Between the ruins of the temple on the top of St. Nicholas, the wind blows the weeds among the stones, here is a ruined wall of the temple, a stone house that has collapsed most of it on the broken wall,

Hundreds of years ago, it existed as a stargazing room for disciples in the temple, and the conditions at that time were not good, and the simple style advocated by the prophet Ferran has been very fully interpreted here, and there is hardly a person in the middle of nowhere, and there is generally little attention paid to these places, not to mention that hundreds of years of wind and rain have already turned this place into a wasteland with wild grass, only a few scattered fragments of grass mixed with it, proving that this place was once inhabited

From here, you can see the situation of the road down the mountain at a glance.

An old man in a high priest's uniform stood on the cliff wall, his eyes blazing at the horse team that was slowly moving up along the winding mountain road a hundred meters below, his two white eyebrows were twisted together, and his shining eyes fell into an inexplicable contemplation,

He is Monroe, the High Priest of the Holy Presbyterian Church of the Sky,

Responsible for the day-to-day affairs of the temple, after the high priest Parschena fell ill, Monroe had faintly become the head of the Holy Church, the mountain wind blew his short white hair, and with a large priestly robe painted with gold on his side, the majestic aura came to his face,

Behind him, there stood two old men who were dressed in the same costume as him, one of them with thick hair, a thin body, and a curved hooked nose that was unforgettable.

Because he is responsible for explaining the doctrine full-time, he is also responsible for supervising the behavior of the middle and lower class sacrifices and missions, and the style is strict and ruthless, so that many middle and lower class sacrifices have to tremble when they hear the name, plus a pair of unique Yin and Crane triangular eyes, giving people a sense of force.

The other was a chubby old man, with a ruddy face, not very tall, standing there giving a stocky feeling, plain and divine eyes, which always seemed to bring a sense of calm, he was the person in charge of supporting the sacrificial ceremony, High Priest Ivan Brown,

Compared to the other two, this Ivan Brown High Priest has a relatively low sense of existence.

Although he is also one of the members of the Presbyterian Church, the first two have a lot of real power, and this one is only in charge of the arrangement of the festival and the preparation of the ceremony, and cannot be put on the table at all. The temple had four high priests

The three of them, together with the High Priest of Timos, who went to greet them, formed the current Presbyterian Church of the Sky Holy Church, nominally to assist Parschena in managing the Holy Church, but in fact they were the core of the Holy Church, and the reason why they appeared on this deserted cliff. It was all because they suddenly received a panicked report that the southern governor of the Empire, Statunko, had actually arrived in St. Nicholas, which was a bolt from the blue for the Presbyterian Church, who was secretly planning to establish a new saint in the Empire. It's like being caught raped in bed with the embarrassment and wolf bèi

The mountain breeze was blowing and it was a little cold, and his eyes paused on the large wooden box on the carriage in the distance. Monroe, the eldest chief high priest, turned from the front and said to the two equally unsightly high priests behind him with a depressed face

"What do you think of this matter, at this time, the southern governor of the empire suddenly came to us with an army of St. Nicholas, it can never be as simple as a coincidence! Although we don't know the true purpose of the other party, we also need to be careful to deal with it,

Especially with the ceremony of the new Holy Maiden imminent, we need to be even more cautious, otherwise, once we are forcibly intervened by the Empire in advance, we will lose all our face, and we are afraid that the little prestige that the Holy Sect has finally recovered will also suffer unbearable heavy losses!"

"What the chief priest said, I don't think it's easy!" replied not by the grim-faced Faculty of Doctrine Adonis, but by the chubby Ivan Brown,

He subconsciously shrank his head and analyzed it seriously

"First of all, the battle for the Black Forest has been over for a few months, why does the Empire only remember to hand over the statue to us now, and secondly, although this is the only large statue of the Prophet from the era of the first grand ceremony found, but because of this, it is really unreasonable to alarm a Vekia Falcon henchman Governor to personally escort it! I'm sure the Doge is on a special mission with the Falcon of Vekia!"

I have to admit that this Ivan Brown High Priest, who is rare to see in a year, is too eloquent, worthy of being the high priest who is responsible for guiding newcomers to understand the complex ritual of the festival, analyzing and speaking on a problem, whether it is true or not, it will first make you dizzy, and make people fall into it unconsciously, a typical god stick!" The eldest Monroe's eyebrows jumped, obviously frightened by this word, what is a special mission, this is too much meaning, anyway, it will not be a good thing to fall on the head of the Holy Sect, otherwise why bring so many guards, "It shouldn't be that much! The relationship between the upper echelons of the empire and us is not so bad!"

