After a while, the tall Reverend Albert walked up towards the children. For an old man of this age, he was handsome in hard labor, his back was not hunched up like other old men, his eyes were not cloudy and his lips were clean and there was no saliva reflective. His back was straight, like a javelin, his face was covered with fine wrinkles like a net, and his robe was carefully starched, much cleaner than Reverend George's.

"Church George. ”

He stood next to George and called out his name with warning. George's lips twitched, and he took a step back as quickly as a frightened fat mouse.

Albert's figure barely covered most of George's part, but Isha could feel that all the children present were invisibly relieved as that hot and disgusting gaze disappeared.

"Thank you for the glory of the Children of Light...... You are the fourth group of children to come here, and you are very lucky, and you should be happy, because this luck is obviously the favor of the angels. However, with all due respect, it is all the more important for you to be cautious in your words and deeds, not to be complacent, not to be arrogant. You have to recognize your condition, you ......"

Pastor Albert held out a finger aimed at Isa's forehead.

His thin, bloodless lips opened and closed with a snap: "It's not a rough piece of gold that has not been picked, and the gold miners need to wash through the filthy and filthy sand of the river for half a month to get a small piece of gold—and now, every one of you may be the glittering treasure, and of course, the lowly river sand." ”

Not a word of expletiveness was spoken, but all the children were silenced by Albert's words.

Albert then looked straight at Isa, his cold eyes flashing with disgust.

He quickly turned his head and whispered in George's ear, "...... Why would a red-haired □□ be on the selection list?"

His voice was just right for Isha to hear this, and Isa's face turned pale for a moment.

Isa's hair, if it had to be judged strictly, probably wouldn't be able to meet the requirements of the Holy Child's selection. Compared to other children's natural blonde, blonde hair, her hair will have a faint carrot color under certain light. Presumably, as she grows up, those unstable pigments in her hair will gradually deepen, and maybe she will become a redhead...... But that doesn't mean Isha will be able to take it □□ the word "redheaded" after hearing it.

She breathed heavily and violently, her eyes glaring at Albert mercilessly.

[If he says one more word—one word, I'll get out of here!I'll spit in his face and turn away!]

She heard a voice in her heart screaming angrily......

In a sense, she even had a little anticipation for Albert's next insults.

At this moment, however, Pastor George took out the notebook from his bosom in a bit of a panic, and with a flick of his fingertips, he quickly flipped through the papers, and then he placed a page in front of Albert's eyes.

Pastor George's words were so low that Isha could only hear "Madeleine".

Reverend Albert's face turned very ugly, and when he looked at Isha, it was like seeing a toad in his bathtub. From that moment on, however, he did not say anything unpleasant as Isha had hoped.

He went to the third floor with the children in an orderly manner and prepared rooms for them, like a real, competent priest.

Isha and Bread were assigned a room that was far more upscale and comfortable than the one they had been assigned to in the House of the Advent Sisters. The doors and furnishings were made of heavy oak, the walls were snow-white, and the cross of an extremely fine angel was nailed to it, and below the cross was a small prayer table, the height of which was completely customized according to the height of the child, the upholstery on the floor was made of high-grade latex, and the outside was wrapped in a thick velvet cover that felt like human skin, and the ceiling was covered with a golden chandelier, which was very bright but very soft, and could do all the lighting in a room— Oh, by the way, this room had no balcony, no windows, only four solid, stone walls, the only door was small and narrow, allowing only one person to enter and exit at any one time, and the shaft of that door was unexpectedly rough, and when entering that room, Isha and "Bread" could not even push the door open without the help of the priest.

Although the rooms are quite luxurious, its new residents are not able to enjoy it to the fullest...... Both little girls were extremely nervous and restrained, especially "Bread", and she shrank into the corner of the wall as soon as she entered the room, and within a few minutes Isha heard a thin, fearful cry coming from under the quilt.

Isha sat at the front of the prayer stand, her fingers rubbing vigorously at the uniforms the priest had assigned to them—white robes as loose as bags of flour.

She hesitated for a few seconds, then covered her ears with her hands, ignoring the "bread" that was crying until she was about to convulse.

Her ginger hair fell loosely over her thin shoulders.

Isha looked at the reddening of her hair on the white fabric, and kept whispering in her heart.

[It's going to end soon...... Soon ......]

She knew that she would never be taken seriously by the group, whether it was her age, her appearance, or her precocious personality—the last point was simply a dead hole for the priests, and if it weren't for the rules, they would have gouged out Isa's eyeballs a few days ago.

Madeleine's sacrifice might have allowed her to stay in this room for a night or two, but once the real selection began, Isha knew she would be the first to be eliminated...... And after being eliminated, she can go home, to Madeleine's side......

Isha sketched out Madeleine's face over and over again in her mind, not the later mummy-like Madeleine in a black robe, but the Madeleine who was always drunk and drunk, with eye shadow and lipstick, who woke her up in the middle of the night by throwing herself on her bed, forcibly kissing her on the face, and shouting "Isha my little darling".

