Ancestral Worship

Ancestral Worship is a skill that allows you to sacrifice items of your ancestor's desires to an Ancestral Shrine, which gives you numen points that can be used to pray for various things (see Prayers section). To sacrifice an item, left-click it to hold it in your hand, and then right-click the ancestral shrine.

You may check what your ancestors desire under the Worship tab of your character sheet. At any time, they will desire 3 items: sacrificing the first (left-most) item will allow you a chance to gain numen points based on your Tradition/Change belief, whereas sacrificing one of the other 2 less desired items will merely reset which items they desire. Since you can only gain numen for sacrificing the first item, you should only sacrifice one of the others when the first item is too difficult for you to acquire. '''If you sacrifice items of a lower quality rating than the amount of numen points you have, you will lose a numen point instead. This applies regardless of whether the primary or secondary desires are fulfilled.'''

Pressing the forfeit button has the same effect as fulfilling a secondary desire but costs half of the currently available Numen points. Only use this if you cannot or don't want to fulfill any of the three desires. Exception is of course when you have zero Numen points, then forfeiting is an easy way to find a good first sacrifice.

The number of numen points you gain is based on your Tradition/Change belief. If you are full Tradition, you have a 100% chance to gain 3 numen points; at full Change, you have a 1/3 chance of even getting 1 numen point.

Note
A character that has just started and has no real ancestors instead has fake ancestors with stats of 10, 20, and 40, giving an average of 30 stats for use in determining the effect of prayers.

One must also build their own shrine to be able to sacrifice. Just finding one wont work until you've built one yourself.

Prayers
You get a new Prayer menu when you get enough numen for a prayer.

Light of the Ancestors, 3NP: Light effect on your character determined in strength by the perception + exploration of your ancestors. The effect lasts six ingame hours.

A Prayer for Bread, 5NP: You get a loaf of bread, quality determined by the cooking skill and the perception values of your ancestors.

Prayer of a Lost Child, 10NP: You get a local map of the area you are in, filled in to a degree corresponding to the perception/exploration values of the ancestors.

Forge Prayer, 10NP: gives you a metal nugget, chosen at random from Cast Iron, Tin or Copper, at a quality that is the same as the amount of Numen points available to the character, but soft-capped by the ancestor's Strength and Smithing levels. 

Prayer of Life, 20NP: will take a seed (any seed) in your inventory, and change its quality to that of your ancestors' Farming stat (not softcapped). 

Einherjeraspekt, 40NP: Strength, melee, unarmed and ranged combat values of your ancestors are added to yours. This effect lasts for one full ingame day.

In-Game Text
"For the ancestors!"

Ancestral Worship allows your character to gain numen points by sacrificing to his ancestors. You can see your ancestors' desires in the "Worship" submenu of your character sheet. Numen points can be used for various effects, all lending you some of the strength of your predecessors.