You are all my wings!

Now that things have come to this point, there is indeed no need to hide it anymore.

Upon hearing this, Ophimosa gave an awkward smile.

As expected, Leon, a legitimate astrologer, saw right through him.

Lyon smiled, not continuing on that topic, and returned to his main point:

"And the key point is, isn't it that your plans have been thwarted because your divine energy has been extracted?"

This reminded Ophimasso of something, and she refocused on this key point. After a moment's thought, she said:

"Was it extracted because of Britta? Has she already mastered the method of using the sacred murals?"

Although Britta didn't understand why Leon brought this up at this time, as it seemed to vaguely suggest revealing information, she nodded, trusting Leon.

"Yes, there was some left before, but this time, in order to deal with your pursuit, I absorbed most of what I could, so there's practically nothing left. Therefore, even if you want to use this to activate the sacred ruins, you probably won't succeed."

Ophimosa frowned.

"Your Highness, is your purpose in plotting against those divine ruins for some kind of secret treasure?"

Lyon continued to ask.

Ophim Marceau looked at Lyon, who seemed to have other suggestions after speaking so frankly.

Having thought this through, she said frankly:

“That’s right, I’m going to go in and find a treasure that is of vital importance to me and to the entire kingdom.”

Lyon's heart skipped a beat, and he guessed what the treasure was.

Inside the divine ruins, besides the fragments of the Mirror of Origin, which was his previous target, there were two other relatively important treasures.

One of them is the semi-mysterious treasure, the Crown of Law, which is 60% complete.

It can gather all the power within a large force and is a large-scale control artifact that can exert a similar effect of 'words becoming law' over its subordinate forces.

With this, the Horsha Kingdom's internal governance will be greatly enhanced.

Of course, this thing has high requirements for use; at least a legendary level is required to use it.

The second is the divine treasure, the Chariot of Mighty God, which is now only a fragment.

It is said to be a fragment of the ancient god of strength's chariot. Having this item grants the ability to travel across the entire continent in a short period of time, making it an extremely important item.

It's important to understand how vast the mainland is. Even if a sixth-level expert traveled day and night at high speed, it might take more than half a year to travel from east to west.

Of course, if a mage has the ability to fly, the efficiency will be higher, but those who can fly for a long time are basically strong people.

For this reason, communication between different races is quite inefficient, which makes the role of bards very important, a profession that mid- to high-level adventurers are eager to befriend.

Lyon knew that Orpheus had most likely learned about this in advance through some special channels.

Because in his previous life, when Ophimosa explored the ruins of the gods, his purpose was not as strong as it is now.

"Your Highness, I suggest you wait until you advance in rank before considering entering the secret treasure. After all, it is a divine relic, and the information you have is probably not complete, right? If something goes wrong, it would be a loss for the country."

After listening to Leon's explanation, the group was puzzled. What was Leon trying to achieve by saying all this?

Saide immediately raised a question:

"Young man Lyon, after all you've said, are you trying to persuade His Highness to suspend this plan? What benefit would that bring you?"

Chapter 235 Timia: This guy doesn't really want to take the Holy Queen and the Empress together, does he?

"My purpose is simple: I just don't want Your Highness to be in danger."

Lyon smiled slightly. "Very good, a perfect straight man has arrived."

Said felt disgusted, realizing he had inadvertently become part of their game.

Out of the corner of my eye, I glanced at Ophie Marceau and saw that her cheeks were slightly flushed and her eyes were curved in a smile. She seemed to really enjoy hearing Lyon's sweet nothings that kept popping up all the time.

He was speechless, then fell silent. Damn it!

Just because she is favored by His Highness, she dares to flirt with him so casually!

And in front of the saintess!

This guy really isn't afraid of being dismembered by some woman who turns love into hate one day.

He gave a forced, insincere smile:

"Hehe, you're joking, Your Highness. Which of us subordinates would want His Highness to be in danger?"

"Of course, there's another important point."

Lyon glanced at Said; male jealousy was truly ugly.

