There was a long hallway and a sloping staircase to get to the assembly hall from the cabin - it was a large ship that could not only accommodate a large number of worshippers, but also provide a venue for various ceremonies and ceremonies, and it was even an honor in itself to be able to ride the Cult of Annihilation for those who followed the Dark Lord.

Most of the congregants did not have this qualification—they were not qualified to board the ship, or even to know of the ship's existence, and they could only hear the secret rumors of the ship during private meetings with other people, and hear the few words about the ship coming from other assembly points:

There is a ship, which carries the will of the Lord and makes the glory of the Lord roam the seas, it is a symbol of the noble cause of the sect and the key to the next glorious age......

Dressed in black, Richard walked slowly down the corridor that seemed to have no end, occasionally meeting other fellow Church members in black robes, and occasionally being greeted by someone, but he only responded minimally, and seamen in coarse cloth robes appeared in the corridor, with symbolic chains around their necks, respectfully and discreetly bowing to every black-robed man who passed by—these seamen were also followers of the Holy Lord, but they were not yet able to withstand the power of demons, so they could only take charge of earthly work here, Serve the "priests" who have truly gained strength.

The lighting in the corridor is not dim, but the dark colors and oppressive decoration still give people an overall sense of dimness, and the gray-and-white walls on both sides are placed with intricately patterned iron and black candlesticks, and between these decorative candlesticks hang oil paintings in a classical style, which use large dark colors to outline landscapes that do not resemble the real world, and distorted and strange human figures, and dark red curtains hang down from the roofs on both sides, covering those darker and more ominous corners.

The Followers of the Shadowy Darkness believe that the Darkness of Chaos is the "hue" of the Lord and the "undertone" of the birth of this world, and they use this style to decorate their meeting places in order to seek to "get closer" to the deep sea in the real world, which they believe will please the Lord.

The dull and oppressive style of decoration could not hide the opulence of the decoration itself, and Richard knew that the construction of the ship cost an astonishing amount of wealth, but that there was always someone to pay for it—officials who wanted to live longer, merchants who suffered from illness, nobles who were seduced by power, and who begged the Lord for mercy when they made offerings to build everything on this ship.

The Church of the Four Gods and the city-state authorities have created a solid set of rules for the so-called "civilized world", which is like an iron wall, which protects the mediocre and dull ordinary people very well, but no matter how tight the iron wall is, there are loopholes, there are in the past thousands of years, there are now, and there will be in the future.

The assembly hall arrived.

A heavy door at the end of the corridor was open, and behind the door was an extraordinarily spacious and bright hall, with a dome supported by thick pillars towering, and ornate chandeliers with a triple structure hanging from the roof, illuminating the whole space—

For practical reasons, the hall could not be kept too dimly lit as the rest of the world, and the builders here had to express the worship of the dark Lord through various decorations and furnishings, whether it was the tentacle reliefs on the surface of the huge pillars, the paintings that symbolized the dark branches of the Lord at the end of the hall, or the various strange sculptures along the walls, all of which together outlined this mysterious, oppressive and majestic atmosphere of "worship".

Richard walked into the hall, walked among his people, pulled down the edge of his hood again, and then looked up to the high platform in the center of the hall.

That's where the "saints" are.

The saints are already there.

The awesome devotional, the pure one closest to the Lord in this suffocating earthly world, the one who had gone furthest on the path of seclusion, was raising his eyes from the edge of the platform and scanning the congregational congregation in the room.

He occupies almost half of the entire platform, and his huge body is like a "crown" made of thorns - the terrifying black bones are stacked on top of each other, piled up on the platform like a bird's nest, and in the middle of the skeleton is a slowly wriggling, nearly two meters in diameter, the bones outside the brain constitute a cage-like structure, and the nerve cords extend from the gaps in the cage, forming eye stalks at the ends, slowly moving and looking around the outer edge of this "crown of bones and thorns", and at the top of this "crown", It's a pitch-black chain.

The pitch-black chains extended from the brains of the bone cages, floated in the smoke and dust, and then returned to the thorny bones to form a closed-loop structure that was the symbol of the "saint" - he had crossed the lower stage of the "mortal and demon symbiotic contract", and now, his contract pointed to himself, his human essence was left, and that awesome gesture was full of the purity of the dark demon.

