I'm really not a Sanctuary Warlock.

When their hooves trod on solid soil once more, the crimson desert was already left behind.

The majestic mountain range stretched out in front of us, like a giant wall built by the gods, and the setting sun gilded the mountains with a blood-red halo.

We've arrived at Mount Nikolay.

Anna pulled on the reins, and the horse she was riding snorted restlessly.

At the foot of the mountain, a small village sits quietly in the shadows, with no smoke rising from chimneys and all is silent.

Lynn urged his unicorn forward to stand alongside Anna and Lisa.

Something's not right here.

It's too quiet.

The silence was unsettling.

“The cultists have taken over this place.” Anna pointed to a few scattered figures in the village.

Those people were wearing tattered gray robes and remained motionless.

“The level isn’t high, Lisa can take care of it secretly.”

Lisa didn't speak, she just nodded.

She dismounted, her entire body seemingly blending into the elongated shadows cast by the ground, and silently stealthily made her way towards the village entrance.

At the village entrance, a cult member leaning against the wall of a wooden house was yawning listlessly.

Lisa's shadow swept past him.

The cultist's yawn froze halfway through.

He remained in that comical pose, his body slowly sliding down the wall, a thin line of blood appearing on his neck, which then quickly expanded.

Lynn's heart started pounding.

too fast.

This is a disciplinary nun when she's serious, a sharp sword that exists solely to cut through sin.

Lisa's figure did not linger for a moment.

She walked through the alley, and the two cultists who were talking in hushed tones didn't even notice her approaching.

A flash of sword light.

Two sword energies, one after the other, precisely sliced ​​open their throats.

The two men clutched their necks, staring at each other in disbelief, before collapsing to their knees and dying in silent convulsions.

Shocked.

Lynn was so shocked by what he saw that he couldn't find any other words to describe it.

So assassins can be this strong?

In just a few minutes, Lisa wiped out the dozen or so scattered cult members in the village.

She stood beside a well in the center of the village and made a safe gesture towards Lynn and Anna.

"Let's go over there."

Anna spurred her horse forward, with Lynn close behind.

A faint smell of blood permeated the air, mixed with a putrid, sour stench that was nauseating.

Lisa pointed to an inconspicuous wooden trapdoor next to the well.

"There are people down there." Her voice was very low.

Anna dismounted and gestured for Lynn to get off as well.

She walked up to the trapdoor and, without hesitation, reached out and lifted it open.

An even stronger stench erupted from the dark cellar.

Immediately following were dozens of terrified screams.

"what--!"

"Monster! Don't kill us!"

"Please, please, let us go!"

The cellar was packed with people, their clothes tattered and their faces gaunt, crammed into the small space, gripped by panic at the sudden light and noise.

Anna frowned slightly.

She stretched out her hand, and a soft, holy light emerged from her palm, slowly drifting into the cellar.

Where the light passed, the heart-wrenching cries and screams gradually subsided.

People looked up, staring blankly at the warm light, their frantic emotions gradually calming down.

An elderly man with white hair and beard shakily squeezed out of the crowd, knelt down, and kowtowed repeatedly to Anna at the cellar entrance.

"Is it the Holy Light... or are the elders of the Church coming to save us?"

"Please, please save our children!"

A young mother knelt down, crying, "Those bad people...those demons...they took all the children from the village!"

“All the children?” Anna’s voice was chilling.

“Yes, all of them…newborn babies, still in swaddling clothes…not a single one was spared!” the old man sobbed uncontrollably. “They said…they would take the children to the mountaintop…to sacrifice them to the gods…”

"Please, please, save them..."

Inside the cellar, cries of pleas echoed.

Anna remained silent for a moment.

"We will go up."

The villagers emerged from the cellar one after another.

"Lynn."

Anna suddenly spoke.

She turned around, her golden hair fluttering slightly in the evening breeze, and her face, which always carried an air of holiness, appeared somewhat blurry in the dim light.

"It's not too late for you to change your mind."

"The Gates of Hell on Mount Nikolay are more dangerous than anything we've encountered before."

"Lisa and I...maybe neither of us will come back."

"You don't need to come with us to our deaths."

This was the last time she asked Lynn.

If Lynn agrees, she will give him enough money to go to a distant city and live as an ordinary person.

Lynn looked at her.

to death?

Of course he was afraid of dying.

Can we go back? Go back to where?

He had no home, and no sense of belonging to the world.

and……

In his mind, the desperate faces of the villagers in the cellar flashed by, and their cries about the baby echoed in his ears.

Escaping is no longer an option.

From the moment Anna handed him the milk and bread, from the moment he decided to become her servant, he had already made his choice.

"What are you saying, Your Highness?"

Lynn smiled, breaking the slightly heavy atmosphere.

"I would never do something like crossing the river and then burning the bridge."

He took a step forward, stood in front of Anna, and looked directly into her eyes.

"Besides, I am still your servant, aren't I?"

Anna did not speak.

She simply gazed at him quietly, his smiling face reflected in her golden eyes.

for a long time.

She nodded slightly and said nothing more.

Anna turned around, remounted her horse, and her movements were no longer hesitant or uncertain.

"Let's go."

She gave the reins a tug, and her mount neighed, galloping ahead towards the dark mountain road.

Lisa mounted her horse nimbly and followed.

Lynn watched Anna's retreating figure, then squeezed his legs tightly around the Holy Spirit Unicorn beneath him and followed closely behind.

Chapter Twenty-Nine: Gargoyles and Demons

The mountain road was rugged and much more difficult to travel than I had imagined.

Anna stopped her horse after climbing less than a hundred meters.

Heavy white breaths billowed from the horse's nostrils, and its hooves kept slipping on the steep, scree slope, clearly indicating that it had reached its limit.

“That’s it.” Anna dismounted. “The rest of the way will have to be walked.”

Lisa didn't say anything, but silently followed and dismounted, tying the reins to a dead tree nearby.

Lynn jumped down as well, then retrieved the unicorn.

The three of them began their trek towards the dark mountaintop.

Without a means of transportation, the hardship of climbing is magnified many times over.

Lynn quickly felt the strain; after all, he was just an ordinary level five person, and his physical strength was no match for Anna and Lisa.

Before long, his breathing became heavy.

Anna, who was walking in front, seemed to notice Lynn's embarrassment and stopped.

She turned around, without saying anything more, and simply extended her slender finger, gently pointing in the direction of Lynn and Lisa.

"accelerate."

A gentle breeze swept by.

Lynn instantly felt a lightness in his body, and the exhaustion that had almost crushed him vanished.

His legs became full of power, the rugged mountain path became flat under his feet, and he felt so light that he almost floated away.

Awesome!

Lynn let out a triumphant shout in his heart.

So this is what mountain climbing really feels like! No wonder a streamer I really admired in my past life could so easily abandon his 100,000 viewers and resolutely go mountain climbing instead of watching live.

Now they've completely reconciled.

With the help of magic, the three of them traveled several times faster.

The night grew deeper, and the last light was swallowed by the horizon.

When they finally stepped onto the flat ground at the top of the mountain, a crescent moon was already hanging high in the night sky, casting a cool glow.

The mountaintop was a wide-open space, barren of any vegetation.

In the center of the open space, a huge stone statue that had been toppled was half buried in the soil, with only half of its weathered body showing, making it look particularly desolate.

In front of the stone statue, more than thirty cultists dressed in black robes were gathered in a circle. They bowed their heads and chanted something in a monotone tone.

At the center of their encirclement, a dark spatial rift was slowly expanding.