Only God
Chapter 241 - 206: The Growth of the Church

Chapter 241: Chapter 206: The Growth of the Church

Xilan had convened the Great Council at the outset to seek consensus.

Within the debates of "Predestination" and "Election," he had no intent to judge which side was heretical and which was orthodox.

Xilan saw that behind the disputes lay the issue of free will.

He could not answer such questions as, in his view, no one in this world could.

Under such circumstances, not knowing was the best answer.

Besides this, Xilan had no other options.

Under Xilan’s leadership, the two factions in the New Rule Garden set aside their conflicts, and Xilan organized the consensus of the entire meeting, letting the believers of the New Rule Garden sign their names on it—those who were illiterate had others sign for them, and those without names used a thumbprint on papyrus.

The texts on that papyrus, being the consensus of the entire New Rule Garden, were called the Creed by the believers, signifying a scripture that was commonly approved or trusted.

Xilan quickly arranged to have the content of the Creed engraved on a new stone tablet. As its status was not as high as the three Logos history books, it was somewhat shorter and stood on the left side of the great hall, not in the center.

After the meeting, the formerly chaotic thoughts were unified again, and prominent believers like Daniel began organizing numerous evangelistic tours extending beyond Ajia Royal City into the various city-states of the kingdom, spreading the routes once trodden by Prophet Noen.

Xilan continually managed the major and minor affairs of the New Rule Garden, which included perfecting the basic rules and leading the believers in prayer—a long and tedious process, but Xilan persevered with steadfast faith.

The New Rule Garden, founded by the Prophet, gradually grew into a vast sect under Xilan’s leadership and came to be known as a church due to its large-scale gatherings.

The development of the Church Flourished.

Due to the spread of the Prophet’s legends and the fervent evangelism of the believers, the church gradually moved beyond its original confines and extensively spread to the noble class from the bottom up.

Those nobles, initially indulgent in pleasures, had first heard of the Prophet’s legends but with the convening of the Great Council, their curiosity about the Church and the divine behind it increased. As their Stone Slaves converted in large numbers, initially just curious nobles began studying the ancient myths of the elves.

In just three short years, more and more nobles devoted themselves to the Lord. They lived under one roof with the Stone Slaves, singing praises and worshiping the same deity at the altar of faith—a scenario previously unimaginable.

After all, Kagawus’s temples did not allow the racially impure Stone Slaves to offer sacrifices, and some temples did not even permit them entry.

Every morning, when Xilan saw countless people kneeling in prayer, he felt an overwhelming pride that his actions glorified God, and he felt increasingly worthy of carrying the title of follower of the Prophet.

"God, all people shall sing your praises,"

he voiced tremulously.

Under the influence of the Church, the creator’s faith gradually deepened and spread widely across the earth, even reaching the savage Beastmen who had heard of the Supreme God.

For the priests serving Kagawus, however, the Church that Xilan and the believers took pride in had increasingly become an issue that could not be ignored.

Initially, the priests adhering to the decrees merely laughed upon hearing of the so-called Great Council and dismissed it.

In Kagawus’s faith, the priests’ decrees and rules, passed down from generations over three thousand years, were considered almost unchangeable and held a unique sanctity in the priests’ eyes.

They were like Kagawus’s innate gift.

Yet Xilan and the Church had needed a council to determine consensus, to determine the direction of everyone’s faith, to determine a faith’s decrees and rules—this had the Three-eyed Ape-men priests dropping their jaws in amazement and unable to suppress their laughter.

Such an approach was too novel.

It lacked not only historical accumulation but also any form of divinity.

In the eyes of the priests, the believers of the Church were undoubtedly like babbling infants compared to themselves.

How could mere infants shake the faith in Kagawus?

When the nobles who believed in Kagawus expressed their worries, the priests comforted them by saying,

"You must know that our strict disciplines have been passed down from our ancestors and witnessed by Kagawus.

But that so-called Church relies merely on human discussion. It has no foundation and has never been witnessed by any divine.

Our Temple allows only the Three-eyed Ape People to offer sacrifices, how pure; while their Church mixes nobles and slaves together in one room, like muddy water mixing with clear water, utterly degenerate."

Some even asked a priest what he thought of that Lord.

The priest retorted,

"What Lord of the high mountains? In this world, only Kagawus is worthy of our reverence.

Only Kagawus is the noblest divine.

The creator? Which god is that?"

Initially, no priest thought the existence of the Church would shake the faith in Kagawus.

But as fewer and fewer nobles ascended to the Temple, and the altars before the divine statues grew increasingly empty...

The priests...panicked.

The panic first arose from the lower temples, which struggled to maintain themselves. Many lower temples depended on the offerings of the lower nobles. But as the Church rose in prominence, the offerings from these nobles diminished, and some even stopped making sacrifices altogether.

These changes inevitably led the lower temples towards decline and desolation.

When the lower levels informed the upper levels, panic naturally ensued.

The priests began to vehemently accuse the New Rule Garden, listing the sins of those believers, ranging from disrespect towards the nobles to desecrating the Temple.

They compiled a list of these charges and submitted it to the High Priest Ora, requesting him to present it to the Queen and to imprison the followers of the Church and Xilan.

Faced with the infuriated priests, High Priest Ora casually dismissed their concerns, ignoring them.

Seeing this, the priests persisted relentlessly, demanding Ora to put forth the charges and judge those believers of the Church.

Confronted by the besieging priests,

Ora suppressed his anger and said,

"What are you thinking... Once, we had set foot there, have you forgotten the oath we swore before the Prophet?"

Saying this, Ora named a few individuals, whose faces instantly turned pale— all old men from the Great Temple, who naturally remembered that incident.

"But, High Priest, that Prophet has already departed... Since that is so, the oath... cannot be considered binding anymore."

Search the lightnovelworld.cc website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.