"The Supreme Guardian ordered us to apprehend the criminals. We cannot refuse to pursue them just because they fled into a sealed-off zone. Dead or alive, I must see them for myself."
Bronya made up her mind and led the Silvermane Guards toward the area corroded by the Fragmentum. "What I can still do now... is eliminate the villains threatening Belobog."
Stelle and March 7th eavesdropped in plain sight. Once the Silvermane Guards set off, both turned their eyes to Dan Heng in unison.
"Fleeing into the corroded alleys is indeed a viable plan for us. Let's follow them and see."
He had underestimated Sampo. Someone who dealt in ancient relics really did need a few tricks to stay alive. Breaking out of jail was child's play for Sampo; if he could be caught, he could escape.
"Uh, are we just going to follow them like this? I feel like we're stalkers." Stelle's focus was rather strange.
"Don't worry about those little details. Our priority is finding our missing teacher, Ye Yan, then clearing up the misunderstanding with the guards. She clearly said she wanted to invite us to discuss something important, then suddenly went back on her word. She doesn't keep her promises at all!"
Launching a surprise attack while people were sound asleep-how despicable!
"Don't forget, someone was rummaging through trash cans all over town yesterday," Dan Heng reminded her. Didn't Stelle think rummaging through trash cans in public was strange?
"How is exploring trash cans not a form of [Trailblaze]?" Stelle had a perfectly good explanation.
Without the unknown, how could there be Trailblaze?
At the Mechanical Settlement, Clara cradled a cup of warm milk tea. One sip of warm milk tea in the snow and ice swept her bad mood away.
"Want some?" Ye Yan asked for the second time.
Svarog said nothing. It was searching through everything Ye Yan had just said, all unfamiliar terms and concepts it had never encountered.
"Importing [Aeons], [Emanators], [Church], and [the recipe for Clara's favorite milk tea] into the database. Progress: 5%... 15%..."
Wait, had something strange slipped in there?
"This is the first time Clara has seen Mr. Svarog like this. How did you do it, big brother?"
"That's exactly the right question, Miss Clara. You must have heard my conversation with Svarog too. Why don't you take a guess?"
"Hmm... was it the [Church] you mentioned, big brother?"
"Data loaded. Term [Church] detected. Analyzing: the Church is the foremost faction under the Aeon of [Eternity]. They are a group of pure followers of [Eternity], whose members are primarily harmonious, friendly, kind, and gentle."
"Conclusion: they are companions worth befriending."
"Mr. Svarog is amazing." Clara clapped beside them.
Listening to Svarog's explanation, Ye Yan nodded in satisfaction.
"Very good, Svarog. You have grasped the true meaning of the [Church of Eternity]!" As a reward, Ye Yan offered Svarog a cup of milk tea. When he received no response, he could only pass it to Clara.
"Oh... that's too much, too much. You're far too generous, big brother."
Looking at the dozen or so bottles of fresh, warm milk tea already beside her, the little angel Clara simply packed the milk tea into a large metal box and carried it off to distribute among the vagrants gathered here.
After Ye Yan's barrage of concepts, Svarog understood one thing.
The results of calculations did not necessarily bring everyone happiness.
If it were Clara, she would certainly say this:
Even if they knew the world outside the cage wasn't all that wonderful... people would still want to poke their heads out and look.
So... help me, Mr. Svarog!
Once Clara left, Ye Yan brought up the word that should have been Svarog's greatest taboo.
"Stellaron."
In the original story, mentioning the Stellaron would make Svarog access its database... only to find access blocked, with discussion of the Stellaron with unauthorized targets prohibited.
To Belobog, the Stellaron was a secret sealed deep within the world. A secret no human should know.
Things were different now. Ye Yan had directly copied over some of the Data Bank's records, and Svarog had undergone an evolution in its thinking.
Now, when an outsider like Ye Yan brought up the Stellaron, it would no longer pose a risk, and they could communicate peacefully instead. Cause for celebration.
Mainly... there really weren't many people in Belobog who knew about the Stellaron. Every Supreme Guardian had chosen to bury this secret in their heart rather than reveal it to the world.
The Architects had also issued an order: any attempt to make contact with the Stellaron would have grave consequences.
There were many ways to deal with Stellarons, such as Ye Yan's method of resolving the problem at its root by sealing its Imaginary Energy.
