this environment. According to the knight captain, the stone giants passed straight through the center of the town at that time. They had a clear purpose and even turned a blind eye to the attacks on both sides of the road. This rampant horde of monsters has dealt a devastating blow to the main road and its surroundings. The only thing that was not destroyed by the stone giant was the church in the center of the town: the powerful magic barrier of the church itself made the stone giant deeply jealous, and those monsters bypassed the church.
The result was that the square on either side of the church was razed to ruins.
Soon the team arrived in front of the church still standing in the center of the town. A hunchbacked old man in a gorgeous cassock was standing in front of the church waiting for everyone. Hao Ren recognized that it was the rector of Girton who had met once. He ran out to meet the orb in person, his aging body looked extremely thin in the cold wind, and Hao Ren even wondered how long the old man's body could stand here: Compared with the last meeting, Dean Gelton looked He was even older, and his face had almost lost all color.
Everyone got off their horses, and four ascetic monks came forward from behind. The bearded man and Gordon greeted each other: "Your Excellency the Rector, I haven't seen you for a long time, thank you Goddess for your mercy. We came back alive."
Gerton nodded tremblingly, his rickety old body seemed to fall down in the cold wind at any time. But his voice was still loud: "It's great to see the four masters come back intact. It's not pleasant to include you in the ranks of the martyred saints."
Ascetic monks are a group with a special status in the Huiyao Sect. They can only be awarded this title after years of practice and painstaking study of various mysterious knowledge. This not only represents their strong strength and firm belief, but also represents their own Achievements in academics, religion, history, etc., so every goddess believer will call them "masters", even the pope will call them that. It's just that the low-level believers call the ascetic monk this way out of respect for the superior, while the high-level believers mention the word "master" more as a "professional title" and "title".
The bearded man waved his hand: "It is my lifelong wish to be a martyr, if possible. I would like to respond to the goddess' orders to die generously at any time, but this time the goddess still needs me to wait for the broken body. We just returned from the dead That's all. Well, don't waste time, we should send the relic into the church at once."
Gordon nodded, and looked at Hao Ren and the others with slightly cloudy eyes: "Several mercenaries... Oh, I still remember you, it turned out to be you... awesome young people, I didn't expect you to finally complete the project." The goddess will be pleased with this sacred feat, and the kingdom will remember your contribution."
At this time, even Becky was embarrassed to ask about the reward, and the mercenary girl awkwardly said: "You are welcome, you are welcome, it is my lifelong wish to be loyal to the goddess and the kingdom..."
Gelton is an old man. As early as the last time we met, he could tell at a glance that Becky was a standard mercenary who was unreasonable for picking up money. He didn't say anything at this time, but just nodded slightly: "Let's come together!" , I want to learn more about how you recovered the orb and the four masters."
Everyone followed Gordon into the church. The building remained intact under the impact of the stone giant due to its powerful magical protection. In the church, there were two or three times more black-robed monks than last time—they They are all priests who specialize in combat, and the golden thread on the chest of their robes can illustrate their strength and aptitude. Hao Ren came to the reception room where he met Gordon last time. He still remembered that he also met another important person here last time: Marshal Ophra of the Kingdom.
But the female marshal is not present today, she should be stationed outside the defense line.
Everyone found a place to sit on the benches and several armchairs in the reception room. Geldon was the last to sit down on his high-backed chair. He coughed twice and looked up at the bearded man: "Master , where did you come back from?"
The bearded man glanced at Hao Ren, and told Gelton about the process he had discussed before: "We have been trapped in an ancient different space for the past few months. We were rescued by these young people by chance not long ago. .”
A look of surprise flashed across Gordon's cloudy eyes: "Different space? What's going on here?"
"Maybe it's another relic left by an ancient civilization," the bearded man said frankly. There are indeed such relics in different spaces in the Dream Plane, and they are much more common than on Earth. After all, this is the birthplace of "alien civilizations" , so this reason is better than anything else, "This should be a test for us by the goddess. We faced cold and hunger in a different space, and finally survived by hunting those twisted and weird ancient beasts. Faith allowed us to persevere until the end, and found the weak point of the impasse in that different space to establish contact with the outside world. These young people are mages from the Horner Empire in the north. They are amazing in space magic. In the end, they helped Opened the ruins—but the exit of the ruins is far away from here, and has already penetrated into the barren land in the extreme north."
Hao Ren subconsciously glanced at Becky as he listened: These nonsense were actually made up with the help of Becky. Otherwise, how could Hao Ren, an outsider and a bored man with a beard, think that it fits the world view without knowing it? A story that was seen as flawed? As a senior mercenary who has spent many years in the tavern, Becky is most indispensable for this kind of bluffing adventure legends.
As long as the parts about "my uncle bravely slays the dragon" and "my girl slays the devil" in this "tavern story" are removed, the rest of their plots are basically true, and a little processing can explain the bearded man The disappearance of four people for several months. Anyway, it is impossible to verify, and this world has never lacked strange things related to ancient civilizations.
More importantly, ordinary people really don't think that ascetic monks can also fool people...
Gordon nodded, and he really didn't have much doubt about this story, because he knew that more than once in history, people fell into the impasse of the different space left by the ancient civilization, and those who came out would bring such thrilling adventure stories. And this kind of thing happened to a group of steadfast believers, and only the will of the goddess could explain it, so he stood up and saluted respectfully in the direction of the holy image in the church: "Thank the goddess for her mercy."
Then he turned his head to look at Hao Ren: "I also want to hear your stories..."
Hao Ren straightened up his mind immediately, knowing that it was time for him to pretend to be fashionable, and he wanted to show his demeanor as a person of great merit with the best mental state, but Gelton's first sentence was this: "I still Remember you are called the 'good name makes a dog' mercenary group, right?"
Hao Ren's face suddenly collapsed, and he could no longer nod after holding back for a long time: "... um, yes..."
"Heroes come out of teenagers," Gelton nodded with a smile, "The good name makes the dog look like a dog, and the leader really hides his secrets."
Hao Ren continued to look like a zombie: "...um, thank you..." (to be continued~^~)