Whispering Verse

"It would take some time to name all my names, but I don't have enough time now."

Shade did not answer the other party's question, but asked:

"So, you are here not because you were 'sucked' in, but because you are here voluntarily?"

The man nodded:

"Yes, this place needs to be guarded. There is no core in this world, but there are also some dangerous places. When the site of the Natural Church was selected, it was originally to suppress this place corresponding to this world, but later the problem became more and more serious. , so every one hundred years, the church will let powerful enough ring warlocks preserve their self-consciousness through rituals before death, and then enter this world to guard the church."

He introduced it without any intention of hiding anything:

"So if you have nothing to do, leave here. If an accident happens here, no one will survive."

"Sorry, I have some matters that require me to enter the church. But I promise that I will never damage the church's seal."

Shade said, trying his best to express the emotion of "apology" in his tone. He admired the soul in front of him.

"Okay, then go in."

The man shrugged.

"Um?"

The eyes behind the mask blinked, which was not expected:

"You just let me in, don't you want to give up on your duties?"

"Oh, I feel a strong power in you. To be precise, if I really want to use my hands, I can't beat you even with the help of the power of this church. The Ring Warlock system is a system where the soul and body are unified. Without a body, it is useless even if you were a high-level person in life. Instead of fighting you and asking you to break the sealing measures of the church, it is better to let you in. Moreover, after staying here for a long time, I can also distinguish the characteristics of the soul. Your soul is not bad. , it can even be said to be noble, I feel the power of compassion and courage."

"Thank you then?"

Shade nodded and asked again:

"Excuse me, has anyone come in before me? Just recently."

The man is still leaning against the wall:

"Yes, a man with wings. He was so scary, so scary that I didn't even dare to show up to see what he looked like."

That was undoubtedly Priest Augustus. It seemed that he was very powerful in the narrow room.

The soul of the ring magician of the Church of Nature points to the depths of the church:

"The other party seems to be very good at manipulating the power of death, and he doesn't seem to be a bad person. He entered the deepest part of the church, probably because he wanted to get the spiritual runes related to [death] by getting close to death."

Things went much smoother than Shade thought.

"Do you know that strange guy with wings? Do you know what he is doing? If possible, I hope you can take him away too. There must be no problems here."

The soul asked, and Shade shook his head:

"I don't know what he is going to do. Didn't you follow him?"

"We are not allowed to enter the interior. I can only move around in the nave."

Soul said helplessly.

"Then can you tell me what's inside the church?"

Shade asked again, thinking that the other party might not say anything, or might give a vague answer, but unexpectedly the soul nodded happily again. Shade felt that he would definitely remember this person. He had met too many people in this world who only spoke half the words.

"Of course I can tell you that there is a door inside."

Shade hesitated for a moment:

"You don't want to tell me that inside the church is the door that leads from the narrow gap between life and death to the real death, right?"

"Yes."

Soul looked at Shade, his transparent eyes full of energy:

"The restless death is invading here, and then affecting the real Sikal Mountains area. If the church does not intervene, sooner or later, the overflowing death will swallow up the central and eastern part of the continent, turning the entire Rommel Mountains into a ghost town like Bordeaux. . In addition to the church, there are other powerful entities that are helping to suppress this abnormal world. What the church has sealed and suppressed is just this door here. It is here that gives death the opportunity to invade reality, and this place is becoming Getting stronger and stronger.”

He did not use the term "Old World", indicating that when the other party was alive, perhaps the New World had not yet been discovered.

"You actually allowed that man with wings to walk past such an important place?"

Xia asked again, but the latter shook his head:

"No matter how strong it is, it cannot affect the other end from one end. The death at the other end can only affect the narrow room we are in, and then affect the real world. This is the rule of the narrow room. Therefore, I did not stop him."

Shade nodded, and after nodding slightly to express his thanks, he walked along the aisle between the benches filled with candles on the carpet and walked towards the depths of the church.

"I want to remind you."

Behind him, the soul leaning against the wall was still talking:

"No matter what the person you are looking for has done, you must never cross that door. Once you pass it, you are truly dead. All mortals are mortal, and everything is mortal. Behind that door is the real death. "

Shade stopped:

"certainly."

He continued walking deeper into the church.

Compared with the "three steps, one soul, five steps, one ghost" situation outside the church, the number of ghosts in the natural church is significantly less. Among the ubiquitous candles that never shortened no matter how burned they were and the charms hanging on silver threads, only the ghosts dressed as clergymen of the Church of Nature were drifting unconsciously, without any reaction to Shade's appearance.

Shade can at least be sure that there are no evil spirits here, so there is no need to fight anymore on the way.

The church itself is a building with a very complex internal terrain, but there is almost only one road inside this church between life and death. All forks in the road were blocked by tables, chairs, benches or other debris. The only path forward was covered with dense traces of rituals, which almost illuminated the interior of the church in gold.

I don't know if it was because the door deep in the church that represented the concept of "death" distorted the space. When walking in the corridors inside the church, Shade felt that the corridors were skewed.

This is not just the horizontal deflection, but also includes the left and right and up and down deflections. Coupled with the golden ritual traces all over the place, the silver wires connecting the steam pipes on the left and right sides, the hanging charms that had to be pushed aside to avoid hitting the head, and the candle flames still swaying even though there was no wind, this made the scene in front of them even more complicated. It's getting weirder and weirder.

