Twenty minutes it took.
They walked past the deserted manors and mansions as they stopped in front of the deserted church gates.
The symbol of the church of light was on the gates, as big as an elephant's head, but with none of the glamor that any normal church's gate would have.
This wasn't a normal church. Normal churches never had gates that blocked people from coming in. This place was a little different.
From inside came no Holy feeling. Instead, Jake only felt his skin yelp as they closed toward the church. There was something inside the church that was too terrifying for them to go against.
Creak!
Ganshin pushed the gates away, and the symbol of the church of light that was at the center of these two gates parted right at the middle, the arrow becoming two pieces as the gates opened.
A path in front of them appeared. The road made of stone and not marble, with grass growing everywhere, about the height of their ankles. It wasn't that long, but it was high enough for something to be inside the grass.
"Mages." Ganshin softly said.
"Augue!"
One of the mages raised his red staff and a fire ball appeared from his staff that flew toward the grass.
As the grass was lit with fear, another mage raised her staff. Her staff had a blue crystal on top which glowed as a blue light appeared from her staff.
The blue light split into two streams which flew forward. The two streams followed the two edges of the path that was to be taken.
They seemed to contain the fire that was lit up. Only the grass on the path started burning, and the blue light made sure that nothing else was burned.
Aargh!
There was a shrill scream from within the grass, just like everyone had excepted. There was someone within the grass, waiting in ambush.
The one voice became two, which became multiple soon enough. Figure started to get up in the heat and the fire that was being created.
As the figures appeared, arrows flew from the party's side, striking the beasts that had appeared. A single arrow was all it took to fell one of these terrible monsters.
Soon enough, the fire consumed them as well, and the entire path created enough heat for all of them to combat the chill that they felt from this place.
This heat was a welcome change. It consumed everything in its path, but refused to stray from it, and soon enough, it stopped burning with no more fuel.
The blue streams then started to grow larger as they started consuming the path. The black residue that was left suddenly started to disappear slowly as the blue light turned a black color.
It was like water, absorbing the waste that was left behind.
After this pruning session, the path before them was left as clean as it was a few decades ago when this place was taken over by the Evil God and his minions.
The caravan started entering the rocky path. The rocks that made this road were completely intact, not broken, not even cracked even though so many years had passed since they were laid here.
It was even better looking than the marble, for it was just cleaned.
Jake looked around and he had no idea where the priest from before felt that holy energy. He was no priest, but he sure as hell felt only the Evil Energy in the air.
Even the heat from just a few moments ago and disappeared, and the chilling cold had returned to haunt them.
The monsters that had lied in wait for them and dropped nothing once again, proving that they were the weakest of the weak evil beasts. They were a mere distraction.
This was not the only barrier that they would face going forward. The path was a simple straight one that went forward about a few dozen meters before it stopped in front of the true doors of the church.
And behind the church, the holy grounds probably stood. Once again, Jake was not sure. He had never been to Holy Grounds, so he did not know what to expect, even.
As they entered the path, Jake heard a notification ring.
Ping!
[You have entered Cursed Realm: Holy Grounds of Saint Ester. You will not be allowed to log out until you die, and you are not allowed to contact anyone from outside the realm.]
"Sigh. A cursed realm? What irony. Calling it cursed and holy in the same sentence." Jake shook his head as he continued walking forward.
He was half expecting this message to come sooner or later. For an S ranked quest, the difficult of what had happened so far did not match the rating. So whatever was going to happen now, it was going to be insanely hard.
Ganshin was ahead of everyone else, and he stopped at the church's doors. His hands caressed the giant bronze knobs of the doors, which he brought up and knocked.
The thuds of bronze on wood resounded inside the church's walls and the echoes were heard even outside.
"The key. Father Joseph?" Ganshin turned around and everyone could see the misty eyes of Ganshin. He seemed to have many memories of this place, for him to be tearing up just because of his entrance here.
"Sister Annie? Please hand him the keys." Father Joseph said from inside his carriage.
"Yes Father." Annie nodded and she took out a set of some twenty keys from inside her nun robes.
"Something so important was with a sister all this time? Wow. Interesting. I thought that it would be inside the carriage." Jake thought what most of the people here were thinking.
Annie stepped up, with everyone creating a path and allowing her to pass.
She nodded at Ganshin and walked past him to step up in front of him. She chose the key that she needed among the dozens on the same key chain, and it slid into the key hole.
Click!
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