Even setting aside the soothing nature of Scholar’s Eye and the mental fortress that the awakening of War Cry allowed him to forge, Leonidas was a man used to routinely pushing his body past the brink of collapse.

These sorts of mind games weren’t enough to make him waver.

“I will make this simple for you. The tome and chalice. Where did they come from? Who gave them to you? Who is backing you?”

A twin pair of crimson irises hovered like two rubies in the darkness.

These words alone let Leonidas know quite a bit.

That day, he hadn’t been able to hide the chalice and tome. To make matters worse, he had also run into House Lady Beccerth and her bodyguard on his way to the Church, and a bodyguard that was suspiciously absent when Leonidas confronted the morbidly obese House Lady.

This only confirmed further how closely tied with the Rardins Beccerth had been.

Leonidas’ body had been stripped of everything that could be considered Blessed.

Even these chains that bound him stopped him from expelling Mana outside of his body, leaving him unable to use Mana Blade.

As such, he was both happy and apprehensive that he hadn’t had the tome on him.

Before leaving for his mission, Leonidas had gone to great lengths to hide the tome.

According to the rules, no one should be able to enter his living quarters without his permission. But, if rules were so easily followed, the situation he was in right now would have never come to fruition.

Nothing was absolutely bulletproof. Leonidas had no way of knowing if his hiding spot had been unearthed or not, but he was prepared for the worst.

“Or what?”

They were two simple words, spoken in a familiar baritone.

If Leonidas’ voice had grown hoarse in his two days of solitude, it was impossible to tell.

The very same rumbling cadence that quaked his ribcage and jolted his hearts came out smoothly, unhurried and unfettered.

Leonidas wanted to know what the consequence of not talking to Benet was.

Would they kill him?

But then they wouldn’t be able to get the information they needed, not to mention taking the risk of offending his “backer”.

Would they torture him?

It was possible. But Leonidas had read a lot about psychological tactics and his pain tolerance could be considered well beyond normal realms.

So what, then? Faced with his defiance, what sort of action would they take?

He had nothing to lose.

No family.

No friends.

No lovers.

There was only him, and he was very much willing to play this game with the Rardins to the very end.

Leonidas had a very clear advantage, and that was that the Rardins likely didn’t know that their connection to his mother’s death had been revealed. As such, they weren’t aware that their relationship was irreconcilable.

There were only two people that knew that Beccerth had managed to say the Rardin name before she died: Leonidas and Anabel.

Due to Leonidas’ use of War Cry on the fragile-minded House Lady, it had resulted in the Mana Circuit restraining her to falter for a moment.

The result was a Binding Blessing. designed to trigger on intention to betray. to lag, giving Beccerth just enough time to say the name.

Leonidas hadn’t planned for this to happen, and it could be said to be a lucky coincidence.

If Beccerth was going to die anyway, it was good that she managed to have some use to him before kicking the bucket.

Plus, this also revealed to Leonidas how valuable War Cry was to him. As a psychological attack on an enemy, if used cleverly, Way Cry could do a lot more than just instill fear in a target.

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This aside, without being aware of how deep Leonidas’ hatred ran, the Rardins would be more likely to take chances for the sake of reaping benefits.

The struggle between the Rardin and Bruthers families was at a tipping point, and Leonidas was a wild card both sides seemed to want to control.

Benet’s gaze narrowed. It might have been an illusion of the eye, but the shadows seemed to shift with his mood.

Without another word, Benet reached forward, the click of the jail cell door reaching Leonidas’ ears.

Soon, Leonidas found himself bound in chains, following behind Benet.

The wound running across Leonidas’ chest had just scabbed over, his disheveled appearance one part due to his battle with the Level 2 Lower Ogre and another part due to his stint in the dungeons.

There would obviously not be a chance to clean himself up, a tragic fate for a clean freak like Leonidas. But he had had a lifetime to get used to being unhygienic.

If there was anything Beccerth’s life could teach anyone, it was that sometimes even something as simple as cleanliness was a luxury of the rich and powerful.

The Church hadn’t changed at all in these last two days. It was the same cobbled-together construction of wood and simple shapes.

The magic of its inner workings wasn’t lost on Leonidas, but it was also fantastical in its subtlety. At least on the surface, the Church of Yves placed modesty on a high pedestal.

Though, considering the fact Leonidas was the only one of its Apostles that called this place home, there was a deeper, unspoken truth hidden in its midst.

