Do not think that swearing an oath is trivial, for in the Church of the True God, lying to the True God is no different from seeking death.
Acts like Malin’s, leaving money and taking food and cookware, were permissible; however, various immovable properties and all sorts of gold and silver treasures were not allowed.
"Uh... everyone’s dead?" Indeed, the young boy had not considered this at all. He glanced toward the direction of the Holy Hall; his friend had gone in a while ago.
"The entire police station perished, leaving only two patrol officers from the block." Lillim, sitting on Malin’s lap, said so.
"The entire police station!" The young boy’s face paled as he stood up while looking at Lillim. "Are there no other survivors?"
"I don’t think so. We had registered as survivors before and told them to notify the Professional police to return to work as soon as possible, but as of this morning, only two patrol officers had come, and they are sorting out information on the block." As Malin spoke, he noticed the young boy’s complexion change, motioned for Lillim to stand up, and then rose himself, "What’s the matter?"
"A week ago, an artifact of extreme danger was brought to Silent Hill and placed in the police station. It was under the watch of an action team from the fourth operation department of our royal special investigation office. No, I must issue a warning. My friend went in there; can you take me to see him?"
"No problem, but may I ask, how dangerous is the so-called ’extremely dangerous artifact’ you mentioned?" Malin immediately indicated for the young man to follow, and wasn’t bothered by Lillim, who followed as well.
Passing through the entrance, the young man uttered an answer that was like dreadful news to Malin, "A Class 1 harmful artifact."
Malin had previously crammed knowledge about artifacts and knew that there were two kinds: those crafted by the natives of this world, which are safe, such as Malin’s World Tree Sapling and Blood Roar. The World Tree Sapling is Class 1, and it is indeed very powerful, but it hasn’t reached Class 0 because it is only effective against the Undead. However, everyone says that even the weakest divine-power Undead could be dealt full damage by the sapling of the World Tree, and using it as a casting tool, the Spell Formation could even ignore the target’s immunities and resistances.
If the target is an Undead, then it is truly worthy of being Class 0.
Blood Roar is Class 2; it is incredibly sharp and especially effective against Chaos, capable of inflicting real damage on Great Demon level beings. In other domains, it is just an extremely sharp axe that never breaks.
Naturally, with the help of Malin’s World Tree Sapling, everyone in the Church had come to regard Blood Roar with the sapling as a handle as a Class 1 entity.
But there are also some problematic artifacts in this world, such as Legendary items corrupted by Chaos or artifacts that have developed self-awareness and continue to sink deeper into a domain of deformity. Mira is one such artifact; she developed self-awareness but is merely a suit of armor. Had it not been for the young girl, Wasp, she would have completely fallen.
Even such dangerous items were only classified as Class 2 by the Bishops in the end.
The Class 1 that this young boy spoke of had to be terrifyingly formidable.
"Wait a second, can that thing move on its own?" Malin suddenly thought of something, "Where would it be placed?"
"It won’t move on its own; it’s just a scroll painting, the only problem is that someone must watch it at all times... If all the people you mentioned are dead, then it’s unknown what could have happened these past few days." The young boy said this.
"What is it called?" Lillim asked, her voice trembled, "I’ve heard that harmful artifacts all have a name, so people can more intuitively sense its power."
"Class 1, harmful artifact, known as the Magic Carpet. It’s a living tapestry, every week freely weaving a fragment of memory of a life that has appeared within ten kilometers of it into an image. If no one keeps an eye on it, the people and animals in the picture could walk right out." The young man, following behind Malin, spoke quickly.
And in Lillim’s voice began to tremble, "Then what if there are Deities or Evil Gods in those memories?"
"It is, after all, just a Level 1 harmful oddity. The greater it is, the lower the intensity, to the point where it can’t even project it. And the more mundane it is, the higher the intensity becomes."
Hearing him say this, Malin pushed open the door in front of him and looked at the bishops sitting inside with their guest, "We have trouble, Your Excellences."
"We have trouble too, my child, but you can speak first," the old dwarf said with a wry smile.
"A task force from the Special Investigation Branch of the Royal Special Investigation Division took a Level 1 harmful oddity into Silent Hill one week ago. They called it Magic Carpet and left it at the police station under special guard. It has been a week," Malin told the bishops before him.
"Zem! We must initiate the retrieval process immediately!" the juvenile yelled to his superior officer.
"But we also have a problem here. Four days ago, the Church of the War God just recovered a harmful oddity. The Holy Hall of the Church of the War God is far from The Temple district. When the Church went to check today, they found the entire Holy Hall has been contaminated. We must end this within 10 hours, or we’re going to have to fight another battle," the Bishop of the Church of the War God said with great distress, "I will resign from my position afterwards; we can’t help you now, child."
"Jiaxi, we have no choice; we have to deal with this first."
"Then I’ll take care of it," Malin volunteered.
"You... If it’s you, Malin, I don’t see a problem, but do you know where that thing is?" asked the frowning Bishop Quassel of the Church of the Goddess of Harvest.
"If I turn the police station upside down, won’t I find out?" Malin said, then turned his head to the juvenile, "Now, let’s reintroduce ourselves. I am Malin Gaiate, fourth-year apprentice from the Carterburg Emergency Response Department, affiliated member of the Church of the Goddess of Harvest, bearer of ’Blessing of Justice,’ a fifth-ring mage, and author of the ninth step of the Detective Sequence."
After saying this in one breath, Malin reached out his hand.
The juvenile fell silent for a moment, then extended his hand to Malin, "Jiaxi Sheringham, member of the Fourth Action Branch of the Special Investigation Branch of the Royal Special Investigation Division, a third-ring mage, and a pursuer at the seventh step of the Hunter Sequence."
"Everyone faces their own purgatory they must confront. Jiaxi, let’s go," Malin said, then turned to the others, "Sorry, we’ll take our leave first."
Having said this, Malin led Jiaxi out of the conference room.
On their way to the door, Malin glanced at Jiaxi, "Where do you think your colleagues would have put that thing?"
"The basement, because the rooftop has too many places to jump off from, while the basement usually has only one exit."
Now that he had the answer, Malin walked through the door opened by the guards, frowning at the girls packing up, "Why have you stopped?"
"Because you needed help, my dear," Jessica said as she dragged two armed cases from a carriage nearby.
"I guess I now know why my father talked to me in such a heartfelt tone," Jiaxi said with a resigned expression beside Malin.
"Your father cares about you," Malin responded as he pulled an engineering warhammer from the side of the armed case Jessica was dragging over.
...It felt much lighter.