"In other words, Your Highness's chances of success are low if you rashly enter the divine ruins now, and you will also waste this opportunity. Because once you fail, and the news cannot be kept secret for long, the chances of success a second time will be even lower after Your Highness fails the first time."

He got up and walked toward Britta:

“There’s an old saying in my hometown: the unopened treasure chest is the one with infinite possibilities. But if Your Highness fails, what awaits you is not infinite possibilities, but a series of major losses that will inevitably follow. It’s also very likely that the kingdom will continue to be thrown into chaos, because the attraction of the divine ruins is far greater than Your Highness has anticipated. At that time, it will inevitably attract many powerful adventurer teams like the Silver Badge Group to cause trouble.”

Ophimosa said thoughtfully, "So you mean..."

"It's very simple. The Papacy and the Royal Family need to cooperate to a certain extent to ensure that news of the divine ruins doesn't leak out. In fact, if the Papacy and the Royal Family could truly unite their powers, wouldn't humanity's voice on the continent be much stronger?"

Lyon's true colors were revealed.

His core objective was to facilitate cooperation between the Papacy and the monarchy, thereby avoiding conflict to some extent.

After all, who says two tigers can't share one mountain?

As long as the mountain is big enough, even ten tigers won't fight.

Essentially, the conflict between divine right and royal power is still driven by the will of the top figures.

For ordinary people, it doesn't matter who is in charge. As long as someone can give them a harmonious and warm home and a good life with meat to eat every day, who would be willing to rebel against this or that?

For middle-level personnel, some are profitable in conflict scenarios, while others are profitable in peaceful scenarios.

To address this, all you need is a large enough cake to allow the two sides to set aside their past conflicts.

Upon hearing this, Britta understood Lyon's thoughts, glanced at Ophim Marceau, and said calmly:

"The Papacy never intended to have a major conflict with the royal family. If they were willing to completely submit and not engage in petty tricks, why would things have come to this?"

She did not directly refuse to cooperate.

Ophimasso snorted:

"Within the Vatican, there are those who secretly control the slave market and brothels; the monks and priests in the Childbearing Church secretly molest all kinds of children; they use God to bully the common people and steal national assets. Such are all kinds of sins. Only you, the saintess, can maintain your holy name under the protection of God. Aren't the others just filthy and corrupt?"

While this statement may be harsh, it does indeed highlight a problem within the Vatican.

This is an inevitable problem arising from the Vatican's internal management system being divided into two vertical lines.

The current main central power structure of the Church of Astalia is a direct line of divine authority with a hierarchical structure of Pope-Acting Pope-Saintess-Holy Knight-Knight.

Secondly, there is a hierarchical evangelistic line consisting of archbishops, cardinals, local branch bishops, priests, priestly warriors, and monks.

The main problems originate primarily within the evangelistic missionary line.

Because very few frontline personnel receive divine protection, there are quite a few managers whose faith is superficial.

Because of the lack of fear, coupled with the decrease in miracles in the last decade or so, the probability of sin arising has indeed increased significantly.

Britta frowned: "I will handle these matters, and your royal family has no right to judge us, because who doesn't know that court officials also have all sorts of power-related sins?"

Ophimasso: "At least I'm a little better than you guys."

It looked like the two were about to start arguing again.

Lyon quickly replied:

"Your Highness must have mastered the method to open the divine ruins, right? And coincidentally, the Holy Maiden possesses divine energy, which can influence the divine ruins. In that case, let's set aside the cooperation between the Holy See and the Royal Family for now, and have the two of you cooperate on a small scale first, shall we? With your talents and strength, if you cooperate, the future Kingdom of Horsha will surely be completely transformed! The great undertaking involved is no less significant than slaying demons and suppressing evil spirits, is it?"

Ophimasso and Britta fell into deep thought.

Upon hearing this, Timia thought to herself:

"This guy is pushing for the collaboration between Orpheus and the Saintess. Could he really be that greedy, wanting to enjoy the blessings of both the Saintess and the Empress? Interesting. I like ambitious men like this."

