The "Red Sand Shenjiao" mine in Yizhou City is located ninety miles east of the state, in the Cangshan Mountain.
Mountain and River Chronicles record that Cangshan Mountain in Yizhou overlooks the East China Sea. There is the tomb of King Dou in the front, the pillar of King Qin in the back, and a stone chamber in the middle. It is said that An Qi was born and Xu Ze was promoted to immortality.
In fact, ordinary people have no idea where the Tomb of King Dou and the Pillar of King Qin are. Cangshan Mountain is composed of 19 peaks from north to south. Each peak has no independent name. The people in the nearby rural mountain villages have known it for generations. Living here, surrounded by green mountains and green waters, is quite comfortable.
In recent years, when officers and soldiers discovered several mineral deposits here and ordered mining, the appearance of Cangshan Mountain immediately changed.
When Guan Luoyang and the others came to the outskirts of Cangshan Mountain, they looked into the distance from a cliff. They saw a dozen black smoke billowing between the distant peaks in the blue sky and white sun. In addition to the smell of green grass and leaves, there is also a faint smell of burnt smoke.
"Mining is making such a big noise?" Guan Luoyang was a little confused.
Gongsun Sheng explained from the side: "The mineral deposits here include one large, two small and three cinnabar mines, several iron ores, and a red crystal mine."
"When mining cinnabar, the cliffs and mountains are covered with firewood and burned with fire. After the mountain walls are burning hot, cold water is poured on them to make the rocks crack and peel off on their own, and then the ore is selected and transported."
"After the iron ore is mined, it must be forged into iron blocks on the spot, hammered and hammered to remove impurities, and the furnace must be opened day and night. The fire will not go out, and the smoke will naturally not go out."
"The last crystal mine is the most troublesome. After mining large pieces of crystal, we transport high-quality cinnabar and smelt it in a furnace. It can produce a kind of purple energy sand that is very beneficial to both immortal and demon masters. On weekdays, When you are practicing internal energy, you can light some purple energy sand in the incense burner or take it, which can transform into a purple energy, eliminate illusions and illusions, avoid impatience, and make your body and mind peaceful and comfortable."
Gongsun Sheng swept the whisk in his hand, as if he wanted to sweep away the increasingly obvious smell of smoke in the wind, and said, "But once this purple spirit sand is smelted, it will take a long time, nine turns and nine practices, I don't know how to waste it." No matter how many fires there are, it’s not surprising that the smoke stays there all day long.”
Dai Zong had also inquired a lot about the Cangshan Mine before, so he took over the conversation and said: "The Taoist officials in Bianliang City specially built several treasure furnaces for the Purple Qi Divine Sand and placed them here. He also sent Baoxu Wushang Zhenren Ren Sen to lead a group of Taoist officials and magicians to look after the furnace fire. Yizhou City also sent a general, Shi Wengong, to recruit brave Zeng family descendants to oversee the mining here."
Gongsun Sheng nodded slightly: "That Ren Sen alone is already quite troublesome. Since Shi Wengong is a general, he must have practiced a sophisticated magic method. From Pindao's point of view, we should be more cautious when taking mercury. , so as not to cause more trouble.”
Lin Lingsu snorted from the side: "The Tiangang Five Thunder Zhengfa in Erxian Mountain is also the best among the thunder methods. If you have practiced it in a good life, how can it be difficult for you to open an altar and kill Ren Sen? I Judging from the fact that your magic power is also a bit mixed, I’m afraid you were still a Taoist official a few months ago, so it has nothing to do with the luck of the court, and you can’t practice the true immortal way.”
Gongsun Sheng lowered his head and said: "Master's early admonitions, but I didn't take it seriously. When I regretted it, I regretted that I had not worked hard in the past. Recently, I have worked hard every night, and I will definitely not disgrace my master's reputation after his death."
Guan Luoyang walked with them and saw that Lin Lingsu had difficulty walking on her own and insisted on being sharp-tongued and sharp-tongued. Everything she said seemed to have a somewhat sarcastic tone. She really admired Gongsun Sheng's good temper.
After all, 80% of his words were directed at Gongsun Sheng.
It's just that Guan Luoyang heard something about it after hearing it too much. The way Lin Lingsu sometimes scolded Gongsun Sheng seemed to be scolding his former self. After all, he was talking about the Taoist priests who were deeply entangled with the Song Dynasty court. , it seems that there are few who can compare with him, the Kinmen Yu Ke and Mr. Yuan Miao back then.
