In the past few days in Jining City, first there was Jiang Muchan's night visit to Prince Lu's Mansion, then there was Xiao Wuji who broke into the Qinglian Hall alone, and then there was the pair of playfully playing with corpses. It can be said that there has been constant turmoil.
This is undoubtedly a troubled time for the Fire Lotus Sect.
But there are some things that they still have to do...
As we all know, those corrupt officials, local tyrants and evil gentry in ancient times loved to make money during the holidays.
Take the officialdom as an example. Except for some extreme examples that everyone is familiar with, such as Hai Rui, generally speaking, even if you are an upright official, when you catch up with the "three festivals and two birthdays", can you not accept some congratulatory gifts and red envelopes?
Not to mention the local tyrants and evil gentry, some of them are shameless and hold birthday banquets all year round. For birthdays of the third aunt, the eighth uncle, the eighth aunt, the nephew, they have to invite all the surrounding neighbors to come.
Even if I don't give you face, here you are, even if I give you some "flower and hair", you still have to give me a big red envelope.
Don't think it's outrageous. This trend still exists today, and it's not just the local tyrants and evil gentry who do it, but anyone can do it. Maybe some of your relatives do it.
As for the Fire Lotus Sect, they are even more arrogant. They don't even bother to treat you to a meal, they just care about your money and things.
What's the reason?
The Winter Clothes Festival before us is a hurdle that the people in Jining have to go through every year.
According to tradition, on the Cold Clothes Festival, people have the custom of "burning cold clothes" for the souls of the dead.
The so-called "burning cold clothes" generally refers to burning five-color paper that symbolizes cloth, and then burning some paper, incense foil, etc. If you have the conditions, then burning some paper people and horses together, this is considered very good.
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But in the territory of the Fire Lotus Sect, the rules of the Winter Clothes Festival are different...
According to the "rules" of the Fire Lotus Sect, on the Winter Clothes Festival, every household in Jining must conduct a "burning sacrifice" under their organization.
What is "burning offering"?
That is, you have to "offer" some real property and hand it over to the hands of the Fire Lotus Sect, and then the Fire Lotus Immortal will "do the magic" for you to bless your deceased relatives and bless you.
If you don't "donate" enough, then your family will be in trouble because you are not pious... If you suffer "retribution" in the future, for example, someone digs up your ancestral grave, or someone comes to your house in the middle of the night
Stones are thrown through the windows, a chicken is stolen every now and then, a few dogs are stolen, etc... Don't be surprised.
Of course, if you really don’t have money, if you have a young lady or a young daughter-in-law at home who is willing to present it to the leader for “consecration”, that’s fine too.
And if you can’t offer anything and your attitude is very uncooperative, then it’s embarrassing – “burn”.
Nothing else. I just said that your home has bad feng shui and is a dangerous place with evil spirits. If you leave it alone, your home will become a "ghost cave" on the night of the Winter Clothes Festival. Then the neighbors will not care about it.
Anyone who has "offered" something will be "unlucky" in the future.
Therefore, for the "benefit of everyone", the Fire Lotus Church set fire to your house before dark, and only allowed the neighbors to put out the fire when it was almost burned.
What? You think this is unreasonable?
In fact, there is an even more unreasonable situation...that is, if you have reached the stage of "burning" and still persist in resisting, then you are a "ghost" and will be burned together with you.
Burned alive, the government doesn't care.
But... this kind of situation has disappeared in the past few years except for the first year of the establishment of the Fire Lotus Sect. After all, there are lessons learned from the past, and the common people even scrape out three melons and two dates to "offer"
"Well, it's better than having the house burned down before winter.
Some families really can't get anything out of it, and they don't want their daughters to be captured and raped by the Fire Lotus Cult, so they simply hang themselves before the Winter Clothes Festival, in order to leave a clean slate and a whole body.
Don't think this is an exaggeration, and don't say anything like "Why didn't the whole family leave Jining?" Back then, it was not as good as it is now, when it was extremely difficult to move to another place.
If you are single and have no parents or children, then it is easier to find a distant relative to join you. Even if they don't accept you there, you can still stay there to work or earn a living.
But if you want to move your whole family from one place, it is as difficult as trying to immigrate as a family whose monthly income is barely enough to maintain the minimum living standard.
Do you have any relatives who can defect to you? Can your relatives take in your whole family? You go to the government and tell the government that your family’s household registration is to be moved, and you have to send a written ultimatum... How can you get it without spending some money? And your whole family?
Where will the travel expenses for food, drink and accommodation come from? Do you still need to run if you have so much money as mentioned above? Wouldn’t it be enough to just “donate” part of it?
In short, in the past few years since the rise of the Fire Lotus Sect, as soon as the common people heard the words "Hangyi Festival", their scalps would go numb, and they wished that God would wipe out this day.
This year, the corpse has encountered unpleasant things one after another in the past few days, and he wants to use this "burning sacrifice" to make a profit so that he can "recover the losses".
So, early in the morning on the first day of October, the Fire Lotus Sect began their "donation collection" operation in the city.
Since all the masters and chief officers of Qinglian Hall have been killed in the past few days, Shi Xuanzi has not arranged for new replacements for the time being, so this year the disciples of Qinglian Hall can only be assigned to the other four halls as followers.
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As for the other four halls, because there is one less person to share the "meat", they are even more frantic. After all, this is a pure profit-making job. Who doesn't want to take the opportunity to make more money?
It's okay for those wealthy families, because the richer and more powerful the Fire Lotus Cult is, the more polite they are to them; when they come to "collect donations" from such families, the Fire Lotus Cultists usually wait at the door and don't enter the house.
, after the steward sent the money out, he saw that it was enough and then gave it away.
