Lord: Sequence Master

"The power of Creation is terrifying..." Rosen marveled as he gazed at the spiritual painting in his hand.

Due to the millions of people in the city, along with countless other believers around the world who had placed their faith in the Church of the Main God, and the divine miracles broadcast live to the entire internet, the Holy City of the Main God had truly become a spiritual painting.

This was the power of faith combined with Creation—turning belief into reality.

Of course, Rosen also noticed that there were limits to this "turning belief into reality" power.

First, it was difficult to exceed Sequence 3. Second, the reality created couldn't deviate too far from the truth. For example, he had claimed that the Holy City was a spiritual painting. Then, by painting the entire city's buildings and transforming it into a massive spiritual artwork, he drastically reduced the difficulty of making this belief a reality.

Had he not taken that step, it might have required billions of believers to achieve the same transformation.

Moreover, the emotional state of the believers also impacted the strength of their belief. The nuclear bombs and Poor Man's Rose explosions were real, but Rosen had sealed all the inhabitants inside a pocket space painting during the detonation. That painting had been created from the spiritual pigments covering the entire city.

Because the people had brushed so close to death and then miraculously survived, their faith surged with an intensity that greatly enhanced the power of belief.

This massive, concentrated outpouring of belief reduced the difficulty of turning the lie into reality.

[Holy City of the Main God: Spiritual Painting]

[Level: Sequence 4]

[Range: 100 miles]

[Population: 5,617,190 people]

[Specialties: Faith, Believers, Spiritual Crystals...]

The level of a spiritual domain was determined not only by its size but also by the number of people within it and the strength of the spiritual energy inside. Although the Holy City's population exceeded that of a Sequence 3 domain, the other two factors were still lacking.

However, even at this level, the painting was incredibly powerful.

Because it could continue to grow, the Holy City could keep expanding, and its population would only increase. In a sense, Rosen was slowly siphoning off the Hunter World's spiritual energy.

Still, for this reason, it was best not to take the Holy City outside of the Hunter World. Otherwise, the world might collapse prematurely, which would not benefit Rosen at all.

But everything was going according to plan—he had acquired the faith and spiritual energy he wanted.

He had also managed to intimidate the V5 while framing the Kakin Empire, thus creating a justifiable reason for war. Once the Church of the Main God crushed the Kakin Empire, the V5 would have to seriously consider whether they wanted to resist any further.

Rosen knew that beyond threats, incentives were equally important.

While the Holy City was filled with jubilation, and the global audience was left in awe, the Kakin Empire was in chaos. Ordinary citizens worried about the impending war, while the royal family and top officials understood that they had been framed.

But once framed, clearing their name was difficult. It was clear that the Church of the Main God intended to use the Kakin Empire as a warning.

King Nasubi Hui Guo Rou smashed his tablet in anger and immediately ordered the nation to prepare for war.

Although the human world was technically confined to an island on the Mobius Lake, the landmasses were not limited to just one. The Kakin Empire occupied an island in the upper right, while the Holy City was situated on an island in the lower left.

Separated by the vast expanse of Mobius Lake, it would take nearly ten days for Kakin's warships to reach the Holy City. Preparing for war would take even longer. Without at least two weeks, there would be no direct conflict between the two nations.

Even using Nen users with spatial abilities, they could only transport a handful of people at a time.

This geographical separation was one reason the Kakin Empire had been left out during the division of Shafik State.

As the Kakin Empire scrambled to prepare for war, the Church of the Main God showed no signs of gearing up for battle. The Church continued its daily efforts to heal the sick, constantly transporting patients in and sending healed individuals back to nearby cities. During this process, those with talent and good character were inducted into the Church, while the rest were dispersed back into society as loyal believers.

Regardless of their motives for faith, or whether they were good or bad people, more and more began to acknowledge the Church of the Main God.

Disguised with his Actor's Mask, Rosen played the role of a pious priest, healing his followers as usual.

Suddenly, his sixth sense activated, and the Eye of Time revealed an assassination attempt four seconds into the future.

It seemed someone had hired assassins to kill him, and he recognized these killers quite well.

The Zoldyck family—known as the world's strongest assassin clan in the Hunter World. Their mansion, which covered an entire mountain, was even a famous tourist attraction.

Despite their notoriety, they had never been eradicated by any country and had boldly established a foothold in society.

Nearly all the Zoldyck family members were powerful Nen users, and their current heir, Killua Zoldyck, was one of the main characters in the early Hunter storyline.

But from what Rosen knew about the Zoldycks, they wouldn't typically target him. While the family was arrogant, they weren't foolish.

