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

"So you don't understand them. They won't stop. They might postpone the final battle, or they might bring it forward, but they will never give up on the final battle—because they need to consume their surplus population, otherwise their food simply won't be enough to feed so many people."

"Since they're already eating people, why don't they just openly and honestly kill them?"

"This brings us to another human problem: although humans are fully aware of what they do, they still need some bright and noble excuse to cover it up. Even a parish can't openly admit to cannibalism unless they want to incite public outrage..."

"This is really troublesome."

"...Yes. It's very troublesome."

Gu Qiefen finally understood—the barbarians of the Roman Empire seemed to be an extremely complex group. They could eat their own kind without a second thought, yet they were ashamed to tell their fellow humans about it. They were stubborn yet cowardly, selfish yet incredibly cruel.

Ultimately, the Roman Empire as a whole is not what the elves consider human—or rather, the only humans the elves recognize are the Bayrjans. Now we also have to include Yang Hao, as well as a very small number of Romans like Joseph and Arthur.

But that's all there is to it.

Finn shook her head, took one last look at the terrain modification work that was still being painstakingly prepared, then took Yang Hao's wrist and used teleportation magic to send the two of them back to the emerald courtyard of Fingel's Hanging Gardens.

As soon as they came down, they found the nun staring at them with wide eyes. Finn returned the smile defiantly, but for some reason, her grip tightened, to the point that Yang Hao felt some pain.

Fortunately, the women didn't seem inclined to make a scene in front of Yang Hao. Finn finally let go, and then watched as Teresa, making a face, took her man's arm and said:

"How are things going at the front?"

"It's alright. We're currently working on terrain modification to create suitable battlegrounds, and the golems are constantly harassing the Northern Expeditionary Force's camp... If nothing unexpected happens, we should be able to reduce their numbers by the end of October when we have our final battle with the parish."

"I see... then come with me. I do have something to discuss with you about the demons."

The nun gave a soft hum, gently took out a handkerchief to wipe the stains off the man's face, and then led the two to her chapel.

Inside the church, the statue of light that Theresa worshipped was faintly emitting a nearly invisible white light. Theresa said that the psychological counseling she had recently done with the demons had been very effective—although she didn't know why the demons ultimately chose to worship the light and become believers in it, overall the demons were now completely willing to join Gaparia and become its citizens.

"And they're willing to put aside their past grievances, huh? I have to say, the parish's invasion did at least do one good thing: it united the demon tribes of the Demon Forest into a single entity."

Muttering to herself, Teresa knelt on the cushion and prayed to the statue for less than two seconds under the strange gazes of the two men before standing up with a flourish.

To be honest, this wasn't the first time Yang Hao had seen her pray—but was this really the piety of a nun?

Faced with Yang Hao's strange gaze, the nun merely pursed her lips and glanced towards the elves:

"In short, Fen, if you want to accept the demons' words, just tell me directly—Yang Hao, you too, just tell me directly. By the way, because the number of believers in my Lord has increased, I can now use some strange divine magic to assist you in battle. So I will also be there for the final battle."

"But Theresa, the front lines are dangerous."

"What do you think will happen to me if you fail? So don't try to persuade me on this kind of thing. If we fail, at least we'll die together, maybe even on opposite sides of the same cross when we're nailed to it—Fin might have a worse time."

The nun pinched the man's waist, whose face was contorted with bitterness. Although she was saying some harsh things, Finn inexplicably seemed to agree with her.

"So we need to avoid the worst possible outcome... So, is that all you have to say?"

"It's over. So remember to let me know when you make your decision—after all, performing Mass for them is tiring too."

"Let's consider expanding the sect and adding more nuns."

"I am a nun myself."

She rolled her eyes. The night passed by in the nun's grumbling.

......

One week later.

Bishop Stephen proved his conjecture with tangible results.

His priests and apologist knights did indeed find traces of the golems' activity outside the camp. Moreover, some apologists even encountered the iron golems while acting alone.

