Chapter 330: Illiquid Assets

“This place feels bigger than it looked from outside, but I’ve never heard anyone mention it. Did you ever hear of it, Dominic?”

The monk with the holy pick hung at his waist raised his lantern, gazing up at the ceiling, where vast murals of flowers and angels adorned the empty spaces between the ribs, preventing this corridor connecting living quarters to storage from becoming too monotonous.

Because it was indoors, these intricate patterns—painted by artists with aching necks—were merely faded and dim, not so degraded that the heavenly and starry scenes between red and blue pigments could no longer be discerned.

Even though this corridor saw few visitors beyond those managing daily chores, the brushwork remained soft and precise, accurately tracing every line and texture.

He had taken some simplified church medical courses and knew that a large portion of patients suffering from spinal and neck ailments came from this group of ceiling painters.

“We weren’t even born over twenty years ago—if it was sealed due to some scandal, it’s normal we never heard of it.” Dominic glanced at the ceiling murals; even by the aesthetic standards he’d developed during his time in Dunling, they were quite impressive.

It was unlikely that a local church could fund such a monastery with this scale and detail—any monastery receiving special attention would be officially recorded.

Students like us, lacking family backgrounds, usually began scouting future postings well before graduation, and even remote church branches were known to us.

If there were an abandoned large monastery near Westmin, rumors of its reopening would surely circulate every year.

Oddly, they still didn’t even know the name of this monastery.

It was as if the builder and its name had been erased along with the inscriptions on wood and stone.

“That is indeed strange.” Thoughts drifted through his mind, flashes of carved and vandalized traces recurring—original inscriptions were clearly unreadable, yet in memory, he felt he should have been able to read something.

It was like viewing something through worn glass—no matter how he adjusted distance, it remained blurred, yet at certain hard-to-reproduce angles, he’d catch glimpses of something, compelling him to keep checking, as if hooked by invisible claws.

Dominic took a deep breath of the cool night air, shaking off this inexplicable feeling; he was more curious about the weapon strapped to his companion’s waist than about the mysterious thing he couldn’t understand.

The heavy pickhead tugged his belt sideways, striking his leg armor in a rhythmic beat, the sound echoing and overlapping through the space.

“Field, I don’t understand why you chose this. Why not pick a sword like everyone else? It makes you look like some old peasant forcibly conscripted from the fields by a lord.”

“Vulgar opinion,” Field, the monk, sneered dismissively. “I bet you all picked yours just because everyone else did.”

“But Father Green uses a sword too—doesn’t that mean there’s nothing wrong with it?” Dominic immediately cited the classic success case.

“That’s exactly why I say you only imitate.”

“Clang! Clang!” Field tapped the metal plates on his body; for lightness, they wore only breastplates and partial limb armor. “Think, my friend. Think.”

“Think about what Master Kraft gave us—this isn’t cheap. Dozens of sets, enough to make even a bishop wince.”

“Are you planning to wear this and go fight heretical sects in Dunling City, the ones who can’t even afford leather armor, like the Inquisition does?”

Dominic suddenly realized something. “You mean…”

“Exactly. There will come a time when we face opponents worthy of this armor. I’m just getting used to it early.” He hefted the heavy weapon, satisfied with its solid weight. “And look at Master Kraft’s two students—which one plays with the long thin piece of metal?”

“That makes sense, but why didn’t you say this sooner?”

“Because one pick for armor is reasonable. Eleven picks? That’s stupid.”

“You’re always the cleverest among us.”

“Thank you for the compliment.”

Dominic fell silent for a long while, deciding not to discuss weapons further.

Entering the open warehouse doors, many were already busy—mostly craftsmen from the team, guiding apprentices and hired laborers to count, sort, move, and store supplies overnight, calculating preliminary repair needs and reporting shortages to the team going down the mountain for procurement at dawn.

The monks’ duty was to take turns on guard to ensure safety.

Honestly, it was hard to understand what the mandatory armed guard requirement was meant to prevent—but the church school had many other inexplicable rules, with severe punishments for violations; compared to those, this was quite reasonable. Caution was never a bad habit.

Especially when superiors were generous, their words often felt inherently reasonable.

As time crept toward midnight, to combat drowsiness, the two stood up simultaneously and began walking around, trying to find something useful to do.

As a large monastery’s warehouse, it needed to store everything for daily life, so its scale was naturally substantial—but it didn’t require expensive arched vault construction. Instead, it was a complex structure composed of many differently functional compartments.

The largest area was grain storage, packed with sealed wooden barrels for grain and ceramic jars for legumes, all raised on bricks to avoid moisture and rodents.

On the rafters hung dried and salted meats—yellowish-white salt crusts glistened on their surfaces, likely pork, beef, and fish.

Of course, even the best preservation couldn’t defeat time; laborers were heartbrokenly pushing entire barrels of spoiled food out for disposal.

Dominic noticed the older assistant and bodyguard to the professor overseeing this, ensuring laborers placed certain sealed small jars into wooden boxes, nailed shut, and carried away.

“What’s this?”

He picked up a few jars and shook them—inside, he heard the sound of granules rubbing or the thick, sticky feel of liquid.

“Salt, seasonings, spices, oil, honey—things like that. The master ordered them all destroyed and discarded, not a single grain left.”

“Isn’t that a bit…”

“Too wasteful?” To his surprise, Kraft’s right-hand man answered directly. “For safety reasons, even honey—which doesn’t spoil—must be destroyed.”

“Please continue your patrol. I’ll stay here until everything is cleared out.”

His eyes held a trace of suspicion—he clearly regarded everyone as a potential threat.

Dominic couldn’t deny he’d just had a fleeting, shameful thought—he quickly repented the greed that had risen in his heart and awkwardly left the scene.

Field bowed his head thoughtfully, making up for his companion’s lack of farewell etiquette.

“The captain is truly a man of self-discipline,” Dominic said, flushing with shame as they left the man’s sight. “I owe him an apology for my prejudices.”

The knightly order’s suspiciously frequent commercial dealings had led him to believe Kraft was overly concerned with money, inconsistent with the traditional church image of detachment from worldly affairs.

If he were in the same position, even if he didn’t keep the well-preserved spices and honey, he’d at least sell them.

“Oh, no need for that,” Field pointed to a small room at the corridor’s end, its door wide open, brightly lit by candles, where two familiar silhouettes stood, metallic glints reflecting off them.

Hearing footsteps, they turned around, casually slipping ledgers and pens behind their backs.

Now he could see clearly—it was Kraft and Monk Raymond.

Though it was deep into the night, they hadn’t left the warehouse; instead, they lingered in the deepest room, their faces lit with smiles barely concealed beneath solemn expressions.

Judging by the door’s design—twice as thick as normal, with dual locks—it clearly had a special purpose.

Indeed, it was the monastery’s reliquary.

Most of the shelves were empty and covered in dust; the former owners had clearly taken portable treasures—gold and silver religious icons, statues, sacred chalices and plates.

But large items—gilded multi-branch candlesticks, reliquary cabinets, marble altars inlaid with silver—had been too bulky to move quickly and were left behind.

If he remembered correctly, he’d just heard words like “pry” and “melt.”

“Oh, Dominic and Field—night watch duty is tough. The third room on the left has snacks ready—go eat something.” Kraft smiled at them with unusual sincerity.

“Raymond and I are checking for any suspicious inscriptions that need to be destroyed.”