After being forced to step down, the once-annoying nun eloped with me.

"what happened?"

"Your Excellency...please come and look out the window."

Led by his attendant, Bishop Stephen arrived at the bedroom window.

As the glass screen window was opened from the inside—a horrifying, piercing scream echoed from high above, and faintly, one could hear curses against the God of Light and the sounds of flames scorching the earth...

What's going on? Who is being disrespectful to God?! Something's not right here!

This is over 40 stories high... why would such a sound come from here?

Bishop Stephen, who was originally furious, was stunned.

He looked in the direction the attendant was pointing and saw a knight riding a hawk.

The knight hurled small, magically imbued orbs down at the city below. These orbs, enchanted by magic, transformed into a circular screen in mid-air, displaying...

The prisoners and corpses of the official Redeemers were burned at the stake, and these believers began to curse the God of Light in agony, pleading for divine punishment or grace, but never receiving a response.

"This...this is terrible, this is terrible..."

Bishop Stephen's eyes widened instantly.

Oh no, oh no!

Bishop Stephen didn't care at all about the failure of the New Salvation Army—after all, the Salvation Army itself was meant to be sacrificed. Although the best among them might become the Order's guards, overall, more than 9% of them would be purged after the war, even if they survived.

Therefore, Bishop Stephen didn't really care whether the Salvation Army would rashly go to the battlefield because of their underestimation of the enemy, nor did he care whether the Salvation Army could achieve results on his behalf—but he cared a lot about the existence of the precious priests and the apostolic army!

But if it were just the loss of a few priests or a few squads of the apostles... Bishop Stephen wouldn't be so alarmed as to cry out, "Oh no!"

The truly important point is about those shameless bastards! Those desecrating elves and demons not only burned the bodies of their believers, but they even subjected their captives to the punishment of burning at the stake?!

"Oh no...oh no! Quick! Get those screens off! Get the bishops here immediately! We need a meeting, we need a meeting!"

The diocese where the Church of Light is located is a typical state within a state, and believers living in the diocese naturally need to follow the rules of the diocese.

People living in the parish would naturally accept all of this, believing that as long as they were not cremated or burned at the stake after their death, the angels of the God of Light would lead them to heaven. As long as they maintained their devout faith, the God of Light would never abandon them, granting them the courage to fight against the devil and allowing them to enjoy God's blessings.

In fact, anyone who is a clergyman knows that the God of Light does exist and that the God of Light's power is genuine—but does the God of Light really care about ordinary believers?

the answer is negative.

The God of Light has even caused two disasters in history—if the diocese hadn't whitewashed the situation and shifted the blame onto the regent, that one "smog" would have been enough to turn the diocese from a cult that everyone flocked to into a small, deserted religion.

The God of Light does not care about ordinary believers. All the priests of the God of Light are well aware of this.

But the pastor must uphold the lie of the God of Light... The pastor must make believers believe the lie that "the God of Light loves every believer."

Because lies are the foundation of parish stability! Lies are the reason why the Church of Light has prospered to this day!

But now?!

That traitor of the Roman Empire! What on earth did that damned regent do?!

He was like someone openly and brazenly dissecting and displaying the rottenness of the Light God Cult's goldfish to its believers...

Believers are not afraid of the condemnation of the God of Light, because the condemnation proves that the God of Light still cares about them—perhaps the one condemned will become hysterical, but the other believers will have greater cohesion. This is a win-win situation for the bishops.

But what believers fear most is... God's complete indifference to their flattery, their prayers, their apostasy, and their insults—especially when God's enemies openly and brazenly desecrate the corpses of believers, humiliate their values, or even execute them by burning at the stake, the most insulting punishment for believers of the Church of Light.

This would directly shatter the believers' faith, and once the believers' faith is shattered...

The entire parish's businesses, except for the nuns, will collapse.

"Stop them immediately!!"

Bishop Stephen's screams echoed throughout the mansion. In fact, some people had already begun to deal with the screen that appeared in the sky, but it was all too late.

Before the parish's griffin friars could even take flight, the eagle fled with its rider.

They have left images of hope throughout the parish, images that have long been clearly seen by the vast majority of believers.

