Chapter 698: Another Battlefield Without Gunsmoke

Chapter 698: Another Battlefield Without Gunsmoke

From the sky above, Xiangyang at night offered a scattering of ten thousand lights, appearing even more prosperous than the capital at this very moment; the capital had been under curfew these past few days, plunged into pitch darkness with scarcely a lantern lit.

Xiangyang had escaped severe damage during the Maitreya Rebellion, and though Lyu Shiheng’s foolish meddling had nearly ruined the planting season, things were pulled back on track after he was stopped in time; now, Xiangyang could be called a blessed land, more stable than most places in the world.

Especially in the southern part of the city, where the concentration of lights was most conspicuous, lanterns hung everywhere amidst a boiling din of human voices, looking from afar like some kind of garden festival.

Surprised, Zhao Changhe spurred his horse toward it, dismounting in a distant grove to conceal his mount before strolling out to see the festival.

From a great distance, the laughter of the people could be heard, the silver-bell voices of young women echoing in the night. It truly was not easy in a world of such chaotic warfare to actually find a scene like this, which was almost like the Suzhou and Yangzhou of the days before the Maitreya Rebellion, filling one with a sudden nostalgia for the Xiaoxiang Pavilion of that time.

Well, this very place was Xiaoxiang.

Zhao Changhe strolled over and soon saw that this was actually a temple fair held before a monastery; the monastery was quite grand, and the plaza before it was immense, nearly rivaling the great square outside the imperial palace... Having experienced the Maitreya Rebellion, Zhao Changhe instinctively harbored a shred of wariness toward things like temples, wondering how such a grand monastery could spring up when desolation reigned everywhere else.

Just as he was planning to find a passerby to ask, his wandering gaze suddenly caught sight of an acquaintance.

A young fellow sat near the festive lanterns tending a stall, which was laden with fragrant braised duck: "Hey, hey, young lady, duck legs aren't sold separately, you must buy at least half a duck."

"I'm just a girl..."

"My good lady, if you fell flat you could crush me to death, so let's leave girlhood out of it."

"Do you even know how to speak? Who does business the way you do!"

"If I cut off a leg for you, how am I supposed to sell the rest of the duck? If you bought another duck, would you only cut off that middle leg to take home?"

"In front of a holy temple, how can there be a rogue like you!"

"I'm just a duck seller, buy it or leave it."

The customer stomped off in a huff, and the fellow leaned lazily against the tree behind him, his eyes scanning around, though whether he was looking at the girls at the temple fair or something else remained unclear.

A large face suddenly popped up before him: "Brother Zhou, selling yourself as a duck?"

Da Zhou froze for a moment, an expression of wild joy erupting in his eyes: "Could this be some kind of illusion? How could you suddenly be here?"

Zhao Changhe made a shushing sound: "Too many ears around, shall we change locations?"

Da Zhou immediately grabbed the oilcloth spread before him, scooping up all the ducks in one motion, and quickly took off: "Come, I'll treat you to wine."

A customer shouted from behind: "Hey, hey, duck seller?"

Without looking back, Da Zhou replied: "We've been packaged up, including the boss!"

...

"Could it be that the Chief received our message? Strange, we didn't mark it as urgent, and with the snowy roads making travel difficult, the messenger might not even have reached the capital by now." Within the secret stronghold of the Demon Suppression Division, Da Zhou cheerfully warmed the wine while cutting off a duck leg to hand to Zhao Changhe: "Whatever the case, now that you're here, we have our pillar. My mind is at ease this time."

Zhao Changhe took the duck leg and began gnawing on it: "How are you so sure it wasn't an illusion?"

"Ha, if an illusion could be this real, I'd accept it," Da Zhou said. "What kind of idiot would ask me if I'm selling myself as a duck the moment we meet?"

Zhao Changhe: "...Hey, shouldn't I be King Zhao and the Imperial Heir in the imperial court order now? You sure are cursing quite happily."

"Ah? You like people being reverent and respectful?" Da Zhou looked at him with curiosity. "I've never seen a prince ride a horse by himself across the realm to risk his life either."

Zhao Changhe clapped his hands and laughed heartily: "Good, good, good."

Pouring the hot wine, Da Zhou smiled and said, "If I liked being an official, I wouldn't have spent my whole life as a secret agent. It's just that I can't be bothered to deal with those bird-brained officials, so don't you play that card with me."

