From Secret Clan to the Divine Dynasty

In the darkness, Karl listened to the voices of many people.

"Help me, great Lord of the Lost!"

"Please answer my plea, I am willing to offer everything to You! Lord of the Lost!"

"Your power will descend upon the world, those fools simply do not understand Your greatness!"

He could hear the prayers of people across the world to him, and those devout individuals seemed to have a "special focus," becoming clear and visible among the multitude of voices, overpowering everyone else.

In recent years, Karl had been hearing more and more voices.

And he suddenly found it quite strange that not only the Fischer family and its influence prayed to him, but also a small portion of the commoners across Cyart spontaneously began to pray to him.

"Interesting."

Karl found this very amusing and began to discern their specific identities, understanding why those people would pray to him.

Mostly they were people who had been persecuted by the church or illegal Extraordinary Exponents who had forsaken the righteous path and prayed to him out of lost hope and hatred for the gods.

Even in Zeya Town to the east of Sunrise Lake, an Extraordinary Exponent of the Transmutation Level actually emerged, impersonating a disciple of a "Discipline Upholder" and gathered a dozen illegal Extraordinary Exponents to set up a branch of the "Lost Cult."

Of course, his real purpose was just to exploit those low-level Extraordinary Exponents.

Karl felt a bit amused and dismayed.

"The identity of the Discipline Upholder itself is fake, yet he impersonated a disciple of the 'Discipline Upholder' and actually succeeded in establishing a small-scale Extraordinary organization."

However, he found out that several of those low-level Extraordinary Exponents genuinely believed in him, which is why he could hear their prayers.

"This is a very interesting situation, my 'vision' has expanded greatly. It would be even more interesting if those enemies of the Fischer family also prayed to me."

But Karl soon discovered that the so-called doctrines those people followed and their image of the Lord of the Lost were completely different, fragmented, and utterly without a unified concept.

Karl found this quite intriguing internally, it was just unfortunate they were not favored clan, not of Fischer family blood; hence, attempts at sacrificing various things were completely ineffective.

They also hadn't taken the Shadow of the Lost potion, so they couldn't hear Karl's voice at all.

"As for those people, I can only listen unilaterally, nothing more... But just listening to prayers actually has its uses, it at least allows me to know many pieces of information."

"Hmm, certain individuals with potential inside can be paid special attention to, and when the opportunity arises, the devout people of the Fischer family could be sent to preach and formally recruit them as part of the Dawn Church."

The activity involving "Solar Gold" actually helped him quite a lot, in a sense.

Although he couldn't make use of those people yet, Karl subconsciously understood that they were definitely useful.

Because those prayers came flying like strands of thread, and some kind of power, born from faith, also began to accumulate, albeit very slowly, along with them.

At first, the number of believers was so small, the accumulated power of faith could almost be ignored. Now it's beginning to increase bit by bit, and Karl decided to try making good use of that power of faith.

"The key to the power of faith is the number of people and the time spent praying, not the power of the believers themselves. It seems, to make use of this force, large-scale preaching is indispensable in the future..."

He even felt that he should order the Fischer family to establish a real godly Kingdom dynasty.

----

In recent years, Nasir Town has also undergone significant changes, with a population growth exploding to over thirty thousand, and already starting to have a siphoning effect on the surrounding villages. In a few years, it would likely grow to a population of over fifty thousand.

Moreover, a population of over fifty thousand is just a starting point. In the steam age everything will be vastly different from the past.

The Fischer family established a new elementary school, then set up a substantial hospital in Nasir Town, and commenced transforming the dwellings of the poor in East City District. Finally, they planned to add a 5th City District, a residential area for the ever-growing number of newcomers.

Most of those coming to the town entered the factories, with the labor force growing endlessly. Consequently, the Fischer family began to consider constructing new factories.

Yet, environmental pollution is also an important issue. Although many factory owners do not take it seriously, Byrne had the foresight to do so.

In the basement of Fischer Manor.

"Regarding military matters, we still need to make a lot of effort."