Iris raised her hand and said, "Leon, although you said the news shouldn't leak out, with an elf like me here, won't it leak out anyway?"

These words startled Seid, who was listening in. This elf was truly fearless, even though she was a pure-blooded elf and extremely noble.

But this is a dungeon, and a monster riot has just occurred. If the princess or the saintess really decides to kill you because of this, and uses the riot as an excuse to kill you, wouldn't you be throwing your life away for nothing?

Lyon laughed and said, "Iris, anyway, your elven holy land is not short of divine relics. You can participate in this cooperation and earn some benefits. I'll report back later."

Saed was shocked. Leon was instigating the elves like this, and wasn't he afraid that the elves would worry about betraying the country and discuss it with other elves, causing the news to leak? He was really fearless.

Iris nodded: "Okay, since you put it that way, Lyon, let's do it your way."

"Then you have to promise not to tell anyone, including Grani and your mother."

"Is that so... Okay, I'll do as you say."

Saed was shocked. Was this girl really that obedient, and with such a sweet tone? Was she still a noble pure-blooded elf, or was she just easy to fool?

He couldn't help but speak to Iris:

"Miss Iris, you... you just agree like that? Aren't you afraid this will be recorded as treason by the Holy Land?"

Iris glanced at Said coldly and said, "What business is it of yours what I decide?"

Said was momentarily stunned by the oppressive look in Iris's eyes.

Well, this is still a proud elf, just not proud towards Leon.

Despite being a sixth-tier cultivator, he dared not say much in the face of Iris's racial suppression.

Ophimasso and Britta were able to suppress Iris simply because they were stronger than Iris and had exceptional talent.

Beside her, Timia chuckled. Interesting. She had previously thought that Iris and Lyon were close simply because Iris was easy to fool. After all, most of the pure-blooded elves Timia had ever met looked down on humans.

No, it's not just looking down on humans; it's looking down on the vast majority of intelligent species on the continent with equal disdain, and even some dragons have the right to look down on them.

After a moment of contemplation, Britta spoke first:

"I think cooperation is possible, but I believe we need to carefully set a timeframe and cooperation plan, and gather enough trusted personnel before exploring it again next time."

Chapter 236 The rumors have spread throughout the capital?

Upon hearing this, Ophimasso turned to observe Lyon, and seeing him smiling at her, her cheeks flushed slightly before she made up her mind.

"Since it was proposed by my future husband, of course I have to fully support it! I agree to the cooperation!"

She seemed to have gotten into the habit of saying the words "future husband," and Britta and Iris seemed to automatically filter out these words, not reacting anymore and just treating it as if she were talking nonsense.

[Breita Main Quest: "The Chosen Ones" quest progress +10%, current progress 28%]

[Ophimaso Main Quest: "The Holy Cause of Reign" quest progress +8%, current progress 23%]

Wow, I didn't expect this collaboration to actually increase the task progress at the same time.

Moreover, judging from the progress, this cooperation is likely to be more beneficial to the Vatican.

Although the exploration plan for the divine ruins was strongly advocated by Ophimasso, judging from the results, Britta was more likely to win by default.

Of course, this is just Lyon's guess about the numbers; the actual result will depend on how things develop.

After all, this is the main quest, and it should logically become more difficult as you progress.

Now that the cooperation has been temporarily agreed upon, Lyon can breathe a sigh of relief. At least on the surface, the relationship between Ophimasso and Britta can be eased somewhat.

Next came the issue of rumors, and Lyon began to think about how to debunk them.

After all, if the rumors were to spread throughout the underground city and lead to the king ordering the marriage, he would have no choice but to accept.

……

Ten days later.

The entrance and exit passage of the Alado dungeon.

Bright sunlight pierced through the cracks in the old buildings on the surface of the underground city, casting bright halos on the first underground level. A gentle breeze blew, and the warm, fresh air invigorated the weary adventurers.