Chapter 1 In fact

Few people knew that the Crystal Holy Mountain, Asueman, had an extremely vast and mysterious interior space, and an ancient gatekeeper had been guarding this magnificent holy place throughout human history. Those qualified to enter Asueman were all bishop-level figures of the Goddess of Creation sect, and only the Pope had ever been able to communicate with the gatekeeper and freely open or close the various halls of Asueman.

The gatekeeper silently opened a gate of light. The edge of the gate trembled a few times, then stabilized into the shape of a teleportation channel. On the other side of the channel, one could see a crystal hall filled with a faint halo. Pope Augustus VII nodded slightly to the gatekeeper and stepped into the gate.

The teleportation channel shook and then closed. Augustus VII had already arrived in the "Star Chart Hall" inside Asueman. This was a pyramid-shaped space, with the four walls gradually converging towards the middle, eventually meeting at a point at the top of the hall. A huge white crystal floated high there, emitting a low hum. Mysterious runes and images constantly roamed the walls and floor of the hall, and only a small portion of them could be understood by humans—this was still the result of thousands of years of research by the most knowledgeable scholars of the church.

Most of the space inside Asueman was in this pyramid shape, differing only in size and lighting. Scholars had spent countless generations deciphering the names of some of the halls, but they knew nothing about their specific functions and operating mechanisms.

The name of the space in front of him was the "Star Chart Hall."

Star Chart Hall was the name engraved on the entrance and exit leading to other areas from here, so there was naturally no doubt about it, but in fact, the church's scholars had always been confused about it: judging from the name, this room should be a place to observe the stars or store astrological data, but in fact, there were no openings here to observe the external stars, and the equipment in the room had nothing to do with astrology.

In the world of Coro, astrology was a profound science. This world had an unchanging, never-flickering starry sky, which was the image of the stars left on the border of space when this space was isolated from the material universe—the Coro people did not understand the secrets of this, but this did not prevent them from understanding the operation of their world from the stars. Although the stars did not move, the various illusions produced by the ups and downs of the Sea of ​​Karnos would be projected onto the starry sky. These rays of light wandered on the natural chessboard formed by the stars, producing various disturbances with the starlight, and astrologers could deduce from this the direction of chaos and the length of the years of order. It could be said that the history of human astrology was as long as the history of the world of Coro, and the people of this world were no strangers to this knowledge.

However, there was nothing related to astrology in Asueman's Star Chart Hall. There were only a lot of mysterious crystals here. On the largest crystal, a mysterious sentence wandered year after year. Augustus VII believed that this sentence must have great meaning, but unfortunately, the scholars had not been able to decipher the secret in this sentence.

The runes inside Asueman were too profound. Even if he copied all the runes inside Asueman and gave them to the highly respected linguists in the Holy Domain for analysis, no one could understand the meaning of every sentence in this holy place.

The old Pope came to the crystal tower in the center of the Star Chart Hall, and the gatekeeper followed the old man silently. The sentence that no one could understand was still floating on the crystal tower as always, but after sensing the Pope's approach, this sentence temporarily retreated to the side, and other symbols and images appeared in the air.

Augustus VII placed his hand on the crystal tower, carefully touching the delicate edges of the crystal column, and the images projected in the air changed accordingly.

It eventually formed a holographic image of the world of Coro.

This picture was blurry and constantly shaking, as if the equipment was malfunctioning. Some of the words floating on the map were completely unclear. Only one mark in the entire holographic image was meaningful, and that was a beam of light located in the south-central part of the Ansu continent.

This mark suddenly appeared less than a month ago—and after it appeared, many areas inside Asueman that were originally closed suddenly woke up from their slumber. The Pope firmly believed that this must be the guidance of divine will.

"...Ansu Continent... Ancient Kasuan Temple..." the old Pope murmured to himself, "This temple, which disappeared from the world of order a thousand years ago, still exists... Goddess, what exactly do you want me to understand?"

The holographic image naturally could not answer the old Pope's question. It just floated quietly in the air, and was constantly made more blurred by some interfering patterns.

Augustus VII turned off the holographic image and continued to start other systems.

He tuned to the only interfaces that could be controlled and understood by mortals. One of the interfaces showed the image of the entire Crystal Holy Mountain: this image was still relatively clear, showing that about one-third of the Holy Mountain was still hidden beneath the earth, and that there was an extremely complex structure inside the Holy Mountain. In many places on the image, there were striking orange markings, and Augustus could still understand those words:

"Unknown error, unable to read analytical data."

