Sacred Art: Sacrificial Fire

At least in this matter, Iver could be sure that Bishop Mathers' information was not as good as his own.

Although Iver had completely forgotten the Plot, the Letter to the Noble Red Society from Someone he had obtained at the Pelican Bar mentioned some key information.

The letter roughly mentioned that the Demon Scholars sent by the Noble Red Society this time should be "a group of people," not just two. "That Lord" would cooperate with their actions, constantly creating cases in various parts of Glass Island in advance to divert the attention and manpower of the Bureau of Supervision.

Similarly, the mysterious person who wrote the letter also issued a warning to the Noble Red Society in an almost equal partnership attitude—roughly meaning that the amount of debt he could allow the Society to incur was limited. If the Society still did not give him what he wanted this time, then he would "execute some unkind behaviors that neither of us want or are willing to see with a heavy heart and firm resolve."

The two "Pen Pals" who came to meet Iver were, in fact, those who had left the main force and arrived in advance.

Their motives were easy to understand.

They had been operating the "Iver" line for a long time. Perhaps they thought that Iver would die in this continuous turmoil; or perhaps they felt that their superiors would come to snatch Iver as a resource; or perhaps they felt uneasy about this operation, so they used Iver, this reserve food, in advance to supplement important resources.

Perhaps at the beginning, they came for the sake of the "Moriarty" family name, but when Iver became a Priest and still held trust in them, he himself became a special value.

Noble blood, pure heart, a Soul seeking Transcendence, a Sacrifice willing to Self-Sacrifice—perhaps there were some other factors. But Iver's specifications as a Sacrifice were very high.

Because that Sacrificial Ritual was not a Ritual to summon Shadow Demons in a targeted manner, but any superior Demon could come. As a result, the Shadow Demon smelled the scent and came over as soon as the Ritual started.

Iver used half of his life force as a Sacrifice and signed a Contract with the Shadow Demon—this was actually the correct price.

The correct Sacrifice price is "half." No matter how much you offer, the Demon only takes half, and usually, it is the renewable half. Because the essence of this Ritual is "equal division."

Equal division of property, equal division of power, equal division of income, equal division of risk—in this way, both parties can be called partners. If the Summoner's quality can satisfy the Demon, the Summoner can symbolically take 1% more to indicate the distinction between "master and servant"; if it is only barely summoned, it is usually a normal 50-50 split.

But in reality, this has no binding force on the Demon's behavior. It is only a difference in the verbal title of "master" or "partner."

Demon Scholars are legal Professions in countries other than Avalon and the Eternal Theocracy. If the Sacrificial Art must kill one's own Sacrifice when used, then the Demon Scholar must be a murderer, and this Profession cannot be legal. And if the Demon Scholar performs Self-Sacrifice, it is directly equivalent to suicide.

In the Avalon Kingdom, the Sacrifices of Demon Scholars are accompanied by slaughter, which is actually not the Demon's need, but the need to silence, rob, or prepare Ritual materials.

In the case where the scope of the spread of mysterious knowledge is limited, most ordinary people do not even know what Extraordinary Professions there are on the Path of Transcendence, or even know the official title of "Demon Scholar," but use the established impression of "Sorcerer," which is "in short, he is a Master who can cast spells," as a folk substitute.

But in fact, the Demon Scholar's spell ability is not strong, and the types of spells that can be used are quite few.

Compared to the Mage of the Path of Wisdom, the Necromancer of the Path of Twilight, and the Sage of the Path of Adaptation, they are far inferior, even inferior to the Law Mage of the Path of Authority—the main Strength of the Demon Scholar comes from "Rituals" and "Demons." Many spells need to rely on Rituals, need to be prepared in advance, and their power far exceeds normal spells.

For example, Veronica's "Curse Infant" requires an infant Cursed to death by the caster as a Ritual material. The Ritual spells guided by a Second Level Demon Scholar have enough destructive power to threaten or even kill a Third Level front-row Profession.

If you don't have suitable materials at hand, and you don't have a Contract with a strong enough Demon, the Demon Scholar will become very weak.

But conversely, if Demon Scholars secretly plan and prepare in advance, they can fully exert destructive power far beyond their level.

Now he is in the open, and they are in the dark.

If Iver only uses his Demon Scholar abilities to fight, it would be doubly disadvantageous—not only is it easy to leak his identity, but he also cannot cooperate with his teammates at all.

He can't even slack off. It's not easy to even lie down.

Originally, Iver planned to obtain the Priest Profession level as soon as possible, but he did not expect it to be so fast. He hadn't told his Adoptive Father about this yet, but Bishop Mathers had thought of it in advance.

In the morning, the Bureau of Supervision called to make an appointment—saying that they planned to come to Moriarty Manor in the evening. His Adoptive Father was very happy, saying that he was going to give Iver some Award Order or something... but Iver wasn't very interested in this.

What good things can the Bureau of Supervision give? In the Game, the players were busy, but in the end, they didn't get anything. They divided the benefits themselves.

