Taiping Inn

Li Xuandu had seen the "Seven Birds and Five Fire Fan" more than ten years ago. At that time, he was only at the level of a human being. He was forcibly taken into Xuandu by the Earth Master and met a Taoist nun holding a treasure fan that could set off a raging fire. Read

This Taoist nun is the spirit born from the "Seven Birds and Five Fire Fan". She can already transform into a human form, and is even better than other immortal objects. Li Xuandu gave this immortal object away, which shows his sincerity.

Tan Taiyun also kept his promise and soon led the crowd to leave the Western Regions and continue to the west.

However, there were still some of Tan Taiyun's old subordinates who were unwilling to leave. With Tan Taiyun's tacit consent, they surrendered to the Taoist sect and the Great Xuan court.

Li Xuandu did not embarrass these people.

However, the struggle in the Western Regions did not end with Tan Taiyun's departure, but just began.

Shamanism alone, of course, could not compete with Taoism, but with the return of the ancient gods and immortals, the situation became complicated again.

The Western Regions covers a vast area and the situation is extremely complicated. Although the Western Regions are dominated by Buddhism, they are also mixed with other sects, and even cults.

There are many traveling merchants and horse thieves in the Western Regions, unlike the Central Plains where the people are mainly farmers.

This is the place where believers are most likely to develop.

But the believers' faith is not solid. Maybe they believe in Buddha today, and change to Changshengtian tomorrow. After the Taoist sect enters the Western Regions, they will believe in Taishang Daozu, and even worship several gods and Buddhas at the same time.

However, for many ancient gods and immortals, these are not a problem. They didn't think about establishing an eternal incense inheritance. They just wanted to harvest a wave of incense and willpower in the shortest time, and then leave. The Western Regions are better.

So a large number of ancient gods and immortals entered the Western Regions, called themselves gods in the world, and preached widely, making the already complicated situation in the Western Regions even more complicated.

This just violated the taboo of Confucianism.

After Confucianism became the orthodoxy of the world, it established a rule that people cannot be called gods in the world.

What does it mean that people cannot be called gods in the world?

It means that after a person dies or leaves the world, it is possible to be molded into a god, but they cannot call themselves gods while they are still alive.

If someone gathers people to establish a sect, claims to be the leader of a sect, and proclaims that he is equal to the existence of a god, and calls himself a god in the world to be worshipped, then it is a cult.

Because of this, when the Neo-Confucianism school emerged later, it did not even regard the most holy teacher as a god, but forcibly created a so-called "heavenly principle", which is quite similar to the "Tao" of Taoism.

Later, Taoism gradually agreed with the views of Confucianism.

This also led to fewer and fewer gods and immortals, and the Shinto path was almost cut off.

However, the Shinto people also came up with a way, which is to earn incense and vows as a subordinate.

To put it more bluntly, it is to call oneself a messenger of God. If they are from the Taoist sect, they will pretend to be the Supreme Taoist Ancestor and preach as the messenger and disciple of the Supreme Taoist Ancestor to earn incense and vows.

Strictly speaking, this is how the Tianshi Sect started. The Ancestor Tianshi used the name of the Supreme Taoist Ancestor to attract believers. Because the Supreme Taoist Ancestor was not in the world, most of the incense and vows fell into the hands of the Ancestor Tianshi, but the Ancestor Tianshi did not choose the way of the gods in the end.

This is a right way, and the same is true for people in the Buddhist sect. The only disadvantage is that the effect is too slow, which is not much faster than the slow cultivation of earth immortals, human immortals, and ghost immortals.

The ancient gods and immortals are naturally unwilling to do so, and they already have the name of gods. How can borrowing other people's names be as convenient as using their own names directly?

In this way, the contradiction between the ancient gods and immortals and the Taoist sect became more and more irreconcilable, and the Confucian sect also stood on the side of the Taoist sect. Although the Confucian sect could not extend its hands to the Western Regions, it was able to rely on its deep foundation to destroy the obscene temples in the Central Plains, which was also very effective.

