Rebirth in the Magic Continent

4. Churches

Churches are not open to children on weekdays, and only allow baptized adults to bring their children on special occasions.

In addition to the nobles who have their own fiefdoms and enjoy the offerings of the fiefdoms, there are three other forces in the empire that support the power of the commoners who do not have fiefdoms to survive.

They were the Adventurer's Association, the Merchant League, and the Church.

The Adventurer's Guild is a gathering of various large and small adventure guilds, and regardless of occupation, they can be incorporated after paying the membership fee, and receive a special identity plate.

After joining the guild, you can pick up your own quests on the guild board, and after the quests are completed, the identity plate will record the completed quests and convert them into corresponding points, that is to say, this identity plate is equivalent to the existence of a savings card that can be exchanged for coins in the guild bank.

Merchant guilds are alliances of some big chambers of commerce. Most civilians choose to log in at the nearest Chamber of Commerce and receive a license from the Chamber of Commerce. There are no special restrictions on joining a chamber of commerce: by paying a cheap deposit and providing regular protection money to the chamber, you can enjoy the right to attend the business lecture halls provided by the chamber of commerce on a voluntary basis. At the same time the commodity trading process can also get the shelter provided by the merchant union.

Therefore, most adventurers will also almost merge a chamber of commerce membership.

The church, however, is the most special and closely associated with the nobility, and it is approximately equivalent to the civil service of the empire.

The clerics working in the church, regardless of rank, enjoy a stable income provided by the palace. However, the requirements for becoming a cleric are extremely strict: the highest respect for the king's power and the highest respect for the nobility are the most important requirements for becoming a cleric.

The church is dedicated to the supreme god of creation, and to the god's incarnation, King Esteban.

Because the prerequisite for becoming a cleric is to make a soul oath of eternal loyalty to the king, this involves the soul level and does dissuade many people who have an eye on a fixed income but are unwilling to give up their freedom.

Churches were fundamental to the establishment of every city, and would travel in the place of their respective lords in the protective role of the territory.

On weekdays, there are rotating priests in charge of treating the sick and wounded, as well as a knight group that patrols the town to maintain order, and daily opens the doors to all those who have been baptized and have obtained the church's registration status for some random teaching activities.

......

At the age of twelve, the church hosts a baptism, a procedure that every person in the country must go through.

Baptism, registration can only be obtained on behalf of the Empire issued by the national documents (about the same as identity cards), get this document after the person is considered to be officially as an individual is recognized as a national of its independent Aisdean Empire identity.

There are two exceptions to the requirement that a person must be at least 12 years old to receive a National ID.

One is that children with special talents detected before the age of 12 can enjoy the right to obtain the National Certificate early; the other is that children of nobles can apply for the National Certificate early with the family crest.

===

Fushil took away the family badge after bringing Inari to this small town of Kesrang, and also hid Inari's identity from the outside world, only packaging her as a child born by accident without a father.

Inari remembered that on the last day of her life, Fursil had specifically instructed her to use her true last name, Kandra, only when she was able to remove all of the items stored in the magic stone once more. The magic stone symbolizing her identity imprinted with the family crest would also automatically return to its original state at that time.

Therefore, Inari's national certificate could only be obtained through baptism after the age of twelve.

---

Inari is still two years away from getting her National Certificate and realizing her independence.

Today's Keslang Church had opened a special event of magic demonstration because of the arrival of special guests.

This novelty is often a favorite entertainment for children, and Great Aunt Marlene, at her young grandson's pleading, had specially put her bakery on temporary hiatus to act as a guarantor to take Jerry and Inari to the church for the event.

On the way to the church, Jerry was still telling Inari of his excitement moment by moment.

The center of his conversation had always revolved around the pretty, god-like, magical apprentice girl he had stumbled upon on the street last night.

In Jerry's words, the girl had long blonde hair as bright as the sun, and a face as delicate and holy as an angel's. ......

Inari listened absentmindedly and didn't agree much, which spoiled Jerry a bit, “Inari, why are you being weird today.” He couldn't help but question out loud.

“No, you're even weirder today!”

Although, Inari still felt in her heart of hearts that she was just a somewhat precocious ten year old, yet still on the one hand squirming with the realization that she actually had an extra sixteen year old memory.

Jerry's cold conclusion that she was “weird looking” helped to calm her turbulent feelings again.

Inari returned to her usual demeanor, chasing after Jerry and making him face up to the conclusion that Inari was the embodiment of the goddess of Chris's town, as she had said yesterday...

Aunt Marlene watched them with a loving smile, her eyes fixed on Inari's smile for a few seconds, and she absently touched her apron pocket.

Today was an important day.

===

This was Inari's second official entrance into the church of Keslang.

On the day she had first moved to the small attic, Fhir had taken her into the church with her. However, she had only entered the church's prayer hall along with her mother before being led to a small lounge-like room. After her mother had told her not to wander, she had left along with a cleric dressed as a priest.

