Deep within the XueRong Mountain Range.
A crystal orb condensed from a vast number of souls cracked.
"No! No!"
A woman in a wheelchair hurried toward the crystal orb. Before she could touch it, the orb shattered completely into fragments.
The souls sealed within surged out from the shards and drifted into the sky.
"Father Cainko... you've set our research back by another month! No... a full half year!"
The woman in the wheelchair stared at the shattered crystal and, unable to contain her rage, crushed the fragments further in her hand.
"This isn't enough. We need more."
Father Cainko jolted awake from his slumber. He clutched his forehead with his aged hands, while the sensation of being torn apart by blades continued to replay across his body.
After collecting himself, he stepped out of the vessel he had been lying in. The Judges in the other two vessels, however, had fallen into eternal sleep within the fragments of the Consciousness Space.
"More?"
Hearing Father Cainko's demand, the woman's anger flared out of control once again.
"Soul fragments aren't pebbles by the roadside!" The woman's voice suppressed her fury.
"The war on the Frost Plains has raged for over a century." Father Cainko limped toward the woman in the wheelchair. "Over those hundred years, Frost Country deployed more than a million soldiers. The resentful souls of those soldiers lie buried beneath the snow. Their souls... how many have you absorbed?"
"The envoys and martyrs use most of those souls to call for the descent of God. We... can only absorb a tiny fraction of the soul fragments! Let alone soul fragments of such quality!"
The woman showed no fear as Father Cainko approached. She reminded him in a low voice.
"Those... damned parasites!" A chill entered Father Cainko's voice.
"Aren't