Goddess Kaleidoscope

"It's nothing, there's more soup in the pot if there isn't enough."

After finishing breakfast, Lu De washed the dishes while mentally planning his work schedule for the day. Yesterday's statue unveiling ceremony was a great success, and the number of followers of the Medicine God Cult in Pine Tree Village had successfully surpassed 250!

Fortunately, after waking Evelina last night, the statue that had been placed there less than a day ago did not disappear. Otherwise, when the believers came today, Rudd would have had no way to explain it to them.

At least for now, it's not advisable for the villagers of Pine Village to know about Evelina's existence. Although her stunning beauty and dignified demeanor when silent certainly exude a "goddess aura," if the villagers were to discover that this goddess possesses no divine power other than her ability to eat, and is nothing like the omnipotent claims of other gods, then the collapse of their faith would inevitably follow!

Therefore, Lude felt that they needed to continue to develop stealthily for a while longer, and before that, Evelina had to hide herself.

However, hiding such a "great living deity" without the villagers noticing is still quite difficult. The temple is only so big, and villagers often come here daily. He had promised the carpenter's children he would teach them to read and write, and he planned to expand the program, aiming to bring all the children in the village to attend. With so many people coming and going every day, it's easy to be discovered if one isn't careful, unless…

Subconsciously, Lude thought of the secret door to the storage room. The dark basement was indeed a good place to hide someone, and to prevent her from running away, chains and shackles could be used...

"Damn it! What the hell am I thinking?"

Startled by the sudden wicked thought that had popped into his head, Lud quickly shook his head, banishing those terrible ideas. Meanwhile, Evelyna looked at Lud in confusion, wondering why he was muttering to himself and then suddenly shaking his head, completely unaware that she had just narrowly escaped disaster.

"Ruddy, Ruddy!"

"Oh! What's wrong?"

Hearing Evelina suddenly call his name, Lud turned to look at her. He found her rummaging through drawers and cupboards like a mischievous child from a visiting relative's house, carrying a black nun's habit in her hand.

"This coat feels quite warm, may I wear it?"

"..."

Looking at the nun's habit in Evelina's hand, Lud's expression twitched slightly. This involved a "dark history" that he was unwilling to mention.

During his exile, Ludd had to evade the bounty placed on him by the Church of Light while fleeing towards the border regions. This nun's habit was one of the "gifts" left to him by the old astrologer, because Hume's smile could only change appearance and figure, not clothes, so matching clothes had to be prepared as well.

At that time, in order to pass through a checkpoint with extremely strict checks, Luther had no choice but to take out his nun's habit. In this world with gods, religious people generally enjoy many privileges that ordinary people do not have, and disguising himself as a nun to pass through the checkpoint was the best option he could have at the time.

So Ludwig gritted his teeth and tried "cross-dressing," and he passed the check very easily. But he never expected that the girl he transformed into would be so beautiful that a young noble officer present at the time took a liking to her.

This fellow was the son of the garrison commander of the pass. Seeing that the woman dressed as Lude was alone and timid, and did not seem to be a nun from any major sect, he thought he had found a target to "take action" against and began to fawn over the woman dressed as Lude.

Lude went to great lengths to get rid of this persistent idiot, and was even taken advantage of by him, almost being dragged into an empty alley.

After that incident, which almost left him with psychological trauma, Rude officially adopted the persona of an "old priest" for his disguise. However, he kept the well-made nun's habit, washed it, and put it at the bottom of a trunk.

The fact that Evelina was able to dig this thing out shows she definitely has the potential to be a destructive husky!

However, upon seeing this outfit, Lud suddenly had a brilliant idea!

"Evelina, you want to wear this?"

"Hmm, this feels better than this dirty robe."

"But if you wear this dress, you'll have to be a nun for me!"

"Nun? What's a nun?"

Seeing that Evelina seemed to have no knowledge of this, Lude couldn't help but smile with a hint of smugness and a touch of wickedness.

To be honest, with only Lud running around the temple, things are indeed a bit tight. He doesn't dare recruit more cultivators from the village, so he often has to shoulder the burden alone. Now that Evelina is here, Lud doesn't expect her to be of much help; just a little assistance will suffice!

