Lord of The Mysterious Realms Chapter 537

Following the instructions he'd received from Miss Bevanna and Mr. Smith, Jenkins walked toward the pond, guided by a path formed by white-robed priests, his steps accompanied by the melodic strains of a choir and the watchful eyes of the assembled crowd.

As he passed, the priests sprinkled him with water, flower petals, and other items of sacred significance. By the time he reached the edge of the pond, he was thoroughly drenched.

The next step was to strip down, immerse himself in the pond, and let Miss Bevanna conduct the baptismal rite. All he had to do was wait.

But Jenkins just couldn't bring himself to undress completely in front of so many people.

He cast a pleading gaze toward Miss Bevanna, who stood nearby in a fresh set of clothes. She met his eyes directly, feigning ignorance of his silent appeal.

He glanced over his shoulder. At least fifty people were watching him.

He had never wished so desperately for an interruption. As his right hand reached for the top button of his shirt, it seemed the gods had heard his plea, because the unexpected actually happened.

It began with a soft sound of surprise from Miss Bevanna, who was standing closest. Then, the Keeper of Secrets at the head of the formation looked up unexpectedly.

But at that very moment, a small black dot appeared on the edge of the blue moon. Within seconds, it was visibly growing larger. The red moon, however, remained unchanged, continuing to cast its desolate, cold glow.

Jenkins could hardly believe his luck. The last time his baptism had been interrupted, it was because of a solar eclipse. He never imagined the second attempt would be thwarted for a similar reason.

Authentic mystical rituals have exceedingly strict requirements regarding time, celestial alignments, and the surrounding environment. Under these circumstances, the baptism could not possibly continue.

On the carriage ride back to the church, he pondered whether this lunar eclipse was a normal astronomical event. But one look at Miss Bevanna's grim expression suggested the likelihood of it being something far more unusual was much higher.

Outside, the world was bathed in red.

When he first arrived in this world, Jenkins had found the red and blue moonlight of the night strange and unsettling. But after half a year, he had gradually grown accustomed to it. Tonight, however, as the blue moon slowly vanished and the sky remained unnaturally clear, the red moon's light cast down directly upon the ground. The city seemed shrouded in a bloody glow, and even in its silence, an uncanny eeriness pervaded the atmosphere.

Clutching his cat, he was escorted back to the church by a tense entourage and promptly ordered not to leave. Soon after, Miss Bevanna and the Scribes from the combat unit vanished, and even Papa Oliver, a man of few words, was nowhere to be found.

He didn't know what a lone moon reigning in the sky signified, but based on the various lore and rumors surrounding blood-drinking species, those creatures who could manipulate blood might very well emerge to stir up trouble.

It wasn't even seven o'clock, and he had no desire to go to bed so early. He found Bishop Parrold in the prayer room. The old man was kneeling alone on a cushion, eyes closed, praying before the holy emblem—a daily ritual for the bishop.

"Back already? So soon?" the bishop murmured. "It seems I'm truly getting old. My sense of time has grown so poor."

One couldn't carry personal effects during prayer, and there were no clocks in the room, so the bishop had no way of knowing the time.

"No," Jenkins replied, "something happened again."

Jenkins felt a little embarrassed himself, even though none of the interruptions had been his fault.

The two of them walked outside, where Bishop Parrold looked up and also took note of the night's unusual celestial display.

His eyes seemed distant, and he gestured for Jenkins to stand beside him:

"The stars, the sun, the moons... they've all grown more and more abnormal this year," the bishop said. "Jenkins, did you know? The last time a lunar eclipse occurred, I was about your age."

That must have been half a century ago.

"Even though I'm not like you, one who can delve into the deeper truths of the world, I can still feel it changing. This has historical precedent. Though much of the history from before our epoch is lost, the surviving ancient myths and religious legends all agree: great cataclysms and worldwide turmoil have always appeared in tandem."

Bishop Parrold was exceptionally well-read, particularly in the realm of religious scripture. Some of the books he had read in his youth were now lost to time, yet the bishop could reconstruct at least sixty percent of them from memory alone—a truly remarkable feat.

"Then are the moons connected to these disasters?"

Jenkins asked, continuing the line of thought as he joined the bishop in gazing up at the night sky.

"Yes. Both folk tales and the records of the Orthodox Church contain related accounts. We even have ample reason to believe that the end of the 12th Epoch was caused by an anomaly involving that blue moon. In myths far more ancient and unverifiable, it's said that in the primordial sky, the moon was neither blue nor red."

This was the first time Jenkins had heard such a theory. Neither Papa Oliver nor Professor Burns had ever spoken of a moon that wasn't red; the furthest back their knowledge went was to a time of a single, monochromatic blood moon. Even if they had encountered similar legends, they never spoke with the bishop's certainty. Since the bishop could state this with such conviction, Jenkins figured he must have read it in one of those lost books.

"So what do the records say about that primordial sky?"

Jenkins asked, not out of a desire to uncover some profound secret, but simply to continue the conversation, which felt so fitting for the moment and the setting.

The bishop shook his head, his tone surprisingly light. "It's hard to say. After all, it's all impossible to prove. They could just be the ravings of a madman that, after being passed down for a few epochs, have become enshrined as myth." For more chapters visıt N0velFire.ɴet

He sighed, his thoughts wandering for a moment, before adding:

"But the most credible accounts maintain that the primordial moon was yellow."

Not far away, Chocolate lay beside a flowerbed and spat out the bright yellow orb.

The cat squinted, glancing up at the blood moon before turning its head to look at the two conversing men. It let out a wide yawn, then swallowed the orb back into its stomach.

The little cat lay there, resting its head on its paws as it stared at the garden bed before it.

The red moonlight seemed to subconsciously avoid the cat, leaving its small form cloaked in deep shadows. Yet its eyes were unexpectedly bright, their color a match for the moonlight itself.