The Devil's Worshipper

An Iron Dagger was approaching, aimed at Adam's neck.

'Their movements... are slow...'

He dodged it by lowering his body and moved away from his attackers.

"AM NOT HERE TO FIGHT! LET THEM GO!" Adam shouted.

"He's a fast one, father. Shouldn't he fill that empty seat?" The man who attacked Adam said.

"Indeed, he is quite agile. But he is not needed." The priest answered.

'Needed? For what?' Adam thought as he dodged more attacks.

[ The Sacrificial Lamb's Devourer says that the ritual must take place.]

'Ritual?'

"As soon as you're done with that poor child, bring Marco. Our lord is getting impatient." The priest said.

"HEY!" Adam shouted as he dodged the attacks. "So your name is Marco. Run away! I'll come find you with your sister later!"

"N-N-N-No! Am...Am staying!" The boy said as he brought his fists to his face as if he was about to enter a boxing match.

"This isn't the time for this! Get out of here!"

"NO! Am staying until we all get out of here!"

Meanwhile, the two other men approached Marco.

They were armed with Iron Daggers too.

"Now? I should, huh? Fine, my lord." The priest said, seemingly talking to himself.

As Adam continued dodging the successive attempts at ending his life from the three attackers, the priest got down from the elevated platform he had been standing on previously.

He walked towards one of the seated girls.

Adam, despite in the middle of dodging attacks, was keeping an eye on Marco and the priest.

'Don't you hurt her...' He thought.

The priest gently pushed the girl's curly hair away from her face.

"My child, do not worry. Do not despair and do not hate me. The Lord has nothing but love for you. Pain is a part of this life." He said as he took a golden dagger out of his white robe.

"What are you... HEY STOP! YOU STOP HIM!" Adam shouted at the priest and the adults around him.

The men and women, at the sight of the golden dagger, bowed down once more.

With their heads against the ground, they recited prayers louder than before.

The priest raised the golden dagger closer to the girl's forehead.

Adam gritted his teeth.

Immediately, he understood what was happening.

The priest was about to mutilate the girl's forehead, just like he had already done to Marco.

He felt his body become burning hot.

Previously, he had been trying not to hurt the attackers, but he knew what the priest was about to do.

The girl was not Marco's sister, but he was trembling.

Adam could hear him whisper "N-No...".

The girl had her eyes closed.

In a heartbeat, Adam closed the distance between one of the attackers and himself.

His right arm and especially his right fist were engulfed in dense purple Mana.

"GET AWAY FROM HER!" Adam shouted as he punched the attacker's stomach in front of him with all his strength.

He used so much of his strength that hitting the man felt like hitting a pillow.

Immediately upon impact, the man threw up blood and his body was launched away.

The man was launched away and rolled on the ground before colliding with the adults on the ground.

As he struggled to get on his knees, the man threw up huge quantities of blood and could not breathe.

Seeing this, the two other attackers took steps back and helped the injured man, but they did not lower their weapons.

Marco had wide shiny eyes.

'He really is a magician! He can save Aria! He can save all of us!' He thought.

Meanwhile, Adam felt very uncomfortable.

Seeing the damage and pain he inflicted on the man.

'I didn't know I was this strong... I don't... want to hurt people...'

Just when he thought that, he raised his gaze.

He raised his gaze towards the priest.

He raised his gaze only to find the priest looking at him with wide eyes.

His golden dagger bloody and the girl wounded.

Adam's whole body shook.

"This is...This is... perfect!" The priest shouted.

Adam could not look at anything else after he noticed the wounded girl.

She was crying silently, as if she had accepted her suffering and fate.

'Am....sorry.' Adam thought as he clenched his fists.

The Mana around his right arm spread around his whole body.

[ The type of Magic that is most suitable for you is changing.]

[ The type of Magic that ...]

"Shut up." Adam said with his gaze lowered to the ground.

[ The System has been muted.]

He greeted his teeth and raised his gaze towards the priest.

The priest was looking at him with wide red pupils.

An air of greed could be felt coming from him.

The men and women on the ground stood up.

Adam started walking towards the priest.

"Why are you... doing this?"

