Looking at the convex shape in the center of this crystal, it is clear that it utilizes the magnifying glass's ability to focus to increase the intensity of light. The craftsmanship, which could be called divine, left Archbishop Adam slightly dazed.
Divinity, it is divinity again. Kuba is a little God, so only its body, contaminated with divinity, can suppress the resurrection of God! It never occurred to him that the ancient era would have such a history. However, Archbishop Adam understood the Pope's words very well. He felt that if he were Shenyin, he would have done the same. No one would tolerate the existence of a God possessing the power to create and destroy everything, otherwise, one could hardly sleep soundly at night.
Just as Archbishop Adam was immersed in the shock of receiving this information, a slight cough from the Pope brought him back to his senses.
"Cough, cough... I... have no time left, Adam. I have already felt the calling of God."
"Your Holiness!"
Archbishop Adam became anxious. He had previously been wishing for the Pope to die quickly so he could take over the position. But now, he felt that sitting in this Pope's position was not very interesting; instead, he was constantly troubled by the corpse of God. Thinking about it this way, he felt he might as well not be Pope; at the very least, he wouldn't have to know about this matter, and his heart wouldn't have to be constantly worried!
"Adam!" The Pope's body had already begun to tremble. His eyes, which had been closed, opened again, but compared to before, they were now devoid of light, covered in a dim, grey, and deathly pallor. The Pope, lying in the bedding, extended his right hand, which was even more terrifying than that of a dried corpse.
Archbishop Adam immediately took it with both hands, cradling it in his palms.
"Your Holiness!"
With heavy, labored breaths, the Pope seemed to have entered the final stage of spasms.
"Hoo... hoo... hoo... Divine blood... can cultivate Holy Knights. I have already given instructions for you to succeed to the throne of the Pope. The management of The Church is yours to do with as you please... but, but concerning the corpse of God, you must look beyond the boundaries of The Church! The resurrection of God will be a catastrophic disaster for all things... so even if The Church falls, even if you are hung on the gallows, you must reveal the existence of the corpse of God so that the next King or Pope will know. Adam... The Church can perish... the corpse of God... must not..."
The Pope's body arched upwards on the wheelchair, as if struggling against the arrival of death. But as his words became intermittent, his corpse-like body suddenly lost all its strength and he slumped back down into the wheelchair. The old Pope's withered body had eyes slightly open, and there was no longer any breath of life left.
"Your Holiness, Your Holiness!!!"
Archbishop Adam called out the Pope's title loudly, yet he received no answer.
No!!!
Wait, I’ve become the Pope! Archbishop Adam felt a complex mixture of emotions, not just because he reached the high seat of the Pope, but even more so because of the corpse of God he had just learned about and the Pope's last words.
"Even if The Church is destroyed and I am hung, I cannot let anything happen to the corpse of God? Your Holiness, you think too highly of me!"
Archbishop Adam looked toward the corpse of God high up in the cave, heaving a long sigh. "You left too hastily, Your Holiness. Kuba, Shenyin, Jonah, and now, what fate awaits me?"
Archbishop Adam felt that his choice to take over as Pope was truly terrible.
Chapter 38: Wolf Pack
A major event stirred up a massive wave of momentum on the southern continent. The See of the old Pope became vacant. The election for the new Pope began. Although the old Pope had internally decided that Archbishop Adam would be the new Pope, this showy ceremony still had to be held. Moreover, just as Archbishop Adam did not know that the position of Pope was already promised before he became the designate, the other Purple Archbishops did not know this either. Therefore, with the passing of the old Pope, the entire Papal States fell into a bizarre atmosphere.
The various Purple Archbishops began putting on crazy displays in their respective territories, and various church ceremonies were held one after another. The Papal States were left devastated by this frenzy of posturing, yet the glory of God shone steadily on every street of the Papal States and in the homes of every poor person.
It was all bare. The people were destitute and homeless.
