Walk through the vast Gessok Empire, across the snow-capped mountains that stretch from the snow-capped fields to the hinterland of the continent, to the fertile Soya Plain, where a huge city rises from the ground and buildings rise and fall to the glittering river at the end of the spectrum. Pen & Fun & Pavilion www.biquge.info

This is the Sacred Capital.

Compared to many cities on the continent with a history dating back to the Second Age, the Divine King, which was finally built at the beginning of the Fourth Age, was as young as a toddler, but it was this young city that had been the irreplaceable political center of Todder for millennia.

The Council, the Temple, and the White Tower.

The ivory tower towered into the sky, and every newcomer to the royal capital looked at it with reverence, for it was the residence of the legendary mage and prophet, Lord Phinex Eudora. She is the High Priestess of the Holy Alliance, and it was she who single-handedly created the Holy Alliance, ended the dark era of war, and brought peace and prosperity to Todder.

It is only in recent decades that Lord Eudora has faded into obscurity, and it is said that she is so busy with other affairs that she no longer attends the meetings of the Holy Council.

The last time the residents of the royal capital saw her was at the ceremony of the alternation of speakers eight or nine years ago, when the current speaker, Augustus, was elected by the members of the parliament and took over the duties of speaker in the presence of Lord Eudora.

Since then, the doors of the White Tower have been closed, and Lord Eudora has not been seen again.

Only the long shadow of the ivory tower pulled out in the sun, like a huge shadow hand on the dial, swept over the royal capital day after day, showing its unparalleled height.

The sun was blazing, and the bright reflection of the vast white stone square was very dazzling, and Emino subconsciously shrunk into her cloak again, even though she was already hiding in the shade of an evergreen tree, the bright light still made her skin tingle a little.

On a hot June afternoon, when the passers-by in the square were dressed in thin and loose clothes, Emino was wrapped in a thick brown-gray cloak, which looked very striking and strange, and the soldiers patrolling around her occasionally cast wary glances, and the guards standing guard in the distance had been watching her for a long time, treating her as a suspicious person.

This square is the place where martial law is maintained all day, and it is also the most heavily guarded place in the capital of the Holy King.

Because on one side of the square, on the long steps, stands an extremely majestic palace. In front of the hall was a long row of white stone columns that could only be hugged by several people, supporting the towering gilded eaves carved with garlands, and the arcade at the entrance was wide enough for an airship to sail in, and countless people of different clothes and appearances came and went, as small as ants compared to the temple.

This is the parliament building of the Holy Alliance, the highest center of power in all of Toddell.

Aeno stood in the shade of the tree in front of the long steps, staring at the passers-by at the entrance of the temple from the shadow of the cloak with large brown eyes, for fear of missing life.

She has been in the city for more than half a month, and in order to accuse her former lord of the dead, the "Blood Staff", she wantonly sent soldiers to kill civilians.

Her parents, childhood friends, and the kind inhabitants of the village, including herself, all died at the hands of the skeleton soldiers, and she saw with her own eyes the resurrection of their bodies under the influence of death magic, and the cold soul fire flashed in her eyes. And on the way to flee with the village chief's grandfather, she witnessed more than one village and town that had been slaughtered, and the Blood Staff Lord had to pay for the crimes he had committed.

She somehow did not return to the embrace of the moon god, was pulled back into her body by death magic after her death, secretly left the castle of the Blood Staff after being accepted by Iluvita, was chased by Zororumi and almost died, and was rescued by Morin, and finally freed.

But she did not forget, and although she rarely showed it, she did not forget the crimes committed by the Blood Staff.

However, her complaint did not come to fruition.

The person in charge of receiving the complaints of the civilians was a young priest of nature, and it took several days for Aeno to finally meet the receptionist, and after detailing her story, he expressed deep sympathy for Aeno's experience, but said that there was probably nothing he could do about it at the moment.

That natural sacrifice is similar to what Mo Lin said before the summer vacation, even when the Holy Alliance's influence is the greatest, it is difficult to radiate into the hinterland of the country of the dead, and now the influence on the country of the dead is even more pitiful, even if the lord's crimes can be confirmed, it is difficult to send people to arrest him.

