Outside the church, Simon lowered his black mask and dropped to one knee, pressing the palm of his hand flat against the ground.
"In the name of the God I revere, grant the shackles that carry out Your will, to bind all that lies beyond Order."
The two rings of black-robed clergy surrounding the church—more precisely, members of the Whip of Order—all dropped to one knee in unison, mirroring his posture as they chanted together:
"In the name of the God I revere, grant the shackles that carry out Your will, to bind all that lies beyond Order."
Beneath each member of the Whip of Order, the dark silhouette of a chain surfaced, extending toward the church before them.
Seen from a distance,
it looked as if countless black chains were locking down the church alongside the Throne of Order looming above it!
...
Rasma stood up. Clenching his teeth in quiet frustration, he said, "Diss, you've gone mad. Do you know who you remind me of right now? The last mad pope of the Church of Light before its fall."
"You all think he went mad, but what if he was the only one who was truly sane? He once stood on the spire and shouted that he didn't believe in the God of Light at all.
"Now, I can somewhat understand what he felt.
"No matter how accurate your thoughts are, once you diverge from the masses, they will brand you a madman.
"Rasma,
"you haven't felt it yet, but you should be able to imagine it.
"The last pope of the Church of Light didn't believe in the God of Light's existence in his heart, yet step by step, he ascended to the papal throne.
"You've always held firm faith in the God of Order in your heart,
"yet here I stand before you,
"incessantly blaspheming God,
"already having condensed a godhead fragment.
"That year,
"after my son and daughter-in-law knelt before me and begged in bitter tears, I ultimately chose to help end their lives.
"Ever since then,
"I chose to sink into despair.
"In my heart, the God of Order ceased to exist, and I no longer worshiped him.
"Yet precisely when I chose to despise the God of Order from the bottom of my heart,
"the faith power of Order began to accumulate at a rapid pace. The branches of Order's faith system grew steadily and matured within me.
"Rasma,
"don't you find that a complete joke?"
"Diss, it is the God of Order forgiving you. In his mercy, he hopes to guide you back from the path you strayed upon."
"No, it has nothing to do with him. I despise the God of Order, but I have always believed in Order.
"He created a hypocritical Light of Order. He fabricated an Order that never existed in the first place.
"Yet because generation after generation of us believed in it so firmly,
"that hypocritical Light of Order became a real Light of Order, and the nonexistent rules of Order became genuine rules of Order.
"He deceived us,
"yet we,
"through our own true faith,
"gradually turned what was false into something real.
"Therefore,
"there is no God standing above the rules of Order.
"You,
"I,
"and the three of you—
"all of us,
"as well as the God of Order, are simply people standing beside this rule, walking down this path.
"He may have walked a bit faster than us, and he may be further ahead. Perhaps we can choose to gaze upon his silhouette from afar, but there is no need whatsoever to prostrate ourselves in worship.
"Because,
"the moment you kneel before him,
"he will smile,
"and then,
"devour you."
Rasma waved his hand, letting the copy of *Light of Order* fall to the floor.
"Enough, Diss. At this moment, I am not the High Priest of the Church of Order, nor are we companions sharing the same faith."
Rasma turned his head to glance at the three Temple Elders behind him.
From beginning to end, apart from Elder Sidi speaking up once, they had remained exceptionally quiet.
Rasma turned his gaze back to Diss.
"Just treat me as a robber. You have a jewel in your hands that we need, and now, you must surrender it to us, because we are determined to have that jewel of yours.
"Now,
"you may state your conditions. We can talk, all right?"
"I have three conditions," Diss spoke.
The moment he uttered these words, Rasma breathed a long sigh of relief. He was certain the three Temple Elders behind him felt the same. Having conditions meant there was room to negotiate.
He had truly feared that after a string of heresies overturning doctrine like the mad ramblings of the last Light Pope, Diss would go to extremes.
