So, it was best not to start anything.
He might just get himself into deep trouble.
Sean had no desire to get beaten so badly he couldn’t move for hours, just like Kate and Sopea.
On the other hand, this might not be a bad thing.
’Since they hate the police, they’re likely on my side. Even if they aren’t colleagues from the Holy Sanctuary, they can’t be too far off. The enemy of my enemy is my friend, after all. The only real headache for me is how to explain that my ID is a fake...’
Actually, no explanation was necessary.
When the man submitted Sean’s ID to his superior, the superior immediately accessed the relevant system to run a check on his identity.
Sean had been wrong about this.
Not only did they have a database, but it was connected directly to the Church Court’s internal network.
All manner of evil would be exposed here.
They had to find out exactly where Sean came from and who he worked for.
Some people you could kill, and some you couldn’t—even if they were an enemy. To do otherwise would affect the grand scheme of things.
The reason their organization had survived this long was because they were always cautious.
But this check put the man in an awkward position.
"This person isn’t in the police department’s system."
"This is a fake ID."
The man: "?"
"Could you have entered the number wrong?"
The superior glanced at him. "Are you questioning me?"
The man: "..."
"I wouldn’t dare."
"Take me to see him."
"Yes."
「A few minutes later.」
The two of them arrived at the dungeon.
Seeing Sean meditating with his eyes closed as if he hadn’t a care in the world, the man’s face darkened. ’Does this guy think he owns the place? Who has the presence of mind for Meditation after getting thrown in a cell?’
He let out two heavy coughs.
Sean opened one eye and asked with concern, "Do you have a cold?"
The man: "?"
’You’re the one with a cold!’
"Mr. Gomez wants to ask you some questions. You’d better be honest. Don’t make things hard for yourself," the man warned.
Sean noticed the middle-aged man beside him. That must be Gomez.
His aura was faint, almost undetectable.
But in this world of Magic, the weaker one’s aura, the higher their Tier.
So Sean opened his other eye, a polite smile on his face as he nodded to the man. "Hello, Mr. Gomez."
"And hello to you, Mr. Fake Cop," Gomez replied meaningfully.
Sean: "Actually, I’m not a cop."
Gomez: "I know."
"But not being a cop doesn’t mean you’re not an enemy."
They had many enemies.
The police were merely the easiest among them to deal with.
"I have a few questions for you. I hope you’ll answer them truthfully," Gomez said.
Sean nodded. "I’ll try."
The man to the side flared up at that. What did he mean, ’try’?
"You *must*!"
He was furious, probably because he’d failed to spot the fake ID. The more he looked at Sean’s handsome face, the more it annoyed him; he wished he could just peel it off and stick it on his own.
But Gomez cut him off. "Go stand to the side."
The man: "...Yes."
Gomez’s attitude was undoubtedly much better than the other man’s.
But you can’t always judge a book by its cover, a lesson Sean had learned long ago in Holkaydo.
When Gomez actually began his questioning, his actions were the complete opposite of his mild-mannered attitude. He was, in fact, utterly blunt—
"My question is very simple."
He turned to look at Sean. "If the Pope and Carl Black were both standing before you, and you had the chance to kill one of them, who would you choose?"
It was a piercing question, cutting straight to the heart of the conflict.
It came without any preamble, completely abrupt and catching one off guard.
And this was exactly the effect Gomez wanted.
From anyone else, one might be able to lie their way out of it. But before Gomez, no lie could escape his sight.
The moment the words left his lips, Gomez’s eyes suddenly became as deep as black holes. A vast wave of Mental Power, like a tsunami stirred by a gale, crashed directly into Sean’s mind.
There was a Wizard in Alola Town skilled in Mind Magic known as the "Lie Breaker." The treatment Sean had been spared from the Lie Breaker, he was now receiving right here in this dungeon.
Compared to the Lie Breaker, Gomez’s Mind Magic was far more terrifying. In terms of Tier alone, Gomez was more than a single level higher. This was a Grand Mage in no way inferior to Robes.
However, Sean didn’t feel any pressure at all.
