The Church

Biodata

Feature	Value
Name	The Church (教廷)
Alias(es)	Holy Church; Sacred Church; Western God of All Things Church; Western Papal Church. Demons call it the “Evil Church” 296 415.
Entity Type	Religious institution and embodiment of a Universal Law; identified as the Incarnation of the Son of God 222 554.
Affiliation	Faith of the God of All Things 19 222.
Leadership	The Pope; named pontiffs include Kaskeric, Innocent II, and Innocent III 296 369 554.
Headquarters	The Papal State on the Boot Peninsula; the Holy City contains Hagia Sophia Cathedral 266 480 554.
Role	Governs religious faith, operates an international ecclesiastical system, legitimizes monarchs, and opposes heresy and enemies of the Universal Law 296 385 479 554.
Status	Active; its Universal Law protects Yveta after his imperial coronation 554 556.
First Appearance	Mentioned as the authority required to witness a manor transfer 1.

Background / History

During Charlemagne’s era, the Pope depended on imperial military backing and was vulnerable to manipulation. Later rulers shattered the Law connecting imperial authority, allowing the Church to become independent. Its regional branches eventually formed a “virtual church empire,” while the secular Empire became increasingly nominal 463.

Accumulated doctrinal disagreements split the Church into three major factions approximately a thousand years before the main story. The Western Papal Church became the dominant branch in the Western Magic Black Forest; ordinary references to “the Church” generally mean this branch 296.

The Hearthstone Witch describes a Holy Purification Movement eight hundred years earlier as a campaign through which the Church established its authority by hunting witches and wizards. She claims that many victims were ordinary women, targeted because genuine witches were dangerous and difficult to capture. Her teacher was killed during the movement 22. A separate account dates a Western Church purification campaign to two hundred years earlier, when the witches of Epirus hid underground as stone statues 298.

Over the last two hundred years, the Church relaxed its pursuit of witches into an unofficial policy of ignoring those it did not openly encounter. This accommodation did not change the doctrine that witches should not exist, nor did it prevent military retaliation against witches who harmed important Church associates 122.

Organization and Authority

Major Branches

Branch	Leadership and Doctrine	Area of Influence
Western Papal Church	Recognizes the Pope as its head and forms a holy international system 296.	Dominant throughout the Western Magic Black Forest 296.
Eastern Orthodox Church	Regards the Pope as an ordinary archbishop and ancient emperors as the highest earthly representatives of the God of All Things 296.	Established in the northern Far East, particularly countries around the Tervil Duchy 296.
Coptic Church	Emphasizes the existence of only one God; disputes the other branches’ treatment of the God of All Things and His Son 296.	Survives in restricted areas of the overseas continent where the God of All Beasts is dominant; its holy cities have fallen to other powers 296.

The Sun God Church is a separate sect associated with ancient spellbooks, sacrifices, and opposition to the Iron Crown’s heirs—not a branch of the Papal Church 406 408.

Clergy and Political Influence

• Pope: Heads the Western Church and claims authority above secular monarchs, including the Emperor 296 482.
• College of Cardinals: Rewards contributions such as spreading the faith and supporting new nobles or monarchs. Helping a king gain a throne is presented as Antioch’s surest route to advancement within it 121.
• Regional archbishops: Can exercise effective sovereignty. The Black Mountain Kingdom is said to be truly ruled by its archbishop 2.
• Local bishops and priests: Administer religious services and participate in civil ceremonies. Property transfers and non-knightly fealty rituals require priestly witnesses 1 17.
• Branch churches and parishes: Exist in independent countries and use ecclesiastical boundaries separate from secular administrative districts 429.
• Church-linked territories: Include numerous small duchies and close connections with the Black Mountain Kingdom, Minkes Archdiocese, Mainz Archdiocese, and Trier Archdiocese 442.

Wealth and Legitimacy

• Tithes supply a major portion of Church wealth. Its international parish network finances military power despite the Papal State’s limited territory 429.
• Coronations confer religious legitimacy. Oyo III’s failure to receive a Holy City coronation leaves his imperial position less secure 480.
• Military aid carries political significance beyond the troops themselves. Church support for Yveta is considered exceptional even by royal officers 378.
• Monarchical alliances are useful to rulers pursuing centralization. Yveta judges that monarchs and clergy generally share interests until the aristocracy has been subdued 429.
• Central control is not absolute: The Frankish Church becomes independent in practice while retaining nominal obedience to the central Church 429 521.

Doctrine and Religious Policy

The God of All Things

• The Church manages faith in the God of All Things and is identified as the Incarnation of the Son of God 222.
• Its doctrine presents the God of All Things as the only true God 51.
• The sacred number 4 appears on churches and in supernatural manifestations associated with sacred power 200 520.
• Despite its monotheistic claims, worship of saints, holy mothers, holy sons, angels, and sacred objects gives its religious practice substantial polytheistic elements 471 515.

