Chapter 373: Blood and Honey

The longest seven days of my life were spent in a withered orchard when I was thirteen.

At that time, I thought faith was an indestructible rock, and I didn't know that this invisible and untouchable thing was so sharp.

So sharp that it could so easily peel open a person's life.

The blight in my hometown spread silently like a plague, and the orange trees in the orchard lost their green one after another, their leaves curling up as if burned.

My parents had long since given up, sitting in the dim house all day, waiting for the same fate as other fruit farmers.

But I didn't.

Under the oldest orange tree in the orchard, I prayed.

One day, two days, three days...

My knees sank into the mud, and my lips were chapped from lack of water.

On the fourth day, I heard the neighbor's crying; they decided to burn the orchard and move elsewhere.

On the fifth day, my brother tried to pull me into the house, saying I was crazy, and how could the great and high God bend down to listen to the prayers of lowly people like us.

On the sixth day, I could barely hear my own voice, and only withered yellow remained before my eyes.

On the evening of the seventh day, when the sunset soaked the sky, He came.

Not the gentle and kind woman depicted on the stained glass window of the town church, but a presence as warm as sunlight.

I couldn't see His face, but I could feel that gaze falling on me, like a mother watching her sleeping child.

"Why persist?" His voice was like a breeze blowing through the orchard.

"Because these trees are my family's life," I answered with a hoarse voice, "I don't believe God would sit by and watch everything die."

Then the sunlight brushed over the withered orange trees, the dry branches sprouted new green, the curled leaves stretched out as before, the fragrance of orange leaves permeated the twilight, and small white flowers bloomed on the branches.

When I stumbled home and told my family about this miracle, they didn't believe it at first, until they saw the orchard full of revived orange trees.

That night, sweet juice moistened my thirsty throat.

But when I came to the neighbor's orchard the next day, hoping for the same miracle, all I saw was a dead silence.

The blight still raged, and more and more fruit farmers were preparing to leave.

Miracles seemed to only descend where His gaze was fixed.

At that time, I didn't understand why God's grace was so magnificent yet so stingy, bestowing only a drop, letting the whole land dry up, and only regarding this special treatment as supreme glory, attributing it to God's calling.

That autumn, when the harvested honey tangerines filled the baskets, I said goodbye to my family and embarked on the path of serving God, determined to dedicate my life, and all my piety, to the great existence that saved my family's lives.

Thirty years have passed.

My hair has turned grey, and many gullies of time have increased on my face.

I feel I am pious enough, but unfortunately, my talent is limited.

Even in the bishop's district closest to God, bathing in the holy light of the Mother of All Things, more than ten thousand days and nights of devout prayer failed to let me go further, only serving as a small manager in a remote corner of the church.

Of course, I wouldn't feel disappointed because of this.

I had long since decided to dedicate my life to that great "Mother," and even if I could only share the most insignificant strand of His dazzling light and become His agent on earth, I would be satisfied.

"Priest Moxi, please preside over the prayer ceremony for the residents of the South District." I took the gorgeously styled process sheet, on which the prayer was written in gold powder.

At the ceremony, I wore ceremonial robes covered with silver threads, leading the believers to chant, and the loud voice echoed in the air filled with the smell of incense and burning candles, covering the faint stench drifting from the distant slums.

I looked at those figures sunken and shriveled by hunger under the stage, looked at those eyes full of hope because of faith, even if my heart had long been numb, my stomach still churned.

Accompanied by the prayer that I had repeated countless times, was an increasingly dead heart.

I know that the cost of this ceremony, just those incense candles that were burned and discarded wastefully, those exquisite utensils carrying simple food... would be enough to feed a village on the edge of the kingdom for a whole month.

"The robes on the bishops are more precious than the wheat ears of the tenant farmers."

I whispered to myself, unable to help but recall the scene I witnessed a few days ago.

Three "big figures" who bathed in divine light and were agents of divine power on earth, closer to the Mother of All Things than myself, argued for a whole morning about the seating order of a certain sacrificial ceremony, while at the same time, the refugees outside the city were pushing and grabbing for a mouthful of bread.

Countless nights when it was quiet, I knelt in the church and prayed to that silent Goddess statue, but the only thing that responded to me was the cold moonlight falling from the dome.

Once, I was responsible for allocating a batch of relief supplies to a disaster-stricken parish.

I saw with my own eyes that the food and medicine that were originally sufficient on the list were deducted through layers of "procedures" and "management fees," and less than one in ten remained when they arrived.

When I took the original list and the final receipt, and rushed into the regional bishop's room trembling, wanting to speak up for those disaster victims who were too weak to even pray,

sitting behind an expensive wooden table carved with exquisite holy marks, that bishop, who was always known for his piety and wisdom, just raised his eyelids and blocked all the indignation in my heart with one sentence:

"Priest Moxi, the church's massive body needs to operate, and a little 'lubricant' is necessary."

"You must remember, sometimes, for the sake of the church, for the sake of the Goddess, focus on the big picture, and individual sacrifices are unavoidable."

At that moment, looking at the holy image of the Goddess "compassionate to the world" on the wall behind him, I only felt a wave of dizziness.

Is the great existence I serve and the "Goddess" in his mouth really the same thing?

I learned to communicate with holy light and guide divine power, but the distance from Him seems to be getting further and further away.

The Goddess hasn't appeared for a long time.

I found with horror that I seemed to have long since stopped expecting His appearance.

This made me feel terrified and at a loss.

I couldn't help but raise doubts in my heart:

Why condone all this?

Or is it... you don't care at all?

Sometimes, I even suspect whether the miracle at thirteen was just a beautiful dream during a high fever.

But the tangerines shipped from my hometown every year, the fragrance when peeling the orange peel, and the sweetness of the pulp remind me that everything really happened.

The place closest to the Goddess seems to be the place furthest from Him.

When the news that my hometown had encountered the blight again came, I also had some connections in the church more or less.

After using some influence slightly, the church sent technicians and the best holy water.

In less than two weeks, the disaster was controlled.

I decided to go back to my hometown to see.

The carriage drove along the familiar road, and on both sides were still familiar orchards, but the large areas of land around were all surrounded by stone walls, with wooden signs saying "Private Property" standing on them.

Occasionally seeing a few strange fruit farmers, they were all respectful to me, calling me "Sir."

The old house at home had been expanded to the point where its original appearance could not be recognized, and the marble door pillars were a bit dazzling in the sun.

The one who entertained me was the person currently in charge of the family business, and also my nephew.

He enthusiastically and proudly recounted how he used the name of the "miracle descent" in the past, combined with my relationship in the church, to monopolize the vast majority of local orchards, and how he made other fruit farmers "voluntarily" give up their land to become employees of my family.

His words were full of desire for wealth and power, but there was no awe for the miracle itself, that orange tree that died and came back to life.

Just like the big figures I had seen in the church who sat in high positions.

"Thanks to you, Uncle! As soon as the church's holy water was sprinkled, the blight retreated immediately!" His fat face, which seemed to be able to squeeze out oil, was full of smiles. "It's not a bad thing either, because of this blight, the last few fruit farmers nearby also sold their land to us."

I asked him to take me to see that miracle tree from back then.

As a manifestation of divine grace, they built a luxurious small shrine for it. It was not large, but the furnishings inside were more expensive and exquisite than the town church.

That old orange tree was surrounded on the altar in the very center of the shrine, like those mummies in the western desert that were carefully dressed up.

I walked closer to look carefully and found that its branches were bare, without a single leaf, let alone fruit.

"It hasn't borne fruit for many years," my nephew said. ===== CHAPTER 374 =====