Chapter 75: Diss's True Strength!

Chapter 75: Dis’s True Might!

Outside the cathedral, Simon tore away his black face-veil and dropped to one knee, simultaneously pressing his palm flat against the earth.

"In the name of the God I revere, I pray You bestow the shackles that enforce Your will, binding everything beyond Order."

The two rings of black-robed clergy surrounding the cathedral—or more precisely, members of the Whiplash of Order—all dropped to one knee in unison, performing the exact same gesture as they chanted together:

"In the name of the God I revere, I pray You bestow the shackles that enforce Your will, binding everything beyond Order."

Beneath every single member of the Whiplash of Order, the shadow of a black chain manifested, extending together toward the cathedral before them.

Seen from afar,

it looked as though countless black chains were locking this cathedral down, along with the Throne of Order that loomed above it!

…

Rasma rose to his feet, gritting his teeth with a trace of helplessness as he spoke:

"Dis, you have truly gone mad. Do you know who you resemble in my eyes right now? You are just like the last mad pope before the collapse of the Church of Light."

"You all thought he was mad, but what if he was the only one truly sober? He once stood at the pinnacle of the spire, shouting to the world that he did not believe in the existence of the God of Light at all.

Now, I find myself understanding his feelings somewhat.

No matter how accurate your thoughts may be, when you do not conform to the masses, the masses will define you as a madman.

Rasma,

you have not felt this sensation yet, but you ought to be able to imagine it.

The last pope of the Church of Light clearly harbored a deep disbelief in the God of Light within his heart, yet he managed to ascend to the papal throne step by step.

Meanwhile, you have always maintained a steadfast faith in the God of Order,

yet right here before your eyes,

I, who continuously blaspheme the God,

have already condensed a fragment of divinity.

That year,

after my son and daughter-in-law knelt before me, bitterly begging and imploring me, I ultimately chose to help them end their lives.

Since then,

I chose to sink into despondency.

In my heart, the God of Order no longer exists, and I no longer revere him.

Yet ironically, the moment I chose to despise the God of Order from the bottom of my heart,

the power of faith in Order began to accumulate at a staggering pace, and the branches of the system of Order faith began to thrive and mature within my body.

Rasma,

don't you think this is a complete mockery?"

"Dis, it is the God of Order showing you clemency. He hopes that through his mercy, he can call you back from your strayed path."

"No, it is not because of him. I despise the God of Order, but I have always believed in Order itself.

He created a hypocritical light of Order; he forged a rule of Order that originally did not exist.

Yet precisely because generations after generations of us believed in it so firmly,

therefore,

the hypocritical light of Order has transformed into the true light of Order, and the non-existent rules of Order have also become the genuine rules of Order.

He deceived us,

but we,

through our own genuine faith,

have caused the falsehood to gradually become reality.

Thus,

upon the rules of Order, there is no God.

You,

I,

as well as the three elders behind you,

we,

and the God of Order, are actually all just travelers standing beside this rule, walking down this path.

He may have walked faster than us, he may be right up ahead, and perhaps we can choose to gaze upon the distant view of his back, but there is absolutely no need to prostrate ourselves in worship.

Because,

the moment you kneel to him,

he will smile,

and then,

he will devour you."

Rasma waved his hand, and the copy of *The Light of Order* dropped to the ground.

"Enough, Dis. Right now, I am not the High Priest of the Church of Order, nor are we comrades sharing a single faith."

Rasma turned his head, casting a glance at the three Temple Elders behind him.

From beginning to end, aside from Elder Xiti stepping forward to say a single sentence, they had remained exceptionally quiet.

Rasma turned his gaze back to Dis:

"Just treat me as a bandit. You possess the jewels we require, and now, you need to hand this jewel over to us, because we are absolutely determined to obtain that piece of jewelry of yours.

Now,

you may state your conditions. We can negotiate, alright?"

"I have three conditions."

Dis spoke.

The moment he uttered these words, Rasma let out a long sigh of relief, and he believed the three Temple Elders standing behind him did the same; having conditions meant there was room to talk.

