The ship slowly entered the waters controlled by the Holy Mother Church.
Although the entire region was under the Church's dominion, its territory was far smaller than that of the Blood Gold Alliance, roughly a quarter of its size.
On every island within its sphere of influence, the Virgin Mary was worshipped. There was something undeniably strange about it.
The treasure-hunting group was, in essence, affiliated with the Holy Mother Church, yet no one had ever attempted to spread the faith among them. Logically, every member aboard the ship should have been a believer.
After all, churches devoted to her existed even within the Blood Gold Alliance. On Turan Island, for instance, where Ed had first gone ashore, there stood a church dedicated to the Virgin Mary.
The Blood Gold Alliance did not forbid belief in her. If anything, it regarded the faith as a stabilizing influence.
