The Lord Demon King is Unfathomable!

In contrast, Hell adopts a completely different strategy.

Due to resource scarcity, famine frequently erupts outside Demon City, the population quality is uneven, and cohesion is indescribably poor. As a result, the combat effectiveness of demons always fluctuates with the faith in the Demon Gods, indirectly making it difficult to defeat the alliance of humans and other races on the front lines.

However, precisely because they are at a disadvantage, Hell is more inclined to seek change. Over the past thousand years, not only have they replaced three Demon Gods, but their system has also evolved from an early feudal model to a "Main God Offline" system.

In addition, to ensure the combat strength of the Chosen Ones, Hell consciously extends the lifespan of High-level Demons, sacrificing intra-layer mobility to enhance the overall strength of the Chosen Ones, thereby compensating for the vast disparity in grassroots combat power and societal productivity.

As for the expansion of Power of Faith, Hell aggressively attempts to corrupt the vested interests of the Imperial factions and their subordinate states, intimidate Saint Sis's followers, and destabilize the cohesion of surface human society to seize Saint Sis's share of the pie.

The Great Graveyard, a Hell Camp stronghold located in the heart of human territory, naturally adopts Hell's tried-and-tested strategy: letting its minions develop freely and exploiting Chaos to stir up trouble while digging out Saint Sis's foundation at every opportunity.

However, due to a fortuitous twist, Luo Yan possesses an additional card that Hell does not.

That card is expanding to Kao Planet!

The cake of the Aus Continent has already been divided among various factions; even if Luo Yan digs into Saint Sis's foundation, he would only pick at the leftovers from Demon God Bayele. To break new ground, he must focus his attention on the "New Continent" several light-years away.

For the Great Graveyard and even the entirety of the Aus Continent, that destination represents the true "incremental market" rather than the "stock market."

The fact that his Faith Value increased by over ten thousand points earlier was largely due to the Outpost Fortress he deployed on Kao Planet.

Thinking of this, Luo Yan felt a slight stir in his heart and turned his gaze toward Youyou, who floated in the Sea of Consciousness.

"If believers were to drastically decrease, leading to a drop in the growth of Power of Faith, would it also reduce the upper limit for beta-testing players?"

He wanted to know if a decrease in Power of Faith would result in some beta-testing players being unable to log into the game.

If that were the case, he needed to figure out whether he could proactively decide who could log in and who couldn't. He didn't want a situation where the hard workers couldn't log in while the freeloaders took up all the slots.

But just as he was pondering this, Youyou's answer eased his concerns.

"The number of beta-testing players likely won't decrease."

Luo Yan frowned slightly.

"Likely?"

Youyou responded in a vague tone.

"Youyou can't be certain about the specifics, but based on the principles of Extraordinary Power, while the number of players shouldn't decrease, the overall strength may be weakened. For example, it might manifest as all players or NPCs promoted through you receiving a DEBUFF, such as a 10% or 20% reduction in Extraordinary Power."

Hearing Youyou's explanation, Luo Yan immediately understood its implications.

This was akin to his prior speculations: under ideal conditions, there exists an optimal ratio between believers and Chosen Ones.

If the number of believers far exceeds that of Chosen Ones, the latter's power won't be directly affected but will gain a higher growth ceiling. However, if the number of believers is too low—as though fewer people were baking cakes—for a constant appetite among Chosen Ones, the amount of Extraordinary Power each Chosen One can receive naturally decreases.

Replacing Chosen Ones with players aligns roughly with Youyou's theory.

More specifically, when the number of believers drops below a certain threshold, all players in the game server would automatically receive a DEBUFF weakening their Extraordinary Power, and the extent of this DEBUFF could theoretically approach 100%!

Although truly reaching 100% was impossible, Luo Yan felt his current reputation would ensure that, even if he lost power someday, more people would reminisce about him than about Reggie Dragon.

"I understand for the most part. The early three thousand players were likely supported by faith remnants left behind by the Mechanical God Linte Isaac. Now, I must rely on my own efforts to collect more believers to sustain additional Chosen Ones... Is that correct?"

Seeing Luo Yan grasp her meaning, Youyou enthusiastically bobbed her abstract head up and down.

"Exactly! As expected of Lord Demon King—you've pinpointed the core issue instantly!"

Luo Yan, slightly embarrassed by the flattering remark, let out a light cough.

"That wasn't much of a challenge to figure out, was it? You've already hinted at it many times, urging me to expand the faith territory, etc."

Privately, he mused that Linte Isaac's residual Power of Faith should be more substantial than it seemed. After all, there were still quite a few people in the Ryan Kingdom who remembered him; they just didn't revere and pray to him as devoutly anymore.

However, considering this guy not only invented an entire system of Mechanical Magic but also redefined Engraving, it wouldn't be surprising if a significant portion of that Power of Faith had already been spent.

In any case, he was already part of history now. Since Luo Yan had walked out of the beginner's zone, he preferred to rely on himself whenever possible.

Lost in thought, Luo Yan couldn't help but revisit plans for Kao Planet.

"...If I could train a batch of human acolytes from Beifeng City and dispatch them to the Outpost Fortress on Kao Planet, that would be ideal."