Chapter 1526: Traces of Violence

Opposite the heavy wooden door lay the hall where the anomaly had occurred. Before pushing it open, Gawain paused cautiously.

The magical energy in the air flowed gently and steadily. Through his magical sight, the corridor looked no different from the outside world. His instincts as a legendary powerhouse gave no warning—whatever strange phenomenon had happened seemed to have completely ended. Moreover, the power of Baphomet, the God of Commerce, had left no lasting “imprint” in the physical realm. This eased Gawain’s mind somewhat, and he reached out to open the door.

But just then, Amber, standing beside him, suddenly stepped forward half a pace. “Wait, let me do it.”

“You?” Gawain looked at the shadow assault goose in surprise. For a moment, he wondered if someone had swapped her out for an impostor. Usually, she was so timid that she needed to activate skills just to fight a dog, yet now she was volunteering to go first? That was stranger than any anomaly. “That’s not like you at all. We don’t even know what’s behind the door yet…”

“Didn’t you always throw me out first to scout ahead?” Amber said calmly. “You even called me your ‘scout princess’…”

Gawain felt a bit embarrassed. He recalled that, back in the early days, he had indeed done just that. And at the time, he had praised Amber highly as a scout—she would run away first, and if she got hit, she’d make more noise than anyone else. She was the perfect face to send out on dangerous missions. But that was ancient history from the startup phase. He hadn’t expected her to bring it up so seriously now. “That was then. Now you…”

Amber waved him off casually. “I’ve got way more experience now. Honestly, if something happens, I’m definitely faster at running away than you.”

Before Gawain could stop her, she reached out and pushed the door open.

The moment the door swung wide, Amber suddenly felt her vision flicker. A strange sensation washed over her, as if another layer of perception was overlaying her own from all directions. It was like she was linked to a vast, immense entity, looking down from a high vantage point at an unfamiliar place. But the feeling came and went so quickly she barely had time to register any details or see clearly what the illusion showed. Before the abnormal sensation faded, only one phrase echoed in her mind.

A strange voice, featureless and impossible to recall later, spoke urgently to some presence: “…Are you sure this thing really works?”

Then the vision ended. Amber stood holding the door open, her movements smooth and natural to any onlookers. The brief anomaly was only a sudden memory fragment flashing through her mind. Gawain’s gaze shifted inside the side hall, and the archbishop who had come with them was about to step forward.

“Wait,” Amber suddenly called out to both Gawain and the archbishop. “I just saw and heard something.”

Gawain immediately withdrew his gaze from the side hall and fixed his eyes on Amber’s face. “You saw and heard something? Residual divine will? I told you not to touch this…”

“It’s nothing serious,” Amber waved him off. “I didn’t feel any contamination. It seemed like a very, very brief thought fragment. I couldn’t see the rest clearly. The only thing I remember is one sentence… Someone—or something—was nervously asking another being, ‘Are you sure this thing really works?’ And it was a question.”

Hearing this, Gawain’s earlier tension turned to astonishment. He stared at the shadow assault goose for a long moment before finally saying, “That’s it? Just that?”

“Just that,” Amber shrugged. “I told you, it was a very short thought fragment. I suspect it was almost completely faded. I’m lucky to remember a full sentence at all.”

“‘Are you sure this thing really works?’ That sounds like the kind of conversation that happens all the time in Rebecca’s lab. Could the one who said it be…” Gawain frowned, stroking his chin as a string of guesses formed in his mind. Suddenly, he turned sharply to the middle-aged cleric beside him. “Wait, Archbishop Boris, you said you personally checked the side hall before?”

“Yes, Your Majesty,” Archbishop Boris nodded immediately. Though the current situation seemed to have some flaw, the high-ranking cleric remained calm under Gawain’s questioning and quickly recalled the details. “There’s only this one door leading to the side hall. I did open it myself, but I didn’t hear or see anything. I swear this on the name of the gods…”

“No need for that. I trust the honesty of a respected archbishop,” Gawain interrupted. Having heard Boris’s answer, he already had an idea. His gaze returned to Amber. “No one else who opened this door felt anything. Looks like this is another ‘trace’ only you can see and hear.”

“…A memory flowing over from ‘that side’?” Amber muttered thoughtfully. Maybe it was because so many similar things had happened recently, but she no longer felt the nervousness she once did when encountering such phenomena. Instead, she felt oddly casual, even chatty. “Feels like I’m getting more and more tangled up with ‘that side’… Hey, do you think that since I keep picking up stuff from ‘that side,’ maybe what I know and see here also affects ‘that side’ in return?”

Gawain saw she was still in her usual rambling mood and knew she was fine. Hearing her speculation, he couldn’t help but roll his eyes. “If that were true, I really don’t want to imagine what kind of mess your poisonous brain would cause over there…”

Archbishop Boris listened in stunned silence to the exchange between the emperor and his trusted aide. Since earlier, the venerable cleric had been utterly baffled. He never imagined the kind of strange relationship Gawain and Amber shared. Now, he dared neither ask nor listen further, only managing to interrupt awkwardly, “Your Majesty, you…”

“Hm, let’s get back to business,” Gawain nodded and glanced at Amber. “We can analyze what you heard later. For now, let’s see what clues the anomaly left inside the side hall.”

The memory fragment Amber had just touched was almost certainly leaked from the “Lady of Night.” In that brief instant, she had reconnected with the ancient god, so the position she experienced in the vision was likely the Lady of Night herself. Considering this was the cathedral of Baphomet, the God of Commerce, the voice she heard was probably Baphomet’s.

From that, the implications were startling.

Baphomet, in his own domain, nervously asking the ancient god Lady of Night if some thing really worked… Could such a matter be discussed openly in front of a devout cleric?

