In the underground Pivotal Secret Temple of the Holy City of Hermes.
Tayfun hadn't had a good night's sleep for more than two months.
As long as he closed his eyes, his ears would echo with the pitiful cries of Archbishop Eyre. She had been dragged back by the Judgement Army. The enemy's weapon had smashed her abdomen and turned her intestines into a pot of porridge. Even with all kinds of herbs, the wound could not be prevented from worsening. After struggling for two days, she died in extreme pain.
Tayfun had begun to doubt the strength of Graycastle after the vanguard led by Soli Dahl suffered a head-on attack. He had repeatedly asked His Holiness Mayne to think twice before making a decision. He wanted to find out the details of this army as much as possible before making a decision. However, Mayne was not swayed at all. He insisted that the main force should immediately attack the defense line of Graycastle at the foot of Coldwind Ridge.
He knew that the church might pay a heavy price, but he did not expect it to be so heavy.
What was even more unexpected was that the most elite force of the church, the unstoppable God's Punishment Army, had been defeated.
When he heard this unbelievable news, Tayfun spat out a mouthful of blood and fainted on the top of the Tower of Babel.
However, this was not the only incredible thing.
None of the Pure Witches had returned, and His Holiness Mayne was nowhere to be found. It was not until he gritted his teeth and forced his way into the Pivotal Secret Agency with a group of people that he learned an incredible piece of news from the guards.
Mayne was not the successor that O'Brien had chosen. It was Pure Witch Zero who had inherited the scepter and crown.
The Holy City had suddenly lost its Pope.
The only thing Tayfun could do was to keep this news underground forever. All the people he had brought with him had joined the Pivotal Secret Temple, and he had become the temporary Pope.
In the following month, Tayfun spent all his time maintaining the order of the Holy City and reading the secret history of the library.
The secrets of the witches' hunting, the creation of the God's Punishment Army, the origin of the church, and the collapse of the Witch Empire were revealed to him little by little.
The old bishop felt that his worldview had been turned upside down.
No matter how hard he tried, he could not imagine that the church had been created by witches.
Even the Witch Empire, which had influence all over the Barbarian Land, was unable to stop the demons' advance. Both the God's Punishment Army and the Sigil of Magic Stones were the products left behind by the exiled witches.
As he tossed and turned in the middle of the night, Tayfun's spirit was rapidly drained. Two months felt like two years. The wrinkles on his face were as deep as the old bishop's, and his every movement was slow and sluggish, like an oil lamp that had run out of oil.
However, he knew that he could not stop. Once he fell, the Church would really be finished.
A large number of Judgement Warriors were selected from the reserve team. The new archbishops and the middle-level believers who had been injured were appointed and dismissed as quickly as possible. Coupled with the call to live and die with the Holy City, the precarious situation was temporarily stabilized.
However, Tayfun knew that this was just a façade. The losses of the God's Punishment Army could not be quickly replenished, and the fighting capacity of the young warriors was far inferior to that of the older generation. In times of peace, he could slowly make up for it. However, now that the Months of Demons had arrived, and he could not stop the demonic beasts' attack.
It was impossible to rely on the power of the church alone. He had to unite the forces of the nobles in the Kingdom of Wolfheart and the Kingdom of Everwinter, just like how the Four Kingdoms united to guard the defense line in Hermes in the past.
It was not easy to make the nobles who had joined the church obey his orders. Tayfun could even imagine that when the news of the church's defeat spread to the Kingdom of Wolfheart and the Kingdom of Everwinter, the nobles who still held the territory and the Knight would once again jump out to oppose him. Therefore, when most of the troops of the Graycastle withdrew from the Northern Region, he sent the last 100 God's Punishment Warriors and the emissary delegation to the Holy City to force the nobles to obey his orders.
Now, both the old and the new Holy Cities were in an unprecedented state of weakness.
The old bishop could only pray that the emissary delegation could bring reinforcements back to Hermes before the demonic beasts launched a large-scale attack.
Tayfun rubbed the sore corners of his eyes and closed the ancient book that recorded the transformation ceremony of the God's Punishment Warriors. When he was about to make himself a cup of winter flower tea to relieve his headache, he suddenly heard the sound of fighting outside the temple.
He was so shocked that his hand trembled, and the teacup fell to the ground and immediately broke into pieces.
How could there be intruders here?
He walked to the window and looked down, only to see a group of figures moving under the dim light of the prism of the God's Stone. They were constantly approaching the Pivotal Secret Temple.
Their speed was shockingly fast, and the imperial guards who fought with them fell almost instantly. Their armor seemed to be useless in front of their sharp blades, and the grayish-white steps were stained with blood that splattered everywhere. In the blink of an eye, the enemies had already pushed to the door of the temple.
"Your Excellency, the Pivotal Secret Temple is under attack. Please leave immediately!" The door of the library was slammed open, and a captain of the Praetorian Guard anxiously walked in, followed by ten God's Punishment Warriors, who were obviously the Pope's personal bodyguards.
"How on earth did they get in?" Tayfun roared in a hoarse voice.
There were only two ways to go underground. One was to use the hanging cage to descend, and the other was to go through the secret fortress of the old Holy City. Even the army of Graycastle could not suddenly occupy the old and the new Holy City without being noticed, unless they all had wings!
The imperial guard captain looked very upset. "The enemies came from the depths of the cave. Your Excellency, please follow me immediately, or it will be too late."
"The depths of the cave?" Tayfun asked incredulously. There was nothing there except for the big and small round holes.
With great shock and confusion, he followed the imperial guard captain down the secret passage inside the wall and soon arrived at the bottom of the temple.
"The hanging cage is unguarded, so it's probably not safe anymore. I'll escort you to the passage of the old Holy City, and please take people back to the Pivotal Secret Temple as soon as possible," the imperial guard captain said as he pushed open the movable stone door hidden in the corner.
As soon as Tayfun stepped out of the secret passage, his heart instantly sank to the bottom.
He saw more than ten enemies standing there with swords, as if they already knew this was the exit of the secret passage.
"I thought I would never have the chance to set foot in the Holy City again. I didn't expect the descendants who inherited the will of the Queen of Starfall Star to be so mediocre." A man in a strange armor that seemed to be pieced together by many pieces of metal came up to him. The mottled blade of his sword was faintly stained with blue blood.
However, when Tayfun noticed his face, he felt his blood freeze instantly.
He had seen this man's face before.
Ellington, the Presiding Judge of the Sixth Advance Troop, had participated in the transformation ceremony of the God's Punishment Army three years ago. Before leaving, this brave and fearless warrior had personally said goodbye to him.
An indescribable chill crawled up the old bishop's spine and into his mind. The strange fear made him almost unable to control his tongue.
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