[Can you guys elaborate what the fuck you mean by them already being defeated?] Nepherage asked the twins. [It sounded like the battle ended in a minute.]

[It...kind of did?] Porcelain Doll answered first. [I think this is something between shown and explained. Logos, Pathos, do you mind assisting?]

<=Not at all=>

In various corners and hiding spots of Emberona, the kaijin began to settle themselves in preparation for a moment that had played out just minutes ago. However, they and the curators would be pouring over this footage for hours once they finished watching.

Especially since what they saw was an incomplete picture, due to the awkward angle the Doll Twins were situated in when everything went down.

They were able to see everything play out, but they weren't able to hear anything useful.

...So, what happened?...

In a small corner of the city of Emberona, two particularly weird sects with incredibly polarizing rulesets were in the middle of performing their nightly rituals.

On one side was the Sisterhood of the Hearth, aka, that group of sexy nuns who were trying to recruit Zhen Liu and his friends earlier in the day. They were in the middle of a ritualistic orgy.

On the other side was the Brotherhood of the Burnt Loins, a monastic order of voluntary celibates who all wore specially made self-immolating chastity belts. They were in the middle of resealing their belts for the week.

The two sects rarely got along with each other due to their differing values, but they never seemed to turn violent on each other despite having every reason on paper to do so.

Even when they were arguing with each other about how their rituals were sins to one another, they never seemed to act on their threats. Especially since the lack of bloodlust in their voices made the Doll Twins think that these guys were all bluster with no bite.

That is, until the wall that the two aforementioned sects had their respective headquarters built next to suddenly exploded and allowed a whole fuckton of Erupting Dawn Soldiers to suddenly enter like roaches being smoked out of a wall.

Now, this should've been the part where the soldiers get the drop on the arguing worshippers and cause a massacre that would inevitably cause instability in Emberona and lead to Zhen Liu and his friends meddling because…reasons.

However, while a massacre did happen, it went in the opposite direction.

In a surprisingly brutal manner too.

To be more precise, shortly after the contingent of Erupting Dawn soldiers made their appearance, a group of Temple Guards had arrived at the scene in an almost clockwork-like manner.

Then, under the leadership of these elite warriors, the Sisters of the Hearth and the Brotherhood of the Burnt Loins put aside their differences and absolutely slaughtered the enemy soldiers.

Normally such conflicts lead to casualties on both sides, with bodies piled high enough to be relatively disturbing.

The only corpses present at the aftermath of this particular battle were those belonging to the enemy soldiers and nobody else.

The warriors composed of the three aforementioned aligned factions seemed to move with a weird amount of coordination that could only be described as mechanically beautiful. Honestly, the only comparison the twins could make in regard to their movements were those of the zakos whenever they were in battle formation.

It looked natural but had a heavy degree of unnaturalness to it.

Once the battle was over, the respective members of each sect helped to clean up the mess alongside the temple guards, who then proceeded to plug up the hole as if it never happened.

And once it was all said and done, the two conflicting sects went back to yelling and cussing at one another over their religious practices, as if they hadn't just disemboweled multiple motherfuckers just seconds ago.

The blood on their hands was still cooling and coagulating as they argued.

…Well, that was weird…

The kaijin were silent as they tried to process what the fuck they had just witnessed through the eyes of their proto-counterparts.

On the one hand, it was impressive to see how such disparate warriors managed to execute meticulous military movements with perfect coordination and timing. On the other hand, that made no goddamn sense since these guys didn't appear united in the slightest.

Such coordination required warriors that were familiar with each other down to the strands of hairs on their heads, or zakos.

Not a bunch of arguing religious nutters.

[Okay, either I'm going nuts or there was something deeply wrong with the way those guys were moving,] Nepherage noted. [Seriously, did you see how flawless that switch-up was? It was like they were sharing a brain. ]

[Yeah,] Hurricroak agreed. [And that's coming from us, the guys who literally have connected brains.]

[So is it a hive mind situation or something else entirely?] Razorstella asked. [Because I sincerely thought we wouldn't be dealing with that kind of thing until we run into Buzza or some weird swarm cultivator.]

[We don't know,] Springerdermain answered. [So I suppose we'll have to leave it for the curators to sort through.]

...Okay, what do the smart people think?...

<Well, that's unexpected,> Pathos commented at the display. <I thought you said that the war front was a couple dozen miles away from Emberona.>

=The main war theater is at least several dozen miles away from our Lord's current position,= Logos defended herself as she pulled up another display and began to do a deep dive analysis of who these raiders were.

They may have been defeated in a matter of seconds and weren't the most interesting thing about this whole conflict, but they were still a source of useful information.

Besides, the curators had to kill time while their main analysis array was working to read through whatever the fuck was coordinating the people of Emberona.

=Oh, well, that's interesting. =

<What?>

=The uniforms these soldiers are wearing are of an older style of the Erupting Dawn Empire's army standard. We got the records for it here in the archive. =

<Okay that's not that weird; cheap bastards will be cheap if they can help it. Especially during war.>

=Yes, but...=

Logos trailed off as they waved a hand over the display and caused several pieces of armor to start glowing before expanding into even more detailed panels.

These panels showed the exact era each piece of armor was used and what materials were used to make and reinforce them.

It was in these displays that Pathos understood what was bothering Logos.

<Oh, that's what you meant. >

The display panels revealed that the various armor pieces weren't just two to ten years apart from each other. Some of these pieces were hundreds of years apart.

=Welp, I think we're going to need samples in order to determine the secret behind these weirdo soldiers and that weird method of fighting. =

<You want the kaijin to steal the corpses of those soldiers?>

=Yup!=

<Huh…wait, committing crimes is my thing!>

=Huh…you're not wrong.=

…Hurray crimes!...

[We need to steal a body?] Nepherage asked.

<=Yes.=>

[We got it!] answered the Doll Twins.

While they were in the midst of exchanging information with the other kaijin, the Doll Twins had actually been actively tailing the transport that the temple guards had produced to transport all of the corpses away from the wall. After all, it wouldn't look good if a city's defenses showed corpses on the opposite of a wall that they should've been on.

That stated, the twins were rather confused at the route that this corpse wagon was taking.

Why?

Because it wasn't being led outside of the city.

Instead, this corpse transport was being actively brought into deeper parts of the city.

The twins had initially assumed that perhaps the bodies were being brought to the district where all the embalmers and funerary rite-focused groups were gathered to have them consecrate the dead.

But that didn't happen as the wagon was brought right through without a single stop.

They then assumed that, as macarbe as it sounded, that the bodies were being brought to the crafting district where they could either be burned or... utilized.

They weren't entirely sure if there were any cannibal flesh sects mixed in, but it was a possibility.

But alas, the corpse wagon turned left before entering the crafting district.

This was the moment things got...weird.

[Hey...what's that big building we're approaching?] Corpse Doll asked Porcelain Doll as the duo began to walk along the edge of a textured prayer wall. [It looks like a palace but it feels...weird. Like...a hot version of that rift that Caretaker stuck his head into.]

[If I had to guess? I think that's where the Sacred Flame is located.]

The big building that Corpse Doll mentioned was this giant pyramid-like temple that appeared like a bonfire to the senses of the kaijin.

The corpse wagon that they were following entered this bonfire-like building and immediately disappeared.

[Uh oh.] 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝘦𝓌𝑒𝑏𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝘭.𝒸𝘰𝑚

This meant the Doll Twins had to make a choice.

[Do we follow or do we turn back? Decisions, decisions...]