Chapter 4: The Old Priest's Agricultural God Church Ritual

Near the back door of the Church, close to the pond, there was a row of stone platforms where several middle-aged people stood, moving quickly to arrange the various preparations needed for the ritual.

Two middle-aged men carried up a roll of something resembling a carpet; it was not light, and after laying it on the ground, they worked together to push it open.

This carpet-like object was a simple ritual aid; the surface of the carpet was drawn with many circles and embroidered text, as well as the standing positions for each person, representing the minimum number of participants required when holding a ritual.

This tool could support a simple ritual with a minimum of one person and a maximum of five.

At this moment, the various tasks required for a one-person ritual were being carried out. A small wooden basin containing intact wheat ears was placed in the white circle at the top left corner of the carpet, and the middle-aged farm woman who had brought it carefully arranged the wheat ears in the basin.

A small basin of intact root vegetables was placed by another farm woman into the circle at the top right corner of the carpet.

A small piece of gold was cautiously placed by a middle-aged man in the circle at the center rear of the carpet; after placing it, he waved his hands at the others to confirm he had not tampered with this valuable, high-purity piece of gold.

Subsequently, a middle-aged man held a handful of plump wheat grains and carefully followed the markings on the carpet, using the wheat grains to virtually connect the three ritual objects placed in the circles.

And in the very center of the carpet, within a white circle, Old Priest Ruiduokasi stood with his figure straight, a change from his usual aged image.

He glanced behind him to confirm that the four devout believers helping him were all standing in their fixed positions at the edge of the ritual carpet and had already begun to pray devoutly to the Agricultural God.

"Then I shall begin." Seeing that everything was much like before, the Old Priest, who had conducted many rituals, needed no further consideration; with his strength, he could complete this ritual relying solely on the Agricultural God's Divine Power within his own body, but by relying on the ritual, he would not need to expend extra Divine Power, as most of the power would be provided by the Agricultural God, the object of the ritual's prayer.

Just like this simple ritual today, the Agricultural God and the Church's Priests had previously agreed upon a series of cumbersome, troublesome, yet inimitable ritual methods that could be presided over by a Priest to directly pray for power and divine assistance from the great Agricultural God who was far away.

Thereby, in various open environments, releasing powerful God's Miracles and Divine Arts that exceeded the constraints of the Priest's personal Divine Power, thus bringing about various effects.

This was a course that high-level Priests must learn; to become a high-level Priest capable of standing on their own, one must master a certain amount of ritual knowledge and experience in successfully conducting rituals.

Only with this skill could one, when out preaching, obtain direct help from the gods through rituals, demonstrate the gods' power, and make the populace realize the gods' strength and ability, thereby having Faith in the corresponding gods.

And interestingly, among rituals of smaller scale, a one-person ritual is the most difficult, followed by a three-Priest ritual, while a five-Priest ritual is the easiest.

But for the same ritual, the efficacy is greatest when held by five Priests together; when held by a single person, the ritual's efficacy can only be maintained at a level just sufficient to be used.

This seems somewhat counterintuitive, but a five-person coordinated ritual requires more complex ritual procedures, as well as larger-scale ritual offerings and corresponding ritual protocols, so the Divine Power requested from the gods through the ritual is naturally greater. A single person, however, does not need to be so complex; as long as the Priest's own strength is sufficient and their ritual experience is richer, they can easily perform the ritual alone. Although the effect is greatly diminished, in terms of the speed and flexibility of conducting the ritual, it far surpasses other situations.

Moreover, there is a hidden factor that most Priests do not know: the degree to which a Priest is valued by the gods also determines the difficulty and final effect of the ritual.

On this point, the people of Kendall County surely have a deep impression; a Priest couple of the God of Rivers and Lakes, using only the two of them, could perform a massive ritual effect comparable to a God's Miracle every year when the spring floods erupted in Kendall County.

It was simply because that ancient, powerful god loved these two human Priests under His command, so using only two people, without complex rituals, they could release powerful divine miraculous power.

At this moment, Old Priest Ruiduokasi stood in the center of the ritual carpet, hands raised high, facing the vast pond; a cool breeze rich with water vapor blew toward him, and he could hear the relaxed sounds of the young Warriors laughing and talking by the pond ahead.

He closed his eyes, and through years of training, he 'saw' the imagined image of the Agricultural God and opened his mouth to pray to Him: "Oh, great Agricultural God, who has the most Faith upon the vastest land."

"Your humble servant is here, in the place where your Faith is spread."