Meanwhile, Norton began his brand-new survival plan. The good news: his great sword and Steel Armor were recovered. This proved that these two items carried no tracking signals. The bad news: the Holy Lord City had been ravaged by some unknown epidemic, causing too many deaths and injuries. The Mass Grave on the outskirts of the city was completely piled into a mountain of corpses, attracting a large number of wolves, wild dogs, and various carrion eaters. Furthermore, these creatures seemed to have bred into sizeable populations. The large presence of these creatures attracted even stranger beasts from the deep forest to hunt them, such as giant avian creatures, huge pythons...
He even saw a Werewolf being snatched as food in the claws of a bird.
Even though they were top-tier, powerful entities in the natural world, the Werewolf, this born hunter, was still just food in the eyes of some creatures. But these birds themselves would be hunted by groups of Werewolves and become their bloody feast. One has to say, the natural world is truly formidable!
The Mass Grave of the Holy Lord City, a terrifying assembly of all kinds of creatures, forced Norton to abandon the idea of living in that old cave because his cave had already been occupied by a bear and was too close to the Holy Lord City's Mass Grave; he feared being targeted by new monsters if he stayed there.
On the cliff edge, the breeze brushed his face, feeling cooling, but the sunlight made Norton feel feverish, with an itching like needles on his body. Norton released the deer he had been drinking blood from, watching it lie on the ground, regain its calm, and begin grazing on the weeds, only then putting his mind at ease. He had killed too many animals the last time he fed, which reduced the population density in this area, meaning he had to spend a great deal of time and energy hunting for food in the dangerous forest.
As a result, Norton had to prioritize sustainable development: he caught some prey, tied them up in captivity, and used them as blood slaves from which he could feed at any time. Oh, damn, had he, Norton, finally started keeping blood slaves? This was what a real Vampire should do!
In this period, after he began to resume regular feeding, Norton's body returned to its previous state. Moreover, he could feel a small improvement in his strength every day. To say his strength was improving might be better described as his physique improving. He could feel himself gradually changing, but this change was so subtle that it might take years of accumulation to manifest a true transformation. Norton had also tried to increase the amount of blood consumed to help him grow quickly, but it seemed a Vampire could not increase their growth progress by consuming large quantities of blood. At the very least, he had consumed over a dozen large animals without any feedback; his strength grew step-by-step, only increasing with the accumulation of time.
This made Norton miss the two Golden Saints he had drained before. If he could catch a few more to drain, his evolution could go a step further. Norton felt a bit tempted, but of course, there was no hurry. After all, he really couldn't beat them.
Norton reached out and pulled the Vampire Bat hanging from his wrinkled skin, then hung it on a nearby tree branch. For him, building a suitable shelter was the most important thing now. The variety of animals gathering at the Mass Grave of the Holy Lord City was increasing, causing his already minimal sense of security to dwindle by the day. This wouldn't do; Norton still wanted immortality!
To ensure his safety, Norton had previously wanted to reduce the number of these species through hunting to prevent these things from swarming him like that strange bird in the future. However, the number of corpses at the Mass Grave was too large, and the variety of organisms attracted was as numerous as stars. Around the Mass Grave, one could often see those strange giant birds flying by, and even more terrifying roars would echo from the direction of the Mass Grave. This scene of a gathering of terrifying creatures made it impossible for Norton to hunt them to thin their numbers.
Having no choice, since he couldn't resolve the crisis through hunting, he could only choose to build a shelter to increase his turtle-shell defenses and ensure his safety.
"Jiji-jiji..."
The Vampire Bat hanging on the nearby branch seemed dissatisfied with the spot Norton had placed it in. After squeaking a few times, it crawled using its hands and feet toward Norton's direction, then used its hooked, claw-like feet to hang onto Norton's wrinkled skin again.
Norton stood up, then picked up the great sword he had moved over, and began to chop down the surrounding trees. A new construction plan was about to begin.
