I'm really not a Sanctuary Warlock.

I wonder if Anna is taking good care of herself.

I am eager to go home.

Lynn continuously poured his magical power into the Holy Spirit Unicorn, causing the unicorn's speed to surge once again, leaving almost a trail of afterimages across the wasteland.

Chapter 201 Have you thought about how you want to die?

In the central square of Holy Song City, the colorful flags of the grand Festival of Light that were still hanging in the air a few months ago have now been stained dark red with splattered blood.

Thousands of ragged refugees were forced back to the massive obelisk in the center of the square.

The once spacious square is now almost too small to even stand in. The outer perimeter is surrounded by densely packed, fully armed noble private soldiers, who hold long spears and heavy crossbows and watch the crowd trapped in the middle.

Nora lay on the stone slab covered in blood, black blood gushing from a deep, bone-revealing wound in her abdomen.

She gritted her teeth and used the broken, chipped sword to support herself on the ground, trying to stand up again, but her legs trembled uncontrollably.

“I still… messed it up.” Nora coughed up a mouthful of blood mixed with pieces of internal organs, staring intently at the noble generals in magnificent armor in front of her, her eyes filled with resentment and despair. “These beasts… they never intended to leave any survivors.”

"Don't speak, Nora."

To Eve's left, Lisa looked like a mother wolf protecting her cubs. Her signature silver hair was completely stained red with blood, her shamanic habit was tattered, and her left arm hung limply at her side, clearly broken. But her right hand still gripped the longsword tightly, each swing filled with a mad, reckless ferocity.

"A bunch of scum!" Lisa cleaved through a heavily armored infantryman who tried to approach with her sword. The blade cut into the man's neck and got stuck. Without hesitation, she raised her foot and kicked him hard in the chest, pulling the sword out and sending a spray of blood flying.

She breathed in the blood-smelling air, her eyes filled with a chilling ferocity.

But behind Lisa and Nora lies the real reason why this defensive line did not collapse.

Anna stood at the very center of the refugees.

Her pure white dress was now covered in dust and blood, and her face was deathly pale. She raised her staff high, desperately squeezing out the remaining magic power within her, and a huge hemispherical shield of holy light enveloped thousands of refugees, as well as Lisa and the others in front of her.

But the cost was devastating.

The world before Anna's eyes was losing its color at a visible speed; grayish-white patches spread across the edges of her vision, and she began to hear those nauseating, raucous murmurs that sounded like fingernails scraping glass.

Her sanity is plummeting.

38 points... 34 points... 30 points...

Each time the noble's private soldiers' magic struck the shield, Anna's body trembled violently, and her sanity depleted at an accelerated rate. She bit her lower lip, blood trickling from the corner of her mouth, forcibly using the pain to keep herself conscious.

Outside the shield, a noble duke dressed in magnificent gold-threaded armor rode on horseback, watching the dying crowd with a mocking expression.

He is Grand Duke Howard, the true master behind the Northern Merchant Guild, and the leader of this noble rebellion. His personal visit is to take control of the Holy Song in order to gain the right to speak with the Royal City.

Beside Duke Howard stood a man shrouded in a black robe. The air around him was distorted by the dense abyssal aura, and the stone slabs beneath his feet had been corroded into black mud.

"Nora, this is the consequence of your attempt to establish a new order." Duke Howard looked down at the people inside the shield, his tone filled with arrogant superiority. "A peasant will always be a peasant. Did you really think that by opening granaries and buying people's hearts, you could gain a foothold in this world? Without us nobles, you wouldn't even know how you died."

Nora stared at him, too weak to reply.

The Abyss Bishop completely ignored Duke Howard's barking; his crimson eyes, hidden beneath his hood, were greedily fixed on Anna in the center of the shield.

"What a pure soul..." The Abyss Bishop let out a laugh as unpleasant as an owl's, the sound piercing through the holy light shield and striking directly into everyone's minds. "How long can your sanity last? Give up the fight. Once your ridiculous shell shatters, your soul, soaked in despair, will become the perfect sacrifice to awaken our Lord. To become a part of the Abyss is the greatest honor for a hypocrite like you."

Anna ignored his provocation and gripped her staff tightly.

"Stop wasting time talking to them, Your Grace." Duke Howard snapped his whip impatiently, a cruel glint of excitement in his eyes. "All troops, listen up! Launch a general offensive! Crush that shield, kill everyone inside, leave no one alive!"

At the Duke's command, thousands of noble private soldiers roared in unison.

