A while later, Leroy had arrived before an unsuspecting alley.
Down this alley, though, was the frightening church of the sun. A church with thousands of eyes painted onto its walls
Finally, he started to walk into the alley with each step, Leroy's heart pounded in his chest. He mustered up his courage and began to inch forward, his back pressed against the cold, damp wall. He tried to make himself as small as possible, as if hoping to blend into the shadows.
After what felt like an eternity, he finally reached the clearing where the church stood.
'Just a few days ago, I was goofing around, and now I have to do this bullshit.' Leroy cursed at his fate.
Getting close to one of the windows, Leroy peered in to see if anyone was inside. Most of the interiors were covered in shadows, and the light barely passed through the red-tinted windows.
Two men stood at the podium, one standing while the other kneeling. Leroy could hear their conversation as the windows didn't seem to be good enough noise suppressors.
The one standing was a large man with shining yellow hair coming down to his hips. He wore an eyepatch over his left eye, and white priest robes with three yellow stripes.
The kneeling man looked to be about average size with short brown hair. He was also wearing a white priest robe, but they didn't seem to have any yellow stripes.
'Is their rank determined by the amount of stripes?' Leroy thought and pressed his head as close to the window as he could while still hiding.
"The ritual is close at hand. We must prepare so that nothing goes wrong."
"Yes, Bishop. I'll make sure that nothing goes wrong," replied the kneeling man.
"Good, this is the key to going past the illusionary barrier. Take it and help protect the artifact."
Said the yellow haired man as he turned around now, took a book in his hand and started reading.
"Yes, Bishop, I won't fail you!" the kneeling man loudly proclaimed as he stood up and started heading for the exit.
As soon as Leroy saw this, he ran as fast as possible towards the alley. Quickly arriving there, he started looking for a spot to hide as the alley was quite long, and he couldn't exit it before being seen by the priest.
Thankfully, he spotted a heap of trash and debris on the side, quickly ran towards it, and hid behind it. The alley was quite small, and almost no light passed through it, so as long as he made no noise, he wouldn't be noticed.
A few seconds later, he saw the priest finally enter the alley.
The closer the priest got, the faster Leroy's heartbeat got.
'This could be my chance to kill him, but I don't have anywhere to leave the body; if someone found him, which is highly likely, then I'd be in a huge mess.'
Leroy thought while clutching the knife in his hand.
Finally, the priest passed right in front of him and continued down the road, his back now facing Leroy.
'It's now or never,' Leroy thought as he quietly got up and came close to the priest while holding his breath and trying to make as little sound as possible.
Finally, Leroy Jumped.
Getting on top of the priest's back, he unfolded his knife and slashed at the neck. As the knife's blade was broken and chipped, it felt more like it was ripping through the priest's neck rather than cutting it.
The priest's eyes widened as he tried to voice out something, shout maybe, but his neck had been totally messed up, the blood now overflowing into his mouth in seconds.
Blood splattered all over the dirt path of the alley.
The priest fell down on his knees and, after a few seconds, fell down completely, dead on the floor.
Leroy just stood there. His hands were covered in blood.
His eyes had become unfocused as he had fallen deep into his thoughts.
'I killed someone, I did it, me. I ended someone's life forever.'
Those thoughts were the only thing going through Leroy's head on repeat, like a broken film. He couldn't think of anything else.
'What did I do to put myself in a situation where I had to take someone's life?'
Leroy mused over and over until finally, he audibly sighed.
'I don't have time for this, or the next one dead on the ground is going to be me. Just don't think about anything and do it.'
Going up to the priest's body, Leroy knelt down and started rummaging through the robes, trying to find the key.
'Just where did this guy put this thing.'
Finally, he found it. Inside the robes, the priest had a belt with only one thing attached to it.
It was a white sculpture of a ball with an eye crying tears of blood on it. The eerie thing wasn't the drawing. It was the fact that when holding the sculpture, you would feel it pulsating in your hand as if it were alive.
Grabbing the priest's belt, Leroy wore it and then attached the sculpture just like the priest had done, finally covering it with his shirt.
'Whys everything about these guys got to be about some freaky abomination'
Leroy thought as he started dragging the priest's body by the feet to where he had hidden from the priest before.
Finally, when he felt that he had hidden the body well enough, he started heading out of the alley into the street as fast as possible.
A few seconds later, he was out on the street, the puppets walking around the same as when he had first entered the alley. The same beggar who had shown him the way to the church was sitting on the side of the street, but this time, his expression was the same as all the other puppets.
'I'd like to go to the tavern and wait for the night, but the body would be found out by then, and I'd have to deal with whoever else is at the crystal and that Bishop guy,'
Leroy thought as he took the monocle out of his pants and wore it once more.
His vision changed, and he could now see the red threads again, all heading towards the same destination, past the illusionary barrier to the crystal ball, the magical artifact that had turned Leroy's life upside down in a matter of hours.
"It's time for some payback, isn't it?"
Leroy said out loud with a smirk on his face.