Originally, there were still some stubborn believers who held the idea that "this is just an illusion created by the elves with magic," "God loves the world, how could he let us suffer?" or "the elves and demons have already lost, this is just their self-deception!" They were extolling the greatness of the God of Light to their fellow believers and restoring everyone's confidence in the God of Light.

Especially after the parish's griffin riders soared into the sky and shattered those screens, their belief in the greatness of God deepened.

But soon—these fanatics themselves had a question:

If God is watching over this place, why would He allow the elven griffins to run rampant and defecate in the skies above St. Petersburg, the city of God?

...The believers looked up at the sky, and for a moment, all the towns and villages in the parish were unusually quiet.

They haven't chosen to believe the truth yet. After all, that's the nature of humans; only when death is imminent, only when they realize that today is the last day of winter break, do they realize that the knife pointed at their throat is real.

The believers chose to remain silent in shock and unease for the time being, while in the emergency convening of the bishops' council, everyone, including the bishop Peter, was unusually serious.

They looked at each other, and finally decided to start with what they cared about most.

"Did the nuns know about this?" Peter asked.

The bishop, who was in charge of matters concerning the ascetics, shook his head: "We have very tight control over intelligence. The ascetics just mistakenly thought that someone was harassing them from above. They wanted to come out and fight back, but we have already calmed them down."

"That's good... whatever you do, whatever you do, whatever you do—you mustn't let the nuns and the saint discover the current state of St. Petersburg. The moment they show any sign of re-entering the world, immediately restore St. Petersburg to the state it was in before the saint's asceticism... Do you understand?! If the saint were to reappear, even the slightly overweight priests of St. Petersburg would have to leave temporarily! We must maintain our image in front of the saint..."

"Yes Yes!"

The bishops readily agreed. After all, they were nuns and saints of the Church of Light!

In every religion in the world, there will always be a small group of people who not only offer extremely fanatical faith, but also demand that others live according to the precepts.

The ascetics and saints of the Church of Light were among them. When the saints and ascetics were still active on the surface, the leader of the Church of Light himself couldn't even afford salted fish and had to eat chaff with the common people. This shows how strict the original precepts of the Church of Light were!

In a sense, if the nuns and saints discovered how wealthy the Church of Light was, they might one day violently purge the entire diocese...

Although Bishop Peter was prepared for the diocese to split, it shouldn't be now.

Only after confirming that the group of ascetic women had been appeased did everyone discuss the second concern.

The questions are: Was the Redemption Army's crushing defeat true? Were the aforementioned effects real? Just how many regions were affected by those elven bastards?

The answers were increasingly horrifying: the Redeemers not only suffered a crushing defeat, but their priests and knights were also sniped by some kind of powerful weapon. The priests' bodies were reduced to their short, stout lower halves, and less than one in ten knights survived; the survivors were mostly delirious, saying things like "this is God's punishment."

Naturally, the prisoners and corpses of the Redemption Army were burned in the flames, and the survivors were also enchanted, so they not only did not die for a while, but even openly betrayed their religion and insulted the entire family and ancestors of the God of Light in order to beg for divine punishment to be relieved as soon as possible. In the end, they did not even receive any divine punishment.

This meant that the bishops' second concern might have reached the general public—but they still clung to a sliver of hope that if the elves were only sending messages to St. Petersburg, they could still control the situation... But was that really the case?

Through divine magic, the bishops exchanged bewildered glances; their already pale and oily faces now showed an added touch of greenish-blue.

Unfortunately, things didn't go as they imagined.

The Eagle Knights had already transmitted the footage to most of the parish. Apart from the effects in St. Petersburg being cleared, the footage had been playing for a full half hour elsewhere.

"A full half hour?!"

Peter was so angry his nose almost twisted. He slammed his fist on the conference table, cracking it into a spiderweb pattern, then exhaled a foul breath at Stephen, his face grim.

“Bishop Stephen! I don’t care how the Redeemers failed, but we must now deal with the aftermath!”

A brilliant victory can restore the trust and faith of believers, so I urge you to spare no effort to secure a victory for us in the near future!

"But Master! How can untrained soldiers go to the battlefield?"

“I don’t care! This is something you have to do! I’m going to plead for my Lord’s grace now, and I also need to change my clothes and comfort the saintess… By the way, how are things elsewhere? I mean, have they received any news elsewhere?”

