Chapter 485: Apostle Evan (2)

Pop, pop, pop!!!

Sparks erupted through the dark corridors.

The overloaded power facilities were backflowing, causing explosions in the distribution boxes throughout the temple.

Lights, floor heating wires, and wall power lines burst everywhere, creating sparks and sending the already flustered priests into a panic.

“No, the temple’s internal facilities are completely paralyzed!!”

“Oh, no… such an unholy commotion right before the sacred ritual…!!”

“We have to fix this before the Archbishop returns!!”

Naturally, none of the priests intended to immediately report the problems in the temple to Archbishop Nidri and have her return.

If they reported an internal power issue to the highest authority in the branch, who would take responsibility? And who would be left to clean up the mess?

Reporting this to Archbishop Nidri wouldn’t instantly repair the damaged temple facilities either.

In this situation, where the power facilities themselves had been damaged by a backflow, the most rational course of action for the priests was to secretly restore the temple before the sermon ended.

“Facility priests, go down to the underground power plant immediately and inspect the problem.”

“First, quickly resolving this matter is the priority. I won’t ask who’s responsible!”

“Everything must be put back in place before the ritual begins, hurry!!”

The priests, even stopping the work of moving the corpses used for offerings, hastily scrambled to various parts of the temple.

Zaif, who had been observing the entire scene from the side, looked back at Lennok in bewilderment.

“To throw the temple into chaos while intentionally cutting off communication with the plaza… did you anticipate this from the beginning?”

“What’s there to say?”

Lennok brushed off his hand that had been holding the wires and replied indifferently.

“If trust isn’t guaranteed between us, it would be difficult to achieve any grand cause together.”

“…I misspoke. Indeed, an Apostle of your caliber wouldn’t ruin things simply by being swayed by impulse.”

Lennok quickly found and exploited the blind spot of disrupting the temple to divert attention from himself and Zaif.

At the same time, he shifted responsibility onto others, preventing the news from reaching Archbishop Nidri for a while.

Other high-level superhumans, even if they noticed problems within the temple, would find it difficult to leave the plaza unless the Archbishop herself moved.

Zaif quickly grasped the results and objectives Lennok achieved by blowing up the distribution box, and felt a small admiration for his sharp intellect.

But Lennok slowly shook his head, looking at Zaif.

“Not yet. Our work begins now.”

“What?”

“Didn’t I tell you earlier that all the secret places within the temple were difficult to enter?”

Lennok grinned and slowly stretched his wrist, looking around the corridor.

“There’s a way to legally rummage through the temple without arousing any suspicion from other priests.”

CRASH!!!

The antique wooden door at one end of the corridor shattered, and a large volume of water gushed out, beginning to fill the hallway.

The priests were startled as the water quickly rose, soaking their calves.

“The sewer burst, and the valve isn’t working!”

“Where are the priests managing the facilities…!”

“We’re trying to perform maintenance using spells, but the overload is spreading to other facilities!”

The power facilities that Lennok had once damaged were not easily repaired.

Since he had directly backflowed magical power to cause an overload, it would be difficult to even use spells to repair them without first removing Lennok’s magical power.

Of course, since Lennok wasn’t directly manipulating it, the magical power itself could be removed with time and careful effort.

However, the internal structure of the power facilities was intricately tangled, and it would take a very long time to remove the magical power from all those circuits.

In the meantime, the overloaded effects of the power facilities would spread to other facilities relying on them.

The sewer bursting at the end of the corridor and turning into a massive flood was due to the same principle.

Just as other priests were helplessly casting meaningless spells at the ceaselessly gushing sewage, for a moment—

WHOOSH!!

Lennok appeared, opening the opposite door, and looked down at the priests coldly, speaking.

“Move.”

“Wh-who are you…?”

“Do I have to say it twice?”

“A-Apostle Zaif…!!”

Zaif, who appeared behind Lennok, glared at the priests with an expressionless face.

“I came back to the temple for a moment to take care of something, and it’s utter chaos, isn’t it?”

“We-we apologize for the trouble…”

“I’m sure the Archbishop will be delighted to hear about this.”

The priests’ faces turned pale at Zaif’s calm mention of Archbishop Nidri.

“We are deeply sorry. We will do our best to resolve the issue before the ritual begins, so…”

“No, that’s enough. I don’t need you. All of you, get out of here.”

Zaif muttered coldly and motioned with his chin towards Lennok.

“I am with Apostle Evan Martinez, who was specially invited for this ritual. This friend will solve the temple’s problems.”

“Pardon? But how can someone do what even the temple’s high-ranking priests cannot…?”

Trickle…!!

Before the words were even finished, Lennok placed his hand into the gushing sewer water and instantly stopped the flow. The priests’ eyes widened as only a finger-thick stream of water now flowed from the pipe that had been gushing with enough force to swallow several people.

Lennok shook off his thoroughly wet arm and muttered the pre-arranged line.

“Is this all there is to it?”

“B-but dozens of facility priests have been stuck in the underground sewer and couldn’t fix it…”

“I told you.”

“We apologize!!”

When Zaif glared at the priests with cold eyes, they clamped their mouths shut and bowed their heads.

“I’m not pleased with the Far Eastern Branch’s inept management, but since the ritual is near, I’ll overlook it as a special case.”

