Ch.501Priest Who Bears Monsters

Near the massive womb, several cultists stood guard like prison wardens. They appeared uneasy due to the commotion above, but from their demeanor, they seemed unaware that Direid had been killed.

After setting Lacy down, I drew Durandal and leapt among them.

“W-what the?!”

“An intruder? A Paladin?!”

“How did they find this place…!”

The men were shocked by the sudden ambush. Wrapped in pure white holy light, I swung Durandal and Frosting without hesitation.

The blade pierced one cultist’s solar plexus, slicing through his stomach and emerging below his groin, while Frosting impaled another’s back, ripping out his spine and entrails completely.

“AAAAARGH! My stomach! My stomaaaaach!”

“Guhhhh…!”

They writhed on the ground, screaming like animals in heat. It was a simple task, as none of them were even at Master level.

Only two cultists remained alive. Not because they were stronger than the others, but because I deliberately spared them for a brief interrogation.

During the interrogation that followed, they maintained an uncooperative attitude, hurling vulgar insults. They claimed they would have turned every orifice into a rag if their brainwashing had worked.

With Lacy’s help, I turned the more defiant one into human tartare to repay their verbal abuse.

“Guh-guhhhk…! Kill… kill meeeee…”

The sight of his comrade still alive despite having all his flesh flayed made the other one more polite than a first-class flight attendant.

“I-I’ll tell you everything. Please…!”

Like a kindergarten teacher facing an angry parent with a kitchen knife, he confessed everything with the utmost courtesy.

—-

Womb of Dark Magic.

That was the name of the horrific monstrosity they had created.

Apparently, if you filled the open upper part with human blood and placed sacrifices in the fallopian tubes on either side, it would randomly spawn small monsters depending on the value of the sacrifice.

The Ascension Cult had been producing monsters using imprisoned Paladins and Priests as materials, then enhancing their own strength by implanting useful specimens into their bodies using Direid’s powers.

Not only did they summon monsters, but they also used the Dark Mana emitted during the process to maintain the Array of Debauchery spread throughout the city.

After extracting all the information from them, I personally stuffed them into the giant fallopian tubes to verify if what they said was true.

“AAAAARGH! No! Nooooo! I told you everything…!”

It was true.

The flayed cultist and the one with crushed limbs were sucked into the fallopian tubes with screams, falling into the dark red amniotic fluid where they slowly dissolved, releasing Dark Mana.

– Thump! Thump! Thummmmp!

After absorbing the two sacrifices, the Womb of Dark Magic pulsated like a heart, and shortly after, the round end opened wide and a small monster popped out.

So this is how it works.

“Kieeeeeee!”

The monster cried as if celebrating its own birth. Its body resembled a cross between a slug and a sea anemone. Perhaps because the sacrifices were such garbage, it was a pathetically weak monster, inferior even to a kobold.

“A flesh mass that devours humans as sacrifices and spits out monsters… it’s an abominably unholy and impure existence.”

Lacy glared at the Womb of Dark Magic with disgust, as if looking at filth.

“Indeed. It’s revolting.”

I crushed the newly born monster underfoot and swung Durandal to dismember the Womb of Dark Magic into pieces of meat.

“Kiererererk-!”

It resisted by swinging tentacles resembling fallopian tubes, but there was no way such slow-moving tentacles could reach me.

To finish it off, Lacy’s holy light engulfed the remains of the womb, turning the chunks of meat into dust that scattered away.

—-

The Paladins and Priests imprisoned there were in a weakened state, corrupted by the thick Dark Mana. There weren’t many Priests; most were Paladins stripped of their armor.

Apparently, the Priests, being physically weaker, couldn’t endure long in the Dark Mana, so they were used up first before death.

Even the Archbishop who had governed this place had apparently become material for the womb. I had planned to execute him for allowing the pleasure district to turn the city into this state, but to think he’d become the womb itself.

They said they made him violate all the priestesses first to cover them in sin, then cursed their defiled bodies to be reborn as the Womb of Dark Magic. These cultist bastards were insane.

“What… what have I done…!”

The Paladins awakened by Lacy’s holy light fell into panic, unable even to stand as they clutched their heads and wailed.

The moment they broke free from the brainwashing, all their sins seemed to crush them mercilessly. Though they hadn’t committed these evil acts of their own will, the memories were too horrific to excuse with the cultists’ brainwashing.

I thought men might be less shocked than women, but being Paladins, there wasn’t much difference.

