Chapter 444 Meeting the God (Huge update with 10k+ words, requesting monthly tickets~)

[1.1-At the beginning of the Epoch, gray fog permeated.]

[1.2-Silence filled the heavens and earth, and ice froze all the seas.]

[1.3-The Lords expelled the silence and began a new Epoch.]

[1.4-And then, there was fire.]

[1.5-As the fire burned, it stirred the wind. As the wind cooled, it gave birth to water. As the water stilled, it condensed into earth. As the earth accumulated, it conceived fire.]

[1.6-Endless cycle, this is the Initial Soul.]

[1.7-Using the Initial Soul, the Lords created all things from the gray fog.]

[1.8-And in their own image, they used the Earth Soul to create Man, and thus the races were born.]

[1.9-The Lord of Fire bestowed the Soul. The Lord of Wind bestowed the Bone. The Lord of Judgment bestowed the Blood.]

[1.10-And finally, bestowed this world upon us.]

[————The Covenant, New Epoch]

Dawn.

Beside a quietly burning pale golden elemental lamp, a tall man with graying hair sat at a table, reading a thick iron-bound scripture.

He wore a white and gold High Priest's robe, with obvious wrinkles around his eyes and mouth, but even though his current appearance was somewhat aged, it didn't detract from the spirited look of the man in his youth.

"Clack."

Suddenly, he closed the iron-bound Covenant in his hand, making a loud metallic clanging sound.

The man raised his head, his azure eyes, like the sky, turned to the coastal area of ​​Twilight City outside the window, at the dark clouds that had begun to densely cover the sky.

"There are clouds, there is wind, today is not suitable for going to sea... but I still have to go."

The priest murmured to himself, stood up, then picked up the heavy holy book on the table, hung it on his waist, and locked it with an iron chain, making another clanging sound of metal colliding.

Priests are not allowed to carry swords, knives, guns, and other weapons with sharp edges or pointed protrusions that could easily harm others. In fact, even for dining knives, priests would only use safety knives with serrations on only one side.

Because the Lords loved everyone, they established various 'Oaths', one of which was to restrain their priests—priests are not allowed to use weapons and tools made to harm others, nor are they allowed to initiate any battles, only to act in self-defense.

Similarly, for any reason, anyone who attacks a priest is committing a serious crime, unless the priest takes the initiative to break the 'Oath' and initiates the attack first.

However, it would be too late to find a suitable weapon when a priest needed to defend himself... and the iron-bound Covenant, specially made for this purpose, was a good self-defense weapon.

A standard Covenant contains seventeen books in five volumes, totaling one thousand nine hundred pages, and weighs nine kilograms.

It is thick, sturdy, and can be used as a shield for defense, or wrapped with an iron chain and used as a meteor hammer.

The Covenant strengthens one's faith, while also strengthening the safety of one's body, and is an essential item for most priests for home travel, evangelism, and self-defense.

At this time, the gray-haired priest had made all the preparations for his trip. He extinguished the elemental lamp beside him, and silently clasped his hands together in the darkness, making a simple prayer.

Now, Aimon was about to go out to sea, to the sea area where the divine miracle appeared last night, to pay homage to the god he truly believed in.

"Good morning, Lord Aimon, are you going out so early? Are you going to venerate the divine descent?"

Leaving the room and walking down the stairs, Aimon met the hotel owner who was cleaning at the door, an old man with some white scales on his arms and already graying hair.

Raising his head, the boss looked at the priest with surprise, fully armed, as if he was going to crusade against pirates. He lowered his head slightly and whispered a blessing: "Glory to our Lord, judgment and justice—may you have a safe journey."

"Glory to our Lord, judgment and justice. Thank you for your blessing."

Aimon politely bowed slightly to the elder, then took out a small bag of silver coins from his arms and handed it to the other party: "Going to sea will take some time, please keep my room for me and don't let anyone else enter, thank you."

"It should be, your room will be reserved for you." The elderly boss put down his broom, took the silver coins, squinted his eyes, counted out a small portion from it, and then wanted to hand the bag containing most of the silver coins back to Aimon: "We are compatriots, and you are still a priest of our Lord, you shouldn't receive so much from you—"

"If we are compatriots, we shouldn't be so polite."

With his hands behind his back, Aimon smiled gently. He did not take the money bag, but turned around and left directly, walking out of the hotel door.

"Hey!"

