Chapter 1 He's the One?!

Seeing the withered old man before them, Hao Ren and Lily cried out in surprise, "It's you?!"

The person before them was none other than the mysterious old man they had encountered after the ancient phantom at the monitoring station!

At that time, the old man said a lot of strange things, but just as Hao Ren and his group wanted to catch up and ask him to explain, he disappeared out of thin air. They never expected to meet him here, under these circumstances!

The old man sitting in the chair showed no surprise when he saw Hao Ren and his group. He slowly stood up, his body, which looked as thin as a rake and extremely weak, was as steady as a rock: "I saw your arrival in a dream. Welcome, guests from afar."

"Dream?" Hao Ren repeated the word. "What we saw before was..."

The old man nodded slightly: "This is the world of nightmares. The boundary between dreams and reality has long disappeared, so don't delve into it too deeply."

"Are you the Pope?" Kalaxius finally couldn't help but speak. "The Pope I know is His Majesty Augustus VII. I've never seen you before! Who exactly are you?"

"You have seen me. You have seen every me," the old man, who claimed to be the Pope, simply smiled in the face of Kalaxius's questioning, speaking in a mysterious and difficult-to-understand manner as always. As he spoke, his appearance began to change constantly, transforming into one different-looking old man and middle-aged man after another. His voice also gradually changed, becoming a composite sound as if countless people were speaking at the same time. "I am Charles I, I am Harold III, I am Augustus VII, and I am Saint Ivan… I am each of them, and I am all of them… I am the Pope, every Pope you know."

Kalaxius's eyes widened. In the old man's constant changes, he saw one familiar face after another—faces that had appeared in the Saint Corridor of the Holy Image Palace, painted into life-size portraits and hung neatly on both sides of the corridor. Since becoming an assistant bishop, he had walked through that corridor time and time again, and he knew the face of every Pope by heart. He also saw Augustus VII. That was the old man's last transformation. That familiar voice and expression only lasted for a few seconds, but it made him tremble from the bottom of his heart!

"You… you…" Kalaxius pointed at the old man with a trembling finger, unable to speak.

"You're a collection of all the previous Popes?" Hao Ren, who was more familiar with similar situations, looked at the old man with curiosity. "Then what are those corrupted creatures we encountered in the real world? And what about that Augustus VII who blocked our way in Asu Manli?"

"Lockmarton thought it could easily corrupt a saint, but it didn't know that the people of the Holy See never had the habit of surrendering," the old man said indifferently, as if the things he was about to say were happening to someone else. "For the sake of faith, we can abandon our bodies, tear apart our souls, and destroy everything we have, leaving only an obsession. In the end, Lockmarton can only corrupt an empty shell. If there is really no other choice, we would rather choose self-destruction, come to this world and perish together with the claws of chaos, than surrender."

Hao Ren vaguely guessed the truth of the matter, but there were still many things that needed to be explained by the other party: "So those in the real world are just corrupted husks? Wait a minute… we encountered a very strange nightmare monster that claimed to be…"

"Benedict III made a noble sacrifice in order to pass the message to the outside world," the Pope's collective shook his head gently. "Originally, he had already failed. He lost his self-awareness before he could send the message. We just didn't expect him to meet you, to meet Head Wolf. By a twist of fate, he still managed to convey some information."

"So you… you have been controlling the situation all along?" Kalaxius's voice trembled slightly. "Your Majesty, why didn't you tell me?"

The first half of his sentence was a dialogue with the Pope's collective, but the second half was clearly a question to Augustus VII.

"Because Lockmarton monitors everyone's dreams, these secrets have always been limited to the sleepless dead," the Pope's collective explained. "After the Popes of the past die, they are buried under the Holy Image Palace. The saints, sages, and living saints of various periods are also buried in the mausoleums all over the Holy City after their death. A part of these heroic souls are summoned and enter the eternal battlefield of the Abyss of Oblivion, fighting against Lockmarton's erosion of the real world together with the Warden Corps. The other part is linked together, becoming the will of the dead who protect the living…"

Gordom, the King of Mountains, nodded: "That's right."

