Several days had passed since the first tripartite discussion regarding Scorpion Forging.
The Count had not left the study to figure out the proper forging method, and was currently engrossed in a sea of engineering blueprints when the urgent report from the Maid Supervisor interrupted his thoughts.
The dark-haired Border Count lifted his head, his wine-colored pupils slightly dilated with fatigue now scattered by surprise: "This..."
He did not bother to confirm the authenticity of the information, for the maid before him, the most outstanding among the maids, a servant always wearing a gentle smile, would not make such a low-level mistake.
However, the content of the message shocked the Count, compelling him to rest a hand on his forehead, his tone revealing an unmistakable surprise:
"The Lady Saintess is missing... How could such a thing happen?"
The Count leaned back in his chair, murmuring to himself with disbelief.
"Yes," the Maid Supervisor nodded slightly, her gaze calm yet filled with a certain solemnity,
"I found out about this while investigating the reason for the disruption of the air route by the Magic Cloud Undercurrent. It seems the Lady Saintess has been missing for some time. Despite the Church's efforts to suppress the spread of the news, you can't really wrap up fire with paper."
While the Count was preoccupied with academic problems such as equipment design and city defense engineering, the outstanding Maid Supervisor had long been accustomed to sharing his governmental duties, handling affairs she could take on.
Recently, with the return of the Hero from the Curse Temple, the Kingdom's air route activity had gradually become a focus of her close attention.
The Holy Maiden from the Border is about to head to the Capital, and she will likely study alongside the daughter of the Border Count, which makes the condition of the air route to the Capital matter of particular concern.
It was during the investigation of the progress in restoring the unblocked air route that she caught wind of this secretive, almost rumor-like intelligence and began to vaguely perceive the massive undercurrent stirring within the Church.
—One of humankind's strongest, the current Saintess, mysteriously disappeared within the polluted skies after setting out to deal with the Magic Cloud Undercurrent, leaving no trace behind.
Meanwhile, instead of receding, the Magic Cloud Undercurrent expanded to even wider areas.
Perhaps, the Saintess had fallen within that mist-like Magic Cloud, or, she might be the very culprit behind the creation of this cloud...
Rumors about the Magic Cloud grew increasingly bizarre, veering toward distorted exaggeration—some people even claimed, with utter certainty, that an ancient Great Demon had devoured the Saintess and would be reborn within the Magic Cloud.
Wild and varied rumors spread among information brokers, but under the Church's heavy-handed management, they had not yet spread widely among the common folk.
For the Border distant from the Capital, both the anomaly of the air route and the political struggles at the Kingdom Center seemed remote and vague; besides, the Border itself had many crises to handle.
For this reason, if not for the Maid Supervisor's acute perception, the Count might have remained unaware of this significant change.
In the short time since learning this information, the Count had come to understand many things.
His eyebrows furrowed slightly, as if sketching out a larger picture in his mind.
Recalling the low-spoken prophecy told to him by the Cruising Bishop, as well as the recent abnormal silence of the Border Church, the Count nodded thoughtfully.
"So that's it, no wonder the Saintess is missing..."
The more colossal the organization, the more intricate its entwined roots, making unity more challenging to maintain. As the lord overseeing the Border, the Count knew this all too well.
And for the Church, which advocated for freedom of thought and housed numerous factions, this problem was particularly severe, hence, it needed an absolutely incontrovertible banner to unite itself—this is precisely where the Saintess comes in.
The Pope and the Cardinal Council controlled the Church's overall structure, ensuring its orderly operation, while the Saintess determined the direction this order pointed.
Even amidst numerous internal factions and severe divergences elsewhere, no one would dare defy the wishes of the Saintess. Each Saintess's thoughts and will would be carried out, even directly affecting the course of the Kingdom.
Thus, the Church has had silent Saintesses who followed their predecessors' will, as well as decisive ones keen on innovation.
But regardless of the path chosen, the existence of the Saintess has always been the Church's most important foundation.
The current Saintess not only held a lofty status but also possessed an Intimidation force that made her impossible for all factions of humankind to ignore.
She was not only the symbol of the Church's stability—she was one of the most powerful symbols of humankind, the Transformation of faith and strength.
But now, this Saintess had mysteriously disappeared, and one could only imagine the chaos this would cause.
However, for those with the ambition, this turn of events was a rare opportunity.
Without the guidance of the banner, the Church's upper echelons would inevitably fall into an intractable conflict, and perhaps the Pope and the Cardinal Council would be able to suppress the turbulence temporarily, but factional strife was bound to surge into a towering wave.
And the intelligence captured by the Maid Supervisor might just be a harbinger of the intensification of this internal struggle.
"It seems the factional conflicts within the Church are about to surface," the Count mused, his eyes gleaming with contemplation, "Some factions are reluctant to acknowledge the prophecies made by the Saintess before, or perhaps they believe they have found a subject more fitting to the prophecy... Or maybe, they have found a way to 'fit' someone into the prophecy?"
"With so many factions within the Church, there are probably more than one possibility."