Confessor Priest

["Blood-stained Broken Wooden Wheel": A weapon once used by Confessor Priest Kadish. When he could not wait for reinforcements, he used it as a weapon and defeated quite a few aberrant creatures attempting to invade the Church.]

"His name was Kadish?"

Colin silently committed the name to memory.

But Colin clearly remembered that when he killed him, he had not seen any weapon on the priest.

"No, when we first met, he launched an attack once. I didn't know what it was then, but thinking about it now, it must have been this thing."

If he had not reacted quickly and avoided getting hit, he would probably be dead by now.

"Even if he threw away his weapon, as long as I kill him, can I still obtain it directly from his corpse?"

Colin stroked his chin, gaining a little more understanding of this "game."

"Number One, use this weapon for now. Stay alert and don't get ambushed."

Colin handed the blood-stained wheel to Servant No. 1.

He was not worried that Servant No. 1 would be unable to lift it, because the requirements to use it were Strength, Endurance, and Stamina of 1.

After Extreme Hunger vanished, coupled with the Inspired effect, both servants' stats had reached 1.

However, it was too heavy, and carrying it would reduce movement speed by nearly 0.5.

So if things got dangerous and they had to run, it would still need to be put away.

Seeing this, Servant No. 2 immediately felt that the porridge in the pot no longer smelled appetizing. He could feel that the moment Number One received the wooden wheel, his body became stronger.

As though he could slap him to death with one hand.

Just moments ago, Number One had been envying him, yet in the blink of an eye, it was now his turn to envy Number One.

But Number Two knew this was the best choice. After all, his hand was injured, and using it now would definitely be inconvenient.

Inconvenience meant a greater chance of danger for Lord, and that was something he found even more unacceptable.

Lord's will and safety came before everything!

"Don't worry. There'll be better things later, and they'll definitely be yours."

Colin smiled, then continued looking through his Inventory. "There's one last thing."

["Twisted Soul": A mass of blue gas resembling flames. Within it, you can vaguely see twisted little figures wailing in pain.]

[Use it and listen to it. You may receive an additional quest.]

[Remaining item duration: 2 days 23 hours 44 minutes.]

[Note: The lower your Inspiration, the harder it is to obtain a quest. If Inspiration is below 1, the chance of failing to listen is 95%. Above 3, you are guaranteed to obtain a quest.]

"A quest-triggering item? What was my Inspiration again?"

Colin looked around, only to find that he seemed to have no Personal Panel option.

Then Colin fell into thought:

[You discover that you do not have a Personal Panel option, but you need to know your Inspiration value to determine whether you can safely accept the quest. As you ponder, you vaguely sense that your Inspiration is greater than 2.]

"I can actually look it up? That's cheating. Seriously, that's cheating!"

Sighing, Colin took the pale blue soul flame from his Inventory and held it in his hand.

After warning the two of them to remain vigilant, Colin suddenly clenched his right hand into a fist. The pale blue flames instantly erupted.

Colin only felt a mass of "chaos" rush toward him, and then his entire body fell into a dazed state.

".Children... the children need food."

".Return to the Church before nightfall. It is coming."

"It?"

".Cough, cough cough cough."

".Mother of Suffering and Thorns, may you... cough cough cough... bless..."

"Cough cough cough cough—"

The invisible murmurs lingered by his ears. In his daze, Colin seemed to see a dreamlike scene.

It was a hunched old figure, coughing as he leaned on an enormous wheel and shakily rose from the corpse of a large beast.

With a ripping sound, he tore off a piece of flesh from the beast and prepared to leave.

But this old man seemed to have reached the end of his life. Even walking had become difficult.

He fell.

The whispers vanished in an instant.

The next moment, Colin suddenly felt a violent palpitation, like dreaming that he had abruptly fallen while asleep, and he jolted awake.

Before he had time to process anything, Colin saw the Task List on the Parchment flashing.

"Got work."

Colin eagerly opened it.

[Trigger Quest: Bring Peace to the Children.]

[Quest Requirement: Go to the Church of Suffering at the foot of Crow Mountain and kill all "Aberration—Suffering Citizen—Wailer" within the Church.]

[Quest Time Limit: None.]

[Quest Description: Father Kadish's final wish was to protect the children in the Church, but now the children long for peace and eternal sleep. (Note: This quest can be completed by other Survivors.)]

[Quest Reward: Mist Points*10, Ordinary Filthy Blood 100ml, Hardened Black Bread*10, Attribute Title*1.]

"Ten Mist Points, not bad. Ordinary Filthy Blood... the description says one hundred milliliters lasts three hours. Average, I guess. Black Bread? Uh..."

"An Attribute Title? Now that's good stuff."

Colin's eyes lit up. Anyone who had played games knew the importance of titles.

This was something he could not afford to miss.

But Colin did not act rashly. After all, he did not yet know how far Crow Mountain was from here, nor how difficult the monsters inside the Church would be to kill.

"If nothing unexpected happens, the monsters should all be those children, right? Yeah, time to work."

Colin looked around and quickly received a prompt.

[You believe the Church at the foot of Crow Mountain lies along this road. It should take less than ten minutes to reach it, though you must be careful of the dangers along the way.]

"Ten minutes is only possible if we encounter nothing and the road is flat the entire way. Conservatively, it should take twenty minutes. We can give it a try. If we run into a few more Aberrations on the way, we can replenish while fighting."

Colin stroked his chin. It had already been confirmed that Aberrations dropped Filthy Blood. If he could keep killing them, each one would extend his time by ten or twenty minutes. He might even become a perpetual-motion machine out in the wilderness.

Of course, that was impossible. Human strength had limits. Doing that would be no different from throwing his life away.

That said, such a huge monster had so little blood. He wondered if someone had watered it down beforehand.

Putting his scattered thoughts aside, Colin packed up his belongings and placed them all in his Inventory before immediately setting off.

Current Hurricane Lamp fuel time: 1 hour 23 minutes.

Colin set this operation's time limit at roughly fifty minutes.

However, they had not walked for long before arriving before a sparse patch of withered woods.

Not long after entering, they encountered another Aberration and began an engagement.

"Is... is anyone there?"