"Solemnly praying to you for the support of power."

"Hereby offering you the plump wheat ears from the village to demonstrate the fruits of our hard work."

At this moment, the wooden basin to the Old Priest's front left began to vibrate, and then the wheat ears in the basin emitted a faint light, were evaporated and carried away by the cyan Divine Power, and flew toward the sky.

At the same time, the wheat grains previously scattered across the entire ritual carpet now had Divine Power connecting them faintly, and Agricultural God's Divine Power surged from the Old Priest's body, seemingly communicating vaguely with some existence far away in the sky.

"Hereby offering you the harvested plant roots from the village, so you need not worry about our hunger or fullness."

Immediately, the wooden basin to the Old Priest's front right also began to vibrate, and the plant root foods inside the basin also evaporated and flew up within the cyan Divine Power, projecting into the sky along the rising Agricultural God's Divine Power.

At the same time, the Agricultural God's Divine Power brought up by the ritual also seemed to have established a connection with the distant Agricultural God. Or perhaps the higher-level diocese of the Agricultural God Church?

In any case, it established a communicative link with a source of Agricultural God's Divine Power, and Divine Power continuously began to fly over rapidly from the distance through the high sky, projecting onto the Old Priest on the ritual carpet.

"Finally, hereby offering you the proof of the village's prosperity, letting you know that we have become wealthy through diligent farming."

As soon as the words fell, the surface of the high-purity gold in the circle behind the Old Priest evaporated a little—not much, just a little gold. This gold flew toward the distant sky along with the rising Divine Power.

Subsequently, more Agricultural God's Divine Power flew back from the distance.

If it were an ordinary young Priest, facing this surging Agricultural God's Divine Power, they would inevitably panic for a while, not knowing what to do with this massive Divine Power.

But the Old Priest had conducted Agricultural God Church rituals of various purposes and effects countless times in his life; at this moment, he was not panicked at all, holding his left hand in a fist against his abdomen, gathering his spirit to control this massive extra Divine Power.

And his right hand stretched straight forward, pointing directly at the pond in front.

He then said softly: "Cast it into the pond, let this pool of clear water be nourished by the great power of the Agricultural God, to wash away the worldly dust from the Warriors' bodies and souls, and soothe the pain in their bodies. Let the devout believers who enjoy this water also share in your majesty, feel your compassion and care, and alleviate the pain and unease in their bodies."

Following the Old Priest's movements and words, the Agricultural God's Divine Power projected from the sky shot directly into the water surface following the direction of his fingertip, causing the fine water surface reflecting the moonlight and starlight to faintly glow with cyan light.

That was the subsequent effect of the Agricultural God's Divine Power entering the water.

The Old Priest did not withhold any of it; he projected all the Divine Power cast from afar, and even added a bit of his own Divine Power, into the water.

Finally, the surface of the pond in the entire village glowed with the unique cyan divine light of the Agricultural God's Divine Power.

The entire village was illuminated by this cyan light, and even because of the reflection of the water surface, even a part of the sky faintly glowed with cyan light.

The birds living around the village flew over one after another at this time; they seemed to know that the pond water at this moment was a good thing, and they landed on the edges of the pond in other directions, cautiously drinking the pond water at the water's edge and letting their wings and bodies make small contact with the water surface.

And Jier and the others, seeing the pond water they were washing in emit cyan light, exclaimed in surprise one after another.

Everyone dared not enter the water at this time and all returned to the shore in a rush, only Jier remained soaked in the water, calling for his subordinates to re-enter the water.

"A bunch of idiots! This is a reward from Old Priest Ruiduokasi for us! Hurry into the water and play, haha, this pond water is trying to heal my body, although I don't have much that needs healing, but you are different; training and fighting always result in injuries of all sizes. Now, soaking in the pond water is of great benefit to the body!"

Once Jier said this, and seeing that he was safe and comfortable in the water, and there were no Villagers coming up to stop or curse them, everyone then re-entered the water to wash.

Even the Warriors and drivers who had not dared to enter the water before were now soaking their entire bodies in the pond water.

Even if they were dull in feeling, they could easily feel the difference in the pond water at this moment; they felt their bodies become light all over, and some old injuries and scars they had sustained in the past were actually recovering to perfection slowly.

The places on their bodies that used to ache faintly no longer hurt, and there was a feeling of being reborn.

Of course, being reborn was too exaggerated; this was just a misconception of the Warriors.

