Shaun looked at the kitchen and saw that the vegetables and meats were prepared, as well as a whole ham hanging from the top of the kitchen.
"I don't know if there's any concept of a Spanish 5J ham at this time of year. But the ham these guys are fixing for me surely won't be bad." Shaun thought to himself.
The villa's basement also had a small wine cellar, and the angled slanted compartments on the wine racks were already filled with red wine.
After cruising through his new residence, Shaun called Karl and Kerpin over and said, "You guys did a great job, I'm very satisfied."
Carl and Kerpin's faces showed excitement: "It is our honour that your lordship is satisfied."
Shaun then said to Carl: "There is one more thing that needs to be done by you. You collate the materials of the unsolved serial murders, noteworthy supernatural events, and cases of killing, enrichment, and other blasphemous acts in my father's name that happened in Europe in recent years and give them to me."
Carl was creeped out and hurriedly said, "Yes, my lord."
"Also you tell the rest of the five men to join you and meet me here tonight at nine o'clock in a carriage with no insignia and keep a low profile." Shaun instructed again.
"As you command, my lord." Carl and Coppin replied once more.
"Alright, you and the others leave." Shaun commanded.
So Karl and Kopin left the small building with the three maids.
The small building was cleared out all of a sudden. Iris had been admiring the paintings in the small building without making a sound. And Shaun sat down on the sofa in the living room to stare and didn't speak again. The whole small building was silent.
"The church isn't trouble." Iris, who had walked into the living room at some point, spoke up. As she spent more and more time with Shaun, Iris spoke more and more casually, as if figuring out that the demon lord was actually quite easy-going.
"How so?" Shaun asked with considerable interest.
Iris sat on the sofa opposite Shaun and spoke, "The priest who came today, if he was someone from the church, I wouldn't call it trouble. He is someone from the Dark Church. This matter is definitely not over."
Shaun listened and secretly thought in his heart:Â "Hearing Iris remind me of this, I did feel that something was not right just now. To simply sprinkle a few drops of water like that and call it an exorcism is too much of a child's play. I thought at the time that I was well prepared, but it turns out that he was dealing with not only us, but also the church. It seems that crossing into a demon can't be careless."
Shaun looked at Iris and asked:``Is there any certainty that it's the Dark Church?"
Iris smiled: "My father is considered to be a big man on earth, and many of the world such as Baron Dietrich knows that from the age of seven until now, I have disintegrated fifteen assassinations for my father. But what they don't know is that ten of those assassinations were against me."
"And seven of those ten assassinations were the handiwork of the Dark Ripple, so I am very familiar with their scent. That priest's Dark Ripple today is at least at the third stage."
Shaun nodded approvingly and asked, "And three more times? In addition to the seven assassinations by the Dark Order?"
"Three other times were three civilian demon hunters that assassinated me just to raise their ranking in the bounty hunter community." Iris replied.
"Bounty hunter rankings? There's such a thing." Shaun muttered in his heart and said with his mouth, "Give me a brief overview of the current state of the Dark Order."
Iris nodded and said: "With the weakening of the church's power, and the church's concession to the secular regime, the number of clergy and believers who are dissatisfied is increasing, and the believers who originally belonged to the moderates have spawned a lot of extremists, so in recent years, the power of the Dark Church is expanding very quickly. Many people who were originally ordinary clergy of the Church have been secretly developed into followers of the Dark Church."
"The Church will still determine whether you are a demon or not before making a move, the people of the Dark Church don't care that much, what they advocate is that anyone who is involved with demons should be purged. In other words, for you, my lord, the Dark Church is a much bigger trouble than the Church."
Shaun thought about it and said, "Thank you for the reminder. It seems like we need to pay attention, maybe the Dark Order will make some more moves recently."
Iris was silent for a while and said, "There is another possibility, we can strike before they do, and take out the guy who came today first."
Shaun had a light in his eyes and thought to himself:¡°This young lady likes everything out of the ordinary ah. But this is a wonderful idea, that Father Eric must not have thought that I would do it right away, and it's possible that he hasn't yet reported the matter about me being related to the demon summoning ceremony to the higher-ups of theDark Order. There would also be subsequent trouble if the name I used for my new identity was known to him. And after getting rid of him as long as the matter of him being a member of the Dark Church is shaken out, the Church won't mind so much about who got rid of him, after all, the threat of someone who helps them get rid of their enemies won't be that great." Thinking of this Shaun looked out the window, it was now five in the afternoon and asked Iris: "Is your ability affected by using it during the day?"
Iris shook her head.
