Chapter 1045: Scarlet Robed Monk

The cold wind is biting!

This place is already near the depths of the Far North Wasteland, where the bone-chilling cold forces anyone without 【Cold Resistance】 to undergo a life-deduction check every day.

Ordinary humans would be frozen to death directly on the ice, and only Frost Giants and White Dragons could frolic in such a harsh environment.

A group of refugees is moving forward incessantly amidst the wind and snow.

Even though they are wearing thick clothing, people still fall along the way from time to time, turning into stiff corpses.

"Grace, this cannot go on!"

Grace opens the stopper and takes a sip, only to start coughing violently.

But the next moment, this radiance is blocked by the Spirit Bone Prayer Beads in the hands of the gnoll 【Scarlet Robed Monk】.

The Goddess of Oceans and Storms, the God of Elven Swiftness and Thieves, the God of Dwarven Crafting, the God of Halflings, the Lady of Fungi, the Mother of Evil Dragons, the Just Dragon God... too many, too many!

Just then, the elderly Paladin suddenly grips the sword at his waist: "You go first... I must stay for a moment!"

The Paladin hands a waterskin to Grace.

If they are all wiped out, the 'Goddess of Dawn' might fall directly!

A dozen minutes later, a touch of red gradually emerges amidst the wind and snow.

He is not a believer of the 'Goddess of Dawn', but every Paladin must take an oath under the witness of the 'God of Protection' of 【Greater Divine Power】—fairness, justice, compassion, and fearlessness!

After encountering this group of refugees, he joined them without hesitation to provide them with Protection.

She picks up the stone Amulet and strokes it.

The gnoll 【Scarlet Robed Monk】 opens his mouth full of fangs, sticks out his Scarlet tongue, and licks the air: "Humans... many humans... and Paladins and Clerics... you should offer your flesh and blood to my Lord, and let your bones become my Artifact!"

Every entry-level professional must choose one faith from among the many Evil Gods to become their own 'Secret Cultivation Honored One', to worship and make offerings to, before they can continuously progress.

Grace's 2nd-circle Divine Spell can only shelter a dozen people; for such a massive group, it is still a drop in the bucket!

There are still too few high-level Clerics!

"Have a sip of 'Fire', the favorite of the Northerners!"

"Paladin... how nostalgic."

For Grace, who has already given her body, heart, and entire faith to the Goddess, this is a future that is absolutely unacceptable!

It is just that...

The wind and snow grow more urgent!

That figure draws closer, allowing Grace to see the other's form clearly.

"Item Name: Spirit Bone Prayer Beads

Item Grade: Legend

Grace looks at the remains of the scroll in her hand and shakes her head.

This Paladin had come voluntarily to protect these believers during their migration.

The Paladin draws his longsword: "Even without using 'Detect Evil', I can see the evil aura on you that is so red it has turned black!"

He looks at this stone Amulet and finds that he does not recognize the emblem on it, but he will never forget this aura: "False God?!"

【Vairocana】 even split into several true gods of 【Greater Divine Power】 in an inconceivable way.

The Gimo are the most cold-resistant humans, naturally possessing the 【Cold Resistance】 feat, being even more resistant to freezing than Northerners and barbarians!

"We can go in and rest for a while."

A touch of holy light appears on her hand, enveloping a dozen old, weak, women, and children.

Divine Spell—Cure Light Wounds!

"He killed my teacher!" The middle-aged Paladin lets the wound on his severed arm recover, merely repeating this one sentence.

Grace lets out a long breath; the battle just now also cost her many companions, but her tears had long since run dry.

"The only random teleportation scroll has also been used up..."

The gnoll says slowly: "The prayer beads in my hand were ground one by one from the skulls of Paladins... one of them seems to be called... 'Hand of Order', right?"

—'Smite Saint'!!

A ghost of a team of Paladins appears; the leader among them looks very young, but is actually over a hundred years old, having entered the Legend realm and obtained the 'Transcendence' feat, keeping his appearance forever youthful!

"Teacher!"

The middle-aged Paladin's eyes are bloodshot, one arm is already gone, and his body is covered in wounds.

If it were before, as a high-level Cleric, Grace would have cast it effortlessly, but at this moment, she only feels her body teetering, and her mental power feels as if it is about to be drained dry!

The Paladin's eyes instantly turn completely red!

The sky is dim.

The 'Lady of Dawn', because she is only a 【Lesser Divine Power】 and her target is smaller, did not receive much attention.

Grace tidies up briefly and builds a campfire.

Grace reacts immediately: "I will go with you!"