The V5 and the Kakin Empire wouldn't dare provoke the Church of the Main God. Why would the Zoldycks? Unless, of course, these powerful nations had coerced the family into testing Rosen's strength.

Four seconds passed quickly, and Illumi Zoldyck, disguised as a patient, approached Rosen.

As he knelt before him, Rosen reached out to place his hand on Illumi's head. At that moment, Illumi's fingers flicked, and several needles formed from his Manipulator-type Nen shot toward Rosen. These needles, when embedded in others, could control their actions and thoughts.

As soon as Illumi attacked, his father, Silva, his grandfather, Zeno, and his great-grandfather, Maha, also made their move.

Silva, Illumi's father, appeared behind Rosen with assassination speed, his hardened hand striking toward Rosen's heart. Simultaneously, Zeno unleashed a dragon formed from his Emission-type Nen to bite at Rosen from the front.

Illumi's needles were blocked by the reinforced Nen aura surrounding Rosen.

Zeno's dragon was devoured by Rosen's summoned Beast of Gluttony.

Silva's heart-piercing strike couldn't even penetrate Rosen's reinforced back.

Instead, the recoil shattered Silva's hand, breaking his bones into fragments.

Rosen grabbed Illumi by the throat as he tried to retreat, crushing his neck with a sickening crack.

With a flicker, Rosen summoned his Wrath of the Dragon King and fired a shot forward—though no bullet was visible.

A second later, Zeno, who had attempted to hide in the crowd, was shot clean through the forehead by a bullet that seemed to appear from nowhere.

In an instant, Rosen sheathed the Wrath of the Dragon King and summoned his Dragonfang Dagger, spinning around to decapitate Silva before he had any chance to evade.

The only one who hadn't acted, Maha, realized the danger and fled at top speed without even showing himself.

Rosen hesitated but ultimately decided to let him go.

Of the four Zoldycks, only one survived, and the lone survivor could serve as bait. If Rosen wanted to wipe out the Zoldycks entirely, he could always use Death Sentence to curse-kill them remotely.

The assassination was over in less than two seconds. The other patients hadn't even realized what had happened before they saw the three bodies lying on the ground.

The gratitude they once felt now mixed with awe and fear.

Rosen had considered capturing the Zoldycks and making them his subordinates. But after thinking it over, he realized it wasn't necessary. Aside from Illumi, they were all too old.

Even if they awakened spiritual power, how far could they progress in the Sequences?

Illumi might have been worth training, but the Zoldyck family members had a few screws loose. The elder brother loved his younger brother so much that he tried to control his mind, while the mother, after being wounded by her son, joyously praised him for his strength.

Such a dysfunctional family was better kept far away from Rosen's domain.

After the Zoldyck assassination failed, all the prying eyes on Rosen seemed to disappear.

But tensions still simmered beneath the surface. The V5 and the Kakin Empire wouldn't sit idly by.

Had Rosen not infiltrated the internet using his Void Eyes, the Church of the Main God would have already been wiped from the web.

As days passed, the Kakin Empire's warships and transport vessels finally set sail.

This time, to destroy the Church of the Main God, the Kakin Empire had mobilized nearly all its military forces.

With their nuclear deterrent in place, the Kakin Empire wasn't worried about other countries taking advantage of their absence.

After all, not everyone had the ability to withstand nuclear strikes.

Leading the fleet was the Black Whale, a massive ship towering 800 meters high, 800 meters wide, and 1,500 meters long. It had vast storage areas for soldiers and was powered entirely by Nen.

King Nasubi Hui Guo Rou had built the Black Whale to explore the Dark Continent, pouring the nation's resources into its construction.

The larger the ship, the higher the material requirements. The Black Whale's size was only made possible by Nen abilities that reinforced its structure. However, aside from its size, it was useless compared to transcendent vessels.

With his map of the human world fully illuminated, Rosen had gained two special abilities: God's Perspective and Full Map Teleportation. As soon as Kakin's fleet set sail, he transported his Self-Portrait Clone and the Quetzalcoatl Warship to the sea, planning to bury the entire fleet beneath the waves.

Two days later, the Kakin fleet was far from land.

Without anyone noticing, strong winds and torrential rain obscured the sky, blocking out the sun.

No one aboard the Kakin ships saw the massive beast soaring through the storm clouds.

The fully-grown, Sequence 6 Storm Thunderbird could shrink down to the size of a sparrow or expand its wingspan to dozens of meters. Now, it danced effortlessly through the storm it had created, with the assistance of a Nature Fairy, stirring up a hurricane that spanned hundreds of miles, bringing towering waves in its wake.

"Heh," King Nasubi sneered from the deck of the Black Whale.

