Volume Dragon: Start by obtaining the Infinity Gems

Chapter 103: The Church of Knowledge's Intervention Method

Bishop Lawrence Martin has been very busy lately, and suddenly, he is instructed by the Archbishop to go to the Kingdom of Imbutu to meet a dragon who is said to be "favored by Oghma."

He crossed the entire Enorok Desert in just a few days. God knows how much suffering he endured!

Unfortunately, the knight assigned by the church was killed by a rattlesnake hiding under the sand on the first day after entering the desert. Bishop Lawrence had to pick up the hammer he hadn't touched for many years and fought a fierce battle with the rattlesnake using all his magic to save his life.

He was traveling alone in the desert, encountering lizardmen, desert trolls, masked robbers of the Zhentarim, and other damned creatures along the way who didn't care about the priest robe he was wearing and attacked him at the sight of them.

Fortunately, Lawrence, who has the 13th level of priest, is no ordinary person. He picked up the adventurous experience before becoming a bishop many years ago, carefully calculated every divine spell, strictly followed the eight-hour sleep time, and made sure his strength was at its peak every day before continuing to set out.

With such caution, Bishop Lawrence, with his mouth full of sand, finally walked out of the Enorok Desert. God knows how tears filled his eyes at that moment, and he swore that he would never set foot in that hellhole again in his life!
Nemesis was also shocked when he saw Bishop Lawrence. When he saw an old man with a dark face and covered with sand, he thought that the other party was Bishop Lawrence's servant. Who knew that the other party suddenly spoke to him and greeted him, saying that he was a bishop sent by the Church of Knowledge.

"Well, it seems you've been through a lot along the way." Prince Ryan said with a stifled smile, and was glared at by Bishop Lawrence with resentment.

"It's hard to put it into words. It's hard to put it into words." The dirty old man sighed.

Then, he looked towards Nemesis. After arriving in the royal capital, he didn't even have time to wash up and hurried to see him, hoping to see what the guy who was favored by the elusive god looked like.

"As expected of a Volume Dragon," Bishop Lawrence said in a complicated tone. As a level 13 priest, he could sense the powerful aura of divine power from the other party. He was clearly a young dragon that was born not long ago, yet he had such a high priest level.

Sensing a hint of jealousy in the bishop's tone, Nemesis said with a smile, "Welcome to the Kingdom of Inbutu, Bishop Lawrence."

The Tome Dragon naturally feels a sense of familiarity with the people of the Church of Knowledge who believe in Oghma.

After some pleasantries, the three of them quickly got down to business.

What Prince Ryan hoped most was that the Church of Knowledge would come forward to support his faction. However, his hope was rejected by Lawrence.

"The Church of Knowledge cannot interfere in the internal affairs of the mortal countries. This is a rule set by the gods." Bishop Lawrence said with some regret.

Prince Ryan's heart sank. He thought that Volume Dragon's behavior represented the will of the Church of Knowledge. After all, there were precedents in history where some churches openly stood on the side of one of the candidates of a country.

But it was obvious that he overestimated the Church of Knowledge's determination on this matter.

Nemesis did not speak. He pondered for a while and made a plan in his mind.

"You said that it is a rule set by Oghma not to interfere in the internal affairs of the mortal world, right?" Nemesis suddenly asked.

Bishop Lawrence was a little confused, but nodded anyway.

"What if it's not an internal affair? What if it's about eradicating the evil forces that are colluding with the devil?" Nemesis said meaningfully.

Now it was Prince Ryan's turn to be confused. He didn't understand how collusion with the devil and the queen could be related, but Bishop Lawrence's eyes lit up.

"Hmm, is the charge of colluding with the devil established? Well, it can be established or not. The evidence is too weak, etc., Dawn Church!"

Bishop Lawrence, who had been mumbling something, suddenly raised his head and said excitedly, "Maybe this will really work!"

Then, he looked at Prince Ryan solemnly and said, "I have to go to the city destroyed by the devil. Yes, the investigation team from Goebenland City and the Church of Dawn will meet there."

Something seemed to flash through Prince Ryan's mind, but he was still confused. Seeing that the other party was puzzled, Nemesis explained.

"The Church of the Dawn has arrived in Gobenland to investigate. The city is now in ruins, but it was once a city where everyone believed in the Lord of the Dawn."

"The Dawn Church will definitely take revenge on the royal family, but they cannot interfere in the internal affairs of the Mortal Realm unless..."

