CHAPTER 76: THERE’S A TRAITOR AMONG US

Londan Base, Windsor Branch, Church of Nature.

The Londan base was located in the Central District—also known as Inner Londan, the most prosperous part of the city and the political and cultural center.

Its front was a public library open to the public for free, preserving publications while providing services like queries and borrowing. The architecture was classical with somewhat dated facilities—not one of Londan’s first-rate libraries.

But it was more than what met the eye. The office building where church members came and went had three portals, each marked with a hexagram, a cross star, and a triangular star.

The cross-star portal in the middle led to the Church of Nature’s head cathedral, which sat in a vast valley with a design inspired by the concept of harmony with nature. The church’s overall structure was primarily naturalistic, incorporating some human ideas of what made architecture beautiful.

The towering spires resembled mountain peaks, while the green lawns surrounding the church were a rising and falling mountain range. The walls were covered in vivid carvings of plants, blessed by the Goddess of Nature and filled with vibrant vitality.

The interior similarly integrated nature into the design, with towering ancient trees serving as the pillars to support layer upon layer of architecture. The magnificent canopies shielded the sky. Light filtered through colorful glass windows into the cathedral, creating brilliant and mysterious light effects.

Elegant plants could be seen everywhere in the other areas, full of life, and each was useful in its own way to the disciples of Nature at the church.

The followers and disciples differed. The numerous followers weren’t allowed into the great cathedral. Only on special days could they pray on the lawns surrounding the cathedral under the guidance of disciples.

Disciples were selected from the followers. Not only were they more devoted to the faith, but they also had to be mages and had made a certain level of contribution to the church.

But not every disciple could enter the great cathedral. The Londan base was an administrative institution and the central command of the Church of Nature’s operations in Windsor. It coordinated and controlled the entire Windsor branch through the local nodes, like neurons spreading from the central nervous system.

Normally, only administrative members in Londan base could enter the cathedral freely. The other disciples weren’t allowed entrance unless they had permission.

Some time ago, Silvia had no choice but to request the headquarters for help. The Death Knight and the Darkness Knight had become active in Londan. To protect the church’s interest in Windsor, she asked for reinforcements to be assigned to Londan long-term.

After a few days of inaction, the church sent a group of reinforcements. There were fewer than ten of them, but each was an elite among elites—especially Flora Evelina, the last Holy Maiden, a priest of the church’s headquarters, and a Gold-rank mage.

Flora was from the Republic of Franc. She and Silvia had been colleagues for some time. They saw each other as kindred spirits and held each other in high regard. The headquarters hoped for them to work together so that the Windsor branch could recover as soon as possible.

Meeting Room.

Light streamed through the floor-to-ceiling window, illuminating the long table.

Silvia pressed a hand to her chest and bowed, greeting her old friend. “Holy Maiden, it’s been years since I last saw you. You’re as beautiful as always. How enviable.”

Dressed in a light green dress, Flora elegantly returned the bow and said, “I’ve come to Londan to assist you under headquarters’ order. I won’t know what to do if you keep treating me with such courtesy.”

“It’s only what I should do. You’re the Holy Maiden after all.”

“I stepped down last year. Now, I’m only a priest in headquarters, tending to flowers and leading the life of a retiree. You’re now the High Reverend, and I’m your subordinate.”

One of them was heroic and spirited, and the other gentle and considerate. Their complementary personalities made them the perfect partners, which showed how good the church was at choosing people.

Silvia took Floara’s hand and guided her to a seat, maintaining the same smile. ”We used to work in Palis together. Given our years of friendship, even though you’re no longer the Holy Maiden, you’re still my dearest friend. I don’t consider you a subordinate...”

Flora smiled. They reminisced about their past and shared many memories they had made as friends.

About twenty years ago, Silvia and Flora met. At the time, they were rivals. One from Londan, and the other from Palis. They competed for the once-in-twenty-years role of Holy Maiden.

There were male candidates as well. The Goddess of Nature wasn’t picky about gender. If a woman were chosen, she would be the Holy Maiden, and if a man were chosen, he would be the Anointed One.

But since it was the Goddess of Nature, and the church promoted Her image as an elegant, noble, and mysterious goddess, having an Anointed One would make things a little awkward when the goddess’s divine will descended. Therefore, there had only been Holy Maidens at the church over the years.

The competition that year was extremely fierce, mainly between Silvia and Flora. As fellow Goddess’s chosens, their starting point was everyone else’s finish line. The competition was between them while the others spectated.

Among them, Silvia was favored by the church’s upper echelon due to her dragon blood. Without accidents, she would be the Holy Maiden.

