Cthulhu Gonfalon

Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio

Among the gods, the God of Plague had always kept a low profile.

He had never shown up in the Pantheon temple nor had he participated in any activities organized by the gods. He had even tried to avoid meeting other gods.

He always hid in his rotten world that nobody knew of and spread plagues quietly and secretly. He also resolutely refused to make friends with anyone.

He did not even respond to the prayers of his followers nor did he grant magic to anyone. People who believed in him could see him only when their souls were taken away after their death, provided that they had tried to spread the plague while they had been alive without being caught. They could also see him if they had been caught but not been beaten to death, or they had been beaten to death, but their souls had not been thrown into the Underground River or been imprisoned in the hell.

After all, such lucky guys were rare, so the believers of the God of Plague, in reality, were basically a group of tragic people who were not loved by others and weak in fighting. They were bad in character and had no strength to organize something.

Although there were many gods in the world, there was only one god that made his followers so tragic.

In Sui Xiong's world before his space-travel, there had been so-called homebodies. It was an evolutionary version of indoors-men or indoors-women, and they basically never went out. The God of Plague was a perfect example of that. He not only rarely came out, but he also did not even communicate with others. He just stayed in his rotten world, and nobody knew what he was doing or thinking. If one were to give this world's gods a mysterious ranking, then he absolutely had the qualification to run for the top!

Acting in this extremely secret way prevented him from many crises, but it also brought him great trouble.

For example, as long as he communicated with his believers in the human world, it might be possible for him to discover from their prayers that Baron Keane was promoting prevention measures for the plague, or that he might be able to go further and find out where the crisis came from. Or, as long as he was associated with other gods, even the evil ones, the God of Conspiracy who had a bad relationship with Sui Xiong might help Baron Keane inquire about what was going on, and then maybe he could find Arcaian.

Or… Whatever, there was no need to give another example. Anyway, nothing had happened.

In short, the God of Plague, who was not far away from the crisis, had clearly felt the danger, but he had no way to find out where it came from. What was worse, even at this time, he still insisted on his usual style of being a homebody. He didn't go out to find what was going on, but instead, he began to strengthen the defense of his holy kingdom.

To be honest, he did nothing wrong, but unfortunately, he had missed the point.

In the underground laboratory of the Void Mask Land, Arcaian sat quietly on the ground, taking slow and long breaths.

With his every breath, the golden-green flame on him bounced slightly like a heartbeat. His strength was improved slightly with that as well. Although this improvement was extremely subtle that even the average Legendary Masters would be unable to notice it, at least he could clearly feel it.

His strength was constantly improving bit by bit, and that made him feel great. He felt that his whole person was indulging in it, and he almost forgot everything around him. All his spirit was focused on the feeling of these changes.

This state would last for a long time until his strength couldn't be improved anymore, to the peak of demigod.

But in that case, it would be a waste of time.

Sui Xiong just looked at him for a while and made up his mind. He called the high-level officers of the church together and began to make arrangements for the spread of medical and epidemic technologies.

"There will be a kind of medical technology which can cure most of the infectious diseases without the help of magic, and it can be mastered by normal people?" Snow, who was always calm, was shocked and asked. "Does it really work without magic?"

"Of course. A lot of magic has been used in the research process, but not for now," Sui Xiong answered. "Arcaian has developed a way to distinguish between 21 pathogens and has found reliable treatment for eight of them. Although the others are still left with no reliable treatment, he has fully understood the principle of their infection and can effectively prevent them."

"That's incredible!" Old Rhode shook his head and exclaimed. "Great! What a great achievement!"

"Yes, it does deserve to be called great!" showing up in his avatar, the God of Knowledge, Wall, also declared. "What I have done is nothing compared to what he has done!"

"Don't belittle yourself so much." Sui Xiong laughed and patted him on the shoulder. "Knowledge changes life, and education changes society. What you have done is also very important and meaningful. You two just work in different directions."

"That's right!" As a student and electorate of Wall, Lord Olian, the Hill Lord of Geerteng City, naturally stood on his teacher's side. "Although medical treatment can spare people from suffering from illness, more educated intellectuals are still needed to make people live better. Sir, your work is no less important than Master Pasteur's!"

"Now our problem is how to promote this technology?" Looking at the materials copied by Sui Xiong, the Archbishop of the Void Mask Church, Leon frowned and said, "I took a look at this set of techniques. To be honest, it is very complicated. Without professional training, it is impossible for ordinary people to master it."

