Deep Sea Embers

The moment Duncan took out the sun talisman, there was a few seconds of silence at the scene—his words "one of my own people" floated in the air flatly, which brought about a dozen pairs of eyes meeting each other unexpectedly and cautiously. They looked at each other, and then the tall and thin man who looked like a small leader suddenly lowered his voice and said hurriedly: "Put it away quickly! Be careful that there are church eyeliners nearby!"

Does this amulet really work? Is this thing so convincing among Sun Cultists?

Duncan was happy in his heart, but on the surface he still maintained a mysterious posture with a blank face covering half of his face. While putting away the talisman, he said lightly: "If there is really a church eyeliner near here, a large group of you gathered together is better than me." The talisman is striking."

As soon as he finished speaking, a man with a beard on the opposite side subconsciously said, "No, if we get together, we will at most attract the magistrate and disturb the public order..."

"Shut up!" The tall and thin leader immediately stopped the bullying of his subordinates, and then his eyes fell on Duncan, "This is a necessary caution - after all, this city is very unsafe now. You go Come here, don't make any unnecessary moves."

Duncan walked towards the opposite side calmly, and the other side looked him up and down carefully. After looking at him for a long time, the tall and thin man asked in a low voice: "Are you a believer living in this city?"

Duncan thought for a while, then nodded: "Yes."

The original owner of this body did live in the city, and he now lives in the city. On these obvious issues, he decided to tell the truth.

His plan is very simple, find a way to sneak into these cultists, and then see if he can get any news, listen and ask more if he doesn't expose it, and let Ai transform into pigeons and give them all to pigeons if he is exposed.

The tall and thin man didn't notice any dangerous thoughts in the mind of this "church fellow" in front of him at all, but asked immediately: "As far as I know, the Deep Sea Church attacked a few days ago..."

"The gathering place in the sewers, there was a sun sacrifice there at that time, the ceremony got out of control, we lost a lot of people - but I escaped," Duncan said without any psychological burden, while paying attention to the reactions of the sun cultists around him , he could feel that the tense atmosphere on these people had obviously relaxed, but only the tall and thin little leader in front of him remained cautious, "There are three other people who escaped with me, but we got separated. , now I can’t get in touch with the church at all—until I met you, the sun gave me guidance.”

The tall and thin man hummed noncommittally, and then his eyes fell on Duncan's shoulder: "What is this?"

"My pet," Duncan said casually, "can't you tell? It's just an ordinary pigeon."

Ai shook his head in a timely manner, making a loud "cuckoo" sound.

"This pigeon has such a loud voice..." The tall and thin man seemed to have finally relaxed his vigilance, probably because he subconsciously felt that the church's fellows who abide by the rules and regulations would not have the habit of running around the city with a bird on their backs. He nodded, " Come with me, it's not safe to talk outside."

Duncan breathed a sigh of relief, he felt that the first step of fishing in troubled waters seemed to be successful.

Then he followed behind the group of cultists, and followed them deeper into the alley.

The alley was deeper than he had imagined, and it seemed to lead to the most forgotten dark hinterland of this run-down urban area. A group of cultists led Duncan around, passing the old pipeline system that constantly released steam, passing through the alley. After crossing the path full of sewage, he finally circled into a group of low and dilapidated buildings, and the deeper he went, the darker and dilapidated side of this prosperous capital of steam was revealed in front of Duncan. undoubtedly.

He originally thought that the place where he and Nina lived was already a low-level community in the city, but now he suddenly realized that the dilapidated antique store was already a "respectable place" in the lower city.

Most of the dilapidated houses on both sides of the road are lifeless and seem to have been abandoned for a while, but in the shadows of a few houses, it seems that one can feel numb or gloomy gazes, as if there are homeless people hiding in this area. In the forgotten city, I was looking indifferently at the uninvited guests who broke into this place.

But in the end, these gloomy gazes were quickly withdrawn—the dozen or so people brought by the tall and thin man were obviously enough to make the homeless people living here fear.

"See, this is the most prosperous city-state on the boundless sea, Purand," the man in black who first attracted Duncan's attention muttered, as if talking to himself or to Duncan, "everywhere Likewise, the same is true of Rensa, and so is Cold Harbor, and even the light harbor of the elves, which is called 'the paradise of peace and justice'...they claim that the so-called 'sun' shines on the world fairly and brings light to all things order, but how much sunshine is there in these gutters?"

