The Holy Saintess waking up did not surprise Lin Gui.
Calculating the time, it had been about a day since he last knocked her out, so it was indeed time for her to wake up.
With an expressionless face, he took out the brick he had swiped from his bag.
He aimed at the red mark on the Holy Saintess's forehead that had not yet fully faded.
He summoned all his strength and swung it down hard.
However, the Holy Saintess merely tilted her head slightly.
And with a margin of a hair's breadth, she elegantly dodged the attack.
She raised her slightly open purple eyes and looked at Lin Gui with a faint smile.
“Apologies, but there are some things on our end that we cannot let you see for the time being.”
Lin Gui explained in a flat tone.
With a flick of his wrist, the brick whistled through the air toward her once more.
“So, Holy Saintess, please cooperate with us again.”
The Holy Saintess still wore a smile, her body shifting slightly as she nimbly dodged again.
Thus, in this desolate mine pit, a peculiar scene unfolded.
A black-haired mage held a brick, repeatedly trying to knock out a pure and holy young girl who was sitting sideways on a staff.
Meanwhile, the girl was like a slender willow in the wind, always managing to dodge right before the brick could strike.
The two of them went back and forth, looking less like someone trying to smash a forehead.
And more like they were playing a game.
Lin Gui was in charge of attacking, while the Holy Saintess swayed her waist and laughed as she dodged.
As a mage, although Lin Gui had done some basic physical training, his physical fitness was ultimately limited.
In terms of speed, reaction time, and agility, he was completely incomparable to the Holy Saintess, who had already stepped into the Transcendent Rank.
After several failed attempts, Lin Gui silently lowered the brick and simply stared at her quietly.
The Holy Saintess pressed her hands together, her eyes filled with amusement.
But very soon, her smile faded.
On the surrounding ground, hundreds of rocks and bricks of various sizes silently floated into the air.
They hovered densely in midair, completely sealing off all space for her to dodge.
The Holy Saintess opened her purple eyes wide and said to Lin Gui,
“If the things you do not want me to see refer to your concealment magic that can even deceive a Legendary Rank expert, or perhaps...”
She paused slightly.
Her gaze shifted behind a boulder not far away.
There, a small head was carefully poking out.
It was Theia, who was peeking.
As soon as she sensed signs of the Holy Saintess waking up, Theia had vanished with a whoosh, hiding behind the boulder with great familiarity.
Now that her presence had been pointed out, her posture—like a mouse that had spotted a cat—made the Holy Saintess smile.
She withdrew her gaze and continued,
“...or the demon identity of your elven wife, then you really do not need to trouble yourself with knocking me out anymore.”
“Because I know all of this.”
Just as she finished speaking,
all the floating rocks around them crashed to the ground.
Lin Gui stuffed the brick back into his bag.
Then, a cold gleam flashed in his hand, and a sharp dagger appeared, its tip pointing directly at the Holy Saintess.
“You,” Lin Gui's voice carried an uncontrollable coldness and confusion, “what exactly did you see in the future?”
He indeed felt thoroughly baffled.
Thanks to a certain fellow he had met back in the Magic City,
he was not entirely ignorant of Prophecy.
From what he knew, it was fundamentally impossible for Prophecy to capture such specific details with such precision.
The Holy Saintess could predict the Dark Tide by observing the 'existence' of the city-states in the future.
That was because the 'survival of the city-states' was a relatively stable 'fact.'
There were less than three months left before the arrival of the twentieth Dark Tide.
No matter which point in the future the Holy Saintess observed, as long as it was three months later,
the survival or demise of the city-states would be clear at a glance.
And that was where the problem lay.
That fellow from the Magic City
had to wait for a full moon just to cast a Great Divination spell once, and could only perform it once a year.
The fragments glimpsed were not only random but also extremely brief.
According to her, Prophecy from other schools of thought was largely the same, riddled with heavy restrictions.
If so, the Holy Saintess's current words were incredibly bizarre.
Could her luck truly be so heaven-defying that, in the vast river of time,
she had precisely captured the fleeting moments when he cast 【Shroud of the Gloomy Night】 and when Theia exposed her demon energy?
From the time he left New Covenant City to arriving here, the only time he had actively revealed the existence of his Shroud of the Gloomy Night was when he was explaining it to Elvia deep down in the Withered Rift, which was only a brief minute.
And from New Covenant City to the present, it had been about two months... nearly ninety thousand minutes. That was just for this period of time. If the time scale were extended into the future, the probability would be infinitesimally small.
The exposure of 【Shroud of the Gloomy Night】 was still within his limit of tolerance.
But the secret of Theia's demon identity absolutely could not be known by anyone else.
The escort team of the Holy Church of Light was currently still in the Royal Capital.
And they were absolute experts when it came to tracking and hunting down the Demon Race.
【Shroud of the Gloomy Night】 could not conceal demon energy.
The Holy Saintess did not seem surprised by Lin Gui's sudden hostility.
Elvia silently shifted her steps and drew her blade.
She stood behind the Holy Saintess, forming a faint encirclement.
No longer hiding, Theia leapt onto the top of the boulder.
Her elven longbow was drawn to its full extent, the cold arrowhead firmly locked onto the Holy Saintess.
The atmosphere instantly turned tense and explosive.
Yet the Holy Saintess chuckled softly, looking straight at Lin Gui.
“How about this? In exchange for knowing your secrets, I will tell you some of mine. What do you think?”
With that, she slowly spread her hands.
A tongue-twisting, obscure, and ominous magic incantation began to flow from her mouth.
Without the aid of a staff, she chanted extremely slowly, taking a full three minutes.
A fierce light flashed in Elvia's and Theia's eyes.
They were about to make a move to stop her immediately, but Lin Gui raised his hand to hold them back.
The moment the Holy Saintess uttered the first bizarre syllable, Lin Gui recognized the category of magic she was about to cast.
As the incantation progressed,
the expression on his face shifted from vigilance to bewilderment, and finally froze completely.
He stood rooted to the spot, looking as though he had been struck by lightning.
What the Holy Saintess was casting was actually a Transcendent Rank dark-attribute spell.
【Dark Healing】
As the final syllable fell,
a pure and frigid surge of dark energy welled up from the Holy Saintess's palms.
Like a writhing black veil, it gently wrapped around the swollen red mark on her forehead.
That aura, completely opposite to Holy Light energy and filled with corrosion and negative energy, began to rapidly repair the soft tissue damage in a way that defied all common sense.
The swelling receded at a speed visible to the naked eye.
This reality-shattering scene
caused Elvia and Theia to instantly widen their eyes, their faces filled with utter disbelief.
Although they were not mages, they could clearly tell that this black mana was undoubtedly dark magic!
The Holy Saintess withdrew her hands, her forehead as smooth and spotless as before.
Meeting the shocked gazes of Lin Gui and the others, she smiled faintly.
“The most devout Holy Saintess of the Holy Church of Light actually knows dark magic, which is regarded as heresy.”
“How is the weight of this secret?”
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