Chapter 5: Holy Swordsman

Safely leaving the apartment, Lei En walked all the way and tossed the bag in his hand into a roadside trash can five blocks away.

After walking a bit further, he entered a station, and before long, a bus pulled up and stopped by the roadside.

A large amount of white smoke billowed from the rear of the vehicle; its shape was similar to a bus on Diqiu, only larger and more crude, divided into upper and lower decks, with no glass windows or air conditioning, and could seat over a hundred people if fully packed.

Lei En squeezed onto the bus and handed the conductor a copper liso he had prepared earlier from his pocket.

The conductor was a middle-aged woman; she tore off a ticket and handed it over, her gaze lingering on Lei En's face for a moment, and a smile appeared on her previously expressionless face: "Young man, there are still seats in the back, please go on in."

"Thank you." Lei En nodded slightly and pulled his sun hat lower.

After squeezing into the back of the carriage, he thought to himself that sometimes being too handsome wasn't a good thing; when he needed to keep a low profile, he easily drew attention.

"It seems I need to put on some disguise on my face, so as not to stand out too much."

Lei En had just sat down when the driver rang the large bell at the front of the bus, making a "clang clang clang" sound to warn pedestrians to get out of the way, and then the bus lurched into motion, gradually picking up speed.

The bus headed east, with the terminus at Lienflar, the poorest area in Longshandecheng, disdainfully called the slum district by the citizens.

In the early days, most of the residents in the Lien district were country folk who had just come to the city to make a living, unable to afford high rent; they worked in factories during the day and could only live in the most remote part of the city at night, and over time the slum district took shape.

No matter which world, poor regions are always a breeding ground that nurtures criminals.

Lien was the largest district in Longshande, located in the east of the city, occupying nearly a third of the entire city, but its public security was the worst in Longshande; vagrants, gang members, lawless elements, unemployed drifters, and hundreds of thousands of poor people all lived mixed together, with many dangerous figures lurking among them, and murder cases occurred almost every day, not to mention countless shady deals that also took place here.

Anyone with any semblance of respectability would not want to live in Lienflar.

This was exactly Lei En's purpose; he didn't want to be recognized by former classmates and friends, and then have the news leak to Ramzi. And those who could enter the academy all had decent financial means, and would rarely come to the dangerous slum district.

Hiding in Lienflar for a while would also make things convenient for his future actions.

His gaze swept across the bus.

Because it wasn't rush hour, the bus wasn't full; the passengers' clothing was mostly very plain, or more accurately, shabby. Everyone bore a deep sense of exhaustion, sitting there with numb expressions, seemingly tormented by a hopeless life, struggling to stay alive.

Lei En withdrew his gaze, leaned back against the rusted seat back, and narrowed his eyes to rest.

Before long, the bus entered the Lien district.

The scenery along the streets gradually became monotonous, the roads grew narrower, the houses more and more densely packed, and both sides of the streets were filled with clamor; all kinds of vendors crowded the streets, hawking their wares at the top of their lungs—bread, cigarettes, fruit, beer, newspapers... as well as numerous common goods.

Under the wall corners along the street, vagrants could be seen everywhere.

They were barely clothed; some sat there begging, some lay on the ground motionless like corpses, yet not a single passing pedestrian spared them a glance.

The bus driver kept ringing the bell to make the crowded pedestrians clear the way.

Even sitting on the bus, one could smell the stench from the street from time to time; the odor came from the drainage ditches along the road, nauseating enough to make one want to vomit, but the passengers were all long accustomed to it, and not a single person even complained.

Lei En didn't ride to the last stop; he got off midway.

As soon as he stepped off the bus, seven or eight ragged children surrounded him; each one was sallow and emaciated, their eyes full of longing and cunning.

Lei En didn't let his sympathy overflow;

few of these begging children were probably truly innocent, more or less working part-time as pickpockets. He pressed down on the money hidden close to his body without leaving a trace, and before he could be completely surrounded, he quickened his pace and ran out of the station, shaking off the group of children.

He walked carefully along the street, planning to find a cheap inn to stay in as a base for the time being.

Walking through the streets of the Lien district, Lei En's biggest impression was that there were a lot of people—people everywhere.

This reminded him of videos of Indian slums he had watched online before; similarly packed with people, wherever you went you were stared at by pairs of eyes full of ill intent, making one's skin crawl.

But even in another world, the Lien district was much better than the Indian slums.

At least among the three traits of "dirty, messy, and poor," the Lien district only had messy and poor, and wasn't that dirty.

Suddenly, an open space appeared at the intersection ahead.

It was a small plaza; on one side of the plaza stood a majestic church. The church wasn't particularly large in scale, with two rows of tall round columns neatly arranged on its facade, and the walls and dome were built of stone blocks, giving a sense of weightiness and epic grandeur.

This was a church of the Justice Church; there were many churches like this in Longshande, each responsible for a designated area.

"No wonder everyone avoids approaching the plaza." Lei En suddenly understood in his heart.

The Empire had three officially supported orthodox churches, and the Church of the God of Justice was one of them.

Although the God of Justice didn't have the most followers, this deity was the most awe-inspiring; people both revered and feared Him, and unless necessary, all tried to avoid dealing with His church.

