More than eighty years have passed since the last time I entered the Mountain and Sea Realm. The Dahuan Dynasty has been established for more than one hundred and twenty years and has gone through six generations of emperors.
More than ten years ago, Prime Minister Teng Yong presided over the change of the Jupiter calendar to the Ganzhi calendar. The time when Fang Xiu broke into the gate of gods and demons happened to be the Bingzi year. The sixth King Huan died, and his legitimate son Chongkang succeeded to the throne. The new king was only eight years old when he ascended the throne.
When the Dahuan Dynasty was established, in order to suppress the tribes, city-states, and clans left over from the original Xuanyuan Kingdom, as well as the barbarians in the southeast, the princes were enfeoffed to send to various places to suppress one side. At the same time, the large city-states and tribes were broken up and separated, and either moved to the royal capital or followed the enfeoffed princes to various places, in order to consolidate their own rule.
In the early days, there were hundreds or even thousands of vassal states, large and small, but now, there are only dozens left.
Among them, the six strongest princes were Shao, Gao, Pan, Wei, Bai and Song. Among them, Gao, Wei, Bai and Song were all from the royal family of Dahuan. In the south, Shao dominated the area, while in the north, Pan had well-trained soldiers and strong national strength.
It also happened that the barbarians and demons in the north were causing chaos and invading Middle-earth. Many strange people, alchemists, qigong practitioners, and yin-yang magicians came into the world. The Taoist temples, blessed places, and sects that had been closed for decades all reappeared and opened their doors to accept disciples.
A large number of disciples entered the secular world to practice, went down the mountain to subdue demons, or joined the Dahuan Dynasty and various vassal states.
Some people assisted others and made the city-states and small countries prosperous and strong; some people became military generals to conquer the world and accelerated the annexation of princes, countries and tribes; some people exorcised demons and saved the people from danger and were worshipped as gods and immortals.
The entire Dahuan Dynasty was like a clay jar of boiling hot soup with the lid tightly covered.
But it could not stop the continuous addition of firewood to the bottom of the clay jar. The fire burned stronger and stronger, and the soup became more and more boiling.
Within a hundred years, the changes in Dahuan were simply unimaginable. The human race ignited the core of Dongzhou like a prairie fire. City-states were continuously established along the Dahe and Lihe Rivers, and farmlands and villages were spread all over the land.
The entire Middle-earth will no longer be the desolate and uninhabited land with barbarian tribes everywhere.
Etiquette education and humanistic civilization spread far and wide, and people began to understand the beauty of splendor and the importance of etiquette. Although the northern vassal tribes and the millions of barbarians in the mountains still had the bad habits of tattooing their faces, cutting their hair, and carrying animals to eat people, the growing prosperity of humanistic civilization was an unstoppable trend.
Fang Xiu stood on a small boat, floating down the river. He was not the only one on the boat. There were also civilians from the southern Shao Kingdom, merchants, and doctors who were going to Tengdi to take up their posts. The merchant was dressed in gorgeous clothes, had a big belly, and was full of wealth.
The doctor was elegant and came from a noble family. His family history could be traced back to the princes at the beginning of the founding of the Dahuan Dynasty a hundred years ago. When talking with Fang Xiu, they talked about the past and the present, and occasionally he could say some insights that were beyond Fang Xiu's imagination. After Fang Xiu asked him about it, he proudly told Fang Xiu that his teacher was from the Xundu Academy.
“All theories, schools of thought in the world originated from Xundu Academy, which was the place where Saint Feng, Saint Zhuang and Saint Yi preached.” When the official Xia Min, who was about to leave, mentioned Xundu Academy, he suddenly stood up. He seemed to have the world in his heart as he stood in the cabin, and his eyes were filled with endless admiration.
"My greatest wish in this life is to be able to enter the Xundu Academy and listen to the various philosophers and teachers of the academy talk about the words of the saints. It's a pity that I was not born a few decades earlier. If I could see the faces of the three saints, I would have no regrets in this life!"
Fang Xiu looked at Xia Min with deep emotion, and his thoughts couldn't help but go back to many years ago. It seemed as if he was standing in the Xundu Academy again, holding a book and looking at the disciples and students in the palace, as well as the children of all ages who came here to admire the school.
"Who preached the truth in the beginning of ancient times?" Fang Xiu sat on the ground, looked out the window, and slowly uttered this sentence.
"Feng Sheng's words! So you also knew it!" Xia Min suddenly became excited, as if he regarded Fang Xiu as a fellow traveler.
Fang Xiu couldn't help but laugh: "I've heard a little bit about it! I've heard a little bit about it!"
The boat passed through the territory of Shao State, with people constantly getting off and on board.
There is an endless stream of boats of all sizes on the rivers, especially in the south where there are many rivers and lakes and water trade is extremely developed. The scenes of villages and towns along the way, as well as the bustling docks, are enough to testify to the prosperity of the Shao Kingdom.
Although Dahuan is still the strongest in the world, whether it is Dahuan's black-armored army or witch priests, as well as more than a dozen second-level powerhouses, the six ministers and five officials are all powerful men of the time, and there are also the mysterious great witch priests and the older generation left over from the royal family. This is how they suppressed the princes and monks in the world who were ready to move and made them dare not move.