The mage corps behind them began chanting frantically, and hundreds of fireballs, ice spikes, and wind blades rose into the air like a torrential rain.

The heavy crossbowmen in the front row pulled the triggers, and thick bolts with armor-piercing runes tore through the air with a piercing whistle.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

Countless attacks slammed into the Holy Light Shield at the same time, causing the entire central square to tremble violently.

"Ugh..." Anna let out a painful groan, her knees buckled, and she collapsed to the ground on one knee.

In an instant, countless cracks appeared on the surface of the massive holy light shield.

"Your Highness!" Lisa turned her head and looked at the swaying Anna, her anger burning.

The defenses are about to collapse.

The cracks in the shield were spreading at an alarming rate.

Each explosion of magic widens the crack a little more.

Inside the shield, the refugees huddled together in terror, their desperate cries echoing through the air. Little girls trembled in their mothers' arms, while the elderly closed their eyes and prayed in despair.

Anna suddenly coughed up a mouthful of blood, the crimson blood splattering onto her pure white skirt in a shocking sight.

Her vision had completely blurred. The world had turned utterly gray and white, and the phantoms of monstrous creatures covered in fleshy tentacles and countless eyes began to flicker before her eyes. The monstrous whispers of the evil god in her ears had transformed into deafening shrieks, tearing madly at her soul.

Sanity points: 14 points... 13 points...

She's almost fallen below the absolute bottom line. If she goes any further, she'll completely degenerate into a mindless, mutated monster.

Anna gave a bitter smile. She knew she couldn't hold on any longer.

In that instant, a series of images flashed through her mind.

She remembered the village where she was slaughtered by cultists when she was a child, the cold floor of the church orphanage, and the countless lonely nights she spent fighting against the abyss after becoming a saint.

But in the end, the image froze on the face of a young man with black hair.

She remembered the man holding her hand without hesitation in the sea of ​​flowers, and the warmth from his palm.

“Lynn…” Anna murmured the name softly, a clear tear sliding down her cheek.

She had thought she had finally found hope to live and someone to walk alongside, but now it seemed she could not escape the fate of becoming a saint.

"I'm sorry, I might... not be able to wait for you to come back."

Anna slowly raised her head, and a resolute look suddenly burst forth from her previously unfocused golden pupils, making it impossible for anyone to look directly at her.

She released her grip on the staff, and her hands quickly formed a hand seal in front of her chest. A holy light power ten times more violent than before began to gather wildly at her heart.

She is going to unleash her brilliance.

This is the final trump card of every Holy Maiden of Light, burning all her life force, soul, and remaining sanity in exchange for a devastating burst of holy light.

This power is enough to completely purify all evil within a radius of a thousand meters, but she herself will also be annihilated, leaving no chance for reincarnation.

"Your Highness! What are you doing?" Lisa was the first to notice the destructive energy fluctuations within Anna's body.

She turned around abruptly and saw the blinding light shining from Anna's chest. She instantly understood Anna's intention, and Lisa's eyes turned red. She tried to run back like a madwoman.

"No! Your Highness! Stop!" Lisa screamed shrilly, her voice filled with terror.

But as soon as she turned around, the spears of two heavily armored infantrymen pierced her thighs and shoulders.

Lisa was knocked to the ground by the immense impact, her blood instantly staining the ground red. Ignoring her severe injuries, she desperately gripped the stone slab with her hands, leaving a long trail of blood as she tried to crawl towards Anna.

"Trying to self-destruct?" Outside the shield, the Abyss Bishop let out a mocking laugh. "Before my lord, you don't even have the right to choose how you die!"

The Abyss Bishop abruptly raised the bone staff in his hand, and the surrounding air was instantly sucked away.

Endless abyssal black energy gathered wildly above his head, eventually compressing into a black spear over ten meters long. Countless wailing vengeful spirits coiled around the spear, emanating a suffocating aura of destruction.

"Smash it!"

The Abyss Bishop roared, and his black spear, with overwhelming force, slammed into the already cracked Holy Light Shield.

This was a fatal blow; the shield couldn't possibly stop it, and Anna's self-destruction was too late.

Everyone closed their eyes in despair, awaiting death.

At this critical moment.

"hiss--!!!"

A clear, high-pitched cry, powerful enough to shatter the clouds, suddenly rang out from the sky, carrying a sense of holiness and majesty, instantly tearing apart the despair on the battlefield.

Immediately afterwards, the originally gloomy clouds were violently torn apart by a brute force.

An incredibly thick white beam of light, like a divine sword of judgment, descended from the sky with perfect accuracy, striking the black spear that was about to touch the shield.

boom--!!!