The boss wanted to catch up, but his legs and feet were really not flexible. When he walked out of the hotel door, Aimon's tall figure had disappeared at the corner of the street leading to the port, lost in the darkness of the early morning.

Since this was the case, the boss could only accept the bag of silver coins. He returned to the hotel a little sadly, continued to clean, and muttered to himself: "If I weren't really old, I would also like to witness our Lord's miracle..."

"I can only hope that Lord Aimon has a smooth journey."

At this time, walking on the street leading to the port, Aimon breathed in the salty smell of the sea, feeling the special atmosphere of Twilight City, this port city.

At this moment before dawn, many people in the city had already started working. Dock workers and fishermen were hurrying to prepare for today's departure—it was almost low tide, and if they didn't take advantage of this time to go out to sea, it would take several times the effort.

But today, there were many people who were not workers and fishermen, who were also walking on the road to the port.

The elemental lamps on the side of the road flickered with dim yellow light, illuminating the bustling crowd. They stepped on the gray stone-paved streets, mostly fully armed, with excited expressions. They would also greet each other when they met.

Aimon was naturally no exception. Most people recognized him as a priest and saluted him, and Aimon returned the greetings one by one with a smile.

If one had keen eyes, one would notice that these people had traces of white scales on their bodies.

The core residents of the Holy Fire Kingdom are mostly Fire Folk. That is, life forms that possess the Soul of Fire, the Bone of Wind, and the Blood of Judgment.

Most Fire Folk are humanoids, but some of them have white scales on certain parts of their bodies, or their eyes appear as dragon pupils, which are symbols of the Blood of Judgment.

There are also some people who have exoskeletons on certain parts of their bodies, which is likely because their ancestors had once been favored by the Lord of Wind, or were descendants of those who had intermarried with the Wind Folk.

Those with this abnormal characteristic have closer relationships with each other than ordinary Fire Folk. They call each other compatriots, just like Aimon and the hotel owner, and similarly, they are more inclined to worship the gods related to their own physical characteristics.

Yesterday evening, at high tide, everyone in Twilight City saw the Holy Marks of the Divine Descent in the distance. This was simply supreme good news for the believers of the Lord of Judgment. Going out to sea to approach the area where the Divine Descent appeared was something everyone wanted to do.

Of course, this is just a characteristic, they are all Fire Folk, even if they grow exoskeletons, they are just Fire Folk with Wind Folk characteristics. These are two completely different races.

The main difference between the Fire Folk and the Wind Folk is whether the bones are inside or outside, but regardless of which race, they all respect the Three Gods, only the Lord of Fire and the Lord of Wind are the patron deities of their people.

However, there are very few Wind Folk on the Holy Fire Continent.

It is recorded in the 'Farewell Record' following the 'New Epoch' chapter of the Covenant that after the Three Gods worked together to create the New Epoch, the Lord of Wind took most of the Wind Folk and a small number of Fire Folk to another continent.

Then the Fire Folk lit the Holy Fire in the Holy Fire City and established the first year of the New Epoch Elemental Calendar.

Two hundred years later, people crossed the Joyful Sea and discovered the new continent and the kingdom of the Wind Folk, proving the truthfulness of the 'Covenant' records.

In the Holy Fire Kingdom, everyone is a believer of the Lord of Fire.

They worship the first flame that was lit at the beginning of the New Epoch, believing that it is a symbol of all beginnings.

Whether it is the Holy Fire in each port, guiding ships, or the Central Holy Fire burning in the Great Shrine of the Central Sanctuary, they are burning to guide people to live on the right path.

However, because everyone is a believer, this has become a kind of culture. In addition to the Lord of Fire, people will also respectively believe in the Lord of Wind and the Lord of Judgment.

The followers of the Lord of Wind are mostly scouts, adventurers, explorers, eccentric inventors, and so on.

The followers of the Lord of Judgment are mostly judges, defenders, wandering adjudicators, and constables.

Only those with truly profound knowledge can simultaneously worship the Three Gods, which represents supreme glory, being favored by the Three Lords at the same time.

Only those who have been acknowledged by the Three Gods at the same time can become the leader of a town, and the High Priest above the priests, this is a rigid requirement.

And Aimon, is a believer of the Lord of Judgment, a Judgment Priest.

His azure pupils, and the few white scales behind his ears, are clear proof of the manifestation of the bloodline of the Lord of Judgment—when Aimon is excited, his pupils will even transform into dragon eyes, which is an extremely rare characteristic among the followers of the Lord of Judgment.