Certainly not. No matter how weak Baphomet’s combat power, he was still a god. The strength of the spiritual bond between a devout believer and their deity depends not on the god’s fighting ability but on faith. Discussing whether their god was compromised by the Lady of Night in front of Archbishop Boris could easily shatter the poor cleric’s faith. So this matter would have to be analyzed privately later. For now, they needed to finish investigating the scene.

With that in mind, Gawain and Amber stepped through the ornate, heavy wooden door. The side hall of the cathedral unfolded before them.

It was a spacious rectangular room with a soaring ceiling and exquisite decoration.

Though not the headquarters of the God of Commerce’s church, this cathedral served as the church’s “showcase” in the imperial capital. Supported by the church’s vast wealth, every corner of the cathedral was lavishly and finely adorned. Even this side hall’s walls, pillars, and ceiling were covered with countless reliefs and metal inlays of “divine script,” perfectly embodying the grandeur befitting the God of Commerce.

But as Gawain passed a toppled decorative piece on the floor, he noticed something subtle.

“…Gilded… no, it’s copper-plated?” He glanced at the shattered fragments scattered on the ground, broken by some unknown force, and raised an eyebrow. “This is simpler than I expected.”

“We actively comply with the Supreme Administrative Council’s orders to avoid extravagance in church activities and prevent churches from hoarding wealth at the expense of the people,” Archbishop Boris straightened up and replied solemnly. Though slightly portly, his expression was as serious as if reporting at a divine authority conference. “The God of Commerce governs wealth, so when it comes to symbolic decoration, we must follow the scriptures. But in practice, many details can be… ‘flexibly adjusted.’ These adjustments don’t violate the scriptures. The deity won’t blame us; on the contrary, He will praise us for saving wealth and using it more appropriately.”

Gawain raised an eyebrow. Then Amber leaned in and whispered, “I looked around. The scales in the statue at the far end are real…”

Gawain nodded slightly and gave Archbishop Boris a look of approval. It made sense that the Church of the God of Commerce would send someone like him to the capital as their face and spokesperson. After all, the Divine Authority Council oversaw and reformed religious power across the continent, and the Cecil Empire was its headquarters. Surviving and maintaining church operations here required more than just piety. This archbishop clearly possessed qualities beyond devotion—like a flexible standard of faith.

Gawain also admired Amber’s skills. After all these years, her abilities hadn’t diminished. She had scanned this huge room at a glance and already given her assessment.

At the same time, he noticed the traces left by the anomaly scattered throughout the side hall.

The relatively empty room was littered with debris and deep dents. Tables, chairs, and lamp stands placed around the hall looked as if something had crushed them, shattered into pieces on the floor. The ground itself was scarred with crisscrossing collapses—some only a few centimeters deep, others nearly two meters. The sight was chilling.

Gawain roughly calculated in his mind: if it were purely a matter of brute force, creating a scene like this in the hall wouldn’t be too difficult. But to do so without causing any disturbance beyond the hall—no vibrations, no sounds leaking into the corridors—that was truly baffling.

According to Archbishop Boris, the “vision” here likely lasted only an instant. From the moment he sensed the abnormal energy fluctuations in the side chamber to when he arrived with his men to investigate, no more than three to five minutes had passed. During that time, neither the clergy nor the worshippers elsewhere in the cathedral noticed anything unusual.

“…A god who holds dominion over commerce and wealth—any miracles they perform should relate to their domain. If the hall had been flooded with gold coins, that would make sense. But this? Pure destruction…” Gawain furrowed his brow, muttering softly, “No matter how you look at it, this doesn’t seem connected to the god of commerce at all.”

“Then maybe it has something to do with the Lady of the Night,” Amber whispered. The moment she said “Lady of the Night,” she nervously glanced around. After all, this was the cathedral where the vision had just occurred; recklessly mentioning that sensitive name could have unforeseen consequences. Fortunately, nothing happened, so she relaxed and continued, “We suspected the Lady of the Night might be using some kind of ‘coercive measure’ against the gods. This could be the result of two divine powers clashing…”

“That’s the only explanation,” Gawain agreed, still frowning. “But there’s no lingering shadow energy here either. And remember our previous plan? We set up ‘windows’ in the major cathedrals—messages left for the gods, asking them to send a sign to the mortal world if they could spare the effort. Just a simple message. So if all went well, what we’re seeing here should be the god of commerce’s ‘message.’ Can you make any sense of this mess as a message?”

Amber blinked, scanning the chaotic scene around them, then pursed her lips. “If this is a message, then the god of commerce’s handwriting is pretty rough…”

“Cough, cough.” Archbishop Boris suddenly cleared his throat awkwardly from the side. The high-ranking cleric, known for his devout yet pragmatic nature, looked at the emperor and the intelligence chief with a helpless expression, as if to remind them that the god of commerce had a representative present.

“Sorry, we mean no offense to the god of commerce,” Amber quickly recovered, waving her hand. “We’re just stating the facts—these marks really do…”

Seeing Amber dig herself into a deeper hole, Gawain had to clear his throat twice to cut her off. But just as he was about to say something, footsteps suddenly echoed from the corridor outside the side chamber, interrupting everyone’s conversation.

The next moment, a cleric in an acolyte’s robe appeared at the doorway. He first bowed respectfully to Gawain, then hurried over to Boris. “Archbishop, Her Holiness Veronica of the Holy Light Church and His Eminence Patriarch Leight have arrived.”

“The two of them?” Boris was taken aback, then instinctively glanced at Gawain before visibly relaxing. He nodded to the cleric who had come to report, “Please, bring them in.”

(End of chapter)