Chapter 373 – Didn’t Know, Didn’t Look, Still Scary
Louis didn’t doubt the authenticity of the list, he was clear that the one who hated the Radiant Church the most wasn’t them, the royals, but instead it was the Calci Family.
The Calci Family was a family of Dark Mages, and they also had a rich history with Dark element Magic. One of the Radiant Church’s goals was to eliminate Dark Mages in the continent, if the church were to fully commit on this goal, the very first ones to suffer misfortune would be the Calci Family.
Louis also didn’t think that the Calci Family gave him this list just to grab up some land. This was because there were not that many n.o.ble clans in the list that were of notable status, most of them were all small n.o.bles. So even if the Emperor did kill these people, the Calci Family wouldn’t benefit from it, so Louis reckoned that the list must be real.
The more Louis trusted the list, the more surprised he became. Louis knew about the brainwas.h.i.+ng abilities of the Radiant Church, he knew that these 10,000 people weren’t the only ones who were faithful to the Radiant G.o.d inside his empire. Who knew how much more people were part of the Radiant Church aside from these 10,000.
After seeing the list, Louis immediately had his doomed soldiers go and monitor the actions of these people.
Louis didn’t know how long these people were inside Rosen Empire, he also didn’t know the exact number of believers that the church had ama.s.sed. So what he needed to do first was track these followers and even if he couldn’t deal with all of them, he should at least eliminate the leaders of each group to stop the religion from spreading.
At the same time, these people may have possibly known that they had been exposed, so they must have been preparing to escape the empire. But it was fortunate that Louis acted swiftly, this plan would have to be trashed.
They didn’t have time to create another plan since Louis already went to arrest and interrogate the people in the list. He checked for who came in contact with the spies and see whether they were Radiant Church followers or not.
In the end, the investigation found Radiant Church believers belonging to these hideouts that numbered to about a hundred thousand people. Some of them have just entered while some have already been a believer for many years. There were even some who helped those who were arrested, which ended up with them also being arrested.
Louis’ actions alerted other n.o.bles. The Radiant Church had always been polite to them, but they were still on guard with regards to the religion. So when they heard the ma.s.sive amount of arrests and investigations happening all across the Rosen Empire due to these uncovered spies, all the n.o.bles conducted their own investigations about their subordinates who may also be an agent of the Church.
And their investigations bore fruit, in their territories, followers of the Radiant Church were indeed found, in some there were a lot while in others just a few. The only territory who didn’t have an ounce of Radiant Church influence was the Calci Family’s territory. The Radiant Church had always been wary of this family of Dark Mages, so they didn’t dare send some agents to their land.
Finally, when counting all of the church believers that the n.o.bles were able to find, it surprisingly reached no less than two million people. This number was beyond anyone’s imagination.
This made the entire Rosen Empire anxious. They carefully scrutinized all of the captured believers. They killed the devout followers and spared those who just joined, only giving them a light punishment before having them released.
Naturally, when they went to capture and interrogate the people on the list, they didn’t blatantly announce that the people were captured because they were believers of the Radiant Church. The empire had to come up with other reasons, such as being a spy, committing a crime, and so on.
After this matter, the n.o.bles of the Empire became even more terrified of the Radiant Church. Normally, they didn’t want to offend the Radiant Church, they didn’t want to wound that tiger. But unexpectedly, this tiger actually wanted to harm them! The Church sent some missionaries to their lands, moreover, without even notifying them. This made the n.o.bles indignant, so the entire Rosen Empire started to resist against the Radiant Church’s teachings. Naturally, all of these suppression were made while in the shadows. This made the Calci Family very relevant, the n.o.bles wanted to ask the family for advice as to how to handle the Radiant Church since they saw that the Family’s territory didn’t have a trace of the church’s influence.
The n.o.bles weren’t afraid that the Calci Family wouldn’t provide any help. This was because they knew that the Calci Family was the vanguard of all those who were against the Radiant Church. So it was correct for them to ask the Calci Family about this matter.
The Calci Family was also very happy with the situation. For these many n.o.bles to resist the Radiant Church, it would truly be impossible for the church to revive their forces inside Rosen Empire. This was a great thing for the family.
`However, the family actually didn’t have a concrete advice for the other n.o.bles. The family regarded the Radiant Church very seriously, also, Dark Mages were very sensitive towards the aura of Light Mages. So the method that worked for the family was to make Dark Mages patrol the territory and feel out any light element aura. This was to ensure that there weren’t any Light Mages who were hiding.
