(Everyone's overthinking it. Norton is such a cautious person, how could any of his experimental subjects still be alive? Besides, the sheep were eating missionaries, not Norton's flesh and blood.)
However, Norton's shed skin, teeth, and nails are currently in Abraham's possession, as will be described.
Just as His Majesty Saint Peter had predicted, the Southern Continent, which had endured a century of war, was indeed facing yet another horrific trial.
In the year 130 of Norton, a great flood occurred.
The torrential rains continued incessantly, covering the entire Southern Continent, and lasted intermittently for several years.
During this period, sea levels rose, coastal cities were submerged, and inland areas were also flooded, with many low-lying areas completely submerged.
Rivers breached their banks, lakes and rivers collapsed, and with the continuous torrential rains, the plains of the Southern Continent were almost completely covered by floods.
Countless people died during this period, and countless people were displaced. Not only humans, but also various wild animals faced extinction.
The raging floodwaters flowed northward. Thanks to the absence of rugged terrain such as plateaus and deserts in the Southern Continent, and the fact that the overall terrain gradually slopes down towards the ocean, although the floods were severe, the inundation did not completely cover the Southern Continent into an ocean area.
Even so, the entire Southern Continent plains were swept away, and all houses and traces of human life were completely destroyed in the flood.
Only the mountainous regions became the places where humans could survive.
Standing atop the mountain and looking down, all that meets the eye is an endless expanse of ocean...
The total population of the Southern Continent, which had already decreased by 50%, plummeted by another 20%, but this was just the beginning.
As the water level rises higher and the continuous torrential rain makes the air increasingly humid, skin ulcers and skin diseases are commonplace.
As more and more people gathered on the various mountain peaks, all kinds of creatures, even monsters, were eaten to extinction by the hungry people. As for human corpses, they were carried away and dismembered as soon as someone died.
The entire Southern Continent presented an unimaginable Hell scene.
Pope Saint Peter was heartbroken by the chaos of the world and wept day and night, his grief never ceasing.
To save the Southern Continent, and for that elusive possibility, the newly appointed Pope of the Holy Lord Empire, Saint Peter, disregarded the opposition of the Holy See and resolutely convened the Ascension Ritual, offering himself as a sacrifice to Ascension, hoping to plead with God to forgive the Garden of Eden...
In the 135th year of Norton's reign, fifteen years after the new Pope Saint Peter took office, he hanged himself on a cross and immolated himself before Ascension!
This is historically known as 'The Divine Emperor Ascends to Heaven!'
Pope Saint Peter's selflessness and dedication have been celebrated throughout the Southern Continent for over a thousand years, leading to his Holy Lord Church as a new faith. Consequently, the term " Saint Peter Church " is often used to refer to Holy Lord Church.
Meanwhile, spearheaded by the Church, the Southern Continent also designated the day of the Pope's Ascension as a new Epoch, known as the 'Holy Epoch '.
Archbishop Duoxia, Vampire, has been appointed to the papacy.
Perhaps it was because Saint Peter's holiness truly moved God, or perhaps it was because the rain had indeed fallen enough.
After Pope Saint Peter immolated himself and Ascension, the torrential rain that had lasted for nearly ten years actually began to gradually subside.
The Southern Continent is high in the south and low in the north, and there are no plateaus or mountain ranges in the north.
As the heavy rains subsided, the floodwaters receded, and within just a few months, the once vast plains were once again covered in water.
Thus, humanity was finally redeemed, returning from the mountains to the plains to continue working diligently and striving for prosperity.
It's worth mentioning that the useless wonder that Blood Clan Progenitor Norton, built at great expense and with a huge amount of manpower and resources, actually came in handy during this flood.
Because these wonders are tall and large, and are entirely made of stone, they possess an unimaginable ability to withstand floods. In fact, many of these wonders have saved some people, giving them a place to stay when facing floods.
However, this was not what Norton wanted, so Norton remained a sullen bad seed, unworthy of praise.
Although the floodwaters have receded, the disaster has not completely subsided.
The Southern Continent, ravaged by floods, is dotted with the swollen corpses of giants, some badly decomposed, others still fresh.
However, no matter what, a major disaster is always followed by a major epidemic, especially after a flood, which is a breeding ground for plagues.
As the floodwaters receded, unsurprisingly, a plague began to spread across the Southern Continent.
In just three years, the population of the Southern Continent has once again plummeted by 20%, leaving only about 10% of its peak population.
However, due to the decrease in population and the reduction in population density, the plague that swept across the Southern Continent finally stopped its spread.
Thus, the calamity unleashed by the Vampire Progenitor came to a complete end!
But this was only the beginning.
The drawbacks of the sun's restored golden hue began to gradually become apparent.
Fifty years later, the population of the Southern Continent recovered somewhat, but new problems emerged.