"My first condition: I will not enter the Temple of Order. I will never allow myself to serve a fraud who isn't even a god, much less allow myself to walk through their doors and offer myself up to be eaten."
"Then there is nothing to discuss," Sidi spoke up. "Your entrance into the Temple is our bottom line. The Church of Order cannot allow you to remain outside.
"Therefore, we will choose to suppress you.
"With some luck, after suppressing you, we might still extract a fractured godhead fragment.
"With bad luck, the Temple of Order will merely lose a newly ascended Elder.
"We accept this outcome, and we are willing to bear the cost."
"Sidi, wait a moment," Geller said.
"Geller, I've had enough. I have truly had enough! He has no intention of negotiating!"
"Wait a moment," Geller urged.
"Wait? Wait any longer?"
"Let him finish."
Geller looked at Diss and said, "Diss, even now, I still consider it a point of pride that I chose not to punish you when you spoke that sentence in front of me back then."
Diss placed both hands over his chest and gave Geller a bow.
Geller returned the bow with the same gesture.
Among the five people present,
the three Temple Elders were far, far older than they appeared. Although Diss and Rasma were old men, before the three of them, they were actually quite 'young.'
"Please finish what you have to say," Geller said.
"I can hand the godhead fragment over to you, but I personally will never step into the Temple of Order."
"Heh." Sidi let out a cold laugh. "Geller, make your move. Suppress him! Haven't you realized it yet? He's amusing himself by mocking us! If he hands over his godhead fragment, can he even survive?"
Diss looked at Sidi calmly.
"I have more than one godhead fragment."
"..." Sidi froze.
Geller's and Niven's expressions changed drastically as well.
As for Rasma, standing closest to Diss, the corner of his mouth began to twitch.
*As young rivals, while I was striving with all my might, you were wallowing in despair.*
*I thought the greatest blow was that after clawing my way through immense effort to the position of High Priest, you secretly became a god while mired in your misery.*
*Turns out what's even more soul-crushing is that you secretly became a god more than once.*
Geller said, "Though this shocks me, I believe you are not lying to us, because once the terms are settled, you will prove it to us."
"I will," Diss said.
"Good. If you can give us a godhead fragment, you need not enter the Temple of Order," Geller answered. "Now, state your second condition."
"The second condition: After me, no member of the Inmerlais family will ever join the Church again. Inmerlais will completely sever ties with the Church and become an ordinary mortal family."
Niven remarked, "Very few people can refuse the blessings a god bestows upon a lineage. Diss, if you enter the Temple of Order, your descendants will become the favored children of the God of Order. Are you certain you wish to renounce that?"
"I made myself very clear just now. It is not merely renouncing the blessings—the family must be completely isolated from the clerical world from now on."
"I agree," Geller said. "Now, state your third condition."
"The third condition is that the three of you swear upon your divinity that you will not erase what I just said regarding the God of Order from your memories. Rasma, you as well—swear upon your faith."
Niven said, "Are you hoping to corrupt us? Then you underestimate our faith far too much. Our loyalty to the God of Order cannot be shaken by mere words from you."
Geller sighed. "Diss, in my eyes, you are still merely a lost soul. I still hope you can awaken soon and return to the embrace of Order."
Sidi let out a cold snort. "Our faith has long been unshakeable."
Rasma waited until the three Temple Elders finished before speaking: "The same goes for me, of course."
Diss stood there, looking at them, and said,
"The third condition can be completed right now."
Geller opened his palm, and a black, glowing crystal emerged upon it.
Niven did the same, opening his palm as an identical crystal surfaced.
Sidi's crystal flew out from between her eyebrows, hovering before her face.
"I swear upon my divinity that what I have seen and heard today shall not be erased."
"I swear upon my divinity that what I have seen and heard today shall not be erased."
The three Temple Elders completed their oaths. Rasma closed his eyes, and a black flower surfaced before him, its intricate lines impeccably clear.