But this method wouldn’t work for the other n.o.bles since there weren’t a lot of Dark Mages in their territories. This matter made the Calci Family a bit embarra.s.sed.
In the end, the higher ups of the family informed their members to help solve this dilemma. So long as they complete this task, the other n.o.bles would feel indebted to the Calci Family. This was very important to the family’s future.
When Smith received the request from the family, he couldn’t find a solution as well. So he went to Zhao Hai and discuss this matter with him. Smith knew that Zhao Hai had an endless amount of wicked schemes and ideas running around his mind. Zhao Hai should have the solution to the Calci Family’s problem.
Hearing Smith explain about the family’s problem, Zhao Hai smiled and said, “This is an opportunity to make the citizens of the continent change their views on Dark Mages. In fact, if we want to stop the Radiant Church’s influence from affecting the empire, then we should first promote our own propaganda.”
Smith looked at Zhao Hai with a puzzled expression, he certainly wasn’t be able to understand the kind of propaganda war that happens on Earth. Looking at the other’s appearance, Zhao Hai just smiled and continued, “Propaganda is important, in fact, this is the main reason why the Radiant Church was able to spread its influence this far. To look attractive to the outside world, they dressed in a bright white color and always wore a gentle smile; this is a kind of propaganda. So what we need the n.o.bles to do is to continually promote all the bad things that the Radiant Church did all these years. Moreover, this propaganda should get more and more frequent. This is to drill into the citizen’s subconscious the fact that the Radiant Church is a terrible organization. This would naturally make them unable to trust the church.”
Smith’s eyes lit up. To spread its influence throughout the continent, the misdemeanors that the church had done certainly wasn’t a low number, and they weren’t able to hide it. The actions that Zhao Hai suggested would certainly deal a huge blow to the Radiant Church. This negative propaganda could even be used as a teaching material.
Zhao Hai added, “Now that almost all of the schools in the empire are under the hands of the n.o.bles to be used for scouting talents, why don’t we set up a curriculum in those schools to teach the negative aspects of the Radiant Church? Children tended to believe things they learn from school more than what their parents taught them at home. As long as the schools educate the children about our view of the Radiant Church, the children will believe that the church is bad for their entire life. So when they grow up, they wouldn’t be able to believe all the preaches that the church would do. It was even possible for the children to influence their parents. Bit by bit, they would influence everyone around them. Given enough time, the Radiant Church would certainly look repulsive to the empire’s residents.”
Smith’s eyes lit up brighter, he nodded, Zhao Hai’s idea was very good and feasible, it was worth a try.
Zhao Hai added more, “We can also use this opportunity to promote the image of the Dark Mages to the populace. Brother Smith, you should know yourself that Dark Magic also has abilities that could be used to treat illnesses. Moreover, the Dark Mage’s knowledge of the human body far outcla.s.sed those of the Light Mages. This would certainly allow Dark Mages to cure more illnesses in a given time. It could even be said that Dark Mages aren’t that worse in curing ailments when compared to the Light Mages. The only problem was just that Dark Mages have been, for a long time, portrayed as a bit strange sort of people. Making the populace unable to really understand what they really are. But with the destruction of the Radiant Church’s influence in the empire, there are naturally no more negative words towards Dark Mages.”
Smith agreed, he understood what Zhao Hai meant since he himself was a Dark Mage.
Zhao Hai then said, “The income of the commoners in the continent aren’t high. So when they couldn’t meet a well intentioned Light Mage, they would go find an apothecary and even then, the prices for the medicine are quite high. The reason that the Radiant Church has been regarded as good was because they would make their Light Mages provide healing for free. So why couldn’t we do the same? We can also have some Dark Mages go out and heal some illnesses of the people, not only those who couldn’t afford to see a doctor but also ordinary people who wanted to be healed. This will surely reverse the image that the Radiant Church pegged to the Dark Mages. So when the Radiant Church decides to suppress the Dark Mages again, it would then be very difficult to do so.
These means were common in Zhao Hai’s view. Back on Earth, which reached the information age, people were very practical when it came to religion. But even then, religious faith still survived. This showed the formidability of belief. There were even cults that still survived because they used rotten methods of propaganda, with this, one would recognize how easy propaganda can be used to influence people.