Byrne was contemplating his thoughts alone. As for the other family members, they were either not in town or too young.

"Building an army is indeed a troublesome matter, but the Fischer family must have its own military force and further expand its armed strength,"

"We need large Arrays that the army can use, mobile barriers, and many weapons including cannons. The cavalry needs horses and ranches, and there are also specialized army camps, medical personnel, and medical equipment to be procured. Training grounds for new recruits, commanders skilled in military combat, instructors responsible for training soldiers, and ideally a munitions factory..."

"It's not just about ordinary soldiers; we also need to increase the number of normal Extraordinary Exponents under our command. Nowadays, the Fischers have enough money and resources to do many things that were unimaginable in the past."

Establishing a real army is like creating a mini society, and Byrne found that even writing it all down on a piece of paper would not be enough."

Although the Fischer family's current finances are sufficient to support a regular military force, it is still very troublesome and challenging."

Byrne had decided to pull in a bunch of old classmates from the military academy, to join forces with some Daybreakers as the core backbone, and then build a professional army belonging to the Fischer family primarily from the population of Nasir Town and the surrounding four towns.

While the power of a Monarch powerful expert is beyond doubt, a strong professional military force is still very useful, especially in battles without Monarch powerful experts.

Even in battles involving Monarch powerful experts, due to the presence of collective spells, an army with enough morale and discipline can fully serve as "blood bags" for the Monarch powerful experts, which is much more effective than using ordinary people.

The Cyart King's order for conscription had been issued nationwide, and the Fischer family must also contribute to the war.

However, on one hand, Darren Fischer had joined the Cyart Royal Army, and on the other, the Fischer family traditionally took charge of producing a large number of high-quality military supplies, making significant contributions, so the rest of the Fischer family were not forced to the front lines.

Although the Fischer family had not yet collectively gone to the front lines, attacking a neighboring country was a very big deal.

Furthermore, just beyond the northern forests of the East Coast Province lies Rhea, too close to the empire for comfort, so Byrne and the others must always be vigilant.

They had to be prepared for any possible surprise attacks from the Rhea army that the East Coast Province might face.

Finally, Chris and Vanessa returned to the family.

"Chris, Vanessa, you're finally back. How did it go? Any progress?"

Byrne was very pleased, though he asked this way, deep down he already had a clear idea of the outcome.

The characters of Chris and Vanessa were such that they would not return to the family until the ritual was completed. Since they were willing to come back, it meant that they had successfully found the ritual, or even that they had completed the advancement ritual.

"Mhm."

Chris nodded slightly without saying much.

Vanessa smiled, her face brimming with joy she couldn't contain, and explained to Byrne:

"Regarding the direction of advancement on the Path of World Order, we have found two completely different methods."

"The first is to strictly adhere to one's inner principles in every action in life, and it takes a long time to take effect, with very slow progress..."

Vanessa paused for a moment, then continued:

"Then there is the second method. I discovered the true method of advancing to the 3rd Rank of the Path of World Order is to constrain others to adhere to one's own thinking."

"Ah?"

Byrne was startled, then slowly grasped Vanessa's meaning.

Vanessa slowly raised her hand and concluded, "According to my principles, I passed judgment on quite a number of people and urged them to change according to my thinking, successfully completing the advancement ritual."

"If it were Moore, he would probably assimilate a group of people to follow his gang's order."

So that was it. Byrne nodded calmly, noting the method of advancement to the 3rd Rank of the Path of World Order in his mind.

"Assimilate a certain number of others to act according to one's principles and obtain sufficient feedback from it."

He suddenly understood something.

Commonality!

"So that's it, I understand now. The principle of most rituals for advancing to the 3rd Rank of the God Pantheon stairway is actually to influence others to obtain feedback!"

Thus, Byrne quickly brought Moore over, told him the method for the next step of advancement on the Path of World Order, and then sent out a letter to Irene, who was away.
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He requested her to return from outside soon, to hold a sacrificial ritual to help Vanessa advance to the next level of the Path of World Order.