10.3

As an offering to the God of Light, it was natural to choose the best.

A large orchard was planted at the back of the Temple of Light, but all the delicious fruits that could be found on this continent would be transplanted here, and there were mages specializing in the botanical department to take care of them. Every two weeks, they would regularly pick the best and sweetest fruits and place them in the ice blue for the temple’s maids to select.

Seeing the Lord Priest himself come, the two plant mages were taken aback and hurriedly bent down to salute.

“I want the freshest fruit, preferably just picked last second.” Treating people other than Father God, the teenager appeared to be very arrogant as well as cold.

However, as was the case with all Priests of Light, the two plant mages did not feel slighted, and hurriedly picked out several baskets of fruits and set them in front of him.

Zhou Yunsheng bent down to look through them and slightly tasted a few, making sure they tasted good before putting them in the basket he had brought. He returned to the temple and used the water in the sacred pool to wash the fruits, drained them and set them aside, then prepared to make vegetarian cakes.

“Priest-sama, just pour the buckwheat flour and water together into a clay pot and knead it into a dough, wring out an egg-sized mass and pat it into a round shape.” Lest he not know how to do it, the maid first mixed and patted one of the flour and set it in the tray as a demonstration.

Zhou Yunsheng glared at the maid with an incredulous gaze. This is the so-called vegetarian cakes offered to Father God? No seasoning, no waking, no shaping, no smoking, just waiting to be dried into dry, harder-than-stone dough before offering it up? This is a blasphemy against God the Father!

The brainwashed soul made him out of rage, he pushed the maid aside, and called up all the skills in his mind that had to do with cooking, poured in flour and water in extremely precise proportions, covered his palm with the power of light, and bit by bit, he kneaded the dough into a fine and soft shape.

“Lord Priest, why do you need to waste the power of light!” The maid felt a fleshly pain when she saw the golden light emerging from his palm. In today’s world where the power of light was becoming more and more rare, cultivating a powerful Light Priest often required the efforts of a country, and Light Priests would never use the power in their bodies unless they had to, because they used a little bit and then a little bit less, and then they would need to be accumulated after a long period of prayers, and some of them even had to spend more than ten or twenty years.

People like Joshua the priest, who use the power of light even to make peace, are simply out of their minds.

Zhou Yunsheng’s brain was indeed broken. Just as he hypnotized himself every day, he loved Father God madly, passionately, so much that he lost himself to pieces and couldn’t stand the slightest negligence of Father God by others.

This kind of vegetarian cake that even a pig wouldn’t want to take a bite of, and they dared to take it and offer it to the public, which was simply unbearable for him.

He swore that he would make the most delicious and exquisite vegetarian cakes in the world to offer to Father God, so he coldly spoke, “What do you mean by wasting the power of light? My power is all a gift from Father God, so naturally I should wholeheartedly return Father God’s favor. In the future, you don’t need to prepare offerings for Father God, this is my job.”

When the maid saw his face cold and solemn, she knew that he was angry and could only retreat to the corner in fear.

Zhou Yunsheng had gone through so many reincarnations that a small thing like cooking was naturally no big deal. He loved to eat and had very picky tastes, so he had developed an extraordinary cooking skill.

In the process of waking up the dough he did not idle, picked a few kinds of fruits and beans, should be stirred into puree mixing, should be squeezed juice juice, think the white dough is a bit monotonous, and then use the fruit juice to blend the yellow, red, purple and other dough standby.

He moved skillfully and elegantly, as if he had done it a thousand times, calling the two maids to look dumbfounded.

When the dough was all risen, he filled it with fillings and pinched it into all kinds of shapes, including flowers, birds, fish, and all kinds of small animals, which looked lovely when they were neatly placed on the tray one by one.

After pinching the vegetarian cakes, there was still a bit of white dough left, he hung his eyes to consider for a moment, and not knowing what came to his mind, his cheeks actually flushed a blush. He placed the dough in his palm, and little by little, he pinched it into the shape of himself kneeling on the ground with his hands folded, and placed it in the center of the tray.

The expressions of the two maids went from dumbfounded to adoring to speechless. They could sort of see that the Lord Priest’s attachment to the God of Light had reached the point of going off the deep end.

The God of Light above the Nine Heavens had been staring at the busy teenager, the curves of his mouth becoming more and more profound. Watching the teenager prepare offerings for himself with his own hands, his cold and hard heart actually became as soft as dough, and there was even a faint sweetness flowing through his heart.

