Chapter 615: A Catastrophe
Hermes Holy City, the underground Sacred Hall of Secrets.
Tyveren hadn't had a good night's sleep for over two months.
Whenever he closed his eyes, the miserable wails of Archbishop El would echo in his ears. She was dragged back by the Judgment Army, her abdomen shattered by the enemy's weapons, her intestines a mess. Even with all sorts of herbs, it couldn't stop the wound from deteriorating. After struggling for two days, she died in extreme pain.
After Solly Dahl led the vanguard army and suffered a head-on blow, Tyveren became skeptical of Graycastle's strength. He repeatedly asked His Eminence Mayne to think twice and act carefully, and to try to find out the details of this army before proceeding. However, Mayne remained unmoved and insisted that the main army immediately launch an attack on the Graycastle defense line at the foot of the Coldwind Ridge.
He knew the church might pay a heavy price, but he didn't expect the price to be so tragic.
What he didn't expect even more was that the church's most elite force, the unstoppable God's Punishment Army, had been defeated.
When this incredible news arrived, Tyveren spat out a mouthful of blood and fainted on the top of the Tower of Heaven.
However, the unbelievable things didn't stop there.
Not a single Purifier returned, and His Eminence Mayne was also missing. It wasn't until he gritted his teeth and led a group of people to force their way into the Secret Chamber of Secrets that he learned an incredible piece of news from the guards.
Mayne was not the successor favored by O'Brien at all. The scepter and crown were taken over by the Purifier Jieluo.
The Holy City had suddenly lost its Pope.
The only thing Tyveren could do was to keep this news underground forever—all the people he brought were added to the Sacred Hall of Secrets, and he became the acting Pope.
In the following month, Tyveren spent all his time maintaining order in the Holy City and reading through the secret history of the library.
And the secrets of witch hunting, the creation of the God's Punishment Army, the origin of the church, and the disintegration of the Witch Empire were gradually revealed before his eyes.
The old archbishop felt his worldview being subverted.
Even with all his guesses, he couldn't have imagined that the church was actually built by witches.
And even the Witch Empire, with its power spread across the barren land, could not stop the advance of the devils. The God's Punishment Army and the magic stone seals were nothing more than products left behind by the liuwang witches.
In the sleepless nights, Tyveren's spirit was rapidly drained. The short two months felt like two years had passed. The wrinkles on his face were as deep as the old archbishop's, and his gestures were also tinged with a hint of sluggishness as if he was running out of oil.
But he knew he couldn't stop. Once he fell, the church would be finished.
A large number of Judgment Warriors were selected from the reserve team, new archbishops and the lost middle-level believers were appointed and dismissed as quickly as possible, and the call to coexist and die with the Holy City temporarily stabilized the precarious situation.
However, Tyveren knew that this was all just an appearance. The loss of the God's Punishment Army could not be quickly replenished, and the young reserve warriors were far inferior to the older generation in combat power. If it were peacetime, he would still have a chance to make up for it slowly, but now that the Evil Moon had arrived, and the attack of the evil beasts could not be stopped, nothing could be discussed.
The power of the church alone could not do this. He had to gather the aristocratic forces of Wolfheart and Everwinter, just like the four kingdoms had jointly stationed the Hermes defense line in the past.
It was by no means easy to make those nobles who nominally joined the church obedient. Tyveren could even imagine that when the news of the church's defeat reached Wolfheart and Everwinter, the nobles who still held territories and knights would jump out again and oppose him. Therefore, after most of the Graycastle army withdrew from the Northern Lands, he sent out the last hundred or so God's Punishment Army soldiers stationed in the Holy City along with the envoy group, as a means to force the nobles to obey orders.
Now, both the new and old Holy Cities were in an unprecedented state of weakness.
All the old archbishop could do at the moment was to pray that the envoy group would bring reinforcements back to Hermes before the evil beasts began their large-scale attack.
Rubbing his sore eyes, Tyveren closed
the ancient books recording the God's Punishment Army transformation ritual, and was about to make himself a cup of Winter Flower tea to relieve his headache when the sound of hacking and killing suddenly rang out outside the temple.
He was so startled that his hand trembled, and the teacup fell to the ground, shattering into pieces.
How could there be invaders here?
He walked to the window and looked down, only to see a group of figures swaying in the dim light of the sacred stone prisms, constantly approaching the Sacred Hall of Secrets.
Their speed was astonishing, and the guards who fought them fell almost at the first touch. Armor seemed useless in the face of their sharp blades, and the gray-white steps were covered with splashing blood. In the blink of an eye, the enemy had already advanced to the door of the hall.
"Your Excellency, the Sacred Hall of Secrets is under attack, please leave quickly!" The door of the library was slammed open, and a guard captain walked in anxiously, followed by ten God's Punishment Warriors, obviously the Pope's personal protectors.
"How did they get in here?" Tyveren roared in a hoarse voice.
There were only two roads leading to the underground. One had to rely on a cage to descend, and the other had to pass through the secret fortress of the Old Holy City. Even the Graycastle army could not suddenly occupy the new and old Holy Cities without anyone knowing, unless they all grew wings!
The guard captain's expression looked very ugly. "The enemy appeared from the depths of the cave, Your Excellency, please come with me immediately, it will be too late if we delay any longer."
"The depths of the cave...?" Tyveren said in disbelief. Wasn't there nothing there except for the large and small round holes?
With great shock and incomprehension, he followed the guard captain down the secret passage along the inside of the wall, and soon arrived at the bottom of the temple.
"The cage is unguarded, it is likely to be unsafe, I will escort you to the Old Holy City passage, please take people to retake the Sacred Hall of Secrets as soon as possible." As the guard captain spoke, he pushed open the movable stone door hidden in the corner of the wall.
As soon as Tyveren stepped out of the secret passage, his heart sank to the bottom.
More than a dozen enemies stood with their swords, as if they had known that this was the exit of the secret passage.
"I thought I would never have the chance to set foot in the Holy City again, but I didn't expect that the descendants who inherited the will of the Meteor Queen are nothing more than this." A man stepped forward, wearing a strange-shaped armor, like many pieces of metal superimposed and pieced together. On the mottled blade, one could vaguely see the ghostly blue blood.
But when Tyveren noticed his face, he felt all the blood in his body congeal instantly.
He had seen this man's face.
Ellington, the chief inquisitor of the Sixth Pioneer Corps, participated in the God's Punishment Army transformation ceremony three years ago. Before leaving, this brave and fearless warrior had personally said goodbye to him.
An indescribable chill went down the old archbishop's spine and into his mind, and the strange fear made him almost unable to control his tongue.
"You...you guys...what...what kind of monster are you?"