“Helena, Lea, Aris, Millenia…! I… I…”

“Lady Saulite, how could you allow this to happen to us…!”

They cried out the names of their comrades they had violated or lamented bitterly toward Saulite. I couldn’t empathize with their despair but could understand it, so I remained silent.

Instead of me, Lacy stepped forward to comfort them.

“Stand up. It’s too early to despair and give up. Even when darkness shrouds the path ahead, we never stop moving toward the sun. Isn’t that the duty of the Paladins you swore to uphold? There are people suffering as much as you, perhaps even more, above us. Do you intend to turn away and abandon them?”

Rather than soothing their wounds, she reminded them of their duty, of what they needed to do.

A cruel request to protect the priestesses while we dealt with the other cultists. For them, it was like facing their sins head-on.

“…How can we possibly…”

“If you don’t wish to, I cannot force you. But understand that refusing would only continue to aid the cultists. Don’t you agree?”

The Paladins and Priests looked ready to commit suicide, but they nodded one by one and stood up, persuaded by Lacy’s persistent appeals to their sense of duty.

Whether it was for atonement, penance, or out of their duty as Paladins, I couldn’t tell.

—-

“Welcome back, Lord Haschal.”

After quickly recovering the equipment the Paladins had left behind and returning to the prayer room, our companions greeted us.

“Yes, everything alright here?”

“Nothing happened. It seems you didn’t encounter any major problems either.”

While Lacy and I were exploring underground, they had cleaned up neatly, piling the scattered corpses in a corner of the prayer room like garbage.

Technically, they should be burned, but we couldn’t set fire to someone else’s cathedral, so they must have left them for now.

“Inquisitor Ceylon…! How is Astraea’s strongest Paladin here…?”

The Saulite Paladins who followed us up were shocked to see Ceylon. They were surprised when they first met Lacy and me, but they clearly hadn’t imagined Ceylon would be part of our group.

Well, with the city in this state, they couldn’t have heard the rumors. Ceylon briefly explained the situation to them.

“Welcome back, miss. The ground was rumbling occasionally. What exactly did you encounter down there?”

Well, something like your mother?

…Of course, I couldn’t say that. Mocking a subordinate’s sore spot would be among the top three things a superior should never do.

Few who ridicule their subordinates escape consequences. They either get betrayed and killed, or even if they live a long life, their descendants get betrayed and their entire faction collapses.

“We saw a monster the cultists were raising.”

“A monster?”

I removed my metal mask and changed the filter, then told my companions about what we had witnessed in the cathedral basement.

“A flesh mass that gives birth to monsters… I wonder where they obtained such knowledge.”

Even Ceylon, with his extensive experience hunting heretics, had never heard of such an abomination. He said monsters were thought to either manifest suddenly or be summoned from other realms by certain mages.

Indeed, even I had never seen a device like the “Womb of Dark Magic” that exchanged humans for monsters.

There were people like Isabella who mass-produced monsters, but they did so by summoning a breeding monster first, then using it to impregnate people to increase their numbers.

—-

Agnes and Lacy showed the sleeping priestesses to the Saulite Paladins and explained what precautions to take.

Mental protection spells could temporarily free them from brainwashing, but it was ultimately a temporary measure, and they couldn’t predict how the women would react when they regained their senses, so it was better to keep them asleep.

“Since I put them to sleep myself, they’ll remain unconscious for at least four hours. So please carry them and escape outside the city. Staying here will only continue to drain your holy power.”

The Paladins thanked Agnes, removed their cloaks to cover the priestesses, and carried them on their backs as they departed. Most of the minions roaming the city had already been dealt with, so no one would stop them.

With the Paladins’ permission, we set fire to the cultists’ corpses and left the cathedral.

This would likely burn down the entire Saulite Cathedral, but the cultists had already stolen or destroyed all valuable items, and since the entire cathedral was thoroughly corrupted by evil, it would be better to burn it down and rebuild later.

Our group boarded the carriage with its roof blown off, and I embraced the gloomy Lena, stroking her back to comfort her. Thus, we left the Saulite Cathedral.

And as soon as we reached the street, we witnessed a shocking sight.

– Whoooosh!

Fierce flames shot up toward the sky, spewing black smoke. Ceylon, sitting in the driver’s seat, made the sign of the cross and sighed.

In the distance, the Imela Cathedral was burning like a beacon, collapsing in flames.