This involves more forces and rules.

"Over the years, the temple has received several such complaints, and it is said that some residents who have escaped to neighboring countries have come to the temple to complain, but to be honest, it is difficult for us to make a difference. The natural priest said helplessly: "We are not only understaffed in the land of the dead, but also restricted by many aspects, and it is very inconvenient to conduct investigations. It's been a few years since you said it, and I'm afraid it's hard to hold it down. ”

"But are you left to those people to do whatever they want?" asked Aeno reluctantly.

Seeing that Aeno's face was full of disappointment, the priest thought for a while and said: "In the council, Councillor Yara has been advocating for strengthening the alliance's control over the dead, you can contact her for help, she should be very interested in what you said, but she is not in the king recently, I don't know when she will come." ”

As he spoke, the sacrifice summoned a magical image, a young woman with long, wavy blue hair.

"Councillor Yara rarely lives in the royal capital, and if you come here you should attend meetings, and if you have time, I suggest you wait in front of the parliament building, and I will write a letter to Councillor Yara explaining your situation. The natural priest sighed lightly: "There is only so much I can do, good luck." ”

With that, he drew a copy of Councillor Yara's magical image to Eminor.

At this time, Aeno was in the square in front of the council hall in the midday sun, just to wait for the appearance of Councillor Yara.

She had been waiting here for nearly ten days after receiving the instructions of the natural sacrifice, hiding in the shade of the trees every day from early morning until sunset, wrapped in a thick cloak, staring at the entrance of the temple with large brown eyes, anticipating the appearance of Councillor Yara.

Today is her last day here, and tonight she's on her way to Victor Academy.

If he can't wait for Councilor Yara today, he will have to wait a few months to return to Iluvita and then find time to find His Excellency the Councillor, Aeno was a little anxious, and took a step with the gradually moving shade.

After a while, the number of people entering the temple suddenly increased, presumably some meeting was about to be held, and Aeno raised her spirits, and sure enough, not far away, she saw the young woman with long blue wavy hair, and a garland badge pinned to her, indicating her status as a member of the Holy Council.

Equinor's magic power flowed through her stiff legs and feet, and hurriedly ran towards her: "Councillor Yara!"

"Stand !!" The two guards leaped in front of her, and even drew their bright weapons, the blazing sunlight reflecting off the blade, stabbing Aeno in the cheek.

Aeno was unsteady on her feet, and almost fell on the blade of the guard, although she also felt that the guards had been paying attention to her for a long time, but she did not expect that they would think of her as a bad person, and seeing Yara go farther and farther, she shouted anxiously, "Councillor Yara!!"

"She's with me. Yara finally saw the little vampire, remembered the letter she had read earlier, and hurriedly came over to explain it to the guards.

Only then did the guard let him go, leaning forward and apologizing to Aeno: "The people who come and go here are all members of the parliament, or important diplomatic envoys of the country, so you must be cautious, and please don't mind the inconvenience caused to you." ”

"I was thinking of going to you," Yara said, smiling kindly at Aeminor, "I've already seen your story in the letter, but if you want to hold the Lords of the Dead accountable, you must first strengthen the Alliance's influence on the Kingdom of the Dead, and at the next meeting I am going to propose to strengthen the intelligence supervision and tracking of the Dead, and then you can tell your story at my table." ”

She led Aeno into the hall of parliament and said, "Actually, many members agree with me, but if a proposal wants to be further discussed on the agenda, it must be approved by more than half of the votes, and if it wants to be implemented, it must be approved by more than seventy percent of the members." ”

Entering the entrance arcade of the temple again, Emino noticed the badge on Yara's chest flickering, presumably through the detection of the magical enchantment, and when the magic sigil appeared on the little vampire's cloak, it was supposed to be a temporary visitor or something. “

I...... What should I do?" she asked hesitantly.

