Chapter 531: The Divine Kingdom

Shishou gave Katsuyu a skeptical glance as he took the ramen and began to slowly savor it.

As he ate, they discussed the knowledge surrounding religion. In his previous life, Shishou had always been an atheist. Now, as a deity himself, he found that he didn't know much about how to inspire devotion in the masses.

In contrast, Katsuyu, who had lived for thousands of years on the ninja world, had witnessed countless examples of successful and failed religions. She had a wealth of knowledge on the subject.

To establish a religion, one must first determine which deity the religion would worship.

After finishing her ramen and downing a cup of sake, Katsuyu asked, "Who will be the deity of the religion you plan to establish? Will it be one of the legendary gods of the ninja world, or will it be yourself?"

"Is there a difference?" Shishou asked, curious.

Katsuyu shrugged. "Not much difference, but worshipping yourself would be more practical. It allows you to perform miracles whenever needed to attract the people's faith."

"Alright," Shishou nodded.

Given his current power, even though he was still far from the level of the divine beings that the Ōtsutsuki clan aspired to, he was already perceived as a god by the people of the ninja world.

This way, all he had to do was occasionally perform miracles to attract a large following.

Moreover, due to his previous efforts in planting trees and reforesting the Land of Wind, the residents there had already begun to refer to him as the "Divine Spirit of the Sacred Tree" and had started to worship him.

He could use this identity of the "Divine Spirit of the Sacred Tree" as a cover to develop a religion.

Katsuyu continued, "Since you've decided to have them worship you, you'll need to establish doctrines, scriptures, and rules for the religion."

"It's best to differentiate between the clergy and the lay followers..."

As Katsuyu continued to explain in detail, Shishou was taken aback. He had expected Katsuyu to be knowledgeable about religion, but he hadn't anticipated that she would be this familiar with it.

Something occurred to him, and Shishou suddenly asked, "Did you ever plan to establish your own religion?"

If Katsuyu hadn't once considered doing so, she likely wouldn't be so well-versed in these religious matters.

Hearing this, Katsuyu's face showed a rare hint of embarrassment as she explained, "Before Ōtsutsuki Kaguya came to the ninja world, it was common for sages who practiced natural energy to establish their own religions."

"I had also made some preparations, but after Kaguya arrived, all the prominent gods in the ninja world were hunted down. I lost the motivation to pursue it."

Shishou nodded and encouraged Katsuyu to continue talking about these religious matters, so he could take note of her insights.

After some discussion, Katsuyu suggested that Shishou visit the Buddhist temples in the ninja world to study related texts.

Hearing this, Shishou prepared to return to the ninja world and start researching immediately.

This time, Katsuyu would accompany him, under the pretense of wanting to explore the ninja world.

With Katsuyu by his side, Shishou first visited the Fire Temple in the Land of Fire, the temple where the monk Chiriku, who was killed by Kakuzu in the original story, had resided.

Sneaking into the temple's library, Shishou began studying the doctrines and scriptures of Buddhism.

Meanwhile, Katsuyu selected the texts she found most useful, ones that were easy to transcribe, and handed them to Shishou for careful study.

After spending a few days in the library of the Fire Temple, Shishou and Katsuyu moved on to other temples to continue their research on Buddhist texts.

Once they had finished with Buddhism, on Katsuyu's suggestion, they began visiting smaller religious sites to gather useful aspects from these various religions.

In the ninja world, aside from Buddhism, there were numerous other religions, though none were as influential.

Among these smaller religions, there were also many that were particularly bloody and violent.

After Shishou visited these violent sects, they mysteriously disappeared without a trace.

Shishou now considered the ninja world his divine kingdom, and he couldn't tolerate the presence of harmful elements that threatened the well-being of its inhabitants.

After touring the ninja world for some time and collecting a wealth of religious texts, Shishou returned to Kaguya's Origin Sphere ecosystem with Katsuyu. He summoned everyone and began brainstorming to create his own religious scriptures.

With everyone's help, Shishou quickly settled on the key aspects of his religion.

The deity of the religion would be the "Divine Spirit of the Sacred Tree" from the Land of Wind.

The doctrines would revolve around environmental protection, such as cherishing nature and promoting harmony between people and the environment.

The rules and scriptures would advocate for peace, avoiding war, protecting the environment, and offering chakra to the main deity.

After finalizing the details for this religion, Shishou had everyone begin working on the doctrines and scriptures for another religion.

He didn't plan to create just one religion to collect chakra; instead, he intended to establish multiple religions under different divine identities.

Having multiple religions would create competition, as a single dominant religion could become a toxic presence, causing issues and potentially bringing trouble to his beloved followers.

Of course, the main reason was that he had too many women by his side, and there weren't enough divine roles to go around, so he had to create more religions.

With Tsunade and the others preparing the scriptures for the new religion, Shishou and Katsuyu traveled to the Land of Wind to experiment with religious management under the guise of the "Divine Spirit of the Sacred Tree."

Upon arriving at his temple, Shishou immediately sought out the temple's administrators and used genjutsu to control them.

When he discovered that they had been using his name to amass wealth and indulge in immoral behavior, he was furious and killed them all on the spot.

He then took over the temple's operations with Katsuyu, educating the visiting followers on the new doctrines and officially renaming the temple to "Sacred Tree Temple."

Thanks to the miracles Shishou had previously performed in the Land of Wind, the people quickly accepted the new doctrines.

After several months, once most of the Land of Wind's followers had begun to worship the "Divine Spirit of the Sacred Tree," Shishou prepared to start collecting chakra from the followers.

However, he encountered a problem.

The ordinary civilians in the ninja world didn't know how to extract chakra.

This meant that if Shishou wanted to collect chakra from his followers, he would first need to teach them how to extract it.

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POWER STONE!!!!

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This fanfiction is complete on my P@treon. If you want to read it, you can find it at p@treon.com/Betek.

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