"By divine decree, this place has been contaminated by heretical forces and must be 'purified!'"
At the center of the knight order stood an elderly man clad in bishop's vestments, his expression pious and holy, yet carrying an unprecedented gravity.
"My Lord Bishop! The perimeter is secured!"
A knight with features as sharp as if carved by blade and chisel rode forward and delivered his report with reverence.
"Excellent! The clergy shall coordinate — not a single heretic is to escape!"
The bishop waved his hand, and behind him, a large number of young priests in white liturgical robes, their expressions equally resolute, fell into orderly formation and began to move out alongside the various knight squads.
A crushing crisis descended upon the little town in an instant, while its residents remained entirely oblivious.
"Hmm? Transcendents imbued with other types of Law…"
Although his own detection capabilities were severely limited, Leilin still noticed this the moment the enemy had fully encircled the village. Unfortunately, there was nothing he could do about it.
In his current state, even stepping out of the forest would require Tifa's help, let alone breaking through the encirclement on his own.
"The gods' surveillance of the world is truly extraordinarily thorough…"
Leilin marveled. As soon as he had entered the village, he had noticed the altar within it and the Law power radiating from it.
Of course, this Law power was somewhat different from what existed in the outside world — perhaps it should more accurately be called divine power!
Under the protection of this divine power, the entire village had essentially formed a domain-like existence. Though its effects were far weaker than a true domain, it possessed the same fundamental properties.
"For an anomaly like me, the moment I step into their domain, I'll be discovered…"
Leilin sighed. "Unless I can find a true gathering place for the faithless, or avoid all altars, temples, and the like, this form of mine will remain utterly exposed no matter where I go… Unfortunately, that's practically impossible…"
In Beelzebub's memories, virtually all the sentient beings in the World of the Gods worshipped some deity.
Here, being faithless was an absolutely terrifying thing — even heretics or devil worshippers received far better treatment than the faithless.
According to rumor, the souls of the faithless, upon death, were not accepted by any god whatsoever. They could only be nailed alive upon the Wall of Wailing!
"The faith in the gods is like a vast network of nodes, covering virtually the entire World of the Gods, and every believer's soul bears their mark!"
Here, killing was not forbidden, but any research related to souls was considered blasphemy against the gods — and once discovered, one would be burned at the stake.
In fact, killing a god's follower would go unnoticed, but the moment one tampered with their soul, the gods would detect it instantly.
That fury — the kind of rage one feels when someone touches one's cheese — would draw down divine wrath.
"Priests, clerics, devout believers, and holy warriors' souls must never be desecrated. Doing so will inevitably invite that god's undying pursuit!"
This was the most深刻的 lesson from Beelzebub's memories that had stuck with Leilin.
"In other words, the path of rapidly recovering through mass slaughter and soul devouring is completely unworkable in the World of the Gods. Otherwise, it would be as if I had a tracker strapped to me — no matter where I went, the gods would find me… Of course, foreign soul energy from other worlds works the same way… There's basically no escape…"
Once he had assessed the situation, Leilin actually felt more at ease.
After all, right now he was merely a soul seed. Being destroyed would have no real impact on his main body, so he might as well seize this opportunity to gather additional data.
"Come at me, priests of the gods!"
A flicker of dark crimson light emanated from the broken sword, gleaming with a bloodthirsty glow.
…
The neighing of horses, the rising roars, the piercing screams and desperate pleas.
Tifa rubbed his eyes with the only relatively clean spot on the back of his hand, then opened his mouth wide.
Woken by the commotion, he saw a great deal of firelight spilling in from outside the windows. The thundering of countless hooves, the pounding on doors, and the shouting voices all echoed ceaselessly around his ears, like the whispers of demons.
"What's going on? Is this a nightmare?" Tifa's mind was in a daze, still struggling to process what was happening.
"What are you doing out here? Get back inside!" The moment Tifa stepped out of his room, his father roughly shoved him back.
On his father's face, Tifa saw an expression of unprecedented gravity and solemnity.
But before he could obediently return to the room, a towering warhorse crashed straight into their family's courtyard.
Mounted upon the horse was a knight clad in full steel armor — a display of wealth that made Tifa gasp. A suit of armor forged from fine steel was often the kind of heirloom passed down among knightly lords or even baronial nobles.