Chapter 217 Approaching Divinity (39)
In the small courtyard within the alley.
A young man dressed as a Divine Official was leading and quietly directing eight other people who were busy working.
They were building an octagonal earthen platform, which was already half-finished but still quite rough, without patterns or statues.
The flowerbeds in the courtyard were dug up and full of mud, clearly the source material for the platform.
"Hurry up! Hurry up!" The man kept urging them, looking shifty, glancing left and right as if afraid of being discovered.
Under his urging, the few artisans worked diligently and without complaint, fulfilling the Grand Divine Official's command with noble faith.
The man looked at the earthen platform, which was gradually taking shape, and showed an expression of having victory in his grasp.
This was the second city he had attacked, and he already had some experience, making his efficiency much faster than before.
"Very good, it's almost done!"
"The last city had so little faith value to convert, it was truly too backward. Thankfully, I'm moving on to the next one soon."
"Looking at how prosperous this city is, its faith value should be very high. Once the conversion is complete, hehe..."
In his excitement, he couldn't help but talk to himself, but unfortunately, the artisans were all dull and couldn't converse with him.
"I didn't expect this 'Liu Sheng' to manage things quite well, much better than my own rustic city. But it's strange, I've never heard of this person... No, that's not right, it sounds familiar. Where exactly have I heard it before?"
This person was quite a chatterbox, constantly muttering to himself.
"Forget it, I can't remember. Anyway, hehe, all of this will soon be mine!"
As he was celebrating, he suddenly heard a clear and melodious voice from over the wall.
"What will soon be yours?" The female voice asked with curiosity.
"Hehe, all the faith value in this city will fall into my hands!" The chatterbox subconsciously replied, a look of arrogance on his face.
He had been focused on his studies for years and hadn't had much contact with girls. As soon as he heard a female voice asking, he immediately became energetic.
"Did you ask for the owner's permission here?" The female voice asked again.
"This... stealing, no, pilfering, no, appropriating faith value, why would I need permission?"
No!
The man had just finished his second sentence when he suddenly realized something was wrong. Where did this girl come from?
Then he suddenly looked up towards the wall in the direction of the voice.
He saw a woman wearing a straw hat and a gray robe sitting on the wall, her feet swinging leisurely.
Beneath the straw hat, a sharp, delicate chin and smiling lips were visible.
Who was this girl?
He was still confused when he suddenly remembered, wasn't this a Divine Official's robe!
Then, all he saw was an overwhelming mass of twisted tentacles...
As he was submerged by the tentacles, he only vaguely heard a sentence: "Stealing my faith value, I don't agree."
"Also, thank you for the compliment."
...
Zhao Laifu, waiting at the alley entrance, hadn't been nervous for long when he saw the Grand Divine Official walking out of the alley with light steps, her clothes showing no wrinkles, completely revealing nothing of what she had experienced.
As expected of the Grand Divine Official! Her methods were impressive!
Liu Sheng completely ignored Laifu's face full of admiration and his starry eyes, and simply said calmly, "Laifu, help me find some ropes."
Zhao Laifu pointed worriedly into the depths of the alley: "Those people..."
"It's fine, I've already dealt with them. Remember to find enough rope to tie up eight people and string them together."
"Yes!" Zhao Laifu immediately took the order, without asking why nine people had become eight.
When Laifu returned with the hemp rope and went back into the small courtyard with Liu Sheng, they brought out a string of eight dazed people. The matter was only concluded when the Grand Divine Official personally escorted them to the county yamen's prison.
...
But for Liu Sheng, this matter was not over; on the contrary, it was just the beginning.
Back at the Divine Temple, Liu Sheng sat in her room, taking out the long list and blueprint she had snatched from the foolish man, and fell into deep thought.
According to the candidate from "Xuan Thirty-Eight City," these were given to him by his Grand Divine Official after he reached one thousand faith value.
The list contained the names of all Divine Officials dispatched from the Divine Temple, along with their town numbers.
In reality, it was a list of all candidates, including their seat numbers.
Liu Sheng saw that "Xuan Thirty-Nine City" was written before her own name.
The blueprint depicted the appearance of the altar, which was said to be the key for candidates to pass through the air wall and travel between different cities.
Unfortunately, Liu Sheng still couldn't build it.
According to the world's analysis of this blueprint, each city's altar had its unique patterns, which could only be activated in the corresponding town.
After teleporting to another town, building a unique altar could achieve conversion. Once the entire town was converted into one's subsidiary city, the corresponding altar could naturally be activated again for teleportation.
Therefore, even if Liu Sheng built an altar based on this blueprint, she couldn't activate it here.
So this must be what the previous Grand Divine Official hid before her death.
No wonder she said before she died that Liu Sheng would lose and regret it.
However, Liu Sheng had no regrets. She disliked being threatened and would not accept being threatened.
It was still the same saying: she would always find a solution.
But what concerned her more was another matter.
"World, did you not even detect an intrusion?"
"Yes, I have not encountered this intrusion program before, so I did not detect it." The World's voice even sounded a bit apologetic.
"I'm not blaming you, I'm just a bit curious. Haven't you already taken control of this town?"
"This intrusion program belongs to a higher level of authority, so I did not detect it. However, I have already traced back historical data and learned the data pattern of the intrusion. If such a situation occurs again, I will be able to detect it immediately."
"That's great! It seems I need to increase patrols recently."
Liu Sheng stroked her chin, deep in thought.
"Has it entered a free-for-all period now?"
"Yes, the work log indeed mentions a stage called 'War of Faith.'"
"According to my understanding, this period is when candidates secretly infiltrate others' towns, build altars, and plunder others' faith?"
"It should be said to convert others' faith, to be more precise." The World corrected.
Liu Sheng pondered for a moment, then suddenly clapped her hands in realization.
"So, in fact, the faith value of each town has a unique identifier at the data level? Otherwise, how would it be called conversion? It must be converting from one style of faith value to another."
"Yes, your understanding is correct."
Upon receiving the World's affirmative answer, Liu Sheng's smile grew brighter.
"Then, may I ask, World, can you directly perform the conversion at the data level?"
"..."
"I can try, as long as I can access the corresponding faith carrier."
Liu Sheng smiled slightly, a plan already forming in her mind.
Conveniently, there were ready-made test subjects.
...
Coming out of the county yamen's dungeon, Liu Sheng looked even more confident.
"Congratulations! thirty-ninth xuan candidate, your Divine Temple's faith value +8, current total value is 1324. Please continue to work hard!" The World's voice was very calm.
But Liu Sheng could tell that the World was also excited, and seemed to be rubbing its hands together in anticipation.
"World, are we thinking the same thing?"
Otherwise, the World would definitely not be so excited.
"Yes." The World admitted.
"Since that's the case, the plan for 'acquiring faith value and seizing control' can finally be confirmed to have an 87.56% success rate!"
"Where did you get that success rate?"
The World felt very strange, so it quickly calculated tens of thousands of times, but all results indicated insufficient information for calculation, and it was almost doubting its "instrument" life.
Yes, its self-positioning was still that of an analyzer for now.
As a result, Liu Sheng merely responded faintly.
"...I made it up, learning from you."
Thank you for the reward from Meow (^^)! And thank you for repeatedly declaring your book-hoarding plan a failure (づ￣3￣)づ╭～