But an accident did occur—in the form of a pretty boy named Auston Lando, who charmed his way into Silvia’s heart with his silver tongue, learning her into marrying him. Thus, Flora was automatically made the Holy Maiden, while Silvia gained love. Both had bright futures ahead of them.

Love was blind. Silvia’s voluntary withdrawal from the selection process offended many higher-ups who had supported her, which resulted in her subsequent assignment to the surgical strike unit. She spent years on the front lines doing the most difficult and dirty work. Even worse, her marriage wasn’t perfect like she had expected. It was as lifeless as a graveyard.

After marriage, Silvia discovered that her husband was a non-believer who disapproved of the faith of Nature. He also tried to control her daily life and demanded that she be an elegant noblewoman rather than someone who buried herself in work every day.

Why didn’t you mention this before we got married? Were you mute during our courtship?

Stop smiling. You should’ve said something earlier. Then I wouldn’t have married you!

They often fought over the matter, and eventually, Silvia resorted to violence. Their relationship only improved somewhat when their child was born.

She had thought that it was a good sign, that the bastard would finally come around, but he only got worse. He became even more controlling once they had a daughter, going so far as to ask her to resign from the church. Eventually, they parted on bad terms and began a long period of separation and argument.

Auston Lando was somewhat of a big deal in Londan. He sought out the Windsor royal family to pressure the Windsor branch of the Church of Nature. At the time, Silvia was a nobody after giving up on becoming the Holy Maiden, so the Windsor branch happily complied in exchange for political and economic support.

A win-win!

The nobody priestess lost it and headed straight to Palis to start from the bottom. That was when Silvia and Flora reconnected and developed their sisterhood. From rivals to sisters, they became such good friends that they made others envious.

Later, Flora was transferred back to the Chuch of Nature’s headquarters to serve the goddess as the Holy Maiden, acting as Her spokesperson and enjoying incomparable status. Silvia only had herself to depend on. She fought her way to the leadership role of the surgical strike unit and earned the position of a district priest.

It had been twenty years, so the higher-ups weren’t going to continue keeping such an extraordinary disciple of Nature shelved. Silvia earned the position of Windsor District High Reverend through her own merit and returned home to Londan in glory.

They chatted about their past and present, and before they knew it, two hours had passed.

“Flora, you must be exhausted after traveling all the way here. I’ve arranged accommodation for you. Let’s not talk work today. Have a good rest.”

“Thank you, High Reverend...”

“Just call me Silvia. I told you I didn’t see you as a subordinate.”

“Alright, Silvia. See you tomorrow.”

They hugged. Flora left the meeting room with a smile. Silvia, too, remained smiling.

The moment the office door closed, Silvia’s expression turned icy. She wiped her hands in disgust and muttered, “Ugh, disgusting. Why did it have to be her? That bitch is no pushover. She’s always scheming something. I don’t believe for a second she’ll obediently assist me.”

She returned to her office and stood before the floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the mountains and grassland. Flora was capable. As a former Holy Maiden, she had received plenty of guidance from the Goddess of Nature and would surely be a strong aid. With her support, Silvia was confident in driving away the Darkness Knight. As long as he didn’t show up with the Death Knight in tow, they had at least a fifty percent chance of winning.

However, Flora was ambitious and extremely competitive. She would be the boss or nothing at all. There was no chance that she would be content with playing second fiddle as a district priest.

While a district priest was in theory equal in rank to a headquarters priest, their actual status was night and day. Flora hadn’t traveled so far to Londan for retirement.

“She wants to be the High Reverend...”

Silvia murmured to herself. Flora had reached her ceiling at the church headquarters. To advance further, she would have to wait for sufficient seniority, which wasn’t good enough for Flora. Someone unwilling to accept mediocrity wouldn’t be content with the status quo, so she actively requested a transfer to accumulate political capital.

It just so happened that Silvia and Flora were good friends on the surface, and she hadn’t gained a secure foothold in the short time since she took office.

Going over the situation and the causes and effects, Silvia closed her eyes wordlessly. Flora brought trusted elites she had trained over many years, while Silvia’s loyal subordinates remained in Palis. Without capable people under her command, she would slowly lose her power to Flora.

“Fine. I’ll give you some authority. You’ll take full responsibility for the two knights from now on.”

***

“It’s massive!”

Manor Street, Western District, Londan.

Wayne looked at the mansion before him. It was nearly as big as the manor in Enrod. He had to marvel at his master’s wealth. With so much money, why would she continue to work overtime every night? Was this what successful people were like?

