Chapter 7: He Is Gray

But Corollis saw the wounds on Lane’s body. There was a scar on his shoulder, marked with several stitches.

Lily remembered those scars. They were inflicted by the deranged remnants. They were wounds he had received protecting her and Fayrol.

The corrupt aura of the capital’s remnants had left scars on his body like curse marks from the Cursed Decay Kingdom.

There was no mistake. He was Gray. The boy she loved. But why would he say he wasn’t?

The unexpected answer diluted Lily’s surprise and excitement and brought her back to her senses.

Once she snapped back, Lily felt relieved that Corollis hadn’t shown anything strange. Except Fayrol on that side had nearly gotten distracted and smashed her own hand with a hammer.

But she still cared about his name. He had denied being Gray, but it was definitely him. She couldn’t be wrong.

Just being able to see him was already an unbelievable miracle.

Everything else… no matter what came next, Lily felt things couldn’t get worse. Being alive was already the greatest fortune.

‘Wait. If he didn’t die on the ship, why hasn’t he come to find me all this time?’

‘Could it be that he wants to leave Fayrol? To leave me?’

The joy of seeing her beloved faded. Rationality returned to Corollis. She looked at Lane with a subtle gaze. He seemed to sense something, but when he looked again, all he saw was Corollis’s calm face.

The male way of thinking from her past life still lingered. She had overcome it once to fall in love with him, but that didn’t mean she thought entirely like a woman now.

A woman in love might be swept away by joy, and Lily wasn’t completely immune. But she also subconsciously turned to the worst possibilities.

The main thing was that he had hidden his name.

He wasn’t planning to cheat on her, was he?

At that thought, Corollis’s gaze turned sharper.

Lane felt a chill run down his spine, as if he was being watched by something dangerous. He looked around but found nothing.

Corollis had already withdrawn that dangerous look.

Though she had thought a lot, in reality it passed in an instant. So Sessimiri and Lane didn’t notice anything odd about Corollis.

But Lane did have some doubts because of Corollis’s words. For example, why did she think he was called Gray?

In the end, Lane just figured the Saint had mistaken him for someone else.

Then Corollis invited Sessimiri and Lane to sit in the church. As the Saint, why would she stay at an inn when there was a church available?

It was like university, when you had a dorm but chose to live outside. Unless your roommate was a nightmare, why waste the money?

It wasn’t like she was going out to do something bad.

Although Corollis could have the local church reimburse her, there was no need. After all, the Church wasn’t that well-off.

They did collect tithes, but only in the Holy Nation. There wasn’t much profit, expenses were high, and even the Pope didn’t live a life of luxury.

Thump, thump, thump…

A hurried sound, like bones striking stone bricks, followed by a few screams.

The sound seemed to come from inside the church.

The commotion drew all three of their gazes toward the church.

Then three headless skeletons, completely exposed, jumped and ran out of the church, with a flustered nun chasing after them.

“Ahh, Sir Saint Bones, please don’t run around! You’ll scare people!”

The chasing nun was so anxious that her tears were about to fall, running and shouting.

But those three skeletons had no flesh or blood, all bare bones, yet they ran fast. They dashed out from the church gate, and even the well-traveled trio was left stunned.

The white skeletons had traces of blood only on their necks and hands. Since none of the three had skulls, they looked very strange. No, the fact that skeletons could move and run and jump was already strange enough!

“Can you help stop them?” The nun, seeing the three about to enter the church, asked anxiously.

In her haste, the little nun hadn’t gotten a clear look at Corollis’s clothing or the knight who had just followed, or she would have shouted, “Help me, Lady Saint!”

“Swift.”

Lane shouted, and his figure flashed, appearing in front of a running skeleton. He reached out to grab it, but the skeleton easily dodged.

Still, Lane’s block made that skeleton stop. It showed no intention of harming him.

Lane’s eyes narrowed. He felt these skeletons weren’t simple. Though he sensed no aura, he could tell at a glance they were no ordinary bones.

Sessimiri hurriedly chanted a few spells, “Vine Technique,” “Water Binding Technique,” to try to restrain the other two skeletons. But even Lane, a third-rank Hero Candidate, couldn’t stop them, so Sessimiri, lacking combat experience, naturally failed as well.

Unsurprisingly, the spells she cast all missed.

The only one who didn’t act immediately was Corollis. When she saw those three headless skeletons, she vaguely felt they looked familiar. After watching for a while, she finally confirmed what they were.

So Corollis released a divine spell to quiet the dead, a first-rank Soul-Calming Art. Because she was the Saint, it carried with it a few faint threads of divine presence.

For that reason, the skeletons calmed down. The frantic nun finally caught up to them.

The nun’s tears swirled in her eyes. She touched the skeletons’ exposed collarbones, patted their smooth bones, and murmured:

“Wuwuwu, Sir Saint Bones, don’t run around. It’s really scary. Just now, several believers in the church were frightened.”

As if soothed by Corollis’s Soul-Calming Art, the skeletons showed a bit of shyness. They touched their empty heads, a patch of air, then gave a nodding motion.

“Lady Corollis… what are these?” Sessimiri asked.

Corollis’s expression clearly showed she knew what they were. Sessimiri had some guesses, but it was faster to just ask Corollis.

“Didn’t this young nun just say it? Saint Bones.” Corollis’s gaze fell on the nun, who was still touching the skeletons.

“During the White Moth Era, they were devout believers of the gods. They are predecessors we can trust and believe in.”

“In an age when the gods had not yet been born, they prayed for the existence of gods. In the calamitous rain, they wrenched off their own heads with nooses. Miracles grew from their pained faces and breaths.”

“The miracles scattered the rain of calamity. Time weathered the ropes that strangled them, but their broken souls were sealed within these bones.”

“So don’t worry. They won’t hurt us.”

The three skeletons seemed to understand Corollis’s words. They gathered around her, because the Saint’s body carried the aura of the divine.

“Eh? Lady Saint!”

The little nun was stunned by the introduction for a moment, then finally took notice of Corollis. Seeing the clothing and aura, she reacted belatedly.

The white Saint, bathed in sunlight, looked at the skeletons and the nun with a gentle expression.

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