The Path to Lordship Begins in the North

In fact, Tia and Linde had an even more blasphemous speculation in their minds: if death is a state, then what is the state of the gods in the world now, especially the goddess who has not responded to her believers for a long time?

Is the goddess also participating in the revival round?

Bernice said to herself, "There is no record of such an event in the books. At least, there is no record of Outer Gods being resurrected in the books we collected in the Lantern Dream."

But then Bernice noticed the expression on Lind's face and asked, "Governor, is there a problem?"

Linde and Tia exchanged a glance and asked, "What exactly is the goddess's state right now?"

Before the Lantern Dream, they knew that Linde had holy water, but their understanding of the holy water in Linde's hands was that it was "a Golden Age potion with effects similar to the goddess's holy water," and they did not know how the holy water was produced.

He was unaware that Linde was fleecing the goddess, but the goddess had not responded.

Bernice explained, "The goddess is different from those false gods. The goddess needs to rest. Right now, the goddess is just sleeping. When the goddess wakes up, she will respond to her faithful followers again."

Upon hearing the words "false god," Tia scoffed, "At least our God of Nature doesn't need to sleep and can occasionally respond to his believers. Why don't you just stop believing in this sleeping god and start worshipping our God of Nature instead?"

I originally thought that Bernice would be furious even if the red heat didn't break her defenses, but I didn't expect Bernice to say calmly: "Thank you for your kindness, but the god you understand and the god we believe in are not the same concept. Don't apply the concept of a false god to the goddess."

Bernice's expression was like that of an adult arguing with a child who hasn't even learned to understand yet. She even sighed after she finished speaking, as if she was going to comfort Tia.

"Ha, who knows if your goddess is just like those so-called Outer Gods, a mere corpse waiting to be resurrected?"

Tia persisted, but Bernice patiently continued to explain, "Even when the goddess is asleep, her followers can still use divine magic. That's the difference between the goddess and those false gods."

"you..."

Tia saw that Bernice was unmoved and wanted to continue arguing, but Lind patted her on the shoulder, so she had to calm down. After all, Lind had already reminded Tia that the Lantern Dream had mastered many ancient scriptures, but at the same time they were a group of fanatics. Arguing with fanatics about this kind of issue would definitely not bring any benefit.

Seeing Lind's curiosity, Bernice gave a more detailed explanation.

The Lantern Dream does not deny the issue of the goddess's current inactivity. The internal explanation is that the goddess is temporarily asleep. However, the goddess is different from other gods. Even when asleep, she can still respond to believers using divine magic; she just cannot issue divine pronouncements.

Tia was quite dismissive of this explanation. In her view, it was nothing more than a self-deceptive explanation among fanatics. Many cultists had an explanation that differed from the real worldview, but was still self-consistent.

But after listening, Lind began to ponder. He could not issue divine pronouncements, but he could automatically respond to the divine spells of his believers.

Linde had consulted the official Vatican definition of divine magic and the Lantern Dream's explanation of it. Divine magic relies on faith to establish a connection with the divine, and is essentially borrowing the power of the gods.

As for the goddess's performance, well... it was a bit too intelligent.

Linde even had a guess: perhaps the Lantern Dream's view was correct, and the goddess might be in some kind of AFK state, automatically processing all requests for divine spells, which is why Linde was able to exploit this loophole and continuously produce holy water.

But this raises a new question: why is the goddess the only one who is different? Although the goddess is a very special being even among a group of gods, from the perspective of the Lantern Dream, the goddess is fundamentally different from other gods. The fact that she needs to rest is something that other gods would not do, let alone the current AFK state where she automatically processes divine spell requests.

What exactly is a goddess?

Linde looked up at the sky, but there was no sky here, only a ceiling.

Then Linde looked at the pulsating mass of flesh and blood. Was the god of this world not just a concept, but a real entity?

After the meeting, Lind asked Bernice to collect all the oracles that the goddess had given. Bernice guessed that Lind, a man of the Golden Age, had found some clues about the goddess, and immediately agreed. However, not all of the goddess's oracles were given in written form, and many oracles were in the hands of the current papacy, so the process might be a bit difficult.

Linde understood perfectly. After all, most of the intelligence was being provided unilaterally by Lantern Dream, and such cooperation was bound to be short-lived, even if Lantern Dream firmly believed that Linde was a member of the Golden Age.

Therefore, Linde also decided to prioritize providing Lantern Dreamland with some technologies that could be revealed. After all, from the perspective of various forces, Lantern Dreamland was probably the most friendly and easiest to satisfy Linde. Of course, it was impossible to get Lantern Dreamland to preach, even if Lantern Dreamland agreed to be under Linde's management.

"Anything gained?"

Lind glanced at Tia, who was deep in thought.

"These guys are definitely a bunch of fanatics."

Tia looked at her notes with a hint of resentment.

"But they do know a lot of things. Where did they get so many other church texts from?"

However, Tia quickly shook her head helplessly. Just as the Lantern Dream said, the Goddess was indeed very special among the many gods. In the past, the Goddess Cult was even the only dominant religion on the continent. Some religions even split off from the Goddess Cult, so it was normal to have scriptures from other churches.

"In any case, this so-called Outer God has polluted the land and is definitely our enemy. We will also reveal some things that can be revealed to other countries. It is clear that this god of the Demon Race is the enemy of all religions."

Tia seemed confident, but Lind felt things wouldn't go so smoothly. Even if Lind and Tia really had the flesh and blood of the demon god, and the Golden Harvest Plain had just finished a major battle, would the other people on the continent really take it seriously?

Even if the gods did respond and issue a divine decree, how would other religions fight against these demonic monsters? Would they send troops into the northern border of the Kingdom of Cape? Or would they enter the north directly from the Gog's Empire of the elves? No matter how you look at it, it seems impossible; in the end, they might only be able to offer scattered assistance.

Moreover, most people probably wouldn't consider this a big problem. After all, the demons were cornered in the North by Lind, and many people wouldn't have a concept of how strong those demon monsters were unless they saw it with their own eyes.

Even in the Kingdom of Cape, many people felt that Linde posed a greater threat than the demons, since the demons were separated from the capital by the Northern Territory, which was actually located far behind the capital.

To resolve this issue, we still need to talk to Her Majesty the Queen. In addition to his regular political duties, Linde has been writing letters to various factions these days, and has finally finalized a specific meeting date and some details with the capital.