Living sacrifices

Guifang Kingdom, Cliff Settlement City.

This was the capital of the Guifang Kingdom, and also its only organized city of any substantial size.

It was unlike the feudal era Li Boyang remembered.

This world was still in a relatively early, primitive slave society, or even an earlier stage of tribal clans.

Mountain villages like Li Household Village were the norm in this era.

Only powerful tribes would leave behind their primitive lives of fishing, farming, and forestry, painstakingly building large cities capable of withstanding attacks from other tribes.

Cliff Settlement City was the capital the original Guifang tribe had spent over a decade building, using up countless slaves and captives.

Cliff Settlement City covered roughly seventy thousand square meters, with the Wuding River serving as a natural barrier, surrounding it on three sides.

The entire city relied on cliffs dozens of zhang high to its north and south as defensive barriers.

Together with the natural barrier of the Wuding River, these formed terrain that was easy to defend and difficult to attack.

Meanwhile, over the long years that the Guifang inhabitants had lived there,

Cliff Settlement City had also naturally developed divisions into an inner city, an outer city, residential districts, commercial districts, and a sacrificial district.

Of these, the outer city formed the outermost ring, where members of other tribes and mountain villagers were allowed to enter and trade basic supplies.

As for the inner city, separately enclosed by two walls to the east and west?

That was the core area, which only true Guifang inhabitants could enter.

In fact, this inner city not only had magnificent buildings and hard-surfaced roads far beyond its era, but even dedicated granaries for storing grain.

At the end of the road through the inner city stood the most important area in Cliff Settlement City-and indeed, the entire Guifang Kingdom-the priests' temple.

Towering buildings rose at its center, with hundreds upon thousands of slaves toiling within.

And surrounded by those towering buildings, a ceremony of sacrifice to the Gods of the Five Directions was taking place on a raised platform dedicated to sacrifices.

Starting with the most basic chickens, ducks, cattle, and sheep, all the way to the slaves or prisoners selected as human offerings...

Every rise and fall of a priest's blade ended a living life.

As the tumbling heads were thrown into the sacrificial pit, the spectators let out excited howls.

Perhaps it was because gods existed in this world...

Or perhaps it was due to the influence of some other, as yet unknown factors...

This barbaric nation, still practicing "living sacrifices," had already developed relatively sophisticated bronze and iron implements.

The most primitive stone implements had long since been phased out, and bronze implements of every kind could be seen everywhere...

As for the priests conducting the sacrificial ceremony?

Every one of them held a sharp iron implement, their faces filled with anticipation and reverence for this sacrificial ceremony.

Had Li Boyang been present, he would have been astonished to discover that the iron implements in the priests' hands were far sharper and sturdier than he remembered iron being.

Never mind comparing them to iron weapons from the feudal era.

Even compared to twenty-first-century high-carbon steel, these iron implements were in no way inferior.

Especially when the priests cut off the human offerings' heads, a faint radiance would appear on the corresponding sacrificial iron implement.

Those were blessings bestowed by the pleased Gods of the Five Directions-and the fundamental reason these sacrificial iron implements surpassed the limits of their own material.

"What an insane tribe..."

Looking down at the magnificent sacrificial platform below, Deception Rabbit, who had assumed human form, could not help muttering under his breath.

Across all of nature, Deception Rabbit had never seen such insane slaughter.

It was neither to fill their bellies nor to survive...

They killed purely for the sake of killing, and most of their targets were members of their own kind.

Deception Rabbit felt that even those Ominous Deities and evil gods destined to bring calamity would not engage in such large-scale, senseless slaughter.

"This isn't insanity. It's faith."

A calm voice came from inside the great hall, and a youth slowly emerged.

The youth was draped in exquisite black silk and held a skull scepter in a distinctly Guifang style.

"The Gods of the Five Directions need our sacrifices, especially now that the Imprisoned Soul Cauldron has been lost..."

"We must obtain more human offerings and blood sacrifices to regain the favor of the Gods of the Five Directions!"

The youth was named Xuan Hui, and he was the Guifang Kingdom's current high priest candidate.

He was a genius who had fought his way out of nearly a thousand candidates, a chosen one who could already communicate with the Gods of the Five Directions before becoming high priest.

"More human offerings and blood sacrifices?"

Turning to look back at Xuan Hui in surprise, and even some horror, Deception Rabbit asked incredulously.

"You've already killed so many people. Aren't you afraid of starting another war?"

Although Deception Rabbit was a spirit creature, he had at least spent many years mingling among humans.

Thus, Deception Rabbit understood better than anyone exactly what it meant for the Guifang Kingdom to begin conducting "living sacrifices" on such a massive scale.

"People?"

"Do you mean those mountain villagers?"

A faint, disdainful smile curled at the corners of his mouth, and Xuan Hui's words filled Deception Rabbit with fear.

"They're nothing but a flock of two-legged sheep. They hardly count as people!"

"Those ignorant mountain villagers are like weeds that can never be cleared away. The moment you stop paying attention, they spring up out of the mountain forests."

"If their blood can please the Gods of the Five Directions, that will be their honor."

These words of Xuan Hui's also represented the prevailing thinking in the Guifang Kingdom, and even in this era.

In the eyes of this era's rulers, those mountain villagers had no value whatsoever.

Only during wars or sacrifices would they capture large numbers of mountain villagers, using them as cannon fodder and human offerings.

At other times, rulers who sent some tribe members to the mountain villages to collect tribute already counted as relatively enlightened.

Yes, this era did not even have the concept of "taxation."

Collecting tribute and having the mountain villagers worship their gods was, in the eyes of this era's rulers, entirely an act of grace.

After all, this was a world where gods truly existed.

Perhaps to outsiders, the faith of the Gods of the Five Directions seemed bloody and cruel.

But compared to those wild gods of the mountains who could not even respond, they already counted as very reliable Orthodox Gods.

Primitive, yet not quite so primitive...

This was the defining trait of civilization in this era, and the fundamental reason Li Boyang had never been able to determine just what era this was.

One could only say that the existence of "Primordial Qi" had raised this world's upper limit, yet also lowered this era's bottom line.

"Forget it. This is all your own human business."

With a soft sigh, Deception Rabbit stopped dwelling on the matter and instead stated his purpose for coming here.

"I need some books, preferably ones concerning medicine and herbal texts."

"And ores. If possible, some bronze and iron ingots would be even better..."

After silently staring at Deception Rabbit for a long time, Xuan Hui finally nodded.

"No problem, if that is your request..."