The City Prefect of Pamir, Jamie Sherring, felt that he was indeed very unlucky recently. Just last month, a caravan had mysteriously vanished, and then, within less than three days, a second caravan disappeared off the face of the earth.
While he had yet to deal with this matter, the Church of the Harvest Goddess came knocking, claiming they received news that their people had wiped out a robber group outside the city, reportedly beheading no fewer than thirty people.
The first thought that came to Jamie’s mind was someone taking credit for other’s deeds. Only then did he remember that these were members of the Church of the Harvest Goddess, not the lunatics from his own City Defense Force.
So, he led his troops and followed the church’s armed forces for two days, and at last, they found the church’s force.
A few mercenaries, a bunch of kids, dragging a cart full of heads.
Since when were the little bastards of the Harvest Goddess Church so capable of fighting?
Then he saw that little princess of the Mowish family—yes, it was definitely her, with the double-colored pupils distinctive of the Mowish family and the family emblem on her collar.
This was something no one dared to counterfeit.
What made Jamie curious, however, was that the first person the Assistant Priest greeted wasn’t her, but another young child.
Named Malin, last name Gaiate... Did such a surname exist among Sydney’s Union Nobility? No, so... a nouveau riche?
Not likely, for he bore no emblem that could represent a family. Instead, like Jamie’s own princess, he bore the emblem of the church.
Then the Assistant Priest bowed to Jamie’s princess and said, "Welcome back to Pamir, Your Highness."
Ah, well spoken! Jamie felt his judgment was not wrong—this was indeed Princess Faye, who was said to have been born in Pamir City and spent her childhood there.
This was truly her homeland.
Thus, the young City Prefect came before her and knelt on one knee: "I pay homage to your surname, my princess."
The young man from the Sherring family believed he was entitled to perform the knight’s salute.
But he was wrong, the princess before him simply smiled faintly and did not, as he had imagined, extend her hand for the kneeling knight to kiss the back of it.
"Rise, Jamie of the Sherring family, I have seen your loyalty and etiquette," she said.
Although somewhat reluctant, Jamie was very pleased to hear his family name and his own name from her lips—this signified his family’s status in the eyes of a Mowish family member and also meant that his existence was recognized by the princess.
What an honor, Jamie, those Northerners from the Central Administrative Province didn’t have this kind of glory.
Jamie stood up and positioned himself behind his princess, while inconspicuously trying to shove aside the boy called Malin—thinking, who are you to stand so boldly by Princess Faye’s side just because you think you’re part of the Harvest Goddess Church?
Please, even I can only take pride in standing behind her.
He wouldn’t dare to harbor any improper thoughts or presumptuous dreams.
After all, her mother was a legend, and without her approval, no young man would dare confess love to the princess.
That would not be pursuing love, but courting death.
Then Jamie’s pride and sorrow froze on his face as if hit by the piercing cold wind of the far north, as he heard her Highness, the princess, extend a cordial invitation—"Malin, come, hold my hand."
She reached out her hand, waiting for him, a sincere smile on her face.
Malin smiled and reached out, holding the hand of the girl before him, and asked in a puzzled and skeptical tone, "Really now, can’t you walk without my hand?"
"Yes," she answered with certainty.
"Alright," he sighed.
Jamie removed his gloves—some people must pay with their lives as apology!
Constance glanced at the church’s gate; his Assistant Priest had been out for almost four days, and by his reckoning, it was about time for him to bring back the little scion of the old Hoffman family.
With the anxiety typical of an older person, he couldn’t help but consider whether any of the youths had been injured, or whether any of them had met an untimely death.
It’s good for the young to seek adventure, but fate never favors anyone for a lifetime. Ever since the invention of firearms, those trendy things that used gunpowder to propel bullets, careening madly through the air, told everyone that they inflicted greater harm than arrows and pierced better than bolts, rendering precise archery insignificant—just get a good grip on the opposite side.
Just then, he heard a faint noise from afar.
"Wagons, more than one." The Bishop of the Church of Justice standing beside him had already heard something.
This annoyed Constance greatly...
Though it was the apprentices of the Harvest Goddess Church coming over for a mission, what business did a Bishop of the Church of Justice have coming over here?
But upon reflection, Constance could not say much—after all, it was said that Malin Gaiate was deeply favored by the Lord of Justice. Such inscrutable deities were truly exasperating. He was our church’s child, so why did you come over?
Yet Constance did not dare to speak out—the Church of Justice was truly formidable in battle.
He could only open the gates and watch as wagons stopped one by one in front of the church.
He saw the wounds on the Paladins and the cut on his Assistant Priest’s face: "What, you met with robbers again on your way back?"