Conversion and Accommodation

• The Church incorporates local beliefs and customs to make conversion easier. In Ambrose, it accepts the established tradition of the Thousand Year Fire 51.
• According to the Hearthstone Witch, its present gentleness reflects secure political dominance rather than an inability to persecute opponents 22.
• Several generations of popes deliberately tolerate the Pirate World as a defensive barrier against heathens 266.
• Vampires survive under tacit Church tolerance. Yveta believes a sufficiently serious threat could provoke a Golden Seal Edict and a continent-wide holy war against Wallachia 227.

Heresy and Prohibited Practices

• Witches are condemned partly because of their alliances with Hell, though their own crimes also contribute to their reputation 480.
• The Church historically labels divination and astrology superstition and threatens astrological researchers with excommunication 60.
• Bows and crossbows are forbidden in the Magic Black Forest except when fighting heretics 11.
• Heresy is treated as more dangerous than unbelief: The Church may tolerate infidels, but a state rejecting its authority over scripture directly threatens its institutional existence 479.
• The Little Brotherhood of Faith conceals its worship of Truth behind generic references to the “Lord” to avoid being exposed as heretical 19 89.

Abilities & Powers

Universal Law: Church

The Universal Law represents the Holy Son’s body remaining in the mortal realm. It establishes passage between the earthly realm and the heavenly kingdom and serves as a source of salvation and guidance 554.

• Environmental restraint: Demons seek fragments of human souls through possession so they can disguise themselves as humans and exercise their true power within an environment governed by the Holy Church’s Universal Law 331.
• Protection of sacred sites: Lorraine Monastery and its sacred object fall under the Law’s protection 515.
• Linked Laws: The Holy Crown is intrinsically connected to both the Church’s Universal Law and the Empire’s Universal Law 413.
• Competing jurisdictions: The radiance of the Church’s thirty-three Heavenly Mountains clashes with the Magic Black Forest’s supreme Law, creating the forbidden conditions of independent Ambrose 21.
• Faith-based jurisdiction: Conversion brings the Light People under Universal Law: Sacred and Universal Law: Church. Proselytizing also strengthens Yveta’s control and can repair broken Universal Laws 556.

Imperial Access to the Law

Event	Chapter	Effect
Yveta receives Universal Law: Sacred’s election crown	551	Identifies him as the god-man selected as Emperor; papal coronation remains necessary for his complete imperial authority.
Pope Innocent III crowns Yveta	554	Places him under Universal Law: Church’s protection and grants top-tier priest abilities through twenty-two sacred bell chimes.
The Law establishes protective precedence	554	Yveta ranks below the Pope: the Law favors the Pope in a conflict between them, but favors Yveta against others.
Yveta gains Black Death purification power	554	Innocent III asks him to protect the faith and purify the Black Death Lord.
Yveta converts the Light People	556	Adds the two Universal Laws’ control to the control already imposed through his black-magic rings.

Exorcism and Sacred Rituals

• Church scripture and Mass can expel demons when backed by effective belief. The Hearthstone Witch uses self-hypnosis to generate blind faith and separate a possessing demon from a girl 332.
• Recitation alone is insufficient: her earlier exorcism attempt fails when her words lack genuine faith 215.
• Church exorcists may prioritize saving a soul over preserving the possessed body. An injured Father asks Yveta to kill a possessed child if necessary 331.

Church Knights

• Members of the Boar Knight Order consume Seeds of Life, undergo organ ascension, and possess Extraordinary Hearts 2.
• Formal Knights have superhuman physiques, reflexes, and dynamic vision sufficient to catch arrows barehanded 11.
• Their battlefield training includes coordinated combat against heretics, cultists, merchants, and enemy forces—not merely individual duels 11.
• Church High Knights can develop Angel Wings, a hybrid organ requiring at least six extraordinary organ types. These improve attack, healing, defense, speed, and endurance while restraining Church enemies 396.
• Cardinal General Antioch is reputed to be a Fifth Rank professional who has initiated at least three hundred wars without defeat 122.

Hidden Forces

• Mr. 333 belongs to a hidden Church force with origins in revelations from the Ancient Civilization era 383.
• This force confronts enemies of the Universal Law concealed behind history and previously discovered by Conqueror Xiao 385.
• Its agents use divine weapons taken from defeated heretical churches 384.

Equipment / Relics

• God Stealing Fishing Rod — Used to hook the Sea Goddess and steal her divine spark immediately before full resurrection 384.
• Inverted Hourglass — Intended to transfer the stolen divine power into Vinsk. It and the fishing rod are destroyed during the Cross Island confrontation 384 389.
• Saint Yalkes’s sacred wooden frame — Preserved uncorrupted for a thousand years at Lorraine Monastery and venerated as a miracle 515.
• Holy Nails — Three nails associated with the God of All Things’ mortal suffering. One fills the sea, another suppresses a volcano at the Center of the Earth, and the last is held by the Frankish royal family 538.
• Ravenna’s holy blood bottle — Local tradition identifies it as blood given by the Holy Son that formed the Monastery Law. Other accounts propose an older water-purifying Law later appropriated by the Church 238.