Soon, Evelina changed into her nun's habit, and Ludwig successfully retrieved his priest's robe. However, he soon discovered that the goddess's figure was simply too good; her curvaceous figure made even a loose nun's smock look incredibly sexy and alluring.

Especially her chest area, it sways violently whenever she takes a step, making people dizzy just by looking at it.

Rudd then remembered that when he made the goddess statue, he had used a "vacuum design" for aesthetic purposes. Since the statue would eventually be fired as terracotta, it wouldn't affect anything. As for whether wearing so little clothing would appear undignified, Rudd wasn't too worried, because the other gods wore even less!

For example, the God of War, Fei Golai, has statues of him all of them as shirtless, muscular men wearing only briefs.

Old village chief Rom recalled how he was on guard duty at the entrance of the Temple of War when a sudden downpour occurred. Fortunately, his post was directly below the colossus of War, and it was the large bulge in the god's crotch that shielded him from the rain.

However, now that Evelina was "alive," walking around like that with nothing underneath would definitely have a bad influence on the village. So Lude took out another roll of cloth and gave it to Evelina, telling her to fix the area around her chest properly.

With the help of the strips of cloth, Evelyna, dressed in a nun's habit, finally looked much more dignified. Although her alluring figure was still not completely concealed, it was still passable. The only remaining problem was her face.

Lude had to admit that Evelina's face was truly beautiful, with delicate features and flawless, snow-white skin. Even with a nun's hat covering her milky-white hair, she was still incredibly striking.

Therefore, Lude still had to find a way to make the other person's stunningly beautiful face, which was almost a perfect 10, ugly to the level of an ordinary person, or at least lower to below 6.

The best way to disguise himself would naturally be to use Hume's smile, but there's only one magic weapon, and Ludwig himself needs it too. Fortunately, he had been an undercover police officer for eight years in his previous life, and had learned a whole host of skills for the job, one of which was his superb makeup skills.

Lude quickly found some usable tools on the spot and then told Evelina to sit in front of him and not move. Out of a special sense of trust that she herself couldn't explain, Evelina obediently remained still.

Lude first used a grayish-brown dye to add some freckles around Evelina's nose, and then used gray powder to darken and smudge her snow-white skin, creating an effect similar to scars.

After Lude's series of applications and modifications, Evelina, though becoming somewhat uglier, looked more like someone who lived in this world. While still quite pretty, she was at least of average appearance. Lude, having finished, examined her carefully again and finally nodded in satisfaction.

"As long as you don't get it wet or sweat, it shouldn't be a big problem."

"Is it done? I want to see."

"It's all done. I don't have a mirror here, so go look at yourself in that basin of water. But don't wash it yourself, okay? It took me a lot of effort to get it done."

Upon hearing Lud's words, Evelina excitedly ran to the basin, but when she looked down at her own reflection, her expression immediately fell.

Why did you make me look so ugly?

"I never said you had to be pretty, did I? My goddess, you need to understand, this is a disguise, done to hide your identity. Until I gather enough faith for you again, if you don't want to become the first goddess in history to be stabbed to death by villagers with pitchforks, don't expose yourself! Oh, and I'll think of an alias for you. From today onwards, you're Sister Aina. Remember to listen to your high priest!"

End of this chapter

As autumn officially arrives, the villagers of Songshu Village enter a busy yet joyful harvest season. This year has been good for the village; the weather has been favorable with no major disasters. With the crops in the fields almost ready for harvest, some villagers can't help but praise the high priest and his revered medicine god, believing they have brought good fortune to the village.

On this day, the villagers were working in the fields as usual when a village girl, who was stretching her back, noticed someone coming down the dirt road to the south. When the person got closer, they realized that she was a young nun, who looked to be about fifteen or sixteen years old, carrying a large bag on her back.

"Auntie, is this Pine Tree Village?"

When the nun asked if this was Pine Tree Village as soon as she arrived, the villagers nodded somewhat blankly. Upon seeing this, the little nun's face lit up with joy, and she quickly asked more questions.

