Pastor's Tantra

"Sulfur, salt, mercury."

In the evening, Sherlock Hermes was in his room, confirming the advanced ritual materials to be used tonight.

Wearing a monocle, he tried to identify the words he had scrawled on the labels of bottles and jars.

Sherlock murmured lowly, running his fingers over the bottles and jars on the shelf: "Consecrated silver powder, blessed holy water. A bunch of dried black sage, unused white crystal, Six new red candles..."

On the other side, in the palace of silver and tin.

Princess Isabel also paced nervously in her room.

She kept reciting the names of the materials needed for the promotion ceremony, and she was clearly restless.

"There are also clove essential oil, cinnamon essential oil, cypress essential oil, benzoin essential oil... and helichrysum essential oil, chamomile essential oil... and... and..."

Elf artist Yanis, who was sitting nearby humming and writing a tune, put down her pen helplessly when she saw this.

"——There are also ginger, fragrant dill, and white bread. Let me tell you...little Isa, what are you nervous about? You have to trust your palace ritualist. They can arrange the ceremony more reliably than you can prepare it yourself. ”

"Yes, I know……"

Isabelle murmured, no longer even emphatic about the words "call me Isabel and not little Isa."

She felt a little breathless, and gently held the collar of her white gauze skirt, as if she wanted to lift the collar to fan some air in and relieve her tension - but she did not dare to go outside because of the image and dignity of the royal family. Such vulgar behavior in front of people.

"It's very easy to advance for the first time, don't be nervous."

Yanis said calmly: "You have to believe in yourself, you are very strong, and your foundation is more solid than most people. It is the first time to advance, it is the full moon advancement... there should be about six or seven people who can advance." , then what are you afraid of?"

"...This is what I'm afraid of."

Isabel looked worried: "If six of the nine people can advance, but I can't advance - then if this spreads out, it will lose the face of the royal family.

"Moreover, there will be people who gossip about you, teacher, and there will be people who say bad things about you. They will spread terrible rumors..."

She was able to embark on the path of beauty purely because of Queen Sofia's doting on her. Because the royal family of Avalon, the "Du Lac" family, can normally only choose the authoritarian path.

But among the Queen's six grandchildren, Her Majesty's favorite is the second youngest Isabel.

Younger than Isabel, only her brother was only two years old.

Isabel showed her outstanding artistic talent at a very young age.

When she was only four years old, she accompanied the Queen to listen to the opera "Lulu's Magic Flute". Even though she didn't understand the Star Antimony language, she could hum the verses directly after listening to it once.

Queen Sofia was very happy. Because before she became the queen, she dreamed of becoming an opera master. She even wrote several operas of her own in her spare time after inheriting the throne. I didn't publish it just because of my identity.

Among her many children, only Isabel inherited her opera talent.

Because of this, she defied all odds.

It directly set a precedent for Isabel. Allow her to enter the path of beauty and formally study "art".

The path of beauty is the path of harmony and art, flow and eternity.

The key skill on the road to beauty is "art".

Including opera, music, painting, sculpture, drama, dance, and poetry, they all belong to the mysterious skills of the path of beauty.

Art itself is mysterious. Great art masters, without exception, are all pioneers in the path of beauty.

Just as the key skill of the authoritarian path is the "skill of leadership" - the king's skill of commanding his subordinates and the skill of arranging others to obey him are also mysterious.

If you want to increase the depth of your path, specializing in one skill is definitely not enough.

Perhaps because of her one-quarter elf blood, Isabel's talent lies in singing and dancing.

And since you want to embark on the road, you must go on firmly.

Once extraordinary people enter the path, they are obsessed with the desire to rise higher - they become obsessed with drilling deeper and rising higher. The longer you stay where you are, the easier it is to go crazy.

It's like an outstanding young person in a certain industry who has some talent but cannot be called a genius. They often feel desperate for their true talent - that is a soul-shaking chasm that people outside this industry cannot feel and can only understand after being deeply involved in this industry.

This sense of powerlessness and shock, if it occurs on the extraordinary path, will make a person crazy.

The path of beauty emphasizes perceiving the beauty of the world and realizing the harmony and eternity of the world... which makes it easier to become crazy.

Those masters of art who specialize in one art are almost without exception crazy.

Therefore, the Queen specially invited Master Yanis for Isabel to teach her the skills of painting, sculpture and music arrangement.

Because this is the safest promotion route.

Anyway, it was not Isabel's turn to succeed. Since the queen is happy, let the children play.

That’s what others thought at the time.

However, the good times did not last long.

Starting more than ten years ago, the Avalon royal family suddenly began to fall ill one after another.

At first, it was suspected that someone was poisoning, but later it was determined that someone was carrying out a powerful curse of annihilation - a continuous and powerful curse that even the church's illumination technique could not completely dispel, and the holy bones of the sages of the past generations could not protect it.

What cannot be dispelled and resisted by the power of one country can only be a curse issued by another country.

Who else could it be?

It can only be the Kingdom of Star Antimony.

Although there is no evidence in Avalon, we know from common sense that... ritualists who can use this kind of strength can only be in the Kingdom of Star Antimony.

