"Are you tempting me?! Are you the devil, or am I?!"
Red Robin flipped the old priest's body over, making him lie face down on the ground, arms spread on either side, prone right in front of the podium, facing the entrance. Then he pulled out daggers from his waist.
"When was the last time you made a deal with a human?"
"A thousand or two years ago, I suppose." Lilith sighed, "Has the human race developed to this point?"
"Yes, that's humanity. Welcome to human society."
As Red Robin was speaking, his hands never stopped moving - he placed the sharp tip of the daggers against the base of the old priest's neck, precisely where the spine protruded.
With a "splosh" sound, the daggers punctured the space between the rib bones on the back of the corpse, then sliced a significant cut.
Making slow and steady movements, Red Robin used an eerie method of slashing to peel off the skin on the old priest's back, folding them upwards.
"Do you even know what you're doing?" The hint of fear and uncertainty in Lilith's tone was rare. She took a deep breath and emphasized, "You're desecrating a clergyman's body in the biggest church in London, right in front of God, aren't you scared..."
"If I were scared, I wouldn't have called you in the first place."
Lilith fell silent. As Red Robin's movements became faster, she couldn't help but ask, "What on earth are you trying to do? Let me remind you, if God genuinely shows up later, I'll say it was all your doing, it has nothing to do with me."
"No way. I would immediately cry out to him that it was you who tempted me. What did you think I brought you here for?"
"You..."
"As I said, welcome to human society."
Red Robin carefully flipped the two pieces of skin he'd removed from the back upwards and stuck them to the old priest's shoulders. Then he reached into the old priest's body and gently pulled out his decayed lungs.
"I'm warning you, that's enough!" Lilith was practically grinding her teeth as she spoke, her voice filled with unease. "If you really do summon God here, we're both screwed!"
"If God were to come, he would've done so when his followers were being victimized. Since God let him die, I'm not overstepping."
Red Robin took a deep breath, then started cutting the lungs into strips with the daggers, and then covered them with skin.
After an extended period of detailed work, Red Robin finally stood up, dagger in hand, walked down the steps, then turned to look at his work.
The old priest had been arranged to lie face down on the floor with his arms spread out. His head faced the entrance. Because of the podium, anyone approaching would take in the sight of his back.
It was a pair of bat wings, bones made of lungs covered in skin, quietly spreading between each arm. The faint light filtering through the three Gothic arch windows bathed the wings, adding an undeniably aesthetic quality to the macabre spectacle.
Noises outside the door of Westminster Abbey's hall grew louder. The moonlight dimmed further, and a gust of invisible wind opened the door fully. Countless blood-red eyes coveted what laid on God's sacred ground.
With the gentle breeze, a pair of pitch-black boots descended from above, softly stepping on the plush carpet. Between the two boots, the figure of the corpse became clearer.
The triumphant joy in Cain's blood-red eyes disappeared in an instant, leaving only deeper gloom and chill, along with unprecedented unstoppable anger.
"Have you ever heard about a theory? The best way to punish a sinner isn't to do good deeds, but to commit even worse deeds right in front of him."
Beside the Thames River, Red Robin held onto the railing, looked over at the roaring flames on the opposite bank, and said: "The letter that I left for Cain will undoubtedly infuriate him."
"Because he died and resurrected, gathered a tribe, waged a war, all for the sake of avenging by attacking the church and desecrating God. But I did it first."
"There is only one chance to profane Westminster. Once I win first, he can't win anymore."
It took a long time for Lilith to answer: "As long as you do the devil's work, the devil won't be able to spread evil anymore. Don't you think your idea is a bit...missing the point?"
"That's because you have a naive understanding." Red Robin smiled and supported his face with his hand, "Spreading evil is the devil's job, not mine. By using my hobby to usurp the devil's work, who stands to lose?"
He snorted, "Cain spent a lot of energy to resurrect for revenge, but I merely found a pastime during my leisure time."
"I've touched plenty of corpses; there are countless ones in this world I could touch. Cain was the first to conquer a significant church, but there is no other Westminster Abbey in the world, brand-new, allowing him to experience the thrill of desecration."
Even though her relationship with God was not good, Lilith put herself in that situation. She sighed and said, "You don't hold such a deep grudge against my dear nephew, what has he done to deserve this?"
"Oh my god, what am I saying?!" Lilith's slightly desperate voice came again: "You're the only one whom I have failed to seduce in millions of years! You're actually trying make me the scapegoat? I shouldn't have answered your phone call!"
Red Robin gave a slight smile and said, "Do you think it's my fault? Have you ever thought that maybe someone else tempted me?"
"...the murderer?"
"Exactly, Professor Shiller, the murderer of the vampire. I now understand why Jason was so scared the first time he met him."
"In just a few days of interaction, he saw through me and at crucial moments, step by step, guided me to do these things."
"Using the truth to tempt a detective, forcing me to go to Westminster Abbey to confirm whether my conjecture about the death theme of that vampire was correct or not. The scene inside the church and the fat allowed me to understand the theme of his crimes, using my ability to appreciate such art made me recognize the beauty within and also tempted me to help him complete his work."
"The death of the innocent and the chaos in the orderly society inspired my sense of justice, the desire to punish Cain and my talent in murder which made it so Cain's most important moment in his vengeance could never reach perfection."
Red Robin sighed softly, lifting his trembling hand in the gloom of the moonlight and said, "...The scariest thing is that I'm enjoying this, even shaking with excitement."
This time Lilith's silence lasted even longer; she seemed to be organizing her thoughts. After a long while, she objectively evaluated.
"If he had been born in Eden, what would the snake have to do there?"