Chapter 1035: ce of Worship


    ?


    The same grand cathedral had risen once again.


    Seven stories tall, branded on its walls with caramel, the construct stood proud, the silvery blue windows showing on all its levels reflecting the bright luminance of the stars beyond.


    Four turrets shot from the cathedral, at their top ends an oil-painting of the Bishop, highlighted unnecessarily to sell her position in the odd religion she had manufactured for reasons unknown.


    Perhaps it was a dream of hers, as a Priestess, to introduce more variety in Aigas. Who knew?


    Within the cathedral, a great hall amodated the cautious Replicus, frowning Warding Pride and delighted Bishop.


    It was very spacious.


    A little too spacious.


    Large, silvery blue tiling made up the floor while a pale gold ceiling littered with the same sort of ssy chandelier showed above.


    At the front of the hall, behind the Bishop, was a massive oil-painted mural of a distorted version of her seeming to look oddly at Replicus and Warding Pride at the same time.


    The Bishop let out a childishugh.


    Primus oozed from her and engulfed her nine followers. All nine began to float in the massive hall, tunics of light appearing over their bodies.


    "Do you remember the penultimate point of our arrangement, Bright Storm?" the Bishop asked.


    Replicus didn''t answer.


    His focus, wasn''t on the old woman currently. His concernid with the bulking men rising in the air.


    Oh no.


    It wasing!


    That damn song wasing!


    Even Warding Pride seemed to be preparing for it.


    "We agreed that if you lost to me, you would have to join my faith!" the Bishop cried.


    Right then, the nine men opened their mouths and began to sing a melody that was both mesmerising and ominous.


    "Listen to the collective,


    The collective of pure thought,


    This indeed is collective,


    The collective of lull thought,


    The fire burning in the senses,


    Let it cool and simmer down,


    The fire raging to the sword,


    Let it cool, let it simmer down,


    The collective thought, the collective,


    Come together quiet just as one,


    The collective thought, the su-um,


    Come together,y hate down~"


    Replicus felt the effects immediately.


    The Bishop had used this song when the Factions were trapped in the Cluster with the Ardent Curses days ago.


    The song, unlikepulsion, did not affect the soul in order to in turn affect the body. The song affected the body directly as long as one heard it.


    All who heard would lose their will to fight and slowly feel themselves grow heavy, saturated from within by azy desire to stare at the cathedral and rx.


    Back then, the only reason Replicus managed to resist was because he had Allora close by. The Unlimited had used her Mind Casting to reinforce everyone''s minds, making it so that their bodies weren''t as affected.


    Right now, though, Skullius had no such cost efficient counter.


    Worse yet, different from before, he was within the Bishop''s cathedral, something he hadn''t known was possible with her technique.


    If he had to guess, there was no way to leave this cathedral conventionally.


    ''Flesh it!''


    Replicus stormed towards the Bishop, vanishing into the Astral Blizzard Corridor!


    Just likest time, it took a little longer for the full effect of the song to make himpletely lose all his functionality.


    Thus, he decided that his best bet was to deal with the Bishop before that.


    Appearing in front of the Bishop, Replicus manifested a bolt of Levin; long, bright and saturated with mana!


    He hurled it at the Bishop from close range.


    However, the old woman didn''t move.


    She seemed confident despite having dispelled her Nitros.


    A brilliant figure shed before her and got pierced by it in her stead. The bolt of Levin sank through both arms as the man tried to defend.


    It was one of the nine, a balloon-like man... who kept singing despite having the bolt poking


    behind him!


    Replicus didn''t stop.


    He hadn''t stopped.


    He stretched his hand forward and a giant ball of Distorted Gravity manifested before him!


    He was just going to have to make it hard for the Bishop and her goons tovishly sing merry and act nonchnt!


    As expected, this... seemed to have made the Bishop wary.


    She finally moved.


    Replicus didn''t quite understand how everything yed out, but...


    His gravity ball seemed to pop like a balloon and then, in the next instance, he found himself


    in another portion of the hall, far from where he had been.


    "You didn''t even realise it, do you? You nearly died right there."


    The Prator turned beside him and saw Warding Pride bearing a disdainful look as she


    gazed down at him.