"Don't be nervous," Yara said encouragingly, "the most important thing is that we need to win the approval of Speaker Augustus, many swinging members actually follow Speaker Augustus's attitude to vote, I have mentioned this bill to him before, I will buy you a certain amount of time to speak, as long as you can impress the Speaker, this bill will definitely pass." ”

"First of all, this proposal strengthens the impact on the deceased, and then we will go after the crimes committed by the deceased lords over the years, since we choose to prosecute in this way, we must be patient, it will be a long and difficult process. ”

Aminor nodded, following Councillor Yara's footsteps.

There is not much extravagance in the halls of the council, the sculptures and frescoes are simple and sacred, and the guards everywhere are dressed in armor with a wreath badge tattooed on the armor, representing the holy council of nations and races.

The people who came and went looked hurried, most of them had papers or manuscripts in their hands, and many of them seemed to know Councillor Yara and nodded to her in a friendly manner, but Emino had already taken off his hood and followed behind the Councillor without attracting much attention.

She followed Yara through a winding passage to a large hemispherical hall.

The hall was surrounded by thousands of seating areas, each large enough to accommodate more than a dozen people, separated from each other by magical barriers, not connected to each other. In the center of the hall is a larger seating area and a towering podium, presumably the area where Speaker Augustus presides over the meeting.

"There are nearly 1,000 members of the Holy Council, and sometimes there are hundreds of people, and each member has his own team, which is responsible for sorting out opinions and information, recording speeches, etc., so this conference hall is so large, after all, it needs to accommodate tens of thousands of people at the same time for orderly meetings. Councillor Yala said.

She saw that Aeno's big brown eyes were full of bloodshots, and said comfortingly: "Wait a minute, when we speak, this seat will have amplification magic, and everyone can hear it with just an ordinary speaking voice, don't be nervous, even if I can't pass this time, I will propose it next time, this is my most important proposal as a councilor, and I will never give up." ”

"You can rest assured of that. ”

As the meeting approached the beginning, there were significantly more members present, and more or less people could be seen in the other seats.

Finally, in the seating area in the middle of the council hall, an old man in a black robe appeared on the high podium, his hair was dyed black, combed back of his head, there were deep ravines on his full forehead, and his dark blue eyes were shining, looking very wise and calm, quite military.

The old man was holding a scepter studded with white gems in his hand, and it was clear that there was no magic fluctuation, but a circle of white wreaths was projected around him, which was the scepter of the Speaker of the Holy Alliance.

"Aeminor, that's Speaker Augustus. "The most important thing for us is to get his approval, and if he does, we can at least pressure the legislators of the country of the dead to make concessions," Yarra said. Of course, it must also be approved by him, and many members of parliament do not want to spend their energy on opposing my proposal for the land of the dead, and only with the support of the Speaker, and the approval of those vacillating neutral members, can my proposal be passed and implemented. ”

"Are you ready?" she asked, "and the first item on the agenda of this meeting is my proposal." ”

"Aejuno?" Yara was surprised not to hear an answer.

She turned around, only to find that there was nothing behind her, and the girl in the cloak had quietly left, only a gray corner of cloth had fallen on the table, and some lines had been marked with magic, which seemed to be some handwriting.

Yara picked it up and looked at it, frowning deeply.

This is the newsletter that Aeno left for her, and it was written with a chilling sentence-

- Speaker Augustus knows my former lords, the Blood Staff, and they are all the way.

Yes, even from such a distance, the little vampire still recognized at a glance, the black-haired old man named Augustus, the speaker of the revered Holy Council.

She had seen the old man.

A few years ago, in the days when she had been imprisoned in the castle by the Blood Staff, she had seen the old man, she had seen him discuss matters with the Blood Staff Lord, she had seen him dine with the Blood Staff, and she had been chatting and laughing gently, and in the plate was a bloody heart that had just been cut out of the girl's chest and was still twitching.

When she occasionally thought about it many years later, she still thought that the picture was just a nightmare from the past, and that the old man who ate people's hearts was just an image she imagined in the nightmare. But he stood alive in front of her, in the center of the council hall, at the pinnacle of Todd's power.

Aeno didn't want to stay here for a moment, and she left in a hurry.