Dragon Clan: They're all insane, and you still want me to slay dragons?

Page 105

"Kakaka..."

The flashes went off continuously. The shop manager put down his camera and called everyone to look at the photos, saying that if anyone was not satisfied, they could have more photos taken.

Caesar remained unmoved. He was confident in his good looks; a handsome man like him could stir the hearts of countless girls even when he was picking his toes.

Chu Zihang remained unmoved, indifferent to whether the photo was handsome or not.

Several girls swarmed forward, probably because girls like taking pictures. At that moment, the elite mixed-race girls and the two ordinary maids found common ground, pointing at the original photos on the screen and saying things like, "The lighting here isn't good," and "So-and-so's expression is a bit off..."

When the girls reached a conclusion and turned to ask the boys for their opinions, they discovered that Gao Kui had disappeared.

"What about people?"

"left already."

"How did you leave?"

“He took the subway. I just saw him enter the subway station.” Chu Zihang pointed to the Nakano Station subway entrance outside the window.

Damn it!

Sakura Yabuki had a headache.

The Snake Clan is incredibly powerful in Japan, with connections and influence reaching everywhere. There are only two locations, or rather two areas or systems in Tokyo, where the Snake Clan cannot extend its reach or informants.

The first is Bancho, near the Imperial Palace in Chiyoda Ward, and the second is Tokyo's subway system.

Tokyo's subway system is extensive, with a peak hourly throughput of 300,000 to 400,000 passengers. Even the Herikihachi family could not efficiently monitor every station and every carriage.

Admittedly, once Gao Kui exits the subway, as long as he doesn't go to a particularly remote place, there's a very high probability he'll be back under the surveillance of the Snake Clan. However, it's also true that he escaped their surveillance for a certain period of time.

How to do?

The only option was to find an opportunity to send a message to Yuan Zhisheng, informing him that the Northern Qi prince had boarded the Tokyo subway and that Tokyo's underworld forces should be mobilized immediately to bring the Northern Qi prince back into the surveillance range.

While Sakura Yabuki was agonizing over her troubles, Takagi had already been aimlessly drifting along in the subway car for two stops.

The train was crowded, even though it wasn't yet peak season. Tokyo is a tourist city, with countless visitors to the metropolitan area throughout the year, putting the city's public transportation capacity to the test.

After sitting for a while, Gao Kui finally found a seat, which was given to him by an elderly man in his sixties or seventies with gray hair, wearing a suit and carrying a briefcase.

The old man said, "Young man, your eyes look so tired, you must have been working a lot of overtime. You young people born after the bubble economy need this position more than we do," and so on...

The old man was very warm and friendly, and Gao Kui responded very politely, but deep down he felt increasingly cold and distant from the world.

Surrounded by crowds, he felt there was nowhere in the world he could find refuge. As the plane landed, the feeling of disgust and alienation surged over him intensified.

After endlessly changing trains without any clear destination, Gao Kui finally found a place where he could catch his breath after two hours.

St. Mary's Cathedral in Tokyo, the Catholic cathedral in Tokyo, is only 3.5 kilometers away from the University of Tokyo.

The curved walls rise from the oblique quadrilateral plane of the ground, converging at the top into a horizontal cross-shaped skylight. Viewed from above, it resembles a Latin cross; viewed from below, it looks like a silver bird about to take flight.

Sunday, often called "Sunday" or "Easter Sunday" in Christianity, is a day when believers, bathed in the glory of the Lord, gather together in church to celebrate Mass and share Holy Communion.

At this very moment, a mass is being held in the main hall of the church, with all the faithful singing hymns to welcome the start of the liturgy.

It wasn't that Gao Kui came by chance, but rather that the St. Mary's Cathedral in Tokyo, as a cathedral, holds a mass every hour and a half or so, starting at 7:30 a.m. on Sundays, until it closes at sunset.

"Our Father in heaven..."

The eulogies emanating from the church formed a low, solemn hum. Standing in front of the church, Gao Kui listened to the eulogies in the main hall and felt his heart completely calmed down.

Chapter 133 Saint Mary

Instead of immediately entering the church, Gao Kui wandered aimlessly around the church entrance.

Directly opposite the church entrance stands an obelisk, its interior hollowed out to resemble a chest. A dozen or so believers gather beneath the obelisk, hushed to their own words as they recount amusing events of the past week.

Gao Kui listened from afar for a while and realized that the people were all speaking Korean. Among the believers lingering in the small square in front of the church, there were more who spoke Korean than Japanese.

This is not surprising. South Korea and Japan can be considered neighboring countries. The three major Christian religions combined have only a little over one million believers in Japan, while Christians account for about 40% of the total population in South Korea, making it a Christian country that is not a Christian country.

fantastic.

