Chapter 14 'Summary of the divine' replaced by 'Conduits and you', and planned to have its effect in the story replaced by seven chapters (16-17 & ??).
Chapter 14 (Replaced) 'Summary of the divine'-
Beyern couldn't help but laugh slightly after the little fool had left his line of sight 'A classic! I love shaking one's faith in any way.'
To defeat, or trick, one's enemy, when you're not super powerful, you must know them in an out.
And... Beyern might've been a bit hopeful in changing class through the church if he got some garbage in class form. Like 'Thrall', 'Serf', 'Slave', and all that good stuff.
Now, the fun thing is, now, with his knowledge over every single church, is basically useless if he doesn't interact with any believers. So yes, he is planning to have dealings with a few of them.
And if he ever finds himself failing in his persuit of necromancy, he can use this as a fall back. It's actually pretty common for people with power to throw their children into a church if they happen to get either a terrible or forbidden class.
You'd be suprised how many convertees come from people with classes that don't fit them, and the churches are happy to facilitate their salvation.
Though there's one problem, to get a class related to a god, except for the god of chaos and war Quytza, you have to get past the living faith-detector in the form of a priest, then you also have to disclose your class with a class-sensor...
Very troublesome stuff really.
The first could be overcome with a few tricks, schemes, and management of your state of mind. The second wouldn't be a problem as long as you let out a few snake tears.
But the former is still very troublesome either way.
From what Beyern can remember, which is a lot, there were a good few gods, seven, listed in no particular order;
-Cercil, god of light and order, recognized as female. The easiest way to be buddies with their possie is to slay demons, not charity, since then you're stealing their thunder, and also ruling a city with little crime. Of course, you can also donate a lot of coin to be friends too.
-Xenxilir, god of tamers and the hunt, recognized as male. The easiest way to cozy up with their pack is to hunt down invasive species and sharing the meat for a feast, hunting monsters that are endangering a habitat even if they weren't invasive and to hunt a few extra's for a celebratory feast where you alone eat to big bad, or saving/increasing the population/creating habitats for exotic species, or those at threatened by extinction in any manner. You can also flex your financial muscles.
-Veinstlat, god of shadows and revenge, recognized as male. The easiest way to curry favor with priests of Venstlat is by sharing secrets, hiding secrets, doing secret deals, or being a master of shadows. Or you could do a 'Vengance pilgramage', where you go to a random place outside of your country, searching out anyone that seeks revenge and supporting them on their way. You could also just have revenge or pay a fortune.
-Quanta, god of knowledge and merchantry, recognized as male. The easiest way to please their goons is simple, knowledge about a market or any form of business. That's the best one, though any other knowledge would work too- Money as well.
-Pramtisqe, god of glory and honor, recognized as male once more. The easiest way to nurture healthy relations with one of their devoted, is to offer them opportunities to gain glory, or honor. It also works if they find such an opportunity, with you being a core part of said opportunity. Though being filled with glory, being honorable, or having very loose pockets works too.
-Zankret, god of steel and magic, recognized as male. The way to to deal with their followers in a way filled with ease is to be a miner, have access to many rare metals and deal with said followers, know magic, and donate a lot of money.
Those are the big six, but if you were astute, you would remember that there were seven gods, but only six were explained;
The god of chaos and war, Quqrth'ytierh'zaxilstyh. Very long and weird name, yes, but you don't refer to them as such, you call them 'Quytza'. The newest of the gods, as there was a time before them, records still maintained from before their appearance, and two different legends that, while not including Quytza, still used from time to time along with.
They lack the ability to overwrite the class of a mortal, meaning that a good portion of their supply for faithful had just flown away into the mist. Though one or two have gotten a class related to Quytza from the getgo, there are far too few to properly manage the devoted, making it difficult to rally forces, or ascertain figure head.
And due to Quytza's inclinations not being aligned with the other six gods, one of more orderly and calm world, trying to bring both war and chaos, in direct oppsition to Cercil's attempts to stop the cycle of century wars, and indirect opposistion to the other five gods.
So basically, it's a small god, with no church to support it, and the first few attempts at creating such a thing were thwarted by Cercil and friends' bullying.