Richard glanced up at the saints, then bowed his head in awe.

The saint is almost past that last step, and at a fraction of a distance, his chains will disappear, and he will be able to fulfill the ultimate quest of all annihilationists—to attain complete purity, to enter the deep sea, and to be with the Holy Lord.

But this great compatriot remains here, in this suffocating dimension of reality, because he is still mindful of his duty to lead many of his fellow citizens as unqualified as himself to the eternal cause—which is undoubtedly worthy of respect.

"The people have gathered."

A low and old voice suddenly came into the minds of everyone at the scene, and the assembly hall, which had been slightly buzzing and talking, instantly fell silent, and a serious atmosphere enveloped the surroundings.

The saint on the high platform raised an eyehandle and looked at the entrance of the hall, and the heavy door creaked shut and locked, and his voice continued to reach everyone's mind:

"The sun is about to set, and in three hours, the Dream of the Nameless will be opened again, and before this dream begins, we need to confirm what we already know......"

Richard subconsciously tensed his nerves and listened seriously to the voice of the saint.

He had that hot, itchy sensation again—coming from his chest, as if something was squirming under the skin there, and fine fibrous structures were growing between flesh and bone, slowly spreading.

He even felt the fine fibers spread to the lobes of his lungs, to his heart, and continued to burrow into the depths of his body.

Maybe it won't be long before you have enough cotton?

The pressure on his shoulders had somehow lessened somewhere, and Richard suddenly heard a little girl's voice laughing softly in his ear, but soon, the voice of the saint sounded in his head again, and his mind was focused again—

“…… We have conducted several explorations into the Dream of the Nameless, including sporadic infiltrations by our compatriots scattered throughout the city-states, as well as exploration operations organized by the upper clerics, and you should have received word of some of them, fellow citizens...... We had setbacks. ”

The "saint" on the high platform spoke, and the "crown of thorns" made of bones made a slight clicking sound, and some of his black bones moved, and the faint streamers converged on the edge of the bone spurs, and gradually flowed into the air, forming a more and more real phantom.

These apparitions formed by the convergence of streamers finally condensed and cleared, outlining the image of a girl wearing a black dress, short black hair, and a decorative bell around her neck, looking a little thin and delicate.

The girl appeared to be about fifteen or sixteen years old, probably too thin, and her appearance was perhaps younger than her actual age, while one of her arms, most of her shoulders, and part of her torso were visibly inhuman, and at the end of the jellent skeletal structure stretched a pitch-black chain, and on the other end of the chain was a very familiar presence to the Annihilation Cultists on the scene - a ghostly hound.

There was a slight commotion among the cultists in the hall, some whispering something and others turning their gaze in the same direction.

Richard felt the gazes that fell on him.

He pulled his hood a little awkwardly, and a sense of ambivalence that brought back important information that should have been proud but awkward and tangled entangled.

Fortunately, the voice of the saint relieved him of his embarrassment in time-

“…… After some human losses, one of our compatriots has finally brought back valuable information, and what you see is one of our enemies.

"Don't be fooled by her appearance, believers, she is not our countryman, but something more depraved and forbidden than all the pagans, she controls a powerful Phantom Hound by unknown means, but more dangerously, her own power seems to be even more powerful than that of the Gloomy Hound—and with vicious means and unpredictable ways.

"The compatriot who brought this information back is the outstanding of us, he has a wealth of combat experience and is not weak, but he is still severely damaged by the vile sneak attack of the enemy, and even almost swallowed by the strange ghostly hounds of the opponent...... Be ye vigilant, for in the course of the actions to come, it is still possible that your fellow citizens who have entered the dream of the Nameless will encounter this dangerous blasphemer again.

"What you need to be wary of the most is this heretic's strange and sinister attack method, and her attack method is ......"

The saints stopped suddenly.

It seems that even such a powerful and intelligent purity would be a bit of a word deficit when describing the power of that female heresy.

Richard tugged at his hood again—it was time to reinforce it when he got back.

And in his mind, the voice of the saint was heard again:

“…… Her attack is by throwing the dog out. ”

(End of chapter)