"If I tell you all my names, it will probably take some time, but I don't have enough time now."
Xia De did not answer the other party's question, but asked:
"So, you appeared here not because you were 'sucked' in, but voluntarily?"
The man nodded:
"Yes, this place needs to be guarded. There is no core in this world, but there are some dangerous places. When the Natural Church was chosen, it was originally intended to suppress this part of the world, but later the problem became more and more serious, so every hundred years, the church will let a strong enough ring warlock preserve his self-consciousness through a ritual before death, and then enter this world to guard the church."
He introduced it without any intention of hiding anything:
"So if you have nothing to do, leave here. If something happens here, no one will survive."
"I'm sorry, I need to go into the church for something. But I promise that I will never damage the seal of the church."
Xia De said, trying his best to make his tone really express the emotion of "apology". He admired the soul in front of him very much.
"Okay, go in then."
The man shrugged.
"Um?"
The eyes behind the mask blinked, which was unexpected:
"You're just letting me in like this. Don't you want to give up your duties?"
"Oh, I feel a strong power in you. To be exact, if we really fight, I can't beat you even with the power of this church. The ring sorcerer system is a system that integrates the soul and the body. Without the body, it is useless even if you were a high ring in life. Rather than fighting and letting you destroy the church's sealing measures, it is better to let you in. Moreover, after staying here for a long time, I can also distinguish the characteristics of souls. Your soul is not bad, and it can even be said to be noble. I feel the power of compassion and courage."
"Well...thank you?"
Xia De nodded and asked:
"Excuse me, has anyone come in before me? Recently."
The man still leaned against the wall:
"Yes, a winged man. He was terrible, so terrible that I didn't even dare to show my face to see what he looked like."
That was undoubtedly Father Augustus, and it seemed that he had great power in the narrow space.
The soul of the ring warlock of the Church of Nature points to the depths of the church:
"The other party seems to be very good at manipulating the power of death, and he doesn't look like a bad person. He entered the deepest part of the church, probably hoping to obtain the spiritual runes related to death by getting close to death."
Things went much more smoothly than Shad had imagined.
"Do you know that strange guy with wings? Do you know what he is doing? If possible, I really hope you can take him away as well. Nothing can go wrong here."
The soul asked, and Shade shook his head:
"I don't know what he was going to do. Didn't you follow him?"
"We are not allowed to go inside. I can only move around in the middle hall."
Soul said helplessly.
"Then can you tell me what is deep inside the church?"
Xia De asked again, thinking that the other party might not say anything, or might give a vague answer, but unexpectedly, the soul nodded again very readily. Xia De felt that he would definitely remember this person, as he had met too many people in this world who only spoke half of the words.
"Of course I can tell you that there is a door inside."
Shade hesitated:
"You don't want to tell me that inside the church is the door that leads from the narrow gap between life and death to true death?"
"Yes."
The soul looked at Shade, its transparent eyes full of spirit:
"The restless death is invading here, and then affecting the Xikar Mountain area in reality. If the church does not intervene, sooner or later, the overflowing death will swallow up the central and eastern parts of the continent and turn the entire Rommel Mountain Range into a ghost town like Bordeaux. In addition to the church, there are other powerful beings who are helping to suppress this abnormal world. The church has sealed and suppressed only this door here. It is here that gives death the opportunity to invade reality, and it is becoming more and more powerful."
He did not use the term "Old World", which indicates that when the other party was alive, the New World might not have been discovered yet.
"You actually allowed that winged person to pass by such an important place?"
Xia asked again, but the latter shook his head:
"No matter how strong you are, you can't affect the other side from one end. Only the death of the other end can affect the narrow space we are in, and then affect the real world. This is the rule of the narrow space. So, I didn't stop him."
Shad nodded, gave a slight nod of thanks, and walked along the aisle between the carpeted benches filled with candles, towards the depths of the church.
"I want to give you a reminder."
Behind me, the soul leaning against the wall was still talking:
"No matter what the person you are looking for has done, you must never cross that door. Once you cross it, you are truly dead. All mortals will die, and all things will eventually die. Behind that door is the real final death."
Shade stopped.
"certainly."
He continued walking deeper into the church.
Compared with the situation outside the church where "a soul every three steps and a ghost every five steps", the number of ghosts in the natural church was significantly less. Among the candles that would never get shorter and the charms hanging on the silver wires, only the ghosts dressed as clergymen of the natural church were floating around unconsciously, without any reaction to Shade's appearance.
At least Shade could be sure that there were no evil spirits here, so there was no need to fight on the rest of the journey.
The church itself was a building with a very complex internal topography, but inside this church between life and death, there was almost only one road. All the forks in the road were tightly blocked by tables, chairs, benches, or other debris. Only the road that could be moved forward had dense ritual traces, almost illuminating the interior of the church into gold.
I don’t know if it’s because the existence of the door representing the concept of “death” deep in the church distorted the space, but when walking in the corridors inside the church, Shad felt that the corridors were crooked.
This was not just a horizontal tilt, but also left-right and up-down tilt. Combined with the golden ritual traces all over the ground, the silver wires connecting the steam pipes on the left and right, the hanging talismans that had to be moved away to avoid hitting the head, and the candlelight that was swaying even though there was no wind, the scene in front of him became increasingly strange.