Fortunately, Lin Lingsu, apart from being sarcastic and having an off-putting tone, also had the advantage of being erudite. If someone gave him an introduction, he could talk a long paragraph on his own.
Guan Luoyang didn't need much innuendo during this period. He just asked Lin Lingsu a lot about the cultivation situation in this world.
There are thousands of schools of cultivation in the world today, and countless different people have formed their own sects throughout the ages. However, generally speaking, they can be divided into three major categories: immortal ways, demonic ways, and heretical ways.
The Immortal Way is said to have originated from Huangdi Laozhuang, while the Demonic Way originated from Chi You and Jiang Shang.
Although the latter had the word "magic" added to his name, Chi You was later also called one of the three ancestors, and Jiang Shang was the first ancestor of military strategists and a sage-like figure. Therefore, the devil's way is also called the way of war, and it is also one of the world's most important cultivation methods. The orthodox method of human beings.
The source of immortal cultivation is to adhere to the concept of "wood is better than flesh, stone is better than wood, and metal is better than stone", collecting the energy of immortality from immortal things, so that the mortal body can gradually transform.
The so-called immortal things can be summarized as "gold, silver, copper, iron and tin, lead, mercury, oil and carbon." The last word "rare" covers the widest variety and refers to all kinds of rare jade, crystal, rare and rare things in the world. Medicine fossil.
To practice the immortal way, you must first practice the nine orifices. The nine orifices of a person are connected to the inside and outside. Ordinary people are weak in the nine orifices. Not to mention swallowing gold, chewing iron, biting lead and drinking mercury, or even suddenly eating too much meat, it may cause various diseases. Naturally, such a person cannot enter the threshold of cultivation if he cannot excrete what he eats.
Therefore, we must first start with relatively mild wood and stone anthers to cultivate and refine the nine orifices. After reaching a certain level, we can start from swallowing stone powder and cinnabar, and improve step by step, until we can eat gold raw and drink copper with ease. The purest vitality is refined from the things and used for one's own use. When the vitality in the body is full, it is transformed into jade liquid. After nine rounds of jade liquid, you can develop an indestructible golden elixir.
The biggest difference between the Demonic Way and the Immortal Way is that the Demonic Way does not care about purity or purity. People who practice the Demonic Way, after cultivating the nine orifices, start with the most common coal, eat whatever is available, and let the impurities fill their limbs and bones. .
After training until the physical body becomes heavy and turbid, and the spirit is stubborn and stubborn, it is difficult to gather the turbid energy into the golden elixir, and can only be allowed to blend into the body everywhere, and finally forge into a fighting body that looks like a god or a demon.
The magic way of training saves a lot of purification steps, and the difficulty of practice is much lower than that of the immortal way. Therefore, it was once widely spread among soldiers and generals. It was passed down from the Shang and Zhou dynasties to the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period. They are the most numerous people in the world.
Unfortunately, after the disputes of the Warring States Period, the Qin Dynasty fell into war soon after its reunification. Then the Chu-Han Dynasty fought for hegemony, and the early Han Dynasty suppressed the rebellion. The world was at war with each other. By the time Emperor Gaozu of the Han Dynasty was in his later years, many of the old mineral veins in the world were almost exhausted, and soldiers were training. At that time, he lacked the qualifications, so that he was deceived by foreigners. Even wise monarchs like Emperor Wen and Emperor Jing found it difficult to restore their old views.
So during the reign of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, the immortal way was withdrawn, the demonic way declined, and the heyday of heretics... arrived!
Heresy, originated from witchcraft, is deeply entangled with the customs of various places. Unlike the immortal way, which seeks truth, and unlike the demonic way, which is pragmatic, heresy cultivates illusory power. Starting from the deceptive tricks at the beginning, it collects people's emotions and spiritual thoughts, and gradually Refining falsehood into reality, possessing the power to influence reality.
This type of cultivation method makes it easy for people to lose themselves when they are indulged in the sea of desire. Moreover, once their prestige is hit, people's hearts are scattered, and their magic power may even regress, so it has always been despised by the immortal and demonic ways.
However, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty reused Dong Zhongshu, Dongfang Shuo, Zhufu Yan and other people to change customs and respect Confucianism, so that the vassal states and tens of millions of people in the world had a common understanding.
Then, using this common understanding as a medium, we pushed the heresy to the extreme and formed the art of dynasty luck.
