Chapter 500: Scouting the Nongshen Church, Solid and Weak Points

Jier and his companion moved quietly along the fences of the farmers' yards within the village, keeping their waists bent to stay hidden behind the fences while carefully placing their steps to avoid making any sound.

Although there was no lighting and the village was quite dark, with only one and a half moons in the sky providing faint moonlight, making it basically impossible to see the scene on the village's dirt roads, the question was: where were they?

Changmai Cunzi!

Bata'er Jiaoshi had stayed here for many years and was far too familiar with the place; he could accurately find his direction and the path he needed to take within the village even with his eyes closed.

Coupled with the fact that Jier's night vision had significantly improved after Knight Training, the two carefully avoided the line of sight of the sentries on the village walls and the sentry in the church bell tower, sneaking into a house just a few dozen meters away from the Nongshen Church in Changmai Cunzi.

They hid on the third floor of this house, looking through the wooden window at the church opposite.

"Look, that sentry at the top of the church." Jier pointed at the Defeated Soldier sitting on top of the church, holding a telescope.

He noticed that this enemy was wearing at least two layers of Soldier Armor, and the armor on his body was quite complete, protecting him from head to toe. Additionally, a foot-pedal heavy crossbow was standing upside down beside the soldier, with a quiver of heavy crossbow bolts placed next to it, making him very difficult to deal with.

The enemy not only had the vision advantage of the telescope but also the protection of Soldier Armor with sufficient defensive power; the presence of two layers of armor meant that bows and arrows without much armor-piercing capability could basically not hurt this person. At the same time, this soldier also had a high-power armor-piercing heavy crossbow by his side; basically, if one wanted to approach from the front and storm this Nongshen Church, many people would be knocked down on the road.

"Damn it, if this person guards here, how can I retake my church tomorrow morning?" Bata'er Jiaoshi looked anxious. Although he could not see the weapon and equipment situation of the person on top of the church clearly, after Jier's explanation, he also understood that facing this enemy who was strong in both offense and defense, they would have to leave behind at least a few lives to take the church.

And the warriors were not veterans who had experienced many battles; whether they could maintain their combat effectiveness when facing casualties was a big question mark.

Jier looked at Bata'er Jiaoshi, his eyes revealing some unspeakable meaning, and he whispered to Bata'er Jiaoshi: "Don't worry, I have already thought of a solution. Although this person is powerful, he is only one person after all. We only need to send people to the side of the church, and this enemy soldier on top of the church will not be able to play much of a role. But because of this, your Nongshen Church can only be attacked last; they might set fire to it if they judge that they have failed. Priest, can you accept that?"

Bata'er Jiaoshi was silent for a moment, then he nodded: "Don't worry, I am not a stubborn fool. Although the church is an important asset of the church, the great Agricultural God has always taught us that the most important thing for the church is to believe in the great Agricultural God, believe in the church, and believe in the believers who are us priests. Their numbers and trust are the church's most important treasures."

Jier patted the priest's shoulder and said affirmatively: "Very good. The grain warehouse has basically been saved just now, and I also have a plan to take down your church. Now let me find a way to get close to it and listen to how many people are stationed in the church."

Then, the two of them came to a side of the house facing away from the church. Bata'er Jiaoshi took out the Agricultural God Wooden Statue and wrapped it in the Agricultural God's Divine Power to provide some lighting, then used a dagger to draw a simple map of the church on the ground.

"This is the terrain map of my church, warrior. It consists of a main entrance, a side door, and a back door." Bata'er Jiaoshi drew a church pattern resembling a rectangle.

"The main entrance is very large, but it is very sturdy. It has received years of Divine Power blessings from me and many Cunzi Priests of this church, resisting the erosion of fire, acid mist, lightning, and frost. Moreover, both large doors have three bolts and latches fixed to them. As long as these bolts and latches are fixed from inside the door, it would be difficult for even a dozen people to ram it open." Bata'er Jiaoshi explained the defensive means and capabilities of the Nongshen Church to Jier.

Jier felt a headache upon hearing this and looked at Bata'er Jiaoshi with annoyance: "So, when these Defeated Soldiers attacked the village, they didn't work at all, right? And now they are being used by the enemy to oppose you and me, the people sent by the Agricultural God Church."

Bata'er Jiaoshi scratched his head, feeling quite embarrassed and a bit ashamed.

Jier waved his hand: "Continue! Let me see what else this church has that can cause us more trouble."