Only the Buddhist sect among the three religions had an ambiguous attitude and did not agree with the positions of Confucianism and Taoism.

In the 12th year of Taiping, after two years, the Great Xuan court initially incorporated part of the Western Regions into its territory, re-established the Western Province Protectorate, and the Taoist sect also established the Western Region Daofu in the Western Regions.

However, the Great Xuan court and the Taoist sect only controlled the Western Region in name, and the bottom was still a complex of various forces. In the past, it was said that the imperial power did not go down to the county level, only to the level of county magistrate. But now in the Western Region, the control of the Great Xuan court can only reach the level of the prefecture, and it can only be said that no one dares to oppose the rule of the Great Xuan court in public.

In this situation, the ancient gods and immortals made waves here, and many powerful figures in the Western Regions also became secret believers of the ancient gods and immortals, which brought great difficulties to the Great Xuan court and the Taoist sect to crack down on the ancient immortals.

Time came to the 35th year of Taiping in a blink of an eye.

The situation in the Western Regions was only slightly better than twenty years ago.

This year, Zhang Luanshan, the Great Immortal of Zhengyi, resigned from the position of Great Immortal and decided to retreat from the world and practice in seclusion. The Taoist sect held a grand ceremony for Zhang Luanshan in Xuandu.

It was also in this year that Yan Feiqing, who had just entered the realm of longevity, replaced his senior brother as the new Great Immortal of Zhengyi. Before this, he and his wife Su Yunyan had been responsible for the trade in the South China Sea and did not participate in the external wars of the Taoist sect.

Li Xuandu had many deep talks with this good friend, hoping that he could be responsible for ghost and god affairs, and work with Li Taiyi, who was in charge of human affairs, to solve the ancient immortal problem that had troubled the Taoist sect for many years.

After several studies, Yan Feiqing believed that the Western Regions were the top priority.

So in the 36th year of Taiping, Yan Feiqing set foot in the Western Regions for the first time.

However, Yan Feiqing did not go to Loulan City to inspect in a fair and square manner as a Great Immortal, but disguised himself as an old man and followed a caravan as a wandering Taoist, bypassing the most prosperous Loulan City and heading to the deep hinterland of the Western Regions.

The Taoist sect has a very weak grasp of this place, and it is also a place where the ancient immortals wreak havoc.

As the caravan gradually goes deeper into the former Western Regions, the current Xizhou has less green and more yellow sand. At a glance, it is all Gobi ruins, which is difficult to cultivate. Between the mountain passes, the wind and sand are whistling.

In the era of Tian Khan, frontier poets emerged in an endless stream. Later, when the Western Regions were lost, it was rare to see them.

The leader of the caravan looked at the wandering Taoist priest who followed the caravan. His hair was gray, his face was full of wrinkles, and his body was thin and inconspicuous. He said to the guard leader beside him: "I really don’t know what you are doing at such an age. Aren’t you afraid of being buried in the yellow sand and unable to return to your roots?"

The guard leader of the caravan has been friends with the leader of the caravan for many years. He shook his head and said: "Maybe he is going to Kunlun."

This is a very interesting thing. The ancestral home of the Taoist sect is in Kunlun, but the main forces of the Taoist sect are all in the Central Plains, including the Taoist temples of the three great immortals. In this way, it is not difficult for the Taoist sect to defend Kunlun. If they want to integrate the Western Regions, they still have to dispatch personnel from the Central Plains.

In addition, the Western Regions are too vast. Even the area between the Central Plains and the countries in the far west can be called the Western Regions. The Western Province occupied by the Great Xuan Court is less than half. The vast Kunlun of 5,000 miles is only a small part of the vast Western Regions. With the limited manpower of the Taoist sect, it is already quite difficult to guard the 5,000-mile Kunlun.

While the two were talking, the extremely old wandering Taoist came towards them.

Both of them stopped talking. Now that the Taoist sect is powerful, they have to respect this wandering Taoist who holds the Taoist sect certificate on the surface.