"It's mainly complicated in diagnosing. The identification, processing and artificial cultivation of drugs are not very difficult," Sui Xiong, who had already read the full set of information, said. "I plan to set up another physician training class in Lanxiang Technical School to specialize in teaching this technology. But the medicinal herbs can't be planted in the Void Mask Land. The climate here is not suitable."

"I have a suggestion," the mayor of Pyroxene Town, Felix, opened her mouth and said. "There are many kinds of medicine to treat diseases, and they need to be planted in different climates. It's better to divide them into several places. Those that suit cold climate will be planted in Pyroxene Town, those that are suitable with the mountains will be planted on Geerteng Hill, and those that prefer plain areas will be planted in Garth. We can find an area around the southern Duchy of Thunder to plant those that prefer the warm climate. That will cover almost all kinds of medicinal herbs."

Sui Xiong was persuaded and nodded. "I remember there was a noble who believed in me in the Duchy of Thunder, a baron, right?"

"Yes, that Baron was a little girl who was admitted to our church the previous winter before her brother took part in the Battle of Sun's Death Day. Later, although his brother came back alive and took over the power of the Hill again, the title still remained with this little girl." As the Archbishop of the Void Mask Church, Leon was clear about all the important things of the Church. "Not long ago, I sent Miramon, the Gourmet, to take over the priest there. According to Miramon's report, he had a good relationship with the former Baron named Crick Keane. Planting medicinal herbs is also a good way to make money. I believe he will accept it."

Sui Xiong nodded. "What about the other three places? Is there any problem?"

"Our Pyroxene Town is okay." Felix laughed. "I have been worried about where to find sufficient financial resources."

"There's no problem with Geerteng Hill," Olian said. "It's not suitable to grow food in the mountains. But it's convenient to arrange some people to grow herbs here."

"We have to make some preparations in Garth City," Lyon sighed softly. "These years, we have planted many bay leaves around Garth City. Considering the income gap, I have to communicate with an area that can't produce high-quality bay leaves to persuade them to plant herbs."

"Will they agree?" Sui Xiong asked.

"Of course. Between getting our friendship as well as physical, economic interests and offending us, even fools what choice to make." Leon's smile was full of confidence. "I just wanted to find a place as close as possible to plant herbs… Well, maybe we need to set up a small village specializing in herbal cultivation…"

"Then, how long will that take?" Sui Xiong asked.

Leon thought it over and said, "It will take about ten days to no more than a month to make sure everything starts!"

The problem of herbal cultivation had been solved, and the next step should be physician training. It was easier in theory than to cultivate herbs, but it was more troublesome to put it into practice.

Physicians should be literate and be able to understand several common dialects on the mainland. Otherwise, they would not be able to communicate effeciently with the patients.

They should be able to accurately identify medicinal herbs and diseases and have certain medical experience to ensure the efficacy. They'd better know how to use magic. When there were urgent illness, magic could work faster than any medicine.

Generally speaking, the requirements of physicians were still relatively high. They belonged to senior intellectuals in a real sense. If one selected trainees only among normal people, the first stage of training would take several years.

Sui Xiong did know that on the earth, a professional physician had to undergo at least six years of training!

Although the senior physicians on earth had much more to learn than the entry-level physicians he was training now, the physicians on earth were all excellent high school students. If they had come to this world, each of them would be enough to be a senior intellectual with a completely incomparable knowledge foundation.

They had discussed for a long time on the matter of physician training and finally decided not to recruit normal people for the time being. instead, they would select physicians from the low-ranking priests of the Void Mask Church. Sui Xiong would use his Divine Power to help them adjust their knowledge field and then directly send an avatar to teach them. It would take six months to one year to train the first batch of physicians.

As long as the first batch of physicians were trained and began to work, the churches of good gods would follow this pattern quickly. It might not be long before there would be a large number of priests who knew medical knowledge. Maybe in a few decades, medicine would become a compulsory course for priests of good gods.

Of course, they should not put all their hope on the churches of good gods. Even if they would not follow Sui Xiong's pattern, the physicians of the Void Mask Church could also help in practical work and teach some good assistants. When these assistants had a certain foundation of medical knowledge, it would be time for them to further study in the physician's school. That could achieve twice the result with half the effort.

As long as this pattern could be stabilized, maybe even without the help of other churches of good gods, it would only take two or three hundred years to popularize the profession of physicians by the power of Void Mask Church alone.

"All in all, you should be confident!" At the end of the meeting, Sui Xiong concluded. "There may be some difficulties ahead, but the future must be bright! For a long time, we have done a lot of things that others did not think we could do, but we have succeeded.

"This time, it won't be an exception, either!"