"I swear upon my faith that what I have seen and heard today shall not be erased."
In truth, oaths were sometimes not very binding.
Even after swearing, there were all sorts of ways to circumvent them, or slip through the cracks of the vow at minimal cost. Yet whether it was divinity or faith, they would forever remember this oath.
Even if they found a way to erase this memory in the future, the oath would still resurface in their hearts from time to time, and with it, the erased memory would reappear.
Geller said, "What was to be agreed upon, we have agreed upon. What was to be done, we have done. Diss, now it is your turn to fulfill your promise."
Diss shook his head.
"I don't trust your promises."
"What on earth do you mean by that?!" Sidi shouted in anger.
A glint of gold appeared deep in Diss's eyes, and his aura began to surge upward. The scene from Oak Cemetery that night was unfolding once more.
"Promises cannot be relied upon. Therefore, I require some guarantees."
"Guarantees?" Geller frowned. "What other conditions do you have?"
"It's not a condition. This guarantee is something I will provide myself."
The golden light in Diss's eyes began to spread, until finally, it filled his entire gaze.
This time, he stepped completely into that realm. At his chest, a black crystal was gleaming with light—the godhead fragment he had condensed.
*Buzz!*
Yet in the very next moment,
a scene that stunned everyone present occurred. To Diss's left, a youthful Diss materialized.
His gaze was sharp, his aura domineering, and at his chest was a nail-shaped black crystal.
The young Diss had been described by Purr as a true genius unlike any it had ever seen in its life. Back then, Diss had held absolute loyalty toward the Church of Order, the God of Order, and the family legacy.
Old Hoffen had once said that Diss worked terribly hard to suppress his realm because he did not want to take that step. But perhaps even Old Hoffen himself had never anticipated that Diss's method of suppressing his realm was to split himself into his past and his present to share the burden. When the burden could no longer be divided, the final result was that both his past self and his present self had reached that realm.
Of course, even if Old Hoffen had known, he probably wouldn't have been too surprised. Anything happening to Diss would seem natural. He was Diss, the man Hoffen admired most in his entire life.
At that moment,
Diss turned his head to look at the younger version of himself beside him.
"Go."
The young Diss took a step forward. The luster of the black crystal within him began to circulate, and before him, a vortex appeared. Within the vortex stood a massive black stone door.
Niven cried out, "That is the gate of the Temple of Order!"
Under the system of the Church of Order, whoever condensed a godhead fragment gained the qualification to resonate with the Temple of Order. The Temple would actively open its gate, forming a medium akin to a teleportation array to guide them inside.
The black crystal inside the young Diss began to burn, and in an instant, the flames engulfed his entire body.
Sidi gasped, "He is burning his godhead fragment!"
The next instant,
the young Diss, completely engulfed in flames, walked straight into the colossal black stone door before him.
In almost a split second,
the figure of the young Diss appeared above a layer of mist.
Beneath his feet
stood a towering, majestic divine temple.
At that moment, on the temple's plaza, other figures had already gathered, looking up into the sky.
"Have Geller and the others completed the guidance?"
"It should be so. This is a new aura. That fellow must have finally seen the light."
"Heh, did he have any other choice besides seeing the light?"
"Never mind that. As long as he comes in, things will be easier for the rest of us from now on."
"Haven't you noticed? This newcomer's aura is a bit too powerful... and exceedingly unstable."
The young Diss standing in midair began to plummet.
At the same time,
the black crystal in his body completely dissolved, and his entire being transformed into an immense fireball!
"Damn it, he's detonating his godhead!"
"Quick, raise the defense array! He's coming!"
"Mad! Mad! Mad! A madman, an utter madman!"
The gigantic black fireball
slammed into the temple.
Then—
*Boom!*
The boundary space where the Temple of Order resided shook violently, and prominent cracks appeared all across the temple.
...
"What did you just do?!" Sidi stared at Diss in disbelief.
