"In the art of war, it is said that knowing oneself and knowing one's opponent will not be defeated in a hundred battles; we Confucianism are the most popular schools in the secular world to collect knowledge of ancient civilizations and the world's natural history. I have collected information from various sources for decades, studied the customs and customs of the Baiyun Aborigines, and I am confident that I know the past and present of this place and this tribe better than any of their chiefs. Then I'll start with the blood sacrifice of the Baiyun natives.

Every year on October 15 in our Central Plains is a festival to worship the Emperor Shuiyuan, and those of you who have sailing experience probably know that the ancestors say that the Emperor Shuiyuan is the great god who opens up and controls the waters and islands of the world. In fact, all the human tribes near the water and on the sea worshipped this great god, but its image changed slightly among the different tribes. Since the Baiyun natives are islanders, they understand Emperor Shui Yuan as the supreme god who dominates the world and kills living beings. The great god was as capricious as the sea, generous to the Terrans when he had a good temperament, and blessed them with constant blessings, and when he was bad, he launched tsunamis and storms that brought disaster to the Terrans.

Here I would like to ask the two of you a question: Do you believe that such a great god really exists?"

"I don't believe it. Murong Zhi and I said in unison.

"Why?"

"Because ......," I replied, "After going through the Confucian education that my mother had instilled in me since I was a child,

"In fact, there is no reason for nothing in the world, and the achievements of civilization are all the wisdom and experience accumulated by the human race from generation to generation, not by the individual gods who dominate people. Under the leadership of those people with outstanding intelligence, and what you Confucian sages call sages, our human race has continued to develop from the state of drinking blood in the era of ignorance to the present, with both the machinery of flying away from the sky and reclaiming mountains and the sea, as well as the cultivators with vast magical powers. There is a truth to the so-called storms and tsunamis, and there is a way to warn or resist them. Didn't we and your ship master the laws of the sea in order to arrive at Baiyun Township smoothly? This has nothing to do with the joy and anger of Emperor Shui Yuan. The worship of the Emperor Shui Yuan is only the visual understanding of water by the ancestors, and our Chinese people's sacrifice to the Emperor Shui Yuan now is just a traditional habit. ”

Murong Zhi said,

"If there is a being in the world who can dominate a living being, it can only be a road of indifference. But the Great Dao incarnates all things in heaven and earth, for the sake of nothing, and for the sake of it, it is not only in each of us, but also in all things in the world, so every living being can seek the Tao and join the Tao, because we are the Dao incarnated. In this way, the Great Dao cannot talk about the gods who dominate the common beings. ”

I suddenly realized that no matter if we went inward or outward, as long as we were still cultivating, we would be able to get close to the Great Dao, because the Great Dao was here. But if you don't cultivate, you're just standing still, and there's no hope of approaching the Great Dao.

Wang Qitai said approvingly,

"Sure enough, you're well educated at Fort Dock. I don't know how much it would take to discern these critical insights with those who are still living in superstition.

In the history of our human race, there have been many sophistication and Shinto figures throughout the ages. After the Confucian examination of the mirror and the discernment of the truth, the so-called gods are nothing more than the exaggerated tribal heroes of the ancestors, the deified natural phenomena, the old mountain spirits-water monsters, the ghosts who have accumulated grudges, and in the modern era for more than a thousand years, there are also cultivators who have cultivated supernatural powers and those demons who have also escaped the beast tricks-"

"Don't you Confucians also think that the emperor of Middle-earth is the son of heaven?"

I muttered.

"Since ancient times, if you want to promote the doctrine of any school of thought in the world, you must rely on the supreme ruler who holds the real power, which is nothing more than a compliment hat that our Confucianism has put on him, you don't have to be entangled. ”

Wang Qitai smiled faintly,

"After clarifying the question of whether there is a true god such as Emperor Zài, we will return to the blood sacrifice of the natives. In the Central Plains, the Emperor Shuiyuan we worship is the image of a great hero of water control in ancient China, while the god worshiped by the Baiyun natives has no image, and only the dust-eating insect entrenched on the top of the Falling Star Mountain can be seen. According to the legend of the aborigines, it was the supreme god who was too lazy to descend to the earth in the heavenly palace, so he sent one of his own divine beasts to the lower realm to act as the mountain god of the Falling Star Mountain. ”

"The sacrifice is the virgin of the tribe, right?"

