Agatha knew that Bishop Ivan's life had come to an end many years earlier—beneath that tightly wrapped bandage, there was barely much flesh and blood, and there was only a stubborn soul left to support him here, except for the miracle of Bartók's downfall.

Few people know what happened to the bishop's body, not even Agatha, who was the gatekeeper, only that it was an "accident" that happened many, many years ago, and that Bishop Ivan never talked to anyone about the real circumstances of that "accident", including in front of her.

Naturally, Agatha would not have taken the initiative to touch this secret.

Bishop Ivan's heart was visibly heavy, and he was silent for a long time before he suddenly said, "We are facing a crisis."

"Yes, Bishop Ivan," Agatha nodded, "I will do my best to get to the bottom of the truth and dismantle the plot to annihilate the Cultists."

"No, you don't understand," Bishop Ivan shook his head, "the truth of this crisis may be beyond our comprehension and imagination, Agatha, the activities of those cultists may be part of this crisis, but by no means the whole story, I have a feeling... …」

Agatha frowned slightly, "A feeling?"

"It's like it was fifty years ago...... Before that chaos erupted, the whole city was filled with an atmosphere very similar to that of today," Bishop Ivan said slowly, "The same seemingly normal city-state, but everywhere reveals strange and inexplicable details, as if suddenly living in a dream where it is difficult to distinguish between truth and falsehood, we occasionally glimpse the terrible sights on the edge of the dream, and the pathetic minds of mortals refuse to understand all this, so that we cannot get a glimpse of the reality that is close at hand..... Do you feel this way? It's as if ...... warp is close in front of us, but we keep our eyes closed."

"I don't understand...," Agatha hesitated, "You mean, cognitive interference? This interference has affected our judgment?"

Bishop Ivan didn't answer her, but after a few seconds of silence, he suddenly brought up a seemingly unrelated topic: "Agatha, did I tell you about the 'Last Queen's Guard, fifty years ago?'" Did I mention the "Second Waterway" in the depths of the city-state?"

"Second waterway?" Agatha was stunned, and then some information came to her mind, "I know a little bit about this, it was part of the huge underground facility that the Frost Queen built for the city-state, but with the end of the Queen's Age, this unfinished facility was abandoned, and now it is still abandoned due to the severe collapse and financial pressure—most people don't even know it exists."

"Yes, it's abandoned, and only gatekeepers like you or antiques like me still know about it." Bishop Ivan said, shaking his head.

"The Last Queen's Guard, what's going on?" Agatha asked, "Why did you bring this up all of a sudden?"

"The last of the Queen's Guards, the last of the rebels who refused to surrender after the Queen's Palace had broken through and relied on the city-state's underground facilities," Bishop Ivan said in a deep voice, as if caught in his memory, "and their last place of entrenchment was the entrance to the Second Waterway—after which they blew up all the connecting wells and died underground. And the reason why I'm bringing it up today...... It's because I suddenly remembered a rumor from the beginning."

Agatha's eyes suddenly became serious: "A rumor?"

"It is said.... When the shaft was blown up, the soldiers attacking the underground suddenly heard a strange noise from the depths of the ground, and in the completely collapsed underground, the last of the Queen's Guards suddenly shouted, as if they were attacking someone," Bishop Ivan slowly recalled, "For a long time after that, it was often reported that the sound of shouting and charging was heard from deep underground, and eventually rumors gradually spread that the 'Last Queen's Guard' had become a deviant army deep underground, and they fought in the darkness every day. Anger boils over, and when the new order established by the betrayers reaches its most vulnerable, they will pour out of the ground to settle old scores..."

Agatha's expression became solemn: "The most fragile moment of the new order.... You just said that we are facing a crisis beyond comprehension, and that the city is pervasive

With a similar atmosphere to that of fifty years ago, is this the most vulnerable moment? The legendary 'Queen's Guard' will come out of the ground? Do you think this legend is true?"

"I don't believe in this legend - the Queen's Guard has long since been wiped out, and I have seen it with my own eyes, even if...," Bishop Ivan said, pausing abruptly, as if thinking of something, but then shaking his head, "Even if some of the survivors survived the Second Waterway temporarily, they would not have survived to this day, and the few surviving descendants would not be able to shake the rule of the city-state, even if we are in crisis now."

