Chapter 359: Chapter 223 Who will come to save me…
Why… must you treat me this way?
As she felt the weakness in her body and the nun supporting her departure at her side, Tiya’s heart plummeted into an abyss, bit by bit.
This was the second time in just a few days that she had experienced a similar despair.
The last time was because of Lynn.
And this time, it was due to the betrayal inflicted upon her by the Church she had always trusted so deeply.
Even though it was betrayal, the look in Sister Gretel’s eyes seemed to only contain spontaneous disgust when laid upon Tiya.
Just as she had said.
In the eyes of the nun and all those in the Church who were in the know, Tiya’s existence was always considered a mistake, one that should not have existed in the first place.
And this time, this face-to-face interaction that could be called a confrontation allowed Tiya to feel as if the other party had voluntarily removed her own mask, for the first time engaging in a conversation with the vulgar soul hidden within this shell of a body.
The term “Holy Daughter” that they used to address her seemed, for Sister Gretel and the others, to be more out of respect for this shell of a body.
After all, right from the start, Tiya had vaguely sensed something off about the people around her.
She even harbored fear for the so-called Moonlight Holy Scripture and the Divine Descent Ceremony.
That fear stemmed from a dissonance deep within her soul, as if she was nothing but a rootless duckweed, liable to vanish from this world at any moment, her existence unknown to anyone.
Looking back now, perhaps that feeling was a harbinger.
The so-called Divine Descent Ceremony was not actually a duty that needed to be fulfilled by generations of Holy Maidens at all, but merely a ceremony for the “Bright Moon Consciousness” mentioned by the nuns to select a vessel.
Given the exceedingly long lives of the divine, the Moonlight Holy Scripture, which only happened once every five years in human terms, was merely the briefest of moments for the Goddess.
Was such frequent selection of vessels meant for resurrection?
Did it mean that the Goddess was not in a good state currently?
After suffering back-to-back spiritual lashings from Sister Gretel, Tiya felt her mind heavy and muddled at this moment, completely drained of strength throughout her body.
Therefore, even her most fundamental thoughts became hazy, as if she were on the verge of losing consciousness.
But she knew she could not pass out.
If she gave up now, upon waking up again, she would likely hear news of Louise and that person’s death… No, in the end, just as the Church’s sudden change of attitude towards her, the Goddess would surely place great importance on the vessel that was supposed to be prepared for her.
Perhaps, after fainting here, there would be no chance of her being revived again.
A greater likelihood was that her body would be taken over by the consciousness of the Goddess, causing her to completely lose her self-identity.
Wasn’t this another form of death in its own right?
Actually, to Tiya, death was not scary.
Just as when she had confronted the King of Cruelty in the Tomb of the Dead Silence head-on.
If she could die meaningfully or save the innocent, she would not hesitate to offer up her life.
Even with her reverence and devotion to the Goddess, if the Church had directly revealed the truth and ordered her to offer up her body, Tiya would likely have complied.
Using her body for the resurrection meant that the Goddess’s control over the human realm would be unprecedentedly strengthened, thus blessing her followers.
Such an outcome was something she could hardly wait for, so how could she refuse?
Of course, the premise was that there was none of the complicated experiences she had undergone during this time nor that being deep within her heart that she wanted to save no matter what.
The originally pure-hearted Tiya, and the current Tiya with a heart filled with all sorts of emotions were, in a strict sense, completely different.
Rather than blindly following the Church’s commands, the Tiya of the present seemed to have learned to think independently.
Come to think of it, there was something very strange.
Just like in those storybooks, the tragic heroine discovers that the fate she had endured all her life was manipulated by someone behind the scenes, and even her marriage and happiness were not of her own choosing, like a canary trapped in a cage.
How similar was that scenario to her current situation?
The difference was, it seemed hers was far more tragic.
Tiya Yohusti wasn’t even an individual with civic rights but merely a “mistake” that had arisen within the vessel.
Or perhaps, like a virus parasitizing this body, a robber occupying someone else’s home, her very existence was negated from the root.
Tiya said in a low voice to the nuns who had followed her into the cold and profound tunnel.
However, the response she received was only indifference and solemnity.
As if nobody cared about the soul inside this shell of a body.
They were following Sister Gretel’s instructions, bringing Tiya to a mysterious facility within the Silent Church’s underground.
This was the destination of their journey.
Upon emerging from the tunnel, the steps of the nuns gradually came to a halt, and then they slowly raised their heads.
Even after witnessing it countless times, every time they saw the magnificent sight before them, that seemed like a divine miracle, a sense of uncontrollable reverence and devotion emerged within everyone’s heart.
It was a place reminiscent of the Divine Battle Ruins, where the earth was devastated by a vast and mysterious force, only the vague remnants of ruined structures remained, ancient and peculiar, like a place where ancient ancestors worshiped the Divine.
Besides, at a glance, countless giant stones floated high in the air, as if they were the pathways and nodes of a matrix, outlining a vast open area right in the center.