The priest opened his mouth, but sighed and continued: "Entering through the main door is the prayer hall. On its two side walls are stained glass windows specially provided by the church. Although they are beautiful and expensive, Jier warrior, if you want to enter the church hall, breaking them would allow you to enter directly. Each stained glass window can be used for entry and exit once broken, and the size is suitable."

Jier nodded. He suddenly stood up and walked to a place where he could see the church to observe for a moment, then returned and said to the priest: "Although it is at a height of five meters, it's no problem. I can reach it in one jump. I guess those enemies won't expect me to break into the hall from there, right? Hehe."

Then Bata'er Jiaoshi continued: "Inside the prayer hall, there are two doors, one leading to the public area of the church and one leading to the living area of the stationed priest. I can't compare to Priest Feilina here; she has several internal courtyards. My church's public area only has a room for discussion and negotiation, and a book room for storing Changmai Cunzi documents and some collected books."

"My living area has only one bedroom, one tool room, and a toilet that can be used by believers. There isn't even a kitchen; I used to go directly to the believers' homes in the village to eat. We have never lacked food here, so we always discussed faith and farming matters while eating."

As Bata'er Jiaoshi spoke, he used his dagger to draw the various rooms behind the church on the ground.

Jier noticed that a side door was connected to the public area, while the church's living area was connected to the back door. The back door was next to the church's toilet and the tool room.

It was a corridor with rooms on both sides.

Jier pointed here and asked: "This living area corridor, with a toilet on one side and a tool room on the other, how is its lighting solved?" This was a very realistic question, because this was not an unimportant place where no one went, so it could not be left without all-day lighting. Because there was a toilet in the church, it definitely had to provide lighting for believers to use the toilet. Believers didn't come to the church at night, but what about rainy weather? So it wouldn't work without lighting.

The priest smiled: "Your question is very good, warrior. This corridor has a hollow skylight, and under the skylight are some flower beds. It can barely be considered a small indoor garden. The few types of flowers I like are planted here. Sigh, speaking of this, I just hope those bad guys haven't destroyed my flowers these days."

Jier smirked: "That's hard to say. I don't think those soldiers would like to deal with excrement in the toilet, so they might just do it in your small flower bed!"

The priest patted his head with his hand and stopped talking to Jier about this: "So Jier warrior, you can skip the back wooden door, which is also reinforced with blessings, and enter the church directly from the skylight of the living area corridor. Also, pay attention to this: the tool room. There is an underground secret passage for escape and hiding inside. Back then, I took the children and hid in there, which is how we escaped the attack of the Defeated Soldiers. After they left at that time, I found an opportunity to take the children and escape the village, heading north."

"An underground Secret Chamber? Is there a possibility of it being discovered by the enemy? In such a narrow place, if the enemy prepares a few heavy crossbows, it would be very difficult to attack." Jier did not mention that his Metal Armor was damaged in the battle. Not only the Metal Armor, but the Elven Metal Shield he used to use often also had damage from the battle with the Dwarf, and it was not good to take it out for use now.

Recently, he had been wearing the set of Hard Cowhide Full-Coverage Armor he designed and made before, but the defensive power of this cowhide armor could no longer keep up with his combat environment. There was really no other way. In the situation where he could not repair the Metal Armor, he could only use the Metal Armor Plates from the enemy's Soldier Armor. As long as he had that standardized Metal Armor Plate, plus some thin rope and needle and thread, he might be able to find a way to reinforce his Hard Cowhide Armor with these enemy metal plates in the lady's dream.

Bata'er Jiaoshi finished explaining the terrain of his church, and then Jier prepared to approach and scout to see how many people were stationed inside this church.

Of course, he would not go directly through the main entrance of the church, nor would he break through the stained glass windows at the top of the hall to kill his way in. Scouting, after all, only required knowing the number and location of the enemy.

Therefore, Jier carefully aimed at the direction the enemy soldier on top of the church was facing and bypassed the area to approach the Nongshen Church from the blind spot behind the opponent.

Bata'er Jiaoshi's Changmai Cunzi Nongshen Church, unlike the pure wooden church painted blue in Lanse-Qingting Cunzi, had a foundation built of stone bricks. Because there were many boulders in the surrounding hills and wilderness, there was enough stone to supply one building.

The foundation and building base made of these stone bricks would basically not be destroyed by fire or war, unless it was a battle of the level of Jier or the previous Dwarf warrior, only then would it be possible for the stone building to be destroyed.