    Arge, metallic cube floated before her. Well, half of it was molten, its bits falling to the


    tiled floor.


    It seemed like another one of her specialised shields.


    "If I hadn''t pushed you out of the way, the Bishop was going to punch you into oblivion, just like she did to whatever that thing you summoned was."


    Replicus socket mes flickered.


    Wait...


    What?


    "You''re still more green than you think. Proud and stupid. You thought taking out the riff-raff


    in the Union would prove that you are someone worth a title you gained after coaxing Eaniss. Now, all that babble is showing its fruit. You didn''t even realise the true strength of someone you boldly decided to y a death game with."


    Indeed. Indeed it seemed so.


    Replicus could only imagine. If the Bishop, as Warding Pride said, just punched gravity...


    The Prator opened his mouth to speak, but no words came out.


    "Don''t bother speaking to me. I can''t hear anything at the moment..." Warding Pride said, her eyes turning to the Bishop who gave them both a very cross look from the distance


    At the mention, Replicus noticed that Warding Pride had severalrge, dark symbols over her


    body.


    His immediate guess as to their purpose was that they blocked out all sound that attempted to reach Warding Pride, eliminating the threat of the Collective song for her. Unfortunately, this application didn''t seem to work for anyone other than the blue-skinned Faction Leader. Replicus noticed that her subordinates had sumbed to the song''s effect a


    fair distance away.


    "Are you really disturbing our innocent game, Warding Pride?!" the Bishop bellowed.


    Warding Pride smiled, shrugged and gestured to her ears.


    In truth, she could understand the Bishop by reading her lips though.


    The Mad Bishop seethed. Her empty socketholes then turned to Replicus.


    "Is this it? Are you really done already?"


    The full appeal of the Collective song, which had yet to stop, was finally affecting the


    Prator. He felt his mind slip, bing both exhausted and dysfunctional.


    His body followed, growing very heavy.


    He kneeled. ''Ah... in the end, my current level of strength still isn''t even a close match for these guys,


    huh?'' Replicus thought.


    The current him truly wascking.


    That was why he needed all these ns and schemes, after all.


    He felt Warding Pride grip the top of his helmet and apply immense force. She then addressed


    the Bishop.


    "I don''t know what kind of understanding you have with him, but I think you should know what he is beforemitting to anything," she said with a triumphant grin. "Some things


    aren''t as they seem. This especially applies to PEOPLE."


    The Bishop raised a brow.


    Warding Pride looked down at Replicus.


    She had only saved him just now because she wanted some closure.


    She, just like the rest of the top brass of the Severed Union, knew that the Bishop often lost


    control of her immense physical strength, which seemed to increase unreasonably the more


    followers she got.


    She couldn''t have Bright Storm die by a ungodly punch that turned him into dust. "Remember what I told you back when you foolishly decided to y games with me? This is exactly what I envisioned. You at my mercy," she scoffed.


    Warding Pride gripped Replicus'' helmet tighter. Of course, she couldn''t unmask him like


    somemon viin with a ski mask. The Hollow Dusk Prison was a Mythical grade item,


    after all.


    Instead, she nned to reveal Replicus'' nature to the Bishop in a shy manner. She aimed to blow it up with a seal.


    A better one that what she usedst time.


    This was going to be very sweet.


    ...


    The sudden disappearance of the helmet she held, however, caught her by surprise.


    The Hollow Dusk''s Prison vanished before she could do anything, revealing the bare features


    of the Titan World Storm Prator.


    As expected, the Bishop recoiled in genuine shock, as did her nine flying man-cherubs.


    She didn''t think.... no one would have thought that this... was what the Prator looked like.


    "What is... THAT?" she said as her face contorted in revulsion.


    Warding Pride did the same.


    While she had seen Replicus'' face, she had never seen his full body.


    The pitch ck skeleton whose body seemed to beced with lightning on every fibre...


    This same skeleton suddenly pointed up with its bony hand as it knelt, taking advantage of its


    stunned enemies.


    Then, from its finger, a familiar light was fired.


    A light that the Bishop recalled without any kind of fondness.


    It was light that ate away at her cathedral''s seven stories in an instant before erupting out the


    roof with a triumphant bang!