"Colluding with the devil! Hiding the truth about the deal between the royal family and Sel, and the truth about Mitzili's secret loyalty to the Red Mage, what will be revealed?"

"The Inbutu royal family conspired to obtain the power of the ancient demon. The Chief Regent secretly sent his most trusted person - his own sister, to break the seal, which ultimately led to the destruction of all lives!"

After hearing this, Prince Ryan completely understood the true purpose of the Church of Dawn.

"That's right. The Dawn Church went to Gobenland not to investigate the truth, but to destroy the evidence! It is even more impossible for Sazas Tan to take the initiative to stand up and declare the truth about his transaction with the Inbutu royal family!"

After all, the Kingdom of Imputu is just a small country, without the military strength as huge as that of Cel. Once the Church of Dawn finds an excuse, they may really send paladins to judge the royal family for their crimes.

Bishop Lawrence said with disdain: "Those hypocrites from the Dawn Church are still so good at playing with the rules."

Nemesis chuckled when he heard this. In the memory inheritance of the Volume Dragon, there was a lot of information about the Lord of Dawn and his followers.

Whether it is the Lord or the true believers who follow him, they are all extremely superficial. That is to say, they only care about the surface splendor, but whether the inner logic is just or not is not what they care about.

There are often some young and hot-blooded paladins on the continent of Faerun. Most of them are excellent talents who have been brainwashed by the teachings of the Lord of Dawn. Such people can be considered relatively pure believers of the Dawn.

However, this also gave the Church of Knowledge an opportunity. As long as Bishop Lawrence revealed to those in the Dawn Church that he wanted to stand on the side of the prince, the investigation team of the Dawn Church would find him a lot of "evidence" of the royal family colluding with the devil.

Punishing demon cultists is the duty of many good god churches, but most of the time these duties are performed by the righteous churches who contribute silently.

The noble blind knight - Tyr, the god of justice.

Compared to the Lord of Dawn, He is more in line with the concept of justice in ordinary people's hearts.

His followers often follow Tyr's teachings and silently devote themselves to the cause of justice. Fighting against cultists can be said to be one of the reasons for the highest mortality rate among Tyr's followers.

This incident involving the Inbutu royal family should have been resolved with many good god churches remaining indifferent and the Church of Justice stepping in to clean up the mess.

But the Dawn Church, as the real victim who had suffered losses, stood up and took over this responsibility with anger.

The same can be said of the Church of Knowledge. Those who collude with the devil give all churches the opportunity to show their sharp blades to them. The only difference is whether they are willing to pay attention to you.

When all other churches have lost interest, the Church of Justice is the only enemy these cultists face. Tyr's followers often scare the cultists with the Holy Slash, which is full of positive energy.

But if another church takes over, the cultists will be even more afraid, because that would mean that the church is truly fulfilling its duty out of hatred and desire to destroy the other party.

As a senior priest who has lived for most of his life, Bishop Lawrence has extensive connections in the church. The leader of the Dawn Team that went to Gobenland City to investigate happened to be an old acquaintance of his. After making up his mind, he immediately set off for Gobenland to meet the other party.

At that time, the Dawn Team had destroyed all the evidence that might point to Mitzili's identity as the Red Robe Wizard. The feather robe that could turn red was burned to ashes in the fire, and the flow of time and space at the scene was completely disrupted by the powerful divine magic, making it impossible for any prophecy spell to replay the scene at that time.

After Bishop Lawrence left, Prince Ryan also informed Nemesis of the news.

"I investigated the vampire offspring before and got some clues."

"My spies visited more than a dozen towns and found these things in all of them. I strongly suspect that this is another conspiracy of Sel. After all, these vampires are the favorite pets of the necromancers in Sel."

Nemesis did not comment on Prince Ryan's speculation. He always felt that it was not that simple. The previous friction between Sel and the Kingdom of Imbutu was all due to the orders of Nie Rong, the chief of the spell department. But now that Nie Rong was gone, why did Sazastan bother to cause trouble for the Kingdom of Imbutu?

Thinking of this, Nemesis became curious again about what happened to Nie Rong, so he asked Prince Ryan.

Prince Ryan also frowned at this question, indicating that he was not quite clear.

"From the beginning to the end, this matter was a secret transaction between the Queen's family and Sel. How could they inform me?"

"I only noticed that there were signs of fighting in the direction of the palace that night. Leorel must have mobilized the army to ambush. The garrison of the capital lost a full 3,000 men after that. The next day, Leorel announced publicly that Nie Rong was dead."