This is all because human lifespan now seems to have been halved compared to before the Holy War.
Before the Holy War, although humans still had to work every day and be exposed to the sun, their lifespan was generally around 150 years.
If one is a pampered nobleman who never sees the sun, then one's lifespan can be even longer. For example, all popes have lived past two hundred years old, and the old pope before His Adam even lived to be over two hundred and fifty.
However, it seems that human lifespan has been greatly reduced as the sun grows golden.
The babies born during the Great Flood are now old and frail, and some have even passed away and Ascension.
In the past, fifty years old was just the beginning of middle age, but now he has already become an old man. Such a reduction in lifespan has aroused complete panic in the Southern Continent.
But panicking won't help.
According to Church research, the sun represents death, and now that the sun has returned to its golden color, the decrease in human lifespan is only natural.
Although life expectancy has decreased, the growth process has accelerated significantly. A body that would normally take twenty years to fully mature can now reproduce at the age of eleven or twelve. This is actually beneficial for population recovery. If this continues for several generations, the population may be able to return to its peak.
As for those who die due to shortened lifespan, according to Church beliefs, their souls will ascend to Heaven, so there is no need to panic about the length of their lifespan.
Another fifty years passed, and in those short fifty years, the Southern Continent had already seen three generations rise and fall.
As the elderly passed away and children were born, the Vampire and Werewolf, who had disappeared without a trace, faded completely from human sight over time. Although there were occasional reports of Werewolf causing trouble in some places, they were quickly killed by Church knights wielding silver swords, and such news became less and less frequent over time.
It seems that the Werewolf are also gradually evolving, and their intelligence is gradually increasing. They do not seem to have any ideas about domination, but are trying to integrate into human society in order to seek sustainable development.
From this perspective, their current alpha wolf is indeed quite intelligent.
In the Holy 113th year, Pope Duoxia initiated the Church Reformation...
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The 113th year of the Holy Age.
One hundred and thirteen years after the Great Flood.
Based on the current lifespan of humans, eight or nine generations have already passed.
As the great flood swept away everything, Blood Clan Progenitor Norton, was sealed away, Vampire and Werewolf went into hiding, and extraordinary individuals in the Southern Continent almost completely disappeared without a trace.
A large number of documents and books describing Vampire were destroyed in the flood, leaving only the Old Faith classics, revised historical documents, and wonders built by Blood Clan Progenitor Norton, where the presence of these two races can still be seen.
A hundred years is but a fleeting moment in the grand scheme of history, but for humans who now only live to around fifty, it is a length of time long enough to bury everything that has ever happened.
The books were also destroyed, and the extraordinary individuals either became extinct or went into hiding. Now, as human history has spanned a century, the so-called Vampire and Werewolf are just stories passed down by word of mouth, no longer possessing the oppressive presence they once did.
A flood completely washed away all traces of the existence of extraordinary species, but it also brought dawn to the development of humankind!
Therefore, Pope Duoxia convened the ' Theocratic Assembly ', declaring that God is holy and should not be corrupted by power, and that the Church's faith is pure and should not be tainted by self-interest. Thus, he decided to relinquish royal power, retain divine authority, and completely decentralize the Church's ruling power. From this day forward, the Holy Lord Church solely a place for the transmission of religious faith!
With the convening of the Theocratic Assembly, Pope Duoxia seized the opportunity to introduce an 'election system'.
In cities, villages, and towns of all sizes, the administrators must be elected before they can take office, in order to formally eliminate royal rule and give the common people a better life.
In the Holy Year 114, the elections for local officials were basically completed. Pope Duoxia formally appointed the Supreme Leader and completely relinquished power, granting him all administrative, legislative, executive, and judicial powers in the regions other than the Holy See. Holy See Papacy was the only one to retain autonomy, remaining as the last Holy City of the Church.
His actions are simply incomprehensible to the world, with some even believing that Pope Duoxia is using this opportunity to eliminate dissidents.
Therefore, the newly elected supreme leader was initially very diligent, and would personally enter the Holy See to meet with the Pope for any questions.
But gradually, he discovered that Pope Duoxia really did not participate in his rule at all. On the contrary, every time he came, he would drag him to participate in the Mass held by the Church. He would only talk about religious affairs and the inheritance of faith, and had no interest in or reaction to the governance of the country.
Thus, the new supreme ruler was finally able to put his mind at ease and begin his autocratic rule.
As the country's governance improved, the supreme ruler changed hands several times. Although there were some ups and downs, no major problems arose. Pope Duoxia officially abdicated and elected a new pope to ascend the throne. After that, the old pope Duoxia disappeared without a trace.
With the last immortal disappearing from sight, the mythological era has finally come to a true end...
Time flows swiftly by. The Southern Continent is constantly changing as time progresses.