The cold-looking Dean of the Doctrine, Adonis, spoke in the same tone as he looked, "At least not yet, because the Holy Religion is the spiritual sustenance of millions of Salanders, and even the Empire does not dare to take any action directly against us!" "It's hard to say!" Seeing the uncertainty flashing in Adonis's eyes, the Ivan Brown High Priest accentuated his tone and continued, "What do you think, what kind of person is the Vekia Falcon, that is the butcher who has killed at least a million people!" So what, I don't believe he dares to kill all the Salanders!" said Dean of the Doctrine, Adonis, whose face was unmoved

Ivan Brown continued, "To be honest, I have been paying attention to the affairs of the expeditionary force during this time, and no one can say the specific situation, but I feel that the empire is very polite to us now, and it is really to the point of turning its face, and there will definitely be no softness!"

"The heart of a ruthless king, how can you and I be able to figure it out?"

Ivan Brown's voice stopped. sighed, and said in a cold tone, "Think about the situation of the expeditionary force, in order to mobilize 20,000 Salanders to participate in the expeditionary force, Vikia Falcon could not hesitate to give all the participating Salander soldiers the best training, weapons and equipment, and officer equipment, but Normandy has just been defeated, and in less than 1 month, the expeditionary force has changed from a hero praised by everyone to a rebel army surrounded and suppressed by the imperial army."

Tens of thousands of troops didn't even have the slightest room for resistance, and they were wiped out like the Vekia Falcon! What does this mean? The Empire's butcher's knife has never been sluggish, and the speed at which it turns its face is too ...... Tsk!"

Ivan Brown shook his head, reluctant to say more, but the look on his face undoubtedly showed that the brutality of the Imperial Army was not an empty word of intimidation, "In terms of killing decisions, even if the three of us are tied together, they are not as good as the lame Southern Governor," Ivan Brown said without hesitation. Behind this governor is the Vicchia Falcon, who is known as the invincible god of war!And as far as I know, for some reason, the temple has always been inconclusive about the expeditionary force, and I heard that some middle and lower classes are worshipping where. There are still many people who are upset with the expeditionary force."

"That's why the Southern Governor came in person!All I can say is that it's dangerous, you're challenging the Empire's patience!" Ivan Brown's voice stopped, and out of the corner of his eye he glanced at the Doctrine Abbot Adonis next to him,

It was like saying in that look. This kind of thing is under the jurisdiction of the Doctrine House, look at what is going on here! There's nothing to do here

"It has nothing to do with me, it's just some personal act of sacrifice! it's not within the scope of doctrinal deviations that need to be corrected!" said Dean of the Doctrine, Adonis, with a look on his face, flipped a white smoke at him, and insisted on his face, "And I don't think it's wrong,

"For hundreds of years, the Holy Religion has been subservient to secular kingship, and it would have been if it was our Salanders who ruled before, but now it is outsiders who rule Salander," the voice of the Dean of the Doctrine, Addonis, echoed in the air, revealing a bloody blood. The original doctrine of the Holy Religion is to take on the responsibility of teaching the Salander people freedom, integrity, and bravery, we are not puppets of the empire, they can dominate the flesh of the Salander people, but we are the spirit of the Salander people, the expeditionary force is not wrong, in the face of national hatred and family feud, no matter whether they have caused any rumored horrific killings, they are all heroes of the Salander people, "They only kill our enemies" Adonis turned his head, looked at the beautiful land of Salander in the distance, and said in a deep voice" The rejuvenation of the earth cannot hide the trauma of the war, and in my mind, I still remember the tragic scene of the broken mountains and rivers.

The murderous Normans continued to invade our beautiful country, and during that time, I felt like I was living in a nightmare every day, and when I opened my eyes, all I heard was the news of the defeat of the front-line army, the groans of pain of the wounded soldiers, more than a million people died in that disaster, countless people fell to the killing of the Normans, and the only thing I could do was to pray for them! I can't go against my conscience to accuse these warriors who bear the humiliation of the whole Salander and raise the sword of vengeance against the Normanders as traitors, because if I could still afford to take arms, I would have gone too, and to declare them rebels in obedience to the will of the Empire would be an insult to me, to insult the Temple, to insult all the Salanders themselves!"

Monroe next to him had a heavy face and didn't say a word, obviously, there was more than one Adonis who had such an idea, in fact, the radicalism of the high priest was also famous in the temple, and many of the Mamunuks who belonged to the temple were actually his loyal followers, in the war between Salander and Normandy, the high priest who was over sixty years old ran to the front line of the war many times, even if the priest's robe was stained red by the blood of the wounded soldiers, he still prayed to the god of the sky in a peaceful tone for the soldiers who were seriously wounded, that war was a disaster for the entire Salander, it was a family hatred, and it was a national hatred！

"Okay, whatever you want" Compared with the insistence of the two companions, the slightly fat priest Ivan Brown could only compromise, he rubbed his temple painfully with his right hand, and said, "Even a blind man can see it, it is obvious that this high-ranking governor is here for the two of you not to express his position!

