New Gods of North America

As a transmigrator,

Wayne, in a sense, is quite "knowledgeable."

For example, Wayne finds it relatively easy to accept the concept of so-called "extraordinary individuals."

According to his understanding, if "extraordinary power" is also a kind of "power" or "energy," then the reason why extraordinary individuals can do things that ordinary people cannot is perhaps because they are consuming the extraordinary power or spiritual power within them according to some special "law of conservation of energy."

Under this premise, it becomes easier to understand why different extraordinary individuals have roughly similar "domains" but different extraordinary abilities.

It might be like different acids or bases reacting with different elements to form different "compounds."

For example, when metal reacts with hydrochloric acid, it produces potassium chloride, sodium chloride, etc., which have some generally similar characteristics, but each differs in specific analysis.

Then, the same "compound" may eventually appear in different forms.

Just like how the same "sugar" is used as a raw material, but when it is manufactured into finished products and appears in the market, there are sugar syrups, sugar cubes, pastries, and other seemingly completely different types of sugar products, and it can even be fermented into more other kinds of products like alcohol and vinegar.

If we continue down this line of logic,

it's easy to understand why extraordinary individuals gradually become "inhuman" as their ranks increase—

For example, installing steel products on a wooden sailboat is called "strengthening" or "reinforcing" when there are few, adding cannons might make it a "warship," and welding the entire outer shell makes it an "ironclad ship."

If the welding is not firm and the load is too heavy, the wooden sailboat itself may "disintegrate and collapse."

If the additions are so extensive that even the "main body" of the wood becomes "accessories," and the most basic power system is changed from "sails" to "steam engines," plus wheels or wings or something,

then the final concoction might not have much to do with the words "wood," "sail," or "boat," and the underlying operating principles will become completely different.

Things on the "hardware" side are easy to understand; you can get a general idea by referring to "mechanical modification."

The "software" side seems a bit mysterious; even the so-called "cyberpsychosis" is difficult to define in the science fiction world...

According to the concepts excavated from the 《Holy Scripture》 by the theologians of the Holy Church,

"free will," or the human "soul," should be a unique thing with both "fragile" and "tenacious" attributes.

For example, even ordinary people can "eliminate" a soul by destroying the physical body, or "change" a free will through faith and education.

However, according to the theory in the Holy Spirit faith, free will and the soul come from the "gift" of the Holy Spirit, but they cannot be easily "erased"—even the more powerful "evil gods" or "demons" cannot easily shake those noble wills and devout souls.

Wayne asked Inisa and Lina, and pondered for a while himself,

but he was still unsure whether "body snatching" is a feasible operation in this extraordinary world.

Judging from the "Lucky Coin" incident led by "Madame LaLaurie" that was investigated, the earlier "Seven Deadly Sins" case of altering the holy emblem, and Wayne's own experience of being pulled into illusions by the "magic mirror,"

"extraordinary power," or at least a part of its "extraordinary abilities," can obviously directly affect the "spiritual level."

But even if "changing" is simple,

the difficulty of an intact "overall relocation" should be completely different...

If you think about it simply, "changing a soul" might be as easy as changing a squad leader in the army; an order can complete the operation immediately.

But if you think about it in a complex way, it might be like facing a precarious "multiple balance" of a pile of shit-like building blocks; if you dare to touch it slightly, it will immediately collapse completely before your eyes...

Even if you rebuild one that looks "exactly the same,"

it might not be the "same one" as before anymore.

The main reason why Wayne associates with "body snatching" is because he accidentally read Pastor Paisse's will.

An old rascal who feels like he might "kick the bucket" at any time, influenced other people's "souls" by deceiving them into taking some kind of potion for a long time.

It's not that Pastor Paisse can't be "enthusiastic about scientific research," but even "scientific research" must have a goal or direction, right?

Wayne, as a pure and innocent American native, is relatively simple in this regard.

Since someone wants to drive away the "aboriginal people" from a piece of land, they must first suspect that the other party wants to "occupy it themselves," or "wants to sell it for money."

After pondering for a while, he felt that he couldn't figure it out.

Taking advantage of the fact that the next day was Sunday and the matter might involve the church's pastor, Wayne went to the Richmond Cathedral again.

...

Originally, Wayne thought that telling Tom Hagen about his suspicions would be a "very troublesome" thing to explain.

Unexpectedly, Tom Hagen's reaction was much faster than Wayne had imagined:

"Wayne, do you mean that you think Pastor Paisse may be conducting some kind of forbidden experiment, with the ultimate goal of replacing souls and occupying other people's bodies?"

Wayne shook his head repeatedly, "It's not 'I think,' I'm just 'guessing,' and I think it's 'possible' only."

Tom Hagen spread his hands, indicating that his office was "very safe to talk in."

But he quickly fell into thought, "If it's Pastor Paisse, it's really a bit of a surprise... We've excluded him from the list of suspects several times."

"You already suspected someone was doing this?" Wayne asked.

Tom Hagen shook his head:

"It's not the thing you're talking about.

"Before, the holy emblem in Georgeberg's parish church was polluted, and then the relevant criminals were silenced. Someone also transported the so-called 'magic mirror' there, almost causing an accident.

"Leaving aside the latter, the former is a very obvious act of malice in terms of both motive and implementation."

Wayne silently extracted the keywords from those incidents and tentatively asked, "Church of Light?"

"Yes."

Tom Hagen did not deny it, "Obviously, they have always been there. And like old wounds, they flare up from time to time."

But Tom Hagen still seemed to find it a bit incredible:

"The Church of Light is like rats in the gutter in America today. In addition to 'spreading disease' in secret, they are basically busy with continuing their existence and developing and growing... Paisse is a veteran pastor. Although he has had many minor problems over the years, he has never had any fundamental problems. I didn't expect him to be involved in the affairs of the Church of Light now."

Wayne couldn't quite keep up with his train of thought:

"Wait, haven't those potions I sent over been identified as 'problematic' yet? Why are you so suspicious of him based on this guess alone?"

"Some things, if you can roughly guess the 'result' the other party wants, then tracing back becomes very easy."

Tom Hagen said, and then seemed to suddenly think of something,

and then a contemptuous expression appeared on his face, "Heh, coward."