But for those ordinary poor people, the more money and power they have, the more ruthless the Fire Lotus Sect will be - they will enter by just kicking in the door, ask for it with open mouth, rob other people's things if they have no money, and arrest their female relatives.
If you resist, you will burn your home. You are worse than a robber.
This chapter is not finished yet, please click on the next page to continue reading the exciting content! Just like this, in just one morning, the entire Jining City was in a state of chaos, and the people were in dire straits.
In the blink of an eye, it was the end of the day, roughly two o'clock in the afternoon, and the Fire Lotus Sect's "donation collection" was finally over.
At this time, crowds slowly gathered at the market entrance in the city.
What are they here for?
Let’s see the great immortal’s “practice”.
As mentioned earlier, after the "collection of offerings", the Fire Lotus Immortal will do something to "bless" everyone.
Some people may want to ask, did Shi Xuanzi really do the magic to bless the people?
how can that be possible……
Where in the world is there any magic that can "bless" the people of the whole city at once? If there were, it wouldn't be called magic, but social insurance.
So what method is Shi Xuanzi going to do now?
It's simple - do a trick.
First of all, since he has said that he will do something to protect the people after "collecting the offerings", what's the harm in showing it to the people?
Secondly, performing a few tricks that have no practical significance but look very exaggerated and show them in front of the people is also a kind of shock in itself.
As for the common people... they have paid their "offerings" and come to take a look. From a certain point of view, they are also considered consumers.
At the beginning of the morning, Xie Xuanzi's figure finally appeared on the altar at the entrance of the market.
This "faith platform" is very high and large, and was completed two days ago. The platform is surrounded by squares and roads. Even if there are thousands of people watching, people in the distance can see what is happening on the platform.
At this moment, with the appearance of Xie Xianzi, the originally noisy square quickly became quiet.
His sense of presence and oppression is indeed strong. Just standing on the stage and looking around can make people far away from him feel creepy, and they will immediately become silent.
"Huh..." After standing on the stage for a moment, and when the surroundings were completely silent, Xi Yanzi raised the corners of his mouth with satisfaction, and then spoke, "Dear disciples and fellow countrymen... Today is the first day of October, Ming Yin
During the Ghost Festival, as usual, I will pray for the people of Jining, appease the souls of the dead, and protect all living beings... I am very pleased to see so many villagers coming to witness this."
Having said this, he flicked the whisk in his hand and acted like a fairy, as if he was waiting for the crowd in the audience to cheer for his hypocritical nonsense.
"The leader of the gods is alive!"
"The leader is so merciful!"
"Great Immortal Fire Lotus! His merits are overwhelming!"
"Great Fire Lotus Immortal! Immortal magic is boundless!"
The grandsons of the Fire Lotus Sect were not slow to respond. The hall masters and chief officials standing on the side of the stage immediately took the lead in shouting. As soon as they shouted, the other minions also followed the rhythm.
As for the common people, those who stand closer to the Fire Lotus cultists on the side of the stage naturally have to shout a few times, otherwise they are afraid that their appearance will be remembered and later settle accounts. Those who are far away... are the most
He moved his mouth, but no sound came out.
After the group of people shouted for a while, Shi Xuanzi waved his hand again, signaling for his minions to stop, and said again: "Hey~ I just did what a cultivator should do.
What’s the big deal? I deserve to be so loved by all of you.”
And his speech, which was similar to "please increase your intensity," undoubtedly triggered a second round of flattery.
After the second wave of shouting was almost done, Shi Xuanzi walked slowly to the side of the altar, came to a table with several magical instruments, picked up a bell, and said: "Okay, that matter
Without further ado, I will start the forum now..."
Just when the zombie was about to start his formal performance, unexpectedly, a loud shout came from the sky: "Yao Dao! Have you finished farting!"
The voice fell and the figure rose.
But he saw someone suddenly fly out from among the crowd.
With his outstanding lightness skills, this person moved forward like a dragonfly on the heads of the Fire Lotus Sect members, and in a few leaps he had jumped onto the towering Dharma platform.
Before he could stand still, Shi Xuanzi had already recognized him through his body shape... If not, who was Jiang Muchan?
"It's you again..." Xi Xuanzi was very unhappy when his "performance" was interrupted, not to mention that the other person was the person he wanted to kill before, so he said unabashedly, "Why?
?Did you come here specifically to receive death today?"
"Ha... I won't die even if you die." Jiang Muchan sneered, "I'm here to take your life today!"
"Just you?" When Shi Xuanzi responded to these words, many of the Fire Lotus cultists in the audience had come to their senses and drew out their weapons one after another.
"It's really impossible to rely on me alone." Jiang Muchan didn't pay attention to the actions of the gang around the stage, and just continued, "But if you add another person, it will be more than enough to deal with you."
Hearing the words "the other one", Shi Xuanzi immediately thought in his mind: It is probably the "Old Immortal Xudong".
But Shi Xuanzi remained calm on the surface and asked in a deep voice: "Oh? Who is it?"
"Good question!" Jiang Muchan seemed to be waiting for him to say this. The next second, he suddenly took out a gong and a small hammer with a cloth head from his arms, and banged it like this, as if
It was the street performer who finished knocking and then said, "He is... the chief disciple of Xudong Old Immortal, the living golden body of Beitian Dangmo Tianzun - Zhang Baoguo!"
When Xi Xuanzi heard this, he thought to himself, "Who is this? Isn't it the one who played with the manure that day?"
But after hesitating for a moment, Xi Xuanzi still asked: "Then where is he now?"
Snapped--
Before Shi Xuanzi could finish these words, the blade of a trident had already broken through the wooden board under his feet, suddenly sprang out from under the high platform, and struck towards his crotch!