He had truly been terrified that Dis would take things to an extreme after a barrage of doctrinal subversion resembling the mad ramblings of the last pope of Light.

"The first condition: I will not enter the Temple of Order, because I will not allow myself to serve a fraud who is not a God at all, much less will I allow myself to voluntarily walk into his domain and present myself to be devoured."

"Then there is nothing left to discuss," Xiti spoke up. "Your entry into the Temple is our bottom line. The Church of Order cannot allow you to continue lingering outside.

Therefore, we will choose to suppress you.

If fortune favors us, we should still be able to extract some broken fragments of divinity after suppressing you;

if fortune fails us, the Temple of Order will simply lose a newly ascended elder."

"We will accept this outcome and are willing to bear this cost."

"Xiti, wait a little longer," Gele spoke.

"Gele, I have had enough, I have really had enough! He has absolutely no intention of negotiating!"

"Wait a little longer," Gele urged, holding her back.

"Wait? We still have to wait?"

"Listen to him finish his words."

Gele looked toward Dis and spoke, "Dis, up until this very moment, I still believe that my choice not to punish you back then, after you uttered those words before me, is something worthy of my pride."

Dis placed both hands across his chest, offering a salute to Gele.

Gele mirrored the movement, returning the gesture.

Among the five people present,

the ages of the three temple elders were vastly greater than their current appearances suggested. Although Dis and Lasma were both old men, before these three, they were actually quite "young."

"Please continue," Gele said.

"I can hand over the divinity fragment to you, but I myself will absolutely never enter the Temple of Order."

"Heh." Xiti let out a laugh. "Gele, do it. Suppress him. Have you not seen clearly yet? He is taking pleasure in mocking us! If the divinity fragment is given up, can he himself even survive?"

Dis looked at Xiti very calmly,

and said,

"Divinity fragments—I have more than one."

"..." Xiti was speechless.

The expressions of Gele and Niwen also changed drastically.

As for Lasma, who was closest to Dis, his lips began to twitch.

As rivals in their youth, while I was striving there, you were decaying over there;

I thought the greatest blow was that through hard work I finally managed to climb to the position of High Priest, while you secretly became a god amidst your decay;

but what is actually more devastating is that you secretly became a god more than once.

Gele spoke, "Though this shocks me, I feel you are likely not deceiving us, because after we finish discussing the terms, you will prove it to us."

"I will," Dis said.

"Very well. If you can hand a divinity fragment over to us, you do not have to enter the Temple of Order," Gele gave his reply. "Now, you may state your second condition."

"The second condition is that the Inmeles family, after me, will no longer have any family members enter the church. Inmeles will be completely severed from the church, becoming a family of ordinary people."

Niwen spoke, "Few can refuse the family blessings bestowed by a god, Dis. If you enter the Temple of Order, your family descendants will become the darlings of the God of Order. Are you certain you want to give that up?"

"I have already made it very clear just now. It is not merely giving up the blessings, but isolating the family from the church world henceforth."

"I grant you this," Gele said. "Now, you may state the third condition."

"The third condition is that the three of you swear upon your own divinity that you will not erase from your memories the words I spoke earlier regarding the God of Order. Lasma, you as well, swear upon your faith."

Niwen spoke, "Do you wish to pollute us? Then you think far too lightly of our faith. Our loyalty to the God of Order cannot be shaken by a mere speech of yours."

Gele sighed and said, "Dis, in my eyes, you are still merely a lost soul. I still hope you can awaken soon and return to the embrace of Order."

Xiti let out a cold snort. "Our faith has long been unbreakable."

Lasma waited until the three temple elders finished speaking before opening his mouth, "Naturally, I am the same."

Dis stood there, looking at them, and said,

"The third condition can be completed right now."

Gele opened his palm, and a piece of black, glowing crystal emerged from the center of his hand.

Niwen did the same; upon opening his palm, an identical crystal manifested.

Xiti’s crystal flew out from between her brows, hovering before her.

"I swear upon my divinity, what is seen and heard today shall not be erased."

"I swear upon my divinity, what is seen and heard today shall not be erased."

