Chapter 651: A Temporarily Stable Scene

"I am Warrior Jier from Kendall County in the Northwest Province, a champion of the Agricultural God Church. Behind me, the blessing ceremony conducted by Priest Bata'er Jiaoshi of the Agricultural God Church is underway. The Agricultural God cannot bear to see the people go hungry, so through the hands of the priest, He is bestowing grain upon the refugees from the Southern Province! So, move aside, and do not obstruct the ceremony!"

Jier spoke with great bravado, his voice not only loud but also full of confidence: "Besides, there are few vehicles on the road at night, so a little traffic jam doesn't matter, right? Can't you just let them detour through the side streets?"

Jier lifted his chin: "Spread out, front and back, and guide the passing merchant caravans to take a detour. Do not block the people of the Southern Province from coming over to receive the God's blessed grain."

Jier's words made the soldiers look at each other in dismay. The soldier captain was extremely hesitant, not because of how much sense Jier's words made, but because of the opening sentence where he stated where he was from.

"You are from Kendall, a Kendallite?"

"Indeed, that is correct. I am a Knight Attendant to Knight Kela, and I am currently undergoing Knight Training." After finishing, Jier fell silent for a moment, then lifted his left combat boot and stomped down heavily.

Thud—Boom!

A small shockwave erupted from the ground, and a small amount of soil was violently kicked up, splashing all around. Jier lifted his combat boot again; a deep boot print had been stamped into the spot where it had just landed.

"How about it?"

"Hmm, since that's the case, we'll do as you say, but the road cannot remain blocked forever, and these mud-legged wretches..."

"Hmm?"

"Oh, no, no, no, I mean the refugees from the Southern Province. They cannot be allowed to gather like this. If they congregate and smash up shops, it will be bad if things get chaotic."

Jier snorted: "It's not as if the shops don't have hired muscle; where is the need for checkpoint soldiers to come and maintain order? As long as no one takes advantage of the chaos to set fires and people don't die in droves, you usually don't bother managing it anyway, right?"

Jier said this based on a general guess about the situation inside the checkpoint, but he clearly guessed correctly. How could the soldiers responsible for maintaining public order in various places really go about maintaining it properly? Weren't they all using this as an excuse to scrape money for themselves and their companions?

Seeing that all his words had been rebuffed by the Knight Attendant before him, the soldier captain finally relented. He was not afraid of Jier, but rather, at noon, hundreds of elite Kendall Army soldiers had passed through their checkpoint and headed toward the Southern Province.

He had found some bold merchants who dared to follow behind the army to inquire, and only then did he learn that the Kendall Army, carrying the passage documents of the Montuoka Viscount, was actually going to support the war on the border of the Southern Province.

These people had marched all the way from the Northwest Province! As a soldier himself, the captain understood the difficulties and willpower involved, and he couldn't help but admire them.

Because when the garrison at their checkpoint occasionally went to wipe out bandits, they were often a disorganized mess; he could not imagine how an army could march from such a distant place.

He had observed that the spirit and will of that army were quite good. It seemed that the long march hadn't worn the soldiers down, but had instead made them even more formidable?

Therefore, now that he heard the person before him claim to be an attendant to a knight leading that army, the soldier captain backed down.

Curling his lip, the soldier captain ordered his men to split into two groups. One group stayed here to watch the scene, while the other detoured to the opposite side of the blocked street, trying to find a way to guide any potential merchant caravans to take other streets.

He pointed at Jier in the end: "Remember, the guarantee you made—it must not lead to a riot!"

Jier waved his hand dismissively: "It will be over in a moment."

"That's just it! There are so many refugees, it will be over in a moment, but what about those who didn't get grain? Will they cause a scene? It would be truly laughable if that priest also got beaten up."

The soldier captain's men began to move, while he himself stood in place, making sarcastic remarks.

Jier snorted coldly: "You don't need to watch the show. If the passage fee hadn't been raised fifty times, would there be so many refugees in the checkpoint? Let them through. Anyway, the Kewen Territory and the Mengtuoka Territory are so vast and rich; these people won't bring trouble, they'll be a benefit."

Unexpectedly, the soldier captain dismissed Jier's argument with disdain: "Hmph, won't bring trouble? You're joking, right? Not every person from the Southern Province who flees here will work honestly. And there isn't that much work for them to do."

"Then you raise the passage tax by fifty times?"

"So what? It was raised so much, did any noble say it wasn't allowed? Everyone tacitly agreed, and soldiers have to earn some money to support their families, don't they?"

Jier angrily pointed at the other man, and the verbal clash between the two ended just like that. He was truly defeated by the man's shamelessness. Sure enough, because of profit, the little bit of kindness in everyone's heart was like meeting cold water, extinguished instantly by greed.

If it weren't for the fact that the other party was a soldier captain at the checkpoint, representing the authority of Montoka City, Jier would have pulled the man's head off if he were anyone else.

Seeming to have defeated the young foreign Knight Attendant with his own shamelessness, the soldier captain became smug, changing from his previous retreating demeanor.