During this period, the supreme ruler attempted to establish a dictatorship and launched a coup, wanting to restore the former feudal imperial system. Although his actions were successful, they undoubtedly set a bad precedent for the Southern Continent.
Over the next thousand years, countless dynasties rose and fell, and countless imperial powers changed hands. The mythological era was completely reduced to myths and legends, at most serving as a pastime for people to enjoy over tea and meals. No one focused their attention on those ethereal myths anymore.
The Southern Continent once again split into various kingdoms, and they once again engaged in years of bloody warfare and endless conquests.
Although the Holy See enjoys a degree of autonomy due to its perceived moral high ground and large number of believers, and no country dares to defy international opinion and wage war against it, this ideological control is extremely displeasing to monarchs around the world. After all, their own people are devoted to the Holy Lord Church, yet they don't listen much to the king's words, while the pope's are taken very seriously. What does this mean? Who is the king, you or me?
With the rise of Catholic Church ( the Common Lord Faith ), in order to divert the faith of their people and eliminate the influence of the Holy Lord Church on their national thought, some kings gathered together and concluded the Reformation based on the principle of "the king deciding religion," formally recognizing that the supreme ruler of each country has the right to choose the faith of his people.
With the establishment of such a system, various Church and faiths sprang up like mushrooms after rain, and various versions of the Bible and the Holy Covenant were different from one another, even creating a classic scene where there could be four completely different Church on a single street.
Although such actions were indeed a betrayal of the Holy Lord Church, the Reformation truly broke the shackles that had bound people's minds with religious thought for thousands of years. The proliferation of various Church and the pressure from the various kingdoms forced them to break away from old ideas and produce all kinds of books and ideas to compete with each other and vie for believers and the inheritance of faith.
As a result, the intellectual liberation movement in the Southern Continent became unstoppable, and the Renaissance and humanism arose spontaneously, becoming a trend that swept across the entire Southern Continent.
People around the world are also showing an increasingly strong desire to create wealth.
Finally, with the various countries of the Southern Continent Southern Continent evenly matched or forming alliances, resulting in little change in the situation for a century, the monarchs and nobles of these countries all turned their attention to the ocean.
The Southern Continent is surrounded by plateaus and deserts similar to the Himalayas, as well as permafrost stretching for thousands of miles. Therefore, going out to sea became a more efficient means of long-distance exploration than crossing the Gobi Desert.
In the holy year of 1557, a newly emerging coastal empire defied the odds by building an ocean-going fleet while other nations were still undecided. The fleet set sail in a grand procession and did not return for the next seven years.
Seven years later, the first fleet of ocean-going ships, which was thought to have long since sunk into the deep sea, suddenly appeared in the imperial port, causing a tremor in the Southern Continent.
Rumor has it that hundreds of black, ghost-like humans are bound inside the ship's cabin, chirping in a bird language, completely naked, and possessing astonishingly large clubs.
Such a bizarre and wondrous experience led the king to question the crew of his ocean voyage overnight. They eventually learned that on the other side of the ocean lay an extremely rich and seemingly endless land inhabited by dark-skinned people. Their society was still in a primitive stage, with incredibly low levels of technology. They couldn't even develop iron armor and were slaughtered mercilessly by the invaders. In the end, thousands of these people were captured and brought back to the capital, intending to present them to the king.
However, food was scarce along the way, and some of them ate a lot and some even fell ill and were thrown into the sea, so now only a few hundred remain.
In addition, they discovered another vast continent to the east during their journey, inhabited by a yellow-skinned race with advanced technology. They possessed firearms capable of killing people from a distance with a single explosive burst, which was extremely terrifying. In order to show that they had no hostility, they had to offer up some of their ships and people in exchange for friendship and the firearms and gunpowder that could kill people from a distance.
The miraculous experiences of the ships on their voyages caused a great stir in the Southern Continent. Not only that, they also made the incredible discovery that the ship's inhabitants, whose languages were not understood and whose intelligence was unknown, could be trained to work on land and, with just a few wields of whips, completely free their hands and reap endless wealth.
This caused an uproar throughout the entire Southern Continent.
Nobles, wealthy merchants, and even kings and royalty from various countries began frantically assembling fleets to transport their own products to the mysterious East for long-distance trade. They used the proceeds to purchase powerful firearms capable of killing silently, and then transported the firearms to another continent to carry out arrests.
The wealth of the Southern Continent accumulated rapidly through this trade, and with the increase in wealth came the influx of foreign ideas, and a wave of cultural revival swept across the land.
With the rise of science, the great kingdoms prospered.
Meanwhile, the increase in the number of wealthy people and the increase in time have led to a surge in scholars, resulting in the creation of academic papers that have become a coveted form of identity for scholars. Amid this cultural revival, some have turned their attention overseas, while others have turned their attention back to their own homes, to the ancient myths created by the ancients, wanting to conduct research and thus leave their mark on history.