Though he was, to say the least, very uninterested in their little forays into chaos. Due to the shopkeep, he had a few interactions with them, and a good few of them are very, very picky in a manner, that if you don't know about their belief, you may find yourself sleeping at the bottom of a well the next morning.
But there was one question remaining, why did he know so much about EVERY church and their beliefs? Why not just one or two? Because Beyern, first of all, had a lot of free time when he wasn't either working or 'Working', and he wasn't the most certain about finding himself a priest of some form on his first try.
Though he could just walk around and find multiple denominations of a church and do his best for the priest variant he wished for, but his own habits and goals demanded certain denominations for a stable residency within a certain group.
Take the church of Quanta for example, he had to enter a denomination that was more focused on money making than trying to find knowledge, as his main philosphy, forced into his skull since young was; 'If you know it exists, it knows you exist. The more you know about it, the more it knows about you. If you can see it, it can see you. If you can touch it, it can touch you.'
Based of a legend from a time before Quytza, which is very telling on how long it's resisted the decaying of time. It was about a being, more like a concept, who knew only about those who knew about it. And at a certain point of knowledge, just killed them.
A very, morbid story. There were many scholars coming from Quanta's church that died a miserable death in the story, so they didn't really like it much.
But that's enough of that, as the ball of mana accumulated in his left hand, used to abuse the ignoramous' [Danger sense].
Skills like [Danger sense] existed, one's with big weaknesses. And every single little priest, palidin, and any other religious class variant has such a weakness somewhere inside it's kit. And if you know how to exploit that, then you basically win, end of story.
But that's the end of Beyern's inner monologe of showing off how much he knew about gods and churches.
Now it was time to think of how to increase mastery, he wasn't really sure what to do with {Mana-manipulation} right now, since it was a bit anomolous in nature, as proved by it's rapid growth.
He could allow it to rank up, though that may be a waste of it's strange aspects, as it had a chance of carrying over beyond that 10th star. If it did, Beyern would, if there were such a thing, be thanking the heavens.
But that would reveal itself in time, now, he had two proper ways in mind to train either {Mana-packing} or {Mana-shaping}. The former was just compressing his mana rings more and more, repeatedly, endlessly. {Mana shaping}'s scheme was making a cube, and then designing a bunch of cool details on it's surface.
Though, he could also... You know... Renovate his conduit.
He was leaning towards the conduit plan far more, due to how much it has been a limiting factor of his mastery accumulation.
There were qoute on quote; 'Myriad ways' to do so. Mostly unique to oneself, there were normal ways, like endlessly drawing out mana to your limit while pouring in both mana, and a bit of spirit as support, to nourish one's circuit. Or, you could do a blood sacrifice once in a full moon to your imaginary friend while putting in mana to help your good friend help your little heart-gate open up.
And just so you know, the latter takes none of your spirit's help, and has more of an effect for the same amount of mana.
Decision, decisions... To do something normal, or to throw sanity to the wind for a greater effect? 'Why not both?' He wondered as he walked the streets.
He felt a tap on his shoulder "Hello, father?" He recognized the voice in an instant, and he had to go full sleuth. Did he want to be recognized? No, he would be in deep shit if he were to ever actually be brought to the attention of a real priest, which could easily see through his faked faith in an instant due to his lack of preperation.
His face quickly contorted into a frown as he turned around, his nose birthing ripples, his right eye slightly closing "What do you want?" Beyern said with a slightly aggresive tone.
The lamb was shocked slightly by, who she had assumed to always be in that calm state, speaking in words she couldn't understand, being annoyed. Until it registered, maybe this isn't him? "Do you happen to have seen someone that looked a lot like you?"
"How would I know, do you have any idea how many artifacts that could change someone's face exist? I don't have time for anymore of this drivvel, bye." He said, rushing to leave. He had put a hint in his words, somewhat out of place to be honest, all that had to happen was for her to take the bait.
While walking, he made sure to make himself look a bit more decrepit by pushing his head a bit forwards, and making his back a little bit more croned, unlike his usually straight back.
And so, the stupid little sheep had been, on the fly, tricked once more.