As we move forward, the white mist becomes lighter and lighter, but at the same time the air becomes colder and colder, and all the objects around us from the real world are slowly fading.

When Shade turned into the final corridor, the light of the candles on the ground had all turned blue, and the walls were dilapidated as if they had been baptized for thousands of years. All traces of divine magic were still there, but they were all decayed.

"Death is affecting this place. Really, what are the priests doing?"

The white mist completely receded here, and the air was so cold that Shade could spit out white mist every time he breathed. If you hadn't known that this was a church, the scene in front of you would have looked like a haunted house covered with charms.

"Is the priest in front?"

The traction on the Holy Emblem Pendant on his chest is getting stronger and stronger, which means that Shade is getting closer and closer to his goal.

Turning the corner of the corridor, the corridor in front of me finally changed into something completely different from the architectural style inside the church. The long and narrow corridor finally leads to a square entrance connected to the underground, and from that entrance, black wind is gradually blowing out.

The wind blew past Shade, who was checking the situation, making him shiver violently, and his soul felt colder than ever before.

The wind left a long and slender wound on his face, and then golden light streaks shone from the wound, and dots of golden embers drifted behind him with the wind.

"What's going on? There's a god's power nearby."

Shade covered his face, and then saw the cracks slowly crawling on his raised right hand.

[No, but this position will make the power of the soul more prominent. 】

"Is it enough to show the afterglow of divinity?"

Shade said to himself, looking at the black tunnel entrance leading underground. Although silver wires hung with charms and bells blocked the entrance, it was no problem to push aside those extremely elastic metal wires and continue walking.

[Foreigners, the concept of death ahead is almost overflowing. 】

"I know, I will be careful. We have come this far, and I have no reason to retreat."

He bent down and walked down, stepping on the steps paved with rough stones. After passing the thirteenth step, he came to the underground corridor.

The howling black wind kept blowing from the front of the corridor. Countless whispers rang in his ears, and Shade could clearly hear them. They were the murmurs of the deceased at the last moment of his life. Those cold winds were like knives, leaving scars on Shade's body and cuts on his clothes. Then, the golden divine afterglow emerged from those cracks, protecting the outsiders. soul.

Even Shade had to raise his arm in front of him before he could continue to move forward with difficulty. The wind made him unsteady, and the soft black soil under his feet seemed to sink him into the ground with every step.

There is no white mist, no magical rituals, not even a ghost. This is the last way.

Apart from the golden scars on his body, the brightest color on Shade's body is the slender thread on his wrist. It seemed to really burn, with fiery red light scattering sparks toward the back along with the cold wind. Shade used his right hand with this thread tied in front of his forehead to maintain the stability of his body temperature and soul.

"So, what kind of fire is that flame in Sister Devlin's hand? It's so powerful."

Death is suppressing all supernatural powers, and the holy symbol pendant on his chest that guides the direction has lost its effect. But it didn't matter, because on the muddy ground covered with mud, there was a row of clear footprints, belonging to the footprints of Priest Augustus.

Shade put his right hand in front of his forehead, lowered his head to resist the black wind with the power of death, and then watched the footprints on the ground move forward step by step in the dark final passage.

Death was eroding him and embracing him, and the cold power seemed to appear directly in the space. Shade even had a feeling that the [Death] spirit rune might appear in his life ring in the next second.

Step by step forward, the traces of light on his body became brighter and brighter. Because I couldn't raise my head, I could only keep hoping to see Priest August lying on the ground or the old man sitting against the wall in the next second.

But nothing appeared until Shade came to the end of the corridor, walked out of the passage, and came to the huge, towering square space at the end of the passage. Still no familiar figure was seen.

There is nothing here, only the huge double stone door standing on the wall facing the end of the passage.

The ancient stone gate seems to represent time itself. It was engraved with stories about death and written with ancient runes that would make Shade dizzy just by looking at them. It seems to be describing the initial death, but it also seems to be describing other stories that are completely incomprehensible.

And those black winds with the power of death blew out from the cracks of the stone door, but they were still strangely silent, cold and silent, as if everything in the world had stopped here.

[Outlander, you feel the whisper. 】

When I saw the door, I heard a prompt in my ear. Shade thus understood that the door that separated the real death was actually a relic.

"But where is Padre Augustus?"

He walked out of the passage, then stopped and looked at the series of footprints of Priest Augustus on the ground as they walked forward to the door.

At this moment, even Shade felt that his entire body was so numb that he could hardly move. At the same time, fatigue was rising. He had to concentrate all his energy to resist the desire to sleep forever.

That desire is really tempting, but fortunately, the images of Mia Cat and the girls have been echoing in Shade's head.

After experiencing so many adventures, he came from Tobesk, thousands of miles away, to Fort Midhill, and finally stood at the deepest part of the narrow room. What Shade saw was that the footprints extended to the ancient stone gate. , but the priest is not here:

"The priest said in his dream that he had 'crossed the border of death.' Could it be that this did not refer to the narrow space between life and death, but"

Shade opened his mouth slightly and looked up at the stone door. He could feel that behind the door was the end of everything. He even felt that he could see what happened to Priest August in the past not long ago.

Rat Augustus has passed death's door.

PS: According to the first sentence of this chapter, what names can Shade say now? At least five or six.