Chapter 38: Follower of Knowledge

Reckdon felt that he had actually relaxed, not knowing whether it was because he could no longer think of any way to solve his current predicament.

He stared at A Meng's face growing out of the enormous stitched-together monster before him, somewhat curious as to how the other party had managed to evade the God of Knowledge's gaze.

"It's very simple. I already told you — I am not a clone, nor have I parasitized any creature. This is merely a Time Worm with no power at all, only an extremely high rank. Compared to a clone, it's more like a magical item with no real use." A Meng's face answered Reckdon's inner doubts quite naturally.

"Damn! Is he using the ability to steal thoughts as mind reading? Playing it real fancy!" Reckdon couldn't help but complain inwardly.

"You seem to understand the abilities of the Marauder pathway very well, figuring out so quickly how I was reading your thoughts." A Meng's enormous face displayed a frightening curiosity.

"Would you like to become my follower? I'm very interested in you." A Meng's voice was full of beguiling charm.

Reckdon didn't even dare to shake his head and refuse, afraid that the other party would twist the meaning of his expression and then he would directly become the other party's follower.

Reckdon didn't believe in being A Meng's follower — saying it was being A Meng's toy felt a bit more convincing.

"You're very cautious! Truly won't you consider becoming my follower?" A Meng continued.

"Bzzzz~"

A tremendous roar came from high above, reaching deep into the soul. Reckdon felt his thoughts freeze in that instant, as if his entire being from body to soul resonated with this thunderous sound in that moment.

"Heh! How boring!" A Meng's voice, full of mockery, sounded beside his ear.

A Meng's voice actually granted Reckdon's mind a degree of clarity. Though it wasn't enough for him to make any response, at least he could receive information from the outside world again.

A beam of pale golden radiance descended from the sky, like a stream of light that pierced through the heavens. Even though it was daytime, it was incomparably dazzling and eye-catching.

This radiance almost instantly landed before Reckdon, completely enveloping the enormous stitched monster that bore A Meng's face. Everything shrouded by the radiance was being purified — whether the fine dust in the air or the soil and rubble on the ground.

Reckdon only felt that his eyes were going blind, but due to the influence of the earlier tremendous roar, he couldn't make the motion of closing his eyes at all right now.

The pale golden light rapidly covered Reckdon's entire field of vision. A searing pain came from his eyes, and tears streamed directly down from the corners.

"Follower of Knowledge!" A Meng's voice echoed somewhat intermittently.

The surroundings quickly returned to silence — not even a trace of wind could be felt. Reckdon even suspected that his own ears had been affected as well.

After suffering through the silence for who knows how long, Reckdon suddenly felt a breeze pass by, and both his eyes plunged into darkness.

"You really are unlucky enough!" This seemed to be the voice of that angel, but it wasn't quite the same as the voice when the other party's crow body had appeared before.

Reckdon's consciousness was somewhat hazy, and he didn't catch the other party's subsequent words.

By the time Reckdon recovered, there was no trace of that angel nearby, nor did that crow appear, but the blurry figures of Captain Eakdon and the High Bishop of the Church of the Harvest appeared before him.

The Giant Bishop of the Church of the Harvest gently swept his hand past Reckdon's eyes. Reckdon felt the interference and stinging in his eyes instantly dissipate by more than half, and even his vision became much clearer.

"Alright. Apart from the injury to your eyes from looking at intense light, there are no other major problems. Just take care of your eyes for the next couple of days and you'll recover very soon." The Giant Bishop's voice was very gentle, as if it could soothe one's heart.

"Thank you, Bishop Aisi!" Reckdon hurriedly bowed to the Giant Bishop.

"It's nothing. But could you tell me what happened just now? Usel and Jin and the others don't know much." The Giant Bishop responded gently.

Hearing this, Reckdon turned his head slightly to glance at his captain, and saw the captain give him a small nod.

Only then did Reckdon recount what he and the others had just encountered, with some omissions.

He changed the fact that he had freed himself from the negative effects of the monster's voice through meditation, saying instead that a feather given to him by the angel of the Church of Knowledge had allowed him to shake off the negative state.

Anyway, that angel had indeed given him a feather. As for whether the feather's true use was really this — if anyone had questions, they could go find that angel and confirm it themselves.

"I see. It's a good thing that His Eminence arrived in time, otherwise things would have spiraled out of control again like last time." The Giant Bishop said with considerable emotion, his face full of relief.

"That His Eminence actually told you His honorific name — perhaps He had foreseen today's events long ago." Captain Eakdon's tone was full of envy and the regret of not having come earlier to see that angel.