Relationships

• Yveta — Develops from a fugitive threatened by Church-funded knights into a supported ruler, Crusade leader, and Emperor protected by its Universal Law 2 377 479 554.
• Hearthstone Witch — A doctrinal enemy and outspoken critic whose teacher died in a purification campaign; nevertheless, she knows Church scripture and can perform effective religious rituals 17 22 332.
• Antioch — Military and political representative who promotes Yveta’s opportunities while pursuing the Church’s interests 122 377.
• Holy Empire — Protector of the Church’s faith, but also a rival over the balance between imperial and papal authority 479 482 554.
• Druids / Green Order — Historical opponents. The Church erases their records and burns associated books; their return becomes a reason for renewed cooperation with Yveta 28 554.
• Sea Goddess — Associated with a faith destroyed after missionaries reached Cross Island; later revived as part of a Church plan to seize her divine spark 375 383 384.
• Church and the People of Ravenna — An independent duchy within the Papal State’s sphere. Its Monastery Law makes local land and water intolerable to evil beings and supports the imprisonment of demons 238.
• Frankish Kingdom — Increasingly defies central Church authority, makes its Church independent, and attacks the Empire and Church despite possessing a revered Holy Nail 521 525 538.
• Black Death Lord — A major threat against whom Innocent III sets aside conflict with imperial authority 554.

Story Role / Major Arcs

Pursuit and Selective Tolerance

• A Great Boar Knight tries to kill Yveta and Black Wolf alongside the Hearthstone Witch to increase his merits and advance toward becoming a stronger Holy Knight 2.
• The Boar Knight Order attacks the inn during Yveta’s awakening ritual; its vanguard is subsequently destroyed 9 12 16.
• In Parviga, Antioch initially observes rather than intervenes. The local bishop later thanks Yveta for saving the church and city council, deliberately overlooking the witch beside him 87 122.

Cross Island

• Antioch directs Yveta toward opportunities on Cross Island and later supplies high-ranking professionals after his victories against pirates 122 377.
• Hidden Church agents permit the Sea Goddess’s resurrection while preparing to seize her divine spark for Vinsk, a chosen king from the Timar family 383 384.
• After the catastrophe, Priest 333 acknowledges Yveta’s control and leaves with Vinsk. A cardinal subsequently crowns Yveta, restoring formal Church involvement after Marco Anson rejected its coronation sixty years earlier 390 393.

Papal Recognition and Pilgrimage

• The Church recognizes Yveta’s authority in Ambrose while negotiating a branch church and its parish-based taxation in Lombardy 428 429.
• Innocent II supports Yveta’s pilgrimage and names him leader of the next Crusade. The Church withholds the Archbishop of Arthas from Louis XIII’s coronation, signaling dissatisfaction with his legitimacy 479.
• Hagia Sophia’s bells ring nineteen times at Yveta’s arrival, recognizing his godhood and helping restore confidence after the failed holy war 480 481.

Imperial Coronation and New Threats

• Innocent III crowns Yveta and grants the protection of Universal Law: Church despite unease over his growing power 554.
• The Pope prioritizes unity against the Black Death Lord and returning Druids, while privately prophesying Yveta’s temporary disappearance 554.
• Yveta uses conversion to extend the Church’s Law over the Light People and reinforce damaged Universal Laws 556.
• A mastermind later reveals that changing Hagia Sophia’s main seal from the God of All Things’ faith to the God of All Beasts’ faith helped open a crucial restraint on a hidden entity 562.

Controversies

• Corruption and bribery: The Hearthstone Witch claims priests can be bribed to approve even demonic transactions. Antioch separately acknowledges that some Church figures are “not clean” 1 87.
• Suppression of records: The Church burns books and removes records of the Green Order 28.
• Condoned human sacrifice: Sixty years earlier, Church authorities knowingly tolerated rituals requiring the lives of believers. A private decree states that Pope Kaskeric abdicated and died in shame, while explaining the decision as a desperate response to attacks on the faith 355 369.
• Uneven institutional conduct: Yveta recognizes that the Church has moral limits absent from some secular powers, while Lorraine Monastery later exposes severe corruption under sacred protection 103 515.
• Threat of national independence: Innocent III fears that Frankish religious independence could reduce the Church from an international political power to a merely moral authority 525.

Notable Quotes

“It is the God of All Things and the head of the Church who choose the monarch above the people, not the monarch who chooses the Church and the God of All Things.”
— Pope Innocent II 378

“We will never fail our believers; this is the promise of our Church. This promise will never expire.”
— Bishop of Parviga 122