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Having faith alone is not enough to extend its power into the real world.
An illusory concept can never be materialized into real "authority".
Thus, as faith weakens, decays, and declines, it will eventually disappear silently in the future...
But now, everything is different...
"Imperial Conferment!"
At the very moment Zhang Jing had this thought, in the real world, Zhang Jing formed a hand seal with his right hand. At the same time, a point of light split off from the Heavenly Punishment Sword and was thrown towards the clay statue sitting on the throne...
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Volume Two: The Truth Hidden Behind History Books: Chapter 722 Imperial Conferment of the Title of City God
At this very moment, in the Digong Temple of Zhaoyang Town, Yanggu City, Zhongzhou, the Earth God Jiang Qing, who was attached to the clay sculpture, turned his gaze southward, and beside him, faint sounds of praise could be heard:
"The city god of this realm, the righteous god of the underworld."
Its power and influence are magnificent; it has received the mandate of Heaven.
They judge right and wrong between the living and the dead, and control the fortunes and misfortunes of officials and common people.
May temples and shrines endure for ten thousand years, and may grace and support last for countless eons.
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With a thought, Jiang Qing arrived outside the Earth God Temple, gazing towards Linzhou with envy in his eyes.
At the same time, outside the Earth God Temple in Huangjia Village, located at the foot of the Ochre-green Peak of Danding Mountain, the environment around the temple had changed dramatically. Many old, withered branches and leaves, as well as other garbage, had been swept away. Strangely, no snakes, insects, rats, or ants appeared during the cleaning, which made the participating villagers exclaim that the Earth God was protecting them.
Some villagers were still doing the final cleanup, while in the dilapidated earth god temple, an old man in a yellow robe, holding a dragon-headed cane, walked out of the temple. Those around him seemed oblivious to his presence…
This was none other than Huang Zongyi, the local earth god. He turned his gaze towards Linzhou, and as he listened to the praises around him, he slightly lowered his head.
"………………"
They wield the power to bestow blessings and tyranny, and create the handle to determine life and death.
They encountered divine power to protect Yingzhou, and encountered ghostly soldiers to drive away barbarian invaders.
Good and evil are clearly distinguished and responded to; merits and demerits are clearly examined and differentiated.
Great loyalty, great kindness, great virtue, and great benevolence...
…………”
Within the abyss, Zhang Jing, seated high on his throne, could easily sense the entire palace trembling. The power of faith that had accumulated since the investiture of the two local deities was rapidly dissipating, just as ice and snow melt under the sun!
In the conferment system, the power of faith is not enjoyed by any one deity in the system, but is shared by the entire system. Within the system, power and faith are allocated and distributed according to the conferment level.
Therefore, in theory, temples like the "Number One Earth God Temple in the World" in Zhaoyang Town are far more popular than ordinary Earth God Temples, and even surpass many City God Temples. This surplus becomes a surplus for the entire system.
This is somewhat similar to the fiscal allocation mechanism of transfer payments in Zhang Jing's previous life. After all, not every temple in every region is thriving, especially at this stage, there are always many deities whose income is insufficient to cover their expenses...
Furthermore, this surplus can also be used when bestowing new titles upon gods, which can greatly reduce Zhang Jing's own consumption.
It was precisely for this reason that, after successfully attempting to bestow titles upon the land and confirming that this method was feasible, Zhang Jing decided to skip the "County City God" and "Prefectural City God" and directly attempt to bestow the title upon the "Prefectural City God".
However, as it turned out, he had underestimated the difficulty of bestowing the title of a prefecture-level city god. Even though one of the two land gods he had previously bestowed the title of was the land god of Zhaoyang Town, whose incense offerings were excessive, the faith that had been accumulated for a short time was still exhausted in a short period of time.
At this moment, the Heavenly Punishment Sword began to vibrate and hum, its power being rapidly depleted...
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Within the abyss, a massive imperial edict talisman was falling. Its power, far more magnificent and imposing than the previous edict from the Earth God, shattered the boundary between reality and concept. The imperial edict talisman crashed down like a falling star!
It descended with overwhelming force and unparalleled power!
Breaking through the heavy seals and lacquer of the dark, gloomy place, Ba relentlessly approached the "Linzhou Yinqi Si" (a place name) located in Liuwei...
夢
"boom!!!"
But then, the group of talismans fell upon the cold, dark world of Linzhou. At the same time, the two merged with a roar, and then, like nuclear fusion, the entire Linzhou underworld began to collapse...
At the same time, the sounds echoing all around became even clearer:
"The city god of this realm, the righteous god of the underworld."
Its power and influence are magnificent; it has received the mandate of Heaven.
They judge right and wrong between the living and the dead, and control the fortunes and misfortunes of officials and common people.
May temples and shrines endure for ten thousand years, and may grace and support last for countless eons.
They wield the power to bestow blessings and tyranny, and create the handle to determine life and death.
They encountered divine power to protect Yingzhou, and encountered ghostly soldiers to drive away barbarian invaders.
Good and evil are clearly distinguished and responded to; merits and demerits are clearly examined and differentiated.
