Chapter 00016: Great Truths
# Great Truths
Chapter 16
Novel: AFK Game: Portal to Another World
Chapter 16: Great Truths
“Boss Li, you’re opening late today.”
“They said it would rain today, so I went to the market first in case I got caught in the rain on the way back.”
Li Chengxi unlocked the shutter of the shop and let the delivery guy in.
The two of them checked the delivery list and the quantities, then moved snacks and drinks into the back storeroom.
Once the restocking for his convenience store was done, Li Chengxi finally sat behind the cash register and opened his laptop.
Because he had spent the morning at the market and checking deliveries, it was already 6:00 AM in-game.
Viola had already arrived at the chapel with the Royal Guards.
Speaking of prayer, it really depends on the person.
When he hovered the mouse over the Royal Guards and clicked, the dialogue box that popped up showed all sorts of wild prayer contents.
Some hoped to improve their swordsmanship skills, others wished to get a bigger bonus at the end of the month, and some asked for good weapons.
Those were still relatively normal.
The most ridiculous ones included someone asking what kind of underwear the Demon God likes, another hoping their colleague would notice their feelings so they could get together with her, and yet another praying for the Demon God's power to make her taller and more attractive.
...
Was the Demon God meddling too much?
Compared to that, Viola’s prayer was the most normal.
She was still asking: “May the Lord grant us divine doctrine.”
The reason why the prayers were so varied was mostly because the doctrines weren’t clear.
If it were the God of Agriculture, people would naturally pray for a bountiful harvest.
If it were the God of War, they’d pray for victory in battle.
But the Demon God that Li Chengxi played hadn’t shown any specific domain or traits, and there was no doctrine at all.
So of course, to them, the Demon God must be an all-powerful one, and they'd pray for anything and everything.
That said, if this had been a few days ago, Li Chengxi wouldn’t have been able to respond.
How would he know how to make up a religious doctrine?
But now, things were different.
Picking up his headset, Li Chengxi said:
“Get your pen and paper ready. Today, I’ll teach you Chapter One.”
On screen, the chibi-style Viola who had been kneeling immediately stood up.
Li Chengxi could clearly see her say something to the Royal Guards behind her.
One of the knights dashed out of the chapel like his pants were on fire, and not long after came running back with a stack of paper in his arms.
Maybe he’d gotten too excited — he tripped over his own feet and fell flat on the ground.
The other knights quickly ran over to pick up the scattered papers, and opened an ink bottle, handing a feather pen to Viola.
Seeing they were ready, Li Chengxi pulled out his phone, lit up the screen, and began to read aloud:
“The Dao that can be spoken is not the eternal Dao; The name that can be named is not the eternal name. The nameless is the origin of Heaven and Earth; The named is the mother of all things. Therefore let there always be no desire, so that we may see the mystery. If we always have desire, we’ll see only the outcome. These two arise together but have different names. They are both called mysterious. Mystery upon mystery, Is the gateway to all wonders.”
Yup, it was the Tao Te Ching.
Religious doctrine is something made up by people, and naturally it follows certain patterns.
No matter if it was the Bible or Buddhist sutras, they could all be summed up as a way to use mythology to show how badass your god is while sprinkling in some life philosophy and moral teachings for daily use.
Li Chengxi figured, since for NPCs like Viola, gods were real, there was no need for myth-making.
Skip the legends and go straight to the great truths.
And what could embody greater truth than the Tao Te Ching?
With eighty-one chapters total, reading one or two chapters a day would be enough to stretch out...
I mean, preach for a couple of months.
Of course, just relying on the Tao Te Ching wasn’t enough.
Li Chengxi had also prepared the Analects, the Five Classics, works from Mozi, Han Feizi, Guiguzi, The Nine Chapters on the Mathematical Art, the Book of Changes, and more.
He was ready to bring the Hundred Schools of Thought into the game world.
After careful thought, Li Chengxi decided he wouldn’t give them translated versions — they’d only get the original classical texts.
As for how to understand them?
Figure it out yourselves.
Interpreting doctrine is the priest’s responsibility anyway, and people interpret things differently.
That’s how different branches and sects of the same religion come about.
It’s not like the head honcho ever comes down and tells you personally: “You’re interpreting it wrong.”
As long as Viola and the others didn’t misinterpret the texts too wildly, Li Chengxi wasn’t going to interfere.
Watching them interpret it themselves was kind of fun — gave his followers something to do.
He could even dress it up a bit: this was to maintain the mystical aura of religion.
Rather than giving a straight-up translation, keeping things obscure and hard to understand made it seem more profound and valuable.
Once Li Chengxi finished that passage, Viola wrote out a whole page, then held it high above her head like a treasure to show the other knights.
Then the chapel was filled with exclamations of “Damn!”, and “Shit!” as forms of praise...
...
Eh, whatever, let them be.
Li Chengxi was too lazy to correct them.
Just then, he saw a guard knock on the chapel door and step in, seeming to say something to Viola.
Li Chengxi moved his mouse and clicked.
The dialogue box popped up: “Your Highness, the soldiers are ready to set out to eliminate the mountain bandits.”
“Mountain bandits? Why’s Viola looking for them?”
–‐‐——–‐‐——
After carefully tucking the page close to her body like it was a treasure, Viola immediately ordered her knights to gather the soldiers and prepare for battle.
Most of the soldiers who had followed her to the Leon Territory were already injured.
Many had seen their wounds worsen due to lack of proper treatment.
But thanks to the continuous healing effects of Holy Light, they had recovered quickly.
Except for the severely wounded who still needed rest, most of the others were already in good condition.
Viola selected five hundred elite soldiers to line up in formation in front of Leon Fortress.
Adding her Royal Guards and local guides, her total force approached six hundred.
As the horn sounded, the army set out toward their destination.
The number might not sound like much, but it fit the situation.
Viola’s total force was around two thousand.
Deducting the heavily wounded, the soldiers on defense duty in the city, and the patrols, deploying five hundred was just about right.
According to scouts’ reports, there were fewer than a thousand bandits.
Even if some of them were deserters or broken troops, their weapons and gear weren’t in good shape, and training was out of the question.
Five hundred professional soldiers were more than enough to take on these bandits.
The real trouble was the road.
The group set off at 7:00 in the morning, marching for two to three hours before arriving at the foot of a mountain range known as the Spine of the World.
Looking up at the snow-capped peaks, Viola recalled hearing scholars back in the capital say that the Spine of the World blocked the cold air from the north.
That’s what created the warm climate of the Avarus Demon Kingdom.
Because of that, scholars called the mountains sacred.
Viola wasn’t sure if the scholars were right, but this mountain range was indeed shielding her now from the Coalition’s pursuing forces, giving her time to regroup in the Leon Territory.
From that perspective, she truly felt grateful to the mountains.
At the base of the mountain, they left the horses and handlers behind.
Everyone would proceed on foot.
Mountain climates changed quickly.
Before long, a fine, misty rain started to fall from the sky, wrapping around the marching soldiers like fog.
On the plus side, the rain made it harder to see, so they wouldn’t be spotted too early.
The downside was that the rain also drained body heat, speeding up fatigue.
The bandits were hiding deep in the crisscrossing ridges of the Spine of the World.
They’d have to walk several more hours before reaching them.
(End of Chapter)