God, Faith, Devotee, Miracle

"What are you doing?"

Ye Qing looked curiously at this girl; he had a very strong impression of her. While responding to the prayers of devotees, he could scale the emotions of people connected to him during the ritual of evolution.

This girl in particular had very strong, pronounced emotional fluctuations and these emotions quickly transformed into sincere, heartfelt devotion.

Ye Qing looked around as the natives who just received his blessing began to jump around in joy and exhaustion as the lesser healing talismans worked their magic.

They laughed, cried, and ultimately… They ran away as soon as possible. Ye Qing wasn't the only one watching with interest; many players who had already resurrected were observing the changes and sneering, especially on stream.

Those who kept steadfast to their faith after receiving kindness were very few, and the little girl was one of them.

The little girl had her eyes tightly shut from the intense golden flare earlier, and now that Ye Qing's voice drifted into her ear, she quivered ever-so-slightly and looked up.

Her small, round face was as confused as it could get. However, Ye Qing wouldn't look down on this little girl as she had survived such a cruel crash.

Even if her big brother tanked the majority of the impact for her… So what?

"I'm… I'm…" the little girl stammered, her face pale with fright. At first, Ye Qing was confused, and then, he quickly understood.

Could it be the jealousy of the so-called gods?

She was caught worshiping someone besides the Goddess of Law and Order, Themis, in the Holy Order Prefecture.

If this wasn't an affront to Themis' dignity, then what is?

Looking at this little girl on the verge of tears, Ye Qing felt a bit sympathetic and smiled wryly. "Don't worry, I've also received the kindness of His Grace, Lord Divine Venerate…"

The little girl paused, asking from the depths of the pit, "R-really?"

"Of course," Ye Qing answered. "How do you think I'm also healed after this catastrophic accident?"

As he spoke, Ye Qing removed the incognito robes and switched them to the default white robes. As expected, the little girl visibly relaxed and heaved a sigh of relief.

Ye Qing then made a 'shush' gesture and said, "We can't let anyone find out about this, else we will all get killed. If anyone asks in the future, tell them that I'm a talisman apprentice and I used my healing talismans on you and your brother, okay?"

Ye Qing promptly showed his talisman apprentice badge and pinned it on his chest. As for the little girl, naive as she might be, she knew the consequences of committing blasphemy very well.

She nodded her head repeatedly.

Ye Qing nodded, "If I'm not mistaken, they will soon dispatch a rescue party for the survivors. No matter what they ask you in the future, just say that Brother Mortal helped you with lesser healing talismans, alright?"

The little girl didn't know why she felt particularly close to this Brother Mortal, but she nodded nonetheless. Of course, Ye Qing knew that this was an ephemeral connection between himself and the girl, since the latter was somewhat of a pious devotee.

Cough! Cough!

"Brother! You're awake!"

The little girl's body went rigid for a moment before she whirled around, finding her elder brother slowly getting his breathing in order even as he sat up against the slanted dirt of the pit.

"Celesti… Mhm, I'm alright… alright…"

Despite his words, the young man whimpered in pain with every twitch of the muscle. Obviously, not even the lesser healing talisman imbued with faith energy, external force, and internal force could heal him to a sufficient extent.

Then again, Ye Qing did nothing but lump the three energies into one, he didn't really fuse them into pure divine energy as said task was far beyond his abilities at the moment. Nonetheless, the effect was good enough to bring the young man from the brink of death back to life.

After catching his breath, the young man looked up in confusion and asked, "What happened?"

Celesti was about to open her mouth when Ye Qing hurried to interject. "This little lass was too pitiful, and I had a few lesser healing talismans on my person."

The young man suddenly looked further up through the stomach of the scorched pit and found Ye Qing standing by the edge, looking down. Immediately, this young man noticed the shining badge with the emblem of a blank talisman paper and a single line etched with a quill.

His eyes glowed with understanding. "I see… Thank you for this kindness, brother…" the young man trailed off.