Lennok continued speaking very naturally, looking at the tops of the priests’ heads. Seeing the priests flinch and raise their heads, he slightly pulled back his hood and smiled gently.

“Let’s keep the commotion that happened this evening a secret between us. Do you understand?”

“Apostle Martinez…!!”

It was an unprecedented situation where the Apostles who had just been reprimanding them were now gently letting the situation pass.

Perhaps there were no priests who weren’t impressed by this small favor, as they all called out Lennok and Zaif’s names with voices choked by water.

Lennok, looking at the priests, opened his mouth once more as if stating the obvious.

“From now on, I will check and restore all the problematic facilities inside the temple, so prepare yourselves.”

“Understood!!”

The priests, without a shred of doubt, reported the detailed locations of the facilities where problems had occurred.

Lennok, guided by the priests who readily divulged the temple’s facility structure, began to move freely through the Crystal Palace.

“The distribution box near the spire has blown. Lead the way.”

He moved freely through secret places where ordinary priests couldn’t even set foot.

“Why is the water pipe near the underground vault like this? I’m going to fix it now, so don’t let anyone in.”

He freely moved among the offerings gathered by the cult, with the vault door wide open.

“You can’t open the office? Then is it fine if the Archbishop’s room is flooded when she returns?”

He boldly entered the empty Archbishop’s office with muddy feet.

It wasn’t just about repairing the visited facilities or rooms and being done with it.

Instead of perfectly repairing the places Lennok stepped into, he would, in turn, overload and break other connected facilities – a repeated cycle.

To put it another way, by repeatedly repairing one thing and breaking another, he gained a legitimate reason to inspect every single facility within the temple.

In fact, some of the facilities Lennok repaired ended up in better condition than they were originally, earning him praise from the Apostles.

“The automatic control system for the water valve has been restored…!!”

“Apostle Martinez fixed what no one could for decades!”

“The entrance recognition error for the incinerator is also resolved; I heard the spell circuit was so twisted it was impossible to fix…”

“Thank you, Apostle Martinez!!”

“There are more problematic facilities. If it’s alright, I’ll guide you personally…!!”

It was an ironic situation where Lennok repaired facilities he himself had broken, only to break them again, yet received abundant admiration and respect.

Crackle!!

“Wrong. There’s nothing much here. I’ll just break some nearby facilities and move on.”

“…I’m too ashamed to even lift my head, given my ignorance.”

Lennok rummaged through the Archbishop’s desk shelves, then shook his hand clean and stood up.

In Zaif’s voice, as he watched Lennok, there was now a faint trace of reverence.

“I never imagined you’d solve this so perfectly under the pretense of repairing the temple’s internal facilities. I apologize for doubting you, even for a moment.”

Because Zaif had watched how things unfolded from beginning to end, right beside him, he knew how absurd this situation was.

Every moment, from manipulating the temple’s internal facilities to playing with the priests’ psychology, achieving his goal like flowing water, felt surreal.

At this moment, Zaif felt he wouldn’t doubt Lennok even if he told him to kill the priests on the spot.

“That’s not the problem, Apostle Zaif.”

Lennok jingled a few artifacts he had taken by the handful from the vault and replied.

“We’ve searched almost every place we thought of, but there are no traces, which is strange.”

“…Does that mean the Archbishop has concealed the secret so meticulously?”

Zaif no longer even considered that Lennok might have been lying about the Archbishop.

“It’s more suspicious precisely because there are no traces. Don’t you see yet?”

Originally, Lennok’s plan was to damage the temple’s internal facilities and weaken security to create an easier environment to disrupt the Selection Ritual.

His claim that the Archbishop was hiding a secret was merely an excuse to convince Zaif.

However, after thoroughly searching almost every facility in the temple like a rat, Lennok had to admit that he was accidentally catching a rat by walking backward.

“We’ve searched everything from the vault to the office, but there’s nothing but official confidential documents circulated within the cult, which is unnatural. This might turn out to be a bigger deal than we thought…”

Corruption is an inevitable consequence of running an organization.

Especially for the Guido Cult, with its continent-spanning scale, it was unavoidable, no matter how strong their faith.

What about the Far Eastern Branch, which was supposedly responsible for supplying each branch from outside the continent?

After such a thorough search, it would be normal to find clues related to internal corruption, cover-ups, or collusion. Yet, there was no sign of anything in the temple of the branch where the Apostle Selection Ritual was taking place.

This was impossible unless the secret the cult was hiding was much larger, and concealed from a much higher level.

If even Lennok’s magical sense couldn’t find a clue, there was virtually nothing more to do here.

The moment Lennok and Zaif, having left the Archbishop’s office, were rapidly walking down the corridor.

“Apostle Zaif?”

A young man who emerged from the opposite direction suddenly called out Zaif’s name.

He gave off an impression of being unusually light-bodied. Calling Zaif so casually suggested he was a high-ranking priest within the cult.

Sure enough, Zaif furrowed his brows slightly, looking troubled, and replied.

“…Bishop Tritan.”

“I thought it was strange you didn’t appear for the sermon, but what are you doing here?”

Tritan’s eyes glinted sharply.

“It seems I need an explanation for all this commotion.”