Chapter 84: Pigsty

Chapter 84: The Pigsty

The master bedroom was immense, with the washroom contained entirely within it; unlike a standard hotel suite, this place comprised spaces designated as the "washroom," "study," "sunroom," and "golf practice green"—nominally part of the "master bedroom," though each was actually a relatively independent area.

The study directly facing the master bedroom resembled a formal office, serving as a "sitting room" for conducting business.

It could be said that half the area of this entire floor was reserved for the patriarch, functioning as both his workspace and his private quarters.

"Leave the things, then you may step out."

"Yes."

The two maids set down the toiletries, turned to leave, and closed the bedroom door behind them.

Karen stripped off his clothes, stepped into the shower stall, and began to wash.

He was quite fond of emptying his mind while bathing; when the hot water washed over his body, his thoughts actually fell into a peaceful silence.

After showering, Karen glanced at the bathhouse pool that had been filled with water in advance, but he did not step in for a soak; instead, he dried himself, took a black robe, and put it on.

He walked over to the bed and sat down;

The bed was remarkably soft, and the air was suffused with a faint scent of vanilla—there was no telling what was emitting it, though it certainly was not incense.

The golden retriever was currently lying on the large sofa opposite the bed, quite consciously using its mouth to pull over a blanket to cover itself; once it was down and properly covered, it seemed to notice Karen's gaze and bared its teeth in a grin at him.

Then,

Where was Pu'er?

Karen's gaze swept over his surroundings, and then he lifted a pillow beside him, discovering Pu'er lying right there.

Karen looked at it,

And Pu'er was looking back at Karen;

"It has been so many years since I slept in a bed at home, I really missed it, oh~ the taste of home."

"Don't you feel that your sleeping here is a bit inappropriate?"

"Hmm?" Pu'er blinked its large eyes, "Is there a problem?"

Immediately after,

Pu'er smiled;

"I am a cat right now, isn't it perfectly normal for a cat to sleep in the same bed as its master?

Or rather, do you not view me as a cat?

So, if you don't treat me as a cat, what exactly do you take me for?

Oh ho ho ho,

How could your mind harbor such filthy thoughts, my Lord Evil God."

Karen also offered a faint smile back at Pu'er,

Pu'er lowered its head again, closed its eyes, and intended to resume its sleep.

Then, it felt itself being lifted up, its body leaving the soft, large bed.

"You can't do this, I've been away from home for so many years, why can't I sleep on the bed!"

Ignoring Pu'er's protests, Karen placed it onto the sofa.

The golden retriever pulled its own blanket over, wanting to offer it to Pu'er to share.

"Get lost, you smelly dog!"

Pu'er jumped off the sofa once more, and just as it was preparing to rush back toward the bed, Karen's gaze swept over.

"Well, young master, I'll sleep at the foot of the bed, is the foot of the bed alright? Just that spot, just that tiny little bit of space."

At the foot of the large bed, there was an extension of a soft couch.

Karen nodded.

Pu'er leapt onto the soft couch and lay down.

Karen picked up a pillow and tossed it to Pu'er.

"Oh, thanks to my stingy yet generous young master prince."

Pu'er rested its body against the pillow, looking at Karen who was sitting up against the headboard.

"Actually, things are quite good now, aren't they?

Your purification requires a large quantity of blessed items, and it also requires an absolutely quiet environment free from any disturbance;

These two requirements can both be fulfilled by the people of the Allen family for you; you only need to give the word, and they will fix all of this for you with the utmost speed;

Well, at least for this kind of work, they are perfectly competent."

"I don't know how to manage a family."

In his past life, Karen had only ever managed his own psychological clinic; there were indeed quite a few employees in the clinic, but that did not constitute management in the strict sense.

"Relax, the Allen family has already reached this point, it is on the verge of bankruptcy; perhaps, by Eunice's generation, it would have encountered this situation anyway.

Therefore, this family is already sitting at the bottom of the valley; even if you do a terrible job, there is no room left to slide further down.

Even, to step back ten thousand paces, if you truly do nothing at all and merely treat the Allen family as a place for you to cultivate the faith system of the Church of Order, letting them serve as your assistants, that would be perfectly fine.

Once you complete your purification, you can create a false identity to enter the Church of Order, keeping one foot inside the Church of Order while the Allen family supports you with the other.

After you become an Inquisitor, if you get a good assignment, you will be able to bring the Allen family under your protection.

After all, the Church of Order is very protective of its own, and their fists are also very hard."

"Then what about this family?" Karen asked, "My meaning is, you haven't previously explained to me the inheritance stages of the family system, or what you might call the hierarchy."

"Because it simply has no hierarchy, at least, not the kind of clearly demarcated system that the churches possess.