Jier ignored the man; as long as the local soldiers didn't interfere, it was fine. Turning around, he saw that Priest Bata'er Jiaoshi was not only flushed with excitement but also breathing rapidly, with sweat dripping down his face and head.

Jier had seen this before; when fighting the Harpy monsters on a large scale, Priest Luosali of the Church of the God of Wealth, who was with the army, had looked exactly like this when the battle was nearing its end.

The Divine Power in his body was nearly exhausted.

That he could still stand now was entirely due to the Divine Art blessing still operating within his body. Once the 'Blessed Grain' blessing ended, his fainting would be a certainty.

Jier strode over, waving his hand to push aside the refugees who had or hadn't received grain, not caring whether their faces looked anxious or desperate, and went directly behind Priest Bata'er Jiaoshi. He struck the back of the priest's neck near his robe, then lifted the unconscious priest in his arms.

"Everyone stop!"

Jier roared, scaring the approaching refugees back.

At this moment, although Priest Bata'er Jiaoshi was unconscious, his hanging hands were still glowing, and grain kept emerging. This grain quickly piled up at his feet into small mounds.

"Although my companion, Priest Bata'er Jiaoshi, had the heart to gift the God's blessed grain to everyone, he is, after all, only a mortal, and his physical condition can only be maintained to this point for now."

Seeing that some people around were very anxious, Jier spoke up: "I haven't received grain yet, right? You, you, and you, you must want to say this? Think carefully, this is grain bestowed upon you by the Agricultural God. Everyone go back and share it with each other. Families who have already received some, take a little out for your acquaintances. How did you all look after each other to survive until now? Are you going to reveal your most selfish side just because of the God's gift?"

Jier pointed one hand toward the sky: "The great Agricultural God is watching you from above everyone's heads! I tell you, this is a test that strikes directly at the Human Mind. It is not just a gift from a God who cannot bear to see hunger; it is also the God wanting to see how much dignity you have! You fled in fear because your homes were becoming chaotic, suffering so much along the way. In this place, you were blocked by shameless soldiers and bullied."

The soldier captain not far away snorted quietly, but dared not interject a single word at this moment.

"Looking out for each other in times of distress, you are all subjects of the Southern Province. Although you were strangers before, the same suffering has brought you together to endure what you should not have had to endure."

"Everyone listen to me, this is a test. The God is watching you. If you can treat every fellow Southern Province refugee who is also suffering with kindness tonight, then tomorrow morning, the Agricultural God will descend another blessing, granting a God's Miracle just like the one before. Let everyone eat their fill—not just eat their fill, but let you regain your dignity and strength. Transform from refugees who are discriminated against and ostracized back into the people of the Southern Province who can rebuild their homes!"

Although the face revealed within Jier's Helmet was young, his tone was spirited and contained a force of anger and unyielding resolve.

The hundreds of Southern Province people present in their dirty, old clothes were silent, listening carefully to his every word.

Some began to shed tears. One person cried, and then more could no longer hold back and wailed loudly. Some didn't even have the strength to wail and could only silently shed tears. Fortunately, the water wells inside the checkpoint didn't charge a fee, so everyone had enough water to drink; they weren't short on water for tears.

Priest Bata'er Jiaoshi, who was being carried by Jier with his head hanging low, also had water droplets falling from his shadowed face onto the grain at his feet.

Seeing that all the people had lost the excitement of greedily grabbing for grain, Jier took a deep breath and exhaled.

He said: "Take what I just said to the other people who aren't here. Everyone share the grain in your hands, hold your heads high, and let the God watching from above—even if He doesn't praise you—at least not be disappointed."

Jier actually got one thing wrong. Although the people of this other world knew that many powerful gods were looking down on them from those strange glowing celestial bodies in the sky, the Agricultural God was not among them.

Although the Agricultural God was the deity with the most widespread Faith and the most believers in the human world, and His power was extremely strong, not losing to many ancient and powerful nature gods, He was not in the magical celestial bodies in the sky.

Jier did not know that, on the contrary, it was the Sun God worshipped by humans—this deity had caused a huge mess last spring, ascended to the throne in the sky, and officially became a member of the powerful gods.

The fluorescence in Priest Bata'er Jiaoshi's hands faded, and the God's blessed grain that had been emerging finally stopped. The twenty-something-year-old priest finally fainted due to the exhaustion of his Divine Power, but before losing consciousness, he tightly clenched his hands, because what he was gripping inside were the best local grain seeds provided by the church to every Agricultural God priest.

The priest gripped them tightly, not letting these grain samples, which had been blessed and replicated, mix with the other God's blessed grain. This way, when he recovered tomorrow, he could use these plump and robust seeds to perform the blessing again.

The size of the grain replicated by each 'Blessed Grain' blessing was based on the samples in his hands; these seeds could at least let the people eat a little more.

Carrying the unconscious Priest Bata'er Jiaoshi on his shoulder armor, Jier did not expect that a temporary small matter would end up becoming this big.

He shook his head, summoned his spirit, imitated the manner of Knight Kela, and confidently walked toward the inn where he had decided to spend the night.

The people beside him spontaneously cleared a path, and Jier had no objections; at least he didn't have to forcibly push people aside, so he wouldn't appear too cold or rigid.

