Witnessing a Believer's Ascension Ceremony!

"She attained enlightenment."

In an ordinary clergy dormitory somewhere in Suotuo City-State, an elderly man in platinum priestly robes, seemingly on the verge of death, sat cross-legged on the floor with an unremarkable longsword in his arms, his eyes closed in meditation. Suddenly, he slowly opened his clouded eyes and spoke in a weathered voice to the man beside him, who was calculating formulas beneath the dim light of a desk lamp.

"When everyone is praising something, isn't that also a desperate attempt to conceal certain things?" The man at the desk did not lift his head. He continued working through his calculations as he answered the old man in white.

Everyone praised the beauty of life, the greatness of life.

"Perhaps life itself is heartless, isn't it?"

"Heh." A faint smile appeared on the old man's lips. "But she likes you very much. She has feelings."

"Which is why." The corners of the man's lips curved upward. He set down his pen and looked toward the pitch-black sky beyond the window, where the storm raged and thunder boomed. A trace of warmth flashed through his deep black eyes, and he smiled knowingly. "Life is life. She is she."

Rumble!

Thunder flashed past, and the world outside the window turned black and white in an instant. The old man in white felt as though his brain had been struck by a heavy hammer. His entire body shuddered instinctively at the thunderclap. After a moment of silence, he raised his head and looked at the man by the window, who showed him only a dark back whose features could not be seen.

"So it was you. Right?"

"Why can't it be something she realized on her own? Her comprehension is quite good too. If she hadn't squandered it, there would basically