For instance, the early hierarchy of the Church of Order is:

Purifier—Divine Servant;

Inquirer—Divine Revelation;

Reflector—Divine Shepherd.

Beyond that, one is an Inquisitor.

Although other churches may use different names, their early stages all consist of the three phases of 'Divine Servant,' 'Divine Revelation,' and 'Divine Shepherd.'

A Divine Servant purifies their own body, akin to sweeping a house clean;

A Divine Revelation is inquiring into one's own heart to receive an enlightenment from the god, inviting the divine statue into the house;

A Divine Shepherd involves using one's own understanding and contemplation to effectively merge the god's revelation with oneself through constant thought and reflection, resembling the interior decoration of a shop.

Once you break through this layer, you reach the Inquisitor stage, which counts as the grand opening of the shop.

But the family belief system completely lacks these stages of Purifier, Inquirer, and Reflector."

"It lacks these stages?"

"Yes, because a god is a supreme and magnificent existence; it takes pity on the world and sheds its divine radiance upon its believers, much like your teacher at school—only when your heart is sincere in seeking knowledge will the teacher be more willing to instruct you.

But a Primarch is different; your relationship with a Primarch is dictated entirely by your bloodline. You are born into this family, his blood flows through your veins, and so you naturally obtain his recognition.

It is like a pair of parents giving birth to a child—do they wait until the child is three or four years old to put them through an IQ test before deciding whether to acknowledge themselves as the child's parents?

The moment the child is born, even from the moment the mother conceives, this relationship already exists.

A family system of belief does not require personal preparation; it only requires reaching a profound, mystical alignment with the Primarch.

Does that mean the family system starts at the Inquisitor level?

That is indeed the case. Puer nodded, then shook her head, But the difference is still massive.

Puer shifted her body, sat back against the pillow, and continued:

First of all, under normal circumstances, a family Primarch cannot compare to a god. The height of their existence is completely different. Of course, this does not rule out a few families with truly heaven-defying bloodlines whose Primarchs can indeed infinitely approach a god—some are even stronger than gods.

But we are not talking about extreme examples, only the common rule.

Family Primarchs generally cannot compare to true gods, so the two are a massive leap apart in terms of height.

Next, do not think that the three stages of God's Servant, God's Revelation, and God's Shepherd are a waste of time; this is actually laying a foundation.

These initial three stages of the orthodox church belief system are somewhat like finishing high school and then going to university; at most, you do some part-time work-study, but for the most part, you still need your family to keep supporting you.

The family belief system, on the other hand, skips these three stages. It is similar to looking for a job to earn money right after graduating from junior high school; you do not need the family's sustenance, and you can even have a decent income of your own.

But looking at future development, someone who has gone to university will definitely have more advantages in terms of future career choices and room for growth.

Of course, it cannot be denied that some very formidable characters can build their own careers even if they only graduated from junior high school, but the effort required is often much greater, and the proportion is too small. We can just look at the median.

To use another analogy, an Inquisitor in the Church of Order is like the chief of a local police station. One who comes out of a family belief system is very much like a gang leader on the street.

If you insist on looking for a system like the one you asked about, it does exist. We generally divide it from grade one, grade two, grade three... up to grade ten.

Hearing this division, Karen lamented, That is... so casual.

Yes, exactly, it is just that casual, because it inherently lacks substance. These grades one, two, and three can be understood as percentages, but they are not absolute percentages because the degree of differentiation within them can be massive, yet it cannot be concretely described...

I am a bit confused.

Because the family belief system worships the Primarch, and the descendants grope for and inherit the Primarch's power through worshiping them. The strength and ability attributes of each family's Primarch vary immensely, so it is impossible to make a standard applicable to all family systems.

For example, my family's Primarch could have shattered your family's Primarch with a single punch back in the day.

Even if I am a grade one in the family belief system and you are a grade three, the height of the benchmark Primarchs is different. When you face me, you will actually feel insecure.

If it reaches grade ten, does it mean replicating the Primarch? Karen asked.

Yes, but those who can replicate the Primarch are few and far inside between. In any case, I have never seen one, because the bloodline has been diluted; there is you, and there are your clansmen. In addition, there are various other reasons—for instance, your Primarch reached that height back then by encountering certain opportunities or even eating some special things, but you have nothing to eat...

Therefore, the developmental trajectory of a family belief system is basically on a downward slide, though it can be slowed down through some other means... Well, if luck is good, new growth points can be opened up.

For example, integrating and swallowing the belief systems of other families can, at the very least, enrich one's own system. Furthermore, there is a tiny probability that it can cause some mutations in descendants who concentrate both belief systems.

