593. The Priest Who Doesn't Believe in God, The God Without Believers, and The Divine Kingdom Without a God

When Itris awoke from the chaos, she was still inside that Magic Pattern tank, surrounded by fresh seawater. Her body was exhausted, yet not a single wound remained.

"Was it all just a nightmare?"

The merfolk mage clung to a sliver of hope, wishing that she had merely suffered a nightmare in the tank and had already arrived safely in Night-Kirin City.

Yet when she tried to draw upon the magic within her body, she fell into utter despair.

"Did His Majesty abandon me? Or did I betray His Majesty?" she lamented.

Itris could no longer make sense of her own condition. In her memories, she had been a believer of the Sea God from the moment she broke out of her shell. She had thought that after Jenny Gallop became a Marquis, she would be able to enter the Temple of Waves and advance to become a High-Rank surge mage.

Yet in the span of one night, Itris had lost everything. She had been separated from her god forever.

"I'm afraid I'm the most pitiful merfolk mage in the world!" Itris shook her head.

"Oh, give me a break!" A majestic voice rang out in her mind. "Look at how Leviathan raised you lot—you don't even know the history of your own Merfolk!"

"Who are you?" Itris flew into a rage upon hearing this. "How dare you defile the Sea God's glorious name!"

"Tch. She's nothing but a usurper. What kind of Sea God is she?"

The voice was dripping with mockery, its words no different from blasphemy. "You, a surge merfolk mage—have you never wondered why more than half the shell tablets in your treasury hold magic you can't use at all?"

"You..." Itris panicked at once. The Temple of Waves was the most sacred magical temple of