My mom is waiting for treatment, and you're summoning me to be a hero?

After assigning tasks for the day of the Glory Trial, everyone left the council hall one after another.

The footsteps gradually faded into the distance.

The heavy wooden door slammed shut behind the last person, making a dull thud.

The candlelight flickered slightly, casting swaying shadows on the wall.

Only two people remained in the room.

Hunter Axe leaned against the wall, arms crossed, looking at Li Yiguang in the main seat.

His rugged face was expressionless, except for his eyes, which appeared particularly deep in the candlelight.

Lin Mo did not move.

He remained seated there, maintaining Li Yiguang's posture, with his eyes closed, as if he were resting.

After a long while, he opened his eyes and looked at the hunter's axe.

"Aren't you leaving?"

Hunter Axe grinned, a hint of amusement in his smile.

"If I leave, what if your own people find out?"

Lin Mo did not answer.

Just then, a soft footstep sound came from outside the door.

The footsteps were slow, light, and unhurried.

I walked to the door, paused for a moment, and then the door was pushed open.

The archbishop stood outside the door.

He was still wearing that gray-brown coarse cloth robe, and leaning on that silver short cane.

The moonlight shone in from behind him, casting a long shadow.

There was no expression on that aged face.

He looked at "Li Yiguang" in the main seat, then glanced at the hunting axe by the wall, and then slowly walked in.

The door closed silently behind him.

Lin Mo looked at him without saying a word.

The archbishop walked to the long table and sat down in an empty seat.

He leaned his cane against the edge of the table, placed his hands folded on the table, and remained silent for a long time.

Then he looked up at 'Li Yiguang'.

"I need your help."

Lin Mo raised an eyebrow slightly.

"explain."

The archbishop took a deep breath, as if to bring out what had been pent up in his chest for years.

"On the day of the operation, do not harm the people of the capital."

Lin Mo looked at him.

There was something in those cloudy, gray eyes that was hard to describe.

It wasn't an order, but a humble plea from an old man.

Lin Mo was silent for a few seconds, then nodded.

"Sure, but only if they don't block the way."

The archbishop nodded slightly, as if he had breathed a sigh of relief.

Watching this scene unfold, Hunter Axe couldn't help but speak up:

"Old man, you've done so much for us, and this is all you're doing?"

The archbishop did not answer him.

He just looked at Lin Mo, his eyes filled with both light and darkness.

Lin Mo met his gaze and asked the question that had been weighing on her mind:

Why are you helping me?

The archbishop was taken aback.

Then he lowered his head and took a book out of his pocket.

The book was old, with a worn cover and curled corners, but it was well protected.

He placed the book on the table, opened it, revealing the dense text inside.

"This is a sacred text, every pastor has one, it records the deeds of God, and I have believed in it my whole life."

Lin Mo remained silent, waiting for him to continue.

"The book says that bad people will be punished, and good people will go to the realm of gods."

The archbishop's fingers lightly traced the pages of the book.

"Until the day the previous archbishop died, he was taken away by the gods."

The candlelight flickered, casting deep shadows on his face.

The archbishop's voice trembled slightly, almost imperceptibly.

"I saw it with my own eyes; the light shone on him and took him to the realm of the gods."

He looked up at Lin Mo.

"But I also know that he is not qualified."

His voice was calm, almost cold.

"It was he who suggested to Li Yan that Zhou Yue be recalled from the front lines. He and Zhou Yue were framed. Those words, those pieces of evidence, those so-called collusion with foreign enemies, were all fabricated by him."

He paused.

"I watched him do those things with my own eyes. One by one, clearly."

Hunter Axe clenched his fist.

The archbishop continued, his voice growing softer:

"He did so many evil things, but in the end, he still went to the realm of the gods. The gates of the realm of the gods were still open for him."

He lowered his head and looked at the holy book.

"During that time, my world collapsed. The gods I had believed in all my life turned out to be neither good nor evil."

He remained silent for a long time.

The candlelight burned, making a faint crackling sound.

Then he looked up at Lin Mo.

A very faint smile appeared at the corner of his mouth.

