The Forbidden Lord of Cinder, who abandoned the duty of kindling, sought the mysteries of the Ancient Dragons.
After reviewing the information on this Lord of Cinder, Miss Maria went over it in her mind but found no corresponding NPC record. That was only natural. What Maria's memory and notebook contained were the events she had personally experienced and well-known NPCs, not some omniscient book.
As for versions 1.0 and 2.0 of the Fractured, Maria hadn't personally lived through them.
"When are we setting out?"
Maria couldn't help but sigh inwardly. It seemed she had barely settled down in Torrent City for a single day before she was off on another journey.
"Wait. Seal." Pastor Arthur spoke in his usual terse and baffling way, saying things Maria couldn't make sense of.
It wasn't that he was unwilling to speak. Rather, long years of silence had left his speech impaired. To communicate with these two teammates, Pastor Arthur strained so hard that veins bulged across his forehead, leaving Maria worried that this Priest of the God of Justice might suddenly rupture a blood vessel and collapse bleeding.
"Wait until the sealing personnel arrive. After all, it's a Lord of Cinder. If it awakens, the Bell is needed to restrain it. This is also to test whether the Bell's sound still works."
Liline took over the explanation.
With sultry charm, she toyed with her raven-dark hair as she eagerly elaborated on Pastor Arthur's clipped words.
Maria at first wondered how Liline knew so much about the Lord of Cinder, then realized: a believer favored by the gods had it much easier. If they had doubts, they could simply pray to their deity and often receive a satisfactory answer. That was an invisible privilege of the Priest.
Arthur, after her explanation, nodded as if relieved of a burden.
Seen in this light, the taciturn priest seemed almost endearing.
"Hehe, though Mr. Arthur is very gentlemanly, staying so quiet is going to cost him dearly in social life~~" The alluring Priestess flashed a radiant smile, her charm striking like a lethal blow.
"Voice… ugly…" Arthur's pale face showed a flicker of awkward embarrassment as he glanced at Liline. Covering his throat, he forced out two words, bowed stiffly, and hurried away.
Liline pouted, clearly displeased.
Maria, ever observant, sensed something between the two. She recalled that Priest of the God of Justice were among the few in the Justice Church forbidden to marry. Their doctrine held that private attachments could compromise impartial judgment, and priests serving the god must remain rational and merciless.
The God of Justice could truly be called a cold machine among the true gods, and Maria could attest to this.
In her previous life on the battlefield of Chaos, whenever an avatar or projection of an evil god appeared, the God of Justice was always the first deity to descend, disregarding the risk of utter annihilation to confront the Four Chaos Gods. Shortly before Maria's transmigration, the God of Justice had been gravely injured in battle, nearly to the point of falling.
"Miss Liline, are you and Pastor Arthur old acquaintances?"
"Mhm. His voice used to be so manly… such a pity." Her emotions shifted in an instant, from anger to joy, then to wistful sighs.
With the visit's purpose nearly complete, Miss Maria rose and took her graceful leave.
She hadn't expected to be drawn into the Lord of Cinder affair so soon. This meant she would inevitably cross paths with players during this journey. A headache stirred within her. She still didn't know whether the forbidden Lord of Cinder of her past life had been corrupted by Chaos, and what once seemed like a clear future now turned uncertain and obscure.
As she stepped out of the stifling Scales Cathedral, Maria's crimson eyes suddenly flicked toward the left.
Her scarlet pupils worked like scanners, etching the sparse pedestrians and streetscape into crystalline clarity. She studied with icy precision. After a dozen seconds, she shook her head, puzzled.
"Strange. Did I sense wrong? I could've sworn there was a gaze watching me…"
......
"Holy crap, holy crap! This NPC's a monster, right? The scout familiar's stealth is tiny, plus I added aura suppression, and she still nearly spotted me! Scared me half to death…"
A player munching on fried potato chips fumbled desperately at his controls, hurriedly pulling his Scout Familiar away from her line of sight.
On the blurry projection screen, Maria's piercing red eyes seemed to roar through with bloody menace, nearly making him spray his chips everywhere.
He was one of the military's spies tasked with monitoring Pastor Arthur.
The job had been easy, with no real risk. Who could have expected some terrifying black-robed nun NPC to appear out of nowhere? He needed to report this to Cerys at once.
When Cerys heard, she erupted in fury.
"Sister Maria, the NPC nun! Isn't she supposed to be with the Church faction as part of their interaction questline? What's she doing interfering in our military's chain quests?"
She immediately ordered subordinates to confront the Justice Church's diplomat, Tyr, berating the Church for dereliction and sabotage. To the noble players, the black-robed nun was clearly a Church asset, so why weren't they putting her to proper use?
"???"
When Tyr got the news, he was utterly dumbfounded.
He had no idea what was happening. Neither Ralph nor Phylin would have done this. If they had, he would have known. It had to be a misunderstanding.
"Look, there's got to be some mistake here. Just let me go, alright?"
With two prototype Steam Rifles pressed to his head, Tyr tried to maintain his diplomatic poise while persuading the noble military players. He had no desire to be the first player shot dead by a steam rifle in the beta, what a pathetic way to go that would be.
"Big Sis says you have to fix this before you can leave."
"Then let me go back to fix it, ok?"
"You can only leave once it's fixed. Big Sis's orders." One burly companion scratched his head.
"Damn it! What kind of twisted logic is this? You want me to fix the problem but won't let me leave? Only by returning to the cathedral can I figure out what's going on! Is this Cerys's idea of a sick joke?"
Fuming, Tyr suddenly suspected this whole farce was just another of Cerys's steam-fueled torments aimed at him.
✦✧✦------------------------------------------------------------✦✧✦