Lord of Prayer

Chapter 48: Chapter 43: The Gods

Indeed.

The Bawo Port Massacre, the Seven-Day Tide of Rage, the City of Eternal Sleep, the Night of the Sun’s Fall… and many other major disasters instigated by the Abyss Church had all caused irreversible, devastating losses.

Compared to all that, this was undoubtedly a trivial matter.

’But is it really trivial?’

Those were two vibrant lives, two completely different paths. They should have had wonderful futures, yet they were utterly destroyed by the cruelest of means…

For Zhou Chen, the one who witnessed it, this was not a small matter. It was incredibly heavy.

True, without the help of the Eternal Fire, Li Guangjun would still be a good-for-nothing right now. He never would have met Zhou Yi, and he never would have had that brief moment of happiness.

But that was Li Guangjun’s business. What did it have to do with him, Zhou Chen, wanting to smash the mastermind’s damn head in?

If he caught them in a nightclub, he’d kill them in the nightclub. If he ran into them on the street, he’d hang them from a lamppost. If he found them in a bathroom, he’d grab them and drown them in a toilet.

—This was his attitude.

—Because he was royally pissed off!

“You must remember this, Zhou Chen. You must remember this feeling.”

Jiang Che looked at him, his gaze calm and profound. “Do not harbor any sympathy, wishful thinking, or pity for the Abyss Church. They are a malignant tumor, pawns used by the Abyss to corrode this World.”

“The Abyss…”

After a momentary daze, Zhou Chen closed the file and asked in a low voice, “What exactly is the Abyss?”

“The World’s cancer, the World’s shadow, a Hell that exists outside of reality. A dark world filled with despair and distortion.”

Jiang Che said, “Some say the Abyss is a scar left over from the War of the Gods at the end of the old era. Others say the Power released during the Divine War was so terrifying that it tore through the dimension of reality, opening a bridge between the Mortal World and Hell.

But no matter the explanation, the fundamental nature of the Abyss doesn’t change—like a cancer cell, it wants to assimilate our World.”

“So basically, they’re some evil force that wants to destroy the world.” Zhou Chen more or less understood. He mulled it over for a moment before asking again, “Then… what about the Gods? Didn’t They try to do something?”

Gods truly existed in this World. Although Zhou Chen had never seen one with his own eyes, he had read through numerous incidents related to “Divine Descent” in the database, from which he could glimpse the unimaginable power the Gods possessed.

Jiang Che shook his head. “Related intelligence is highly classified within the Star Association. I only know that They tried once, but ultimately failed.”

“Failed?” Zhou Chen looked stunned.

“It’s perfectly normal. Every Abyssal King is a being equal to a God, and what’s more…”

After a pause, Jiang Che continued, “There are currently seven Gods in the world, but two of them defected to the Abyss. Their names have become unmentionable taboos. The remaining five are the ’War God,’ the ’Dream Lord,’ the ’Goddess of Life,’ the ’Silent Moon,’ and the ’Master of Storms and Oceans.’”

“Wait a minute.” Zhou Chen was incredulous. “Defected?”

“Did you think there are no conflicts of interest or deceptions among the Gods?” Jiang Che said calmly. “Besides, don’t think of the Gods as too perfect. They were once human, too.”

“Alright, umm… I have one last question.”

Zhou Chen asked, “Don’t They have their own Churches? Why have I never seen any?”

“Of course They do, but they are all small-scale Churches that ordinary people don’t come into contact with.

First, the Star Association doesn’t allow them to proselytize on a large scale. Second, They don’t need the Power of Faith, so They never even considered establishing Churches. That would just be asking for trouble.

Even sleeping in would be ten thousand times better than dealing with all the trivial crap their followers complain about.”

Jiang Che leisurely stirred the coffee in his teacup:

“But the reason Gods are called Gods is precisely because They possess Power beyond imagination. Even revealing a tiny fraction of it is enough to be considered a ’miracle,’ inspiring worship from thousands.

They have no intention of establishing Churches, yet groups of people who have received Their divine favor have spontaneously formed Churches to worship Them.

But due to a lack of guidance, many of them went astray.

Later, the Star Association discussed it with a few of the Gods and asked them to take some time to look after their own Churches to prevent any more mishaps. This is how they evolved into the current Divine Favor Churches.

—The followers of the ’Master of Storms and Oceans’ are mostly located in coastal areas. The followers of the ’Dream Lord’ are insomniacs and Mysticism enthusiasts. The followers of the ’Goddess of Life’ are mostly doctors and patients who once had terminal illnesses. And the followers of the ’Silent Moon’ must be kind-hearted individuals.

As for the ’War God,’ He has no followers, only adherents. They are stationed year-round at the Abyssal Outposts on the front lines, monitoring and defending against the crises from within the Abyss.”

Zhou Chen silently processed this information. Just then, there was a knock on the office door.

“Come in,” Jiang Che said.

As his voice fell, a male employee came in carrying a box, set it down without a word, and then turned and left.

“What’s this?” Zhou Chen asked curiously.

“Open it and see.”

“A present for me?” Zhou Chen was taken aback, not expecting it to be for him at all.

He rubbed his hands together excitedly, found a small knife in a drawer, and eagerly sliced through the tape. Opening the cardboard box revealed an exquisitely crafted alloy case inside. An all-too-familiar logo was printed on top—it was the symbol of the Helandy Alchemy Workshop.

Without a doubt, there was definitely a piece of Alchemy Equipment inside.

’I wonder what it is…’

Filled with the same excitement he felt when Drawing Cards, Zhou Chen fiddled with it for a long time but couldn’t find any way to open the case. He looked at it from the left, from the right, from above, and from below. No matter how he looked at it, the thing was just a seamless metal lump.

“Please enter the access code.”

Suddenly, a synthetic, mechanical voice sounded from within the alloy case.

“P-E-7-A-5.” Jiang Che put down his phone and verbally entered the random verification code he had just received, one character at a time.

CLICK.

The sound of mechanisms and gears turning came from the alloy case. The metal shell opened with the sound, and pushed up by a small lifting platform inside, a palm-sized, flat, black, circular metal object slowly rose.

An intricate and complex Alchemy Matrix was inscribed on it. Countless fine lines were as precise as a circuit board, making it look like a component from some large alchemy machine at first glance.

“What is this?” Zhou Chen picked it up and examined it repeatedly, but didn’t notice anything special about it.

“Place it on your chest,” Jiang Che prompted.

Zhou Chen did as he was told, pressing the Matrix to his chest. In an instant, with a soft whirring sound, the metal Matrix flowed like liquid, extending in a flash to completely envelop his body and form a suit of Steel Armor that gleamed with a cold, metallic luster.

He stood frozen in place, in disbelief.

“N-Nanometer Battle Armor?”