"Suffering, what a perfect soil for faith!" Standing on the edge of the hotel balcony, Sylvia couldn't help but mutter to herself as she overlooked the various weird buildings and chaotic streets in the low-lying area not far ahead.

.

When Sylvia said this sentence, she used French. Joan and Penny around them didn't understand it, but they could tell from the change in tone that it might be a poem.

These people did not guess wrong. Sylvia's words are indeed a poem, and it is a very famous poem. It was recited by Simon, the great teacher of the Enlightenment Movement in the Velen world, when he was burned to death in the name of a heretic by the church.

The most famous line in poetry.

Although they are two different worlds, this poem is very suitable for the current black city of St. Paulia Port, which is full of suffering from life and confusion of the soul, and the only thing that can help them come out is the power of the church.

It’s the same with any church.

Before actually coming into contact with the Port of Santa Pelia, both Sylvia and Leo thought that the black city of Port of Santa Pelia was similar to the slums of other cities. In addition to the filth and chaos in the residence, there were also rampant gangs and poor security.

Extremely bad, precarious, but actually completely different.

Although the Black City District is dirty and messy, there are no organized gangs, only some shabby street gangsters. This is mainly because the churches in the city spare no effort to crack down on the gangs in the Black City District, regardless of the consequences.

In the past, there was a big shot living in Baicheng District who wanted to get involved in the Black City District and use the chaos in the Black City District to cultivate his own power, so he secretly entangled a large number of street gangsters and formed a gang force.

As a result, on the day it was first formed, this gang force was jointly eliminated by several churches in the city, and the big shot in Baicheng District was also jointly eliminated by people supported by the church that day.

Although this incident aroused dissatisfaction among other members of the Chamber of Commerce in the city council, these dissatisfaction quickly dissipated after the church showed its tough attitude that it would not hesitate to launch religious purges. Afterwards, in order to appease the grievances of the chamber of commerce, the church even voluntarily vacated the city.

A few seats in parliament and several important positions in the management, the matter will be settled.

However, from this point on, the big shots in Baicheng District knew that the people in Black City District were forbidden by the church and did not allow any other forces to approach.

This also makes the people of St. Paulia Port very curious as to why the church pays so much attention to the Black City area, but is unwilling to spend a lot of effort to improve the living environment in the Black City area.

However, in the eyes of Leo and Sylvia, two outsiders who came to Saint Pelia Port for the first time, the answer to this question was so obvious. There is no doubt that the residents of the Black City District have become a fixed

The church has become a production base for devout believers.

As long as the current status is maintained, the Black City District will be able to continuously provide high-quality, devout believers for several churches in this city. You must know that in this world with many churches and fierce competition for faith resources, having a church that can produce stable output

How precious is the area of ​​devout believers.

"What a terrible world!" Sylvia couldn't help but muttered after sighing in Simon's poem.

Leo on the side nodded in agreement.

In fact, in the previous ecclesiastical kingdom controlled by the Church of Purifying Fire, Leo and Sylvia had already felt a little weird about the development of the church in this world. It was just that the Church of Purifying Fire and other inland areas of the New World were absorbing believers.

There are still some concealments in other aspects, and they have not shown too much, but now several churches in St. Paulia Port have completely exposed everything without any cover-up.

It is not difficult to see from the situation in Heicheng District that the church has begun to use artificial cultivation methods to cultivate its own believers in batches and stably. Although it is still a prototype, it is not difficult to infer that as long as the effect is good enough, then this prototype will

There will be further improvement and expansion. By then, the people of this world will be like livestock in captivity, specially raised and harvested by the church and the gods behind it. By then, the world will have completely fallen and there will be no hope.

It can be said that it is even better to fall directly into the abyss.

"I don't like this kind of world." Sylvia suddenly said seriously.

When Leo heard this, he looked at Sylvia in surprise, and then asked with a smile: "Are you going to do something?"

Sylvia didn't answer, but just told Leo that she was going out for a while and would come back later, and then walked out of the room.