The upper part of the church was also basically made of wood, with a simple and grand style. Even if it had been occupied by those scoundrel Defeated Soldiers for a period of time, this Nongshen Church still made people feel trust as soon as they saw it.

But as soon as Jier sneaked close to the church, he could hear the voices of the Defeated Soldiers coming from inside the church, as well as some sounds of fighting and cheering.

Jier bypassed from the side of the church's public area. The building here was sturdy, the windows were small, and the only side door had the Divine Power blessings of successive priests. Unless he broke the tiles on the roof, it would be difficult to enter the building.

Jier carefully peeked inside through a small window on the building.

Inside was originally a place for the priest to hold meetings and talk with villagers, but it had now been transformed into a barracks by these soldiers, with the sleeping bags or floor mats of the soldiers laid out in the room. Jier counted, and there were about ten people's spots.

There was lighting inside. In the messy room, the soldiers' clothes and equipment were thrown casually on their respective bedding. In addition, there were many valuable items looted by the soldiers from the farmers' homes in the village, and even some torn and scattered books were thrown here casually in their respective 'territories'.

As for the book room next to it, it was pitch black, and no breathing could be heard in the room, which meant it was not being used by the Defeated Soldiers.

He leaned against the outer wall of the church and carefully made his way to the side of the prayer hall, looking up to see that the light from inside was leaking out from a height of five meters.

This height, which was basically unreachable for ordinary people, was easy for Jier.

He jumped lightly, and his body jumped five meters high against the wall, then he grabbed the edge of the gap in the stained glass window with his hands, pulled with both hands, and his body was lifted up.

Jier carefully let only half of his head look into the church, his right eye carefully looking down at the scene inside the church prayer hall.

Whoa, they were fighting and gambling.

Seven or eight Defeated Soldiers were standing in various places in the messy hall. They were all looking at a fighting area in the middle of the hall surrounded by wooden benches where believers sat during prayer. Some people were eating and cheering with their fists, while others were more excited, standing outside the benches and shouting loudly to 'instruct' the two people in the arena on how to fight.

And the two people fighting were shirtless, revealing lean muscles, with Linen Cloth wrapped around their fists, fighting each other with punches that carried wind.

These were also two Defeated Soldiers. Just looking at the state of these soldiers in the hall, Jier knew that these people had some skills; the warriors under his command were basically not the opponents of these people.

'This is a bit troublesome. In the team, only Weier and Aoni feel like they can take down any one of the people here one-on-one. Others must form a team of five or more to have a possibility of winning against one of the opponents. It feels like they are all Refining Qi. Such a team actually doesn't even dare to fight on the battlefield and just hides to avoid battle. Then how strong is the neighboring country's army?'

Jier thought.

Jier looked at the state of these people carefully again, and then looked at a wooden ladder going straight up and down on the opposite side of the hall. This wooden ladder in the hall was the only route to the church bell tower at the top. Unless long-range means were used, one had to go up here to deal with the enemy on the bell tower.

If there was no super-standard power like Jier, it would take at least fifty people to take down this church.

Jier loosened his hand, and his whole body landed lightly against the wall. He then bypassed the church, not worrying that the people in the church would see him, and went from this side to the living area on the other side of the church.

Jier pushed the back door of the church, and it was indeed locked from the inside, and the whole door was very sturdy; he was powerless with just the Steel Dagger in his hand.

Immediately, Jier jumped onto the roof of the church's living area. He carefully lay on the top of the building, not letting the enemy on the church bell tower notice him. The opponent indeed did not care about the situation under his feet, just blindly using the telescope to see what other companions on the village wall were doing, or turning north to peek at the only house with lights on over there.

Jier climbed a few meters and found the wooden skylights on the Corridor that provided ventilation and natural lighting.

Bata'er Jiaoshi's intention was for him to break these skylights to enter the Church and investigate. But Jier examined these wooden skylights slightly and discovered they were not firmly fixed above the Corridor, but were merely wedged into the top of the Corridor due to their precise dimensions.

Jier shook these wooden skylights slightly, careful not to make a sound, and soon removed one, which gave him a passage to enter the interior of the Church.

"It's truly laughable; the Priests reinforced several doors very sturdily, and the Church was also built to be difficult to destroy, yet in a place like this, it is unexpectedly weak."

Thinking of this, Jier shook his head, gripped both sides of the skylight with his hands, and squeezed his whole body inside.

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