The three temple elders had finished swearing their oaths. Lasma then closed his eyes, and a black flower manifested before him, its patterns incredibly distinct:

"I swear upon my faith, what is seen and heard today shall not be erased."

In truth, oaths were sometimes not very effective.

Even after swearing, there were various methods to circumvent them, or to escape through the cracks of the vow by paying only a minimal price. However, whether it was divinity or faith, they would always remember this vow.

Therefore, even if they truly found a way to erase that previous memory in the future, from time to time, this vow would still surface in their hearts, and thus, the erased memory would follow and reappear.

Gele spoke, "What needed to be promised, we have promised. What needed to be done, we have done. Dis, now it is your turn to fulfill your promise."

Dis shook his head,

and said,

"I do not trust your promises."

"What exactly do you mean!" Xiti roared in anger.

A glint of gold appeared in the depths of Dis's eyes, and his aura rose accordingly; the scene from that night in the Oak Cemetery was playing out once more.

"Promises are unreliable. Therefore, I need some guarantees."

"Guarantees?" Gele frowned. "What other conditions do you have?"

"Not a condition. This guarantee, I shall provide myself."

The gold in Dis's eyes was gradually spreading, until finally, it completely filled his entire eye sockets.

This time, he stepped completely into that realm. At his chest, a black crystal was flashing with light; this was the divinity fragment he had condensed.

"Buzz!"

But in the next instant,

a scene that shocked everyone present occurred. To the left of Dis's body, a young Dis appeared.

His gaze was sharp, his aura formidable, and at his chest area, there was a black crystal shaped like a spike.

The young Dis had been called by Puer a true genius the likes of which it had never seen in its lifetime. At that time, Dis possessed absolute loyalty toward the Holy Church of Order, the God of Order, and the family heritage.

Old Hoffen had once said that Dis worked incredibly hard to suppress his own realm because he did not want to take that step. But perhaps even Old Hoffen himself could not have anticipated that Dis's method of suppressing his realm was to divide himself into the past and the present to share the burden. In the end, the result of this inescapable burden was that both his past self and his present self had actually reached that step.

Of course, even if Old Hoffen knew, he probably would not be too surprised, because anything appearing on Dis would seem entirely normal. He was Dis, the person Hoffen admired most in his life.

At this moment,

Dis turned his head to glance at his younger self standing beside him,

and spoke,

"Go."

The young Dis took a step forward, the

Niven spoke, his voice trembling, "That is the very gateway to the Temple of Order!"

Under the theology of Order, whoever condensed a shard of divinity gained the right to echo the Temple of Order, which would proactively fling wide its gates, forming a conduit akin to a teleportation array to summon them within.

The black crystal within the body of the young Dis began to ignite, and in an instant, the flames enveloped his entire frame.

Xiti cried out in horror, "He is burning his divine shard!"

In the next breath,

The young Dis, completely consumed by the raging conflagration, walked straight into the colossal black stone portal looming before him.

In what seemed like a mere heartbeat,

The silhouette of the young Dis materialized high above a sea of dense mist.

Beneath his feet

Stretched a majestic, towering temple.

At that moment, upon the temple plaza, other figures had already gathered, their eyes turned toward the heavens.

"Has Geller and his company completed the summoning?"

"It seems so. This is a fresh aura; that fellow must have finally seen the light."

"Heh, what other choice did he have but to see the light?"

"No matter, as long as he can enter, things will be much easier for us from now on."

"Have none of you noticed that this newcomer's aura is somewhat too powerful? And exceedingly unstable."

Suspended in midair, the young Dis began to plummet downward.

Simultaneously,

The black crystal within his body dissolved entirely, and his whole being transformed into a colossal, sweeping fireball!

"Damn it, he is detonating his divine shard!"

"Quickly, raise the defensive arrays! He is coming!"

"Madness, utter madness! He is a lunatic, a complete and utter lunatic!"

The monstrous black fireball

Crashed violently into the temple.

Then came

"Boom!"

The barrier sheltering the Temple of Order shook violently, and pronounced fractures webbed across every corner of the sacred structure.

……

"What did you just do?" Xiti stared at Dis, unable to believe her eyes.