Peter's words silenced the bishops.

Another exchange of divine magic ensued, and soon a bishop made contact with friends in the capital and the military region.

Fortunately, the parish's biggest scandal had not yet reached the ears of Prince Garsen, that jackal, and General Dreschka, but even so, these images could still be spread through word of mouth...

The spread of the scandal had to be stopped—just as the bishops reached a consensus and Bishop Peter was about to leave, there was a sudden, urgent knocking on the meeting room door.

Before Bishop Peter could even furrow his brow to allow the outsiders to enter, the messenger deacon barged in, his face ashen, and shouted:

"No, this is terrible! The Redemption Army, the defeated Redemption Army has fled back to the parish! Now they are burning, killing, and looting in the villages around the parish, openly proclaiming the Redemption Army's defeat, and even saying that the elves and demons have the help of God—Your Excellency, Your Excellency! What should we do?"

Silence. Still silence.

The Redemption Army's routed troops—everyone had considered it, kept it in mind, but no one expected them to arrive so quickly.

Upon closer reflection, it's understandable that the Monster Forest wasn't far from the parish, which led to border friction between the parish and the Elf Kingdom... It's quite reasonable that they were able to get back to the parish within a few hours.

If it's just a simple rout, there's really nothing to be afraid of.

But what's truly alarming is that just moments ago, those images representing countless scandals in the parish were still being played recklessly in the sky, and those being burned, roasted, and hurling insults at the God of Light on those images were none other than soldiers of the Redemption Army?!

This was bad—everyone was looking at Bishop Stephen. Bishop Stephen was sweating profusely.

He stood up, about to say that he would personally lead the elite of the Northern Expeditionary Force to persuade or annihilate the Redemption Army's routed troops, when another cry rang out, "Something's wrong—!"

Another deacon, pale-faced, entered.

"Oh no! Demons! Demons and elves! They've attacked the Northern Expeditionary Force's camp, and one camp has already been destroyed! Those elves and demons are killing anyone they see and burning any supplies they find. What should we do?!"

Everyone looked at each other.

The next moment, a bishop with low endurance collapsed limply into his chair, clutching his forehead.

Unable to withstand the successive blows, she was so frightened that she fainted.

Chapter 8: Bloodshed Tactics and Pre-Battle Planning

Twenty minutes ago, twenty kilometers away from the original camp of the Redemption Army, was a training camp for some of the new recruits in the 20-strong Northern Expeditionary Force.

The new recruits receive the most basic training here, cultivating the most fundamental qualities required for marching in formation on the battlefield—in a sense, this is as absurd as giving a farmer a hammer and then letting him forge iron himself.

The parishes are free. They just need a lot of cannon fodder while consuming the population that will soon be divided up according to the agreement—so it doesn't matter whether these people have learned how to forge iron or not, as long as they can go up and die, that's great.

Even so, the parish only wished for them to die.

Instead of becoming "disabled" patients who need treatment—and in such large numbers that they can no longer be directly thrown into the slaughterhouse for processing.

"Phew... Now we just need to let the golems roam freely. Let's go."

When Chief Naruja of the Ling tribe led her people away on a swift eagle, the gate to the training camp was completely blocked, leaving only a few golems made of stone and earth playing a happy cat-and-mouse game with the survivors in the camp.

Golems are a specialty of the Listening Clan. After a long period of change and improvements by elven mages, as well as Arthur's new ideas and Yang Hao's tactical concepts, Naruja lived up to expectations and proposed a new type of harassment tactic. This tactic would keep the parish constantly on the run, leaving it with constant wounds, and making it feel the terror of the elves and demons.

This tactic, known as the "Golem Drop Tactic," essentially relies on the current Listener race's skill of "Standardized Golem Production."

The Ling people, under the protection of the elves, would ride on eagles and land about one kilometer away from the enemy camp.

They would then use the cheapest stones and mud available to make golems, making them as big as possible.

After that, the Listeners will control the Golems to encircle the camp based on the number of entrances and exits, while the elves will ride eagles to shoot arrows from above to destroy siege equipment that threatens the Golems, thus allowing the towering Golems to block all entrances and exits of the camp without any doubt.