"Is High Priest Rudd here?"

"High Priest? Oh! You're looking for Lord Rudd, right? He is indeed in our village. Look! Over there on that hillside, that's the temple; he's right there."

The village women pointed to a very conspicuous temple not far away, and the little nun immediately ran towards it. After walking a few steps, she turned back and politely bowed to the villagers who had given her directions.

"Thank you all. My name is Aina. Please take care of me in the future!"

Later that day, the villagers of Pine Tree Village had a new topic of conversation during their leisure time—Lord Lud's female disciple had arrived!

The female disciple, who called herself Aina, was sixteen years old and a nun. She was a disciple of Priest Rudd. She had recently received a letter from her teacher informing her that he was about to complete the goddess's trial and open a temple in a place called Pine Village. So she came all the way from the monastery where she was staying.

Her background seemed perfectly legitimate, and coupled with the girl's youth, cuteness, and politeness, she quickly became popular with everyone.

But the villagers didn't know that this seemingly energetic little nun was no ordinary person, but the Medicine God that many of them worshipped!

Three days ago, the goddess of medicine, Evelina, was born under the witness of Rudd, but this new goddess was too weak, as weak as a mortal, so Rudd decided to have her disguise herself as a nun in his temple for the time being.

However, considering that appearing suddenly overnight would be too abrupt and could easily arouse unnecessary suspicion, Lude specially prepared a "script" so that Evelina could appear in Pine Village very naturally.

Under Lud's careful arrangement, Evelina first hid in the attic on the second floor of the temple for two days, practicing the script he had prepared for her. Then, on a fine day when it was sunny and there was no rain and no one around, Lud took Evelina south to hide in the forest by the roadside as dawn broke.

Ludwig handed Evelyna a travel backpack, instructing her to discreetly observe the area until dawn, when villagers went to work in the fields. She was to then walk along the main road into the village right in front of them. She was told to remember to ask for directions, to inquire if Ludwig was there, to complete the entire charade!

The whole process went very smoothly, or rather, Evelina truly had a talent for acting. The villagers simply remarked that it was truly remarkable that the young girl had come all this way, but the village chief, Rom, was more astute and asked Evelina if she had encountered any danger while traveling alone.

Fortunately, Lud was prepared. Evelina said that she had come with a caravan and they only separated when they were not far from the village, so she did not encounter any danger.

And so, Evelina, using the alias Aina, became a new resident of the village, living with her teacher, Rud, at the temple. She helped receive villagers who came to the temple to pray or seek Rud's help. Everyone discovered that although the girl was sometimes a bit naive, she was actually quite kind.

Soon, almost ten days had passed since Aina arrived in Pine Village, and the villagers had just finished harvesting their autumn crops. This year's harvest was quite good, and since Pine Village had the status of settlers and enjoyed a five-year tax exemption promised by the king, they would not only not go hungry this winter, but would also have surplus grain to sell to the town and exchange for money to buy livestock or tools.

However, just as the villagers were excitedly discussing what to buy with the money from selling their grain, a group of uninvited guests suddenly arrived in the village. They were a group of about thirty migrants, including men, women, and children, with their families in tow.

When Lude learned of this, he knew that Old Rom of the village would take people to handle it. He felt it was somewhat inconvenient for him to show his face, lest Old Rom think that he was going to compete with him for the right to speak, and that this would create some rift in their originally harmonious relationship.

The villagers weren't as friendly towards these people as they had been to Lud and Aina. After all, it was already late autumn, and few people would choose to leave their homes and migrate to the border village next to the Void Forest in this season approaching winter. Moreover, judging from their sallow and emaciated appearance, they might be escaped serfs from somewhere, and taking them in would mean giving them some of the grain they could have sold for money.

However, this was not the biggest problem. The knowledgeable village chief, Rom, had heard that after the autumn harvest, it was the most active time for bandits and robbers, who would target villages in remote locations and always make a considerable profit.