The simplest example is a husband from an earth-attribute family belief system paired with a wife from a nature-attribute family belief system. The child they give birth to is highly likely to possess both earth and nature attributes, and these two attributes can achieve compatibility and amplification. Under a certain probability, this dual attribute can also be inherited by the next generation.

Therefore, families with corresponding attributes will arrange marriages very frequently.

Well, even if there is no correspondence, or if they do not match at all, given the chance, they can still couple up to try it out. What if there is an unexpected effect, right?

It sounds like the family belief system and your practices are somewhat like...

Like what? Puer waited for Karen's analogy.

Like developing hybrid rice.

Puer blinked: This analogy is somewhat obscure. Can I understand it as something akin to selective breeding for optimization?

Pretty much.

Then indeed, it is exactly like that.

Therefore,

We have always known,

Weakness is the original sin of our family.

Once you are weak to a certain extent, your clans

My choice back then to forge a friendship with the Inmeres family was simply because I viewed them as a stable incubator for the Church of Order. For a single family to so reliably produce talents for the Church was a truly rare feat.

And at that time, I was at the very pinnacle of my glory. Striking up an alliance with whichever family I fancied was nothing more than a matter of a single word, wasn't it?

But afterward, I was turned into a cat, and Dis grew up from a child.

The history of the Inmeres family can be completely bifurcated by the emergence of Dis. From that moment onward, what right did the Allen family possess to even dream of associating with an Inmeres family that had Dis?

Dis dared to bomb even the Temple of Order; would he care about some so-called family friendship left behind by the older generation?

Even Rasma had to speak with utmost caution when facing Dis. Anderson—that chief of fools—what right did he have to sit, drink tea, and chat with Dis?

Therefore,

was it that Dis had long since discerned that while Anderson was a fool in all other aspects, he possessed an incredibly keen instinct in certain matters?

For instance, the way he immediately overrode all objections to hand the management of the family over to you right after you first entered the Allen Manor."

Karen remained silent, for another possibility had crossed his mind.

Because no one understood his grandfather’s character better than he did. This was a grandfather whom even the likes of Minarent and the others revered with absolute awe, yet toward outsiders—irrelevant outsiders—Grandfather was too miserly to offer even a perfunctory gesture.

Most importantly, when Dis arranged a matter, the sheer meticulousness of it was truly terrifying to contemplate.

He seemed never to make a useless arrangement; every single step was a prelude to some future event. It was only when the event actually unfolded that one would realize it in hindsight, and perhaps, after some time had passed, it would cause yet another sudden epiphany.

Purr said quite bluntly:

"You say that I caught sight of your potential and your future, and so I wished to drag you into the Allen family to help me pull this now fallen and incompetent family of mine back onto the right track.

Then... what was the reason Dis personally received those successive batches of fools from the Allen family time and time again over all these years?"

Purr continued to lean her body forward, and then, quite accidentally, her body tumbled forward. After performing a roll, she sat down before Karen, her cat tail once more habitually raised straight up in front of her belly:

"Could it possibly be that while that fool Anderson was encouraging Dis to pull himself together, Dis was instead savoring the belief system of the Allen family?

Was the belief system of the Allen family precisely what Dis considered to be the finest supplement to the Inmeres lineage?"

Karen spoke up, "But Grandfather wished for the family's descendants to live the peaceful life of ordinary people, no longer stepping into the dark circles of the Church."

"That was the later Dis. The earlier Dis might not necessarily have thought so. Besides, even if he did hold that thought, it hardly matters. Maintaining the relationship with the Allen family before that desired outcome came to fruition—is that not an easily understood behavior?

Just look at what Dis prepared for you.

Me,

that stupid dog,

plus that radio sprite.

Furthermore, you do not lack money.

That is precisely why you had the notion of picking up your bucket and running away, because you could completely live in seclusion by yourself in Wien, taking everything slowly.

The Allen family might be able to provide you with assistance, but it could also bring you trouble, and an exquisite egoist like you dislikes trouble and responsibility above all else.

If you could think of this, would Dis fail to think of it?

Why then did he force you into a blind date with Eunice? Why did he insist that his most beloved and cherished grandson go and reside within the Allen family?

Anderson certainly did not possess a face grand enough for that.

Since you wish to walk this path,

then,

why could Dis not consider things for the sake of his... great-grandson?

You might blame me for viewing you as a breeding stud these past few days, but perhaps Dis has believed for these past decades that my Allen family has always been living inside the pigpen of his own design."

Purr opened her mouth, bit her own tail, then pushed it away forward, opening her cat paws:

"My suggestion is that you wait a little and observe a little first. Of course, you have already taken a bath here and are preparing to take a afternoon nap in the master bedroom; in truth, you already have your own analysis and decision in your heart.

