Cthulhu Gonfalon

“This really is fortunate!” As he watched silently from Wall’s side, Sui Xiong was sincerely happy for him.

After working hard for so many years, Wall had finally managed to get some good luck. Or maybe, this was fate making up for the past, if fate was something that really existed in the unseen world of spirits.

But Wall wasn’t entirely lacking in opponents. Among all the gods wantonly evangelizing here, there was also one who was evenly matched against him—The God of Aristocracy.

The God of Aristocracy had already spread his reach over the Mifata Federation some time ago, and his churches already covered the land. He had a temple in practically every city.

The core of his doctrine was to sing the praises of noble lineage and continuously rouse one’s drive to advance upward. The former provided rationale for rule by aristocrats while the latter could lull the people, as well as continually cause those of outstanding talent to be absorbed into the aristocratic group.

Actually, Sui Xiong didn’t really dislike the God of Aristocracy’s doctrine—it’d be fine as long as you added one more line.

The influence of a nobleman will die in the fifth generation.

This was a line he’d learned from the internet. It meant that regardless of how great your achievements were, regardless of how outstanding your success, you wouldn’t be able to pass it down past the fifth generation.

If your achievements weren’t great enough or your successes weren’t outstanding enough, the number of generations you could keep them relevant would be even shorter.

If he just added this, Sui Xiong would be able to say that he accepted the God of Aristocracy’s doctrine. Even if you twisted the grandeur of one’s actions into the grandeur of blood lineage, it wouldn’t be straying all that far.

But without this, it just didn’t work.

However great your ancestors were, what did any of it have to do with their offspring? How was it fair for the children and all the following generations to lie on their ancestor’s credit book, indulging in a life of debauchery?

Behind red doors, meat and wine go to waste, while out on the road lie the frozen bones of the poor. Were those tyrannical rulers who oppressed the people really any more noble than those starving people by the wayside?

Bah!

But this argument was greatly welcomed by the aristocracy, as well as those who didn’t have to worry about basic necessities or whose lives were progressively getting better. The former felt comfortable with it, whereas the latter saw hope.

Even a good number of those people who weren’t doing all that well approved of the God of Aristocracy’s doctrine, because it at least let them console themselves with, “The reason I’m not doing well isn’t for any reason other than the fact my bloodline isn’t noble enough.”

So the God of Aristocracy’s doctrine really did have a foundation among the masses.

About half a month later, the great missionary trial between all the major churches had already begun to show results.

The Church of the God of Knowledge and the Church of the God of Aristocracy had undoubtedly taken the first two places in the race. If you added all the new believers of all the remaining gods’ churches together, the resulting number wouldn’t be able to compare to either one of them.

If you were to say that the religiously available people in the Mifata Federation numbered ten thousand, then the Church of the God of Knowledge would have taken two thousand, the Church of the God of Aristocracy had about the same, and the rest of the churches together took 1,800 or 1,900 people at most.

To put it in other words, there was around 40% of the population still available to continue competing over.

But having reached this point, the easy-to-win people had already been won. Of the ones who were left, either they required great amounts of manpower and resources, or they were still hung up over the god they had lost; neither was easy to obtain.

Many gods’ churches drew back at these circumstances. Only the Church of the God of Knowledge and the Church of the God of Aristocracy continued to put in effort.

One of these churches had an advantage in their philosophy, and with their great wealth of money, there was no problem they couldn’t overcome. The other’s advantage lay in their having operated here a long time, and with their powerful abilities and no lack of wealth, there was no reason for them to back down either.

But, as the missionary work gradually intensified, the two churches had more and more incidences of friction and conflict. The contradictions were growing greater by the day, and it was clear that a fierce battle would break out at any moment.

Honestly, situations like this were very commonly seen. Competing over believers was the most common reason for conflict between churches.

Of course, it was alright to avoid battles as well. As long as one side retreated, then a war became impossible to fight.

But the Church of the God of Aristocracy had a forceful attitude and clearly had no interest in retreating. Most likely, the God of Aristocracy had already decided that he was willing to risk a war.