Grace intends to lead this group to that place to settle down.

Grace stops the Paladin from continuing his Purification: "Ever since the invasion of the Outer Gods and the Time of Troubles... the gods have issued a Divine Oracle to temporarily set aside all prejudices; even if they are Demons, as long as they oppose those Outer Gods, we can join forces!"

That is a monk wearing a red robe, walking with quick steps!

At this moment, Grace suddenly stops him: "Please wait! Let me see..."

A Paladin wearing Leather Armor with extraordinary aura defense comes to a female Cleric and says: "The believers are mostly ordinary people, not professionals; if this continues..."

The Paladin stands up, leaning on his broken sword, and scans the surroundings, discovering some hemispherical igloos not far away: "The random teleportation spell has limitations; we should still be in the Far North Wasteland, just don't know where... it seems there are people living over there?"

This has led to many low-to-mid-level Clerics losing their Divine Spells one after another; only high-level Clerics can barely maintain their spellcasting abilities, but the consumption is several times higher than before!

Because the gods are no longer in their kingdoms, but have been cast down to the Material Plane in the form of 'Saints'!

"Whoosh! Whoosh!"

Item effect: 【Saint-Breaking】, this string of prayer beads has distorted the alignment characteristics of Paladins; all attacks from Paladins (Lawful Good) (below Demigod level) will be weakened by 50%!

The Paladin could no longer restrain himself, let out a roar, and slashed out with a sword!

A crescent-shaped radiance flashed through the void!

Snap!

A piece of wooden furniture shattered, revealing a rough Shitou amulet inside.

Ever since the "Great Catastrophe," the Weave Goddess had fallen; not only had all mages lost the convenient Weave, causing their spellcasting abilities to drop significantly, but even the faith networks of clerics had collapsed along with the invasion of the Evil Gods.

The carving on it was very rough and had long since become blurred, but one could vaguely make out the shape of a tree.

That 【Red-Robed Monk】 wore a yellow monk's robe inside, an outer Scarlet cloak, and a cockscomb hat on his head; his emerald pupils were filled with some unspeakable sense of evil, and in his furry claws, he held a string of Spirit Bone Prayer Beads that exuded an aura of Chaos Evil Domain!

——This was a Gnoll!

Whether it was the physical class, the spellcasting class, or the cleric class, it was the same for all!

Perhaps, it might even be the last group in the Material Plane that still worshipped the "Goddess of Dawn."

Therefore, this group of believers was very important to the "Goddess of Dawn."

The Gnoll 【Red-Robed Monk】 held the Spirit Bone Prayer Beads and began to chant mantras and secret spells.

"There is an aura of evil, but it is very faint..."

The weather-beaten Paladin stood guard by her side, watching the fleeing group.

The signature skills of a Paladin were "Detect Evil" and "Evil-Breaking Slash"!

Due to their oaths, they were irreconcilable with evil and were the objects most hated by all evil beings in the Material Plane.

But after the foreign Evil Gods and their favored ones descended, the local evil beings were stunned to discover that in the face of true evil and insane chaos, they were simply nothing at all...

According to the natives' view, those under the command of the foreign Evil Gods were all, without exception, evil "clerics"!

A 【Red-Robed Monk】 needed to be promoted from a 【Yellow-Robed Monk】, comparable to a high-level professional!

Daring to pursue an entire group of refugees alone, the opponent might even be approaching Legend!!

Whoosh, whoosh!

Seeing that those people's expressions were much better and they were thanking her one after another, Grace waved her hand at them and came to sit down nearby.

This female cleric had a head of chestnut curly hair and azure eyes that were incomparably pure; although her small face was frozen red and her lips were dark blue, they were still firmly pursed with determination.

A radiance of healing emerged on Grace's hands.

【Soul Summoning】, by paying a certain amount of flesh and blood and Mana, you can summon a team of fallen Paladin wraiths to fight for you!"

Especially that Lord of the foreign Gods who trampled on the bones of many true gods and ascended to the Supreme; His arrival even caused the Abyss to cheer. The Abyss was so enamored with Him that the demons directly submitted to His chaos and evil, and His name was—【Vairocana】!!!

Not only that!

Grace said: "The one who could kill the 'Hand of Order' is at least a high-level Legend; you must recover completely and enter the Legend realm before you can plot your revenge!"

The Paladin raised his longsword, intending to purify this amulet.

The weather-beaten middle-aged Paladin could not help but have tears in his eyes when he saw this young Paladin.