Unsurprisingly, those tall metal golems or golems completely ignored the slashing and thrusting of conventional swords. With a light stroke of their peculiar claw-like limbs, they could easily tear through the armor of the Guardian Knights, not to mention the impact their heavy weight would have on ordinary soldiers as they advanced.

The priest's spear of light was quite effective against these golems, but before he could completely kill one golem, the enemy reinforcements drove back the priest and his guards.

This was very embarrassing for the priests at the time, but for Bishop Stephen, the achievement was already enough.

“We have scouted a new type of enemy unit and determined how they might pose a threat to us—now that the fire in the camp has passed, our wounded should not suffer further losses, and the pressure at the slaughterhouse should not increase further.”

At the meeting, Bishop Stephen passionately expounded his ideas. But just as Bishop Stephen was feeling smug about his wisdom in warfare, bad news reached his ears.

For some unknown reason, the elves and demons used magic and unknown forces to create a canyon in the open area in front of the Demon Forest, blocking their path of attack.

Although the canyon is still under construction, once it is completed, it will pose a real disadvantage to the Northern Expeditionary Force.

This caused Bishop Stephen's smile to vanish instantly. He took a sip of wine to suppress his anger, and after checking his troop strength, he suddenly had an idea:

"Perhaps I know how to make the most of wounded soldiers."

With a mysterious smile, Bishop Stephen, after entrusting his property to his servants, personally stepped into the camp of the Northern Expeditionary Force.

And after casting a bishop-level divine blessing on the wounded soldiers.

He sent these beyond saving wounded men into the trenches being dug, braving a hail of elven arrows, and from a distance used divine magic to fix the corpses into hard stones that could not be efficiently mined.

By this point, the number of Northern Expeditionary Forces had dropped to 25—but these 5 wounded soldiers not only provided the Expeditionary Forces with food, but also became the cornerstone of the Expeditionary Forces' future decisive battles.

They could be described as giving their all.

Whether or not one can go to heaven is another matter entirely.

Chapter Nine: The True Divine Art of the God of Light

...After resolving the historical issues of wounded soldiers and preventing the Golems from continuing their attacks on the Northern Expeditionary Force's camps and demoralizing them, the Northern Expeditionary Force and the elven-demon alliance found themselves temporarily bogged down in a quagmire from which they could not extricate themselves.

Neither side could defeat the other. The elves and demons tried their best to dig wider and more treacherous canyons, but to no avail because of the petrified corpses of the believers—those who were turned to stone by the divine magic of the bishop level might still be alive. After all, the elves had heard that as long as the caster was alive, those punished by petrification would never be able to ascend to heaven.

As long as the poor souls aren't completely dead, the stones on these guys' bodies will be indestructible and will regenerate almost indefinitely. In Yang Hao's helpless words: This is a kind of magically created living metal that can repair itself!

Although he wanted the Ling people to simply use these stones as raw materials to create special golems, and then return these golems to their rightful owners.

However, whether due to interference from divine magic or not, the magic of the Ling people was of no use to these special corpse stones... So they had no choice but to abandon the first half of the canyon, which was occupied by half of the corpse stones, and instead expand the canyon backward.

The elves and demons were forced to compress their rear lines. The northern expeditionary force was also in dire straits.

While it's true that Bishop Stephen's personal arrival did significantly boost the morale of the believers, ultimately, more and more desertions occurred.

These deserters almost all ran away during field training—their faith in the God of Light seemed to have been crushed by the fear of death. Rather, they preferred death to spending the rest of their lives crippled or scorched by flames, unable to go to heaven.

Moreover, their disdain for the images projected across the entire diocese also told them that even if they betrayed the God of Light, he would not punish them...

so...

Things got even worse.

Initially, only one or two people may have escaped.

But then small squads of soldiers escaped.

In the end, they even fled one by one, from staff to staff!

Bishop Stephen previously had an army of 250,000, but now that there are no more wounded soldiers to lose, nearly 20,000 of them have deserted due to low morale!

Left with no other choice, Bishop Stephen had to order the priests and the friars to "fire freely," granting them the right to execute deserters in public and even the right to carry out burnings at will.

In this way, desertion was successfully suppressed, but the number of soldiers killed by their own people actually increased.