When I ambushed two Tsukuji warriors, I occasionally heard them discuss in the indigenous language: this year's blood festival will produce eighteen pairs of virgins, and Aung San Baoyan will also choose a pair of virgins and girls from the dust-eating insects.

"You've heard about it?"

"I've also gathered some information. ”

Wang Qitai looked solemn,

"Sacrificing people in our Central Plains is a matter of the era of ignorance, and this is a bad custom in the uncivilized era. Even if the natives of the island have been isolated from the world until now, and the civilization has developed to a certain extent, there will be voices among the natives who question the blood sacrifice. What's more, the Baiyun Sanbu is not an isolated race, at least not in the era of civilization. The history of the real blood sacrifice is not too long, in fact, it is only 500 years - I will be more clear, 500 years ago there were no dust eaters, no fog from falling stars, no storm rings, and no blood sacrifices. Even the Baiyun Sanbu were not originally inhabitants of the island, they were also a group of people who migrated from a small border island in the Middle Earth Divine Continent. ”

- I was stunned for a moment. Doesn't this mean that the Baiyun Sanbu, like our two groups of people, took refuge away from Middle-earth with sea charts? But they were thousands of years earlier.

I remembered that our building ship encountered the mirage that I still remember vividly in the ocean on the outskirts of Baiyun Township. Now that I think about it, could it be that the people in the city are also the seafarers who have come to Baiyun Township for thousands of years? It's just that they end up being eaten by mirages and turned into illusions that bewitch another group of newcomers -- because the soldiers attacking us on the castle tower in the illusion used bows and arrows, which were long-range weapons that had gradually declined by the end of the civilization era.

"Are you saying that there was a regression in the history of the indigenous people five hundred years ago, and that civilization collapsed and superstition flourished? where is your evidence?"

Murong Zhi asked.

"One is the legendary evidence, and the other is the physical evidence.

The blood sacrifice is mysterious and bloody, contrary to human feelings, and it is natural to make and maintain the myth of its existence. In addition to the decree of the gods that I have just told you, there is another legend among the natives that is interdependent with the oracle, which explains both the creation of the Ring of Storms, the origin of the Dust Eaters, and the cause and effect of the blood sacrifice.

Legend has it that the three tribes of Aung Shan, Jinsha and Shenhe escaped the catastrophe of the last days and crossed east to Baiyun Township, which the gods promised in their dreams. They made a covenant with the gods not to allow other outsiders to land on the island, because the gods only chose them to be the people of the new world.

The three tribes had always followed the agreement with the gods to live and work in peace and contentment in this happy land, and if there were occasional Gentiles who drifted over, the tribes would only give them water and food for three months, and then expel the Gentiles from the island to find another way to survive. ”

-- This is really like the wolf scene that I told me about when the townspeople of Shunshui first came to Baiyun Township.

"But one day something happened. A chief of the Aung San tribe was infatuated with a peerless beauty who had been displaced to the island, and he was so confused that he forgot the will of the gods. The chief secretly hid the beautiful woman on the top of the Holy Mountain, which at that time did not yet have the name of the Falling Star Mountain, and secretly went into the mountain to rejoice with her, and the two conceived a pair of children.

The good times didn't last long, and nothing could be hidden from the gods. The sky changed color, the gods were furious, and a meteor fell from the sky, fell to the holy mountain, and struck an abyss that led directly to the land of the Nine Shadows, and the flames erupted from the abyss, burning the South Island where the Aung San tribe lived at that time into a barren land, leaving only the two sons and daughters of the chief and the beauty to survive.

A storm wall was raised on the outskirts of Baiyun Township, so that no Gentile could enter the island, and no Baiyun natives could go out.

Next is the great punishment after the gods stop in anger.

The beauty who charmed Chief Aung San showed her true face, and it turned out to be the divine beast of the gods to test the loyalty of Chief Aung San to serve the gods, and the gods originally planned to choose Aung San to ascend to heaven as his subordinate god. Aung San did not try to do so, and the beast also concealed his affair with Aung San to the gods - the gods claimed that he had only ordered the beast to seduce Aung San, and did not ask him to have a relationship with Aung San.

So the divine beast was cursed into the appearance of a dust-eating monster, deprived of the qualification to return to heaven, and was punished to guard the meteor that fell in the holy mountain - when the god was furious, he threw one of his treasures into the lower realm, and now the treasure is contaminated with mortal energy, it does not want to take it back, and does not want others to get it, so the divine beast is simply punished by him to guard the falling star mountain in the mortal world.