Since then, during the five years that Inari had lived in the small town of Kesrang, Fursil had never brought her to participate in any of the church's special events. As a result, Inari never had the chance to enter the church's interior again, but only heard some side stories about the church from her little friends as she grew up freely, as well as passing by countless times, thus memorizing what the church's main entrance looked like.

--

The church of Keslang was a large complex of buildings, and the gate into the church was always guarded by at least two guard knights, and only a small side door next to the main gate was open on weekdays.

Today was a highly participatory event.

Facing the dense crowd, the church's doors were rarely open, and there were about ten or so guard knights checking and registering the identities of the people entering the church in order.

After Aunt Marlene showed her national card, Inari was recorded as the granddaughter and grandson of Marlene the baker along with Jerry. Inari was also given a temporary ID badge.

When they entered the front door of the church, Jerry did not hesitate to abandon Aunt Marlene, who was a “tool for entry”, and dragged Inari towards the main hall of the church, with the intention of occupying one of the front rows, where they could possibly interact with the wizard.

Although Inari wanted to politely thank Aunt Marlene, she couldn't resist Jerry's enthusiasm and her own secret desire to win, so after hastily repeating her thanks to Aunt Marlene for bringing her to the event, she followed Jerry's lead and ran to the main hall.

Great-Aunt Marlene didn't care that she had been left out, and in Inari's backward-scanning glance she saw that Marlene seemed to be talking to a cleric who looked suspiciously like an acquaintance.

......

It was Inari's first time attending a large church event, and a crowd had begun to gather in the main hall, mostly children under twelve who hadn't gotten their Independence Certificates, and Inari saw a few familiar faces she'd met before dabbling in classes.

Jerry pulled her along with him, weaving his way through the crowd and eventually taking a seat in the front row.

--

Today the main hall of the church has been specially remodeled, chairs are all cleaned up leaving a large space, in the center of the hall there is also a large round platform with a diameter of ten meters, there is a layer of light curtain visible to the n***d eye wrapped around the center of this round platform.

Inari had already been given a lot of knowledge about today's event by Jerry.

Those who displayed magic in the church today were court magicians who worked for the king.

The maximum level of a magician was ten, and the court magician this time had passed the eighth level not long ago, while also holding the status of the head of one of the factions of the Este Imperial Academy...with such a title, it was indeed worthy of being the magical initiation tutor of Maria (the heroine with the halo).

“...Inari, but it's strange, normally Marlene doesn't even bother with my request to attend the church, after I mentioned that today is a rare day for a court magician to come, she loosened up and allowed me to drag you along.”

The wait was a little long, Jerry had given Inari a half-hearted introduction to the event and had the presence of mind to talk about something else, instead

“I've heard that court wizards have special skills in reading people. Do you think Marlene thinks that my talent can be seen by the court magician who came today? Hey hey, if that's the case, I can save the ten gold coins testing fee ......”

Breathlessly looking at Jerry's more and more outrageous imaginations, Inari did not open her mouth to interrupt his daydreams.

Jerry is the first friend Inari met after moving to Chris town with her mother, the new home is located in the town on the side of the busy street, the houses are all one close to each other, the first floor of the house on the right is the bakery of Marlene's aunt, and the second floor is the residence of Marlene and her young grandson.

It had always been clear to Inari that Jerry's parents were gone due to an accident, and that he was dependent only on his grandmother, Marlene. The situation was similar to her own, and her mother, Fusil, was close to Marlene, so Inari quickly became like a brother and sister to the Jerry next door.

Originally, Inari has no real sense of her own noble identity, and after five years of playing around with Jerry, the more and more they do not take their past hazy castle life seriously, but the five years of living in the town has allowed Inari to deeply appreciate the Empire's differentiated treatment of class.

For example, while Jerry was still worrying about the cost of ten gold coins for testing equivalent to the yearly expenses of an ordinary commoner's family, a child in a noble-viscount family so mundane that it was even just at the end of the line was able to enjoy the opportunity of a free and decent court test right after the age of five.

Another example is that the nobles are honored by their family name, even the long various middle names superimposed on the first name of the tedious viscounts, but also reluctant to omit their full name in the initial introduction with the people; while the names of the commoners are simple and clear, most of them do not have a family name but only a first name, or simply inherited their parents' first name to become a family name, after all, these are not recognized by the palace is not considered to be a rare name.

However, Jerry's fantasy had a few possibilities.

Wizards who enjoyed the title of court magician were the only exception that was allowed to have a personal karmic stone, the rest of the karmic stones were controlled by the three forces led by the palace, plus the church as well as the adventurer's association.

It was indeed possible that today's court magician might be carrying a precious Knot Stone.

Thinking about this, Inari also had a few moments of anticipation, and she still wanted to have the chance to conduct another magic test.