"Who cares? They're all bad guys. It would be best if they were all dead." Prince Ryan sneered. To him, Leorel, the traitor who sold out territory, was hateful, but Nie Rong who wanted to summon a demon was even more hateful. He hoped that the two sides would fight each other, and it would be best if both sides would suffer losses.
-
After the meeting, Nemesis walked out of the Prince's Palace. Since he came to the capital, he has been studying magic and has not had a good time in this most prosperous human city in Inbutu.

"Boss, Boss, there are so many humans here!"

The silver-haired boy was walking on the street, and his angelic face attracted the attention of many passers-by, but when they saw a meerkat with big round eyes lying on the boy's shoulder, they couldn't help laughing.

After all, they had never seen a talking meerkat.

Nemesis curled the corners of his mouth. It was very noisy every time he let it out.

The meerkat's life is very short, so before he fell asleep last time, he signed a magical pet contract with it, allowing the meerkat to be completely transformed into a magical pet.

Magic pets are exclusive to mages and warlocks. Mages can often choose some weak animals or even monsters, sign a contract with them, and transform them into magical pets that will live and die with them.

A wizard cannot form a pet contract with a powerful monster, and each different pet will give the wizard different abilities.

For example, if a bat is chosen as a familiar, the caster's hearing will be greatly enhanced. If a cat is chosen as a familiar, the caster's body will become more agile and flexible. If a snake is chosen as a familiar, the caster will become more deceptive and so on.

Nemesis had never chosen a familiar before, because he had already decided to make the meerkat his familiar. After it became a familiar, as a living being condensed from magic power, the meerkat turned into an immortal energy creature. Unless Nemesis died, it would live forever.

And Nemesis was very confident that he would live forever.

So he was very curious, what would a meerkat that lived long enough become in the future?
The ancient Greek god of meerkats?
Nemesis, who had been complaining in his heart, began to regret it since the contract was signed, because the meerkat was too noisy. Every time it would nag in his mind for Nemesis to let it out for a ride. And after Nemesis released it from the pet pocket, he had to endure the other party's constant slapping.

Although I enjoyed it very much.

However, the meerkat is not completely useless after becoming a magical pet. As a meerkat, the ability it brings to Nemesis is an ability that the Scroll Dragon swore he would never use even if he died - farting.

However, as a magical pet, the meerkat also has the common functions of other magical pets.

First of all, magical pets are immortal and are highly malleable energy creatures, which means that magical pets are the best companions for transformation mages, because they can use Transfiguration to transform magical pets into powerful monsters of any size.

Most of the time, transfiguration needs to take the size of the creature into consideration. Small creatures cannot be transformed into monsters that are too large, but magical pets do not need to consider this because they are lives condensed from magic power.

A powerful Transmutation Mage would often arm his familiar to the teeth, and then send his familiar, which had transformed into a [Four-Armed Gorilla] and endowed with [Bear Power], to fight the bandits who were trying to rob him.

This leads to the second characteristic of magical pets - spell connection.

Strengthening spells like [Bear Power] can strengthen others, but there are also many spells that are only effective on the caster himself.

But magical pets are an exception.

All the enhancement spells that the wizard uses on himself will have the same effect on the magical pet. The reason for this is that the two have actually become one.

The third function of the magic pet is also very powerful - spell transmission contact.

The casting distance of many spells requires the caster to make close contact with the creature. For example, in the three-ring necromancy spell [Vampiric Touch], green light will emerge from the caster's hands and absorb the vitality of the creature it touches.

There is also the priest's [Turn Undead], which also requires contact with the surface of the undead.

This is very dangerous for the spellcaster. After all, close combat is one of the scenarios that the spellcaster needs to avoid the most, so contact spells are very useless.

But the appearance of magical pets broke this situation.

The familiar can be regarded as the hands of the caster, using its body to touch the enemy and trigger the spell effect.

Imagine a magical pet that has transformed into an adult red dragon, with all kinds of powerful buffs all over its body, fighting with the enemy, and each of its attacks is also accompanied by powerful spells such as [Vampiric Touch] released by the wizard.

For a wizard with transmutation spells, a pet is the best meat shield, bar none!

　Sorry, I was at a wedding yesterday and had a blackout. I woke up at noon today, went to the vehicle management office in the afternoon, and was busy all afternoon. After lunch, I came back and wrote like crazy. I have just finished. I will resume writing 6,000 words tomorrow.
　　
　
(End of this chapter)