The Necromancer's Church Management Manual

After the land title was signed, another day passed before Garr finally received approval.

So he and Selena went to Black Dusk City.

Upon entering the outer city, Garr knew that this was worlds apart from a first-tier city like Gusenberg.

There are no towering spires here, nor are there elaborate road designs. A narrow path, with low houses on both sides, resembles a row of tombstones under the leaden sky.

This is the outer city.

The refugees lived in disarray in dilapidated huts with open skylights, letting the snow cover them.

Many people were so cold that their faces turned ashen, and the air was thick with the smell of decay.

This was far more desolate than Gard had imagined.

They couldn't even get food, and they were barely clothed; they simply let themselves freeze to death in the freezing cold...

Garr frowned and walked up to a sallow-faced, emaciated little boy.

The little boy was kneeling blankly on the ground, with a frozen female corpse in front of him, perhaps his mother.

Garr shook his head, broke off some bread from his bag, and offered it to the boy's mouth.

The little boy didn't even look at Gar. He just smelled the aroma of the hard food entering his nostrils, and instinctively, like a wild beast, he grabbed the bread and began to devour it.

After finishing the bread, he licked the crumbs from his fingertips, raised his eyes which gleamed with an eerie green light, and stared intently at the remaining bread in Gal's hand. Then, he reached out his hand.

He still wanted to eat.

The refugees who lived with the little boy watched as he ate bread, and those whose legs weren't broken struggled to get up from the ground, while those whose legs were broken also struggled and crawled in the snow.

They rushed to Garr and stretched out his bony hand.

One, two... a dozen or so.

Those layers of arms were like a wall, completely pressing down on the little boy's small hands. Some people even stepped on the little boy, knocking him to the ground, just to reach their hands higher and closer to Gar.

Selena couldn't bear it any longer. She rushed to the wall made of arms, pulled the little boy out of the crowd, and looked at his dirty footprints and bruised skin. Without hesitation, she used the blessing of the God of Life.

A soft, pale green light emanated from her hands and fell upon the boy's wounds. The bluish-purple marks faded at a visible speed, and even the frostbite on his hands healed and scabbed over.

The boy had just experienced the changes in his body. His lifeless eyes looked at Selena, but he didn't say anything, just stared blankly like a fool.

Instead of sharing the remaining bread, Garr put it in his bag.

This little bit of bread won't solve anything; we'd better hurry to the church.

"Selena, let's go."

He pulled Selena up from the ground, glanced at the greedy refugees, and casually uttered:

"Tomorrow morning, come to the church at No. 19 Church Lane and help me clear the snow from the church entrance. Complete the prayer of the God of Light, and you will receive food bestowed by the divine."

Then, he walked away without looking back.

Garr knew that these refugees, if used properly, could be of great benefit to him.

He was quite certain that they were all ordinary people who had not received the favor of the God of War. If they were followers, they could at least pursue the profession of adventurers, earning their living by hunting monsters.

If their professions have special relevance, they can pursue more professions. For example, an arcane mage who worships the god of wisdom has a very high profession bonus in inscribing arrays and is suitable to be an array mage; or a berserker who worships the god of war has a very high profession bonus in forging weapons and is suitable to be a blacksmith.

Those with family ties are rare and a vital resource for the nation; they will never be reduced to vagrants. At twelve years old, if you are blessed by the gods, even if you are a rat in the sewers, you can emerge from the darkness and walk onto the street.

Even more ridiculous is that relatives can also use connections. If your parents have relatives of a certain rank, or if they perform righteous deeds that promote the gods, the gods will surely favor you and may even increase the blessings you receive.

What a ditch world.

Having experienced the prosperity and peace of his previous life, seeing these starving refugees who eventually froze to death filling the streets, Gal felt a profound sense of alienation from his soul.

He didn't know what he was feeling at that moment, but his fists kept clenching. If there were a sandbag right now, he would want to smash it to pieces!

"It seems that Lord Zane is doing a really bad job." Selena looked at the desolate scene before her, and all her expectations before coming here were washed away. The warm life she had been looking forward to was probably gone.

"If such a large-scale migration event were to occur in a second-tier city of Minos, it would probably lead to an uprising."

"Where the Temple of War falls short, the Church of Light will make up for it." Garr said no more and silently walked toward the church.

After calming down a bit, he quickly realized that these refugees, who had not been favored by the god of war, might be the driving force behind his rapid rise to power.

If these refugees believed in the God of Light and received his protection, what would they do?

Finally, in an open space in the outer city, among several frozen corpses in various poses, Garr saw the church described in the land deed.

The church was a regular square shape, the kind of small church in a rural parish. It was very dilapidated, with the main door broken in half and the glass windows missing. It was empty, and the inside was also empty. The pews and the pulpit in the inner room were all dismantled and scattered. Several vagrants were sleeping inside.

When we arrived at the priest's residence, the three or four small rooms were also crowded with refugees.

Garr wasn't too surprised; after all, there were so many dilapidated houses outside, so this abandoned church couldn't be an exception.

It seems we need to get rid of these refugees first, and then use skeleton soldiers to completely renovate this place.

As for why Garr didn't let these refugees do work relief, he naturally had his reasons. Making these crippled men and women and children, who couldn't even get enough to eat and had no strength, do construction work would be extremely inefficient, and they couldn't work at night either, which would be a huge waste of time.

It's nowhere near as efficient as having his skeleton soldiers do the work, and skeleton soldiers don't need rest because they're tired, nor do they demand compensation for being injured or killed...

However, using the skeleton requires avoiding nearby residents and Selena.

Garr didn't want to be affected by his identity as a necromancer in the early stages of development.

"Selena, why don't you go rent a room at a nearby hotel and rest? I'll take care of the church matters."

"No!"

To Garr's surprise, Selena resolutely refused this time. She squeezed Garr's hand, feeling the force from his fingertips, and Garr could sense her anger.

"Shouldn't I have something I can do myself?"