The Order God Church's purpose in sending an investigation delegation to the Desert Order God Church was, in fact, to assess both sides' actual circumstances under the guise of an "investigation," laying the groundwork for its subsequent intervention.
Whatever happened, the Order God Church's "original intention" of annexing and controlling the Desert Order God Church, turning it into a puppet subsidiary church like the Pamireth Church, had never changed.
Its original plan, however, had been to support the Desert Order God Church's separatist forces and use them as its opening.
That plan had initially progressed very well. Even when Chief Bishop Woforen of the York City District and his entire family were assassinated, the Order God Church had intended to swallow the affront for the sake of its broader interests, despite having already uncovered leads.
But High Priest Norton had subsequently emerged from seclusion and forcibly overturned this silence in the name of interests. This had obliged the Order God Church to suspend its original plan, publicly condemn the Desert Order God Church's reprehensible actions against Order, and support the orthodox Desert Order God Church's campaign against the separatists.
From then on, the two sides of the Desert Order God Church had openly broken with one another, and civil war had erupted.
At first, quite a few factions within the Order God Church had voiced objections to the High Priest's reversal of the plan, including many that had originally supported him. As the civil war continued, however, those objections gradually faded.
Even without Order's support, the separatist Desert Order God Church had displayed truly astonishing strength in the civil war. Although the orthodox side had initially held an absolute advantage on paper and won one so-called great victory against the rebels after another, it always failed to achieve complete success