Zhou Yunsheng washed his hands clean and took the tray to be steamed. While he waited, he went to the garden to pick flowers to offer to Father God.

According to the bard’s rumor, the white moonflower was the favorite flower of the God of Light, and the flower’s language was – respect, reverence, sublimity, purity, and it was indeed a good match for the Father God. With a happy smile on his face, Zhou Yunsheng stood on his tiptoes to climb and fold the most beautifully blooming one.

“Priest-sama, moonflowers are thorny, you should use scissors.”

Unfortunately, the maid’s reminder was a little too late, and Zhou Yunsheng frowned, pulling back his stinging finger, a drop of bright red blood slowly spilling out of the rounded and lovely finger belly, appearing very eye-catching.

The two maids rushed forward to bandage him.

“It’s just a small injury, no harm done.” He shook his head and put the injured fingertip into his mouth and sucked on it, taking it out a moment later to look again, the blood droplets had disappeared.

The maids of honor had their hearts in their mouths and immediately fetched scissors, urging him not to touch the thorns again. The priests of light were the most important property of the empire, and they couldn’t afford to have even a single drop of blood spilled that would reach the bishop’s ears.

Above the nine heavens, the smile at the corner of the Bright God’s mouth pursed into a straight line, and when the teenager left with the flower basket, he raised his fingertips, and a beam of black light penetrated through the water mirror and landed on the moonflower bushes that had bloomed on one whole wall, either pink, yellow, red, or white, and appeared to be extraordinarily fragrant and rich.

In the blink of an eye, the blooming flowers withered, the tender green leaves withered, the stems collapsed and hardened, and eventually turned into black fragments rustling to the ground.

When the passing squire saw this scene, his eyes radiated fear and horror, and he immediately ran toward the bishop’s attic.

Meanwhile, Zhou Yunsheng placed the carefully prepared offerings one by one on the offering table. He picked up the small noodle man and looked at it, his cheeks red and looking a little shy, before placing it at the very front of all the noodle dishes.

“Father God, please don’t disdain these humble offerings, if I could, I would hate to give my all to You, but this body is too small and too humble, how is it qualified to receive Your mercy. If you can hear my prayer, just give me a faint glance above the nine heavens I would be satisfied.” He knelt down in front of the statue and performed a great salute with his hands folded, the shyness on his face replaced by misery.

There are so many beings in the world that need to be saved, how could God the Father possibly notice him? The so-called love of God the Father was just an extravagant hope that could never be realized.

He wrinkled his brow at the thought and wanted to cry a little again, taking small steps and knees to the statue of the Father God, hugging and rubbing his ankles, looking depressed.

The God of Light pressed and rubbed his brow, not knowing what to do with the little devotee. He was so delicate and adorable, yet sensitive and fragile at the same time, and the fact that he thought so lowly of himself really made him both angry and amused. Did he think that every Priest of Light could receive a gift from the God of Light when he prayed?

The Pope, who ruled over all the priests and shrines, had only received a trace of his divine power of light after thirty years of devout prayer. On the contrary, if the little believer wasn’t afraid of the huge divine power bursting through his body, he would have wanted to pour all of his benevolence and affection on him.

How could he think that God his Father did not love him?

The God of Light was distressed and reached out his fingertips to gently tap on the young devotee’s brow, ferrying a ray of golden light saturated with tenderness.

Zhou Yunsheng groaned as he was tantalized by the divine power. His furrowed brows relaxed, his pale cheeks flushed, his mood became joyful and light, and he went to kiss the back of his father’s feet with a quiet smile. When he finally broke free from the feeling of being loved, he realized that the offerings on the table were all gone.

He was so alarmed that he immediately ran out to question the two maids.

Above the nine heavens, the God of Light laughed helplessly at his back as he hurriedly ran away, and then held up the small noodle in front of his eyes to scrutinize it. The noodles had not yet cooled down, and a wisp of white mist wafted through the air, bringing out a fragrance that belonged solely to buckwheat. Without tasting it, the God of Light could imagine how sweet the flavor would be.

The little noodle was fabricated in a perfect way, and it swelled up a bit because of the hot air, which in turn made the image of the teenager look very round and cute. The God of Light gazed at it for a long time and gently turned it, and his heart seemed to be rushed by electric current, numb and itchy, with a kind of fluffy feeling.

After watching for a good ten minutes, he moved the little face to his lips and discreetly, gently kissed it before looking to the standing God-Emperor and asking, “Is he cute?”