Ordinary left-behind warlocks only fooled villages and towns, but Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty unified the people of the world based on principles, and the pattern was more than a hundred times bigger.
Wei Qing and Huo Qubing were talented and victorious in every battle. The higher their reputation, the stronger their fighting power. They swept away the haze of foreign races that shrouded the Han border and created the confidence that one Han could serve as the five barbarians. In addition to their own military and strategic talents, that is, It embodies the characteristics of the dynasty's luck technique.
Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty was dictatorial and no one dared to disobey the government orders issued. He also relied on this luck technique.
The laws in the imperial court are strict, and the power brought by the dynasty's luck is inseparable from the official position. Once the emperor deposes a person from the official position, this power is immediately deprived of it. It is easier to control than the immortal way or the magic way. The emperor authority has reached an unprecedented peak.
None of the emperors of subsequent generations could escape the temptation of power. Therefore, from the Han Dynasty, Wei, Jin, Sui and Tang Dynasties, until now, the art of dynasty luck has been maintained.
After the founding of the Song Dynasty and Emperor Taizong's accession to the throne, maintaining the dynasty's destiny became a top priority, and Confucianism was respected far more than before.
However, over-respecting Confucian scholars and civil servants naturally inevitably belittles and neglects generals. Many people have to get tattoos when they join the army. They are no different from prisoners, and they are not even ashamed of the common people.
The people's hearts are not in the generals, and the strength that the generals can get from the luck of the dynasty is getting less and less. Even if there are famous generals for a while, they cannot resist such a declining trend.
When Lin Lingsu talked about this, Gongsun Sheng mentioned the current emperor again.
After Emperor Ming ascended the throne, he ignored the obstruction of his ministers and went his own way, vigorously promoting magic methods in the army. He actually did not know where he got the secret method of prospecting for mineral veins. He sent people to patrol the country, prospected with extraordinary accuracy, and mined massively to provide training for the soldiers. The past ten years can be said to be an era of revival of the Demonic Way...or, in other words, the revival of the Military Way.
In today's Great Song Army, everyone has practiced some military skills.
Among the Cangshan mines, Shi Wengong led 800 elite troops to garrison, which was much more dangerous than Ren Sen's group of Taoist officials. No wonder Gongsun Sheng first stated that he should proceed with caution.
"Pindao, let's go to the smaller cinnabar mine first. Maybe there is some inventory, and we can steal it directly."
Gongsun Sheng watched for a moment, pointed in a direction and said, "Brother Dai Zong, you are here to take care of Mr. Yuan Miao. Brother Guan Dao, are you staying here, or are you going to have a look with Pindao?"
They have not been together for a long time, but Gongsun Sheng already knows that Guan Luoyang is quite curious about everything, so he asked this question.
Sure enough, Guan Luoyang said: "I'll go and have a look too."
The two of them set off immediately and walked through the valley depression. When they approached the place where the black smoke was rising, they saw tree stumps all over the mountains and plains.
The Nineteenth Peak of Cangshan Mountain should have been full of forest land, but the closer to the mines, the more bare it appeared. The grass and trees were cut down and burned as firewood. After several winds and rains, the soil slowly changed from the rocks. It is drained and the rocks are mottled.
Guan Luoyang thought to himself: No wonder the smoke was so thick. Not only because there were a lot of things burned, but also because the firewood didn't have time to dry. It was all wet wood, so he just threw it into the fire.
"Climb the hillside ahead and you'll reach a guarded place."
Gongsun Sheng warned in a low voice, then pressed the invisibility formula with his hand, and his body turned into a piece of transparency and disappeared.
The subtle electric light on Guan Luoyang's body flickered for a while, and he walked over so openly.
Gongsun Sheng, who remained invisible, was about to say something when he suddenly forgot where Guan Luoyang was in the blink of an eye. After he calmed down and looked again, Guan Luoyang was clearly still walking there slowly.
"This..." Gongsun Sheng searched his mind and couldn't think of any family with such strange spells.
Guan Luoyang's mental magnetic field spreads outside, moistening things and silently affecting other people's brains. Even if others see him, they think he doesn't exist at all.
Even a person with Gongsun Sheng's level of cultivation cannot completely avoid this influence. As long as he blinks his eyelids, he will temporarily lose sight of Guan Luoyang. It will take a while to "see" again. Those responsible for holding shovels and rakes in their hands. Naturally, the young and strong civilian men who were guarding were unable to resist.