Geller spoke, his tone heavy with dread, "He burned a divine shard and chose to detonate himself right above the Temple of Order."

"You are insane! You are insane!" The aura radiating from Xiti spiked violently, a terrifying pressure bearing down, but Geller threw himself directly in front of her, blocking her path, "Xiti, compose yourself!"

"How can I compose myself? He is nothing but a—"

Xiti's voice choked in her throat.

For she saw on the platform, beside Dis, another figure materialize—it was the middle-aged Dis.

The Dis of middle age had endured the tragedy of killing his own son and daughter-in-law with his own hands, utterly abandoning his faith in the God of Order.

His gaze was glacial, carrying an air of absolute indifference.

Niven gasped in disbelief, "It wasn't two divine shards... He... he has three!"

Geller’s mouth fell open, "Three!"

Xiti, too, fell silent, drawing back her rampant aura.

For on that night in the Oak Cemetery, the old Dis had set one foot into that sublime realm, proving that his true body had also condensed a divine shard.

Even if he had detonated one, he still possessed two more.

Coupled with the Temple of Order's almost unconditional welcome to those who formed divine shards, it meant that if Dis so desired, he could unleash two more rounds of self-detonating strikes against the Temple's barrier space, just as he had done moments ago.

Faced with this reality, even the most hot-tempered Xiti felt a surge of fear.

She had been highly confident before, believing that dealing with a junior would be simple, no matter how troublesome that junior might be.

Yet everything shattered the moment the young Dis chose to detonate himself, forcing her to see the reality of the situation.

Oftentimes, a thousand words were less simple and effective than a single, devastating blow.

"Withdraw the Throne of Order, and release the Chains of Order!" Dis commanded. "Otherwise..."

Before the middle-aged Dis, a vortex began to swirl, signaling that the gates of the Temple of Order were about to open once more.

"Lift the seals!" Geller roared.

Rasma immediately barked an order, "By the name of the High Priest, I command the Order hierarchy to withdraw all seals!"

Previously, the clergy of the Church of Order had deployed two layers of seals outside the cathedral to prevent Dis from escaping.

However, the grand gates of the Temple of Order itself could entirely bypass such sealing barriers.

Thus, once Dis chose the most brutal method to execute his first self-detonation, everything became remarkably simple.

Since you refuse to let me leave the cathedral, I shall simply go to the Temple of Order and blow myself up.

"Buzz!"

The immense phantom of the Throne of Order instantly dissolved.

"Buzz!"

The dense, interlocking black chains shattered completely into nothingness.

Because the withdrawal was so abrupt, many red-robed clergymen and members of the Whip of Order coughed up blood from the backlash.

Inside the cathedral,

The floorboards beneath the middle-aged Dis split open, revealing a hidden teleportation array within.

This was, naturally, the handiwork of old Hoffen; the array was remarkably complex, requiring meticulous calibration, which was no simple feat even for him.

Yet the destination Hoffen had designed for this array was nearby—it linked directly to the teleportation hub of the Church of Order's Ryluan District.

The light of the array flashed vividly,

And the figure of the middle-aged Dis vanished into thin air.

The next moment,

The middle-aged Dis materialized within the array chamber of the Ryluan District Administration; the clergymen responsible for maintaining the array stared at him, utterly dumbfounded.

Dis swept his gaze across them, a shockwave of air rushing forth and knocking them all off their feet.

Then, reaching out, he recalibrated the array and forced a restart.

Using a teleportation array twice in such short succession would inflict severe structural damage under the immense strain, but this was clearly of no concern to Dis.

With another flicker of light, his figure vanished once more.

......

"Who are you?"

"Who are you!"

The middle-aged Diss glanced at his surroundings, walked straight out of the formation, and vanished on the spot.

He had already arrived in Wien.

If it weren’t for the fact that the Allen family's teleportation formation had long been destroyed and rendered useless, he wouldn’t have needed to borrow the formation stations of the Church of Order's various districts to teleport.

"Please look closely, this is the most precious collection of our Raphael family. In the distant past, it once belonged to the Allen family, but now, it stands as the symbol of our Raphael family's rise!"