Using ‘he’ instead of ‘it’, the God-Emperor realized after a little pondering that this small-faced man was probably the image of the mortal that Father God had been spying on recently. Moreover, Father God’s tone of voice revealed a bit of pride and pleasure, like those aristocrats in the lower realms who flaunted their treasures.

This was no longer ordinary interest, but rather fondness and drooping love. The divine messenger’s heart flinched as he hurriedly replied with a smile, “Very cute. My subordinate has yet to see such a lovely young man, and I’m afraid that no divine servant in the divine temple can compare to him.”

The slightly raised corners of the Light God’s mouth pursed into a harsh straight line, and his dark golden eyes swept over coldly.

The divine messenger immediately knelt down and apologized, desperately trying to think of what he had said wrong.

“Can those humble servants of the gods be compared to my dearest child.” He held the little face in his hands as he walked away in style, and with a wave of his sleeve, he placed a banning spell on the god’s messenger.

The divine messenger had no resentment in his heart, but instead breathed a sigh of relief. Gods who angered Father God and were burned to ashes abounded, and he was already extremely lucky to have saved a life. It seemed that Father God’s love for that priest in the lower realm had exceeded his imagination, and he didn’t know what kind of magnificent beauty the other party was.

If this fondness continued, God the Father was afraid that he would grant him the divine frames that he had plundered from other gods. Those Godheads were treasures that every God-Emperor, and even every God-Servant, could only dream of.

————

Zhou Yunsheng searched for half a day without finding any offerings and was chagrined when he saw the Bishop, Vice Bishop, and a line of Martial King ranked martial artists hurriedly arrive at the main hall.

He immediately stooped to salute the two elders. The bishop did not tell him to rise, but fixed him with an odd, slightly wary look.

The vice bishop pressed on and spoke first, “Just now, a servant reported that the moonflower bush that you had picked was corrupted by demonic qi and withered. As we all know, where there is magic qi there must be a demonic creature, and it is possible for him to parasitize anyone, including the Light Priests. We came here this time because we want you to prove your innocence.”

Seeing that it is about to accompany the second prince to go out and travel, and then not deal with Joshua, two years later he will be adult, can inherit the bishop’s seat, so the vice bishop is very anxious, get the news and immediately think of a poisonous plan.

Zhou Yunsheng only short-circuited his brain when facing Father God and things related to him, but he handled others with ease, calmly asking back, “Then before I prove my innocence, may I dare to ask Lord Bishop and Lord Vice Bishop to possibly prove their innocence? Demons are very cunning, and their favorite thing to do is to lure other races to kill each other.”

“We have all drunk the holy water.” The bishop handed over a pure white porcelain vase and said softly, “Drink from it, child.”

If it is parasitized by a demon, after drinking the holy water its host will suffer severe pain all over the body and skin ulcers, and then the demon will be poisoned and forced out of the body, which is one of the few killing weapons that can directly fight against demons. However, the holy water needs to be nourished with the purest power of light for a hundred years to make it turn from a transparent color to a brilliant gold color before it can take effect, and it is a very precious treasure for the Holy See, where the priests of light are getting more and more rare and their power is getting weaker and weaker.

The Bishop’s Unity had only collected three bottles in total, and had intended to leave them for the Imperial family, but now they had to use them. Light Priests were the key to ensuring an empire’s victory in the Dark War, especially since the Sakaya Empire only had three Light Priests, it could not withstand the attrition even more.

Zhou Yunsheng pursed his lips and was about to reach out to pick up the porcelain vase when the bishop’s attendant stumbled and fell on him, his arm slamming hard into the back of his hand, causing the vase to fall and shatter, the golden liquid seeping through the cracks in the floor into the dirt, never to be found again.

The squire knelt down and apologized in fear, but no one paid any attention.

This was obviously premeditated, what did they want? Zhou Yunsheng turned his head to look directly at the Vice Bishop, while the Bishop flew to a possibility and his face instantly turned pale.

“This is the last bottle of holy water. Demonic creatures that can resist the power of light and parasitize in the body of a Light Priest are all at the level of Emperor or above, and even if the Bishop-sama and I combine our efforts to cast the Light Illumination Technique, we are unable to identify it. In order to prove your innocence, please also head to the trial pool behind the main hall.” The Vice Bishop said courteously.

“No!” The bishop’s voice hissed in denial.