Because the divine portfolio of the God of Justice, "Tyr," included "justice," "order," "law," "fairness," and "protection," most of His followers were engaged in judicial and public security-related work.

Under normal circumstances, those who got involved with the Justice Church were either victims or those being judged.

Neither situation was anything good, so people naturally kept their distance.

Besides the Justice Church, the Empire's other two orthodox churches were the God of Magic's "Church of Knowledge and Magic" and the Earth Mother Goddess's "Earth Church," the three collectively known as the Three God Churches.

The majority of the Empire's subjects believed in one of these three deities.

Lei En's family were all followers of the God of Magic; in his memories, his mother Malinda was an especially devout believer, praying to the goddess before every meal and before bed, or whenever she had a spare moment. She was a teacher at the church school in their hometown and also a missionary, spreading the light of the goddess's wisdom to the students.

However, the previous Lei En didn't seem very devout in his faith in the goddess, praying very rarely, only once every ten days or half a month.

As he passed by the plaza, Lei En glanced toward the church interior.

He was about to withdraw his gaze when, right at that moment, a resounding bell toll rang from the top of the church, carrying far and wide.

At the same time, a squad of guards in gleaming silver armor emerged from the church's main entrance, descending the stone steps one by one with loud, uniform footsteps, and arrived at the plaza.

Such a commotion immediately made the pedestrians on the street stop and gather toward the plaza.

"What happened?"

Lei En stood like everyone else, curiously watching it all.

More and more people gathered at the edge of the plaza, and it was soon packed tight; Lei En stood at the very front, and even if he wanted to leave, he couldn't squeeze his way out, forced to become a member of the onlooking crowd.

The silver-armored guards spread out in the middle of the plaza; their armor reflected light, their long swords planted on the stone-paved ground, both hands resting on the ends of the sword hilts, motionless like statues, radiating a sense of solemnity and authority.

Lei En was only a few steps away from the guards and took the opportunity to observe them.

The guards' armor was a type of full plate armor, extremely finely crafted, forged from complete metal plates and assembled from multiple parts, including breastplate, pauldrons, arm guards, gauntlets, leg guards, combat boots, and so on; the elbow and knee joints were connected with intricate locking clasps, and combined with the nearly fully enclosed helmets that only had a T-shaped slit at the front, the entire set of armor was astonishingly heavy, like a tin can.

With such heavy armor, an ordinary person might not even be able to walk after putting it on, yet these guards moved freely, standing there with great ease.

This detail made Lei En sense a formidable power, and he suddenly remembered—these guards were the Justice Church's "Holy Sword Attendants."

The Justice Church had an extremely powerful extraordinary profession called the "Holy Swordsman," typically wearing heavy armor and skilled in swordsmanship and the power of the mind.

Every Holy Swordsman is carefully raised by the Church from childhood; they are the most faithful believers of the God of Justice, carrying out the God of Justice's oracles, maintaining order, guarding law and justice, and are the God of Justice's spokesmen in the mortal world!

And before becoming Holy Swordsmen, these people were called Holy Sword Squires.

Holy Sword Squires are still ordinary people, only after long-term training possessing strength greater than that of ordinary people, serving as reserve candidates for Holy Swordsmen, or lifelong guards of the Church.

Clang!

Another toll of the bell rang out from the church, and a group of people walked out from it once more.

At their head was a tall, middle-aged man; he too wore full armor, with a white cape draped behind him, but wore no helmet, allowing people to see his face clearly.

His face was resolute, his gaze sharp; he had short brown hair and a trimmed beard on his chin, a very powerfully built frame, and a steady yet forceful stride, walking with an upright and dignified bearing that made everyone who saw him think: this is a man worth trusting, someone you can rely on.

The middle-aged man carried a sword in his hand, longer and wider than an ordinary longsword, yet not a two-handed sword; it looked suited to both single-handed wielding and two-handed gripping.

Lei En noticed that a golden balance scale was engraved on his breastplate; the central support shaft of the scale was a sword, its tip pointing downward, thrust into a legal codex!

"This is the holy emblem of the God of Justice." Lei En had seen this insignia before and recognized it at a glance.

The people called out the middle-aged man's name: "Lord Dempus!"

"Holy Swordsmen are truly imposing..."

"Of course — Lord Dempus is no ordinary Holy Swordsman. They say he broke through to Mid-stage long ago, and may soon be promoted and transferred away."

Behind Dempus followed two guards, carrying a black platform between them.

The platform was cast from metal, only half a person's height, with a sunken notch in the middle, its surface covered with dark red blotches that looked like bloodstains left behind by something splattered.

As soon as this black platform appeared, it immediately drew gasps from the townsfolk.

Someone nearby cried out in a frightened whisper: "The guillotine! A trial ceremony! Has someone fallen? Or has a curse flared up?"

Then, people saw the answer.

A haggard-looking man was escorted out by guards, wrapped in a silver chain that bound his upper body tightly, hands tied behind his back, feet shackled in fetters, struggling step by step down the stairs in front of the church.

"Luis!"

Among the crowd, some townsfolk recognized the man bound in chains.

The man named Luis had been in a daze; suddenly hearing someone call his name, he snapped to attention and shouted: "Let me go! What are you going to do?"