Chapter 1066: The Island Shrouded in Night

Chapter 1066: Chapter 1066: The Island Shrouded in Night

New World. Night Island.

This was an island situated near the edge of the Calm Belt. Dark, roiling clouds choked the sky, blocking out the sun completely. Not a single ray of light penetrated the gloom, plunging the entire island into perpetual darkness.

Moreover, the island’s geography was treacherous; a radius of ten kilometers of surrounding sea was littered with jagged reefs of all sizes. Even small vessels dozens of meters in length could not approach, and larger fishing boats easily ran aground and sank.

Most importantly, because the island sat close to the Calm Belt, a family of six or seven giant Sea Kings prowled the nearby waters for over ten hours every day. Measuring at least five hundred meters in length, these colossal beasts frequently capsized stray merchant ships or pirate vessels that wandered into their territory.

Splash—

Near a certain stretch of coastline, a sleek miniature submarine, pitch-black as ink, broke the surface of the water. It was only about six meters long, over three meters tall, and oval-shaped.

Immediately afterward, the hatch on top of the mini-sub opened silently. Wearing futuristic sci-fi monocle goggles and a black offensive exoskeleton combat suit, Sriya poked his head out, looked around cautiously, and hopped onto an adjacent reef. Right behind Sriya, two burly men in identical attire climbed out of the submarine. Sriya didn’t speak; he simply flashed a hand gesture to his two subordinates.

Even amidst the pitch-black darkness of the island, these two Elite Strike Team soldiers managed to catch Sriya’s hand signal with unexpected clarity. They decisively leaped onto the nearby reefs, scrambled ashore in the blink of an eye, and split up to secure the flanks.

Before long, three more mini-submarines of the exact same design broke the surface. Their hatches opened soundlessly one after another, each disgorging three fully armed soldiers.

Without a word, Sriya gave a wave of his hand. The group vaulted upward, bounding across the nearby clusters of rocks, and quickly reached the thicket.

Including Sriya, there were exactly twelve people, a standard squad complement for the Elite Strike Team.

"Sync your watches. The time is 15:11 PM!"

Sriya gathered everyone into a tight circle, held up the glowing fluorescent watch on his left wrist, and said in a deep voice, "Although the underwater reef tunnels allowed our mini-submarines to slip inside and reach this island, the subterranean topography was far too complex and wasted quite a bit of time. We need to pick up the pace for the rest of the operation!"

"Repeating the mission objective: Verify whether this place is the main headquarters of the Church of the Night. Operation codename: ’Nightstalker’! Move out!"

"Understood!"

Instantly, the group sprang to their feet and, led by Sriya, quickly slipped away toward the interior of the island.

As time slowly passed, Sriya and his subordinates pressed deeper into the island’s interior. To his astonishment, he discovered a multitude of bizarre plants scattered across the land, varieties he couldn’t even identify.

Only a single type of dragon blood tree was begrudgingly recognized by him, and even this dragon blood tree was a mutated specimen standing over a dozen meters tall. Together with other towering trees and vegetation, they formed a vast, sparse forest.

One had to remember that this island was shrouded in dark clouds year-round, entirely devoid of natural light. Over the course of a year, there were only a handful of occasions when the clouds parted just enough to let a sliver of sunlight pierce through.

For such meager sunlight to sustain so many trees and plants on this island was utterly bizarre.

"They’re all dark-affinity plants!" Sriya muttered to himself as he scanned his surroundings. "What a strange island!"

Before long, even before Sriya’s squad had cleared the forest, they began encountering patrolling knights from the Church of the Night. Moving in squads of six and carrying pairs of torches, they patrolled the sparse woods.

Bypassing several patrol squads, Sriya led his men out to the edge of the forest at the foot of a mountain. Some sixty or seventy meters away, along the base of the slope, wound a path paved with bluestone.

Furthermore, two towering stone watchtowers stood proudly in a clearing at the foot of the mountain. In addition to the torches illuminating their perimeter, a massive bonfire two meters in diameter blazed fiercely in the center, casting its light across a radius of dozens of meters. This allowed Sriya to clearly see more than twenty knights of the Church of the Night standing guard between the two stone towers.

"Captain Sriya, look straight ahead!" a soldier whispered, pointing toward the peak of the mountain as a cautionary reminder.

Everyone raised their eyes. At the summit of the hundreds-meter-tall mountain sat a massive, brilliantly illuminated structure resembling a fortress.

"A castle? To build such a massive structure up on top of a mountain..."

A look of astonishment crossed Sriya’s face as he hurriedly pulled out a monocular telescope and began to observe intently.

Through the eight-power monocular, the summit of the several-hundred-meter-high peak came into crystal-clear focus. It was a colossal cathedral built entirely of obsidian, its outer walls adorned with white jade crosses. At the pinnacle of the cathedral-castle stood a towering black statue of a female figure, holding...

"The Goddess of the Night!"

The moment Sriya laid eyes on that female statue, the name slipped involuntarily from his lips.

The Goddess representing the night, holding high the cross of light and hope, this was precisely the ’divine entity’ worshipped by the Church of the Night: the Goddess of the Night, Mavis!

Right then, a soldier beside Sriya tugged at his sleeve, pointing toward the distance below, and said, "Captain Sriya, a procession is heading toward the watchtowers!"

Prompted by the warning, Sriya lowered his monocular and narrowed his gaze toward the watchtowers.

Sure enough, a procession numbering in the dozens was escorting a carriage bearing a black background and a white cross, slowly approaching the towers.

"Thirty guardian knights, ten clergy members... Wait, that old bastard is..."

As Sriya counted the members of the entourage, his gaze suddenly locked onto a particularly striking elderly man walking at the front of the carriage. The old man wore an obsidian-and-white-cross tiara, donned black clerical robes embroidered with golden threads over a white-cross motif, and clutched an obsidian staff. He possessed a sharp, wolf-like, hawk-eyed expression, lending him a distinctly chilling air.

After a moment of racking his brain, Sriya finally recognized the man’s identity, his tone turning heavy.

"Augsgur Asher! One of the three Obsidian Archbishops of the Church of the Night, and also the most senior veteran of the organization. Rumor has it that his last public appearance was over twenty years ago in Loguetown, on the day the Pirate King Gol D. Roger was executed, and he carries a staggering bounty of 600 million Berries issued by the World Government!"

The surrounding soldiers exchanged bewildered glances. This was a figure straight out of eras long past.

"To think this old bastard is personally escorting the carriage... Just who on earth is inside that carriage? Could it be the Saintess of the Night?" Sriya muttered with a heavy frown, racking his brain to think of anyone within the Church of the Night whose status could surpass Augsgur Asher’s and warrant such a personal escort.

Meanwhile, in front of the two stone watchtowers, a tall, burly man with black hair and a full beard had appeared. Clad in fine steel armor bearing a black-and-white-cross motif and draped in a large dark cape patterned with white crosses, he looked to be of considerably higher rank than the ordinary guardian knights.

"Who the hell is this guy? Part of the Church of the Night’s upper echelon?" Sriya guessed internally, fixing a deadly glare on the two parties as they converged.