The Mech Touch novel Chapter 3629

Chapter 3629 Fellowship of Hakkaiden

The Fellowship of Hakkaiden was not doing well these days.

Its history was already marked by many difficulties. When the Great Mourner rose up and proclaimed the majesty and power of a god called Hakkaiden, not a lot of people accepted his message.

The Age of Conquest had just ended and much of human space was in shambles. A lot of cults and religions mushroomed into existence as the traumatized survivors tried to process the tragedies in their own ways.

The Fellowship of Hakkaiden was one of many cults that had risen up during those 'boom times', yet it had never risen as far as other successful religious organizations.

The beliefs of the cult had a lot to do with it. According to the first Great Mourner who founded the cult, Hakkaiden was the god and personification of human sorrow. Its doctrine encompassed many facets of sorrow such as sadness, mourning, crying and the acceptance of loss.

While this made it easy for the fellowship to attract the desperate who had lost everything, a lot of humans wanted to move on. As the Age of Mechs unfolded, humanity slowly regained its optimism. Many more people became interested in pursuing happiness rather than finding the best way to wallow in their misery.

Though the Fellowship of Hakkaiden no longer experienced a lot of growth, it nonetheless managed to cling to existence.

This was because its members were quite good at dealing with disappointment and setbacks. They stubbornly kept the Fellowship of Hakkaiden going.

Their efforts paid off, if only barely. The cult not only managed to prevent any decline, but steadily grew larger and wealthier as their steady investments paid off in the long term.

In order for the Fellowship of Hakkaiden to subside beyond the pitiful donations it collected, it even developed its own mental health practice.

Over time, numerous followers of Hakkaiden graduated with degrees in psychology and other related fields in order to help with generating more income. The Hakkaiden Clinic achieved success and expanded a lot faster than the cult itself.

This was because the treatment personnel largely kept their beliefs to themselves while they performed their professional duties. They had proven to be highly effective at their jobs once they did that and managed to attract a lot of wealthy clients.

One of the greatest attractions of the clinic was that all of its members were sworn to secrecy. The followers of Hakkaiden swore to their god to keep their lips sealed, and they always kept their word!

Thus, the Hakkaiden Clinic managed to support the main cult, but the flow of revenue was not that abundant.

More importantly, the Fellowship of Hakkaiden never succeeded in spreading the faith any further.

Hakkaiden was not a god that was easily able to attract worship. The people living in the star sector where the cult was based also became increasingly tougher to convert. Many of them had become aware of the cult and grew wary of joining an organization where no one had any fun!

After a long period of stability and even slight growth, the Fellowship of Hakkaiden slowly began to decline. Not even the Hakkaiden Clinic could stop the cult from recruiting less and less believers.

While the cult could still hang on for a long time, it would be a disservice for it to fall. The great Hakkaiden must not be forgotten!

It was for this reason that Great Mourner Ivaerd and his council sought a way out of this steady decline.

The Fellowship of Hakkaiden spent decades preparing for a migration. Originally, the cult was supposed to move from a relatively prosperous part of the galactic rim to a more remote part of space in order to find more fertile ground.

Then, the Red Ocean opened up, and the cult gained another option.

Even though the dwarf galaxy was a place of wonder and opportunity, it also played host to a lot of tragedies, both human and alien.

With so many people suffering losses over the course of their stay in the Red Ocean, the leadership of the Fellowship of Hakkaiden saw great potential in converting more believers!

It took a lot of effort to reach the Red Ocean. It would have been impossible for the Hakkaidens to scrounge up the merits and band together with other pioneers if not for their previous preparations.

Eventually, the Fellowship of Hakkaiden successfully migrated to the Red Ocean, yet that was where all of their progress halted.

"Where can we build our temple?" Great Mourner Ivaerd asked as he stroked his long, black beard.

As a strong believer in Hakkaiden, the man was familiar with disappointment and setbacks. No follower of the God of Human Sorrow enjoyed many opportunities of happiness as their lives were always difficult.

Right now, Ivaerd's greatest challenge was to find a way for the Fellowship of Hakkaiden to plant their roots in the new frontier.

The Fellowship of Hakkaiden initially wanted to build their temple in the Vulit System, but that turned out to be way too expensive.

The cult then moved to a nearby colony, only to get rejected by its owners.

"We do not welcome religion in our society! Take your crazy beliefs and go elsewhere!"

Other destinations also proved unsuitable to the Fellowship of Hakkaiden for many reasons.

"You can settle on my land, but I do not tolerate the presence of outsiders in my domain. I demand your allegiance."

"Go away, false believers! This star system is already claimed by the Blue Advent Church! We will never allow you to pollute the minds of our vulnerable flock!"

"Feel free to build your temple outside of the city. You'll be completely safe there. The rumors of pirate raids and devastated colonies are completely false, I promise!"

"We have enough space to accommodate your temple. It's completely safe out here. We're so out of the way that not even pirates want to detour to our star system. There's nothing for them here anyway. Our planet isn't terraformed and there aren't resources or sources of wealth that attract greedy plunderers."

None of the destinations suited the Fellowship of Haikkaiden for one reason or another.

While there were still destinations where the cult could settle and exist in relative peace, these locations were usually so obscure or restrictive that it was too difficult for it to expand in numbers.

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