Millennium Witch.

Chapter 109-108- Requiem Ritual
Climbing the steps like an ordinary tourist, Yvette passed through the archway and entered the interior of the black church.

The interior of the church is a spacious area, unlit by any artificial light; all illumination comes from the thousands of candles lit on the walls. Under the stained glass windows of the dome, an orange glow spreads across everyone, creating a solemn atmosphere. Even tourists from out of town find themselves drawn into this serene environment, hesitant to make a loud noise.

At that moment, directly in front of the rows of pews inside the church, on a white bone altar carved with skull patterns, a bishop was preaching doctrine, while the believers below listened attentively in complete silence.

Yvette glanced at him and roughly confirmed the bishop's identity; he was probably a "requiem priest."

Using information gathered online and the booklets distributed to tourists here, Yvette already knew about the hierarchy of clergy within the Holy Spirit Cult.

The lowest rank was "deacon," which consisted of ordinary clergy members who wore black hoods.

Then there are the "priests" and the "high priests." The former are responsible for the daily ritual activities of the church, such as Mass, preaching, and guiding believers to understand doctrines, while the latter are the heads of individual churches and only come out to preside over ceremonies on special days.

Above that is the "Soul-Soothing Ritual," which belongs to the middle and upper levels of the Holy Spirit sect, the highest leaders of the city-level diocese.

Then there is the "High Priest of Reincarnation". If the Requiem Priest can be compared to a mayor, then the High Priest of Reincarnation is the governor. Due to the small size of Rusty Bones' territory, there are only five High Priests of Reincarnation in total, and these five people are responsible for handling the vast majority of the sect's affairs.

Finally, there are the three "Holy Priests" and "His Holiness the Pope," the four most mysterious and terrifying leaders of the Holy Spirit Sect. Each of them is an unfathomable necromancer, known as the incarnation of death on earth.

Rumor has it that these four have even mastered the core secrets of necromancy, becoming immortal beings. That's why New Eden, as one of the world's two superpowers, has been reluctant to wage a war on terror with the Rustbone Free State, fearing that they might not be able to kill the four super mages and instead anger them, bringing continuous disasters to the country.

Of course, this claim is not guaranteed to be true.

……

Since she was there to gather intelligence, Yvette didn't do anything special. Like other tourists, she stood in a designated area, watching the worshippers celebrate Mass and glancing a few more times at the requiem priest on the altar.

The other person had a very kind face, like an honest and simple middle-aged man, which made people feel friendly. However, thinking of the evil spirit that had flashed by outside the church, Yvette had to be more vigilant and guessed that this requiem priest was most likely an evil necromancer, and that the evil spirit just now might have been summoned by him.

Gradually, she began to have some ideas.

It was impossible for her to obtain necromancy through legitimate means. Six months was not enough time for a new clergyman to be promoted to Requiem Priest, and she didn't think the Church of Soulfire would approve her application.

The only options left are to steal or rob, but this raises another problem—whether it's stealing or violent robbery, it will inevitably attract the attention of the Holy Spirit Sect. What if it attracts a certain priest?
That is the embodiment of death, a true walking nuclear weapon, even more terrifying than nuclear weapons themselves!
After some thought, Yvette decided that she would only need to gather some intelligence in the early stages to deepen her understanding of the Church of Soulfire, and then carry out infiltration and theft, or even violent robbery, in the last half month.

Even if she attracts the arrival of a holy priest, she only needs to make a slight move, hide in Fusjiang for a few days, and once the time is up and she leaves the dream, no matter if you are the incarnation of the Grim Reaper or the incarnation of the Witch of the End, you will never be able to find her again.

She noted down the layout of the church as part of the basic intelligence. After more than ten minutes, Yvette stopped lingering and turned to leave.

But as they approached the door, a priestess wearing a black hood suddenly came up to them and politely asked, "Excuse me, are you Miss Wuming?"

“...It’s me.” Yvette stopped and narrowed her eyes slightly.

"Mr. Koss would like to invite you to stay a moment. I have something I'd like to discuss with you... if it's convenient for you."