If we suddenly announced a halt, we would be able to get out of the crisis for a while, but it would also be tantamount to acknowledging that the Temple had succumbed to secular kingship. There is absolutely no way for us to hold it or stop it, and the time is approaching by the moment...... What a!" "Actually, I have a solution!"

Dean of the Doctrine Adonis hesitated for a moment, and said mysteriously, "Since we can't avoid it, if we face it directly, he will catch us off guard, and we can also hit him by surprise, so it's better to make the situation bigger."

"Well, what do you mean, to be clear!"

The hook-nosed dean of the doctrine sneered at the corner of his mouth, "Anyway, the selection ceremony of the new saint is in 3 days. Even if the other party knew, he would not be able to inform the Vecchia Falcon in Normandy, far away across the sea, in a short time, and we could have taken this opportunity to announce to the whole of Salander that the ceremony of the new saint would be held in the Holy Land of Nicholas, and that the whole ceremony would be open to all, and I believe that day would be unprecedented!

"This seems to work!" Ivan Brown, the head of the Sacrifice Hall, hesitated. nodded in agreement,

"Hehe, that's a brilliant idea," Monroe glanced meaningfully at the long black line that had already reached the middle of the mountain in the distance, and smiled at the corner of his mouth with excitement, "So be it." I immediately sent an informant to Sù Timos, and placed the Doge in the Sanctuary of St. Perod, which was in a beautiful setting and could be seen at all times in a beautiful mountain landscape. The most important thing is that it is located in the middle of the mountain path, whether it is up or down, it is under our watch! Don't let the wind come out of here, once the three days are over, even if the other party wants to react and mobilize, it will be too late!"

In the dark night, the fat man stood in the courtyard halfway up the mountainside, looking up at a bright fireball slowly rising in the black night sky, "Touch!" There was a loud bang, and in the distant sky, beautiful fireworks exploded one by one in the sky, illuminating the fat man's dark pupils full of longing, and also illuminating the environment around him.

The emerald haze, with a dozen palm trees swaying in the wind rubbing in the night, is a turquoise spring flowing down from the mountaintop, and the sound of tinkling and clanging is like a melodious nocturne.

It's simple to the extreme, the spiritual realm is at the extreme, revealing the real stillness,

The sound of people singing and dancing happily came from the bottom of the mountain, looking from afar, the lights illuminated the square of the city under the mountain as if it were day, and the celebration of the birth of the prince aroused the weakness of the fat man's heart, and the father and son connected their hearts, and the fat man's eyes looked at the fireworks that burst out in the air.

This is a stargazing platform outside the temple that can look up to the sky, standing here, the fat man can see the scene under the mountain more realistically, several guards were about to follow him, the fat man turned back slightly angrily, "I am an ordinary guard now, who will come to harm me, you follow me, it is the real harm to me!" Several guards did not dare to follow, so they had to return to Antonstatunenko's residence,

There is no wind in the quiet night, time passes like water, and the celebration at the foot of the mountain seems to have reached its climax, with the sound of people shouting long live the prince, and the melodious sound of the organ fluttering in the wind, even the hardest of hearts will be melted away by such a sight

The fat man listened to the laughter and laughter in the distance, suddenly raised his head, looked up at the stars above his head like electricity, and a shocking feeling hit, such as a huge galaxy of light, like a long river hanging, people can hardly feel their own existence, between this heaven and earth, human beings are so small, maybe as Prais said, in front of the powerful river of time, anyone is a hurried passerby, only the blood is the trace of the zài, unconsciously, the fat man has completely relaxed the nervous body, and thoroughly feels this very rare long-lost feeling, only at this moment, he feels the hegemony of the dynasty, it's just a decade of time and space, and the one thing I've worked hard for is just to live better!

I don't know how long it took, the sound of the celebration at the bottom of the mountain gradually calmed down, and there were footsteps on the mountain road returning from the city celebration, there were men and women, most of them seemed to have stopped at the bottom of the mountain, where the low-level sacrifices lived, only a small footsteps from far and near,

Suddenly, the fat man heard a displeased low humming female voice in his ear, "It's really unlucky, how did you meet an imperial dog here!"

The fat man opened his eyes and saw that more than ten meters in front of the stargazing platform, seven or eight heavily armed Salander women stared at each other.

In the middle of several women, there stood a young woman with a gorgeous appearance, who was one of the few wearing Mamunuk armor, with a slender figure, and a strong and moving beauty.

The girl looked at the fat man coldly, and the male self-esteem made the fat man not hide from her gaze. A strange look flashed in the girl's eyes, and she frowned, "Where have I seen you......?" Miss, like the stupid fat man across the street!" said another timid female voice, and the fat man was stunned that he had heard this voice somewhere (to be continued). )