Manga World: Bringing Steam Technology to the World of Sanctuary-Chapter 127: EastGate’s Cathedral

The morning sun filtered through the monastery's stained-glass windows, painting the floor blue and gold. I remember how the air smelled of fresh herbs and oil for weapons, mixed with the aroma of freshly baked bread that the novices brought from the stone ovens.

A dark-haired young Akara wearing white and purple robes of the Priesthood led young girls wearing leather armor and holding weapons such as swords, spears, bows, and crossbows in their hands.

A girl of about 12 years old with her clothes and hands stained with soot holds arrows and arch showing them to two other girls a little older than her.

"Look! I added spikes, it will pierce even the steel of a fallen!"

the most serious of all, crossed her arms:

"Only if you don't miss the shot, Charsi."

"Fine girls! Moreina, Behave yourself. Remember to come back before dark Kashya"

"..."

"..."

"..."

"Is this an illusion?" Christel, standing at the entrance to the Cathedral Nave in the Monastery of the East Gate wondered quietly.

He easily recognized the faces of all the girls present in the Cathedral. He also observes the care and maintenance of the monastery.

Although Rogues are a profession within the mercenary industry in the world of Sanctuary, where they were like the Assassins, they remained in hiding, hidden in the shadows and their attacks were behind the target's back.

In the Monastery they only look like a group of girls who laugh and play, bake bread, sew clothes, take care of plants, etc.

So, in Christel's eyes, the Cathedral is shown as a place full of life and sunlight.

The young Akara in the distance, near the altar, saw the three girls running and saying goodbye to all the other girls in their path.

Kashya, Moreina and Charsi passed by Christel without noticing her.

Christel, seeing the huge double wooden doors through which the trio of young girls came out, could see the blue sky, but flooded with threads of infinite shades of colors.

Christel looked up more, and the cathedral in his eyes had no roof, but he could see the sky from inside the Cathedral and the infinite threads that seemed to be alive and vibrated like guitar strings.

"It's like the ceiling spell of the British wizarding world~"

Then, a sphere of fire appeared and envelops the world, and went through the walls and everyone but it seemed not to exist. The world remained the same.

But that's when Christel realized. Just as the orange fire sphere approached her, Christel stepped forward and broke through the wall of the fire sphere.

Then, a smell of rot entered his nose.

Christel's boots crunched over the remains of a sacred chandelier as she stepped on, its melted wax mixed with something darker. The main nave of the Rogue Monastery is no longer a refuge, but an open wound in the world. The air smells of rotten incense and charred flesh, as if hell itself had coughed its breath on these stones.

The high vaults, which once resounded with the songs of warrior-priestesses, now groan under the weight of cobwebs thick as veins, clinging to the frescoes of the Sisters of Sight. The faces of the warrior saints have been beaten off, leaving only empty eyes in the stone.

Along the central aisle, oak wood pews are chipped, some converted into funeral pyres.

The altar of Light is corrupted. Where once a silver chalice gleamed, there is now a black hollow from which sprout twisted, throbbing roots, like exposed intestines. And in the center... the throne of Andariel:

"You have made me wait for you a long time. Petit~ "The voice is sweet as poisoned honey.

Andariel is here. She writhes on her throne of bones, a perverse parody of a queen. Her figure is an agonizing balance between the divine and the abominable.

Her skin is white as the moon pierced by storm clouds, so perfect that it hurts to look at her. But that whiteness is corrupted: black veins snake beneath its surface, beating to the rhythm of a heart that is no longer human.

Her red hair is no longer human hair. They are like living flames, streamers of dried blood that curl around her neck like anxious hands. And her eyes, her eyes. Blue as ice in the abyss.

The red novice dress she wears is torn with obscene precision. The shreds of fabric cling to her body like a second skin, revealing more than they hide with a neckline going down to her belly.

Andariel arches over her throne, in a sideways pose, moving as if dancing. Below her waist and short skirt, a long, thick snake tail appears with dark, shiny scales.

A magnificent body between the divine and the abominable.

"Do you like it? ~" Andariel said as her forked tongue came out from between her lips and tasted the air in the air.

"You smell, you taste, better than I expected..."

"This place looked better before..." Christel, after exiting the infernal portal, began to walk towards the throne at the back of the Cathedral Nave in a calm manner.

The golden-haired girl's state of calm and tranquility astounds Andariel and makes her want to corrupt her more.

"If you stay here with me, you can make this place whatever you want~" Andariel began to use her seductive voice to seduce the little girl with golden hair like the sun.

"I thought that the -Maiden of Anguish- would stay deep in the Catacombs of the Monastery" Christel ignored Andariel's words.

Mainly because Christel knows that this place will be his next home so there is no reason to contradict the words of this Prime Evil.

"For you~ Little one~ I would wait right here, although I wouldn't have imagined that you would arrive using my own portal, hehehe~"

"In this I have to thank you, opening that red portal saved me time from running and climbing mountains~"

"You can thank me by staying with me here forever~"

"I have that in mind, but it would not be a thank you. So I'll have to thank you in another way..." A silver light began to enter from the windows and frying of the Cathedral.

Christel's hands also began to glow in silver light. Then, as light filled every corner of the structure, Christel's clothes began to change.

With the arrival of the silver light, screams and eerie wails could be heard from the dark corners and from the stains on the floor and walls as if people were suffering from being burned.

"AAARGH—!"

"IIIIIIIHHH!"

"CRUAAACK!"

Christel turned a deaf ear to these cries, for in his perception he had seen that they were only hellish creatures.

Ever since Christel arrived at the cathedral through the portal of fire, he has been analyzing the entire place, from the depths of the catacomb, to the prisons, to the inner cloister and barracks, to the outer cloister and past the monastery gate, as well as the training grounds and the housing buildings, to the workshops, to the storage rooms, each room and place was left in Christel's view under his spiritual perception.

Now only lesser creatures and their nests remain.

But what caught Christel's attention the most, was a point on level four of the Catacombs, a pool of blood from which powerful energy emanates and seems to have no bottom.

Andariel rose from her throne, reaching about three meters in height easily, but dragging her snake-like tail that appeared to be six meters long.

"Little one~ keep showing how special you are~" from Andariel's small hands, a greenish light glow and an aura shot towards Christel's location.

Christel, seeing this, just jumped gently and a pair of white butterfly wings appeared behind his back.

"Poison..." Christel raised his left hand and a silver magic staff with a rising moon materialized.

Waving the staff gently and a silver crescent-shaped light shot out towards the ground and the poison that Andariel had shot out was purified.

Then Andariel's hands changed from a green light to an orange light and guiding her two hands forward, a pillar of fire rose from the ground and covered Christel, it's just that when the pillar of fire was raised, Christel had already disappeared.

*THIINK* a metallic sound was heard as Christel slammed his magic staff on Andariel's back.

Two pairs of claws appeared on Andariel's back. As if these claws were born from a stump on their spine.

"teleportation~ you are good at small space magic~" Andariel's hands and eyes glowed orange and a wall of fire appeared behind Andariel's back.

Christel used teleportation again and appeared to the side. The next moment, two silver spheres slowly advanced towards Andariel, freezing everything in their path and throwing blades of silver ice forward.

This time Andariel, with her infernal energies, conjured a red sphere of magma and just as Christel threw it forward advancing at the same speed as Christel's ice spheres.

The extreme cold and extreme heat when colliding caused strong wind currents as well as the appearance of fog and vapor in the air.

"Good use of the Frozen Orb, do you know that all the magic of the Mortals was learned from the -Nephilim-? And the Nephilim learned magic from us Primordial~"