Under these circumstances, it was Wall who began to hesitate.

“Your Majesty, do you think… I should quit while I’m ahead?” he asked in a somewhat worried manner. “I’ve already expanded by almost five million believers, which is quite sufficient for me. Should I continue expanding? I feel like any more would be too greedy…”

Sui Xiong shook his head. “The God of Aristocracy has expanded by that many believers as well, but why isn’t he quitting while he’s ahead?”

“His church supports aristocrats, after all, so they have a natural advantage,” said Wall, shaking his head as well. “It’s been barely 300 years since he achieved godhood, and he’s gone from a weak Divine Power to the peak of a mid-level Divine Power. I estimate that he plans to use this chance to break through to become a great Divine Power. At this point, there isn’t any chance of him backing down.”

“That’s even more reason for us not to back down!” said Sui Xiong. “The Human God System already has three great Divine Powers, and if they add another, their expanded influence will be too hard to deal with. Because of our connection with Yorgaardman, the God of Justice, we’re ultimately not on the same side as the God of Light. There’s a good chance that one day we’ll become actual enemies. When the time comes for Yorgaardman to go handle the God of Light, I’ll probably take charge of controlling the God of Heroes and the God of Protection… Are you planning to use mid-level Divine Power against the God of Aristocracy’s great Divine Power?”

Wall was startled, and his gaze quickly turned fierce.

“I understand!” he said in a heavy tone of voice. “I’ll just have to alter my plans then. Missionary work is a trivial matter here; what’s important is striking at the Church of the God of Aristocracy and ensuring that the God of Aristocracy has no chance of advancing!”

“We may need to pay a heavy price for this, but whatever one might say, any cost is worth preventing him from rising smoothly through the ranks.” Sui Xiong nodded his head, then sighed. “To tell the truth, I’ve always been a little afraid of the God of Aristocracy. That guy… he’s kind of hard to understand.”

“Don’t worry, no matter the consequences, I’ll be sure to stop him!” came Wall’s resolute reply. “So he wants to take this chance to advance? Dream on!”

Wall was a man of his word. A moment later, he’d sent down an Oracle to tell the church to mobilize their believers and begin preparing for battle against the Church of the God of Aristocracy.

Not just that, but he even had his priests give speeches criticizing the Church of the God of Aristocracy’s doctrines. This practice was considered taboo. Going this far was basically a declaration of war—which was exactly what Wall intended.

War was what they wanted anyway, so why not do their worst? Let’s fight!

There was truly a great number of competent people among the Church of the God of Knowledge’s priests and believers—scholars especially. When they started putting their minds to work on attacking the God of Aristocracy’s doctrine, they easily found all sorts of justifications and started violently attacking it from every possible angle.

Some scholars came from a historical angle, surveying tens of thousands of years’ worth of history in order to argue that noble bloodlines would ultimately either dissipate or degrade into scoundrels. Some scholars looked at it from a biological angle, listing all kinds of powerful creatures and arguing that powerful lineages happened not because they were noble, but because their ancestors had probably crossbred with some sort of demon beast. Still, others used a societal angle, analyzing that those who spared no effort for progress most likely wouldn’t be able to obtain a noble family background, but rather, they would be eaten alive by the people far beneath them before finally getting discarded like an old cleaning rag.

The numerous arguments were all wildly different, but without a doubt, the way every one of them was worded was sufficient enough to make the believers of the God of Aristocracy so angry that they were practically itching to pull out their swords.

People said, “Hurt the body, not the pride,” but that line could no longer describe the problem with the Church of the God of Knowledge. What they were doing now was punching the opponent in their figurative right cheek, then the left cheek, then aiming for the chin, after which they struck at the nose.

Forget the fact the Church of the God of Aristocracy had always been overbearing, even the most open and honest church wouldn’t be able to endure a situation like this!

Since they couldn’t endure it, they might as well get ready to fight!

For a moment, the air was cold with murderous intent, and both churches vigorously assembled armed forces. It was obvious that a large-scale war was about to begin.