A thousand years ago, the Trial Pool could help Light Priests drastically increase their cultivation speed. As long as they were immersed in the water of the pool, their bodies and souls would be refined, thus becoming stronger. The Light Priests of a thousand years ago possessed the power to move mountains and fill the seas, and were not at all comparable to the priests of today who could only hide behind mages and martial artists and lay down a Light Boundary.

By all rights, the Pool of Trials should be a place of cultivation that everyone tends to rush to, but I don’t know from which day onwards, but any Light Priest who crosses into the pool, as long as a little bit of flaw or selfishness is mixed in their souls, they will be burned to ashes by the magma-like water of the pool.

In this world, except for the gods, there was no one whose soul contained no impurities, no one whose heart was free of selfish thoughts. The Priests of Light didn’t understand why God the Father had become so harsh, but they had no choice but to give up the Trial Pool and pray instead.

The divine power that could be gained from prayer was very weak and often required decades of precipitation. This was exactly why the Light Priests were getting weaker and weaker.

The Vice Bishop had turned so many corners with the ultimate goal of getting rid of Joshua! By the time the bishop realized this there was no other way out, siding with Joshua risked sparing the demons, and his sense of duty would not allow him to do that.

He waved his hand as if to retract that ‘no’ word from before, and was silent for a moment before speaking with difficulty, “Joshua my child, you must know that this is my duty as the Bishop of the Sagaya Empire. I cannot spare any demon, even if it is parasitizing the king.”

“I understand, as you wish.” Zhou Yunsheng bent down and saluted, then walked towards the depths of the great hall with a steady pace.

If he hadn’t gotten the energy of the B-class world to quench his soul, it was possible that he would still be worried about it, but now he didn’t even look at the so-called trial pool in the eye. He knew that his soul was pure and could withstand the erosion of the pool’s water, and after deep hypnosis he didn’t have a single distraction other than his mad love for the God of Light.

His love for the God of Light scares even him when he thinks about it.

He took off his shoes and outer robe, and slowly walked into the pool of trials wearing only a thin silk tunic. The water was pure black, gurgling with bubbles, and exuded an extremely cold and chilly feeling, when it found unclean dirt it would immediately boil up and turn into a reddish color like blood, that shocking temperature could devour even a god, not to mention mortals.

The vice bishop’s hand hidden under his wide outer robe trembled slightly from excitement. As long as Joshua died, with no one else to choose from, he would definitely be able to sit on the bishop’s throne and share the ruling power of the Sacajawea Empire with the king. Ever since the matter of his illegitimate son came to light, he had been thinking of getting Joshua killed all the time, and today he finally got his wish.

It was as if he saw the path of light already unfolding before him.

Above the Nine Heavens, the God of Light stared at these mortals in the great hall, his pupils turning dark gold for a moment and pure black for a moment, his powerful and unparalleled divine power escaping uncontrollably, destroying the magnificent divine throne. If it wasn’t to protect the little believers immersed in the pool, he would have already lost his mind in anger.

The so-called pool water in the trial pool was actually demonic qi concentrated into a liquid state. The demonic qi could search for the darkness hidden in the bottom of a person’s heart and use it as a guide to extend past it and breed a demonic creature within the person. To put it bluntly, demons were not born from the dark abyss, but from the human heart.

Extreme darkness can give birth to light. A thousand years ago, the God of Light didn’t have the bad taste that he has now, and he placed a prohibition in the pool to ensure that the demonic energy would only promote the power of the priests of light, and not erode them. But suddenly, one day, he was so fed up with the world that he withdrew the forbidding and killed all the gods.

In billions of years, the God of Light had never found a truly pure heart. He had once pulled out the heart of the Goddess of Spring and dipped it in a pool of water, and was then surprised to find that it didn’t take a second for the bright red heart to turn black, and then dissolve into dirty dirt.

He had found it very amusing at the time and smiled, but now he hated the idea of destroying all the trial pools left in the Temple of Light. That way, his little believers wouldn’t be subjected to such sinister treatment.

The soul of the young devotee is pure and he can withstand the first wave of the pool’s water, but what comes next? As soon as the slightest distraction or fear arises within him, he will suffer extinction.

The God of Light’s fingertips built up a ray of golden light, ready to wrap the little believer securely. But without waiting for the golden light to cross over, he froze in surprise.

Only the little believer’s body emanated a crystal clear white light from the inside out, isolating the tumbling black pool of water, a power that only the purest of hearts can possess. What made his mind so clean and focused? Was it because of his devout faith in himself?