Jier had played in the water enough, so he also came to the edge of the pond, took out the Soap, and began to scrub his body. After scrubbing away the dirt and sweat from his body, he plunged into the pond with a splash.

He swam back and forth twice, and his body was completely clean.

Only then did he remember that there was a kind of Plant Essence specially made by the Old Priest in the wooden basin the Villagers had given them that hadn't been used, so he returned to the shore, took out the Plant Essence from the wooden bottle, opened it, and poured a little bit into his hand.

This thing carried a pleasant plant fragrance; after rubbing it with his fingers twice, it quickly and refreshingly moisturized the skin on his body.

"Good stuff! Everyone, hurry and use this; after cleaning your body, apply this stuff from the bottle to your body, whoa, it's really nice."

While recommending it to everyone, Jier poured the remaining Plant Essence from the bottle into his hands and rubbed it all over his body.

Seeing Jier's actions, everyone also began to imitate him.

However, what everyone was most concerned about were the two glowing marks on Jier's ribs and stomach; they were curious about them, so they asked in hushed voices.

"Oh, this thing? These are two blessing abilities granted to me by the Agricultural God Church. They aren't permanent, but rather magical abilities with a limited number of uses." Jier pointed to the 【Grass and Wood Source】 blessing ability on his ribs.

"This is 【Grass and Wood Source】, a blessing ability gifted to me by the priests of the Mengtuoka City Agricultural God parish. Its effect is that every time it is activated, it can provide me with infinite stamina and energy."

Jier struck a bodybuilding pose and patted the muscle on his Upper Arm Armor.

The Warriors looked at each other, some feeling envious, but most felt it was nothing special.

Of course, it wasn't that simple. Although when they first told him about it, they said it provided infinite stamina and energy, in actual performance, its true function was: during the time the ability was active, the various substances and energy consumed by Jier's own body would be temporarily replaced by the Agricultural God's Divine Power within the blessing ability.

This was terrifying. If Jier were just an ordinary Warrior, he would at most have infinite stamina and energy, allowing him to swing his sword or run endlessly. But as long as he possessed some supernatural power, he could use various supernatural powers that he usually dared not use much, in a nearly infinite manner during this time.

For example, his own Life Energy, as well as the Shadow Divine Power of the Shadow Bird, and so on.

The former requires him to slowly replenish it through eating, or to accumulate and increase Life Energy more quickly by eating Monster meat; in short, if it weren't for 【Grass and Wood Source】, his consumption would exceed his intake.

Thanks to this blessing ability, Jier can use his Life Energy to strengthen his body with nearly full power every time he fights.

And the latter requires the night to recover, and to increase it, he must kill enemies himself and let the grievances and lingering thoughts of the enemies entangle his soul, so that the Shadow Bird, which also manifests in his soul, can defeat those grievances and lingering thoughts to be strengthened.

The problem with this ability is that Jier's level of Shadow Divine Power is limited; his own accumulation meant he would run out of steam after using a few Shadow Bird abilities, but after having the 【Grass and Wood Source】 blessing ability, he can use the Shadow Bird's abilities in a nearly infinite way.

Producing terrifying destructive power in battle.

Of course, these detailed aspects of his own combat system could not be explained in detail to the Warriors. These were all Jier's important secrets.

"As for this, this peculiar mark on the skin of my stomach, it is a blessing ability personally granted to me by the Agricultural God. It's called something like 'Calling the Spirit Beast in the Heart.' It can summon a huge Spirit beast that only I can see and touch, which I need in my heart."

Jier's words left everyone confused; what did it mean by a huge Spirit beast that only he could see and touch?

Jier waved his hand: "Hey, it's just a huge Shepherd Dog that is five meters long and over two meters tall. Only I can see it, you can't; only I can touch it, you can't touch it at all. To you, it is something that completely doesn't exist, but to me, it is a reliable animal partner that obeys my orders and can understand my instructions."

When Jier said this, everyone who was applying Plant Essence raised their heads and looked around, seemingly wanting to find the huge Spirit Dog that Jier spoke of, which they could neither see nor touch.

"Ha, stop looking. Yesterday it officially finished its mission and dissipated. Besides, for a period of time before, that huge Spirit Dog was always by my side, and none of you noticed it, did you?" Jier said with a chuckle.

Only then did everyone remember that Knight Jier did indeed sometimes reach out and pat or rub a dog's head in empty air beside him. It turned out that everyone thought Knight Jier was acting crazy at the time, but it turned out there really was something there.

It was just that everyone couldn't see it.

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