After the Taoist priest greeted the two, he said: "All good things must come to an end. Thank you for your care along the way. Today, I will leave."

The leader of the caravan was a little surprised and naturally tried to keep them. However, the Taoist priest declined the caravan leader's warm invitation and walked into the vast sandstorm alone, eventually disappearing.

The Taoist priest was Yan Feiqing. Along the way, he followed the caravan to see the situation in various places in the Western Regions, and felt very worried. It must be said that the situation in the Western Regions was worse than he expected.

Although the ancient immortals, Buddhism, and Shamanism did not dare to confront Taoism in public, they were constantly making small moves in secret.

After Yan Feiqing left the caravan, he knew that this place had entered the range of the ancient immortals' attention. Although the ancient immortals had fallen into a lower realm, their various magical powers were still there. Many of the mysterious places among them could not be underestimated even by immortals, let alone ordinary great masters in the realm of heaven and man.

So Yan Feiqing walked on foot with the strength of a normal person, drank water when thirsty, and found a place to avoid the wind and sand when it came. After walking for about three days, Yan Feiqing finally arrived in Shule City.

Shule City is a city in the Cheshi Kingdom in the Western Regions. It is located at the northern foot of the Great Snow Mountain, next to a deep ravine, with a dangerous terrain, and guards the north-south passage of the Great Snow Mountain.

In the early years, it was just a military fortress. After years of expansion, even though it is not as prosperous as Loulan City, it is also a very prosperous city.

Today, there are nine temples, shrines, and Taoist temples in the city.

The first is the Galan Palace of the Western Regions Buddhism, which enshrines the Great Sun Tathagata and the Eastern Buddha.

The second is the Taoist Tianxing Temple, which was just built not long ago, which enshrines the Supreme Taoist Ancestor. However, compared with the deep-rooted Buddhism, it is a bit like a vase display.

In addition to the Buddhist and Taoist families, there are the ancient gods and immortals who have descended.

The seven ancient immortals set up a sacrificial site here, and it can be seen that the divine light is shining.

Yan Feiqing did not enter the city immediately.

With the divine consciousness of the immortal, he felt the weakness of the seven ancient immortals.

Most of these ancient immortals were not much different from Wu Xian in the ninth year of Tianbao. They were higher than ordinary great masters of the realm of heaven and man, but lower than those who were immortal, and could not even be compared with Zhang Luxu in the Nether Valley.

However, they had truly set foot in the realm of immortality after all, or rather, they should not be called fallen realms at this time, but seriously injured. As long as they recovered from their injuries, their realms would naturally recover, and there was no threshold.

Yan Feiqing was not Li Xuandu after all. He was not sure that he could deal with the seven ancient immortals on his own, and he had no intention of conflicting with them at the beginning. He planned to observe for a while first.

At this time, a bloody smell suddenly came from the city.

This smell was not a real smell, but an invisible smell similar to murderous aura.

Yan Feiqing was a little surprised and walked quickly into the city.

Shule City had already nominally submitted to the Great Xuan Court, so after Yan Feiqing showed the certificate, the city gate guards happily let him go, and even confiscated half a copper coin.

After Yan Feiqing entered the city, he found that there were many people who were proficient in the Central Plains Mandarin. He asked around and found out that a blood sacrifice was being held in the city.

Yan Feiqing was even more shocked because blood sacrifice was only popular in the ancient witch cult era. After the Taoist sect defeated the witch cult, blood sacrifice was soon abolished. In the Central Plains, any blood sacrifice would be regarded as a cult.

Unexpectedly, in this remote place, someone would restore such barbaric means.

Yan Feiqing followed the flow of people and saw the blood sacrifice ceremony that was about to be held in front of a temple filled with wild atmosphere.

The high altar, the masked priests, and the sharp long swords looked like a place of execution.

Yan Feiqing stood in the crowd, his face as heavy as water, and fell into deep thought.

"Are these ancient immortals so impatient? It is not enough to just harvest incense and vows, but also to speed up their recovery speed with blood sacrifice."