Before striking, these cunning wild dogs would often send their henchmen disguised as refugees to infiltrate the target village and secretly find out the village's population, the location of the granary, and so on.

However, just as the old village chief Rom and a group of villagers were about to drive the people away, an uncle among the refugees suddenly stepped forward, saying that he was a blacksmith and showed them the tools he had brought. He said that if the village was willing to take in these poor people and give them some food so they wouldn't starve, he was willing to work for the village for two years for free and would absolutely not accept a single penny.

The other party's offer immediately made the villagers somewhat tempted.

Songshu Village has more than 400 villagers, which can be considered a medium-sized village in terms of size. However, there is only one carpenter in the whole village, so if they want to have handy metal farm tools, they have to go to the town to buy them.

If there were a blacksmith in the village, they could simply buy cheap iron ingots or mine open-air iron beds near the village, which would save them a considerable amount of money.

As a result, many of the villagers who had initially firmly supported the village chief's decision to drive the man away changed their minds on the spot. Even old Rom himself hesitated, as he knew very well how important a blacksmith was to the village.

As long as this guy is truly skilled, then keeping him with the village's surplus grain is definitely a worthwhile deal for the village!

End of this chapter

Because he coveted the blacksmith's skills, Old Rom finally agreed to take in these refugees to Pine Village. The village would provide them with some food, but this wasn't free; it was a loan from the village, requiring the blacksmith and others to sign an IOU.

To write the IOU, old Rom specifically called over Ludd, who was literate, hoping he could help him write it. Ludd was initially reluctant, but after confirming several times that this cunning old man wasn't trying to lend money at exorbitant interest rates, he finally agreed.

In front of both parties, Lud wrote an IOU for grain on a papyrus, stating that Pine Village would provide grain for these newly joined refugees until the first crop was harvested next year, and the refugees would have to pay an additional five percent interest when repaying the debt.

To be honest, the interest rate wasn't too high, and the migrants knew there was no such thing as a free lunch, so they obediently pressed their fingerprints on the IOU.

Lude counted them; there were a total of thirty-one refugees. There were only twelve adults, seven elderly people, and the rest were children, the two youngest of whom were still in swaddling clothes and were crying incessantly, perhaps because they were hungry.

The blacksmith, whose name was Bank, was the leader of the group. He was indeed the type to do heavy physical labor, and he was quite sturdy. When the man came up to put his fingerprints on the metal, Lude secretly observed him. The man's hands were calloused, and the backs of his hands were covered with burn scars. He had a red face, the result of years of working in front of a furnace.

While Rudd was observing the other man, the blacksmith Bank was also observing Rudd. He was surprised to discover that the white-haired old man before him was actually a clergyman, and was somewhat taken aback to hear others address him as "Priest."

Logically speaking, religious figures of the priestly rank should at least have a temple in a small town, or in a large village with several thousand permanent residents, almost reaching the level of a town. The fact that Pine Village, with only a few hundred villagers, has a temple and a priest seems somewhat illogical.

But Bank knew he was new to the area, and seeing that the priest held a high position in the village and the villagers treated him with great respect, the blacksmith, adhering to the commoner's principle of "don't ask if you don't know," put his doubts aside and obediently pressed his fingerprint on the IOU.

At this moment, Lu De saw four children following behind the blacksmith. The oldest one was about sixteen or seventeen years old. He immediately called the blacksmith "Master," so he must be an apprentice learning the craft. The other three were relatively younger. The two boys were about seven or eight years old, and the youngest was a girl, about three or four years old.

Lude noticed the children because he discovered that the youngest girl seemed to be sick; her face was flushed, she looked listless, and she kept coughing.

This terrified Lud, whose soul came from the 21st century Earth. Back when he was in junior high school, he had experienced the SARS outbreak, so he had a relatively intuitive understanding of the horrors of infectious diseases.

The world he's currently in is far inferior to Earth in terms of sanitation and basic medical care. If this little girl has some particularly dangerous infectious disease, the entire Pine Tree Village might suffer as a result.

"Mr. Bank, is this little girl your daughter?"

"Yes, Your Excellency, her name is Nina. Is there a problem?"