Pawn Crossing the River

After Qi Xuansu left St. York, Qi Xuansu's true form and incarnation did not meet in one place. From capturing the "ape god" to presiding over intelligence work, Qi Xuansu's Bingjie incarnation was in charge, and his true form has never shown up.

What did Qi Xuansu's true self do?

Qi Xuansu went to New Paititi, which was regarded as a private visit incognito. The purpose of Qi Xuansu's trip to St. York was similar to that of Qi Xuansu, which was mainly to understand the situation. Although there are detailed introductions in the Taoist archives, as the old saying goes, what you read on paper will always be shallow, and reading thousands of books is not as good as traveling thousands of miles.

Because preventing Xidaomen from expanding the situation and ending the war between the North and the South is only a phased task for Qi Xuansu, it can be regarded as a temporary solution. His other mission is to mediate the situation in the Southern Continent and cure the root cause.

To be fair, this task is a bit too difficult for Qi Xuansu. This is an arduous task that meets the standards of Ping Zhang Da Zhenren. Letting a Taoist immortal hold Gong Fu with his left hand and Tantai Zhenxiao with his right hand to facilitate reconciliation between the two, or meeting the ancient gods of the southern continent and chatting and laughing, it seems logical and very reasonable. After all, the strength and status of the people involved are also important. of.

Now due to various reasons, it seems a bit weird to give this task to Qi Xuansu. There is a status gap between Qi Xuansu and these immortals. It would be ridiculous to ask him to hold Gong Fu with his left hand and Tantai Zhenxiao with his right hand. It's like a child pulling two men. It's weightless, so it's not surprising.

But no matter how difficult it was, Qi Xuansu had to do it.

So Qi Xuansu launched a two-front battle. On one side, the Bingjie Avatar and Huangfu Ji started working on the hidden front. On the other side, since he could not catch up with the Avatar, he simply refused to join and went directly to New Paititi.

On the way to New Paititi, Qi Xuansu saw the most temples. The temples here are also called "pyramids", but they are different from Misir's triangular pyramids. Strictly speaking, the pyramids here are more like a trapezoid. , the top of the pyramid is flat ground, and the temple is built on this place.

Most of the temples Qi Xuansu saw were abandoned, dilapidated and covered in dust. The corresponding ancient gods may have encountered unexpected events, either entering the first level of death or the second level of death, or being asleep.

This is not surprising. When the Holy Court attacked the New World, in addition to conventional wars on land, there were also divine wars specifically targeting the local ancient gods. The three holy apostles of the Holy Court, Seraphim, Toronus, and Cherubim, As the Lord, with the Son apostles Tominius, Pavas, and Wirtes as the auxiliaries, and the Holy Spirit apostles Punsbalitis, Archangel, and Angel as auxiliaries, a full-scale war begins. These ancient gods belonged to different pantheons of the three major empires. Even ancient gods within the same pantheon fought with each other and were eventually defeated one by one.

There are many who have fallen.

Qi Xuansu simply surveyed the ruins of these temples, then left and continued on his way.

The rainforest climate here is very different from that of the Central Plains, and somewhat similar to that of Nanyang, but not exactly the same. For example, the main food crop in Nanyang is rice, and the main food crop in the Southern Continent is corn.

In terms of institutions, it is even more incomparable with the Central Plains.

As early as the founding of Daxuan, under the promotion of Xuan Sheng and Emperor Gaozu, the abrogation status was completely abolished, and all women, including prostitutes, did not belong to the status quo. Although slaves still exist in the world outside the Taoist sect, and even within the Taoist sect, they are essentially an employment relationship and cannot be killed at will at the legal level.

But here, not to mention low status, there are still de facto slaves, and it is common to bury people and sacrifice.

From this point of view, the Southern Continent and the Northern Continent can be regarded as the eldest brother but the second brother, an excellent New Continent matching mechanism.

Why didn’t Xidaomen abolish slavery?

The reason is simple. The foundation cannot be reached. For the aborigines of the Southern Continent, this is an ancient tradition. If you want to abolish the tradition, you must develop it to a certain extent. The change of ideas always lags behind the change of material things. .

Just like at the beginning of the founding of Daxuan, Xuan Sheng and Emperor Gaozu seriously discussed the possibility of abolishing the emperor and completely breaking the Confucian system. In the end, they decided that it was not feasible. The resistance was too great and the people could not accept it. The country could not live without a king for a day. The idea of ​​the emperor has been infiltrated into everyone's bones. It may take hundreds of years before the people's wisdom becomes enlightened before the emperor can be abolished.

There is still a war going on here in Xidaomen, and the material problems cannot be solved yet, so of course we cannot talk about ideological problems.

Therefore, the Taoist sect often criticizes the slave trade issue in the Holy Court. In this regard, the Taoist sect is relatively confident. One of Wang Jiaohe's crimes is slave trading. Xidaomen just kept silent. Although Xidaomen didn't deal with slaves, Tawanting did it too, and Tawanting's buttocks were also unclean. The only difference is that the Holy Court does not use its own people as slaves, but captures the barbarians in their eyes as slaves. Tawanting uses its own people as slaves and a small number of Western slaves, mainly from prisoners of war, debts, and violations of the law who were demoted as slaves.