In addition to his work as a priest, he also works as a professional defender and a wandering adjudicator... in short, he defends people, and as a mobile adjudicator, provides services to suburban residents who cannot go to court to try and adjudicate the crimes of criminals.

This time he came to Twilight City because some time ago, there was a raid on the temple by an elite pirate fleet.

A total of three large pirate ships joined forces to raid the Twilight City Temple. They broke through the temple's defenses, seized the Source Water Soul Shard preserved within, but because they feared the divine punishment of the Lord of Judgment, they did not kill anyone after completing their mission, and returned to the sea.

The Central Sanctuary believes that this raid was too suspicious, and the pirates' opportunity to raid the temple was grasped too accurately—Twilight City High Priest Gero happened to be visiting local farmers in the suburbs who had suffered crop failures due to heavy snow, taking more than half of the temple's priests and transcendents with him, so that the Twilight Temple, with its empty personnel, had no power to fight back against the pirates' attack.

Therefore, the Sanctuary sent Aimon to investigate the situation and verify whether there were traitors and informants within the temple.

"...Since the rebellion more than a hundred years ago, heresy has spread wider and wider, and even within the temple, there is no longer 100% piety."

Recalling his mission, Aimon couldn't help but sigh. While checking whether he had brought all the necessary props with him, he looked at the still dark sea in the distance, his heart filled with worry and confusion: "But the Lords have always been silent, never responding, allowing these lies to fill the world."

"Why?"

With such doubts in his heart, he had now arrived at the Twilight City port.

The Twilight City port has a classical shape, built from large blocks of rock, most of which were laid by the first wave of Holy Fire City explorers three hundred years ago. They used stone pillars that were difficult for seawater to corrode to support the docks and moorings, and artificially built dikes to keep the port calm.

Next to the port, on a protruding coastline, stood a towering temple. This temple had a huge dome design and a bell tower, making it look majestic and spectacular—but one could see that there was a very obvious semicircular gap on the side of the temple, although it had been mostly filled, the traces of destruction were still very obvious.

That was the trace left by the pirates who seized the Source Water Soul Shard and raided it a few months ago.

The Source Water Soul Shard is a strange thing that randomly appears in certain secret realms in the sea.

It is shaped like a crystal sea urchin, with soft thorns. If someone eats it, they will have various special water-related superpowers, depending on the person.

However, not to mention that in the rumors, the taste of the Source Water Soul Shard is so bad that it can make people faint... after eating the Source Water Shard, if the eater leaves the sea for a long time, they will lose all their power, even their lives.

So even if the Holy Fire Sanctuary collects it, it will only use the power of this shard to warn of sea storms and the direction of fish schools, and will not really use it.

In the mouths of pirates, the Source Water Soul Shard is the shard derived from the only 'Water Soul' left by the Lords among the Initial Four Souls—unlike the Holy Fire Sanctuary, they have always been chasing the power of these shards.

And speaking of this, it involves the subsequent content of 'Covenant·New Epoch'.

Legend has it that the Lords used the 'Earth Soul' to create the bodies of the races, and then used the 'Fire Soul' to give vitality to the mud shells, and finally used the 'Wind Soul' to make their thinking work, gain wisdom, and be able to move.

The Three Souls unite, and people change from mud into life—and in this process, the gods did not use the 'Water Soul', so it stayed in place and finally turned into the current Seven Seas.

Because there is no power of the Water Soul in the body, everything in this world will feel thirsty and need water to continue to survive.

However, because the Lords did not bestow water upon all things, although life needs water, it will die if it rashly enters the water—especially the water in the sea, which cannot be drunk directly, and will only make you thirstier, and even cause poisoning if you drink too much.

It is recorded in the Covenant that the God of Fire once had sacred words:

[Do not rashly approach water, all rivers, lakes, seas, and wellheads are dangerous. Good people should not approach water unless necessary, people can drown in water a foot high.]

Therefore, most Fire Folk will not get too close to water in their lives. Apart from fishermen and sailors transporting goods, only heretics like pirates will take the initiative to go to the sea.

But this time, Aimon had to do the same thing as the pirates.

Because today, he also had to take the initiative to go to the sea to explore the traces of the descent of the Lord of Judgment.

At this time, the gray-haired priest had arrived at the sanctuary's dedicated dock in the corner of the port, next to a single-person boat.

