"Your Excellency, if all goes well, we will return before tomorrow."
Duolin and the others led their Hoofed Beast alongside Ed, creating a sense of mutual respect between heroes.
Ed nodded:
"Alright, rooms have been reserved for you inside the castle. If you'd like to stay outside, you can, but you'll need to wait a few days."
"I'll do whatever you say."
Duolin said he didn't care, then pressed for an answer:
"Your Excellency, do you know where Yiden and the other apostates are conducting their wicked experiments? Should we conduct a preliminary investigation?"
Ed searched through the original owner's memory fragments and discovered that the location of the Tree Worship Church Cult's human experiments was actually beneath the White Wax Town Church.
The soil there is very shallow, and below it are rock layers with natural caves. Half of the church's hidden area is a man-made underground area, while the other half utilizes some caves that are not connected to the outside world.
In general, the man-made area was used for experiments, while the underground area served as prisons.
Ed escaped through a narrow passage by taking advantage of a lapse in the priests' experiment, with the help of Little Green, who had not yet become symbiotic with him or developed any sense of reason.
If it weren't for the fact that his long-term experiments had made him rather thin, he would have almost died on the very first step of his escape.
"No need, your safety is the top priority."
Ed flashed his signature gentle smile:
" The Second Holy See has very few people; we can't do without your help. Just proceed with the White Wax Town story as planned."
Duolin felt a warmth in his heart upon hearing these words of encouragement. Thinking of those priests Crown on the surface but had actually become completely corrupt, and looking at the last hope of the Holy See before him, he couldn't help but feel tears welling up in his eyes.
"I understand. Please rest assured, we will return as soon as possible."
After saying this, Duolin led his team onto their Hoofed Beast and began heading south along the rarely traveled road they had come from.
The Hoofed Beast issued to the clergy by the Verdant Holy See were in excellent physical condition. Under the control of the well-trained guards, they entered their destination, White Wax Town, with almost no slowdown.
The last time I was here was the night before last. Although only thirty-odd hours have passed, Duolin is no longer the Duolin as it was two days ago.
He was already wary of the Tree Worship Church, this behemoth rooted in the northern part of the continent.
As we all know, once a person has a preconceived notion about something, they will inevitably develop the idea of "loving everything about it" or "hating everything else."
That was the case with Duolin at this moment; whether he entered White Wax Town White Wax Town at midnight or left it at dawn, he did not see a single town resident.
Because of the time constraints, he didn't take it to heart at the time.
But now it was almost noon, and they had returned to White Wax Town without seeing a single resident, which was really strange.
The guards exchanged glances, their eyes revealing the same unspoken doubts. They then set aside their suspicions for the time being and soon arrived at the White Wax Town Church, located in the center of the town.
Duolin looked at the building covered in Boston Ivy, took a deep breath, adjusted his expression, and pushed open the heavy wooden door.
The first thing they saw was Yiden's old face, and the moment he saw them, he flashed an incredibly sincere smile, his wrinkles deepening into a deep smile.
Cursing his bad luck inwardly, Duolin strode forward to meet them, while Yiden carefully checked the number of people in the group and whether anyone was missing an arm or a leg, before letting out a long sigh and sitting back down on the bench in front of the sacred tree sculpture.
The old priest looked at Duolin and asked in a tone that was both concerned and slightly reproachful:
"Why did the bishop only return today? Your current status is different from that of a guard; a bishop in charge of a diocese should never take risks lightly."
As he spoke, he shook a piece of paper in his hand and said with a hint of self-deprecation:
"You see, if I don't hear from you again today, I'm going to write to the provincial cathedral to inquire."
Duolin ignored the old man's acting and simply straightened his clothes before sitting down.
As Duolin sat down on the other side of the bench, the distance between the two closed again, and Yiden saw the damage to the Tree Worship Church robes worn by Duolin and the other guards.
"Oh dear, what's going on?"
Yiden jumped to his feet, looking the disheveled group up and down:
"Did you really encounter that escaped apostate? He's very dangerous, and he even carried a sacred relic..."
Still calling yourself a heretic, heretic? Your acting skills would put even professional actors to shame.
While cursing inwardly, Duolin still put on a smiling face:
No, it's not what you think.
Once Yiden was seated again, Duolin began another version of the story:
"We inspected the two villages that belong to the White Wax Town Parish, and also passed through the so-called Dragonborn Village."
"Those Dragonborn have terrible tempers and completely lack respect for the Tree God. We were furious..."
Yiden quickly stretched out her hands and began to shake:
"This is too dangerous..."
Duolin ignored his performance, clenched his fists and waved them a couple of times, putting on a show of a competitive, muscle-bound fool:
"Those idiots weren't that great at all; our victory was expected. Later, we inspected that ancient castle, the one you marked on your map in the wilderness..."
As a homebody who hadn't left the church for over a decade and hadn't left the town for decades, Yiden inevitably listened attentively to Duolin's wondrous adventures.
"We finally cracked the mechanism at the Shattered Castle gate after a long time, and now we've begun exploring the first level."
At this point, Duolin sighed deeply and tossed his tattered priest's robe in front of him to show Yiden:
"Unfortunately, there was an alchemical golem guarding the inside of that castle, and most of our wounds were actually caused by it."
"But I can see that the golem is almost dead from lack of maintenance. With a few more days of polishing, it will definitely..."
Yiden suddenly interrupted Duolin's narration:
"Take a few days? You mean... you and your team are going to that castle every day? And what about the parish-related matters...?"
Upon hearing the second half of the sentence, Duolin's face broke into a smile again. He looked at Yiden, whose expression was filled with worry.
"We won't be traveling back and forth every day; we plan to stay there for a while. As for handling the parish issue..."
He turned and grasped Yiden's aged hands:
"But you're here to keep things in order..."