"Why? WHY? A foolish question, my child. I am but a priest. All a priest does is follow the Lord's voice and obey his commands!" The priest shouted while moving his arms passionately.

[ The Sacrificial Lamb's Devourer says that if you join the priest, you shall too gain great strength.]

"The Lamb's Devourer? He talked about a ritual before. Are you following his orders?"

The priest, upon hearing these words, opened his arms wide and looked at the ceiling.

A second later, he lowered his gaze back down towards Adam.

Tears were going down the priest's face.

"So you were Blessed by the Lord too." He noted.

"Your Lord is not mine. What is the ritual? Why are you doing it?"

Even though Adam was talking, his Mana was concentrated on his legs.

'He isn't far. I can probably close the distance in an instant. Go ahead, raise your dagger, walk towards one of them. I'll make you regret it right away...'

The Mana around Adam's body got much, much deeper than ever before.

"It is quite simple. Our Lord wants us to mark these poor lambs. After that, we must..."

At that moment, the priest received certain Private Messages.

[Your Sponsor says that the real Sacrificial Lamb has appeared.]

"Is that so? Oh... How the Lord's plans are beautifully connected... Like a tree's roots under the ground, they are intertwined and are much deeper than one might think..." The priest muttered.

[Your Sponsor says that the children are but the means to get to the real lamb.]

'Sacrificing the Blessed One might give much more strength than sacrificing normal children...' The priest thought.

He paused for a moment.

"My dear followers..." The priest said as he raised his golden dagger towards the ceiling. "I have received a Revelation from the Lord."

The men and women all turned towards him.

Not one sound was made.

Their sole focus was the words that would follow.

"Some of you have accepted to even sacrifice your children for our Lord. He is forever grateful and you will always be loved by him..."

Two men and one woman lowered their gazes at those words.

The woman shed tears silently.

Adam's body froze.

'Their children... are here...? They... brought them here?'

"But do not worry. Your children will stay with you. The Lord has judged you worthy, worthy of being his followers. You do not need to make sacrifices in order to show your love and loyalty to him. You can free your children."

Right away, each of the three ran towards a child, supposedly theirs.

Once they freed them, they hugged them before going back towards the priest.

One of the children was the girl who had just been wounded.

They accepted the hugs expressionlessly and stayed seated.

Adam could feel his blood boil.

Many blood vessels in both his eyes burst.

The white of both his eyes were tainted by a bright red.

"The Lord only has one job for us. This child here..." The priest lowered the dagger and pointed at Adam. "...he was blessed by the Devil. We have all witnessed his great physical prowess. The poor child has been deceived by the Devil in order to gain strength."

The men and women turned towards Adam.

"He must be saved. He must be reborn. And the Lord can only help this poor, young soul, with our help."

As a group, like under some sort of hypnosis, the group took a step towards Adam.

"The Lord has already informed me as to how we can purify the child's soul. Previously, the 12 children, our own children had to be marked before being sacrificed tomorrow on a full moon. We must do the same to this lost soul, for his own sake and the Lord's sake." The priest added.

Excluding the priest, the group was made up of eight men and ten women.

Five of the men were armed with Iron Daggers, the rest of the group took whatever they could found.

Some had big chunks of wood, others took large pointy fragments of glass.

"Is that... the ritual?" Adam asked.

"It is, my child." The priest said as the whole group stepped forward.

Adam breathed deeply.

He raised both his hands and opened them.

"Let the others go and I'll follow you." Adam told the priest.

The latter stopped moving

The group turned towards the priest.

"I will free them, and you will let them go. In exchange, I won't run away." Adam added.

After a couple of seconds, the priest answered.

"That won't do. The children must stay. If you run away, they shall be sacrificed."

Adam clenched his fists and lowered them.

'So it's me... or them...?'

Adam suddenly got an idea.

'They're too close to those children. I have to take this gamble...'

He turned away from the priest's group.

Adam faced Marco for a moment, before walking past him and outside of the church.

He started walking away.

"W-What is he doing?" One of the armed men said.

"What do we do?" A woman asked.

The priest after a short pause started walking forward.

"Catch him. The Lord wants us to. Three of you stay here with the children."

Once they heard that, most of them ran towards Adam while three women grabbed Marco and made him sit next to the other children.