The core of the Church was split into a few sections.

The dining hall, which had acted as the setting for Leonidas’ first step into this world, was one.

The living quarters and training areas that Leonidas was so intimate with were two others, with the outer section reserved for Clergymen being a third.

Then there was the location Benet was currently dragging Leonidas toward.

When they entered, Leonidas couldn’t help but feel his heartbeat slow.

For a moment, he had become a third-party observer of his own body, the rhythmic beating of his chest, the flow of his blood, even the slow contraction of his diaphragm up to the filling of his lungs.

Leonidas’ mind had been set free from its cage.

For the first time in his life, he could no longer feel the crippling weight of his body nor the weakness brought upon by his poorly harmonized Bloodline Traits.

He had never felt better in his life.

This feeling, though, for a cynic like Leonidas, was more like a punch to the face.

After a moment of basking within it, his mind snapped itself awake, Scholar’s Eye working its magic and refocusing his thoughts.

‘Ambrosia.’

Leonidas came to this conclusion the moment he awakened.

There were three forms of energy that gave Apostles strength.

Mages relied on Mana, Fighters relied on Breath, and Healers relied on Spirit.

There were subtle differences between the three that became more important as you progressed, but what many didn’t know was that there was a fourth form of energy, a kind reserved for the Gods: Ambrosia.

Just having this knowledge was grounds to make you an enemy of the Gods. Then, it wasn’t a surprise that Leonidas was only aware of this thanks to the Knowledge Well of the Fallen Apostles.

Ambrosia was the unique energy of the Gods, untouched and unmatched by mortals.

It was this energy that made what seemed impossible a matter of a swipe of the hand and it was also what guaranteed the monopoly Gods held on true strength.

Realizing what was in the air, Leonidas also understood that this was where the Sub-Shrine was located. When his senses came back to him, they also confirmed as much.

The room was filled with a warm somber light, being neither too grating on the eyes nor too dim.

It had a circular shape to it, surrounded by seats barred from the center of the hall with elaborate workings of precious stone and marble.

The floor alternated between lavish red-violet carpets and polished black flooring so clear that they reflected perfect mirror images of the hovering brownish-gold lamps.

In the center of it all stood an altar and to its back, a stone statue of Goddess Yves stood.

Compared to the wooden statue that could be found outside the Church, this one was not only twice as tall, but even more detailed, capturing every fold of the Goddess’s clothing and every line of her delicate features.

A subtle power of majesty radiated from the stone statue, without a doubt proving it to be the source of Ambrosia that had shocked Leonidas earlier.

At its feet, the Altar sparkled with golden waters, releasing delicate motes of light that hovered in the air for a moment before popping like bubbles.

The sides of the room were filled with familiar faces: the Apostles of Violet Waters.

The Apostles of the Bruthers family took one side, those of the Rardins taking the other.

Though, there was one very obviously missing: Lady Eve.

Leonidas could feel a slight itchiness upon his chest, one it took him a moment to realize was actually his wounds healing.

It seemed that the added healing factor given to him by being within Goddess Yves’ territory increased several folds in this region.

By the time he took his third step into the Sub-Shrine, he could already feel his scab peeling.

The sight of Leonidas rejuvenating before their eyes caused much of the complacency his enemies had been feeling to chill.

Not only were the Blessings Leonidas experienced normally beyond them, but it was now obvious that the effects were even more exaggerated in the presence of the true Sub-Shrine.

With the mystery of Leonidas’ origins still looming over them, a slight shift occurred to the momentum of the atmosphere.

Chains rattled as Leonidas glided forward. Soon, he found himself alone at the very center of it all, several gazes looking down upon him.

Following a brief moment of silence, the sound of footsteps rang once more.

This time, however, they weren’t nearly as quiet as Benet’s. Rather, they were steady and forceful, carrying with them a solid air.

Not long later, Father Barat stood before the altar facing Leonidas, the motes of light obscuring much of his lower body.

Leonidas’ gaze flickered.

This wasn’t too far outside his expectations. With how much emphasis he placed on preparedness, he had spent a not-so-insignificant chunk of the last two days learning what he could about trials from the Knowledge Well.

It was just unfortunate that many of the conclusions he came to were bad news.

Father Barat would act as a truly neutral party.

And, considering the circumstances that had led Leonidas to this point, this wasn’t entirely a good thing.