The God of Light could not wait to penetrate into the heart of the young devotee to see what was going on, which would not have been difficult for him, but he could not do it on the young devotee. He did not find it strange or even scornful. Quite the contrary, he was delighted by the young devotee’s uniqueness. He was happy to guess his mind, and that made his dead soul rejoice, leap, and be unstoppable.

With one hand on his cheek, he gazed at the teenager with a smile, and when he saw him sit down with his hands folded, he knew he was praying to himself. Because of the outsiders, he did not recite those prayers that were sweeter than the flower dew, which was a shame.

He looked so petite and pathetic in the churning black water with only a head and hands showing. The God of Light wanted to wade into the pool and encircle him with his tall, handsome body, giving him more and more warmth.

With this in mind, he detached a strand of his divine thoughts and formed a gorgeous to the core figure within the great hall, then marched to the little believer’s side in front of the horrified gazes of the crowd and stroked his warm cheeks.

The little devotee was so engrossed in his prayers that he didn’t even open his eyes to look at himself, which made the God of Light feel sorry for him. He wanted to go back to stroking his platinum-colored hair, but had to refrain for fear of interrupting his prayer and causing the black water to invade.

Staying in the Trial Pool to cultivate without laying down a prohibition, the power of light gained was unimaginable to normal people, and more crucially, it could drastically purify the cultivator’s potential. The body of a Light Priest was like a container, and the potential determined how much Light power the container could reserve.

The little believer was a top-tier qualification and could continue to rise upwards after being quenched by the pool water. In other words, in the future, he could inject more divine power into the little believer’s body without worrying about harming him.

This was just what the God of Light wanted, so he would never interrupt a young devotee’s practice, even how much he longed to embrace him.

“Who are you? The Demon King of the Dark Abyss?” The bishop and the vice bishop questioned in horror, and simultaneously began to chant the incantation of the Holy Arrow of Light. The higher the level of the demonic creature, the more beautiful its appearance declined, and the magnificence of the person who suddenly appeared in front of them was beyond the limits of human imagination.

If he was truly a demon, his rank must be above that of a Saint.

The God of Light put his hand against his lips in a silencing gesture. At the same moment, the Bishop and the Vice Bishop realized that they had lost their ability to speak and could not chant incantations, so what were they going to attack this demonic creature with. The two tried to run out to get help, but then realized that they couldn’t move their bodies either.

Instantly restraining two Bishop-level Light Priests, what kind of terrifying ability was this? The eyes of the two widened to their limits were filled with despair.

Soon, however, they were no longer afraid, but became more incredulous.

Only to see the blonde man walk silently to Joshua’s side, carefully depicting his delicate and exquisite features through the void, then dropping his head and dropping a kiss on his brow. His expression was so gentle, and his gaze was so compassionate, as if he was watching his child, and as if he was watching his lover.

He looked and kissed and kissed, his body escaping golden spots of light because he couldn’t restrain the joy that filled him.

That point of light contained powerful divine power, burning through the skin of the bishop and the vice bishop when it touched them, but it didn’t harm Joshua one bit, instead it drilled towards his body one after another.

Joshua hooked his lips slightly in a comfortable expression, which made the blonde man’s mood even more pleasurable. He laughed lowly, his thick and sexually-charged voice enough to make everyone go crazy for him.

He lifted a strand of Joshua’s hair and twisted it around his fingertips to play with it, rather lovingly. Seeing Joshua’s brow twitch as if he was awakening, he remembered his other identity and surprisingly chickened out. He wasn’t actually as nice as Joshua thought he was.

He let go of Joshua’s hair and paced the temple anxiously, and when he passed the five-meter-high statue, he saw the plain face of the middle-aged uncle of the so-called God of Light, and as if he had been struck by lightning, he froze in place and could not move.

It wasn’t even him! Just the thought of Joshua pouring his love into it every day while mouthing his name made him want to destroy the statue, along with the temple of the Sakya Empire, for all it was worth!

But the little devotee was inside the temple, and he couldn’t afford to hurt him, so he pressed down his inner rage, waved his sleeve, and transformed it into a statue of himself sitting on an ornate throne.

He walked back to the edge of the pool and pointed his fingertips towards the vice bishop, withdrawing all the power of light from his body before bending down to kiss the little believer’s brow once more, giving him a mouthful of pure divine power before he slowly disappeared as a shadow.