Theos’ eyebrows, which were crumpled in displeasure and embarrassment, wriggled at Abel’s words.
He looked back with a surprised look on his face. After hesitating for a while, Theos bowed his head looking back at Lee Sungmin and Abel.
“……The Saint……she wants to apologize in person.”
“She doesn’t show her own face even in this situation?”
“I’m sorry.”
Abel and Lee Sungmin looked at the white and plain-looking carriages in expectation. There were a few carriages that were looking the exact same as the ones before, and there wasn’t a sole carriage that stood out amongst them.
At this point, Abel eased his attitude a little. Theos showed signs of being flustered still, but took Lee Sungmin and Abel to one of the carriages that was halted with the other Holy Knights and Paladins.
It was seemingly just another white carriage; the same as the others that were being escorted by the Holy Knights Brigade, but as soon as Abel and Lee Sungmin got closer to it, the attitudes of the Holy Knights that were standing guard around the carriage, changed suddenly.
Theos shook his head at the Holy Knights who had moved their hands towards the hilt of their own weapons.
“……just in case…….”
“Don’t worry, the stupid things you’re thinking of won’t happen. I may be an old and crazy wizard, but I’m not a clueless idiot. I, the Magician Guild Master, would not try to insult your Saint of the Holy Church or belittle them like a degenerate.”
“That…… word choice is a little…….”
“Should I just open it up and go in?”
Abel grumbled as he was tired of the pointless exchange of words with Theos.
Theos sighed deeply and opened the carriage door. Lee Sungmin stood behind Abel’s back and looked inside the carriage.
For a moment, he doubted the scene that was before his very eyes.
The same was true of Abel. He squinted back at Theos with displeasure and let his arms that were folded, loosen up.
Theos laughed as Abel and Lee Sungmin looked back at him, already expecting their reactions to be like this.
“What kind of prank is this…….”
“It’s not a prank.”
Theos shook his head when Abel questioned him.
[……Well.]
Even Heoju didn’t seem to expect this situation.
Eventually, Lee Sungmin and Abel entered the carriage and sat facing the Saint of the Holy Church.
Lee Sungmin had not known anything about the Saint in his previous life, but he did hear some stories about them from Abel over the past three days.
While it was indeed confirmed that the Saint was a real person and not some fictional identity, very little was known about them. Even their age and gender was completely unknown. Few of the Church’s many Holy Knights, Priests, and Paladins knew the true identity of the Saint.
However, there was one thing that was certainly known about the Saint. Their holy power was leagues above any other believer in all of Eria.
Lee Sungmin and Abel did not expect some kind of old and senile old man, but nevertheless their expectations were completely destroyed the second they laid eyes on the Saint.
“I’m Teresa.”
The girl opened her mouth. She slipped the white hood of her robes back so her face could be clearly revealed.
Abel was completely speechless as he had never expected the Saint of the Holy Church to be a teenage girl.
Even in such an uncomfortable silence, Teresa looked at Abel and Lee Sungmin with her eyes full of curiosity.
“It’s the first time I’ve met a Master of any of the Guilds within Eria. You’re quite a famous person, aren’t you?”
“Sai…… You……… No……what should I call you?”
“You can just call me Terasa. The Holy Knights and the Paladins treat me in a difficult way, but you’re not a member of the Church.”
“Then how should I address you…yeodongseang?” (T/N : Abel is basically not sure how to address her honorifics- it’s a way to address others casually in korea when attaching honorifics)
“Do you prefer to be called oppa?”
As Teresa asked this question, Abel felt incredibly flustered.
He wasn’t used to talking to these kinds of people.
“Abel…… I think you can just call me Abel…It’s not like that….”
Abel’s muttering made Teresa smile broadly. Then, she turned to Lee Sungmin.
Teresa giggled and then started to laugh when she looked at the ghost mask on Lee Sungmin’s face.
“That’s a scary-looking mask. Why are you wearing something silly like that?”
“I have my own situation.”
“I know who you are.”
Teresa said as she puffed out her chest with confidence. It was a barely developed chest, but when she put it forward like that, it did reveal a bit of cleavage.(T/N : I have no clue why the author put this line here lol)
“A person wearing a ghost mask and wields a spear. There’s only one person in all of Eria that is widely talked about with such an appearance. You’re the Ghost Spear, right?”
“Yes.”
Lee Sungmin agreed to Teresa’s words without hiding his identity.“Hehe.. I was right.”Teresa muttered in a quiet voice to herself. She seemed quite proud to have guessed his identity correctly.