Geller spoke in a heavy, somber tone: "He burned a godhead fragment and chose to self-detonate above the Temple of Order."
"You're mad! You're completely mad!" The aura on Sidi instantly erupted, and a terrifying pressure bore down, but Geller moved straight in front of her, blocking her path. "Sidi, calm down!"
"How can I calm down?! He's just a—"
Sidi's voice caught in her throat.
Because on the altar, beside Diss, another Diss had appeared. That was... middle-aged Diss.
The middle-aged Diss had gone through the tragedy of killing his own son and daughter-in-law with his own hands, and had completely abandoned his faith in the God of Order.
His gaze was cold, carrying a profound indifference.
Niven gasped in disbelief, "Not two godhead fragments... he... he has three!"
Geller's mouth fell open as well. "Three!"
Sidi calmed down too, pulling back her surging aura.
Because that night in Oak Cemetery, Old Diss had stepped half a foot into that realm, proving that his true body had condensed a godhead fragment as well.
Even after self-detonating one, he still had two left.
Coupled with the fact that the Temple of Order extended guidance almost unconditionally to anyone who condensed a godhead fragment, it meant that as long as Diss was willing, he could unleash two more rounds of self-detonations against the boundary space where the Temple of Order stood, just like before.
Faced with this situation, even Sidi, the most short-tempered among them, felt fear.
She had been confident before, thinking that dealing with a junior would be easy, even if that junior was troublesome.
Yet everything changed the moment the young Diss chose to self-detonate, forcing her to recognize reality.
Most of the time, no amount of words was as simple and effective as a slap to the face.
"Dispel the Throne of Order. Dispel the chains of Order!" Diss spoke. "Otherwise..."
A vortex began to form before the middle-aged Diss as well, signaling that the gates of the Temple of Order were about to open once again.
"Dispel the seal!" Geller shouted.
Rasma immediately commanded: "Ranks of the Church of Order, in the name of the High Priest, I order you to dispel all seals!"
Earlier, the clergy of the Church of Order had laid down two seals outside the church to prevent Diss from escaping.
Yet the Temple of Order's own gate completely disregarded such barriers.
Thus, when Diss chose to complete the first self-detonation in the most ferocious manner possible, everything became very simple.
*Since you won't let me leave the church, I can only go blow myself up in the Temple of Order.*
*Buzz!*
The massive phantom of the Throne of Order shattered and vanished.
*Buzz!*
The dense thicket of black chains disintegrated as well.
Because they were retracted too abruptly, blood seeped from the lips of many red-robed clergy and members of the Whip of Order.
Inside the church,
the floorboards beneath the middle-aged Diss cracked open, revealing a teleportation array hidden within.
This was naturally Old Hoffen's handiwork. Teleportation arrays were actually very complex, even for Old Hoffen, because establishing the connection was no simple task.
However, the destination of this array designed by Old Hoffen was very close—it only connected to the Church of Order's teleportation array in the Ruilan District.
A light flashed across the array,
and the middle-aged Diss vanished.
The next instant,
the middle-aged Diss appeared at the teleportation array station of the Ruilan District headquarters. The nearby clergy responsible for maintaining the array stared at him, dumbfounded.
Diss cast a glance at them, and a sweeping shockwave overturned them all.
Then, he reached out, adjusted the array, and reactivated it.
Using an array twice within a short period would place immense strain and damage upon it, but Diss clearly didn't care.
As the light flashed again, his figure vanished once more.
...
"Who are you?"
"Who are you!"
The middle-aged Diss glanced around, stepped straight out of the array, and vanished from the spot.
He had arrived in Wien.
If the Allen family's teleportation array hadn't been ruined and rendered unusable long ago, he wouldn't have needed to borrow the arrays at the Church of Order's district headquarters to travel.