"Later I realized that what I believed in was never the gods in the sky. What I believed in was the principles in this book, the proverbs that teach people to be good, and the scriptures that exhort people to be compassionate. Gods may not distinguish between good and evil, but I cannot."

He closed the Bible and put it back in his pocket.

"I just wanted to do what an archbishop should do."

He looked at Lin Mo, and there was a very clean light in his cloudy eyes.

"Protect believers, protect the people, do good deeds, that's all."

Lin Mo looked at him and remained silent for a long time.

Then he nodded.

"I see."

The archbishop stood up and picked up the short cane that was leaning against the table.

He walked to the door, stopped, and looked back.

"Lin Mo".

This was the first time he had called Lin Mo by his name.

Lin Mo looked at him.

The archbishop opened his mouth as if to say something, but in the end he just waved his hand.

"Go, do what you're supposed to do."

He pushed open the door and went out.

Hunter Axe stood there, silent for a long time.

Then he walked over to Lin Mo and patted him on the shoulder.

"This old man seems to understand things quite well."

……

By the time Lin Mo returned to his room, it was already past midnight.

Mianmian was curled up on the bed, her small pink and white body rising and falling, sleeping soundly.

Yin Xue lay beside her, eyes closed, its tail swaying unconsciously.

Lin Mo sat down on the edge of the bed.

He first released the puppet from Li Yiguang's control.

The feeling of control faded from my consciousness, like taking off a heavy garment.

He stretched his shoulders and let out a long breath.

Then he closed his eyes and focused his mind on his body.

The attribute panel unfolds in my consciousness:

Name: Lin Mo

[Level: 60]

【Body: 120366】

[Agility: 120366]

【Spirit: 120366】

Free attribute points: 16800

[Skills: Mirror Image, Double Strike, Steel Sword, Soul Corrosion, Fatal Strike, Evolution]

【Sacred Revelation: Killing Domain】

Level 60.

He looked at the number and nodded slightly.

Those Marcus family members raised him from level 58 to level 60.

But it's still a long way from level 100.

He took the wooden box out of his pocket.

The box was small, entirely black, and its surface was engraved with fine sealing runes.

Upon opening the box, a crystal core the size of a fist lay inside.

The essence of the mother of fungi.

The crystal core was grayish-white, with fine lines covering its surface, resembling the traces of some kind of fungal hyphae spreading.

A faint light emanated from within, flickering and shimmering, like a living thing breathing.

He gripped the crystal core tightly and closed his eyes.

Mental energy probed in, touching that hard outer shell.

The next instant, a massive flow of information flooded into my mind!

Mother of Fungi – one of the most bizarre creatures in the deepest part of the abyss.

It itself does not possess strong combat power, but it can fuse with various fungal communities to hatch countless powerful fungal beasts.

The strange beasts obeyed its commands, forming an inexhaustible army of fungi.

Its essence lies in just one skill.

【Coral fusion】.

Lin Mo's consciousness was immersed in the information of that skill, sensing its essence.

Just then, a familiar wave emanated from my waist.

Black sword.

It woke up again.

The dark power surged from the sword, transforming into countless fine black threads that wrapped around the essence.

The threads pierced into the crystal core, beginning to frantically transform, reshape, and twist it.

Lin Mo did not stop him.

He allowed that power to rage within him.

Let it tear, recombine, and merge that skill.

I don't know how much time passed.

When that force finally subsided, and when those black threads faded from his body, Lin Mo opened his eyes.

A new skill has been added to the attribute panel:

[Soul Fusion]: Multiple souls can be fused to create powerful soul creatures. The more souls fused and the higher their quality, the stronger the creature created. Each fusion requires a large amount of mental energy, and the fused creature needs to maintain its existence with the host's soul as an anchor point.

Lin Mo stared at the skill description in silence for a long time.

The fusion of microbial colonies transformed into the fusion of souls.

The microbiome became the soul.

The fungal army transformed into spirit beings.

He looked down at his hands.

In that hand, the essence was still held.

But the essence had shattered, turning into a pile of grayish-white powder that fell softly through the gaps between the fingers.

Outside the window, a faint glimmer of dawn appeared on the horizon.

A new day is about to begin.