Chapter 831 “Follower I”

"It's easy for little kids to get carried away with the illusion that it's reality for them. Even though the mass witch hunts are over, they're still reporting and like to accuse people in public. Do you remember the story about the Emperor's New Clothes?" The bishop's secretary of the diocese of Venice, in his office inside the Basilica of San Marco, asked two uninvited guests.

"You mean the kid who no one else dared to say but one kid who said the Emperor had no clothes?" Snape asked.

"It's a pleasure to get the attention of adults, especially children in the street. The last witch to be executed in Bavaria was a girl named Veronica Zellachin in 1756. She was 14 years old. She was kicked out of the house by her stepfather when she was 5 years old, she joined a children's gang, lived by pickpocketing, and was sent to an orphanage by a distant relative, she was already very abnormal at that time."

"Why is it abnormal?" Gianluca asked.

"She stole the communion, not the gold and silver tableware, but the unleavened bread, and the bread broke in her hands..."

"Is it broken or fermented?" Snape asked.

"No one will eat the food she touches," said the secretary-general. "I've never seen food desecrated like that."

"Bugs?" Snape asked with a smile that didn't bother him.

"In the 1680s, children could still be key witnesses, and some witch commissioners of the Inquisition even used 'possessed' girls to identify whether a suspect was a witch or not, because they claimed that the witch had the mark of the devil on his body. Take it as true." The Secretary-General laughed funnyly and said, "Did you take the words of the kid who falsely accused your godson to be true, wizard?"

"Do you see a mark on me?" Snape smiled sarcastically.

"You have evil eyes," said the Secretary-General. "You're really bad at hiding."

"I'm not going to pretend I'm a Muggle because I'm afraid I'll be hunted down," Snape said. "Go on about that Veronica girl."

"The courts had a particularly difficult time dealing with the allegations of young children. Under the law at the time, teenagers under the age of 14 were not required to turn themselves in, but to deal with their guardians, usually their mothers and aunts, but street children had no guardians. They ran away from home, or their parents died of the plague, and they slept behind cowsheds, stables, or bathing sheds, and they avoided contact with adults as much as possible, because they did not trust adults, and lived by begging and odd jobs, compared with sending them Workshops, they are more willing to accept the church’s alms, the lord and the monastery will have regulations, charity can only be done for a few days, the charity of this parish is over, they will go to the next parish, and they use the monastery as a base during the journey..."

"Then betray the information to you, all right, let's go back to the Veronica story." Snape interrupted the Secretary-General impatiently.

"Girls are more obedient than boys. Boys are rebellious and troublesome. Sometimes they will be persecuted by local 'law and order' defenders. From time to time, there will be large-scale reports. As long as the referee is willing to deal with them, they dare to report. The stories they make up are their basis. Anyway, those boys have nothing to lose.” Acting, like they were born to be actors, but Veronica is different, after finding out she stole the communion, the nun at the orphanage let the Franciscan friars come and see, and under the threat of a whip she didn't steal the communion bread .”

"That way you won't be executed?" Gianluca said.

"She ran away again, and went to work as a maid in a rich man's house, but she showed signs of being possessed again, and the master drove her away in fear. Later, she tried to commit suicide but failed, and she again Went to the house where she worked and killed the mistress and her child."

"How did she kill herself?" Snape asked.

"You won't believe it." The secretary-general stubbed out his cigarette, and said calmly, "After being arrested, she was very obedient and didn't need to torture her to extract a confession. She took all the charges, including flying at night and worshiping demons in the middle of the night. She also Knowing that she will die if she admits these crimes, but she doesn't care anymore, what if you are the judge?"

"She doesn't want to go back to the orphanage?" Snape asked.

"I'm still thinking, why does she only steal communion?" said the Secretary-General. "She can steal the gold and silver, just like the thief boys, and the bread is worthless."

"Can't you exorcise her?" Gianluca asked.

"People are already crazy, maybe the lunatic asylum can find some peace, there are wizards panic everywhere, and many people are swindling under the guise of exorcism. The most famous exorcist at that time was John Joseph Gasner. Linking disease to witchcraft, other exorcists have been equated with jugglers, myth-tellers and charlatans, and only a handful are powerful enough to be exorcists. Even now, the Holy See has only 200 exorcists. Demon man, to deal with exorcism all over the world."