Tree after tree was felled and cut by Norton, then divided into boards to construct a house. Becoming a Vampire was truly refreshing; even though Norton was now withered and ugly, he didn't need to exercise, nor did he need to cultivate obsessively like in those immortal cultivation novels to increase his strength. Instead, along with eating and the passage of time, his strength and stage would naturally and steadily improve. This was the best blessing for a lazy person and allowed Norton to spend his time on other aspects.
With the cycles of day and night, Norton's house and his various anti-air spikes were gradually perfected. In the blink of an eye, a year had passed.
The sunlight gradually sank to the west, and twilight blanketed the earth. The deep autumn season felt even more lonely at dusk; if one had a bit of mental illness, one could easily sense an atmosphere of sorrow from this environment where all things were withering.
"Ooooo..."
A shrill wolf howl sounded in the already pitch-black forest. Along with the wolf howl, there were dense, green-glowing pupils wandering through the forest like ghostly flames. Just looking at the height of those eyes was enough to make one feel that the size of this pack was certainly not small.
The defense system for the wooden house on the cliff had taken shape. Compared to the first one he built, Norton's building level had improved significantly; at the very least, it could be considered quite tidy. A wooden house, likely around six square meters in size, stood on the cliffside. The roof of the house was covered in sharpened wooden spikes aimed at the sky to defend against aerial attacks. Around the perimeter, a row of anti-cavalry spikes facing outward had been erected. This thing was very useful against beasts. For Norton to be able to build such defenses under these crude conditions was certainly not easy.
The house was pitch black, yet some movement could be heard inside.
"Creak..."
A gap was opened in the wooden window by someone, and then a blood-red eyeball suddenly appeared in the gap. Night, the cliff, the empty wooden house, the monster with blood-red eyes... all these keywords combined could make a horror movie like "Midnight Mutant".
However, the midnight mutant of today was a bit panicked himself. Norton's blood-red eyes gave him excellent night vision. With the transformation of his body, the eye cover he once used for night and underwater vision seemed to have degenerated and fallen off. A year's time did not bring him much growth; he was still in that withered state, at most with a slightly higher level of physical strength than before. Perhaps for a Vampire, a year was still too short.
But the problem with the Holy Lord City had continued to worsen over such a long time! Norton had smelled the stench of the Holy Lord City two years ago, but for the city, they had started dying three years ago. Three years was a long enough development time for the various beast populations that had flocked there. It seemed that because so many people died in the Holy Lord City, the species there didn't lack food at all. This led to them not hunting normally but rather eating and drinking until full, allowing them to mate anywhere and anytime, causing their populations to skyrocket.
However, with the passage of time, as food gradually decayed and disappeared, the overly large populations meant the supply and demand for food could no longer be balanced. Consequently, these groups began to hunt each other, or migrate en masse. After a year of conflict, the major tribes either migrated elsewhere or were gradually depleted in the territorial wars.
As of today, the final winner was finally born.
Chapter 39: The Attack
Werewolf: the product of mating between God and a female wolf. Actually, there is another type of monster in this world called the Man-Headed Wolf. That was a monster born from the mating between God and a male wolf. However, because male wolves cannot naturally give birth, that species had become extinct. Norton had seen what the Man-Headed Wolf looked like in a book of monster illustrations; it was a strange creature with a human head and a wolf body. However, its strength was far below that of a Werewolf.
It is unknown if God’s genes were truly excellent or if the Werewolf species' genes were simply too powerful. The strength of the Werewolf itself far exceeded that of both wolf and man. Powerful self-healing abilities, extreme environmental resistance, a brain not as smart as a human's but far smarter than an average wolf, and sweat glands similar to humans allowed them to have great endurance. At the same time, their human-like body structure made them larger than an average wolf, while their naturally strong muscles made them far more robust than humans. If the Vampire, this cloned product, were excluded, then the Werewolf could claim the title of most perfect creation without any controversy.