Moreover, Iver was worried that it would be Hai Na, that blockhead, who would come again, several hours early. So he didn't dare to go out today.

Originally, I planned to stay at home and read books with my sister.

But at nine in the morning, Bishop Mathers invited me to the Candle Holder Cathedral.

However, Iver felt no dissatisfaction at all, but was unusually pious and extremely serious.

Just kidding, this is a Profession skill tutor! And strictly speaking, I got in through the back door. I didn't pass the exam, nor did I do that long and stinky series of "recognition tasks," and I directly obtained the qualification to learn Sacred Art!

The old Bishop slowly lectured, "The so-called 'Sacred Art' is the most practical, safest, and easiest to master mysterious art of the Dedication Path, carefully selected by the Church based on the principles of 'safety,' 'health,' 'easy to learn,' and 'Benefiting Others'. After passing the corresponding qualification examination, the corresponding art will be taught free of charge by the Bishop until you learn it."

I understand, it's like the starter trio. Charmander, Squirtle, Bulbasaur... Emphasizing ease of use and ease of raising.

Iver muttered to himself, feeling anxious and impatient.

But Bishop Mathers still spoke unhurriedly, "There are four kinds of Sacred Art that can be mastered below the Bishop level.

"'Prayer', 'Sacrificial Fire', 'Illumination', 'Blessing'. It is especially important to note that the essence of mysterious art cannot be understood from the literal meaning."

The old Bishop explained, "The so-called 'Sacrificial Fire' refers to a technique for strengthening the body and restoring oneself.

"A person's life is like a candle, and the Soul is the fire. We, the companions of the Path of Dedication, will share our light and fire. And this also means that we will gradually become depleted ourselves.

"I deliberately created this unhealthy state for myself to demonstrate to you."

As he spoke, the old Bishop pointed to the unnatural white hair at his temples.

Iver knew what he was going to say, but still nodded obediently.

In short, the spells of the Dedication Path all require burning one's own blood.

Even healing involves burning one's own blood to restore others' health—if that's the case, then the Dedication Path must have a stable means of restoring health.

This is the art of "Sacrificial Fire."

"First, light a new candle. Any color will do, there is no difference—when you are proficient enough, you can carry a pack of matches with you."

As the old Bishop spoke, he extended his left hand, "I don't know how much understanding you have of mysterious knowledge, so I'll start from the beginning.

"Among the five fingers of the hand, the thumb symbolizes fire, the index finger symbolizes air, the middle finger symbolizes ether, the ring finger is earth, and the little finger is water. The four basic elements each have two corresponding fingers, while light and darkness are the left and right hands, respectively. Therefore, we usually use the left hand for Sacrificial Fire—and the elements of the Dedication Path are light and fire, so our most important fingers are the left thumb and middle finger.

"Before you can use it proficiently and engrave it into your instincts, I don't recommend that you use your right hand for any operation."

As he spoke, a cluster of white flames ignited on the old Bishop's left thumb, illuminating the candlestick in front of him.

There, a thick and long white candle had been placed in advance. The light that shone after it was lit instantly illuminated the entire space.

"To make it easier to guide you through your first visualization, I specifically chose the brightest model."

Bishop Mathers explained, gesturing for Oswald to push Iver's Wheelchair over.

"Come, raise your left hand. Do as I do..."

His movements were very slow, "Imagine that what is in front of you is not an easily reachable candlelight, but a distant golden Sun.

"No matter how bright the fire in front of you is, you must imagine it shining with extremely brilliant light—that light fills every corner of your vision, filling your entire perspective, without a trace of shadow. Imagine it can penetrate the palm of your hand, even if you open your hand, your hand should be as transparent as glass."

Iver did as he was told.

And just as he stretched out his hand.

A pop-up suddenly appeared before his eyes:

[Samuel Mathers is teaching you "Sacrificial Fire". Do you want to spend 1 general experience point to master this Sacred Art?]

The instant he saw the pop-up, Iver was stunned for a moment and subconsciously looked at Bishop Mathers.

In the Game, if a player's Sacred Art was obtained through a quest—that is, not through reading, but by maxing out a certain NPC's personal favor and receiving a one-on-one instruction, the experience required to learn the Sacred Art was proportional to the skill level and inversely proportional to the instructor's level.

In other words, the easier the Sacred Art was to learn and the higher the instructor's level, the less experience the learner had to spend.

In the Game, this setting didn't have much significance; it was just to indirectly show how strong someone was. Because players weren't short on experience—this broken Game had no stamina limit, and the experience required to learn Sacred Arts wasn't much.

But when online Beastmen discussed "who is stronger than whom" and "who can instantly kill whom," they would use this as a basis to deduce the corresponding Profession level of the NPC.

Back then, when players learned Sacred Arts, they all had to spend seven experience points to learn it—and that teaching NPC whose name Iver had forgotten was at least a certain Bishop, no matter how weak he was.

So, what's going on with you, old man? You had such a high level in version 1.0, so why have I never heard of your name in the Game? — Crap, I've run into a hidden master.

Today is still over six thousand words, remember to follow the reading during the new book period~