This ship was approved by the Central Sanctuary for Aimon to investigate the attack on the Twilight City Temple. In the past few months, Aimon has been driving it, analyzing from the sea and land from which angle the pirates attacked the temple, and what clues they left behind.

Because the investigation had ended some time ago, this boat was no longer needed, so now was a good time to use public resources for personal purposes.

"No, no..." Thinking of this, Aimon couldn't help shaking his head vigorously.

——Regarding the Lord, can that be called using public resources for personal purposes?

For a priest, things related to the gods are major events, what pirate attacks, possible traitors, all go aside!

You must know that not only Aimon, but the residents of Twilight City saw the various traces of the descent from the Lord of Judgment—although they disappeared quickly, like illusions, the huge dragon-shaped phantom, and the lightning-filled light, could prove this.

Unlike the Lord of Fire and the Lord of Wind, who have descended several times, even in the Covenant, the Lord of Judgment has never descended even once.

And yesterday's appearance was the first time since the New Epoch!

Aimon was 100% sure that the investigation order from the Central Sanctuary would come down soon, requiring him to investigate the descent as quickly as possible. He was just acting in advance now.

In fact, many locals were preparing to do the same.

One could see that for the sake of the miracle, many fishing boats gave up their plans to go out to sea to fish today, and merchant ships also unloaded their cargo. They suspended their work for a day and decided to go out to sea to investigate.

So, just as this gray-haired priest boarded his single-person boat and prepared to set off.

At this dark dawn, at low tide, hundreds of fishing boats and small ships of various sizes sailed out at the same time, pulling out white waves on the blue sea, heading towards the distance.

At this moment, the bell tower of the Twilight Temple at the port also rang, echoing between heaven and earth.

In the center of Twilight City, the pure white Holy Fire burning in the Holy Fire Tower suddenly shone brightly. It cast a straight beam of light, pointing remotely to a certain sea area in the distance.

That was the sea area where the Lord of Judgment descended yesterday at high tide.

This was the light guiding everyone to the place of the miracle, and it also showed the official attitude of Twilight City.

So, in this silent blessing, everyone set off, following the instructions of the Holy Fire, sailing in the darkness.

Aimon smiled and turned his head, then entered his single-person boat. He started the boat's elemental engine, causing the rotating elemental force to push the boat forward, following the receding tide, heading towards the depths of the ocean.

In an instant, the wind and waves began to surge, and the white boat quickly overtook many ships that had set off earlier, leaving the coastal area and leaving the coast behind the horizon.

This was not strange.

This seemingly unremarkable boat actually contained the most advanced technology of the Central Sanctuary—the elemental furnace core, which seemed only the size of a human head, could release tens of thousands of times the power of the elemental lamp, allowing the boat to cut through the waves and sail normally in the wind and waves.

It is said that the Sanctuary is developing a larger-sized elemental furnace core to drive a super battleship cast from iron... With this kind of large battleship that does not need to care about the wind direction and ocean currents, the end of the pirates is coming.

However, after all, this elemental boat was just an experimental product. Ordinary wind and waves were fine, but it could not resist the most terrible storms in the summer ocean.

What Aimon was worried about was this—even if the sun had not come out, he could see that at this time, the sky above the Joyful Sea was full of dark clouds, but there was no sign of rain or waves... This proved that a real storm would come soon. At that time, even the largest mast sailing ship would probably be in danger.

"But if I wait until after the storm to look for it, I definitely won't find any traces."

Everything has risks, and Aimon would rather take risks than miss it.

However, not everyone was as devout as him. After the initial passion, realizing that the weather was not right, some ships had begun to stop and return.

Gradually, a strong wind rose at sea, dark clouds surged in the sky, and thunder rumbled faintly.

In the third hour after setting sail, the thing Aimon was worried about finally happened—the storm did come.

With a muffled thunder like a drum, the strong wind began to rage, and the dark clouds seemed to collapse, falling heavy rain while also setting off raging waves.

Aimon watched the high waves surging on both sides of the boat, and the completely darkened sky. Although the momentum was not great now, he was almost certain that this was a rare big storm. The waves were still good now, and later the huge waves that would be set off would be higher than the entire ship, like a wall, sandwiching it in the blue waves.

Even if this boat had the power to surpass ordinary sailing warships, it could not defeat the power of nature.