However, the center of civilization gradually shifted from Central China to the Shao Kingdom in the south. Whether in terms of etiquette and education or rich population, the Shao Kingdom in the south far surpassed other places, including the royal capital of Dahuan.
If it weren't for the difference between the laws of heaven and earth in the mountain and sea world and those in the present world, and if heaven and earth were not evolved from the five elements of vital energy, Shao State would probably have crossed the gap of thousands of years and leaped to the present world in one step a few decades ago.
However, after they discovered the gap in the laws and that current technology was completely unusable in this world, they gave up this plan.
This is a world belonging to cultivators and gods and demons. Magic and the great way are the tone of this world, a world of mountains and seas that is completely different from the real world.
When passing a big river called Bohe on the way, a demon crocodile was swimming in the river. Before Fang Xiu could make a move, a glass magic bead flew out from the opposite boat and smashed the demon crocodile's head into a rotten watermelon. The crocodile then floated on the river with its belly turned upside down, looking hideous.
Xia Min was not surprised at all and immediately said, "We have already arrived at Tengdi. How dare you, a little monster, show up?"
"This was the old Teng Kingdom, and now it is a territory of the Shao Kingdom!"
When Fang Xiu passed by, he saw a sacrifice being held by the river and a tall statue of the river god being pushed out. It was an old man leaning on a cane and wearing the black and red robe of Dahuan.
"Who is that? The river god?" Fang Xiu asked immediately.
Without even looking at it, Xia Min said, "It was the former Prime Minister Teng Gong, who returned to his hometown after retiring. At that time, the Bo River was still full of monsters. Dragon monsters brought huge waves and floods, and the river often broke its banks and submerged farmland and towns."
"When the Prime Minister Teng Gong sailed down the river, all the evil spirits and demons disappeared as if they had encountered the blazing sun. The Bo River, which was hundreds of miles long, returned to calm, and there were no more floods on both banks. From then on, the people of Tengdi began to offer sacrifices to Teng Gong to suppress the evil spirits and dragons in the river. This place worships Teng Gong as a god, and this custom has been going on for nearly ten years."
Fang Xiu looked up, his gaze passed through the entire Bo River, and he could see that the Yin Si She Ling in this water vein had disappeared, and the water vein was gradually calming and unobstructed under the combing of people.
"It seems that someone has discovered a way to ascend to the throne of the God of Earth!"
"Finally, someone lit this fire!"
Fang Xiu could tell at a glance that the god of the Bo River was about to be born. If nothing unexpected happened, it would be the so-called Prime Minister Teng Yong.
By accumulating merits, offering incense and sacrifices, receiving edicts from the underworld or divine decrees from the underworld, and then controlling the veins of the earth or water, one can become the lord of mountains, rivers, and lakes, or the god of a place. Of course, the more powerful the priesthood, the higher the merits required.
The merits accumulated by this prime minister of the Dahuan Dynasty were only enough to allow him to be appointed the river god of a tributary of the great river, but he did not dare to seek the position of river god of the great river.
Xia Min got off the boat here. After Fang Xiu sailed for a while, he went ashore and headed north to Dahuan and Xundu.
After seeing the prosperity of Shao Kingdom in the south, Fang Xiu did not stay there at all. After all, the south was not a place where spiritual practice was flourishing.
Xundu and Dahuan are the places with the largest number of practitioners, and also the places where the practice forces are most prosperous.
Monks and extraordinary people are the main theme of this world. This is a world controlled by practitioners and gods and demons. The power of an individual can support a country, and powerful wizards and monks can withstand thousands of troops.
Therefore, no matter how prosperous and civilized the Southern Shao Kingdom is, it cannot compare to Xundu and Dahuan. The mysterious and powerful Great Witch Priest stepping into the territory of Shao Kingdom is enough to make the whole country tremble.
A few days later, huge waves suddenly appeared in the Bo River, just like a dragon passing through the water, swimming upstream from the end and leaping into the air.
The aquatic creatures of the entire Bo River followed suit. Millions of koi and silver fish leaped out of the water under the sunlight, following the roaring water dragon. Finally, accompanied by fluorescent light, the water veins deep underground finally opened up into an illusory divine realm with a crystal palace and shrimp soldiers and crab generals shuttling around.
A majestic old man in a black and red robe, holding an underworld decree emitting divine light, walked into the crystal palace under the protection of thousands of aquatic creatures and merged with the river.
The Hundred Libo River declared that it had its own master.
The gods returned to their positions, the water veins were unobstructed, the earth veins were unblocked, and the reincarnation order on both sides began to stabilize.
All the river god temples and river god statues in Tengdi emitted light at the same time, and the strange phenomenon alarmed all the common people in Tengdi.
The news that someone had ascended to the throne of god, even under the deliberate suppression of the Shao Kingdom in the south, could not be stopped from spreading due to the exploration and attention of those who were interested, and shocked all the cultivators, alchemists and qi cultivators in the world, all major cultivation sects and the Dahuan Dynasty.