Duncan didn't respond, but just looked up. He saw the steam and fuel pipelines spreading from the upper city and the industrial city, criss-crossing the buildings above his head, and the huge valves and pressure-rectifying structures were entrenched like many grotesque behemoths. On the top of the low and dilapidated buildings around, the sun shines through the gaps in these pipes, causing the sewage between the buildings to emit an unpleasant stench.

Most of the sewage was condensed from the steam leaked from nearby pipes. With the operation of the city, these sewage mixed with the chemicals in the factory and accumulated in the lower city day after day.

It doesn't take long to live in this city, Duncan can roughly guess how this "urban abscess" appeared at a glance.

Duncan silently glanced at the aggrieved man in black, his expression still indifferent.

Bewitched by the Sons of the Sun, or forced by a harsh life, these cultists do have a reason for their birth—but so what?

These cultists who thought they were persecuted by the city-state and had to live in the gutter eventually came to the lower city to capture the helpless poor and make living sacrifices—there were countless ragged people in that cave. People, not a single decent person uptown.

As a "foreigner" who doesn't know enough about this world, Duncan feels that he doesn't need to make too many comments on this city-state, but at least as a former sacrifice, he feels that these cultists are not a thing.

In silence, he finally arrived at the stronghold of these cultists.

The base is located underground in an abandoned factory.

These cultists who burrow around in the gutters seem to always find a way to find a suitable gutter and transform it into their gathering place, or this prosperous capital of steam already has countless gutters, which are suitable for growing some Something dark and profane.

A group of people crossed the half-collapsed courtyard wall outside the factory and opened the iron gate leading to the underground structure. Duncan originally planned to take a good look at the situation in the factory and satisfy his curiosity about the "steam age", but it turned out that Not finding a chance, he was taken directly to a sloping staircase leading underground, and came to the "secret base" of the cultists.

It used to be a warehouse of a factory, or a facility like a machine room, but it has obviously been evacuated now, leaving only the remaining pipe system on the roof and the gas that can no longer be lit on the walls in the huge space. Lamps—dark spaces are dangerous, and even cultists know this, so they lighted oil lamps fueled with whale fat all over the ground, and under the light brought by a large number of oil lamps, Duncan saw that there were still More than a dozen cultists gathered here.

After the church severely damaged a sacrificial field, there are still so many sun believers gathered together? Where did these cultists come from? Is it the same as mushroom moss, which grows whenever there is a gutter?

Duncan looked at the figures gathered in the wide basement with some surprises, and those cultists also looked at him, a stranger who suddenly appeared, curiously and warily, and then the tall and thin man came over again, almost A believer who looked quite strong and tall followed closely behind, standing around Duncan.

Duncan frowned: "Why, you have to search again after you come in? I didn't know there was such a rule."

"If you are really the church's eyeliner, a body search is useless," the tall and thin man said, and he took out a strip-like thing from his arms and handed it to Duncan, "Relax, it's just a more rigorous verification, it's just necessary Prudence—we have lost many compatriots to various reasons over the years. Take it, and read it after me."

Duncan glanced at the object handed over by the other party, and saw that it was a dirty piece of cloth, even something torn from old clothes, with dark brown stains on its surface, like dried blood.

Is this another prop for the sun believers to verify their compatriots?

Duncan was a little surprised, and lamented that this is indeed a group of professionals who are hunted down all day long. Although the combat effectiveness is not obvious, the skills of preventing penetration from the outside and ghosts from the inside are really full.

Then he took the things handed over by the other party, and heard the tall and thin man begin to mutter some sentences in a low voice: "In the name of the sun, may the glory of the Lord shine..."

As soon as Duncan heard it, he felt very familiar - he only heard a cultist say this to himself not long ago!

The cultist even gave him a talisman.

Duncan raised his finger calmly, and a cluster of green flames that no one noticed immediately seeped into the seemingly ordinary strip of cloth in his hand. Afterwards, he kept a straight face and imitated the tall man in front of him. The thin man read the prayers over.

The cloth that seemed to be soaked in blood remained obediently in his hand, seemingly unresponsive.

The tall and thin man's eyes fell on the strip of cloth. After a long time, he finally nodded lightly. While reaching out to take the strip of cloth out of Duncan's hand, he said with a smile, "Welcome back to the glory of the Lord, compatriots."