The Era of Gods

Chapter 387: The Power of Faith Accumulated Over a Millennium

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Since it contains a powerful life force, it naturally has an extremely potent healing effect.

But that’s just a basic application. The higher application of the Seed of Life is resurrection. When he became a Totem Lord, the seeds of life he produced could resurrect the dead, and this resurrection function was much stronger than ordinary Resurrection Techniques. Unlike the Divine Arts of resurrection, which have limitations, the top-tier Seeds of Life could perfectly resurrect any being, even if only a remnant soul remained, it could restore the soul to its perfect state.

To illuminate this talent, a branch from an ancient tree containing a powerful life force was needed, regardless of the tree species. As long as it came from an ancient tree with a powerful life force, it would suffice.

In the Totem World, Lin Xiao would probably break his legs running everywhere without knowing where to find such an item, but with the backing of the Yan Huang No. 5 War Zone, this wasn’t a problem.

As Commander Xie Tianyan put it, as long as it was related to this operation, all his requests would be satisfied, even if he took the opportunity to profit personally.

For a superpower, everything he needed now was just a trifle, and even demands he thought were excessive seemed so. Moreover, his request was prepared for this mission, so there would be no objections.

Soon, a branch that seemed fresh and tender appeared inside the Creation Rubik’s Cube. When taken out, a fresh sense of life force hit him.

This was a tender young branch from an adult Tree of Life, freshly picked less than half a day ago.

The tender young branch from an adult Tree of Life completely met the requirements to illuminate the second talent.

After refining the tender branch, a thin wave of life force flowed into the totem phantom, mixing with the Power of Faith that substituted the Deity Indwelling Power, gradually illuminating the second talent.

The second talent was successfully illuminated, but it was unfortunate that he couldn’t try it out immediately. It wasn’t possible to produce a Seed of Life overnight, and with his current strength insufficient, it would take at least a month or two to produce one.

Next was the third talent: Seed of Essence.

The effect of this talent was that the roots of The Golden Ancient Tree could break down anything into nutrients for absorption and then convert them into Essence to be stored as Seeds of Essence.

For instance, if it absorbed a vast iron ore vein, then it could produce fruit with a hundred percent pure iron.

If it absorbed a large amount of biological remains, it could produce fruit with a hundred percent pure flesh and blood.

Moreover, he could control whether the fruit produced was purely and simply flesh or flesh with various beneficial nutrients according to his will.

To illuminate the third talent, materials produced in various extreme environments were required for refining, and only after continuously refining and extracting a total of ninety-nine Seeds of Essence would the process be complete.

This step was incredibly resource and time-consuming. Although he didn’t lack resources, producing ninety-nine Seeds of Essence couldn’t be hurried, and he could only wait patiently.

Having illuminated two talents, he had used less than one percent of the Power of Faith accumulated over a thousand years inside the Dier Cathedral. He estimated that to illuminate all five talents and become an Official Totem Master, he would need less than ten percent of this Power of Faith, meaning he had enough to use for a long time even after becoming an Official Totem Master.

Even if he said he could advance to a Totem Lord in one go, it might be possible….

Well, no, advancing to a Totem Lord might not be quite enough; he would probably have to accumulate a bit more, or plunder the Power of Faith from another cathedral.

In the days that followed, Lin Xiao stayed in the cathedral every day, absorbing various extreme materials transmitted from his True Body. Outside, a turmoil was brewing. Afonso had pacified many forces and led his army out of the city to engage in a major battle with the Holy Church Knight Order led by Bartos outside Dier City. On the frontline, they completely defeated the Holy Knights, with Afonso personally defeating the Great Knight Bartos and capturing most of the Holy Knight Order members.

With Bartos’s defeat, all voices of resistance in Dier Province vanished completely, and numerous aristocrats sent messengers to pledge recognition of Afonso’s occupation of Dier City.

Of course, that was only recognition from the local lords; to legally replace Count Dyson, a messenger had to be sent to the Royal Capital to seek the Queen’s approval.

But that issue wasn’t a big one; Afonso had already defeated Count Dyson with his strength and was the de facto owner of Dier City. The Queen in the Royal Capital could not send troops to attack, and she had no choice but to acknowledge the situation.

The only problem was the obstruction of the Holy Church. The Church’s covert influence was immense, capable of affecting many of the big nobles and kingdom ministers. There would definitely be all kinds of hindrances when the time came, and the confirmation process was expected to be very troublesome.

But it was the same old story, they were already the factual owners of Dier City, and opposition would only be dragging out time. To prevent them, their opponents would have to send troops.

Even if the Church had such an intention, gathering resources and assembling soldiers for a long march would take at least half a year.

In fact, it was even questionable if they could proceed with such a plan, as the most likely outcome would be a retreat midway.

Because the Holy Church’s military force in each diocese is fixed to a certain number and cannot be stronger than the local great lords, especially in the Royal Capital, where the Church’s forces are even fewer. The main reason is that the Royal Family does not allow it.

