One day later.
Chen Lun stood in front of the gate of the Red Apple Church in Honghua Town.
There was dead silence all around, no one in sight.
This town is even more desolate than Bingnuo Town and Youdou Town. Since he entered the town, he has not seen any living people, not even plague lunatics.
Except for the crows flying by from time to time, it was lifeless, like a dead town.
"Mr. Jack?"
Dongyang spoke up from the side.
Chen Lun came back to his senses from his thoughts, turned his head to look at him, and then looked at the players behind him.
The players who died in Youdou Town before have been resurrected and returned to the team. Fortunately, they have established a certain connection with Youdou Town because of the battle, and the resurrection point is automatically refreshed at the entrance of the town, so they did not get separated.
Chen Lun let the crow on his shoulder fly away, then spoke softly:
"This church has no clergy. The people from the Red Apple Church have already evacuated..."
"Already withdrawn?!"
Dongyang and others looked at each other in surprise.
They opened the task panel again and found that the completion rate of this task was only "2/3". It was obvious that the church in front of them still needed to be destroyed.
"——Could it be because of the tip-off from the Lost Name Guild? So the Red Apple Church made preparations in advance?"
Chen Xi spoke.
“——It’s very likely!”
The centaur said.
"——There's no need to think about it, it must be those bastards... We wiped out the church branches in the two towns ahead. They suffered such a huge loss, they must want to regain some favor from the church by reporting on them."
Dog-Head Gold immediately responded in the team channel.
The others nodded, agreeing with his statement.
"Let's go."
Chen Lun turned the silver cane in his hand and gently placed it on his forearm.
He held up his black hat and walked in.
Dongyang and others followed closely and entered the outer courtyard of the church.
The dense sound of footsteps echoed in the empty and silent scene. Everyone walked through the outer courtyard and came directly to the door of the church hall. Chen Lun personally pushed open the huge and heavy wooden carved door.
Crunch——!
The uniform, low-pitched prayers suddenly reached everyone's ears.
Dongyang and others looked carefully and found that the entire hall was almost full of men, women, old and young. They were dressed in ordinary people's clothes, kneeling on the ground devoutly, muttering the Bible teachings of the Red Apple Church.
These believers looked very strange, their expressions were pious yet fanatical, their eyes were filled with longing.
"God said, hunger is the natural desire of man, and eating is to obey one's heart..."
"God said that flesh and blood are the root of man, and growth is the continuation of life..."
"God said that illness is just a necessary condition and we need to endure the test..."
The chanting of prayers was full of holiness, and the sound waves impacted Dongyang and others, making their backs cold and their hearts shudder.
Chen Lun looked around expressionlessly and found that all these believers had no heartbeats. They seemed to be alive, but in fact they had already died.
The reason why he can behave like an ordinary person, just like he did when he was alive, is due to a method used by the Red Apple Church.
Chen Lun still remembers this method clearly.
"In the previous life, the Red Apple Church 1.0 was able to wreak havoc on the empire on a large scale, relying on a supernatural creature called 'fruit maggots'... that was a creation secretly researched by the church."
The "fruit honey" that I had encountered in Amber City before was the excrement of this extraordinary creature after eating apples. Whether it was taken directly or prepared into a medicine injection, it could increase the vitality of the human body and achieve a certain degree of "healing" and "strengthening" effect.
The side effect is that it will shorten your life.
Many uninformed people are extremely eager for the "honey" distributed by the church, and are even willing to spend all their wealth to donate and offer it, just to allow themselves or their family and friends to survive for a while.
Connie's father is a believer who is deeply dependent on this "drug".
Gary, the first leader of the Iron Fist Gang, and the bodyguards found by Senator Daniel were all enhanced people who had been injected with "drugs".
It can be seen that during the process of secret research, the Red Apple Church spread the unused "excrement and garbage" to make money.
The real research result is to implant fruit maggots directly into the human body and perform certain church rituals to create a group of terrible church "soldiers".
These people died during the ritual, and the fruit maggots would continue to eat away at their bodies until they were completely destroyed. In a sense, they were actually just a body controlled by maggots, full of pollution and chaos, and were very scary monsters.
This kind of people... no, they should be called fruit maggot parasites. They have a common name, called "fallen believers."