As we move forward, the white mist becomes thinner and thinner, but at the same time the air becomes colder and colder, and all the objects around us from the real world slowly fade away.
When Shade turned into the last corridor, the candle flames on the ground had all turned blue, and the walls were dilapidated as if they had been baptized by thousands of years. All traces of the magic were still there, but they were all decayed.
"Death is affecting this place. What on earth is the priest doing?"
The white mist completely disappeared here, and the air was so cold that every time Shade breathed, he could exhale white mist. If he didn't know that this was a church, the scene in front of him would have looked like a haunted house covered with talismans.
"Is the priest just ahead?"
The traction on the holy emblem pendant on his chest was getting stronger and stronger, which meant that Shade was getting closer and closer to his goal.
Turning the corner, the corridor in front of him finally changed into something completely different from the architectural style of the church. The narrow and curved corridor eventually led to a square entrance connected to the underground, and from that entrance, a black wind was gradually blowing out.
The wind blew past Shad who was checking the situation, causing him to shiver violently, and his soul felt a coldness he had never felt before.
The wind left a long wound on his face, and then a golden light flashed from the wound, and bits of golden embers floated behind him with the wind.
"What's going on? There's divine power nearby."
Xia De covered his face, and then saw the cracks on his raised right hand slowly crawling and extending.
No, but this position will make the power of the soul more prominent.
“Is it enough to show the afterglow of divinity?”
Xia De muttered to himself, looking at the black tunnel leading to the underground. Although the silver wires hung with talismans and bells blocked the entrance, it was still possible to continue walking by pushing aside those extremely elastic metal wires.
Stranger, the concept of death ahead has almost reached an overflowing level.
"I know. I will be careful. Now that I've come this far, there's no reason for me to retreat."
He walked down with his back bent, stepping on the steps paved with rough stones. After stepping over the thirteenth step, he came to the underground corridor.
The whistling black wind blew continuously from the front of the corridor. Countless whispers rang in Xia De's ears, and Xia De could clearly hear them. They were the whispers of the dead in their last moments of life. The cold wind was like a knife, leaving scars on Xia De's body and cuts on his clothes. Then, the golden afterglow of the god appeared from those cracks, protecting the soul of the stranger.
Even Shade had to raise his arms to block in front of him before he could move forward with difficulty. The wind made him unstable, and the soft black soil under his feet seemed to sink him into the ground with every step.
There is no white mist, no divine ritual, not even a ghost. This is the final journey.
In addition to the golden scars on his body, the brightest color on Xia De's body was the thin line on his wrist. It seemed to be really burning, and the fiery red light drifted away with the cold wind. Xia De used his right hand tied with this line to block his forehead to maintain the stability of his body temperature and soul.
"So, what kind of fire is that in Sister Defulin's hand that is so powerful?"
Death was suppressing all extraordinary powers, and the holy emblem pendant on the chest that guided the direction had lost its function. But it didn't matter, because on the muddy ground covered with mud, there was a row of clear footprints, belonging to the Augustus priest's footprints.
Xia De put his right hand in front of his forehead and lowered his head to resist the black wind with the power of death, then looked at the footprints on the ground and moved forward step by step in the final dark passage.
Death was eroding him and embracing him. The cold power seemed to materialize directly in space. Shade even had a feeling that the Death Spirit Rune might appear in his life ring in the next second.
As he moved forward, the light on his body became brighter and brighter. He could not raise his head, so he could only hope to see Father Augustus lying on the ground or the old man sitting against the wall in the next second.
But nothing appeared until Shad reached the end of the corridor, walked out of the passage, and came to the huge and towering square space at the end of the passage, but still did not see the familiar figure.
There is nothing here except a huge double stone door standing on the wall at the end of the passage.
The ancient stone door seemed to represent time itself. Stories about death were engraved on it, and ancient runes were written on it that made Shade dizzy at the first glance. It seemed to describe the original death, but it also seemed to describe some other completely incomprehensible stories.
The black wind with the power of death blew out from the crack of the stone door, but it was still strangely silent, cold and silent, as if everything in the world had stopped there.
Stranger, you feel the whispers.
When he saw the door, he heard a hint in his ear. So Shade understood that the door that separated the true death was actually a relic.
"But where is Father Augustus?"
He walked out of the passage and then stopped, looking at the trail of priest Augustus's footprints on the ground leading all the way to the door.
At this moment, even Xia De felt that his whole body was numb and he could hardly move. At the same time, fatigue was rising. He had to concentrate all his energy to resist the desire to sleep forever.
That desire was really tempting, but fortunately, the image of Mia the Cat and the girls kept echoing in Shad's head.
After so many adventures, coming from Tobesk thousands of miles away to Midhill Castle, and finally standing at the deepest part of the narrow gap, what Shad saw was that the footprints extended to the front of this ancient stone gate, but the priest was not here:
"The priest said in his dream that he had 'crossed the border of death'. Could it be that this does not refer to the narrow gap between life and death, but rather..."
Shad opened his mouth slightly and looked up at the stone door. He could feel that behind the door was the end of everything. He even felt that he could see what happened to Priest Augustus in the past not long ago.
Rat Augustus has passed through death's door.