Great loyalty, great kindness, great virtue, and great benevolence
Supreme in spirit and holiness, upright and impartial.
Today, the merits are complete.
By imperial decree and imperial edict, he became the lord of the capital city.
The main altar guards the palace, and the City God of Linzhou is here!
At the same time, the entire world of the Underworld in Linzhou began to emit a blue light, which then rose up and began to ascend...
During the process of sublimation, the territory of "Linzhou Underworld" continued to expand. The newly expanded lands were vaguely visible, seemingly in a state of chaos and uncertainty, yet the speed of expansion was extremely fast. In a short time, it had expanded to an area several times the size of Linzhou Underworld, and it was still expanding...
Meanwhile, a large number of bubbles continued to converge into the world of "Linzhou Underworld," seemingly providing it with nourishment for constant change. This allowed Linzhou Underworld to not only expand continuously but also gradually develop more hierarchical structures...
Zhang Jing, who had been observing from the sidelines, now understood what this ever-expanding world was all about. It was not simply the "Linzhou Underworld" but the "Jiangdong Province Underworld".
This is because the City God of Linzhou is the City God of the prefecture, and in addition to Linzhou itself, he theoretically also governs the entire underworld of Jiangdong Province.
This is why this imperial decree consumed so much power, because it was not only about "conferring the title of City God," but more importantly, it also involved the "establishment of the underworld."
Within the abyss, Zhang Jing, seated on his throne, kept looking through the curtain at the increasingly clear statues of gods on the palace murals, namely the City God of Linzhou and his several assistants.
At that moment, as if struck by a realization, he shifted his gaze to the sky. The next instant, his figure vanished from the throne and reappeared outside the palace.
Before his eyes, the area surrounding the floating island that supported the palace was undergoing dramatic changes. Thick clouds began to form around the floating island, and in the distance, a huge shadow was appearing.
That was actually the newly elevated "Jiangdong Province Underworld"!
It was somehow drawn here by some mysterious force!
However, the changes continued. In two other directions, two more floating islands were converging. Without even looking, Zhang Jing knew that they were the territories of the two land deities previously appointed.
These previously unrelated areas are now converging due to some mysterious connection. Within the abyss, the so-called "distance" is actually just an abstract concept; there is no real spatial distance. The true distance between different areas lies in the difference in concepts!
P.S.: I wrote some discussions about feudal ethics in the setting and ideas; interested readers can take a look.
Volume Two: The Truth Hidden Behind History Books: Chapter 723 Creation
At that moment, Zhang Jing could feel his spiritual senses suddenly expanding, and along with the expansion of his spiritual senses, these fields began to converge, adjust, and appear in new forms!
A certain regular system is beginning to form!
Just like galaxies in the universe!
They are merging into a unified whole!
At this moment, Zhang Jing could clearly feel this change happening, as if he were the master of this system!
In Zhang Jing's gaze, everything around him—the clouds, the mist, and even the outer layers of the underworld and the local temple—began to spin. This spinning accelerated, gradually forming a vortex that continued to expand, growing larger and larger...
It's an incredibly spectacular feeling, like the whole world is collapsing and then rebuilding!
The entire heaven and earth, including all the surrounding void, chaos, and clouds, everything was spinning and recombinating!
It's as if the whole world is being reborn!
And he was right at the center of the vortex!
Meanwhile, his ever-expanding spiritual sense continued to spread to a larger area. Zhang Jing could feel that as the new system was forming, his spiritual sense was constantly extending. He could sense countless new areas forming within the vortex...
After an unknown amount of time, the vortex finally subsided. Zhang Jing noticed that the floating island he was on had changed shape. The platform on the floating island and the palace on the platform still existed, no different from before. However, the original "floating island" itself had now transformed into the shape of a "planet".
The area beneath Zhang Jing's feet, originally the highest plateau on the floating island, had now transformed into the highest mountain range on the planet, and the entire planet's area was several times larger than the previous floating island. Zhang Jing looked around; in the distance, the altitude decreased with the undulating mountains, revealing even more expansive plains. Here he was, atop the mountain peak, still a vast plateau, but its height had increased considerably, its terrain somewhat resembling Mount Fuji in Zhang Jing's previous life in Japan, its summit having been flattened.
The palace still stands in the center of the mountaintop plateau, surrounded by clouds and mist, just like the abode of the gods in mythology.
Zhang Jing gazed into the distance for a while, then directed his senses toward the sky. Here, "sky" was not a literal reference, but rather a reference to the "ground" beneath his feet.
He could sense that the planet beneath his feet was not the entirety of this change, but only a small part of it, and that there was another layer of structure in the region far from the planet.
If we broaden our perspective, we will find that this is a multi-layered structure similar to an egg, with the "planet" where Zhang Jing is currently located being like the yolk of the egg.
Outside the egg, separated by the egg white layer, there is also an eggshell.
From a great distance away from the "yolk," if you were to stand on the planet beneath Zhang Jing's feet and look out, it would be like standing on Earth and gazing at the starry sky. But unlike Earth, the starry sky there is not a series of round planets, but a vast, interconnected region.