Amenominakanushi

A delighted smile spread across Jiang Hao's face.

He still had the powers of the Sun God. That meant he was a god on Blue Star, too.

I lived on Blue Star for over twenty years and never saw any supernatural power. Chances are, none exists here. The statues people worship in temples, Shinto Shrines, and churches are just lifeless clay. I can perform miracles and draw their believers away.

The thought of becoming the only god in a godless world filled Jiang Hao with excitement.

According to the United Nations, Blue Star's population reached 9.4 billion in 2018. As for the other world, I don't know how large it is, but judging by its meager food production and the population density of its cities, it can't have as many people as Blue Star. If I turn everyone on Blue Star into my believers, my divine power alone could overwhelm all the gods of the other world—at least in quantity.

But I'll need to plan carefully.

Jiang Hao tapped his fingers against the table without realizing it.

For a god, nothing mattered more than faith.

Believers meant power.

The more believers a god had, the greater that power grew.

For a False God like him, enough faith could easily transform him into a True God.

Then he could return to the other world as a True God without fearing he would be treated like a rat everyone wanted to kill.

False Gods were hunted. True Gods were not.

Jiang Hao's mind raced as he began to plan.

Showing off miracles on Blue Star without warning would draw too much attention. I'd become everyone's target.

Actually, I don't need to compete with those clay statues for believers.

Jiang Hao changed his approach, and the idea in his mind grew clearer.

I can impersonate those statues and take their faith directly.

Gods could only absorb faith directed at themselves, but they could accept faith by posing as another god.

In the other world, Undead King Nasanaraku had spread his faith across the snowfields under the identity of Glacier God Adonis, encroaching on the glacier's divine authority. If the Goddess of Ice and Snow had not shattered the Glacier God's Divine Kingdom during a war between gods, his believers might never have discovered that the Glacier God Adonis they had worshipped for centuries was actually Undead King Nasanaraku in disguise.

The revelation had caused an uproar across the other world.

Blue Star's faiths are already well established. Every country and people has its own mythology. A New God appearing out of nowhere and asking for worship would be at a disadvantage from the start. And if that god performed miracles, humanity's leaders would likely target him. Suppression, restrictions, and tests would follow one after another. They'd be hard to handle.

Jiang Hao might have divine powers, but he was not a True God. He did not think he could do whatever he pleased on Blue Star.

After living there for over twenty years, he knew very well what those countries were capable of.

Arrogantly taking them on would be asking to die!

But posing as one of those statues is different. A god from a people's own mythology performing miracles would be far easier for them to embrace. That god would also be woven into their culture, making it difficult for anyone to impose restrictions.

These are only ideas, though. I'll test the waters in the Eastern Isles first and see what happens.

Jiang Hao took a deep breath. A black sun rose behind him.

At a thought, the black sun became a disc as tall as a person, engraved with brown runes. Before it stood Jiang Hao, dressed in white ceremonial robes edged with gold and wearing a crown. Snow-white hair fell loosely over his robes. Slender, pale-gold fingers extended from his broad sleeves to grip the Sacred Tree.

Jiang Hao looked at his reflection in the mirror and nodded in satisfaction.

Amenominakanushi was the foremost of the three gods of Takama-ga-hara. Though he was not the god-king of the Eastern Isles, he was an ancient god who had existed since the creation of heaven and earth in Japanese mythology, with believers throughout the Eastern Isles.

The Gion Festival is in three days. I hope everything goes smoothly.

The Gion Festival was one of the three great festivals of the Eastern Isles.

At the start of the Gion Festival, dozens of young boys in oversized white-and-patterned robes beat wooden drums to clear the way.

Behind them came a procession of hundreds dressed in court attire from the Nara and Heian periods.

They pulled floats nearly three stories high. On the floats, dozens of musicians with faces painted white played ancient hymns to the gods on an array of instruments.

Two priests knelt aboard a phoenix palanquin. Dressed in dark hunting robes and tall black hats, they gazed straight ahead over the people of the Eastern Isles below.

At the center of the palanquin sat a child in imperial robes and a porcelain mask. She held herself straight and still, like a lofty god surveying her people.

Nearly a hundred thousand tourists followed the floats, forming a long, winding procession through Kyoto's streets.

Jiang Hao was among them, walking at an unhurried pace in ordinary clothes.

More people had come to the Gion Festival than he had expected, but as far as he was concerned, the more, the better.

He looked at the child seated in the center of the phoenix palanquin and smiled faintly. "Surveying the people on a god's behalf? You'll do."

Makino Tatsuya of Kyoto City's Tourism Planning and Promotion Department was giving a television interview amid the crowd. Now in his fifties, he smiled into the camera and said, "More than two hundred thousand people have come to this year's Gion Festival. Everyone should visit Kyoto City and experience the atmosphere of Heian-kyo!"

Fukamizu Iiko held the microphone as she interviewed him. Watching Makino Tatsuya smile, she felt the corner of her mouth twitch.

Tourist numbers in Kyoto are down this year, but do you really have to push the advertising this hard?

Besides, advertising won't help. The Gion Festival is spectacular, but it's the same every year. Anyone would get tired of it. Unless they come up with something new, no amount of advertising will stop tourist numbers from falling.

Despite her thoughts, Fukamizu Iiko kept smiling and gave nothing away. She was a television reporter, not an employee of the Tourism Planning and Promotion Department. Kyoto City's tourist numbers had nothing to do with her.

She was about to ask the next scripted question.

Then a sudden commotion caught her attention.

"What's going on?" Fukamizu Iiko looked toward the noise.

The child who had been sitting in the center of the phoenix palanquin had suddenly stood up. At some point, a length of jet-black wood had appeared in her hand.

"What's going on?"

"What happened?"

"Why did the child on the palanquin stand up?"

The festivalgoers of the Eastern Isles stared at the palanquin and began talking among themselves.

The priests seated on it could no longer remain still. They reached out to press the child back into her seat.

"Reiko, sit down."

"This is a major festival. Don't move around."

But the moment the two priests touched Reiko, an invisible force hurled them away.