Faced with this storm, more ships that had prepared to pay homage retreated—the sails were already useless. Under the impact of the irresistible waves, no matter how hard they rowed, they would only be driven around like toys. Even the most devout heart could not overcome the fact that if they did not retreat, they would be swallowed by the storm at any time.

In an instant, more ships decided to return, and Aimon was also worried.

"This storm is like the Lord doesn't want us to get close..."

The boat that the gray-haired priest was riding had watertightness and special materials, unlike ordinary wooden sailing ships, which would be broken by huge waves, nor would it be submerged by seawater and suffocated like ordinary boats.

He could continue to move forward, anyway, as a priest at the peak of the 'Revelation Stage', possessing extraordinary power, he might be drifted by these waves to an unknown distance, but it was basically impossible to die because of this.

Revelation, Chosen, Blessed by God, these are the ranks of extraordinary power in the Holy Fire Kingdom.

Those blessed by God, as the Lord's spokespersons on earth, have power close to that of the gods, enough to suppress the power of the storm itself.

Although those chosen by Heaven cannot suppress the storm, they can slightly control the elements and protect several ships in this storm.

Those enlightened may be able to protect themselves, but they may not have the strength to help others.

Naturally, Aimon was not blessed by God, nor was he chosen by Heaven. Although he was devout in his faith, his talent was not good. He had practiced for decades, but he was only at the peak of the Revelation Stage, and it had always been difficult for him to advance to the Heaven Chosen realm.

It was also a strange thing—in fact, all Fire Folk with the blood of the Lord of Judgment were not very strong.

It can even be said that the more devout they are in the Lord of Judgment, the lower their strength is, and in the temple of the Lord of Judgment, those Heaven Chosen and those blessed by God with high strength are mostly somewhat rebellious, do not follow the classics, and are disliked by most believers.

Aimon, who was extremely devout in his faith, was naturally no exception. Although he had already reached the Revelation Stage decades ago, he had been unable to go further, to receive true revelation from the gods and advance to Heaven Chosen.

"This must be because I am not devout enough and have not confirmed the Lord's Dao."

This was Aimon's idea all along.

But even such a devout Aimon, facing such a storm at this time, couldn't help but feel a sense of retreat.

——If I don't leave, it will be too late to retreat, I can only drift with the waves.

In this sea area, there were only a few large and small ships left, apart from the boat Aimon was riding, all of them were large merchant ships. Although their ships' manufacturing technology was far less good than the one Aimon was riding, they were large enough and heavy enough, so they were not very afraid of storms.

But even so, these large ships were being forced by the sudden strong winds and could not normally sail to the place where the descent was, slowly shifting their direction.

At this moment, Aimon couldn't help but fall into memories, and his mind began to emerge with why he chose to believe in the God of Judgment.

Aimon's full name was Aimon Sterr. His family was once a large merchant in the south of the Holy Fire Kingdom. They lived a happy and fulfilling life, and their house was full of gold and silver jewelry. It can be said that they were extremely happy and fulfilling. The young Aimon was even engaged to the daughter of a local Heaven Chosen, destined to enter the real upper class.

However, in a drought, the Aimon family was accused of maliciously hoarding grain, and selling it at a high price during the disaster—the people who came to search actually found several large warehouses full of grain, but the Aimon family was at a loss, because those warehouses were not their property at all.

Maliciously hoarding grain during a disaster was a serious crime. In just a few days, the entire family's property was confiscated, and the young Aimon immediately fell from heaven to hell. Not only did he have to endure the contempt of others in prison, but he was also forced to work as a servant taking care of horses, and he even had his engagement with his childhood sweetheart annulled, losing everything.

No one doubted whether the Aimon family was innocent—the luxurious life was too much to provoke the hatred of others, and the Sterr family must have offended many people to become big merchants.

Under the publicity of the sky-high public opinion, the Sterr family quickly became a typical example of local greedy merchants, vicious merchants who ignored the disaster and made black-hearted money, destined to never be able to turn over.

No one spoke for them. Even Aimon and his parents were desperate. After all, everyone could not be persuaded. When everyone thought they were bad people, even if they were not bad people, they were bad people.

But at this time, a wandering adjudicator who wandered around came here and raised doubts.

"Have you investigated? Why did you directly determine that the Sterr family was guilty? They obviously do business in luxury goods such as stone and carvings. Why would they suddenly go to hoard grain?"