The micro-expressions and demeanor of these believers were significantly different from those of the Japanese and Koreans that Gao Kui had in mind, and were no different from believers in China.

While a sense of familiarity arose, an extremely unusual sense of alienation lingered in his heart. The closer he got to the believers and the more he listened to the archives in the church, the more he felt alienated from the whole world.

In "The Divine Comedy," Dante is lost in the Dark Forest and is guided by the ancient Roman poet Virgil to visit Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven, experiencing a journey of redemption for his soul.

Dante was a lost soul, Virgil was his guide. Fate had decreed that Dante would be guided by Virgil to purify his morality and spirit, ultimately leading to the creation of "The Divine Comedy".

At this moment, he felt that he was no different from Dante, who was lost in the dark forest. He was also lost in the steel forest of a foreign land, and he was also troubled by three wild beasts: a leopard, a lion, and a wolf.

The prayers of his followers are his Virgil, guiding him through the fog of delusion, overcoming hardships and obstacles, and suppressing the challenges posed by the leopard, lion, and wolf. Just as Dante wrote the Divine Comedy, he did what he truly wanted and ought to do.

All of this can be ended by following the prayers in the church and heeding the call of your heart.

Do you really want to do it?

Regardless of whether that dreamlike intuition and feeling was real or fake, right or wrong, when faced with a choice, Gao Kui couldn't help but feel reluctant to leave this world that had alienated him.

It was a very strange feeling; if I had to make an analogy, it would probably be pain.

Painful stimuli trigger the release of endorphins in the body, which may produce a brief feeling of euphoria while relieving pain. Therefore, just the right amount of pain can actually produce pleasure. For example, the feeling is especially pronounced when you scratch your skin when it itches.

Gao Kui has always loathed the alienation and falseness of the world. Now, faced with a choice, he feels a lingering attachment, almost like scratching an itchy spot.

After lingering at the door for a long time, Gao Kui finally went into the church.

St. Mary's Cathedral in Tokyo usually doesn't open its main entrance; worshippers and tourists can only enter through the side entrances. Fortunately, today is Sunday, and the cathedral doors will be open all day.

When we entered, the staff at the main entrance told us to try not to make any noise and not to walk forward; we could only sit on the benches in the back.

Gao Kui asked why?

Staff explained that Masses are normally kept entirely private; once a group of worshippers enters, all the doors are closed. After they leave, the priest rests briefly before allowing others in for the next Mass, continuing this practice until the end of the day.

However, cults are rampant in Japan and South Korea, and Christianity is declining in Japan. This church, designed by Kenzo Tange, is also very famous...

In order to distinguish itself from the shady cults in Japan and to help more lost children return to the Lord's embrace, the bishop recently decided to allow tourists and catechumens to enter the church during Mass and observe the Mass proceedings from the back row.

Yes, that's very Christian, Gao Kui thought to himself, giving a thumbs-up to the bishop of the Tokyo diocese.

Christianity, the world's largest religious sect, has a characteristic very similar to Confucianism in China: it knows how to innovate and keep up with the times, and is extremely adaptable.

At least today, Christian denominations have very few rules when it comes to their outreach to the masses. Calling them religions is an understatement; they're more like political parties with generally conservative ideologies.

Looking at Japan, South Korea, Europe, and the United States, compared with cults, extremist organizations, extreme progressives, and leftist movements, the reformed ideas of the three Christian religions instantly become clear and distinct.

As soon as you enter the church through the main gate, you are greeted by gray trapezoidal cement walls on both sides and a white ceiling about three or four meters high overhead. Overall, it feels no different from an ordinary room.

After stepping out of the corridor, everything suddenly became clear.

Unlike traditional Gothic, Romanesque, and Baroque churches, the interior of this church is incredibly simple, with no arched doors and windows, no stained glass, and no flying buttresses...

The walls meet at the same point, connected by skylights, forming a huge cross-shaped skylight. The gray walls slope upwards and converge above the lectern, allowing sunlight to naturally stream in through the skylights.

The church interior is devoid of any superfluous decorations, featuring only gray trapezoidal walls, long tables and benches, and a pulpit. The sense of depth and spaciousness is immediately apparent, and the sound of the worshippers' prayers echoes throughout the church, creating a solemn atmosphere that makes one instinctively reluctant to make any noise.

The priest, choir, and band presiding over the Mass stood on the pulpit, leading the congregation in singing praises of the Father's grace. They didn't even glance at Gao Kui as he entered the church.

Gao Kui consciously found a seat in the back row and sat down.