"Take a good look. This is the most precious collection piece of our Raphael family. In the distant past, it once belonged to the Allen family, but now, it is the symbol of our Raphael family's rise!"
Inside the manor's study, the head of the Raphael family was showing off to the head of another family.
"The Allen family is finished. That bunch of fools has no idea how to manage a family. Now, it is time to drive them completely out of York City."
"I think I still need to consider it."
"What is there left to consider? There is no need to hesitate at all."
"Indeed."
"Who are you!"
The middle-aged Diss appeared inside the office. The perimeter of this manor was guarded by elite security forces, and the interior held the auras of clergy and aberrant demons. It could be called heavily fortified.
Unfortunately,
they were facing a Temple Elder!
"Goddess of Nature—Incinerate!"
A spell from the Berry religion was unleashed by Diss. It was the simplest spell of the Berry faith, but its effect was exceptionally practical—especially when Diss had already immobilized both of them.
Right now, they could do nothing but stand motionless as the flames consumed them.
Not knowing which one was the head of the Raphael family and which was not, Diss simply burned them both.
Inside the study, only two piles of ash remained.
Immediately after, Diss's figure vanished from the room.
He returned to the array station at the Wien District headquarters. Several clergy had just rushed over to investigate the breach, but before they could react, Diss swept them all aside.
The array activated once more. The middle-aged Diss traveled to the next location, and then another, and yet another...
Facts proved that when their own Temple Elder went mad and decided to play with teleportation arrays, the various district headquarters were truly powerless to stop him and could only let him run wild.
Meanwhile, at the origin of it all,
inside the church on Mink Street,
the real Diss spread open his left palm,
while his right hand held a sword hilt.
Black mist flowed from the hilt, slicing open a massive wound across his left palm, and blood gushed freely.
"A blood sacrifice. In my name as the Inmerlais Patriarch, from this day forth, sever the spirituality of all Inmerlais family members and their descendants!"
The 'spirituality' here referred specifically to the talent for joining the Church, nothing else.
The reason the Inmerlais family had endured for hundreds of years within the Church of Order was largely that their bloodline frequently produced members brimming with spiritual energy.
Ancestors of other families prayed for blessings for their descendants, some even going so far as to become summonable entities. Yet Diss was casting a curse upon the Inmerlais family!
From this day forward, he stripped away the possibility of any Inmerlais family member joining the Church at the very root.
Blood began to flow beneath Diss's feet, forming a blood sacrifice array.
In his name as patriarch,
he laid down the curse!
...
*"Karen, when you read up to this point, please open the drawer to your left, put it on, and wait for me to return."*
Karen pulled open the drawer. Inside lay only a silver-white mask. A single look at it sent a chill through one's spine.
Its icy touch was deeply unsettling, immediately bringing waves of dizziness and nausea.
Yet Karen endured the discomfort, picked up the mask, and placed it over his face.
Because all along, his response to Diss's instructions had always been:
"Understood, Grandfather."
He had worn the mask for a long time, nearly an hour.
Since Grandfather had instructed him to wear it and wait for his return, Karen would not take it off early. After putting it on, he simply leaned back in the chair, not even moving his head.
At that moment,
inside the house,
invisible threads of blood appeared beneath Uncle Mason's feet, beneath Aunt Winnie's feet, and beneath the feet of Mina, Lunt, and Chris.
They attached to their bodies first, then withdrew. None of them noticed a thing, nor did they feel the slightest discomfort.
At the same time, in the third-floor study, Purr suddenly raised its head. It saw a thread of blood appear abruptly, snaking toward Karen.
Then, upon touching Karen, the silver-white mask on his face radiated an ashen glow, and the thread of blood instantly shattered.
Karen felt a burning sensation wash over his body, but soon, a cool sensation spreading down from the mask began to soak into his entire frame.
At that moment,
the words he and Diss had spoken while riding in the hearse suddenly echoed in Karen's mind:
*"Order is actually just a mask."*
Chapter 75