When he thought about how his master was not only rich, but also a powerful mage, he got so envious that his hands balled into fists automatically.

Oh, wait, she’s my master. Never mind then.

With one phone call from her, all the servants assigned to the mansion, including the butler, were given paid vacations. The place was unusually quiet with no one around, meeting Wayne’s request for peace and quiet. He went on a tour around the mansion to get to know the place so that he would be able to navigate easily in emergencies.

He spotted a tunnel in the basement. It looked like the typical bomb shelter, containing a large inventory of everyday necessities. It was just like the tunnel under the Lando family’s vacation house in Enrod. Wayne turned on the lamps on the walls, grumbling about rich people and their paranoia when it came to survival. He could guess that the tunnel led to the city’s sewage system.

And he was right. In two minutes, he found a lever for the gate and entered the well-connected underground tunnels.

“Old friends, what a coincidence. Here you are!”

Delighted, he spread his arms and pulled all the elemental particles into his arms with his dense tentacles. As they said, two strangers in a strange land should stick together and take care of each other. Given that his life essence hadn’t been filled yet, he could only rely on his friends’ understanding and care.

The fire elements were eager. They pledged their loyalty and declared their willingness to take good care of him. They held onto the other three elements and waited for his tentacles to collect them together.

Fire represented desires. Wayne suspected that too many fire elements were the reason he had been making rash decisions. Although the fire elements in his body were unusually calm and had never done anything sinful, the books wouldn’t lie. The fire elements had to take the blame.

“If not for you making a ruckus and trying to lower the high bar of intelligence, someone as calm and composed as I am wouldn’t have gotten ahead of myself.”

He criticized the culprit of his selection. The fire elements made a case for themselves. To win Wayne back, they pinned down the earth, water, and wind elements with more fervor.

There’s a traitor among us!

The three elements would’ve said that if they could talk.

Wayne inhaled the elements to his heart’s content. How incredible, he thought. The rich even have a bigger reserve of the four elements in their basement.

Were he in the other parts of the sewage system, he would already have emptied a spot and been forced to ravage the next household. Now, he had only gotten ninety percent of the elemental particles, and an endless supply continued to fill in the gaps.

“Wait, fill in the gaps?”

He realized, to his surprise, that the shelter had a special force field that automatically gathered the four elements. Although it couldn’t keep up with his plundering speed, its replenishment was still much faster than normal.

It would normally take several nights for elements to refill the sewers, rather like draining a pond to catch fish. Here, it was different. He could continue to drain the water without permanent consequences.

This was Master’s house, so she was likely to have created a magic circle to draw in the four elements from around the area.

“Why didn’t she tell me earlier? Then I would’ve moved in long ago rather than wandering the sewers at the risk of stepping on shit.”

Wayne mumbled. His master was great in every way but her tendency to prank her student.

My studies come first. This isn’t what you should tease me about! I’ll forgive you this once, but not again!

He was able to meditate twenty-four hours every day, and the process was completely automated, meaning he would instinctively capture the four elements around him even while asleep. This place was perfect for training. He decided to settle down. He fetched a pillow and a bedsheet from the guest bedroom and made a bed out of the bench before lying down.

Intangible tentacles started moving on their own, locking up the four elements that unwisely wandered into this area.

***

That night, Wayne, who now slept during the day and woke up during the night, received a call from Silvia. Satisfied with his new abode, he promised her that he would stay indoors and not stir up trouble for her.

That was the best news she got all day. She praised her student thoroughly before hanging up.

With nothing else to do, Wayne let the owl and white dove out to feed them. The two messenger birds got on well. Perhaps it was because they were different species and thus didn’t see each other as rivals, or it could be that the snowy owl was too much bigger for the white dove to get aggressive.

In any case, they didn’t get into fights, and with enough mice as food, Snow didn’t see the white dove as prey.

“I’m warning you, if you dare to eat it, I’ll chop you up and make you into a poultry plate,” Wayne warned. Then he picked a couple of literary classics and took them to the shelter to kill time.

The white dove, emboldened by his backing, hopped around before Snow. Once Wayne left, Snow pinned the dove to the ground and tore off a few feathers with its beak. After a panicked coo, the white dove went utterly still as if it were dead.

Well, at least they pretended to get along before Wayne.

Meanwhile, a few figures came up to the mansion with night as their cover.

“This is the place...”

“The bastard’s alert enough to realize that he’s targeted.”

“So? He’s just a mage apprentice. He’s not gonna be able to fight back.”

“Right. The world of mages is cruel. Let’s teach him a lesson on what real magic is!”

“Hahaha—”