Guan Luoyang walked across the hillside in front of them.
What you can see is a huge valley with piles of gravel everywhere. Many people squat on the piles of stones to pick out the cinnabar ore and put them into baskets.
They carried the rough stones with their bare hands, stepped on the gravel with straw sandals, picked up full baskets, and walked to the path on the left side of the mine.
To the right is the vermilion mountain wall. Someone is laboriously spreading grass clippings and wood on the mountain wall, waiting for the next time it is set on fire.
Next to each group of miners, there are one or two middle-aged men holding sticks and staring eagerly at them.
Different from the miners who were in shabby clothes and with old wounds and bruises all over their bodies, these men carrying sticks were just like the young men responsible for guarding, with strong bodies and plump faces that could only come from eating meat. She is shiny and wears thick-soled cloth shoes or boots.
This group of people are neither soldiers nor miners. They should be the descendants of the Zeng family who were recruited by Shi Wengong as mentioned by Gongsun Sheng and others and are responsible for assisting in management.
There were many of them, and they had a yellow talisman affixed to their chests.
The invisible Gongsun Sheng came to Guan Luoyang and said, "The left side of this mine should lead to the storage area."
Guan Luoyang raised his chin: "What is the purpose of the talismans on those people's chests?"
Gongsun Sheng looked at it carefully and said: "It seems to be a charm to ward off dust and evil spirits. It also has the effect of calming the mind. It mainly prevents confusion and sudden madness. Strange, do people often get crazy here?"
Guan Luoyang remained silent and looked at the miners again.
They were rummaging around for cinnabar ore, dust was everywhere around them, and they would cough twice from time to time. Some people were wheezing and couldn't cough out, so they beat their chests hard, and their clenched fists were still stained with vermilion marks.
It seemed to be the powder of the ore, but if they washed their hands, they would find that the color had soaked deep into the skin.
However, contrary to the red patches on their palms, most of their faces appear blue and white, bloodless, but their eyeballs are covered with bloodshot eyes. Sometimes they stare at a certain place for a long time, their eyes are dull and rigid, and they cannot recover. After being beaten with a stick, he seemed frightened and continued to work while gasping for breath.
Guan Luoyang closed his eyes. He could hear the wheezing sounds of all the miners in the mine. The coughs accompanied their footsteps, sometimes so intense and dense that they could overwhelm everyone else's footsteps.
Cinnabar can be used as medicine, but cinnabar is also poisonous. All the miners here are deeply poisoned.
Gongsun Sheng has sneaked into the storage place to steal mercury.
Guan Luoyang left here and walked to other mines where black smoke was rising. The people working in the iron mines were not in better health than those in the cinnabar mines.
Gongsun Sheng stole more than a hundred kilograms of mercury, which was packed in bamboo tubes with stoppers sealed. He wrapped many bamboo tubes with a whisk and hung them on his back before walking out of the cinnabar mine.
Guan Luoyang appeared next to him again and said: "Isn't it said that the entry threshold for magic is very low, and you can also practice with mineral powder? Hasn't anyone taught it to these miners to make their work easier?"
Gongsun Sheng was stunned: "They are not in the military. How can they learn magic? How can anyone have the patience to teach them?"
Guan Luoyang said: "Who are these miners?"
"Logically speaking, the prisoners should be put first. All the prisoners in Yizhou should have died during the mining in the past few years. Very few people in the mines have survived more than three years."
Gongsun Sheng also looked back at the miners and said, "These people should be civilian laborers recruited from nearby. They will be out of work for about two years. According to the rules I asked about before, they will be sent home with their wages."
He added, "Since the revival of the magic way, too many mines have been opened in various places, and there is really a shortage of manpower. I heard that the prefects and prefects in some places have extended the two-year period to three or four years before they can barely collect it all. The ore meets the requirements of the imperial court.”
"What happens when these miners go home?"
Before Gongsun Sheng could answer, Guan Luoyang had already shaken his head, as if he had asked something stupid.
Just go home, no one will care about the future life of these miners. Those who can bring their wages home are already extremely lucky.
Gongsun Sheng hesitated and said: "Brother Guan Dao..."
Guan Luoyang waved his hand and said, "You go and meet Lin Lingsu and the others first, and I'll take a walk later."
"Shi Wengong, I've heard of this name too, and I'm a little curious."
Guan Luoyang laughed and walked away.