Wherever it went, it left ruin and devastation behind. To the various civilizations that had suffered deeply from it, the Stellaron was a symbol of destruction.
When it came to dealing with Stellarons, the first to come to mind were the Astral Express and the Stellaron Hunters. Those two factions were specialists in handling Stellarons.
Only then came the infamous... universally renowned Church of Eternity. Not only had they prospered through planets' natural water resources, they also knew a thing or two about handling Stellarons.
Rumor had it that deep within the cathedral stood an iron door that remained closed year-round... A cleric had once asked Chair Blake what exactly lay behind it.
Chair Blake had said only one thing:
[A holy land of [Eternity] known to none. If you have no fear, you may contemplate Eternity here.]
The answer was obvious. Beyond the iron door lay that bottomless black-hole space-the Gift of Eternity!
A minor skill Ye Yan had casually used all those years ago had been discovered by Chair Blake, then converted into a place specifically for storing Stellarons and banishing sinners.
As for why it was called a prison for sinners, that was something to ask the marvelous Chair Blake.
For no other reason than that it sounded cool, even though the Church had no sinners in the true sense of the word.
The only person who had ever done anything wrong was the priestess. She had wasted too much paper while drafting the doctrine, writing and tearing it up, then tearing it up and writing again. Blake had shut her in a dark room to reflect for half an Amber Era.
The poor priestess. She was clearly the Church's founder, yet a latecomer had seized her power and gained authority over her. She was so angry that she cried, screamed, and rolled around on the floor throwing a tantrum. Boo-hoo, how pitiful~
It was called seizing power, but she hadn't actually wanted to manage things either. After handing the position of High Seat to Blake, she had run off.
That certainly wasn't neglecting her duties. Traveling while spreading [Eternity] looked very diligent to Yite, that veteran slacker god!
At Backwater Pass, the three followed Bronya into the area. Stelle looked this way and that. Even the trash cans were fewer in the alleys corroded by the Fragmentum.
Even after the Fragmentum's corrosion, this place was still part of Belobog, and the Silvermane Guards knew it like the backs of their hands. Bronya soon drew up a battle plan and split off a group of soldiers, intending to surround their targets from front and rear.
"Looking at it this way, Sampo's kind of pitiful... being hunted down by so many Silvermane Guards."
"That includes us," Dan Heng reminded her. Stelle was still immersed in the invisibility spell of [Eternity].
Her first experience felt great!
They followed Bronya through the alleys. At one corner, the smell of rust mixed with dust rushed into their throats. Amid the rhythmic dripping from some metal pipe, her hanging silver hair trembled faintly.
"Huh? Why did she suddenly stop?"
March 7th poked her head out. The second squad of Silvermane Guards Bronya had just dispatched... every last one of them lay unconscious on the ground.
"This... it's only been a few minutes! The whole squad got wiped out already?"
Bronya carefully stepped forward to check. Only after confirming the Silvermane Guards were still breathing did she notice a plushie leaning against the stone wall.
A closer look revealed that the plushie looked like Sampo.
"A Sampo plushie? Huh? This is..."
Before March 7th could finish, her concealed figure appeared beside Bronya, along with Stelle and Dan Heng.
"Huh... huhhh?!"
The scene turned awkward for a moment. March 7th looked at Bronya, at a loss.
What happened to absolutely safe? Why did it disappear?
Teacher Ye Yan, you're letting us down at the critical moment!
Bronya immediately retreated to put some distance between them. "Pela's analysis was correct. You really did sneak into the alleys in league with the escaped prisoner."
"It's a misunderstanding... a misunderstanding!"
The familiar scene played out again. When they first arrived on the snow plains, Gepard had taken them for Sampo's accomplices. Now Gepard had been replaced by Bronya, which meant they were about to clash.
"Sigh... this girl really won't let up. She won't even give us a chance to explain. What crime did we even commit?"
"There's no harm in telling you. My orders are to apprehend you. As for the specific charges and punishment, the tribunal will explain them to you."
"It's difficult for us to accept such a drastic change overnight, too."
Dan Heng tried to communicate peacefully with her. Force was not the only way to solve problems.
They had not met this commander yesterday, which also made communication between the two sides difficult.
"The Guardian investigated your backgrounds. She summoned me last night and said you had deceived her; your identities and purposes were all fabricated, with the intent of undermining the Architects' control over Belobog..."
"...villains of Yite of [Eternity]."
The trio: ???