His incarnation of wrath—【Great Black Heaven】, was a 【Greater Divine Power】 from birth, and even killed the 'Lord of War,' who had extremely strong combat power among the 【Greater Divine Power】, during the Divine War!

Could their group really reach the Land of Hope?

Grace was suddenly startled and began to pray silently: "My Lord... please forgive my weakness; I will definitely bring your last believers to your Promised Land!"

Item description: This is a string of prayer beads ground from the skulls of Paladins; the largest one seems to have come from a certain legendary Paladin, whose soul is imprisoned within, suffering endless torture...

Furthermore, He found a hot spring valley deep in the Far North Wasteland, which could serve as the final Shelter!

Inside the Gimo's igloo.

A Sword Light, extremely similar to 'Evil-Breaking Slash' but filled with filth and corruption, emerged!

The Paladin remained silent and suddenly slashed his longsword toward a certain spot.

A terrifying Evil Spirit aura overflowed!

Therefore, the leader of those foreign Evil Gods, a terrifying existence who surpassed 【Greater Divine Power】 and reached 【Great Divine Power】, stirred up a terrible riot of the Chaos Sea Original Force, knocking all the gods down from their Divine Kingdoms and turning them into 'Saint' forms that even mortals could kill.

The Paladin's signature skill—Evil-Breaking Slash!

"I want to kill him! I must kill him!"

The eyes of the Hand of Order were ashen, and he gripped the hilt of his sword.

Up to now, too many true gods had already fallen.

The foreign Evil Gods did not allow the existence of other professionals; they had their own separate power system.

The middle-aged Paladin was startled, then silently shed tears.

The Paladin muttered.

At this time, he arrived inside an igloo with the Paladin and found that it had long been uninhabited, but there was still a considerable space beneath the ice layer, and it was quite warm.

"He has not yet become a Legend and could not possibly have killed the 'Hand of Order'; that legendary item must have been bestowed by the Evil God he worships or some other master!"

"I remember now, this should be a Gimo settlement, but it has long been abandoned."

Equipment requirements: Intelligence 15 points, Perception 15 points or higher, Evil Domain

"This seems to be some kind of primitive Natural Sciences worship of the Gimo, it is already very ancient..."

A portal emerged.

Today's Material Plane, whether it be the wealthy Southern Kingdoms, the North, or even the Forest of Elves, the Hills of Dwarves, the wilderness, the oceans, the Eastern deserts... were all controlled and occupied by the minions of those foreign gods.

2nd-circle Divine Spell—Temperature Control!

Then, He descended a Divine Oracle in the Material Plane, letting His minions come to hunt them down...

Grace healed the Paladin's wounds and wiped the sweat from her forehead: "I can no longer cast 'Limb Regeneration'... the wounds can only be treated like this for now; are you alright?"

Grace supported the middle-aged Paladin, and they fled in a sorry state.

Grace said.

"I can still fight!"

The most powerful group of 【Greater Divine Power】—the Lord of Radiance, the Earth Mother, the Lord of Order, the God of Death, and the Lord of War—all resisted, but the final result was total death!

The minions of the Outer Gods were frantically tracking down those Saints who had fallen into the mortal realm, while simultaneously slaughtering their followers.

This group of refugees consisted mostly of followers of the 'Goddess of Dawn', and the 'Goddess of Dawn' was merely a 【Weak Divine Power】, whose church in the Material Plane was not strong either.

"Calm down! I will heal you!"

She looked at the group, gritted her teeth, and chanted a few syllables.

Even for a true god of 【Weak Divine Power】, within their own Divine Kingdom, it is difficult for even a 【Greater Divine Power】 to completely kill them.

"To think it is a 【Red-Robed Monk】, this is troublesome..."

Apart from being killed directly by those minions of the Outer Gods, the most common cause of death was the loss of faith due to followers being slaughtered or converted, leading to a natural fall...

It was evident that doing this consumed much of her mental energy, but she still persisted.

"Evil one!"

At the mere thought of those foreign Evil Gods, Grace could not help but shudder!

Those Evil Gods from outside the Crystal Wall System were so powerful!

This scene caused a rare trace of a smile to appear on the Paladin's face.

"There are enemies!"

The middle-aged Paladin fell silent.

Although he had also received a similar Divine Oracle, this did not align with his 'Taoism'!

But thinking of that 【Red-Robed Monk】 and his own teacher, a look of pain appeared on his face, and he sheathed his sword: "False Gods are deities without true Godhood or Divine Kingdoms... Some do not even have the strength of a Legend and have merely gathered some faith... The light on this amulet is extremely dim; I fear its owner is not powerful..."

(End of chapter)