“You and our Church have a strange relationship with what happened in the North. No, should I call it a relationship with Kim Jonghyun instead? You participated in the subjugation of Kim Jonghyun up North with us, didn’t you?”
“Then there was a conflict between myself and the other members of your Church and members of the subjugation.”
“I apologize for that. I wouldn’t say I represent the church, but…….”
“I don’t pay it any mind anyways.”
Lee Sungmin answered, shaking his head.
“My situation is a rather fickle one to explain, and words don’t mean much in this day and age.”
“Still, I’m very grateful for your actions. At that time… you saved the lives of several Holy Knights and Priests that had been sent on the subjugation. There were a lot of deaths, but…….”
‘It couldn’t be helped.’Teresa muttered wordlessly. The North’s subjugation of Kim Jonghyun ended in a spectacular failure. At that time, the forces of each of the different powers who participated in the subjugation were all severely damaged.
There was also a lot of damage that had been inflicted on the Holy Church as a result of that failure. One of the Brigade Captains of the Holy Knights was killed along with several other high-ranking priests and Holy Knights that had been sent along with them.
“I could hear it from outside, but it seems that both you and Abel here, have the same plans as I. I was planning to go and stop Kim Jonghyhun from continuing his atrocities.”
“Aren’t there too few troops for you to succeed?”
It was Lee Sungmin who asked the question.
“I don’t know how much you know about Kim Jonghyun’s power, but Kim Jonghyun is not just some ordinary Dark Wizard. He’s become… a half-Devil as well. Not only that, but the Volander, the Monarch of the Death Knights, and his army are with him.”
“Based on the city and location that Kim Jonghyun chose to attack, it’s safe to say he will not move from his location. By the time we get to the City he has chosen as base, Germane will have turned into a complete Necropolis. Beyond those city walls will be thousands upon tens of thousands of undead.”
“I guess you’re right about that.”
Teresa nodded her head. Perhaps she had already imagined a horrible outcome when she had decided to personally move as her face was already firm with resolve in front of such a horrid description. Teresa didn’t hesitate to continue though.
“Even so, I can’t leave Kim Jonghyun alone. As time goes by, the damage caused by Kim Jonghyun will only increase.”
“Is that your God’s will?”
Lee Sungmin stared at Teresa and asked her bluntly. This is because he was for some reason, reminded of Wolhu, who joined Musin in the murder of his master, Sima Ryunju. At that time, Wolhu had joined the fight under the pretext that it was the will of the Heavenly Spirit.
Perhaps the God that Teresa followed, was like the Divine Spirit. It was a question that was full of hidden intent behind it, but Teresa continued to eyeball Lee Sungmin as if he had asked something strange.
“No, it’s not my God’s will. It’s the will of the Holy Church. We don’t… follow God’s will. How much do you understand about the Holy Church?”
“A bit.”
“The believers of the Holy Church are divided into two categories. One of those types of people is like me. They lived in a different world prior to being summoned to Eria. When we were summoned to Eria, we lost our spiritual connection with the original gods that each of us followed. Thanks to this, we can’t hear our God’s voice. Only the power of our faith remains intact.”
The other group that was unlike Teresa, were the people that followed and believed in the Gods that ruled in Eria.
The Mountain of Mush had several people who worshipped Mush from outside the mountain and built shrines for her. Such people were similar to those from the Holy Church.
“The Gods of this world don’t force us to do anything either. I mean…… the Church is simply polytheism. Most of them serve different gods. Therefore, if someone acted in the name of their god, they would not be representing the Church as a whole.”
“So, it is not God’s will to proceed with this, but the will of the Church?”
“Of course we had to act. Kim Jonghyun has killed too many people. Those who have died to him have been cursed from not being able to leave the cycle of life and death and been raised up as the undead. Someone has to stop him.”
Teresa’s words were not empty as the entire church believed that breaking the cycle of life and death like so, was taboo. Kim Jonghyun was a villain no matter how one looked at it.
‘A Villain.’
When Lee Sungmin associated that label with Kim Jonghyun. Lee Sungmin also thought of Baek Sogo. It was possible that if she was truly walking the path she believed in, she would likely be here as well.
Kim Jonghyun’s actions were basically announcing himself as a worldwide evil.
He had already killed thousands of people in the north, and led Volander and his army of Death Knights to massacre the entire population of Germane. If someone didn’t stop him, Kim Jonghyun would only continue to move further North and kill tens of thousands of innocents in his endeavors.
