From the perspective of the people of the ancient town, stopping their worship rituals is tantamount to breaking the agreement that their ancestors have made with the gods who guard the dragon veins on the sacred mountain.
If you do, you will lose your protection and may even face the wrath of the gods.
Doesn’t this mean harming them?
So, of course everyone will boycott it.
You can't say that these people are superstitious and ignorant. After all, this is the current situation.
Otherwise, what changes would Zhong Yunqi and the others need to make?
While Zhong Yunqi was deep in thought, in the center of the square, the old mayor was already arranging the worship ceremony!
The previous three sacrifices were all hosted by the old mayor, so there was no problem for him to arrange them.
Moreover, after experiencing the strange things that happened at night during this period, people became more active and excited about worshiping!
The livestock needed for the sacrifices were naturally brought from the ancient town, but they were not given in vain.
In the whole town, except for the elderly and children, all the money and materials brought by the members were used to pay for the sacrifice.
Of course, the most important expense is actually the people who bring supplies and livestock.
It is equivalent to the whole town pooling their money and materials to buy these livestock.
Of course, the worship held every ten years is actually the most grand event in the ancient town.
The lack of culture has also led to the fact that there are not many cultural activities in the entire ancient town.
Except for some festivals that have been passed down since ancient times, life in the ancient town is actually very simple and monotonous.
After the three animals and five animals are slaughtered and washed, they are used as tributes to worship the gods on the sacred mountain.
Of course, it is said that there are three kinds of animals and five kinds of animals, but in fact, there are only three kinds of sacrifices that have been handed down in the ancient town.
Moreover, the whole head is not used for sacrifice.
This is particular.
The head of the pig is taken, the belly of the sheep is left, and the chicken is trimmed.
The so-called pig is another name for pig. (In ancient times, it was called pig, for example, sealing pig and growing snake, wolf running and pig jumping.)
That is to say, when people worship the gods on the sacred mountain, they must use three kinds of sacrifices: pigs, sheep and chickens.
Among them, the head of the pig must be used, the belly of the sheep must be used, that is, the body except the head, hands, feet, and limbs, and the complete chicken must be used for worship.
No one knows why.
Perhaps there is no reason for this. Sacrifices have always been done that way, so I just followed suit.
In this case, after a pig is slaughtered, except for the pig's head, everything else is still there, and the sheep's head, as well as the front and back legs of the sheep, are also still there.
However, according to the rules of the town, animals slaughtered for sacrifice cannot be stored as meat.
To put it in ancient terms, what is left behind is a gift from the gods.
Therefore, the meat left behind will be shared and eaten by people in the whole town.
According to the saying passed down from generation to generation, this is eating together with the gods and making a contract.
Worshiping the gods is to express one's feelings towards the gods.
Eating the meat given by the gods means that you have been blessed by the gods and will receive their protection.
This sounds really nonsense.
The pigs and sheep were obviously raised by the people in the ancient town, but they were said to be gifts from the gods.
But, does this really matter?
Compared with the little meat after being divided, what can bring more comfort to people's hearts is the blessing and protection of the so-called gods.
How many people are there in the entire ancient town?
Perhaps, compared with those towns outside the mountains, the number of people is completely incomparable, but it is still quite a lot.
One pig and one sheep, how many mouths will there be after each person is divided?
However, after this worship ceremony, it was only a few mouthfuls of meat, but everyone, regardless of men, women, old or young, could eat it extremely happily.
Isn't this just another form of using material things in exchange for spiritual comfort?
After the old mayor made the arrangements, the people in the ancient town, especially the middle-aged people, immediately began to take action.
The first step is naturally to select the sacrifices to be used for sacrifice.
Many people who raise pigs and sheep at home actually really hope that their own pigs will be selected.
After all, there are so many families and so many pigs and sheep in the whole town. It is a blessing to be able to choose them as sacrifices to worship the gods.
People believe that they will receive additional blessings from the gods.
The first step is to select the best one from these families as a sacrifice.
Pigs are like this, sheep are like this, including chickens, and they also make the same choice.
After choosing, calculate the value of these things.
Intuitively speaking, this is the price of these pigs and sheep.
This price will be paid by all households in the entire ancient town on a per-person basis.
In fact, after they were separated, each person really didn't contribute much, and that's not counting the elderly and children.
Then, the pigs and sheep will be carried to a fixed place for slaughter.
After slaughtering, take the pig head, sheep body, and whole chicken and steam them together in a large stone pot.
In fact, in the square, behind the stone monument, there was originally a huge stone pot.
That stone pot used to be a tool for cooking sacrifices.
However, in the area where the old mayor’s father lived, it was completely gone!
No one knows when the stone pot became unusable.
Later, after the stone pot slowly shattered, the center of the square was balanced by everyone.
People, on the other hand, built earthen stoves in other places and used large iron pots to cook sacrifices.
It's actually quite normal.
In the past, the pots used to cook sacrifices were large stone pots polished when the ancient town was built.
In fact, when Wu Xian led people to build the ancient town, he wasted a lot of effort.
After all, if you wanted to make such a big pot at that time, you could only use a huge stone to grind it.
However, it is still a stone after all,
If it were not moved, its stone quality should be able to survive to this day.
However, every time a fire is set up to cook pigs and sheep, it causes huge damage to them.
Heat expands and contracts with cold. Over time, even if the stone used to make the stone pot is far ironier than the stones used to build the ancient town, it will not be able to withstand a single fire.
After putting the pot on the fire, place three incense sticks on the side.
This is not an ordinary incense, but a huge incense stick specially made according to the standard of a kind of fragrant wood unique to the ancient town.
According to the rules, only after the incense is extinguished can the fire be put out and the sacrifices taken out.
This fragrance lasts for hours at a time.
Why do sacrifices need to be cooked before being used for sacrifice?
This issue has probably never been considered by the people in the ancient town.
After all, this has been passed down from generation to generation, so naturally they did it too!
Perhaps Wu Xian, who originally established the rule of offering sacrifices to the guardian deity of the sacred mountain every ten years during the Autumn White Period, knew why, but he never told the people in the ancient town.