Inside the manor's study, the patriarch of the Raphael family was showing off to the patriarch of another family;

"The Allen family has long been finished, that group of fools had absolutely no idea how to run a family. Now, it is time to drive them completely out of York City."

"I think I still need to consider it."

"What else is there to consider? There is no need to consider at all."

"Yes."

"Who are you!"

The middle-aged Diss appeared inside this office. There was a highly elite team of bodyguards on the periphery of this manor, and inside the manor, there was the aura of clergy and heterodox demons; it could be said that the defenses were extremely tight.

Unfortunately,

what they were facing was an Elder of the Temple!

"Goddess of Nature—Incineration!"

The spell of the Berry Cult was cast by Diss. This was the simplest spell of the Berry Cult, but its effect was highly efficient, especially since Diss had already completed the restriction upon these two men;

they were now essentially forced to stay completely still while being burned by fire.

And because he didn't know which one was the Raphael patriarch and which one was not, Diss simply burned them both.

Inside the study, only two piles of ash remained.

Immediately after, Diss's figure vanished from the spot.

He returned once more to the formation station of the Wien District Administration Office. Several clergymen had just arrived to investigate the intrusion, but before they could make any reaction, they were all blown away by Diss.

The formation was activated once more, and the middle-aged Diss went to the next location, and then, the next location, and after that, yet another location...

Facts proved that when an Elder of one's own Temple went mad and wanted to play with teleportation formations, the various districts truly lacked the power to stop him for a time, and could only let him play on.

And back at the origin of it all,

inside this church on Mink Street,

the real Diss spread open the palm of his left hand,

while his right hand held the hilt of a sword;

the hilt swirled with black smoke, slicing a massive gash across the palm of Diss's left hand, blood flowing profusely.

"Blood sacrifice, in the name of the Inmures Patriarch, from this day forth, sever the spirituality of the Inmures family members and their descendants!"

The spirituality mentioned here referred to the talent for joining the faith, rather than anything else.

The reason why the Inmures family had been able to pass down through the Church of Order for hundreds of years was largely due to the fact that the family bloodline frequently birthed members possessed of abundant spirituality.

The ancestors of other families would pray for blessings for their descendants, not even hesitating to become summonable entities; yet Diss, on the contrary, had laid down a curse upon the Inmures family!

From this day forth, the possibility of Inmures family members entering the holy church was stripped away from the very root.

Blood began to swirl beneath Diss's feet into a blood sacrifice formation,

in the name of the patriarch,

he enacted the curse!

......

"Karen, when you see this, please open the drawer on the left side, put it on, and then, wait for me to return."

Karen opened that drawer, and inside, there lay only a single silver-white mask. A mere glance at it sent a shiver through one's heart.

That icy touch made one incredibly uncomfortable; feelings of dizziness and nausea immediately rushed forward.

Yet Karen still forced himself to endure these discomforts, picking up the mask and placing it upon his face.

Because all along, his response to commands from Diss had always been:

"Alright, Grandfather."

The mask was worn for a long time, nearly an hour.

Since his grandfather had commanded him to wear it and wait for his return, Karen would not take it off early. After putting it on, he leaned back in the chair just like that, without moving even his head.

At this moment,

inside the house,

invisible lines of blood appeared beneath Uncle Mason's feet, beneath Aunt Winnie's feet, and also beneath the feet of Mina, Lunt, and Chris.

They first attached themselves to their bodies, and then withdrew; the individuals involved noticed nothing at all, nor did they feel the slightest discomfort.

At the same time, in the third-floor study, Puer suddenly raised its head. It saw a line of blood abruptly appear, creeping toward Karen.

Then, upon making contact with Karen, the silver-white mask on Karen's face directly emitted a deathly gray luster, causing the line of blood to instantly shatter and dissipate.

Karen felt a burning sensation like fire upon his body at this moment, but very quickly, the cool chill spreading down from the mask began to saturate his entire being.

At this moment,

a phrase he had spoken while sitting in the hearse with Diss suddenly echoed in Karen's mind:

"Order, is actually just a mask."

———

Begging for monthly tickets, calling for monthly tickets, hugging everyone tightly!