If there is no comparison between the two, I can only say that each has its own merits and is a matter of opinion.

Xidaomen general accusation

On the issue of the Holy Court's aggression and the massacre of indigenous people, Tawanting, as the victim, occupies the absolute moral high ground.

All in all, this is a semi-slavery country.

Its system is also very complex. Under the Taoist system, it is only generally divided into four classes, but here there are seven classes, namely Taoist priests, priests, nobles, officials, warriors, free people, and slaves.

Logically speaking, Taoist priests and priests actually hold divine power. In fact, Taoist priests have perfectly inherited the Confucian tradition, and both divine power and political power are indispensable. Taoist priests directly intervene in military and political power, and do not let go of the ideological and spiritual world, which makes priests , nobles, officials, and warriors all essentially became vassals of Taoist priests, and could only attach to a certain faction in the Taoist priest group.

Soon, the new Paititi was in sight.

Qi Xuansu hadn't entered the city yet, but he could see the rich divine light in the city from a long distance away.

According to the archive records given by Daomen and Xidaomen, there is a special temple area in New Paititi, with a total of nine pyramids of different sizes. This symbolizes the nine gods recognized by Xidaomen.

However, according to the standards of Taoism, some gods are not at the level of immortals, but at the level of pseudo-immortals. They happen to still have "godhead", just like the incarnations of the ancient immortals. They only have the realm of pseudo-immortals, but have the insights of gods. understand.

This reminded Qi Xuansu of a special situation.

If this guess is correct, it means that the ancient gods are already very weak.

Although the ancient gods headed by Kukulkan repelled the apostles of the Holy Court, they themselves also suffered heavy losses. Especially when the divine power is insufficient, the golden body will enter a state of slow decay, and the borders of the Kingdom of God will gradually collapse, causing the Kingdom of God to become smaller and smaller. In order to avoid entering the first level of death, many gods have no more than two methods. Increase revenue and reduce expenditure.

Open source is about finding new sources of divine power, which is not a simple matter. If there is a new source of divine power, it will not be insufficient. The second is to reduce expenditures, proactively maintain a relatively small divine kingdom, give up unnecessary priesthoods, and reduce expenditures on divine power. This will also cause the gods to lose some of their magical powers and power, and even fall into their current realm.

This is the unique fall of gods.

On the other hand, when gods steal and plunder other people's clergy, they increase their cultivation. For example, Kukulkan and Siming Zhenjun have done this kind of thing. However, this will increase the expenditure of divine power, and you must have enough income to do so.

From this point of view

, most of the ancient gods cannot compare with the ancient immortals who are wreaking havoc in the Central Plains. After all, the ancient immortals "have no worries about food and clothing". They are not satisfied with the status quo and want to seek more divine power to seek transcendence.

One wants to eat well, the other wants to eat well and live longer.

There is still a big difference.

When Qi Xuansu entered the city, he saw many warriors wearing feather crowns and masks.

It is worth mentioning that these people cannot be regarded as the samurai class. The current samurai class has been transformed by Xidaomen and has become the most Central Plains-oriented group. They are completely Central Plains-oriented.

These warriors wearing feathered crowns and masks should belong to the nobility and priests respectively. Among them, the dark gold masks and black feathers are the warriors of the royal family. They are the lowest nobles themselves, similar to the knight class of Westerners. The turquoise mask and white feathers are priest warriors, who can also be regarded as preliminary priests, similar to the battle priests of the Holy Court. In addition to praying mass, they can also put on armor, set up shields, swing maces, and go directly into battle.

There are also feathered crowns and masks in other colors, representing warriors of nobles, or some traditional warriors who refuse to accept change.

Qi Xuansu is dressed as an ordinary Central Plains person, with a sword on his waist. Others will know at a glance that this is a samurai-sama—the samurai of the Taoist priests.

Compared with the royal warriors and priest warriors, the biggest characteristic of Taoist warriors is domineering, because they have the strongest fighting power and can fight head-on with the Holy Court's steam army.

You must know that the Holy Court defeated the three great empires of the New World and massacred countless people. Although it laid a blood feud, it also scared many people out of their courage and feared the Holy Court's "celestial soldiers" from the bottom of their hearts. Under such circumstances, having the courage to fight head-on with the Holy Court, or even win the battle, has become something to be proud of.

Needless to say, the Taoist priests did dominate Tawanting's supreme power. There is no way, without Taoist priests, there would be no integrated Tawanting; without Taoist priests, it would be impossible to obtain assistance from the far east; without Taoist priests, it would be impossible to resist the Holy Court's army.

After all, Xidaomen is not here to do chivalry. They have spent more than a hundred years and paid such a high price. Of course, they are not asking for nothing in return. It is inevitable for Taoist priests to hold the highest power.

With the Taoist priests at their backs, these warriors naturally dared to be arrogant. They considered themselves to be one of the triangles parallel to the royal family and priests.

To put it bluntly, we are all under the eaves of Xidaomen. Who is higher than who?

Qi Xuansu entered New Paititi easily.