[I'm sorry...... I'm sorry...... I can't ......]

Before she knew it, Isha was also in tears.

I have to say that the precocious Isha is indeed quite smart - if it hadn't been for that accident, everything would have gone according to that plan. She would be sent out of the church in the desert a week later, and Madeleine would yell and cry for years, but she would slowly emerge from the darkness, and children like her would always know how to survive in harsh conditions.

However, Pastor George learned of the existence of "bread."

That night, after that sumptuous dinner, there was no "bread" among the children who returned to the room.

Isha was so flustered that she kept asking for news of the "bread", but she could only get a cold answer from the nun of life—the lovely, plump little girl with roasted cheeks like baked bread, who had been taken away by the priest for evening counseling.

Isa's attitude suddenly became so bad that she was put in a confinement cell.

When she returned to her room late at night, "Bread" was already back on her bed.

However, there was no expression on the little girl's face, and she couldn't even cry anymore, and Isha walked over in horror, afraid that the "bread" lying there was dead - but when she saw the "bread", she found that the little girl's eyes were open.

That's all.

The two pupils were embedded in the child's childish cheeks, soulless, mindless, just two old glass beads, her breath was hot, and her little chest rose and fell slowly.

The "bread" uniform was new, not the one she wore out the door.

A faint scent emanated from the rough fabric of the uniform, and Isha remembered the smell of a "White Lion" brand of laundry detergent...... Before joining the Adventists, Madeleine would take her to the laundry around the corner every weekend to do her laundry.

The laundry is always full of noise, buzzing, the air is warm, and the aroma of detergent is intertwined, very strong.

Madeleine's favorite laundry detergent of the "White Lion" brand, lavender-scented, freshly washed clothes sticks to her face and is hot, which can dilute the lingering smell of alcohol and cheap perfume on Madeleine's body during that time.

……

Isha trembled violently, not knowing that she was crying unconsciously. She stroked the cheek of the "bread" with her hand and forced her to sit up.

"We need to get out of here...... We have to leave...... This is not right...... Teacher Moriton told me that this kind of thing is not right......"

She muttered nervously, going back and forth in circles around the room.

"It's not going to end if we're still here...... Those old □□ won't let you go...... We're going to run!

As Isha chattered, the pupils of the "bread" gradually became glowing, as if she had accidentally picked up some fragments of her soul.

"Mom...... Yes...... Angry ......"

She spoke hoarsely, with visible wounds at the corners of her mouth.

The red burned Isha viciously like a hot soldering iron.

She fell to her knees – right in front of the cross – and vomited violently.

"Bread" stumbled out of bed, and she grabbed Isha in horror.

"Isa?"

She spoke quietly, fearfully.

Then he saw Isha turn her head sharply, her pale face, her eyes bloodshot and her pupils as bright as hot coals.

"Mom was just deceived...... After knowing the truth, they will not curse...... We're good kids, and those guys are bad guys. ”

Isha said hurriedly.

She searched the room several times before she found her shoes, a pair of cloth shoes that were only a little thicker than their socks, which had been given to them by the priest when they checked into the room, and their own shoes had been taken away.

With a dumb "bread", she managed to remove the cross from the wall, and then Isha pulled the door open with all her might, and she stuck the cross in the crack of the door, priing the door open a gap that people could barely get through.

She let the "bread" get out of the way, and then herself.

In the darkness of the night, the interior of the church was as intricate as a maze of minotaurs, and Isha was running down the corridor with the "bread" as fast as she could.

They passed one portrait after another, on which were the perfect faces of the "children of light", and the portraits painted by the masters were so vivid, at least at night, that they were smiling and looking down at the two children in the frame, and their pale faces appeared abruptly in the darkness (in the portraits, he was always dressed in a black robe), like the heads of dead men hanging in the air.

"Pounding...... Pounding ...... Pounding ......"

Isa's heart had never beaten as fast as it did today, and the moon cast countless twisted shadows on the ground as it shot through the carved fence into the window.

In her extreme tension, Isha felt as if the shadows were twisting like monsters.

One minute, two minutes, or more than ten minutes, an hour?

Isha couldn't tell how much time had passed, but after running for a long time, she finally found the door that she remembered leading to the outside......

Mom –

She raced towards the door.

And then......

"Click......

Golden, so bright that the light barely kept Isa from opening her eyes.

"What are you doing?"

Isha heard a cold voice ringing behind her.

I don't know when, she bit her lip, and in this second, the sweet fishy smell in her mouth spread and became extraordinarily strong.

Isha turned her head slowly, like a cheek robot running out of electricity.

Reverend Albert stood next to the light switch, his gray eyes staring straight at her.

"What are you doing? Isha?"

He repeated. 166 Reading Network