There was no earth-shattering explosion, only a chilling sound of energy annihilation.

A violent energy shockwave spread outwards in a ring from the point of impact. Hundreds of noble private soldiers who were preparing to charge were thrown dozens of meters into the air like rag dolls caught in a hurricane before they could even scream. They crashed heavily into the distant ruins, their fate unknown.

The Abyss Bishop's seemingly inevitable fatal blow was easily disintegrated and melted away the moment it touched the white beam of light, just like snowflakes under the scorching sun.

"What?!" The Abyss Bishop was jolted back several steps by the powerful backlash, his hood being ripped open by the gale, revealing a withered, ugly face covered in black magic patterns. He looked up in disbelief, staring intently at the sky.

The light gradually faded.

In mid-air, a pure white Holy Spirit Unicorn with a spiral horn on its forehead stood on the ground, and with each breath it took, a pure white ripple spread through the air.

On the back of the unicorn sat a young man.

He was wearing a pure black mage's robe, the hem of which fluttered in the strong wind.

He didn't carry any weapons; he simply sat there quietly, looking down at the chaotic battlefield below.

At that moment, he was like a god descended to earth.

The entire central square fell silent.

The wind stopped, the sounds of fighting ceased, and everyone's eyes were fixed on the black figure in mid-air.

Lisa lay in a pool of blood, biting her lip tightly. When she saw that familiar face, those eyes, always filled with murderous intent and vigilance, widened in shock. Large tears mingled with the blood on her face and splattered onto the stone slab. Her fingers, which had been gripping the longsword so tightly they were convulsing, finally loosened slightly at that moment.

Nora leaned against the base of the obelisk, coughing up blood. She looked at Lynn in mid-air and forced a smile: "This guy... really knows how to pick his moment to appear."

Anna, standing in the center of the crowd, finally snapped the moment she saw Lynn.

The self-destructing light gathering in her chest vanished instantly, and the terrifying hallucinations before her eyes and the piercing screams in her ears seemed to be forcibly dispelled by some force the moment Lynn appeared.

She felt all her strength drain away, her knees buckled, and she fell backward.

Lynn's eyes narrowed slightly.

The next second, his figure disappeared directly from the unicorn's back.

Teleportation.

Almost at the same moment Anna was about to fall to the ground, Lynn appeared behind her. He stretched out his arms and steadily caught Anna's incredibly light body in his embrace.

It was icy cold to the touch. Anna's body was as cold as ice, and her white dress was stained with glaring blood.

Lynn looked at Anna's deathly pale face, and his heart clenched painfully. Without any hesitation, he immediately transformed his overflowing rationality into the purest and gentlest power, continuously channeling it into Anna's body through the point of contact between them.

Anna's sanity, which had plummeted to 13 points, began to recover at a frenzied pace.

15 PM... 30 PM... 50 PM... 70 PM...

As her sanity surged, Anna's previously ashen face finally regained its color. The gray world before her eyes was once again tinged with color.

Anna slowly opened her eyes.

She looked at Lynn's face, which was so close to hers, at the stubble on his chin, and at his bloodshot eyes from rushing around.

She didn't ask him how he escaped from that madwoman, the Queen Mother, what he had experienced along the way, or why he hadn't come back sooner.

She simply reached out her still slightly trembling hand and gently grasped the collar of Lynn's robe at his chest.

"You're back." Anna's voice was so weak it sounded like a breeze that might dissipate at any moment, and her eyes were terribly red.

Lynn lowered his head, looking at the foolish woman in his arms who had almost burned her soul away to protect others. He raised his hand and gently wiped the blood from her cheek, tucking her disheveled golden hair behind her ear.

"Hmm," Lynn said, offering only one word.

But this one word contains all the responses.

Lynn carefully picked up Anna and walked to Lisa's side. He knelt down and looked at the disciplinary nun, who was covered in wounds and still struggling to stay awake.

"You bastard..." Lisa gritted her teeth, her voice choked with suppressed sobs, "Why did it take you so long to get back..."

"Sorry, I took care of a few stray rats on the way, which delayed me a little." Lynn handed Anna to Lisa and poured a stream of pure magic into Lisa's body to stabilize her injuries. "Take good care of her."

Lisa hugged Anna tightly and nodded vigorously.

Lynn stood up.

When he turned his head and looked again at Duke Howard and the Abyss Bishop outside the shield, all the tenderness and calmness in his eyes vanished in an instant.

Instead, there was a palpable violence and murderous intent.