Leo knew what Sylvia wanted to do when she went out, but he did not stop him. Instead, he took out some previously made gadgets from the storage space and threw them seemingly casually towards the Black City District. For these things

He has not considered who will pick it up and what role it will play. Instead, everything will be decided by fate.

After nightfall, Joan and Penny both finished the training arranged by Leo and went back to their respective rooms. The couple also sent over their tickets. The sailing time was tomorrow at noon, and the cabin was not the first-class cabin as promised.

, but a second-class warehouse.

In order to prevent Leo from misunderstanding, the couple also explained that it turns out that the regional patriarchs of several churches in St. Paulia Port have to go back to the main church of their respective churches in the Old World to receive the holy sacrificial ceremony once every ten years. This couple in the New World

It was especially important for the church, so there were many more people traveling, and the entire first-class cabin was booked by them. Others, including the ship owner’s relatives and friends, could only use the second-class cabin.

Leo didn't know much about the Holy Sacrifice Ceremony of this world's churches, or there was very little relevant information. He just mentioned that each church would have its own Holy Sacrifice Ceremony, with different scales and methods. But what he didn't expect was this.

The church's Holy Sacrifice seems to be held on the same day, which is obviously unusual and there must be something special about it.

At this time, Leo suddenly thought of something and turned his head to look in the direction of the Black City District, with an inexplicable smile on his face.

I have to say that this incident is a bit of a coincidence, as if it was made by fate. The Holy Sacrifice Ceremony is undoubtedly very important to the Church of St. Paulia Port, so they should have taken away the best talents from their respective churches to participate in the Old World

, and this time, plus the time required for the Holy Sacrifice Ceremony itself, at least about two months, the Church of Saint Pelia Port is in a weak period.

At this time, he randomly dropped some interesting gadgets into the Black City District. Sylvia should also do some things in the Black City District. These things should be fermented in the next month or two. When the time comes, she will face the Black City District.

Due to the turmoil, the church in St. Paulia Port may not have strong enough manpower to solve these problems, so things will become interesting.

When it was completely dark outside, Sylvia returned to the hotel room. From the smile on her face, it was easy to see that her affairs were going smoothly.

Leo did not ask for the relevant details, but just told Sylvia that the senior leaders of several churches in St. Paulia Port went to the Old World to participate in the holy ceremony. After hearing this, Sylvia's face changed.

She showed a smile similar to Leo's, obviously she and Leo wanted to go together.

"Eh?" Leo sensed something at this moment and said with a smile, "Someone picked up what I threw out."

In the garbage dump near the incinerator in Heicheng District, cartloads of garbage pulled from Baicheng District were dumped nearby, and soon a garbage mountain was formed. While the garbage was being dumped, a group of children living nearby swarmed up and began to

The oldest of these children is only fifteen years old, while the youngest is three or four years old.

For people in Baicheng District, all the garbage transported for burning is useless, but for Heicheng District, these garbage contain wealth that others cannot imagine.

For example, someone once found a box of high-end silk handkerchiefs among the garbage. Many of these handkerchiefs were not used and they were discarded for some reason. For the person who picked up this box of handkerchiefs, he was just like

After picking up a huge fortune, he eventually took these handkerchiefs to the black market and sold them for a large sum of money. This large amount of money allowed him and his family to live a good life for several years.

Although the entire Black City District knew that the garbage waiting to be incinerated contained astonishing wealth, no one dared to take it completely for themselves, because the church in Baicheng District had very clear arrangements for the garbage.

First of all, the people picking garbage are not allowed to be adults. Only children under the age of 15 are allowed to enter the incinerator area to pick garbage.

Secondly, the entire black city area is divided into different small urban areas according to the streets, and each small urban area can exclusive use of the garbage for two months. When the time is up, it is the turn of the next small urban area.

Finally, there are two sales channels for all the valuable garbage picked out. One is the recycling point set up by the church in the incinerator area, and the other is the black market recycling merchant designated by the Chamber of Commerce. They are not allowed to be sold to third parties, but they can be kept by themselves.