Agatha didn't speak for a while, and was silent for more than ten seconds before she suddenly spoke: "The legend of the last queen guard may be false, but the existence of a large-scale uncontrolled area under the frost city-state is true, what you are worried about is not the queen guard that disappeared fifty years ago, but something else East XZ is on the second waterway?"

"We've been searching the city for a long time, and we've caught quite a few of them, but they're all insignificant, and most of them don't have very strong stealth skills—they can't have created so many 'fakes' and 'elemental pollution' in the city-state, let alone cause a movement on Dagger Island," Bishop Ivan nodded, "Now it seems that the minions we've caught are more like skirmishers who have leaked out of a large lair. Most of the city-state has been searched more than once now, if there is anything else that has not been found...... I'm afraid that's only the depths of the earth."

Agatha pondered for a moment, then spoke uncertainly: "But according to the data, most of the second waterway has collapsed badly, isolating each other into a network of death, coupled with toxic pollution and a large area of darkness, it is impossible to survive below at all-the Annihilation Cultists are also living people, except for a few priests who are about to transform themselves into ghosts, most of the Annihilation Cultists still need a normal human living environment...... How could they have been hiding in that place all this time?"

"At the very least," Bishop Ivan said slowly, "start searching the collapse site around the boiling gold mine."

Agatha thought for a moment and nodded slightly, "That's where the town hall needs to cooperate—protective equipment, underground machinery, professional engineering personnel, and the cathedral doesn't have the reserves for that."

"I'll negotiate," Bishop Ivan nodded, "List the manpower and equipment you need, and I'll get it for you."

"Okay, I'll give you the list by noon," Agatha was polite, "and until the personnel and supplies are in place, I'm going to have a good chat with the Annihilation Cultists who have already been caught, and see if they can reveal some useful information......

As the night faded and the sky grew brighter, Vision 001 began to rise from the edge of the city-state, the glorious sun wheel rising into the sky little by little, the double rune rings sweeping over the towering minarets and rooftops, the heat of the sun dissipating the accumulated cold of the night.

At the entrance of the No. 3 cemetery, the heavy carved iron fence door creaked open, the gate swept the snow on the ground, leaving two arc fans with wings spreading, and the old guard in an old coat stood in front of the open cemetery gate, took a deep breath, and looked at the sky that had cleared.

The sky was clear, but for some reason, this sunny morning could not stop the irritability in his heart, and the old guard looked in the direction of the city block, only to feel that the faint sound of cars and horses in the middle was vague and noisy, like the restless wind of last night.

Even the clear sky at the moment seems to be fake.

He whispered a few words of grumbling, then looked at the ramp in front of the cemetery.

The wrinkles on the old man's face stretched for a moment, but in the next second, all the wrinkles twisted again, and his brows were also tightly wrinkled.

He saw a small figure appear on the ramp, walking towards it with difficulty and momentum—and after noticing the old man's gaze, the figure deliberately stopped and waved happily in this direction.

The old guard grimaced.

He waited for the other to approach, and only after Anne began to pat the snowflakes on her pants and boots did he say with an unkind face, "You're here again - I had a quiet day yesterday, and I thought you could finally stay at home honestly, and here again today?"

"I wanted to come yesterday too," Ann

Ni stuck out her tongue, "But Mom said that there was too much snow on the road yesterday, and she couldn't go out until the snowplow cleared the avenue, and she didn't wait for the old man in front of her to speak, so she took out a small bag and handed it over: "Biscuits!"

」.... I'm eating biscuits every day now," the old man's eyelids jumped as he glanced at what he had handed him, but he reached out to take them, "Thank you, Lady Belloni, on my behalf."

Anne laughed happily.

"What else?" The old guard glanced at the girl in front of him, "The cemetery is not available for tours today."

"It's okay, I'll just talk to you," Anne said with a grin, "You know what? We've had a couple of new guests in our house recently, guess who?"

Twelve-year-olds are really not good at pressing the secrets in their hearts.

"I'm not interested," the old guard felt inexplicable and waved his hand impatiently, "The house belongs to yours, you can rent it to whomever you want, what does it have to do with me?"

"It's the big man in black with a lot of bandages!" Anne didn't care about the old man's response, her smile became brighter, and her tone was inexplicably proud, "It's the one at the gate of the cemetery last time... Grandpa Guard, are you alright?"