He had already anticipated that the Church of the Main God had the ability to manipulate the environment, as evident from the unnatural rain during their press conference. Nasubi wasn't foolish enough to venture into the sea unprepared.

He pulled out a teru teru bozu doll and hung it up, then inserted a hose into the torn wound on the doll's back. Black, viscous liquid slowly flowed through the hose, absorbed by the doll.

As the doll swayed in the wind, the storm around the fleet began to calm.

However, the doll itself became increasingly worn and tattered, causing Nasubi to tremble with heartache.

Such high-quality Nen tools were rare in the entire Kakin Empire.

What would the Church of the Main God throw at them next?

Seeing its carefully crafted storm dispelled, the Storm Thunderbird became enraged and descended upon the fleet.

These crude ships lacked any trace of spiritual energy and posed no real threat to the Thunderbird.

With a crack of judgmental lightning, a small escort ship was instantly blown apart by a thunderous strike.

At that moment, the Thunderbird was finally locked onto by the fleet's radar system.

One by one, the anti-aircraft guns aboard the ships fired, and a flurry of anti-aircraft missiles streaked toward the Thunderbird.

The Thunderbird, unfamiliar with missiles and sensing no spiritual energy from them, focused its efforts on dodging the gunfire, paying little attention to the incoming missiles.

Dozens of missiles exploded around the Thunderbird, nearly shattering the protective storm barrier that enveloped it.

Although the missiles failed to break through its defenses, they only provoked the Thunderbird further, causing it to unleash even more destructive lightning.

Subsequent missile barrages were torn apart by the Thunderbird's furious wingbeats, which conjured devastating gusts of wind.

Nasubi's expression darkened, and he immediately ordered the deployment of the Nen army.

Though only one in ten thousand people had the potential to master Nen, in the hands of a nation like the Kakin Empire, this was no obstacle.

The Kakin Empire's Nen army consisted of over a thousand soldiers, each wielding different Nen abilities.

Among them, some were incredibly strong, while others were relatively weak. If they fought individually, over 90% would be nothing more than cannon fodder.

However, what distinguished an army from an individual was its soldiers' ability to cooperate and follow orders.

Even a hundred weak Nen users, if their abilities were combined and amplified, could produce a power far beyond any single Nen user's capabilities.

Hundreds of abilities were linked together, eventually flowing into a massive man who stood at the end of the chain.

This man wielded a cannon that, with only his power, could launch a Nen blast capable of destroying a single warship.

But with the amplification of hundreds of abilities, one blast from his cannon would rival the destructive power of a nuclear bomb.

Sensing imminent danger, the Storm Thunderbird ceased its attack and soared higher into the sky.

Just as the cannon-wielding soldier prepared to fire, a bullet from seemingly nowhere pierced his forehead.

Rosen stood atop the Quetzalcoatl Warship's figurehead, effortlessly picking off targets from miles away.

He was performing ultra-long-range sniping, shooting from tens of kilometers away, through a fierce storm.

At this distance, with the wind and rain clouding visibility, the Nen soldiers never even saw their enemy before being shot down.

They could only trace the general direction of the bullets and beg for help over the radio.

Dozens of missiles locked onto Rosen's position and were fired simultaneously. However, the Quetzalcoatl Warship had already activated its Void Shadow Cloak, hiding itself within the shadows of the clouds reflected on the ocean's surface. Being in a different dimension, the missiles were useless.

Rosen continued his ultra-long-range sniping, and after killing over a hundred Nen users, the survivors retreated into hiding.

With the use of his Four-Element Homing Bullets, he could have wiped them all out in one shot.

But Rosen chose to take them out one by one because he wanted to capture some of them alive.

Those he shot were individuals whose abilities were of little use or value to him.

Rosen then used his map's permissions to send all his elite assassins from his domain to the Black Whale.

The surviving Nen users, still rattled from Rosen's sniping, were now ambushed by his stealthy assassins. Only a few with unique abilities managed to escape, while the rest were incapacitated by poisoned blades and thrown into the sea to be devoured by the Void Gallery.

Once the last assassin returned to the Void Gallery, Rosen's eyes glowed as he conjured a painting in the sky.

The painting depicted a massive meteor descending from the heavens, and his golden divine power rapidly consumed the painting, bringing the meteor to life.

The meteor hurtled down at tremendous speed, crashing into the Black Whale and obliterating all nearby warships with the resulting shockwave.

Meanwhile, Rosen had already teleported his transcendent followers and a thousand knights directly to the Kakin Empire.

The war was over before it even began. The missiles, nuclear bombs, and all the technology that humanity so proudly boasted about were utterly useless against transcendent Sequences.

The only potential threat—the Nen army—had already been wiped out or captured.