The little girl's face scrunched up in discomfort, wanting to tell her big brother the truth. However, thinking about it, she felt this might as well be better, she didn't want to implicate her big brother.

Ye Qing hurriedly said, "Mortal, you can call me Brother Mortal from now on."

"Alright, Brother Mortal," sighed the young man. "This is my little sister, Celesti, and you can call me Reiner… I will forever remember your kindness."

Both Celesti and Reiner had a neutral good alignment, and so Ye Qing knew they wouldn't betray his kindness in the future. Those prone to doing so are the people with chaotic good, chaotic evil, and neutral evil alignment.

Another reason was that he could see a golden indicator next to Celesti's neutral good alignment; this indicator had the image of a golden cloud circled by a chain.

After thinking for a bit, Ye Qing jumped down into the pit and brought out a few dry rations from his bag of holdings. Although he couldn't store living things inside and the space was very limited, he could keep a few rations.

"Is that blood?"

Celesti observed the wrappings on the rations and asked curiously. Clearly, the motion of drawing items from thin air didn't register with the siblings.

Ye Qing's heart shook, not having expected this to happen.

Reiner tapped Celesti's forehead with his fingers and reprimanded, "What's the big deal? Your brother doesn't have a spot on his body free of blood; watch your manners."

Ye Qing laughed dryly, relocating the bloody right arm inside his bag of holdings to a spot further away from the rations, even as he sighed in relief.

This right arm must be a precious treasure!

Celesti pouted. "Sorry, Brother Mortal…"

"It's fine," Ye Qing waved it off and offered some of the rations with a smile. "Let's eat, I'm pretty sure all of us are beyond exhausted."

The three quickly forgot about that bit of blood as Ye Qing diverted the conversation elsewhere. Suddenly, he received a private telepathic message from Luke.

Luke: "Insane news! The controversy on the forums exploded again! There's a heated debate about whether this 'Divine Venerate' is a player or a dev arranged by the game… Haha, some people are claiming him to be a God representing the players too."

Ye Qing was stunned.

He replied a moment later, "Divine Venerate?"

Luke: "…"

Luke: "Man, you really need to start browsing the official forums more often. You know, playing these games has more to it than exploring the map, you need to get out there and establish a solid connection with the population."

Luke: "This might not prove very helpful in the starting phase of the game, but if you want to reach to the far end of any online game, things like connection and reputation are invisible yet indispensable commodities!"

Luke: "Oh, my guild leader is reaching out to me… Hey, man, I'm telling you; this prefecture's player population is about to explode through the roof!"

…

Luke disconnected without leaving Ye Qing the opportunity to input a single word. Even as he was lost in this chain of events, Ye Qing opened the forums after a bit of hesitation to take a look at the ongoing controversy.

[Birth of a God?]

Ye Qing opened the post; thousands of comments were being posted, and the controversy was insane!

[This is obviously the dev team's work! We've only been playing for a little over two weeks, are you telling me some fuckin dude became a God already?! You guys are high!]

[Hey, just because you can't do it, doesn't mean others can't either! Here's a piece of advice… Get good!]

[Haha, GG! Hey, that guy is probably some no-life basement zombie, what else explains that high level?]

[I thought it was impossible for people to play more than 10 hours a day? The hell????]

[It's not impossible; just turn off your safe mode, and you can play for as much as your little brain can handle]

[Oh, that makes sense… Still, I don't think that's a God… I mean, come on?]

…

Ye Qing was dazed by these comments, and suddenly, he harbored this ridiculous idea… What if players started worshiping his Divine Venerate evolution the same way Children of the Realm worshiped the Seven Titans?

With that thought in mind, Ye Qing snuck a glance at Celesti and entered his game recording files, selecting a few screenshots and clips while making sure to hide Celesti's features.

After some hesitation, he uploaded a post on the forum and titled it; God, Faith, Devotee, Miracle.

The post almost instantly occupied the trending charts!