At this point in ti, only Zhen Liu and Jinju Ren were conscious in the shared room, so they were more or less able to have a private conversation.
The mont Zhen Liu shared the real reason why he wanted to go on a religious building tour, Jinju Ren directed a mildly judgental gaze in Zhen Liu’s direction.
It wasn’t a horribly judgntal gaze that seed upset with Zhen Liu’s actions. Rather, it was the type of judgental gaze one would give to a friend or loved one who was clearly overworking themselves and needed a break...or a very strong drink.
"Uh...Xiao Ren?"
Jinju Ren remained silent as she got up from her bed, walked over to Zhen Liu, and hugged his head.
Zhen Liu was mildly confused at the action at first, but then he felt her rub the back of his head in the sa manner Jin Fang would do sotis when he was...ah.
"First, how do you know about this? Second, you think I’m overstressing myself for no reason again, aren’t you?"
"I learned this from Jin Fang, you should know won talk to each other about matters of the heart. Especially when they happen to like the sa person," Jinju Ren answered in a surprisingly motherly tone. "Also, yes I do."
"Mmm."
Zhen Liu would’ve argued against this statent, but Jin Fang had an uncanny knack of calling Zhen Liu out whenever he did decide to overwhelm himself for no good reason. Evidently, Jinju Ren had that sa knack.
"Just because you happened to find so holy relics related to so weird ancient fla doesn’t an you have to imdiately pounce on it the next chance you get," Jinju Ren said as she continued to rub the back of Zhen Liu’s head. "Hells, you didn’t even plan on going this way until that Bishop guy showed up."
"Is...is this your way of telling to have bygones be bygones and get out of town? Because—"
"Nothing like that, you big baby," Jinju Ren lovingly teased. "I’m just saying...roll with it. If sothing happens that compels you to act, do so. Just don’t plan so far ahead that you end up causing whatever you were trying to avoid to happen. Self-fulfilling policy and all that."
"That’s...fair."
Zhen Liu took a mont to breathe and digest Jinju Ren’s words before finally exhaling a rather heavy sigh.
"Aside from own paranoia, I do still kind of want to tour around the city," Zhen Liu eventually said. "It’s not often we visit a city with this many conflicting religious sects. I’m kind of curious what kind of [Desires] I can find popping up around here."
"Fair enough."
The tender mont lasted only for a few minutes but could’ve gone on for longer. However, as the two embraced one another, the other mbers of their group began to stir from slumber.
It was honestly kind of surprising that none of them were disturbed by all of the religious chanting that was happening just right outside of their window.
"Baaa," Zhen Tai yawned. "Felt like I just slept for a—eh? You two are already awake?"
"Yeah..." Zhen Liu answered. "You ready to go touring churches?"
"Say what?"
...What do the kaijin think?...
[Wait...by definition, we’re like...demons, right?] Corpse Doll asked her older counterparts. [And churches, regardless of the denomination, are considered holy ground. Doesn’t that an it would cause us pain to be walking through them?]
[That only applies to certain worlds and universes, not ours,] Blazejudicator answered with surprising confidence in his voice. [Besides, if that was the case, then we would’ve been howling in pain when we went exploring last night.]
[Oh yeah...]
[Adding on to that, we’re already weak against Law, Chaos, Dragon Force, true Nirvana, and technically music,] Nepherage piped up. [Which...now that I think about it, shouldn’t a church be the ultimate culmination of all those weaknesses?]
[Huh...neat.]
[Does that an we have free reign to ss around the churches when we get the chance?] Hurricroak asked.
...Back to the mortals...
When Zhen Liu had suggested the church tour thing, he had ant it.
The day prior, when they were dodging the preachers and priests as best they could, he had noted that among them was a peculiar-looking fellow advertising a tour of the city’s more accommodating sects and their facilities.
It made sense to a point; many religious sects would try to present themselves as being gentle and open so that vagabonds, tourists, and the like would feel comfortable enough to join them on a more permanent basis.
And in a worse-case scenario where nobody decides to join at the end of this tour, at the very least, they would get so of the money that was paid as the price of admission.
Correction: They would get the money as a church donation.
Much to the surprise of everyone in Zhen Liu’s group, except Zhen Liu, the guided church tour was surprisingly popular with foreign visitors.
"Huh... I’m honestly surprised that there are this many people who signed up for a church tour of all things," Zhen Xing comnted at the sight of all the people waiting for the tour guide. "Then again, I guess we’re not exactly the most spiritually inclined people...despite everything we’ve seen and dealt with."
"To be sure, I’m pretty sure having to fight so so-called deities would make one anti-religious," Olstenna said.
"True."
When Zhen Liu suggested the church tour, his friends and family assud that the tour would be depressingly empty.
The entire city was forty percent churches, so having soone act like a guide in such a place was weird to the Zhen Clan group. But lo and behold, the tour that Zhen Liu had selected was hosting a wide variety of tourists.
So appeared to be scholars, others appeared to be traders, while a great majority were just ordinary tourists looking to kill ti.
It was honestly crowded enough that Zhen Liu felt like he could just sneakily drop so of the kaijin on to the ground and have them blend in as mortals.
But if last night was any indicator...perhaps that wasn’t a good idea for the ti being.
^Hello, everybody! I hope you have all had a blessed morning!^ a cheery voice called out near the front of the crowd of tourists. Which, coincidentally, was where Zhen Liu and his friends were situated.
’Huh...he looks like a tour guide.’
The man who had called out a greeting to the crowd was a tall, thin man who was dressed in missionary clothes and had a holy symbol around his neck in the shape of a fla burning in a brazier.
This symbol was, as far as Zhen Liu could rember, the symbol for the central church of the Sacred Fla Theocracy, aka, the guys in charge of everyone else.
^Now as a quick introduction, I am Cleric Oswin of the Sacred Fla Church and I shall be your guide for today,^ the man said with a slight, humble bow. ^ Our tour for today is going to consist of three churches that have gracefully volunteered to showcase their rituals as well as their bases of operation. As is tradition, the first church will be of a recently created offshoot of the Sacred Fla, the second church will be one that was created during the ti from before the war, while the third will be of a church that has been established since the day the Sacred Fla was first sanctified. ^
’Okay, I was expecting that kind of set-up,’ Zhen Liu thought to himself as he tried to imagine these churches. ’I wonder what kind of Kaijin would pop out if I could transform the whole building...’
^And with that out of the way, ladies and gentlen, let us begin the tour!^
^Woo!^
...Scene change ti...
The first church that the tour group stopped by was a quaint little building that was done in modern Dozing Salamander-style...which in Zhen Liu’s head was kind of like a brick version of a pueblo-style building. As for the occupants of this particular building, they were a group known as the Holy Candle Monastery.
As the na implied, this monastery had a heavy candle the going on with them, mostly due to their group’s exclusive aether formula requiring that the user understand the intricacies of candle-making...and have a candle burning 24/7 on the top of their heads.
Zhen Liu and his friends thought this was kind of weird, but they knew better than to bring it up in front of the monks themselves. Plus, they all got handmade candles with unique fragrances that only these monks could make.
"Is it weird that this candle is making hungry?" Rianna asked as she sniffed the wax object. "It slls like a cookie."
"Mine too," Antonio agreed as he sniffed his own gifted candle. "Although mine sll like berries..."
Unfortunately for Zhen Liu and his friends, this was going to be the only church that they would be able to visit without shit going south.
Why?
Because sotis, preachers fail to read the fucking room.
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