After all this, Bishop Stephen now has only about 22 troops left to use—and the majority of them are ordinary believers who haven't received much training and are just there to bolster morale and serve as cannon fodder.

"Ugh!"

Bishop Stephen sighed heavily—given more time to train them, he was confident he could turn those 22 men into a capable militia.

But not only did the elves not give him time to frantically dig trenches in front, the bishop council in the rear also didn't give him time.

Bishop Peter and the other bishops urged Bishop Stephen to secure a resounding victory, but Bishop Stephen knew very well that this was actually a sign that public opinion in the diocese was about to get out of control.

After all, there are still quite a few of those damned Redemption Army routs roaming the mountains and forests within the parish. These bastards already know that if they are caught by the parish, they will definitely die, so they simply chose to abandon their faith. Not only did they start burning, killing, and looting their former fellow believers, but they also loudly proclaimed the God of Light's "disrespect and lack of love."

This caused the parish a great deal of trouble: after all, even if the parish wanted to deal with these defeated troops, even the most elite griffon paladins could not quickly clear them from east to west when they were scattered.

To use the simplest analogy of movement, this is like cockroaches scattered throughout the house—your insecticide might kill one or two in front of you, but it's still useless against those that have penetrated deep into the cracks in the walls.

The diocese had no choice but to place all its hopes on Bishop Stephen: if Stephen could bring victory, then the diocese's propaganda machine could regain the bishops' control over the believers.

But even Bishop Stephen is in a difficult position!

"How are you expecting me to win with a bunch of cannon fodder?! Have you forgotten that these guys were recruited specifically to die?!"

Bishop Stephen said with a bitter expression: Yes, more than half of the soldiers in the Northern Expeditionary Force were conscripted to die.

From the very beginning, the diocese deliberately focused its attention on the Elf Kingdom to ensure their deaths—although Bishop Stephen admitted he had fantasized about defeating the Elf Kingdom and making a fortune, objectively speaking, the soldiers here were simply incapable of achieving such a goal...

They were conscripted to their deaths! And now these clueless strategists think they can win with sheer numbers? What a joke!

If sheer numbers could win, then ants would have wiped out human nations long ago! Do they even realize that, besides quantity, the most important things in war are quality and discipline?!

Those cult soldiers might only have a pitchfork in their hands! You want me to use them to attack the Elf Forest?! To attack the Elf Kingdom, where arrows seem inexhaustible and they even seem to have new weapons?

Why the hell didn't you let me commit suicide?!

Bishop Stephen's heart was erupting with rage like a volcano.

But the bishops' council has real power over him. And if he fails to achieve his goal and returns, the punishment from Bishop Peter will be real as well.

Bishop Stephen feared more than death that Bishop Peter would bind his soul in a candle to be endlessly roasted and burned.

So he took a deep breath and gritted his teeth and decided: Since the current believers can't help me win, then let me transform them into suitable soldiers!

But before that...

He first had to deal with the demoralized deserters in the army, as well as some priests who were already showing signs of disobeying his orders...

"Someone come here! Communicate the order to the Seventh Legion!"

Bishop Stephen gritted his teeth.

It's better to send your soldiers to hell than to send yourself to hell.

............

It was late afternoon in late October. The elves and demons were still painstakingly preparing advantageous terrain for the final battle.

More and more demons are volunteering for the army, but these demons are simply incapable of going to the battlefield—in Yang Hao's observation, they are too impulsive. They have almost no discipline, and if they were really sent to the battlefield, they would only disrupt their own side's formation.

However, due to the severe shortage of troops at the front, Yang Hao could only deploy them to the flanks to fill the gaps in the front line—after all, between the two options of "no one" and "someone," he preferred the latter. After all, having people would at least be able to withstand the enemy's advance.

Moreover, for some reason, the parish has been launching more and more suicide attacks on the trenches recently.

"This is the sixth batch today..."

He murmured to himself as he watched the approaching army of believers and priests in the distance. With the sounding of horns, the allied forces of the elves and demons immediately ceased their work and, under the cover of longbowmen, retreated behind cover to await the enemy's assault.