He zoomed in on the picture and locked it on the crack at the top of the Holy Mountain. The image showed that there was a terrible penetrating wound there, and a "foreign object" was stuck in the deepest part of the penetrating wound.

Several months ago, it was this mysterious extraterrestrial object that cut through the sky and tore a crack in the sacred mountain body of Asueman. From that day on, the state of the Crystal Holy Mountain deteriorated day by day, until not long ago, even the light of order had receded from the Holy Mountain.

And in this process, Asueman itself was actually working hard to heal itself: the crack had now healed nearly two-thirds, but just because the "foreign object" was still stuck in its deepest part, this healing could never be complete, and the self-healing speed was far slower than the rate of the Holy Mountain's decay.

The top of the Holy Mountain on the holographic image shone with orange light, indicating a warning, and the crack was marked in red, with a line of text floating next to it: Serious warning, #@￥#%@￥ severely damaged, output power decreased, self-repair function limited, manual intervention required immediately.

The old Pope looked at these pictures and asked without turning his head: "Is there a way to get there?"

The gatekeeper stood behind him without saying a word, without any expression.

The old Pope knew that this meant "no."

If something could be done, the gatekeeper would do it immediately. If she didn't react, it meant that it absolutely could not be done. The gatekeeper was such a mechanical guard, unable to be persuaded by reason, or even communicated with.

The old Pope frowned, but couldn't say much to the silent gatekeeper. He knew that this matter had exceeded the limits of mortal ability.

The "extraterrestrial object" bombarded the summit of Asueman, the highest crystal spire known as the "Throne of Divine Will," and that was undoubtedly a forbidden zone for mortals. The Crystal Holy Mountain, Asueman, was shrouded in powerful divine energy all year round. From the foot of the mountain upwards, for every hundred meters of ascent, the sacred energy wandering around the mountain wall would double. The height of the mountain wall corresponding to the top platform of the "Palace of Holy Statues" was actually the limit that mortals could withstand. This was also why only the Pope or bishop-level personnel could stand on that platform: this was not only a symbol of status, but also because the strength of ordinary people was simply not enough to face the pressure of Asueman.

Even Augustus VII himself would probably only be able to hold on for ten minutes if he climbed to the Throne of Divine Will—after that, he would be burned to ashes by the divine might, let alone the other monks.

Therefore, even if everyone knew that the "extraterrestrial object" that was causing Asueman to constantly decline was in the Throne of Divine Will area, they had no way to take that thing out.

It was impossible to climb to the top of the Holy Mountain from the outside. Augustus VII once placed his hope on going to that place from inside the Holy Mountain.

But the gatekeeper had never opened the passage leading to that location—this mysterious guardian mechanically adhered to some kind of principle like a magic puppet, and compared to this principle, she seemed to not care at all about the reality that Asueman was constantly weakening.

After staying in the Star Chart Hall for a while, the Pope left this place.

He did not leave Asueman, but asked the gatekeeper to take him to several other opened halls. Some of these halls had been open to the public for thousands or even ten thousand years, while others had only recently awakened from their slumber last month and suddenly appeared in front of outsiders.

Among the several halls that had recently opened, one in particular caught the attention of Augustus VII. He had visited this place more than once in the past half month.

Structurally, this newly appeared hall should be located on the mountainside of Asueman Holy Mountain and run through the central axis of the Holy Mountain. Before the crystal barriers blocking the hall suddenly disappeared, no one realized the existence of this room at all.

Led by the gatekeeper, the Pope entered this hall called the "Will Hub." Just like the previous few times, as soon as he stepped into this place, he immediately felt a soft and low voice ringing softly in his mind.

However, this voice was too weak and intermittent to be distinguished.

The Pope raised his head. He saw a huge, irregularly shaped crystal standing quietly in the center of this pyramid-shaped hall. The crystal was three meters high and surrounded by a halo, and inside the crystal, something seemed to be sealed.

He was of course no stranger to this scene. In fact, he had been studying the crystal for a full half month, but even a scholar as knowledgeable as the Pope did not understand what was in the crystal.

A ball of light was sealed inside, a ball of light like a starry sky.