CHAPTER 94: CHAPTER 92: TRUTH DEDUCTION (4K MEGA CHAPTER, DOUBLE RELEASE)

But after the Saintess appeared, they found true faith and wanted to escape their disgraceful past.

They wanted to stop being pirates and, like people from the outside world, earn wealth through labor and work.

However, Jermaine Count was the first to disagree with such change.

The Saintess’s influence was undoubtedly strong, but Jermaine Count knew the townspeople too well; he had too many ways to control them.

With just a single sentence, he could make the townspeople, eager to step into the light, fall back into darkness.

"The Saintess will eventually leave."

The charisma of the Saintess was enough to overshadow Jermaine Count’s iron-fisted rule, and equally enough to overshadow the doctrines she preached.

For the people of Briff Town, the doctrines were not their light—the Saintess was.

Thus came the question from the Lustful Divine Envoy.

"Will you stay on this island?"

Unfortunately, the Saintess was destined not to stay on this island.

So Jermaine Count, thoughtfully assisting, fed the Saintess the Golden Flying Fish.

After consuming the Golden Flying Fish, the Saintess became addicted to fish, completely unable to turn back, falling under Jermaine Count’s control.

Perhaps from the very beginning, the Saintess was Jermaine Count’s target, simply because of the Holy Mark she bore.

Even though it’s not yet known what the Holy Mark represents, its retrieval along with finding the missing Saintess is acknowledged as coequal conditions for completing a side quest, indicating the Holy Mark’s priority over the Saintess.

Since this means only the retrieval of the Holy Mark matters, the religion wouldn’t delve too deeply into the Saintess’s fate.

Having obtained the Holy Mark, Jermaine Count, in order to completely cover up the secret, exploited his understanding and control over the townspeople to once again incite their desires.

This time, it was jealousy.

Perhaps it’s said the Saintess broke free from control and plans to escape Briff; perhaps it’s said that once the perception of the cult’s matters is exposed, the Saintess will regard the townspeople as heretics, leaving no mercy or compassion...

There are many ways; Wu Chang can effortlessly think of seven or eight different methods.

In any case, Jermaine Count successfully stirred up the townspeople’s jealousy, including the Bishop.

As a leader of opinions in the minds of the townspeople, the Bishop’s judgment completely ignited the townspeople’s flames of jealousy.

They envied where the Saintess was about to go; envied others who would share this light.

Possessed by the notion that what cannot be attained should be destroyed, the townspeople’s jealousy burned the Saintess to death, and also burned the part of themselves that felt the light.

This scene mirrored what Wu Chang saw within the Resonance of Mental Images from the Bishop.

As the townspeople ignited the stake, they also ignited themselves.

By the time everything calmed down, the townspeople suddenly repented, but it was too late.

The now-calm Bishop fell into endless self-blame; the judgment filled with jealousy on that day became his greatest flaw.

To this end, he sealed his eyes shut, yet was forever stuck in that day unable to emerge, causing his Inspiration and Will as an Ascetic to be lower than Professor Ebert’s.

Not only the Bishop felt self-blame, but all the townspeople did as well.

Having learned virtues from the Saintess, they experienced a transition from darkness to light, then plunged from light into darkness, clearly seeing their inherent sins and the ugliness brought by those sins.

The experiences related to the Saintess were extracted by them, becoming seven different Inner Worlds on the island representing the Seven Deadly Sins.

With their inner morality and conscience burnt to ashes, the townspeople could only simulate the life once depicted by the Saintess in the light through stringent rules and radical measures.

Wu Chang sighed deeply and shifted his attention away from reviewing the truth.

He already had a rough guess of the truth that once transpired on Briff Island, but with the gradual exposure of the truth, many questions arose.

If Jermaine Count targeted the Saintess to seize the Holy Mark, what was his plan?

After sentencing the Saintess, why did Jermaine Count also disappear? What exactly was the giant faceless nun left at the main house of the Count’s Manor?

The greed and wrath he hasn’t yet discovered—what do they correspond to?

The story has been mostly explored; next, he must accelerate strategy for the dungeon.

Meanwhile, as if sensing Wu Chang’s decision, the Saintess he brought out from the Bishop’s Resonance of Mental Images opened her eyes from a stupor.