Baluo turned left and entered a spiral staircase. Listening to his footsteps fading into the distance, Samuer emerged from another corner behind him and entered his room with a serious expression.
He drew back the curtains, and the bright sunlight streamed back into the room. Samuer leaned against the windowsill and called softly:
" Icarus."
As he called out, the little bird figurine placed on top of the cabinet suddenly came to life, fluttering its brightly colored wings and landing lightly on a withered branch on Samuer's shoulder.
The birds appear very lively, but closer observation reveals some clues:
Its skeleton is made of brass parts, with a dark bronze color that extends all the way to its beak. The emerald green feathers on its body are rows of neatly growing, Alienation leaves, and you can even clearly see the veins on them.
Samuer reached out and stroked the bird's head, asking:
" Icarus, what did he just do?"
The little bird mechanically pecked at the spot in front of it, tilted its head, and said:
"Sit, chair, drink water."
"Hmm, is there anything else?"
"No."
"Well done."
Samuer opened the window and tossed the bird out, watching it disappear into the distance before turning and leaving his room.
Meanwhile, Samuer knocked on the door of the room located at the highest point of the Records Office.
After receiving permission, he pushed open the door and entered, where he saw the old cardinal with white hair and beard.
Cardinal Luxiusi was sitting on a rather narrow wooden chair, bowing his head and praying silently to the World Tree statue in front of him.
" Luxiusi."
Samuer came behind the chair and interrupted the other person's prayer.
"Okay, go ahead."
The old man opened his eyes and looked at his attendant:
"Did you discover a problem with any of the documents?"
Samuer shook his head:
"I have received a confidential letter, and the writer requests that I present it to you."
"Oh, who wrote the letter?"
Upon hearing the Cardinal's question, Samuer smiled with a hint of excitement:
"As you expected, Your Excellency, you are Pure Ones from the Garrison Academy that you dispatched to the border diocese."
Cardinal Luxiusi was momentarily stunned, but then instantly understood Samuer's meaning.
That was, after all, my own plan; it's just that I'm getting old, which is why I didn't realize it immediately.
Arrangements for the Pure Ones.
The internal divisions within the Tree Worship Church were long-standing, and as a cardinal, Luxiusi was well aware of this.
As time went on, the activities of the Stained Ones became increasingly rampant, and the minds of some of them seemed to be affected by the Demonic Tide to varying degrees, gradually shifting from experiments aimed at Resurrection Tree God to acts of torture and slaughter.
Luxiusi knew it was happening, but he was powerless to stop it.
As an internal matter of the Tree Worship Church, such things could not be presented to the vast majority of believers, whose faith forms the cornerstone of the Tree Worship Church. Luxiusi would not do something that would destroy his own foundation.
But he also knew that if the Stained Ones were allowed to run rampant, it was hard to say whether the Tree Worship Church could survive the next century of Demonic Tide.
In order to restore the Stained Ones to their original intentions and to ensure the continuation of the Tree Worship Church amidst the Demonic Tide, the aging Luxiusi decides to launch a secret war.
He selected a list from recent graduates of the seminary, especially the Garrison Academy, listing these relatively capable Pure Ones as the first choice to fill vacancies in the Tree Worship Church.
Since the Stained Ones have already infiltrated every parish, let the young, most steadfast, and Pure Ones contend with them.
Even if those Pure Ones are susceptible to conversion, they will at least adhere to the original intentions of those Stained Ones, preventing the experiments from escalating into cruelty.
If this plan succeeds, the Tree Worship Church can at least continue for a while longer; if it fails, perhaps the Tree Worship Church has indeed gone down the wrong path.
After all, in that peaceful and tranquil era a hundred years ago, no one knew how to survive the Demonic Tide; everyone was essentially groping in the dark.
Now, his covert plan has received its first feedback.
He extended his somewhat withered hand, and Samuer handed him the letter of denunciation. By the light of the prayer room, Luxiusi opened the envelope and began to read.
The letter was short to begin with, and after removing the meaningless polite greetings, there was hardly any valuable information left, but Luxiusi read it with unprecedented seriousness.
After reading it several times to make sure there were no omissions, he looked up at his attendant Samuer. The secret letter from Duolin, which had been casually folded, had transformed into a plant seedling in the cardinal's hand and then merged into his body.
"Finally, some good news. Go help me..."
The excitement on Luxiusi's aged face vanished abruptly; he realized he had been so excited that he had almost made a wrong decision.
"Oh no, go continue organizing those files, and come see me at nine o'clock tonight."
Samuer bowed slightly:
"Yes."
At nine o'clock in the evening, the cardinal, accompanied by his trusted attendants, arrived at the first floor of the Records Office, where reports from various places that had been sent over the past three days were stored.
Samuer began searching without waiting for the bishop to speak, and soon found the document "Routine Report of the White Wax Town Parish, Aduolin Province, August 908".
A glint flashed in Luxiusi's eyes as he fluently read the words on the paper before him in the pitch-black night.
After a while, he closed the file and had Samuer put it back in the pile.
The attendant placed the documents down and looked at the cardinal beside him:
"Sir, what should we do now?"
"Could you please go to the archives?"
"What are your plans?"
"I need all the monthly reports for White Wax Town in the Aduolin Province for the past ten years."
"Yes."
In the pitch-black night, with the help of several withered branches, Samuer placed a thick stack of documents in front of the cardinal, while the old man had already prepared paper and pen on the table.
"Find the tax amount, expenses, and balance, then record them. We'll divide the work: I'll be responsible for the most recent five years, and you'll be responsible for the previous five years."
"Yes."
The rustling sound of copying echoed in the Records Office's reading area as lines of numbers were copied down and eventually presented to the cardinal and his attendants.
Looking at the flawless data from the past decade, Samuer couldn't help but sigh:
"Wow, the data is so neat, it looks fake."
"It's fake."
Luxiusi's expression was not pleasant. Although this was entirely within his expectations, seeing it with his own eyes still stirred a surge of anger within him.
" Samuer, who is the Archbishop of the Aduolin Province?"
The attendant scribe thought for a moment and replied:
"It is Archbishop Antiya Lisi."
"Oh, it's Antiya."
Luxiusi gazed at the night sky outside the window, lost in memories:
"My good student from fifty years ago."