Compared to the congregation in the front row attending Mass, there were far fewer people in the back rows, only about twenty. Gao Kui guessed that they were either tourists or people who missed this round of Mass and were quite devout, so they came into the church to pray silently in a place closer to the Father.

For example, the man sitting next to Gao Kui was an elderly man in his fifties or sixties, tall and robust, with more defined features than most East Asian men, suggesting he was of mixed Eastern and Western descent. For someone his age, he was generally considered quite handsome.

He was wearing a loose-fitting, all-black suit. Judging from the cut, it was probably a product of the last century. The wear and tear on the cuffs and collar also gave it a heavy sense of age. Overall, he looked a bit like Angers, but a bankrupt version.

Anger wears a haute couture suit designed by a master craftsman a maximum of three times; wearing it even once more would be disrespectful to the board of directors' finances.

The old man looked up at Gao Kui, nodded, moved aside, and then continued to bow his head and pray silently.

Entrance hymn, greeting, penitential prayer, mercy and glories, Bible readings... Thanksgiving prayer, receiving Holy Communion.

The priest said, “This is the body of the Lord, which was given for you. Do this in remembrance of the Lord. And whenever you drink this cup of wine, which is the new covenant in the blood of the Lord, do this in remembrance of the Lord.”

The believers say that the Lord is the bread of life. Those who come to the Lord will never go hungry, and those who believe in the Lord will never be thirsty. Under the guidance of the priest, they will share in the Lord's blood and flesh.

This was not the first time Gao Kui had watched the congregation celebrate Mass. Several years ago, when he fell ill, he had watched the congregation celebrate Mass in a small church in FZ City.

That church was a Protestant church, and as is well known, Protestants have the fewest rules and the simplest religious rituals, while this St. Mary's Church is a Catholic church.

This was the first time Gao Kui had ever witnessed such a complicated mass. In the midst of this tedious process, he felt an unprecedented sense of solemnity and grandeur, and he vaguely wanted to immerse himself in it, to completely sever ties with and abandon that false and alienated world.

After the ceremony, the faithful who had shared in communion filed out in silence. Gao Kui wanted to find the priest to chat with him and clear up some of his doubts, but the priest turned around and went backstage without looking back after finishing the Mass.

"That's the bishop of the Tokyo diocese."

The old man stood up and stood next to Gao Kui, explaining, "This church is the Catholic cathedral in Tokyo. The bishop is usually busy with various branch churches in Tokyo and rarely performs Mass for the faithful in person. Today is an exception."

Therefore, there are especially many people attending Mass at the church today. Those who come today are truly blessed to have Mass presided over by the Lord's shepherds.

"Did you come to the church for Mass today because the bishop is presiding over it?" Gao Kui casually struck up a conversation with the old man, and the two followed the flow of people out of the solemn church.

“No, I come every week, without fail for decades.” The old man shook his head.

"If that's the case, why do we say that the faithful who came today are blessed simply because the bishop is presiding over Mass?"

"Do you think the bishop is someone who values ​​authority a lot, or rather, someone who is very distant?" the old man asked Gao Kui.

Young people these days are all arrogant and can't stand being wronged. This interviewee developed a dislike for the bishop after being ignored by him, which is understandable to the older generation.

“No, I have no ill feelings towards him; in fact, I think he’s a very good bishop.” Gao Kui shook his head.

Gao Kui could completely understand why the bishop left without looking back when he tried to ask for help. After all, the bishop had presided over Mass all day and also had to manage diocesan affairs, so he was busy with work and time.

On the other hand, the staff at the entrance said that it was the bishop who made the decision to make the Mass public, in order to distinguish it from cults in Japan and to accept more lost people.

Gao Kui strongly agreed with this move to reform the old rules. After all, Christianity was originally a product of reforming Jewish doctrines.

After a pause, Gao Kui continued, "I just feel that believers shouldn't have so much awe and respect for bishops, simply because they feel blessed to have a mass presided over by a bishop..."

Gao Kui was expressing a very abstract concept and idea that ordinary people couldn't understand, but the old man understood it.

"Are you a Protestant?" The old man roughly understood Gao Kui's background.

Protestantism advocates equality among Protestant believers, has no strict hierarchical system, allows each denomination to be independent and autonomous, and does not recognize the authority of the Catholic Pope or the episcopal system.

“My ‘mother’ at the orphanage was a Protestant, but I wasn’t. I should be considered a follower of Protestantism, or perhaps not even that…”

The old man nodded in realization. It was quite normal for Protestant seekers to dislike the complicated religious rituals and rules of Catholicism; just as there are many factions within the Lord's retinue.

An old man, with a deep Christian background, a somewhat confused heretic who had not yet been baptized, created a portrait of Gao Kui in his mind.