So, starting a few years ago - with the first royal being dragged to death by an incurable curse - Avalon and Star Antimony officially entered a state of hostility.

Today, among Isabel's father's generation, only her father is still alive.

And in her lifetime, half of them have died of illness.

Only Isabel's eldest brother, Isabel, and her two-year-old brother were left.

She did nothing and somehow became the third heir to the Kingdom of Avalon.

——If she really inherits the throne, then a big problem will arise.

Avalon, where the whole country advocates the path of authoritarianism, has a new queen who has no aptitude for the path of authoritarianism at all.

Now she is the third heir, but no one knows whether she will suddenly become the first. Because "third" is already a very dangerous position.

Isabel did nothing wrong, and Master Yanis even less so. However, due to changes in the situation, there were even rumors among the kingdom's senior officials that the purpose of the Star Antimony Kingdom was to put Isabel on the throne - so that Avalon could be plunged into chaos from within.

The entire kingdom's privileged class, all the extraordinary people in government departments, and even most of the soldiers came from the authoritarian path. How could the Queen of the Path of Beauty get their 100% loyalty?

So Isabel was under a lot of pressure.

Any mistakes she makes will be magnified continuously. Then be criticized and blamed.

But she didn't want to blame them either.

Because she could sense that they were under a lot of pressure and worried about the future.

She can also understand that their worries are correct - if she really becomes the queen in the future, I am afraid that there will be long-term chaos in Avalon. But she really doesn't have the adaptability to authoritarianism... She has tried hard many times, but she really can't learn it.

All she could pray for was that her brothers would not die again.

But she couldn't do anything. She didn't say this either.

She can only do everything according to the rules, silently and do her best - and don't let others have the opportunity to find fault.

Because of this, she did not use her privilege. Instead, he entered university and lived with other students.

She became a transcendent through formal channels only after passing the comprehensive assessment for the three semesters of her freshman year. Before that, she strictly restricted the scope of her studies and only studied the marginal parts of "art" skills, the parts that ordinary people could touch... Then she continued to hone her basic skills, but never progressed to anything related to the extraordinary. The study of strength.

She endured it and practiced basic skills for thirteen years.

It's boring and meaningless, and painful enough to make you want to vomit. But she persisted.

Because she wanted to show that she would not use royal privileges at will.

She hopes this will silence those dissatisfied voices.

She tried hard to downplay her image as a "princess" and hoped that people would only view her as an ordinary person, rather than the third heir to the kingdom.

Only now did she suddenly realize——

Maybe I have never become an "ordinary person" in the true sense.

She was still being served, pampered, and helped.

While other extraordinary beings were preparing their own rituals, she could only sit aside and drink tea. The royal ritualist will help her take care of everything, and she doesn't have to do anything - she doesn't have to worry about drawing the wrong ritual array, or buying inferior or fake materials that will cause the ritual to fail.

"...I'd better do it myself."

Isabel made up her mind.

She bowed deeply to the ritual master: "Master Osborne, I'm very sorry... It's not that I don't trust you. I just thought... maybe it wouldn't be good if I watched from the sidelines."

Isabel didn't know how to describe the tension and anxiety in her heart.

But as she watched the white-haired ritual master prepare the ceremony for her, she always felt uneasy.

It's like it was your own fault, but someone else took the blame.

Her older brothers and sisters loved her very much. If she accidentally broke something, they would be the first to admit it.

Although Isabel was not reprimanded at that time, she always felt restless.

——Just like now.

It was like something was tormenting my heart.

"Please let me prepare for the promotion ceremony myself."

Princess Isabelle repeated.

Her voice became clearer and less timid than before: "You can assist me on the side, Master Osborne."

The white-haired ritualist on the side happily touched his beard and nodded with a smile.

"Okay, my little princess. It's true that this kind of thing... you really have to do it yourself to have a sense of ceremony.

"Remember this feeling well, Your Highness Princess. Entering the dream world for the first time, contacting the other eight paths for the first time. Truly breaking away from the status of 'trainee' and becoming a true transcendent——"

The other side.

In Moriarty Manor, Aiwass climbed out of bed, holding his forehead.

He actually hasn't had enough sleep.

But his spiritual intuition told him that if he didn't wake up, things would be delayed - so he forced himself to wake up.

The sun is setting outside.

Aiwass rubbed the match with trembling hands several times before lighting it.

Shivering, he lit the white candle placed by his bedside - this was obviously the "therapeutic medicine" prepared by Oswald.

Aiwass grasped the flame and felt the vitality pouring into his body from the candle flame, and then he slowly breathed a sigh of relief.

Fortunately...because Aiwass is interested in occultism, he has a variety of materials prepared in his room. It won't delay things.

The so-called "poor students have too much stationery".

Although he didn't know how to use it, he bought everything he could buy.

...It’s just that he hasn’t eaten all day. Hungry and flustered.

Think of ways to fill your stomach first, and then come back and quickly prepare for the promotion ceremony.

I have read 5,000 words, and Maomao is very happy - so today is an update of more than 8,000 words! ! !

You won't be able to see this chapter when it is posted today, but I can see it in the background, so if you want to complain, or if you see typos or wrong sentences, you can still say it! If nothing else, it should be restored tomorrow~