.

Compared with the recycling price of the church, the recycling price of the black market merchants is more attractive. However, some capable people will mostly keep it for themselves and wait for a period of time to sell it to other people in need in the black city. Doing so does not violate the church.

Provisions.

Sam is fifteen years old this year. He is a person from Badui Street and has been picking up garbage for twelve years. He is considered the most senior garbage man in Badui Street. This year is his last year of picking up garbage. He hopes to be able to pick up garbage at the end of

Before this career, pick up a big guy so that he can have enough tuition to study at a missionary school in the black city.

Although learning knowledge in church schools is free, there is a fee to participate in church armed training, and you need to prepare all kinds of equipment yourself, which costs a lot of money.

In the past twelve years, apart from part of Sam's harvest from picking up garbage, he gave it to his family, and the rest was saved by him. The accumulation has now become a huge sum of money, but he feels it is not enough because he

He didn't want to take a rusty rag like other kids in the black city to take the church's armed combat courses, but wanted to buy a brand new iron sword and a set of standard armor, so that he could save the money.

A little worse.

Sam quickly picked out the valuable rubbish from the rubbish pile and put it aside. When the conditions were met, he explained to the other Stink Street kids who were following him what the value of the rubbish he picked out was and how to clean it.

To whom should it be sold?

As the eldest and most experienced garbage man in the group, he has the responsibility to tell the other children in Stinky Water Street what he knows. This is their tradition, and this is how he learns how to pick out good garbage.

Sam has been picking garbage for twelve years, and he thinks he has seen all kinds of garbage. Many times, as long as the garbage is dumped from the car, he can tell which garbage in the garbage pile has value and which garbage has no value with just a glance.

It takes time.

However, there are exceptions to everything. Just like now, he was a little confused about a piece of garbage he had just dug out from the garbage pile and couldn't think of an answer for a long time.

The reason why he was confused was because the piece of garbage in his hand was very strange, a square stone with some strange-looking patterns carved on its surface.

A few years ago, Sam might have regarded this square stone as a discarded decoration by a rich man, but since what happened two years ago, he has realized that these things with strange patterns may be

They all contain power that ordinary people cannot imagine.

Two years ago, a child who was picking up garbage picked up a pendant engraved with mysterious symbols. At that time, the child just regarded the pendant as an ordinary jewelry, so he wore it and waited a few days to sell it on the black market.

Lose.

However, then the child was accidentally injured, and the blood from the wound flowed onto the jewelry. The jewelry immediately turned into a beam of light before everyone's eyes and merged into the child's body. The child's injuries quickly recovered, and he became much stronger than before.

.

Later, the War Temple Church learned about this matter. They sent people to see the child. After some tests, they took the child away. Recently, I heard that the child had been sent to the War Temple in the Old World.

The Cathedral has received training as a holy warrior.

It was precisely because of this precedent that when Sam saw the stone with the mysterious pattern on its surface, he immediately thought of the child's necklace.

So, when he found something, he directly tried to smear his own blood on the square stone to see if he could use this method to unleash the power that might be contained in the stone.

But the result was no response, leaving him disappointed and confused.

Sam's actions were naturally noticed by other children. They had also heard the story of the child who became a reserve paladin, and immediately realized that the square stone in Sam's hand might be an item similar to the pendant in the story.

They just saw Sam smearing blood on the square stones but it didn't elicit any reaction. They all showed a little disappointment and looked at Sam with a strange look in their eyes, as if they were laughing at Sam's whims.

Sam also felt the mocking gazes of the people around him. He was a little embarrassed at first and wanted to throw away the stone stained with his blood, but in the end he refused and put the stone into the container he used to store valuable garbage.

In his pocket, even if this thing cannot give him the power as he wishes, it can still be placed as a souvenir at home.

However, he did not notice that after the stone was put into his pocket, it emitted a faint light without any light, and the light penetrated the pocket and clothes, shining directly on his body, as if entering his body.
Chapter completed!