Chapter 314

Kraft saw a series of subtle, conflicting expressions cross Brother Wading's face: tension over the deteriorating situation, ritualistic mourning, personal association with his own condition, and a touch of unavoidable schadenfreude.

As they drew closer, those expressions flattened and vanished, replaced by suspicion and wariness.

The boat looked as if it had lain there for a long time—long enough to be swallowed by damp, revolting black mold, its original color indiscernible.

A frayed rope, knotted tight and nearly worn through, tied it to a jagged outcrop of rock, leaving only a few frayed fibers holding the abandoned vessel against the rising and falling currents.

It was not the same style as their own boat, nor did it have fixed floats—just a common flat-bottomed skiff of the Tem River, used for ferrying or hauling cargo in calm waters, built with ordinary materials and prone to capsizing.

Someone outside the Church had arrived here earlier, roughly weeks to two months ago.

The boat contained no items to identify its occupants, only deep gouges and rips along its hull, revealing what it had endured on its journey.

The interior had been extra-reinforced with planks, yet this did not stop whatever attacked them from prying off a large section of the hull and drilling several large, jagged holes into the bottom—likely the reason they had fled ashore in panic.

All of them survived the attack and reached this place.

"Those heretics." There was no other plausible suspect, but Father Green found it hard to imagine how they could have descended before the hall collapsed—and brought a boat with them.

"I hope they drowned in their own madness." Rather than still existing here in some form—that would make things far more troublesome.

Though reluctant, Green pragmatically turned his questioning gaze to Kraft, who leaned on his sword to support half his body and nodded—his condition was barely acceptable; if necessary, he could employ unconventional means to resolve unconventional troubles.

The priest halted briefly, walking toward them. "The Ancients once allied with kings who held swords forged from stone; kingdoms were thus blessed with glory—proving that a sword is not good or evil by its origin."

"Today is no different from a hundred years ago. Perhaps the Father is testing us once more—calling us to unite our wills and cast aside our divisions."

He removed his gloves, performing the gesture with exaggerated theatricality, and gripped the professor's hand firmly just as the man understood what was expected.

【You handle this, I'll handle the rest.】

After confirming Kraft understood his meaning, Green released his hand and scanned the assembled monks, locking eyes with each face that had chosen to follow him here.

He did not know if others thought the same, but on this unusual stretch of stony beach… the strange "small creatures" gathered here, the boat pushed ashore, and themselves—all signs pointed to this being the special place.

The Father's will, the lake's choice, some inevitable outcome—a hidden confluence fate had arranged for those who had strayed for different reasons.

An epiphanic clarity washed through his mind: the answer lay ahead. The answer to the months-long mystery, to the heretical worship, to the historical enigma—perhaps even the final answer to a few insignificant lives.

A question he had once found impossible to empathize with surfaced in his mind:

【Don't you want to know?】

Many things flashed through his thoughts: his first hearing of the Father's deeds, his vow to become a guardian of doctrine, receiving his theological degree, assuming his current post, half a lifetime spent where the spire of the Mother Cathedral was visible.

Having unknowingly traveled so far, how could he not want to know the final answer?

Yet now, standing just one step from understanding the miracle, the heavenly realm, he realized his heart was not as fervent as he'd imagined—like a knitted overcoat draped over armor: beautiful, comfortable, but when it grew dirty and heavy, shedding it mattered little.

"No, I don't." He cared nothing for whether an afterlife existed, whether the Church represented that supreme will, or even whether a benevolent supreme will truly existed at all.

He had come only to resolve the great problem he had first discovered—and nothing more.

Green turned and walked deeper into the stony beach.

Confused, Kraft—who had not yet synced with the shift—followed the group, unsure what exactly Green had rejected, but the outcome seemed good: the rift within the team had lessened, no one lingered at the periphery, and resolve hardened to press inward.

The outward-tilting rock clusters grew denser and taller, like waves crashing toward them, standing in dense, towering rows.

Most of the clusters bore hollowed-out niches resembling shrines, their craftsmanship matching the traits of the lost people. When slivers of light entered, they occasionally illuminated muddy, writhing shadows wrapped around pale, hard objects.

The water did not vanish with depth—it still lingered at their feet, pushed to the surface by pressure between narrow fissures, gushing out through unexpected Kong Dong and gaps, vanishing instantly into the gravel-strewn ground.

Mist drifted through the stone forest, carrying with it dampness and cold—and other, more ominous signals: a cruel scent that triggered instinctive alertness, dark stains of chilling hue, the unmistakable sign of a fellow life extinguished.

The traces of bodies torn apart had been diluted and oxidized, reduced to a discontinuous trail of deep brown, guiding them toward the remnants.

Scattered bones coated in a reddish-brown hue—still remarkably fresh. The soft tissues once attached had been "washed away"—Kraft could think of no better, odd term—like specimens in a lab, chemically treated to preserve only certain parts, "clean" to an extreme.

Fabric and chainmail were entangled, inseparable; reddish-brown stained the woven threads and iron rings, unmistakably matching the material worn by their own group.

The staggering volume of bloodshed revealed the horrific ordeal they had suffered—yet the traces differed from what was expected.

No time to mourn the other party—after inspecting, Green and Brother Wading reached the same conclusion: he had not been dragged here; he had come on his own.

It appeared he had been severely wounded, then fled in desperate flight, finally collapsing from blood loss. The winding path showed multiple detours and backtracks—evidence he had lost all sense of direction.

With permission granted, Kraft stepped forward, lifting aside the fabric to examine the entire skeleton, now scattered due to the loss of connective tissue, hoping to find damage that might indicate the nature of his injuries—and thus reveal what enemy they were about to face.

But reality once again contradicted his assumptions: the skeleton showed no obvious missing parts, but instead exhibited uneven, abnormal growths.

Not at common joints or epiphyses, but concentrated on the left mandible, scapula, and ribcage—nearly half the upper body displayed bizarre, extreme alterations in bone structure.

New bone growths sprouted like inverted spines, needle-tips, wildly extending two to three finger-widths; not a single flat or long bone escaped—so densely packed they obscured the original surface entirely.

They pierced surrounding organs and vessels, bursting through the skin from within, tearing the body open from the inside out.