The next day, many disciples arrived at the square before Thatched Palace, where attendants had long since laid out rows of meditation cushions.
There had originally been more than three hundred disciples from the Eastern Court Protectorate who had come to Qingyang together. Later, Qian Province Academy had taken in another group, and there were now roughly more than five hundred disciples within Spirit Pass.
At this moment, quite a few natives of Spirit Pass stood about half a li away. There were no fewer than ten thousand of them.
These followers of alien gods had now become believers who worshipped the "gods of Celestial Xia." They were exceedingly devout, and had built temples for these "gods of Celestial Xia" at their own settlements.
Among them, "Fan Lan" and "Qi Wu" had also been fashioned into enormous statues by the native sculptors and placed there.
After Fan Lan and Qi Wu learned of this, they neither supported nor opposed it.
Though they themselves could subsist without food, some of the lower-ranking disciples could not.
That meant manpower had to be organized and a great deal of time spent on production, which delayed cultivation. Yet the presence of these natives allowed them to free themselves from such matters.
However, they did not merely take without giving. They had also ordered the disciples below to provide the natives with limited assistance.
Having come from the Eastern Court Protectorate, they possessed ample experience in dealing with natives and had long formed a plan. Once the time was ripe, they would send attendants to teach these natives Celestial Xia writing and Celestial Xia rites. In roughly a hundred years, these people would become part of Celestial Xia.
However, they strictly prohibited the natives from using living beings as sacrifices. After their initial discomfort, the