His unobservable, fluctuating Mental Defense had activated once again, silently blocking Gomez’s Mental Shock. As a result, Gomez’s tried-and-true "Great Honesty Technique" was rendered completely ineffective, though Gomez himself had yet to realize it.
Besides, even if the Mind Magic had worked, the question was a freebie for Sean.
’He *was* Carl Black. What was there to choose?’
"Of course, I’d kill the Pope."
Hearing this answer, Gomez’s expression clearly softened a lot.
But he didn’t rush to a conclusion. Instead, he continued to question, his face cold, "You want to rebel?"
"Heh," Sean sneered. "What do you mean, ’rebel’?"
"Did Lord Blake and the Hall of Truth ever submit to the Church Court?"
"Kovri has never been under the Church Court’s jurisdiction."
"Furthermore, what vassal would dare occupy cities surrounding the Holy City of the Church Court and establish their own domain?"
"It was the Church Court that broke faith, taking advantage of Lord Blake’s absence to tear up the treaty and attack the Holy Sanctuary."
"So this isn’t a rebellion. I just want to help Lord Blake take back what is rightfully ours."
Sean spoke with such logic and reason that anyone who didn’t know better would think he was an expert on the feud between the Church Court and the Holy Sanctuary.
But in truth, he had just pieced it all together on the fly from the information he currently possessed.
"Well said!" Gomez laughed loudly.
His laughter died as his face turned cold again, killing intent flaring in his eyes. "For such outrageous treason, you can die!"
Sean: "?"
The next second, Gomez drifted before him like a phantom, moving so fast it was a blur. Sean only saw a trail of afterimages approaching before Gomez was right in front of him. He raised his right hand, his entire palm transforming into a swarm of unsettling, pale moths that he brought down hard toward Sean’s forehead.
For a split second, Sean considered using a Forbidden Spell.
But in the end, he suppressed the impulse and did not resist.
One reason was that he felt Gomez was still testing him.
Second, resistance seemed futile. He was merely Tier Three, and the gap between him and a Grand Mage was greater than that between a man and a dog—not something a single Forbidden Spell could bridge.
He could only gamble one more time. He closed his eyes to "await his death" and, just as he had with Kate, shouted with the resolve of a martyr, "Faith cannot be defeated! Even if you kill me, even if you nail me shut in a coffin, I will use my decaying voice to cry out from the grave—"
"Long live Lord Blake!"
"Long live the Hall of Truth!"
HUM!
The descending hand of moths finally came to a steady halt, just a hair’s breadth from Sean’s forehead.
When Sean opened his eyes again, he saw a broad, appreciative smile on Gomez’s face.
"Very good, young man. You’ve passed our test."
This was not originally a test, just an interrogation of an enemy, but Gomez was the leader here. If he said it was, then it was.
He liked that Sean had a backbone and was gratified to see that the Holy Sanctuary still had such die-hard loyalists.
Sean’s Tier was a bit low, but that wasn’t an issue. The organization valued loyalty above all else. As long as his faith was firm, even if he were useless, Gomez could use their resources to forcibly raise Sean’s Tier.
But now, it was Sean’s turn to act difficult.
"Test or no test, I never said I wanted to join you. Hmph."
’He’d been captured and interrogated without knowing a thing; he was entitled to show a little resentment.’
Gomez roared with laughter. Without further explanation, he simply said, "Trust me, you’ll choose to join."
"Come on, I’ll show you around the place first."
In Gomez’s eyes, a die-hard "remnant" of the Holy Sanctuary like Sean had no other choice but to stay with them. If he were ever truly caught by the Church Court, even a quick, clean death would be a luxury he couldn’t hope for.
The Church Court typically dealt with Heretics by burning them at the stake—nailing them to a cross and burning them alive.
The more stubborn ones might even be drawn and quartered by chariots, not even leaving a whole corpse behind.
Faced with such extreme torture and enemies on all sides, the Holy Temple Wizards naturally had to live with extreme caution. Compared to a life of hiding and fleeing, their environment here was not only safe but could even be called "blissful" to a degree. Aside from the lack of Sunshine, this place was almost no different from the outside world.
When Sean walked out of the cell and saw everything before him, he understood what Gomez meant.
This wasn’t a basement.
It was an Underground City.
...