“What position do you have in the church?”
When asked by Lee Sungmin, Teresa blinked her eyes. Teresa, who was tilting her head, replied after a brief bit of pause.
“It’s a little weird to say it myself, but I’m the only one in the church who’s called a Saint.”
“Do you know about the Apocalypse?”
Lee Sungmin asked the next question without a hint of hesitation as if to make sure Teresa understood how serious the question was. Abel glanced at Lee Sungmin. He took out the Weiss and held it in his hand.
If this conversation was to bring one of the Apostles of the End to interfere, it would have been necessary to set up a boundary to stop them like Abel had before when he discussed with Sima Ryunju and Lee Sungmin before.
It was a question that aroused quite a bit of tension, but Teresa opened her eyes wide and tilted her head.
“What’s that?”
Lee Sungmin glanced at Abel because he couldn’t tell if she really did not have any knowledge about the End. (T/N : so the end is basically confirmed be an Apocalypse, just wanted to clarify that for you all)
Abel stared at Teresa with his eyes shining with mana.
Teresa wasn’t such a fool that she couldn’t understand the heavy gaze and tension in the air. She perked up her eyebrows and stared at Lee Sungmin and Abel.
“I’m not brazen enough to lie about things I don’t even know about.”
[Don’t you think the Holy Church, or at least the Saint would know about the Apocalypse?]
Lee Sungmin sent a mental message to Abel. Abel was lost in thought as he stroked his chin.
[Those who know the Apocalypse are limited. My brother and I devoted our lives to understanding the content of the Weiss and learned about the Apocalypse through that…. The Vampire Queen is a creature who can see glimpses of the future, and that group known as Beyond the Heavens knows about the Apocalypse because of the direct contact of the Heavenly Spirit.]
[Wait, Envirus also devoted his lifetime to interpreting the Weiss?]
[Yeah, he’s never been able to use the Weiss since the last time you saw him.]
Abel grumbled.
Nevertheless, Teresa really didn’t seem to know about the Apocalypse.
But it was still too early to judge that the entire Holy Church, not just Teresa, would not know of it.
[It doesn’t matter much if she’s the Saint and doesn’t know about the Apocalypse or the Catastrophes. She and the church are definitely going to stop Kim Jonghyun since he’s acting out of line with their beliefs and morals.]
“Ghost Spear.”
Theresa, who did not know that Abel and Lee Sungmin were having a secret conversation, called Lee Sungmin by his martial nickname while speaking with a blank expression.
“You’re strange.”
“What about me is strange?”
“I can feel so many things from you. The word ‘chaotic’… of all the people I’ve seen in my entire life……I don’t think there’s anyone better suited to that word than you.”
“…..”
“Don’t you need any help?”
Teresa asked with a smile. Lee Sungmin did not immediately answer her.
He looked into Teresa’s eyes to find out what she meant by her words.
Teresa’s eyes glistened and shone as if there were countless stars in them. At least Lee Sungmin couldn’t find any evil hidden in her eyes.
“I can help you.”
“How so?”
Lee Sungmin smirked and asked back in a sarcastic manner. At his snarky reply, Teresa raised her hand and slowly stretched it towards Lee Sungmin.
“I can purify it for you.”
“…purify what?”
“The several mixed up energies inside your body. If you allow me, I can do it for you.”
“What do you want from me?”
“No, no, no, I’m not saying this because I want something in return from you. You look like you’re in trouble, Ghost Spear. And I’m saying this because it’s something I can do to help solve your troubles.”
“How can you help me? You say you can purify the energy in my body, but that’s too vague.”
“It’s a complete purification of the relationship in your body and the power that doesn’t match what you originally have.”
For example, Teresa touched the back of Lee Sungmin’s hand.
“The poor soul that is inside your dantian and cannot ascend. Wait.. your heart…… What’s this? Your heart is… black? That and……and…….”
‘Poison…’
Teresa, who had been agonizing over words for a while, added that.
“There is a poison spreading throughout your body. It’s still calm, but that poison… it’ll definitely kill you if you let it.”
[She’s got it all figured out.]
Heoju laughed in Lee Sungmin’s head as Teresa allied the inhuman entity in Lee Sungmin’s consciousness, poison. Lee Sungmin looked into Teresa’s eyes while listening to Heoju’s laughter.
“…So you’re saying that you are going to get rid of the poison and imbalances from my body?”
“What? Of course.”
“Then it’s fine.”
Lee Sungmin pushed Teresa’s hand away who had placed hers on top of his.