Who is Koss?

“It’s that esteemed person on the altar.” The acolyte raised his head, revealing a young face peeking out from under the hood, and looked behind Yvette.

Following his gaze, Yvette looked at the requiem priest she had carefully observed before, and saw him give her a smile from afar.

Yvette was a little confused, wondering if this meant to show goodwill and let bygones be bygones, to wipe the slate clean of the evil spirit attack?

But she decided to see what the other party was up to, so she nodded and said, "Lead the way."

...Following the black-robed assistant priest, Yvette arrived at a side reception room.

After waiting on the sofa for about ten minutes, Yvette saw the requiem priest push open the door and walk in, smiling lightly, "Miss Nameless is indeed as rumored. Even without a photo, one only needs to look at her to recognize her."

"My name is Hoyle Koss, a requiem priest from the Church of Soulfire in Fusjiang. It's a pleasure to meet you, Miss Nameless. I've heard so much about you!"

Yvette found the overly enthusiastic tone somewhat odd.

After a moment of silence, she asked, "Are you here to reconcile?"

"Reconcile...reconcile?!" Hoyle's smile froze on his face. After a few seconds of stunned silence, he said in confusion, "Miss Wuming, we should be meeting for the first time...is there some misunderstanding?"

"You weren't controlling that evil spirit?" Yvette asked.

“Evil spirits? What evil spirits?” Hoyle’s expression became even more confused. “While I do possess some knowledge of necromancy, I only know a few simple spells, not anything related to evil spirits…”

Because Hoyle's expression was genuine enough, not like acting, Yvette frowned and changed the subject, asking ambiguously, "What do you want from me?"

“Uh… it’s like this, Miss Anonymous, you… you raided the base of those two human trafficking gangs in the suburbs of Fusjiang a couple of days ago, right?” Hoyle became serious.

"Ah."

“That’s wonderful,” Hoyle said sincerely. “I have long wanted to eliminate those two evil bases, but I have been unable to do anything about them because my forces are not strong enough and my own strength is insufficient. Miss Wuming, you have acted on behalf of heaven, and I would like to express my gratitude to you first.”

"..."

“Miss Anonymous, this gratitude is from the bottom of my heart and there is absolutely no falsehood! But I have taken the liberty of inviting you today because I have an even more important request... that is, I would like to make a request to you on behalf of the local Church of Soulfire.”

"You said."

“I hope you can investigate the true identity of the mysterious leader ‘General’ behind the criminal organization ‘Ghost Hand Society’, and ideally, kill him directly,” Hoyle said. “If the investigation is successful, I am willing to pay a reward of 100 million digital currency; if the decapitation is successful, the reward will increase to 500 million… Miss Anonymous, what do you think of this?”

After a moment of silence, Yvette didn't directly answer whether she agreed or not, but instead asked, "What do you know about evil spirits?"

She suspected that Hoyle deliberately assigned her the task to create a blind spot, so that she would no longer suspect his connection with the Ghost Hand Society. But then she felt that if that were the case, Hoyle wouldn't have gone to such lengths; it would only make him seem like he was trying to cover something up.

In short, ask first and see the other person's reaction.

“There are two kinds of evil spirits: those that are naturally born or those that are created by necromancy… Miss Nameless, have you encountered an evil spirit?” Hoyle asked seriously.

Yvette described the evil spirits in the human trafficking camp and the one she had just seen in the church, then asked, "How can you prove that the evil spirit has nothing to do with you?"

Hoyle was silent for a long time, and then said somewhat dejectedly, "I'm sorry, I have no way to prove it, Miss Nameless."

He paused, a look of hesitation on his face, and lowered his voice: "In fact, I myself feel that there must be someone within the church who is colluding with Ghost Hand... There may even be such a person in the Church of Soulfire, but I don't know who it is... So you must be careful of everyone here."

Yvette asked, "Including you?"

Hoyle paused for a moment, then nodded and said, "Yes, that includes me."

(End of this chapter)