Shaun said: "How can you find him accurately?"
Iris said: "Ripple Qigong was supposed to be the nemesis of demons and black magic, one of the powerful skills of the Church. But the Dark Ripple practitioners of the Dark Church used spells that were close to black magic in order to achieve quick success, so they were banned by the Church and declared as Dark Ripple. Those who have cultivated Dark Ripple have the aura of black magic on their body, and other people who cultivate black magic are able to recognise it, and those like me who have been assassinated by them seven times can track and find Dark Ripple practitioners below stage four within a certain range."
Shaun thought about it and said, "Let's go, make a plan as we go, and we have to be back by nine o'clock at night."
Before leaving the house, Shaun used an inconspicuous cloth bag to pack two sets of clothes originally intended for male and female servants, then the two of them went out the door and walked for a while to find a rented carriage parked on the side of the road waiting for business.
After travelling along the Rhine in the hired carriage for about twenty minutes or so, Shaun had the coachman stop the carriage, settled the bill, and then walked with Iris for about ten minutes to reach the vicinity of the cathedral.
The two first found a noisy pub and went to the bathroom separately to change into servant's clothes, and Iris found some grime to smear on her and Shaun's faces. The image of the two immediately changed from a high society gentleman and lady to a male and female servant out shopping for food.
When they arrived near the cathedral, Shaun walked up to one of the priests on duty at the church and said with an expression full of respect, "Reverend Father, I'd like to see Father Eric, he helped my wife with her epilepsy last week and I'd like to thank him in person."
The priest thought for a moment and said, "I just saw Father Eric walk into the bishop's living quarters, in the alleyway across from the main entrance to the church, you can go there and wait for him outside the front door."
Shaun crossed his chest and bowed his head and thanked the priest. Then rejoined Iris and together they walked down Burgmauer Street across from the church to the bishop's living quarters.
Although this area was close to the cathedral, there were not many shops, the streets were narrow and very quiet with few pedestrians. "The ideal place for an assassination." Shaun thought to himself.
"There, it's still inside." Iris signalled to Shaun that she had found the scent of the Dark Ripple.
Shaun nodded and the two stood in an inconspicuous spot about fifty metres from the gate to the bishop's living quarters pretending to talk while watching in the direction of the gate.
Father Eric was talking to the bishop in the bishop's parlour at the moment. The bishop inquired about the situation regarding someone performing a demon summoning ritual, and Father Eric told him what he had seen today at Earl Kopin's manor before smiling and telling the bishop, "It's just some stupid nobles seeking excitement and pulling a trick to amuse themselves."
The bishop nodded and instructed, "Yesterday, the government's intelligence officers just captured a member of theDark Order, our focus should still be on preventing the infiltration of theDark Order. Those stupid nobles just let them be as long as they don't make a circle."
Father Eric nodded and stood up to make a cross in front of his chest: "As you wish, may the Lord bless you." The bishop made a cross in response.
Father Eric walked along the ornate corridors of the bishop's residence and let out a sneer in his heart: "Such a corrupt church has long been unable to carry out the Lord's will. That person who took Benhart's name today definitely has problems and should be burned to death by divine light as a warning to those foolish nobles."
Father Eric walked out of the gate of the bishop's residence, seeing that the light of day is still bright, the doorway of the Ri thinking about whether to sneak into Earl Kopin's manor tonight, to kill that person with a suspicious identity with the darkness ripples, suddenly out of the corner of his eye there was a flash of black light, the warning signs in his heart instantly rose, the darkness ripples in his body had already rippled around his body as the centre of his body, but it was already too late, a black light swept across his neck, a fountain of blood exploded, Father Eric's head had been chopped off, spinning twice in the air and falling to the ground together with his torso.
Fifty metres away Iris's eyes returned to normal focus, and the two men quietly left the scene amidst the panicked shouts of a passerby.
The two of them quickened their pace and walked for a while, then found another pub to go to the washroom to change back into their original clothes to restore their appearance, and then unhurriedly found a hire carriage to drive towards their residence.
"My lord, without the help of your darkness power, my spirit body's speed and strength wouldn't have been able to do this and I would have been injured by the other side's darkness ripples." In the carriage Iris whispered to Shaun.
Shaun smiled pleasantly and replied: "Without your ability, I can't do it to kill the opponent silently either. Sort of a good co-operation."
The two men stopped talking, but the mood was light and pleasant.
Shaun had the carriage stop just half a kilometre from his residence, then the two walked back to the small building.
Changing into his home's civilian clothes, Shaun looked at the materials in the kitchen and began to prepare dinner.