The Dust Eaters were too ashamed to see people, so they raised clouds and sealed off the top of the mountain and the entrance to the Noble Phantasm. But recalling the glory in heaven in the past, the dust-eating insect is always uneasy, and the ferocious attack goes to find someone to eat indiscriminately to vent his anger. Therefore, every year the Baiyun natives began to hold blood sacrifices to appease it with virgins and boys, and the time coincided with the festival of the gods on October 15. They saw this sacrifice as a confession of repentance for their ancestors' previous unbelief in the gods.

The Aung San tribe, which are descendants of dust-eating insects, especially upholds this ritual.

The sons and daughters of the Aung San tribe have a partial demon bloodline, so the descendants they give birth to are likely to be brave people who have been stimulated by the dust eaters in each generation.

Although the Storm Ring made it impossible for ordinary people to approach Baiyun Township, it was not an obstacle for cultivators. The so-called "Celestial Gods Falling to the Mortal World" attracted cultivators to come here to explore the treasures, and the Dust Eaters and the brave people who appeared in the Aung San Department were responsible for killing these individual people with bad intentions. ”

"Therefore, Shunshui Town, with Wang Qinian and you, the two Jindan, has violated their double taboo, and the Aung San tribe especially cannot accept you. ”

Murong Zhi said.

"Haha, I have come up with an idea, since we have all confirmed that there is no existence of the gods, then the so-called legend of the gods is simply a lie to cover up something. ”

Suddenly I touched something, and suddenly it dawned on me,

"Peel off the skin of the myth, in fact, the changes of a qiē all started from the meteor falling to the top of the holy mountain, the previous Baiyun Sanbu was an even more ordinary refuge seaman than us, there was no storm ring, although it was a little difficult, but the fleet led by Jindan Realm could also land in Baiyun Township. After the meteor fell, the storm ring was created, which eliminated the possibility of new ordinary people landing on the island. Because that meteor is so important, the fewer outsiders who explore the secrets of the meteor, the better. ”

Things were completely clear in my head.

"There is no need to take the trouble to remove the inhabitants who are already on the island, after all, there are hundreds of thousands of living beings, and killing them all will be entangled in cause and effect, so it is enough to weave a myth to scare them. A powerful monster can make them half-convinced, and a pretending blood sacrifice can almost make them believe it. The Aung San tribe is either a co-conspirator behind the scenes, or a pawn of those behind the scenes, acting as the spreaders and defenders of this myth. The benefit they get is that they can get the empowerment of supernatural powers, and they can become a Jindan powerhouse who dominates an island through a method of high elimination and high death.

In fact, there is no need for any fictional gods to be able to create the above-mentioned supernatural phenomena, a powerful enough cultivator is enough, and it is easy to explain the wind and fog. As a god, the above myths are too humane, and I found that there are many stories of third-rate men, women, and gods and monsters. What kind of divine beasts that were punished in the lower realm, the treasures that fell into the mortal world, are all ghosts, it is clearly a treasure mine in the sky that fell to the island, and was discovered by a powerful cultivator, he sealed the treasure mine, and the aura did not leak out, and then sent a demon beast to watch, and the blood sacrifice is that the monster solves the annual food problem by itself.

Those cultivators who discovered the truth and came here to explore the treasure were, of course, to be killed by the demon beasts and Aung San.

The natives who don't know the cultivators think that it is a miracle, but in my opinion, it is a collection of tricks. ”

I'm done reasoning.

Wang Qitai bowed his head.

"What about the physical evidence?"

Murong Zhi reminded,

"Your reasoning is very novel, and I also support that it is not the gods, but the cultivators. But you can't overestimate the value of the meteor, if it is really a huge treasure, the cultivators behind the scenes will not be sealed here for five hundred years, and such a precautionary mechanism is not enough to deal with the masters of the Yuan Infant level. I think that the meteor in the valley of the Falling Star Mountain should be a medium-grade spiritual vein, which is attractive to people with Jindan. That cultivator doesn't need this spiritual vein for the time being, and has the attitude of keeping it on the island, just like we reserve food for the winter—the reason I think about this is that if it's too hot spiritual vein or treasure, the cultivator will personally intervene to stop us from starting at that time, and then we will be empty. ”

"Your personality is different from that of Xiaokong, even if you see the context of things clearly, you can think carefully and make sure that everything is safe. You're together, it's a real match. ”

Wang Qitai praised it.

Murong Zhi's face turned red, and I was embarrassed.

"My brother saw the meteor. ”

"Oh?!"

We exclaimed.