From Skaven to God of War

Chapter 34, Desire and Faith
During the rapid advance, some races did think of resisting. A mixed goblin tribe with hobgoblins and bear goblins as the ruling class was the first to stand up.

They were also the culprits responsible for the first major defeat of the ratmen since they entered the forest.

A 5,000-man Skaven force, led by Good Eyes' Skaven warlord, faced off against this combined goblin force.

Then the army of hobgoblins and bugbears rushed into the team and beheaded the rat warlord, followed by an undoubted rout.

The rat warriors and young rats fled in all directions in the forest and ran away completely in an instant.

In this situation, the ratmen's performance was not as the bear goblin leader expected.

There wasn't even much fear.

Soon, all the ratmen troops in the forest received the news and rushed towards this area with red eyes.

In total, there were four armies of five thousand ratmen warriors, led by the Rat Lord Good Eyes and his minions, three ratmen warlords.

Formed a 20,000-strong ratman brigade.

There are also countless young rats serving as auxiliary troops.

After gaining access to the resources in the forest, the number of ratmen has been doubling every two months.

This allows the Skaven to easily pull out a large number of loose troops.

It's a very pure feeling, and the sheer quantity alone is enough to make people's hair stand on end.

Although these gathered ratmen troops did not launch an attack on the goblin tribe.

Those warlords with red eyes, instead, took their own ratmen and began to search all over the mountains and plains for the fleeing ratmen warriors and young ratmen.

Not long after, a long group of slave rats escorted by rat priests started from the forest and headed towards the mountains.

After all this was settled, the rat warlords once again turned their attention to the goblin camp in front of them.

Without any twists and turns or accidents, the huge rat-man army successfully overwhelmed this mixed goblin tribe, which was not small in size in the forest.

At the same time, perhaps because they obtained too many slaves and sacrifices this time, for a time they even exceeded White Rat's requirements.

The priests mentioned a little about storing sacrifices after killing the unruly hobgoblins and bugbears.

A large number of short ordinary goblins were also tied up with ropes and taken back to the mountains as slaves.

Of course, the rat warlords did not gain nothing by doing this. In exchange, the priests would use the blood mushrooms in their hands to exchange for sacrifices and slaves.

This would free them from the harsh demands of the White Rats and would also allow the Rat Warlords to work harder.

Under the temptation of blood mushrooms, they even sent the fleeing ratman troops of the dead ratman warlord to the priest in exchange for mushrooms without hesitation.

Under the manipulation of such rat priests and warlords.

The number of slave rats began to expand rapidly, which further promoted the construction of more tunnels and deeper caves by the rats.

More mushroom growing rooms, nurseries, production rooms, storage rooms, and winding mineral veins that are gradually being hollowed out deep in the mountains.

With the help of their mining expertise, the rats naturally developed a simple ventilation system.

As a result, the depth they dug became deeper and deeper.

But this is not the most important thing.

Among the series of projects, the most ambitious and the one with the most slave rats working on it was the Temple Project directed by White Rat himself. Countless slave rats sank and floated in the blood lake. They were not sacrifices, but living slave rats. Or, in other words, not all of them were sacrifices.

As the slave rats sank and floated, they used their sharp claws to dig and expand the size of the blood lake again and again, so that the originally small underground lake had doubled in size.

Of course, this process is not easy, especially under the supervision of the rat-man priests who are watching with eager eyes. Many skinny slave rats are lifeless after sinking into the blood lake and floating up again. They are also used as sacrifices, waiting for blood mushrooms to grow on their bodies.

After being picked several times, it turned into a skeleton and sank to the bottom of the blood lake.

With the continuous excavation, huge stone steps one after another have appeared under the blood lake.

The White Rat wants to carve out a huge pyramid that will sink into a lake of blood.

Du Yuan’s altar and divine stone pillars were set up on the platform at the top of the pyramid.

This is undoubtedly a huge project, but White Rat obviously doesn't care what the cost of this project is.

He watched enthusiastically as the pyramid in front of him slowly took shape.

Unspeakable happiness was brewing in his heart, which was his gift to the gods.

He couldn't afford to relax even a little bit. Even though he was now the leader of the ratmen, he was no longer a young and energetic ratman.

But the white rats would still jump into the blood lake every day, constantly sinking and floating, to determine whether there were any mistakes in the slowly forming pyramid.

The devout white mouse was looking forward to the completion of the pyramid in front of it.

In terms of piety, Bai Shu is indeed the most fanatical rat man in his belief in Du Yuan.

However, if we go a step further, from a fanatic to a saint, Du Yuan feels that it is a bit suspenseful. Not only him, but also many priests among the rat people who are also fanatics, are unlikely to become saints.

Because compared to fanatics, saints do not need simple fanatical beliefs, but they need to have their own thoughts amidst the fanaticism, and even be able to give suggestions to the gods and help them make up for their shortcomings.

Of course, setting conditions, making suggestions, and making up for deficiencies are not difficult things, but the difficulty lies in the fact that you must have devout and unreserved faith to meet these conditions.

Only then can one be called a saint.

It is because of this that Du Yuan feels that Bai Shu cannot do it, and even other rat priests find it difficult to do this.

Because these guys are more eager for blood mushrooms, eager for gifts, a very fanatical desire, a devout desire or greed.

Until their desire and greed were mixed with the gift that they could only get because of Du Yuan, until they themselves could not tell whether it was their own uncontrollable greed or their fanatical belief in Du Yuan.

These ratmen became fanatics.

It is difficult to judge whether this can be considered a kind of piety. However, since the ratmen fanatics born in this way are both pious and fanatical, and can provide faith value, although it cannot be said to be a devout belief, it is still a succumb to desire.

Placed my desires on Du Yuan.

Then Du Yuan just ignored this awkward feeling, but he was sure that he would not be able to become a saint this way.
However, Bai Shu is indeed a devout believer of Du Yuan, not the kind of fanatical ratman who confuses desire and craving. But the problem lies in Bai Shu's piety, which is too pious to the point of fanaticism.

You can’t become a saint either.

However, because of this piety, sometimes Du Yuan would not interrupt his decision, especially when it comes to faith.

This is God's concession to believers.

Although, he may not know that his God is actually more helpless about his actions.

(End of this chapter)