In less than half a month, the Kakin Empire, the second most powerful nation after V5, had been completely crushed. All of its resistance was wiped out.

The overwhelming power of the Church of the Main God left the V5 uneasy, and they began secretly plotting against the Church.

However, given humanity's current technological level and their Nen users, it was impossible to pose any real threat to the Church.

Thus, their final trump card had to come from the Dark Continent.

Rosen wasn't entirely sure just how dangerous these trump cards from the Dark Continent could be, which was why he hadn't yet used Death Sentence to eliminate the V5.

Moreover, he had no real desire to destroy the V5 entirely.

After all, what he needed was faith. If the entire human world were consumed by war, hatred would outweigh belief. And who knew what the V5 might do if pushed to the brink of annihilation?

With the Kakin Empire vanquished and the V5 sufficiently intimidated, it was time to offer them a tempting incentive.

In the name of the Pope, Rosen sent out invitations to the V5 and all other nations, inviting their representatives to the Holy City.

While the top leaders of the nations didn't attend personally, they sent ambassadors through various channels to the Holy City.

Rosen delegated these matters to Kurapika, while he focused on continuing his efforts to heal the sick.

In theory, with the Angel Beast and Doctor Sequence, there was no real need for Rosen to be directly involved in healing.

If he wanted to project an image of benevolence, he didn't need to personally work day and night.

However, Rosen had ulterior motives.

While he healed the sick, he was secretly doing two things.

First, he was honing his Divine Power of Enchantment. He discovered that when he wore the Actor's Mask, his Enchantment power combined perfectly with his acting abilities, making him irresistibly charismatic. Everything he said radiated an undeniable allure.

Over time, his Enchanted Tongue began developing a powerful bewitching effect.

As this ability grew stronger, everything Rosen said was accepted as absolute truth by his followers.

Thus, Rosen began weaving a second lie.

Through the Ashen Veil, he implanted the idea in the minds of his patients: Death is not the end. All faithful believers will be reborn in the Divine Realm of the Main God through the Gate of Heaven after they die.

To reinforce this lie, Rosen meticulously painted a spiritual artwork depicting the Gate of Heaven and hung it inside the Cathedral.

As more and more people came to believe in the existence of the Gate of Heaven, the power of Creation would eventually make it a reality.

At that point, Rosen might even be able to create a transcendent building in his Divine Territory.

While Rosen busied himself with his intricate plans, Kurapika successfully concluded negotiations with the various envoys.

Rosen had so much to offer. The most basic of these gifts was the elimination of disease and the promise of eternal life.

In return, all they had to do was pledge their faith to the Main God. Mortal governance would remain under their control.

While the V5 debated, many smaller nations had already begun constructing churches for the Church of the Main God and abolished all other religions. Unlike the Kakin Empire, they were too weak to resist and had no other choice.

As more and more smaller nations succumbed, the V5 finally had no choice but to yield.

One day, Rosen allowed himself a rare moment of rest.

The Cathedral had brought good news: the Sequence 5 castle from the Gray Mouse's spiritual domain had finally found a buyer in the Cathedral's marketplace. Rosen immediately entered the Cathedral to complete the transaction.

What he received wasn't a skill crystal, but a self-study guide for a Sequence 6 Painter skill.

Even so, this guide was worth as much as a Sequence 5 castle, equivalent to a Sequence 3 transcendent artifact. That alone spoke volumes about the skill's value.

It took Rosen two full days just to digest the detailed knowledge of this skill.

Human Body Art—a skill that involved painting directly on the human body.

By embedding vast amounts of spiritual runes into the artwork, it became a permanent part of the person's body.

Through this, it was possible to enhance a person's attributes or even grant them skills from other Sequences.

However, it was an incredibly difficult skill to master. The prerequisite was the ability to use over two thousand spiritual runes.

At present, Rosen only knew five hundred, so he was still far from the required level.

Fortunately, the skill guide included over three thousand commonly used runes.

That was why the guide was so valuable—the sheer amount of runes recorded required a special medium to hold them.

Rosen continued to heal the sick in person, while his Self-Portrait Clone buried itself in studying the spiritual runes.

Months flew by, and at long last, there were no more patients left to heal.

In the beginning, patients had to travel all the way to the Holy City for treatment.

But not everyone could afford that. As more people sought treatment in the Holy City, travel costs skyrocketed, leaving many unable to pay their way.

However, once the churches in other regions were built, Rosen left a painting in each one.

Through the paintings' Canvas Space, the Church's personnel could travel freely between any church without using Rosen's own teleportation powers within the spiritual domain.

Now, patients only needed to visit their local church to receive treatment.

(End of Chapter)