The Pope's collective nodded to the King of Mountains, and continued: "After the Wardens fell into chaos, we realized the changes in the situation, and deduced the worst-case scenario. The early plans began at that time. However, no one expected that Lockmarton would break free so quickly. Not only was it continuously polluting the Abyss of Oblivion, but it also infiltrated its aura into the real world through the corrupted Warden Corps—the remains of the saints were the first to be eroded, followed by the souls…"

"We realized that this pollution was irreversible, and if we were trapped in the real world and only relied on the Chaos War every hundred years to passively resist, then mortals would never be able to resist the power from the nightmare world. Not to mention counterattacking, this can't even be called an effective defense.

"However, the gate to the Abyss of Oblivion is sealed. To break through it, unless we obtain the power of the gods, or find that crucial key, we have neither of these two things…

"But a turning point appeared in a situation we did not expect. It is not appropriate to call it a turning point, because it is not only our opportunity, but also Lockmarton's opportunity—a few months ago, a fragment containing powerful power penetrated time and space and crashed into Asu Man."

Hao Ren couldn't help but interrupt when he heard this: "Wait, are you saying that you used the power of that crystal to teleport the City of God's Grace in?!"

The Pope shook his head: "We can't use the power of that fragment. We just slightly borrowed the 'oscillation' it caused. That impact damaged Asu Man's function, causing loopholes in the seal that imprisoned Lockmarton, but it also opened up a path for us, a path that only the dead could see. Thus, the plan that had been prepared for thousands of years could finally be implemented. When Lockmarton's power found Augustus VII, all the conditions were ripe. So Augustus VII sacrificed his body and became a member of 'us' as the last member. When Lockmarton thought it had finally successfully corrupted and occupied a Pope, its connection with the Holy Image Palace also became the beacon for us to hunt it down. Although it was very vigilant and cut off its connection with the real world as soon as possible, we still came… to seek blood vengeance from it!"

The old Pope narrowed his eyes slightly as he said this, and finally revealed some emotion on his face, which was an expression of pride and determination.

Gordom, the King of Mountains, was shocked by this grand and decisive plan. He couldn't help but stare at the Pope, carefully examining him for a long time: "You always manage to surprise people… I never thought that mortals could do this…"

The Pope quietly glanced at Gordom: "We are mortals, but mortals also have backbone."

"I admit, I never thought you would have this kind of power," Gordom shook his head. Although this vast cathedral could accommodate giants like him, it still seemed narrow to him after staying for a long time. "But you must also know that Lockmarton is an evil god. It is not easy to deal with—although you have transferred the most powerful armed forces of the Holy See and the souls of saints accumulated over thousands of years to this world, the sum of these forces may not be enough to destroy Lockmarton."

"At least we can strike it hard and give the world of our descendants at least thousands of years of peace," the old Pope said. "We have no choice. Rather than sit and wait for death, it is better to fight to the death, so that we die like a Holy See person."

Such a resolute statement touched everyone present. Lily couldn't help but step forward: "Well said! Don't worry, old man, we're here to help!"

The Pope nodded: "I know—it seems that the goddess is still protecting us, sending a powerful reinforcement at the darkest and most critical moment. I just don't know what your plans are?"

Hao Ren stepped forward: "I have the most powerful means of attack. If I'm not mistaken, I should be the only one here who can truly destroy Lockmarton."

Izhaks continued: "But first we have to find Lockmarton's main body and understand some of its properties—for example, under what circumstances can it be destroyed, whether it has any backup plans for hiding or resurrection, and how strong the counterattack it can mobilize is, and what form it takes."

"And and!" Lily also chimed in, becoming energetic when talking about this kind of head-splitting topic. "If Lockmarton is killed, what will happen to this nightmare world? We have to prepare a backup plan, right…"

"Does that Lock-whatever-it-is have any hidden ultimate moves? Does it drop good stuff after it's killed?" Little Elizabeth also jumped out, and one could tell that she had been cooped up on the Petrified Tortoise Rock Table playing games for the past month.

"One question at a time, one question at a time," Hao Ren quickly waved his hand to quiet everyone down, and turned to look at the Pope. "Let's talk about where to kill and how much to kill first."

The Pope nodded slightly after seeing that this group of people had finally summarized a definite question: "Beyond the Scorched Earth Plain, on the border of the Chaotic Sea, there is a Spiral Hill. It was once a node in the prison that imprisoned Lockmarton, and it was also the first node to collapse. Now, Lockmarton is entrenched in that place."