"Get out of here."
Chen Lun suddenly spoke out.
"This is the empty shell of the church left by the Red Apple Church. It is actually a trap."
Dongyang and others were all shocked.
"Yes! Mr. Jack!"
They immediately turned around and tried to leave the church hall.
But just at this moment.
Bang!
The two huge wooden doors closed tightly with a loud bang.
Not only that, the bricks on the wall above the gate suddenly moved away, and a sturdy iron fence popped out and inserted straight into the threshold, completely blocking the retreat.
One could faintly hear a clicking sound coming from the wall; it was obviously a trigger mechanism that had been set up long ago.
"Oh no! We're locked up!"
the centaur shouted.
“Watch me!”
The dog-headed gold shouted, his body expanded, and then he slammed into the wall on the side of the gate. He wanted to destroy the wall and make a big hole so that everyone could leave.
Boom!
Bricks were flying and smoke and dust were everywhere.
But the expected hole in the wall did not appear. Everyone discovered that the walls of the church hall were not only very thick, but also had a row of very sturdy iron railings inside.
"When this was built, was it intended for the Iron Fortress?!"
Goutoujin moved his aching arm and complained angrily.
Perhaps because the noise he made when he banged his head against the wall was too loud, all the prayers stopped abruptly and the entire hall fell into dead silence.
Dongyang and others turned around and looked at the group of believers kneeling on the ground. They were all motionless.
In the atmosphere where you could hear a pin drop, a child's voice suddenly rang out:
"Mom, I'm hungry."
A few seconds later, a woman's voice sounded:
"Eat when you're hungry."
Everyone held their breath, and saw the believers kneeling in front of them slowly turning their heads, staring at them with eyes wide open.
"Hungry."
"I'm hungry too."
"Might as well eat them."
The believers stood up one after another, their expressions gradually became ferocious, their eyes were full of desire and madness, and then they surrounded Dongyang and others.
"shot!"
Dongyang acted promptly and shouted loudly.
At the same time, the fallen believers also rushed over hysterically.
Bang bang bang...!
Nearly a hundred muskets spewed out fireworks, and countless small steel balls flew out.
A series of dull hitting sounds were heard, and the small steel balls shot into the bodies of these believers, splashing blood. Many believers were covered in blood after being shot, and fell to the ground due to the recoil, but they still struggled to crawl , their eyes becoming more and more ferocious.
suddenly.
Some fallen believers underwent strange changes after suffering severe damage.
Puff! Puff…!!
Their bodies twisted, and suddenly disgusting and hideous tentacles grew from their shoulders, backs and even navels. They were made up of bones and muscles, and even had some unevenly distributed teeth, nails and hair on them.
The players opened fire again, but this time, the bullets were much less effective. Even after being shot several times, the believers still stood firm and even became more crazy.
They quickly rushed to the player, grinning and waving their tentacles.
Some players tried to fight with it, but the swords in their hands could not kill the opponent. Instead, they were pierced and entangled by dozens of tentacles, and finally sent into the big mouth full of sharp teeth, where they were chewed and swallowed.
Several extraordinary people from Dongyang also stepped forward to fight, but found that these fallen believers were extremely difficult to deal with. They could only fight one against three at most, and they would not be able to hold out if there were more.
Mechanical gloves and bombs are not suitable for use in this enclosed scene. It is very easy to accidentally hurt teammates. Dongyang has used up all the cards he should use. He has no choice but to ask for help:
"Mr. Jack! Please help us!"
Chen Lun stood aside, watching the scene in front of him quietly.
He knew that this was a microcosm of the empire's future. By then, such degenerate believers would appear everywhere, serving as "soldiers" in the hands of the Red Apple Church, existing only for madness and killing.
The alienated fallen believers are obviously more violent, and their vitality, recovery and physical fitness have also been enhanced, almost reaching the threshold of extraordinary people.
The entire Red Apple Church hall was filled with the smell of blood, and the originally solemn murals were stained with blood. There were probably about 100 to 200 fallen believers , so it was normal for Dongyang and other players to be unable to defeat them.
"Um……"
Chen Lun turned his head slightly, watched Dongyang and the others fighting hard, and pondered for a moment.
"Well, after all, this is not something you can handle."