"The Sterr family does live a luxurious life, and big merchants can't be said to be good, but one thing is one thing, can you be 100% sure that they really went crazy this time and had to hoard grain? This is not reasonable at all!"

"You think it's reasonable? You think? Who are you? If you say it is, then where is the truth and justice?!"

Even in the face of the coercion and inducement of the entire local forces, the wandering adjudicator had no intention of compromising. Realizing that he alone could not cross these local forces to conduct an investigation, the believer of the Lord of Judgment directly called the Central Sanctuary headquarters, calling in hundreds of priests of the Revelation Stage and twelve Heaven Chosen of the Lord of Judgment.

Even, alarmed by this news, a divine grace of the highest priest of the Lord of Judgment at the time, cast his gaze on the south.

Everyone had no intention of compromising, and had no intention of forcibly suppressing anything. Their only requirement was to allow them to normally investigate the ins and outs of the matter, to determine whether the Aimon family was really guilty.

They only asked to know the truth of justice.

Soon, without being hindered by the local forces who were so shocked that they dared not move, the truth came to light—the Aimon family did not maliciously hoard, buy and sell, but another giant merchant in the south, in order to eliminate competitors and threats, bribed a large number of official members to set a trap for the Aimon family.

Naturally, the Sterr family returned to its original state, its reputation was restored, and the giant merchant who framed them and all the bribed officials were all arrested and put on trial.

Rescued from the abyss of death, freed from despair, the Aimon family originally wanted to donate most of their family property to the temple of the Lord of Judgment as a reward, but the wandering adjudicator refused this.

"Wealth is just an external object for faith. Only truth and justice are eternal in this world, and can be called pursuit."

He said so, his tone decisive, causing the Aimon family to completely join the banner of the Lord of Judgment, and as the eldest son of the Sterr family, Aimon was sent to the temple of the Lord of Judgment to become a priest.

Decades have passed, although Aimon's strength is only at the peak of Revelation, his position in the temple of the Lord of Judgment is not low. If not, the Central Sanctuary would not have entrusted him with the important task of 'finding traitors'.

Memories flashed before his eyes like smoke, and in the midst of the storm, Aimon's eyes gradually cleared.

"This is revelation."

He whispered to himself: "I must go."

"Whether it is the Lord's test, whether it is dangerous, I will eventually have to take a look—if I don't even have this courage, then decades of persistence will be too ridiculous."

It's not that he is not afraid of danger, but he knows the danger, but he is ready to pay the price for his choice.

Is it a test, or a normal natural phenomenon? Aimon didn't know, but he understood what it meant for the Lord of Judgment, who had never descended even once since the opening of the New Epoch, to appear for the first time in hundreds of years.

He must not miss it.

In the darkness and storm, the gray-haired priest was determined, he drove the elemental boat, trying his best to sail to the other side where the wind and waves were becoming more and more violent.

The waves crashed against the ship's wall, and the waves were surging. Wave after wave of huge waves surged high, even larger than the boat itself. They came crisscrossing, like two merging cliffs, about to completely crush Aimon and his ship.

But even so, the priest did not give up. He gathered his strength to strengthen the already tough cabin. The elemental boat was a sealed structure, and it was not afraid of water. This was its advantage over other ships.

But even so, under the increasingly loud thunder and the increasingly violent wave impact, Aimon still felt like a fallen leaf in the wind, constantly drifting in the sea, and even being thrown up by huge waves from time to time, really floating in the air, and then falling into the sea again, creating a little insignificant splash.

"Ah, sure enough, it still won't work."

But, just as Aimon felt hopeless to successfully approach the sea area of ​​the descent, and this life-threatening struggle could only end in failure.

Suddenly there was a light, showing a figure, walking out from the raging waves, and walking towards the fluttering boat.

In an instant, a kind of unspeakable fear and awe seized Aimon's heart. Even though this gray-haired priest had fought against the storm for several hours without slacking off, he slowly opened his eyes when he saw the figure, forgetting the surrounding wind and rain.

Aimon's azure pupils gradually transformed into dragon pupils. He could see that a figure was slowly walking on the water, walking towards him.

At this moment, the storm on the sea gradually subsided—it was still raging before, with strong winds and heavy rain setting off turbulent waves, but after a moment, as the storm stopped and the dark clouds scattered, the turbulent sea became calm, at most like a well-behaved cat being stroked, softly meowing, and the wind and waves calmed down.