They were the most perfect hunters in nature; any creature could exist on their menu. However, such an overly powerful body also cost them the drive to evolve toward intelligence. They didn't need any tools or tactics to obtain a steady stream of food, so evolving intelligence or not made no difference. If a Vampire was an anomaly among the creations of God, then a Werewolf was an anomaly among creatures of wolf and man.
Because their body structure differed from wolves, Werewolves were expelled from the pack once they had been raised by wolves to a certain size; therefore, adult Werewolves were generally solitary. Although they could be domesticated like wolves, a smarter brain than that of a wolf meant they had no steadfast loyalty, and their overly cunning heads made them even harder to tame. To summarize, this thing was a born hunter that embodied cunning, cruelty, strength, and savagery.
And now, this group of born hunters had gathered their sights on Norton.
The blood-red pupils glowed with red light in the darkness; this degree of light really impacted the success rate of sneaking and ambushing, but it undoubtedly added to the intimidation factor. The scarlet eyeballs turned within the gap of the pitch-black window; although they were blood-red throughout, with no distinction between sclera and iris, they strangely made one feel they were staring at a specific spot. In Norton's view, deep in the dark forest, Werewolves, each over 1.8 meters tall, with sturdy bodies and on all fours, were gathering.
And their target was his small house. This was very strange.
These Werewolves were not lacking food now; although the Holy Lord City didn't have enough food, the dense forest was full of species that had thrived and grown over the past three years, such as wild dogs. If they wanted to get food, they could hunt other creatures. Why did they have to fixate on the skin-and-bones Norton? This was exactly the same as the Harpy he had encountered before! Even when they had already caught food, they would rather discard it to hunt him.
What on earth did he, Norton, have on him that could attract these monsters? Could it be because he had consumed the blood of a Holy Knight? The blood of the Holy Knight made Norton skip a stage of being a Vampire; this thing was clearly a treasure cultivated by The Church through mysterious means. If this blood could have such an effect on any species, then the Werewolves hunting Norton would be normal. But when the Harpy hunted him, he hadn't yet consumed the Holy Knight's blood.
"Jiji-jiji..."
The bat hanging on the roof of the dark wooden house also seemed to sense something strange. It opened its mouth and emitted a few strange syllables, then dropped from Norton's head, landing on his shoulder, then used its hooked, sharp claws to snag onto Norton's wrinkled, stiff, tree-bark-like skin.
Norton grabbed it and peeled it off his body, then bent down to pick up the Holy Knight's armor he had piled in the corner, putting it on piece by piece. The Werewolves outside seemed to want to surround and annihilate him. Norton still remembered the movies from his past life where Werewolves and Vampires were born enemies, but that was in movies; the story structure was completely different from what was recorded in The Church books of this life.
"The Church's methods for entering the city are bizarre and unpredictable; a single portrait of God can track me down for a precision strike. Staying in the wild is even more dangerous everywhere; I haven't even entered the river, otherwise, aquatic organisms would have already dismembered and eaten me! No wonder Kuba felt so unbalanced; it turns out that life in the wild is just too miserable."
Norton sighed, then used his withered and slender hands to pick up the golden great sword from the ground. His current body state was very similar to the membrane wing of a bat; it was entirely bone wrapped in skin, with only the slightest bit of flesh to keep it from being completely dried out. His withered skin was as hard as tree bark, but it clearly provided him with good defense. His hands were even more shriveled due to the dryness, making his fingers look long and strange, while his nails were hard and sharp. His body was forever in its peak state, which gave him endless strength if he matched it with his current build and features. Norton even felt that not wearing armor or using weapons, so as to fully utilize the agility of his body, would be the best way to attack. But now, facing a group of Werewolves, he felt it was better to wear it.
Norton was wearing a suit of Steel Armor, and every time he moved, the metal friction sound was produced. The atrophy of his body made the armor a bit ill-fitting for him now. Two scarlet pupils lurked within the helmet; Norton's nose had already caught the foul scent drifting from the Werewolves in the air.