Marco didn't fight back.

He only stared at the back of the "magician", the "magician" who turned his back on them.

Adam was about fifteen meters away from the church's door when the whole group was outside.

"FOLLOW HIM! DON'T LET HIM GO!" The priest ordered the rest of the group.

As soon as they started running, they heard a loud ferocious beast growling behind them.

A huge black wolf had appeared behind them.

The monster was bigger than certain cars.

Every single one of them, no matter whether man or woman, fell to the ground before running away screaming at the top of their lungs.

Adam, who had used his Temporary Concealment Skill, had been completely forgotten.

While the group and the priest were running away, Light was chasing after them without using his Intimidating Stare Skill.

He walked back into the church.

As soon as he did, a woman shouted at him.

She was standing behind the girl who had been injured previously.

"WHAT HAPPENED? WHAT WAS THAT CREATURE?"

'Right... The windows are broken...'

"It's nothing...I was..." Adam tried explaining himself.

"NO! NO-NO-NO-NO! NO! This isn't... This wasn't how it was supposed to go!" She shouted.

"Just calm down... Everything is okay..."

"SHUT UP! ShutupShutupShutupShutupShutup! SHUT UP!" She screamed at the top of her lungs while pulling the young girl's hair with all her strength.

The young girl cried because of the pain.

Adam's hands trembled.

"THAT CREATURE! THAT MONSTER! It was... It was sent from hell! This is it. We are all dying... Even the Lord and the priest have gone away... We should have... We should have sacrificed them! WE SHOULD HAVE KILLED THEM!" She pulled the girl's hair even more rigorously.

"You're hurting me!" The young girl shouted.

She finally looked at Adam who was standing in front of her.

It was the first time Adam heard her talk.

All she did was bear the pain silently ever since he came to this wicked church.

The scene broke his heart.

He raised both his hands and walked closer.

He tried the act in the least threatening way.

Still, the woman took a huge sharp piece of glass out of her pocket and waved it towards him, threatening to cut him.

"Step back... STEP BACK!"

The woman looked around her.

She looked disoriented and lost.

"Listen, I can..."

"NO! NO YOU CAN'T! That's it. Am sick of this! Everything went wrong because of you. The only thing that helped us survive was the Lord. And now we lost both the Lord and our priest! Everything was perfect until you came along. You...You worshipper of the Devil. Not only did you not accept the Lord's grace, you even brought a demon from hell! The Lord wanted us to save your soul, but now we are all forsaken because of you!"

The woman talked while waving the sharp piece of glass around with one hand and pulling the girl's hair with the other.

She was looking everywhere.

It looked like her pupils were twitching rather than looking at different things.

'Did the priest poison them? Or did she lose her mind?'

After a bit, the woman calmed down.

She stopped pulling the girl's hair and instead embraced her with both arms.

Adam was extremely confused at the scene.

"That's it. Don't cry, Katherine. It'll be okay. I promise. We're leaving, okay?" The woman asked gently.

'Is she really fine...?'

The young girl stopped crying and nodded.

"Let's leave. We're going to a better place. I'll see you there in a bit."

As soon as Adam heard those words, his senses went haywire.

He launched himself forward towards the girl, but it was too late.

The woman had slashed her throat with the sharp piece of glass.

The young girl's neck bled.

Blood squirted everywhere.

As Adam was jumping forward, he could see the surprised expression on her bloody face.

An expression he never forgot.

The woman let go of the girl's body.

The young girl took two steps towards Adam, before falling to the ground.

He immediately got to his knees and turned her body so that the young girl would face the ceiling.

His breathing got heavier and heavier as he poured Healing Potions inside the girl's mouth.

He shook her body, pressed his hands against the wound to limit the bleeding and gave her more Healing Potions, but nothing worked.

His whole body was shaking and he felt like he could pass out at any moment.

A pool of blood quickly formed under the young girl's unmoving body.

He stayed on his knees, even after he realized that the girl was gone.

[ The Sacrificial Lamb's Devourer says that this is all your fault.]

[ The Sacrificial Lamb's Devourer chuckles.]

As a darker Mana enveloped his body, Adam's face quickly became expressionless.