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Therefore, if the Holy Church desires to attack the Church of Life and Wisdom, they must send envoys to contact other provinces’ dioceses, assemble the military forces from several provincial dioceses at a certain location, and then attack together.

Such actions would take at least half a year, and possibly most of the year just to assemble.

Therefore, even if the situation worsens, they still have half a year to assimilate their current territory and prepare.

It was with this in mind, alongside the gradual surging of the Elemental Tides and the resurgence of spiritual energy, that the Plane Will began to awaken, slowly relaxing the world’s restrictions. The birth of the Holy God could happen at any moment, leaving Lin Xiao with little time to develop. He needed to expand his territory as much as possible before the birth of the Holy God.

As long as he had enough territory and enough followers, and as many elite troops as possible, he could defend the lands he had conquered and stabilize their development.

Following Lin Xiao’s wishes, Afonso didn’t wait for the royal capital’s orders to declare himself the de facto ruler of Dier Province. He ordered all the lords of Dier Province to send some militia according to their noble rank.

Barons sent ten each, viscounts thirty each, and the lands of knights were not needed. There were still more than a dozen baron and viscount lords in Dier Province, which altogether provided him with two hundred and thirty able-bodied militia.

Then he combined these militia with the previously captured prisoners and the existing troops for training.

When they attacked Dier City, they had gathered a total of seven to eight hundred people. Previously, when Count Dyson defended Dier City, there were nearly two thousand people. Some died in battle, others fled, and after excluding some of the old, about thirteen hundred remained.

Later, after the battle with Bartos’s Holy Church Knights, they captured over six hundred more, creating a combined force of almost one thousand six to seven hundred people.

Although the ranks were mixed and chaotic, it was sufficient to have the heads counted.

A camp was established following a standard training regimen for the natives, where everyone was intermixed; they would train while being indoctrinated.

He planned to first train them for two to three months, firmly establishing a stable faith through indoctrination before starting large-scale enhancement.

Besides that, he also dispatched a large number of Holy Warriors and Church Knights to set up several Church envoys that ventured to various territories within Dier Province to preach, using the original churches of the Holy Church to quickly fill the gaps left by the Holy Church’s retreat.

Unlike the Holy Church, they spread faith not only in towns but also in villages.

By receiving some of the converted clergy from the Holy Church locally, they were sent to preach in various villages.

While Lin Xiao was vigorously training and assimilating the faith of Dier Province, the entire plane was also in turmoil. A large number of Descenders started causing disturbances after their initial hibernation period, with news occasionally arriving of some god or church emerging somewhere.

The most powerful among them was naturally the Child of the Spirit Realm, Nolan, who possessed a Top-tier Heirloom allowing him to exhibit Transcendent Power despite world restrictions. Even before Lin Xiao, he had conquered the capital of another empire’s province and had now officially occupied an entire province after eliminating all resistance.

Besides him, the strongest ones only controlled areas comparable to a viscount’s territory and were engaged in conflicts with other neighboring forces.

Apart from Lin Xiao and Nolan, the other Descenders had similar beginnings, and without the ability to cheat, their development couldn’t progress very fast.

Unfortunately, with ninety-nine Descenders scattered sparsely across the entire plane, their density was low, averaging fewer than ten people per kingdom. It was already quite dense for Lin Xiao to encounter three in Dier Province, as normally there would only be one or two per province.

Time slowly passed amidst the political squabbling in the royal capital and the Church’s assimilation of Dier Province.

In just two months, more than thirteen hundred prisoners had been indoctrinated. Lin Xiao personally verified that all had established a line of faith with him and were True Believers or higher. Even the fanatically trained order followers from the Holy Church changed their faith in the face of constantly displayed Transcendent Divine Acts.

One must admit that spreading faith with Transcendent methods in a magic-less plane was incredibly effective. Even the most devout faith could not withstand witnessing such real miracles day after day, and those who were brainwashed from childhood to become order followers, once they witnessed real divine acts and changed their faith, became even more devout. At the very least, these captured knights from the Holy Church became Devout Believers upon conversion, with a considerable number becoming Fanatic Believers.

It’s worth mentioning that the former leader of the Holy Church’s Knights, Bartos, who had been captured, also converted to the new faith under Lin Xiao’s personal demonstration of miracles and became exceptionally devout.

Afterward, Lin Xiao began to make public appearances, presenting himself as a Divine Envoy in the barracks, and initiated large-scale enhancement of these faithful soldiers.

Before they realized it, four months had gone by, and the royal capital still hadn’t reached a conclusion about Afonso replacing Count Dyson.

As he expected, Her Majesty the Queen intended to agree to Afonso’s pledge of allegiance, but the immense influence of the Holy Church saw strong opposition from a large number of ministers and nobles, leading to a deadlock that remained unresolved until now.

In addition, the Cardinal Archbishop of the Neuer Kingdom’s Archdiocese had secretly communicated with archbishops from various provinces, and Church military forces moved frequently; the scale of the activity was so significant that most of the aristocracy felt something was amiss.