Reckdon felt that his captain's image in his mind had somewhat collapsed. He hadn't expected that his captain, such a thick-browed, big-eyed fellow, would actually be a fanboy.

"Uh—" Reckdon had originally wanted to say that the captain was overthinking it, that he had been the one to actively ask that angel for it. But before the words came out, Reckdon suddenly thought of that Cherubim who was already Sequence 2 — the prophetic ability from when he was Sequence 4 had long been strengthened more than once.

"That should be the case." Reckdon swapped out the words he hadn't yet spoken.

"Did that His Eminence permit you to disclose His honorific name?" Captain Eakdon asked with great curiosity.

"Uh, I'm not sure. Should I ask Him?" Reckdon felt that his captain really was like a fanboy.

Captain Eakdon's eyes first lit up, but then he thought of something and dimmed again, advising: "No need, don't disturb that His Eminence over this kind of thing."

"Alright." Reckdon said indifferently.

"This incident counts as a serious unexpected situation. You can choose to withdraw from this cleanup operation first and go back to rest for a while." Captain Eakdon no longer dwelled on the matter of that angel.

"It's fine, Captain. I wasn't really affected — I was just here chatting with that A Meng for a bit. The only harm I suffered was the aftermath of that angel purging A Meng." Reckdon shook his head and said.

Truth be told, Reckdon did quite want to go back and rest. Even just going back to read books and accelerate the digestion of the Reader characteristic within him would be good. But the magical creature he wanted to keep hadn't been found yet, so he didn't really want to leave just like that. Besides, he hadn't really been harmed, and after this, there surely wouldn't be any A Meng left around here.

With something like this happening, it would be unreasonable for the Earth Mother not to glance this way. Under the gaze of two true gods, Reckdon didn't think any A Meng could still remain hidden.

"Chatting? Did you and that A Meng talk about the reason He did these things?" The Giant Bishop of the Church of the Earth was very interested in what Reckdon and A Meng had chatted about.

"No." Reckdon shook his head.

"Mm. Even if He had spoken, we wouldn't dare believe the words of the God of Deception." The Giant Bishop said, not disappointed.

"I heard from Usel that you want to find a magical creature to keep around here." The Giant Bishop changed the topic.

"Mm, yes. It's a pity — I haven't found a single magical creature." Reckdon nodded in response.

"If you don't find a satisfactory magical creature in the end, you can come to the Church of the Harvest. There are some magical creatures there that have been pacified. If you're willing to keep one, that would be quite nice too — we've never figured out how to deal with them." The Giant Bishop gave Reckdon a suggestion.

Reckdon's eyes lit up: "Sure! Thank you in advance, Bishop Aisi."

"No need to be polite — this is also helping us deal with those magical creatures!" The Giant Bishop nodded in response, his voice gentle.

After saying this, the Giant Bishop left the area.

"Let's leave here first and regroup with the squad. We'll need to revise our cleanup plan after this." Captain Eakdon said to Reckdon.

"Alright, Captain." Reckdon had fully recovered his condition and responded with a smile.

"You handled this well. Stalling for time and waiting for that His Eminence's arrival was the most correct choice." Captain Eakdon praised Reckdon.

Reckdon felt a bit awkward. What handling was there — it was entirely a choice to leave things to fate when he had absolutely no other options. At the time, Reckdon had already fully pinned his hopes on whether the Sage of Concealment might suddenly appear to save the day.

After reciting that angel's honorific name in his heart with no response, Reckdon had already given up on the other party's rescue. He hadn't expected that in the end, it was still this angel who rushed over to save the day.

Reckdon even somewhat suspected that this angel had arrived long ago, but simply hadn't shown himself.

"Captain, if I need some extraordinary materials, for practicing ritual magic and making charms and such, where can I buy them?" Seeing that his captain seemed to be in a rather good mood, Reckdon asked a question he had never had the chance to ask before.

"You want to practice ritual magic? That's right; in the early stage of the Reader's Path, the main means is ritual magic. It's normal to feel your strength is insufficient after encountering so many things in a short time." Captain Yikangdun nodded in understanding.

"You can directly submit an application, go through the Church's internal channel; the Church will give you the corresponding discount, and within a certain quota it's free—consider it the Church's nurturing resource." Captain Yikangdun then said.

"You can do that too!?" Leikdun's eyes widened.

Leikdun previously thought that all churches were roughly the same in this regard, but the Night Church didn't have this option; at most they'd reimburse you for material costs.

However, thinking about it, the Knowledge Church's Reader's Path in the early stage has nothing usable for combat besides ritual magic, so it's not surprising.

(End of chapter)