Jier did not turn his head to look behind him; what the people who had fled to this place from the Southern Province did specifically was none of his business.

If these people did well, he would let Bata'er Jiaoshi perform another one tomorrow; in any case, although the blessing consumed the Priest's own Divine Power of the Agriculture God, he guessed that it was likely the first time Bata'er Jiaoshi had used it and he hadn't controlled it well, or rather, the Priest had just exhausted his own Divine Power to give the people more food.

And the blessing was not afraid of those who came; if you had Divine Power to replenish it, then it would create more food for you.

The front hall entrance of the inn was crowded with people, most of whom were the young men or women of the inn; when they saw Jier carrying the Priest in from the inn's carriage entrance, they all began to whisper to one another.

Everyone had a look of shock and excitement.

As for the few bold merchants who dared to do business at this time, they gathered together, whether they knew each other or not, discussing what exactly was going on just now—no, what was happening right now.

The crowd discussed it heatedly, but at least they agreed on one thing: that Priest just now was indeed very powerful, having released a powerful and rare Divine Art that could actually produce so much food by himself.

"It's enough to feed over a thousand people for a day or two, at the very least," a merchant who had dabbled in grain transport judged.

"It's fortunate that such Agriculture God Priests are rare; otherwise, if everyone relied on the gods to grant food to survive, who would still labor and farm?" Someone felt a lingering fear, as if, having truly witnessed the power of the gods and the Church, they were terrified of this strength.

"You haven't seen anything yet. You're scared by this? If you had heard the 'Dragon Fall Valley' that bards rarely sing, you'd be scared to death. Heh." A plump, wealthy merchant twirled the jewelry ring on his hand and retorted with disdain toward the former.

"'Dragon Fall Valley'? What is that?"

Facing the inquiries of those around him, this merchant proudly spoke of a large-scale legendary long poem performance he had heard in the Kingdom's capital theater.

"That is a long poem describing the wars between the various Church holy lands in the southwest of the Empire. Although I didn't see with my own eyes how the various Church holy lands fought, just the performance in the theater accompanying the bard's recitation of the long poem was enough to scare me out of my wits."

The merchant gestured: "After the priests of the various Church holy lands started fighting, some churches turned the peaks of the mountains into stone giants, each one taller than the highest castle, and the boulders they threw could destroy our checkpoint in one hit."

The people around him exclaimed in surprise.

The merchant closed his eyes, as if he had returned to the theater from a few years ago: "Priests from some churches summoned giant lightning from the sky to strike the stone giants, but it was useless. So another church summoned a lava pool from the earth, trapping the stone giants inside and burning them directly away."

"Some churches forcibly summoned huge light in the night, intending to burn all other churches to ashes, while some churches called upon Dragon allies, who spread their wings and flew into the sky, using their massive shadows to shroud the battlefield."

"There were huge vines traveling across the battlefield; with the opening and closing of every flower on the vines, a previously deceased priest could be resurrected. The Knights of the churches flew in the sky, their bodies emitting light as they fought each other; the water in the rivers turned into deadly water-made monsters, wanting to drown every living person; insects covered the sky, gathering into human faces and spitting out filthy Curses. There were also mortal bones gathering into towers, emitting deadly ripples to drag people into the land of the dead."

The fat merchant became more and more outrageous as he spoke, and the companions listening around him were all terrified.

Because anyone with a little knowledge had heard of the holy land war that broke out in the Empire many years ago; the war was a real event, and if it were truly as terrifying as this man described, then how much power did this world, which had experienced such a terrifying war, and those various churches they dealt with normally, have behind them, and how terrifying were they?

"So, why is 'Dragon Fall Valley' called by that name?"

A bold fellow suddenly asked this question.

The fat merchant, who was describing the theater scene he remembered with passion, looked at this person with dissatisfaction: "Idiot, 'Dragon Fall Valley' is called that because the Dragon that shrouded the sky and prevented the light from scorching the earth was defeated and killed on the battlefield. The valley where it fell is the origin of Dragon Fall Valley."

"What happened in the end? I mean the result of the war."

The fat merchant shrugged and laughed at himself: "Later, because of the death of that Dragon, even more Dragons came. The Dragons stood on the mountain peaks beside the valley, braving the flames, lightning, torrents, and auroras released by the various churches, and spat out scorching white Dragon fire, turning the vast majority of the priests of the various churches in the valley into white smoke. I heard that the souls of those priests couldn't even go to the gods' Divine Kingdom. The priests who arrived later all refused to step onto the battlefield. Because they were not afraid of death, but were afraid that they could not go to the gods' Divine Kingdom after death."

"Hahahaha."

"Hahahaha, those guys."

"Not feeling that a lifetime in this world is important, but instead looking forward to the afterlife in the Divine Kingdom—that really is the way those priests are, always babbling about gods. Unlike us, a fulfilling life is the most important thing, right?"

"Isn't that so! Cheers!"

"To us having nowhere to go after death!"

"Wouldn't it be better to wish for us to live forever?"

"Makes sense, makes sense!"

"Hahahaha."