Chapter 1432.1
Chapter 1432.1
The church, traditionally an open-door pillar of community gathering, was nearly silent after the beloved priest passed away—despite most of the villagers coming to the graveyard to pay their respects and express their emotions. The doors were locked tight, and the inner sanctuary, once full of blessings, had been heavy with sorrow for days.“Ah... Father... how could you leave us like this...”
“How are we ever going to repay the kindness you showed our village...”
A steady stream of people came and went.
The villagers mourned the priest’s passing, placing white flowers on his coffin. Despite the village’s small size, meaning there weren't exactly droves of people arriving, nearly all who lived in the village took the time to come and pay their teary-eyed respects.
Elysia, besides greeting those who came, stood silently in her black nun’s habit.
She didn’t shed a single tear, flooded with desiderium for the priest who had not only shepherded her faith, but also shown her how to live a happy and loving life.
One villager cautiously asked, “Elysia... are you okay?”
“Yes, I’m fine. He’s gone to God’s embrace, after all... I shouldn’t mourn, I should bless his journey.”
Even as she spoke, she was violently trembling. Her eyes were wide with shaking pupils, though she didn’t realize it herself.
“It’s okay,” one of them comforted her. “You can cry. Our God is so cruel, though. To take him and leave this poor young child behind...”
“Sob... Sob...”
“It’s okay... You can cry...” A woman with a robust figure quietly held Elysia in her arms, comforting her. “When you want to cry, you cry. The concept is the same even for a cleric. He was your precious father, after all.”
In the end, she couldn’t hold back her tears. She let her emotions pour out. “Sob... Aaaah!”
It was a sudden outburst, but none of the visitors were surprised.
“Waaa! Dad... Dad! Why did you go so soon, Dad...”
The woman patted her back, holding her close with a bittersweet expression.
However, neither of them knew that the extreme emotion had stimulated her racial instincts, causing her to suppress the pheromones she’d been unconsciously emitting.
She didn’t notice that at the same time, the expressions of a few young men who had come to pay their respects had changed.
A few more days passed.
The cleric was quietly interred in the cemetery on the outskirts of the village.
Elysia, who had somehow managed to hold back her tears, finally broke down as she watched the coffin sink into the ground. She rushed forward, trying to prevent the coffin from being buried.
Everyone understood what she was going through. They were no stranger to such struggles, as many young men from the village had become casualties in the past war against the demon race, returning home in caskets.