However, I still must remind you of one thing. If you believe that Dis is forever acting for your own good,

upon hearing Dis's instructions,

as his most precious grandson,

what kind of reaction should you make?"

Purr clapped her two cat paws together, though unfortunately, the pads of her cat hands were too thick to produce any sound;

nevertheless, she imitated Karen's tone:

"Very well, Grandfather."

Having conversed up to this point, Karen glanced at the sky outside the window and said, "I intend to take an afternoon nap. We will likely have to dine together this evening."

"Very well, Young Master Karen." Purr rolled back to her own soft couch.

Karen lay down, pulled up the blanket, and closed his eyes. Purr's words still echoed in his mind from time to time, though after traveling and rushing about for so long, he was indeed somewhat exhausted.

Sleeping on the soft couch, Purr extended a cat paw. Outside the couch was a small wheel, and she gently turned it with her paw.

A faint and crisp sound rang out like a lullaby. The master bedroom seemed to have been designed with its existence in mind. This stream of sound began to echo and dance within the space, yet the person about to fall asleep did not feel the slightest aversion to it, for its effect was to induce slumber.

Purr crouched there, listening to this lullaby from the depths of her memory, her gaze tinged with a touch of sorrow, but soon, she closed her eyes.

Karen on the bed was the same, entering the realm of dreams amidst this silent, moisture-like hypnosis.

...

"Uncle."

"Hi, Karen, you're back!"

"Hello, Aunt."

"Oh, my Karen has come home."

"Aunt, where are Minachris and the others?"

"School has started, didn't you know?"

"So that's how it is."

The familiar stairs—the first floor, the second floor, up to the third floor.

Karen walked to the door of the study, reached out, and knocked.

"Knock... Knock..."

"Enter."

Pushing open the door, Karen saw Dis sitting behind the desk.

"Grandfather, I am back."

Dis put down the fountain pen in his hand, raised his head, looked at Karen,

and asked:

"I heard that Eunice is pregnant?"

...

Karen opened his eyes, a profound numbness and soreness washing over his body, as though all the fatigue stored within every cell of his being had been completely released during that brief slumber.

The discomfort quickly faded, replaced by an abundance of physical and mental vitality.

This sleep had been deep, solid, and utterly restorative.

Except,

When Karen looked up at the clock standing directly in front of the bed, he found the time was four-thirty, but it was pitch black outside the window, so this was not the afternoon—he had not just taken a two-hour nap, but had slept until the early hours of the next morning.

"Phew..."

So, he had missed dinner too; as a guest, this was a severe breach of etiquette.

Karen threw back the duvet, preparing to wash up.

Unexpectedly, Pu'er, who was supposed to be sleeping on the soft couch, had somehow moved onto the duvet over his chest; as the cover lifted, with a soft thud, Pu'er rolled straight off the bed.

However, there was a rug on the floor, so the fall did not hurt, and Pu'er's slumber was so deep that the cat didn't even wake up, simply turning onto its side to keep sleeping.

After all, it had taken Karen half a month to travel to Wien, but Pu'er had been walking this road back home for over a century.

Entering the washroom to clean up, Karen then opened his suitcase and changed into his formal attire.

By now, he felt rather hungry, but regardless, he ought to present himself to offer his apologies; though Anderson and Bede were likely fast asleep as well, he could convey it to the servants on the night watch.

Yet,

When Karen pushed open the bedroom door,

He was astonished to see three people sleeping in the corridor just outside.

Mick was asleep in his wheelchair,

Mr. Bede was asleep on a chair,

While Anderson slept on a makeshift bed formed by three aligned chairs.

The sound of the door opening startled them awake; Mick woke first, Bede followed, and Old Man Anderson—whose light sleep meant his eyes had actually fluttered open and closed first—managed to "accidentally" roll off his chairs and tumble onto the carpet just as his two sons stood up.

Patriarch Bede immediately went to help his father up, but the old man pushed his son's hands away, looked directly at Karen with a smile, and said:

"You're awake, child;

Oh no, Young Master Karen."

"What are you all doing..."

"It is like this, Young Master Karen."

Old Anderson stood up, while Patriarch Bede beside him held up a thick stack of folders;

"These are the accounts of the Allen family's various businesses and assets, please review them."

Patriarch Bede held the documents high, Mick's expression was somewhat solemn—the red mark from the cane on his face now joined by a second one—while Old Anderson trembled on his arthritic legs and twitched his lips, looking at Karen with profound hope.

Karen placed his hand upon the documents;

And then,

Gently pushed them away.

In an instant, Old Anderson's face turned deathly pale, his legs ceased to tremble, and his lips stopped twitching.

But the next sentence from Karen managed to bring the color right back to the old man's face:

"Let us go to the study."

————

Another chapter tonight.

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