Arcane Lord

The last day of November.

This is Netheril's Moon Festival, and every household worships their ancestors on this day. If there were no plans to renovate Linshui Village, Daxia would have held a grand ceremony.

However, because the demolition of Linshui Village has begun, the relevant ceremonies are kept as simple as possible. In addition, due to the shortage of death priests, Xia Duo has not yet approved the construction of independent cemeteries in each village.

The current cemetery management in Netheril relies heavily on death priests. The cemeteries of a small number of people with status, status and even wealth can receive regular blessings from death priests to ensure that negative energy does not breed.

If handled properly, the corpse can even remain incorruptible for a long time, but ordinary people do not have such good conditions. Being able to regularly dispel negative energy is considered a territorial benefit.

Even the Great Xia Territory, which values ​​fairness more, would find it difficult to bless every cemetery, but Xia Duo does not want to be completely determined by status, background or money like other territories.

Instead, based on the merits in front of the person, as long as they meet certain standards, they can receive regular blessings at the cemetery for a certain number of years. The higher the merits, the longer the blessing time will be.

At the same time, the annual large-scale sacrificial rituals, in addition to the purpose of the sacrifice, are actually used to collect holy power for the death priest. If several large-scale sacrifices are cancelled, the holy power may not be able to make ends meet.

Of course, in the ongoing renovation project of Linshui Village, the new cemetery has added a lot of magical elements, but Leiden didn't think so much about it. This was added by Xia Duo.

The main purpose is to dispel negative energy and save the holy power of the Death Priest. However, the tranquil area of ​​the cemetery itself cannot be replaced by magic. This is the result of the power of the Death Priest.

All in all, in a word, cemetery management in the current era is a very delicate job. If you pursue it a little bit, you are likely to hover on the edge of making ends meet.

…

Of course, the cremation system can also be used to replace the method of death priests guarding tombs, but this view is too advanced. When the territory was first opened, because there were no death priests to follow, Sha Duo tentatively asked many leaders civil.

But everyone's answers were unanimous. Out of memory and protection for their loved ones, and looking forward to the afterlife, the living would not want to harm the deceased as much as possible.

This is also an important reason why necromancers are so annoying in Netheril, so much so that once they create undead creatures on a large scale, they will be outraged by the public and be jointly strangled.

Desecration of corpses is intolerable in most places where civilization has developed a little bit. After all, no one wants to be treated like this after death. If you tolerate someone today, it may be your turn tomorrow.

But in the long run, Xia Duo still wants to promote the cremation system. On the one hand, it can save land resources, and on the other hand, it can also reduce the soil for the birth of necromancers as much as possible.

This kind of thing has no psychological burden on him. After all, the cremation system is also popular in his hometown. This is also the result of changing customs. It was not like this at first.

Therefore, Xia Duo needs to improve the lives of most people and improve their knowledge level so that they can truly understand the natural laws of this world and know what the afterlife is like.

Only in this way can the cremation system be accepted by more people.

…

After the simplified sacrificial ceremony, Shado asked the territorial death priest Mote, "How much holy power have you collected today? Is it enough to last until next year?"

"If there are no new deaths, it should be enough."

But how could there be no new deaths? The total number of people in the territory now exceeds half a million. With a population of this magnitude, at least several thousand more people will die of natural causes every year.

Could it be that simplifying the ceremony was wrong?

Although a large-scale sacrificial event can collect a lot of holy power at once, in terms of quantity, it may not be as good as the daily accumulation of the death priest.

After thinking about it, Sha Duo continued to ask Mote, "How is the recruitment situation of priest apprentices?"

"Too few. Most children hope to enter the Tower of Time to learn magic. As for adults, unless they have had special experiences, it is difficult for them to have the opportunity to perceive the Holy Power of Death."

Mote was the death priest who followed Sha Duo earlier, and some of his words were relatively straightforward. After hearing this, Sha Duo felt that he might have overlooked this aspect.

Magic cannot conquer the world, at least not at this stage. Many affairs in the territory need to rely on various priests, such as cemetery management and the temple clinic.

The latter can provide certain basic treatment for the people in the territory, and because the belief in the Lord of Radiance is very widespread among the Nese people, the scale of the Midsummer celebration is unmatched by the Moon Festival sacrificial activities. Therefore, the Holy Power of Radiance in the current territory Although it consumes more, it is not to the point of being stretched.

At the same time, some high-end medical treatments or extremely rough treatments can also be replaced by magic. With Xia Duo's attention, the clinic is currently operating fairly well.

Thinking like this, Xia Duo suddenly thought that in his hometown, the funeral major was actually a very unpopular, but very employable major. Unexpectedly, a similar situation would occur in the magical world!

"I will find a solution to this problem. When Linshui Village is renovated next year, I will let the school offer a course on the theory of death. You can prepare the teaching materials now, and if you are willing, you can go and teach in person."

"I don't have time for this, but I can let the apprentices go there, and I can use teaching to deepen their understanding of death."

Mott has longed for the night snack in the territory for a long time, but the night snack course was decided by the Lord. It has common sense, laws, and glorious mottos, but there is no content about the doctrine of death.

Now that he was allowed to bring the Death Course into the school, Mott's first reaction was not how much divine favor he would get by doing so, but that he finally had a chance to rest.

For him, the significance of setting up such a course in school is to select potential priests in batches who are consistent with the doctrine of death. He does not seek to train thousands of people at one time like the Tower of Time, but only needs to give him dozens of spiritual priests. Children are enough.

Speaking of which, the total number of death priests in the Bactria Territory and the Saville Territory does not add up to dozens. Now there are ten in the Bactria Territory, and five of them are still apprentices and cannot truly perceive the Holy Power of Death.

As for the Saville Territory, there are even fewer people. There are only two priests who can sense the holy power. There are more apprentices, but as long as they sense the holy power, they will be sent to the Daxia Territory.

After all, there is really a shortage of manpower here.

If dozens of death priests could be trained at once, it would definitely greatly alleviate the current priest shortage in the territory.

…

That night, Shado and Mott talked for a long time, and even talked about future funeral reforms. As a death priest who has sufficient knowledge of the nature of death, Mott fully agreed with cremation, a method of directly eliminating the mortal body. .

Because the disappearance of the mortal form does not affect the peace of the soul, and at the same time can reduce a lot of troubles in the present world, it is simply a genius idea.

But like Sha Duo, Mott is not in favor of implementing the cremation system now, because any reform in the field of death may affect the people's understanding of death, and thus affect the income of the Holy Power that year.

Unless all past cemeteries are subjected to the same treatment (cremation) at the same time as the reform, if the holy power gap is too large, it will easily lead to some bad things based on the current size of the cemetery in the territory.