Xu Xiake clearly remembered that they were still some distance away from the lamp. It was really strange to him that the lamp would not light and spontaneously ignite when they could not get close.
Wu Xuanyu explained: "It is phosphorus powder. Phosphorus powder is added to the grease. As long as there is fire in the air or the temperature rises, the phosphorus powder will spontaneously ignite and ignite the wick in the grease to form a green flame."
"But what's the use of these? Is it just for lighting?"
The Taoism that Xu Xiake believed in has never advocated sacrificing living people. If anyone dares to use human corpses to worship gods, this is considered disrespectful and will be punished as a demon.
"It's not lighting, it's worship."
Wu Xuanyu emphasized again: "The faith of the Witch God Kingdom is completely based on the Witch God and the twelve gods. These twelve gods are the mountains and rivers, the sun, the moon and the stars, wind, rain, thunder and lightning. In other words, the gods worshiped by the Wu people They are natural gods, not your Han people’s order gods.”
"The gods of order became gods because of incense and merit, enjoying the faith of thousands of people. At the same time, because humans are the source of faith, they must be responsible for their own believers. They should not use human sacrifices easily, otherwise they will destroy the foundation of faith, and even some After the followers of the God of Order disappear, some gods cannot maintain their form and can only disappear with their faith and annihilate the void."
"Nature spirits are different."
She looked at the people around her and explained in an eccentric way: "The emergence of natural gods has nothing to do with the worship of incense and merit. In the mythology of the Witch God Kingdom, gods are born in response to the laws of heaven, whether it is mountains and rivers, the sun, moon and stars, wind, rain, thunder and lightning, or flowers and plants. Trees, stones, and flying insects will neither become powerful because of the worship of believers, nor will they gradually lose their divinity and fall to the altar because of the lack of believers."
"In short, the worship of believers is dispensable to them. The purpose of the existence of these natural gods is not to maintain the right path or light, or even to benefit mankind. It is just because they are part of the way of heaven. As long as the way of heaven is immortal, there will be There has been."
"Then what do your gods do?"
Xu Xiake didn't particularly understand. His eyes were full of doubts. Taoist gods must benefit mankind, otherwise they would have no meaning in existence.
Wu Xuanyu thought for a moment, then his eyes lit up and he continued: "Don't do anything. The river god is every drop of water, the mountain god is every mountain peak, and the tree god is every tree. They are gods, and gods are them. Human beings live together as neighbors, and sometimes spirits will appear, sometimes they will act mischievously, and sometimes they will get angry or be kind."
"They are not aloof, but they seem to live in the fields, houses and streets. They can be seen everywhere. It is this feature that allowed the Kingdom of the Witch God to form a cultural thought that the mountains and rivers are spiritual and there are gods everywhere. Since Natural gods don’t care about human worship at all, so human worship is just sentimental.”
"What we call witch gods and twelve gods is more like the meaning that we shamans give to these natural gods. In this case, worshiping gods is more about us needing gods to maintain our faith, rather than gods needing us. Accumulate merit.”
At this point, Wu Xuanyu paused, his tone became mysterious and said: "Since the gods don't need us, the things humans offer to us are dispensable. People can only dedicate their most precious things to the gods above. , will you get a short response from the gods."
"Think about it, what is the most precious thing a person has?"
"Yuan Datou."
Before Yue Erpao finished speaking, Wu Xuanyu's bright eyes looked a little helpless. She rolled her eyes at him and corrected herself: "At least for the people of Wushen Kingdom, the most precious thing is their own pure and pious body and soul."
"It is precisely because of this that people are willing to become Gu people after death and offer their flesh and blood to the gods. In your opinion, it is indeed a wild sacrifice, but to the shamans, it is them offering themselves. The most precious thing.”
Wu Xuanyu continued to lower his voice and said: "From now on, the souls of these Gu people will always be with the gods, and at the same time they will become the new gods of the people of the Witch God Kingdom. This kind of worship ritual is not only to express piety, but also to The new gods can be canonized so that these Gu people can protect the future high priests of the Witch God Kingdom and get more instructions from the gods. These cultural factors and concepts are mixed with each other, which makes the sacrificial ceremony extremely noble, but the people cannot participate at will. "
"Have you seen all these things?"
Pregnant Peacock is quite worried about this. After all, she is likely to be the high priest of the Witch God Clan in the future, which means that the body after death is likely to be groomed in this way.
Wu Xuanyu shook his head and retorted: "I have only lived so long, how could I have seen it, but I heard from Eminem that before the altar of the Witch God was not closed, priests would be sent to the altar every year to offer tribute and burial butter. , after these people are sent to the altar, their statues and tablets will also be placed near the lamp."
"Since the Altar of the Witch God was closed, few high priests in the Kingdom of the Witch God have had the opportunity to carry out tribute burials. At most, the corpses are refined into oil and enshrined in the Witch King Shrine. It is not inferior to offering it to the Witch God, and there are more people. Climb the altar of the witch god and restart." m.
After hearing this, Song Siyuan basically confirmed the origin of these human oils. The gods of Wushen Kingdom were indeed different from the gods of Han Dynasty. She probably knew this from the myths of Xiangxi before, but now she heard Wu Xuanyu explain it in detail. A little more, it can be regarded as supplementary information about the belief in the witch god.
"Let's go, as long as there isn't any poisonous gas inside."
Yue Guanchao led them down the stairs and down the stone lacquered boardwalk. As they walked, they could indeed see a stone-lacquered iron statue near the bronze locust tree.
These statues are the same size as real people, and each wears the costumes of the priests of the Witch God Kingdom. They are gorgeous, mysterious, thick and noble. Their bodies are carved to be full and realistic, and their eyebrows and eyes are lifelike. In addition to being calm and serious, the slightly narrowed eyes also add a sense of mystery.
There are many divine tablets at the feet of the statues, which are engraved with the identities of these statues during life and their titles after death, so as to canonize various priests who became Gu people.
Song Siyuan walked near one of the statues, pulled away the cobwebs on the statue, and cleaned up the guano and bat soil. The ancient pigments were slightly faded and oxidized, and the color was gone. It was extraordinarily thick and majestic. When illuminated by the candlelight, the metal skin showed an ancient color.
The eyes of this statue were profound and mysterious, as if he was having a conversation with her after thousands of years!
She picked up the flashlight and looked at the sacred card, and explained: "According to the time when the Witch God Altar was built, there were at least 5,000 priests on the tribute and burial boardwalk here. They became the guardian spirits of the Witch God Altar, almost completely occupying the downward extending boardwalk. Full."
Some people died, but not completely...