The sky was clear and the clouds were clear, the white waves subsided, and the blue Joyful Sea restored its original appearance, like a piece of broken blue gems, boundless, extending to the end of the sea, all the same color of the sea and sky.

The white elemental boat quietly floated on this calm sea. He didn't know when, the elemental furnace had stopped running, but Aimon had no energy to pay attention to these things.

Because the gray-haired priest could see that after the dark clouds receded, the morning light rising from the east shone on the heaven and earth, and the bright sunlight projected on the figure in front of Aimon, making his face clear.

That was a young man with long black hair. He had facial features that were not like those of the Fire Folk, but they were so perfect that it was unbelievable, and it was impossible to pick out even a trace of flaw, and he revealed a kind of majesty originating from the essence of the soul, and in the depths of those cyan-purple dragon pupils, there was even a brilliant spiritual light flashing, his whole body filled with an unspeakable solemnity and sanctity.

In this instant, it was as if daylight had arrived.

"You, you are..."

Opening the sealed door of the elemental boat, Aimon subconsciously walked out of the boat, wanting to approach the figure—when he took a step, the priest remembered that he was at sea.

He stepped on the sea, thinking that he would fall into the sea, but the opposite was true. Aimon felt as if he was stepping on solid ground, and the sea carried his weight like land, allowing him to walk normally.

There was no time to think too much, everything was a miracle, Aimon clasped his hands together in front of his chest, he walked forward step by step.

A kind of strong intuition.

A kind of closeness originating from blood.

A kind of instinct from the supremacy of the spirit.

And, invisibly, the gathering of that ethereal willingness and ethereal prayer.

Aimon even vaguely saw that behind that figure, there was a great dragon, a huge, white-winged, horned, lightning-缠绕 immortal ancient dragon soul was roaring to the sky, and on top of this ancient dragon soul's head, there was an incomparably bright 'Eye of Judgment' formed from pure soul light emerging, releasing a cyan-purple light, like a crown, worn on the dragon's head.

He was just standing there, as if he could illuminate the heaven and earth, and even the light of the stars in the sky was dimmed by his existence. The vast sea with no boundaries was completely occupied by his presence, making it appear narrow and solidified, as if it had stopped.

——This was something that did not need to be questioned at all.

Step by step forward, the gray-haired priest soon came to the figure, and only then did Aimon realize that he was the only ship in this sea area, everyone had returned in the storm, only he had persisted until now.

And the black-haired youth smiled and looked at Aimon.

"—My Lord!"

Facing that figure, Aimon devoutly clasped his hands together, wanting to kneel down to worship, but a gentle force prevented him from kneeling, so he could only straighten his chest and stand in place.

Then, he heard a calm voice, speaking in ancient Tartadis, echoing in his ears and in the depths of his soul at the same time.

[There is no need to kneel to any existence.]

The voice said so, as if it contained the truth: [People only need to bow to their own hearts.]

"Yes, yes—"

Suddenly, the gray-haired priest suddenly realized, he murmured to himself: "The Lord of Judgment said in the sacred words: There is no need to bow to people for a long time in the world, only true justice is worth bowing to—I actually forgot your teachings, I am really ignorant!"

Su Zhou, who had roughly figured out the attitude of all living beings in this world towards the Lord of Judgment through the storm and the Heart of Non-Thought: "?"

——Did I say this?

"You definitely didn't say it, but the 'Lord of Judgment' in this world may not be."

In the soul space, Yala joyfully laughed: "As an existence that has begun to have legends sung, and even become a deity and myth, you have to be prepared that every word you say in the future will become the source of classics and 'sacred sayings' for some people—just like I didn't actually write that Holy Snake Prayer Book, but it appeared, and there was nothing I could do."

"That's not a problem—the main thing is why in this world, I would actually become the main god worshiped by the entire world?"

Facing the gray-haired priest standing respectfully in front of him, Su Zhou looked at the other party and couldn't help but feel even more confused: "And such devout believers! He is even reciting the original text of the classics related to me in the 'Covenant'! No wonder I had such a huge willingness to lock me in as soon as I got here, no wonder!"

"What exactly has the legendary me in this world become like?"

Although he thought so in his heart, in reality, Su Zhou still smiled calmly.

"Go, my apostle."

He said to Aimon in this way, his voice was like coming from a distant place, with heavy echoes: "Do not publicize, maintain silence."

"Then, show me what this new epoch looks like."