"Priority is to save those who are worth saving. Orphans like Veronica are not worth saving." Gianluca said coldly.

"Do you have a better way?" the Secretary-General asked.

"So, she was executed?" Snape asked.

"That's what it says in the information." The secretary-general lit another cigarette, "Kant said that the task of a philosopher is to explore the boundaries of human reasoning, but I have no intention of being a detective."

"You think she's saved?" Gianluca asked.

"Women and children are often considered innocent victims, and judges are people with eccentricities, not to mention Veronica is a little girl." The Secretary-General sneered, "The intelligence of a group is always lower than that of an isolated individual. But in terms of emotion and action, the group is higher or lower than the individual, and maybe there is a group that saved her."

"Your evidence?" Snape asked.

"Bavaria doesn't have to deal with wizard burning, but beheading, and her body was exhumed." The Secretary-General rubbed his brows. "Bavaria is a relatively enlightened region, but sometimes I hope that the candidate emperor will not be so enlightened."

"Even a wizard would die if his head was chopped off," Snape said.

"Thank you for your comfort." The secretary-general smiled wryly, "Although you know witchcraft, you are still human beings."

"Maybe she used invisibility to deceive you." The wizard said mercilessly to the pastor. "During the French Revolution, a wizard used invisibility to hide his neck and escaped the revolutionaries."

The long face of the priest has become longer.

"You mean the wizarding movement has a lot to do with children?" Gianluca asked.

"Not every child is an angel, and there are children who are like demons." The Secretary-General said, "Maybe Zodiac is haunted by the evil spirit of a killer who specializes in eradicating children."

"Are they related to ETT?" Snape asked.

"It's definitely not a 'white penitent'." The Secretary-General recalled, "nor is it a 'black legend'."

"Is that the name of the band?" Gianluca asked.

"You tell me, teenager." The Secretary-General said deadpan.

"Is it possible that they were rescued by kind monks?" Snape said. "I know there are quite a few wizards hiding in the Church."

"You want to create internal strife? Let us check out our own people?"

"As you please!" Snape sneered.

"Devil possession is contagious. We are also human beings. Protestants were the first to deny the belief of wizards. No matter what era you are in, you are all shit-stirring sticks." The Secretary-General glared at Snape.

The wizard spread his arms and shrugged.

"What do you mean?" Gianluca asked.

"Religious Reformation promoted the decline of wizards' beliefs. They were the first to abolish the Inquisition!" The Secretary-General said angrily, "They distributed pamphlets everywhere, saying that mass is the pope's witchcraft, and it was the same when they attacked the Ottoman Empire." They secretly robbed merchant ships in the Mediterranean, and when the Palatine passed secular laws to declare witch hunting illegal, the King of England did not agree..."

"Oh! This is the crux!" Snape yelled. "We also sent representatives to hope that the king will agree to hunt wizards illegally!"

"Then why didn't they agree?"

"Because they think it's absurd to admit that there is magic in the world!" Snape yelled like Feronundsley, "There is no magic in this world!"

"What?" Gianluca asked stupidly.

"The people of Heidelberg don't believe in witchcraft either." The Secretary-General gritted his teeth, "So they legislate against harming wizards."

"It's like Prohibition, the more it is banned, the more rampant it becomes." Snape said helplessly, "Then it was banned."

"They did a good job, directly attacking the belief of wizards." Gianluca murmured, "This way, the Holy See and the secular world have been turned into superstition by Protestant countries."

"You are so naive, child. When they preached, they equated the contract signed by wizards and devils with the contract between believers and God." The secretary-general smiled and said, "Moses' ten commandments, do not worship idols, you Worship is the cross, which was borne by the Lord on the way of suffering, who on earth signed the contract with the devil?"

"I told you, I am a godfather only because of tradition."

"What are you doing here today?" the Secretary-General asked aggressively, as if planning to die at any time.

"Isn't this the time?" Gianluca asked.

"Yes, now is not the time." Snape pursed his lips. "Very bad time."

Britain is isolated. If they don't look for the United States as a small partner, who else can they look for?

Both Newton and Einstein eventually went to study theology and occultism, why?