"Then what do you remain a secret agent for?"

"To see the things that cannot be seen on the official surface, to leave no place for monsters and demons to hide."

"Good, good, good." Zhao Changhe raised his bowl and clinked it against his for a drink, then smiled. "What is the situation here? Since you said a messenger was dispatched to the capital, it means there really is some issue, and it's not just my paranoia?"

"Mm... there is indeed a problem, though of course it didn't meet any wartime urgent standard, so I don't know if the Chief received the message."

"She didn't. Even if she had, since you didn't include an urgent marker, it would likely be pushed to the back for processing; she has too many matters on her hands right now. It's fine, now that I'm here, just tell me."

"As for this monastery, it didn't just spring out of nowhere on this scale. You know that many years ago, Buddhism was rather prosperous in the world, only to fall into a decline after the late emperor eradicated it. The rise of the underground preaching of the Maitreya Sect was also related to this background."

"Mm... so this monastery existed in the early years?"

"Yes, it was just abandoned for a long time. But after the destruction of the Maitreya Sect, traditional Buddhism showed signs of a resurgence; previously they didn't dare to be too flagrant, but once the late emperor died, they had no more scruples and flourished." Da Zhou sighed as he drank the warm wine. "Look, the late emperor actually hasn't been gone for very long, barely two months by full count? Yet this monastery has already been renovated, believers are donating money and goods with burning enthusiasm, and the various temple fair activities are crowded with people."

Zhao Changhe said, "There is no festival or celebration today, so why is there a temple fair?"

"There is, today is the Laba Festival. Laba is a Buddhist festival; no one celebrated it before, but now it has begun."

"I see..."

"The new Prefect rather believes in this sort of thing, so he has opened the doors of convenience wide. In theory, the current prosperity and the peace of the people's minds could be counted as a merit of civilization. We don't know if there's a problem with this situation either... instinctively, we feel that anything capable of broadly uniting people's hearts and gathering crowds to act might not be a good thing, which is why we reported it. To put it plainly, Her Majesty hasn't rescinded the late emperor's decree to eradicate Buddhism either, so treating it as if it never happened feels a bit amiss, doesn't it?"

Zhao Changhe nodded; the sensitivity of these agents from the Demon Suppression Division was high enough, as ordinary people would absolutely never consider so much.

One could only say that in such a chaotic world, the hearts of the people desperately needed something to lean on, and the doctrines of the Four Symbols Sect were inherently less suited for this; changing the flavor of gods descending to rule everything into gods descending to lead everyone to ultimate bliss required a long period of propaganda.

At present, they certainly could not compete with Buddhism and Daoism, whose accumulated propaganda and recognition had long since penetrated deep into the hearts of the people; this was also the reason why Gui Chen was so calm as to directly "retire to Mount Tai"—his Daoism already possessed a sufficient foundation, so why should the Four Symbols Sect bother fighting them.

Originally there was nothing wrong with this... but once bitten by a snake, one remains afraid of a rope for ten years; after being subjected to such a spectacle by the Maitreya Sect, anyone with a bit of sensitivity would fear this kind of gathering and association, which could easily turn into another Maitreya Rebellion if handled poorly. Therefore, Da Zhou and the other agents watched it as if confronting a formidable enemy, even reporting it to the capital.

"Mainly, we feel that their resurgence from the ashes is simply too fast, giving off the feeling that there is a hand pushing it." Da Zhou's expression grew solemn. "Setting other things aside, just the Prefect granting them tax exemptions has caused farmers to affiliate and donate their fields to them, and becoming monks to avoid corvée labor has led a large number of commoners to shave their heads. If this continues over the long term, it would be strange if no problems arose."

Zhao Changhe nodded; this happened to strike right during the gap where the imperial court truly could not spare the hands to manage these matters, and once such a custom was established everywhere, it would become too deeply entrenched to cast off.

Da Zhou was murmuring, "Why the late emperor eradicated Buddhism in the early years, I was young then and didn't know, but looking at it now, if this develops for another eight or ten years, Her current Majesty might just have to do it once herself."

Zhao Changhe thought for a moment and asked, "Has there been any bullying of men or taking of women?"

Da Zhou said, "We have been watching closely, and so far we haven't found anything of note; we haven't seen any of the deceptions like the old Maitreya Sect used either, there are no flaws, everything is out in the open. But there has already been a public security incident where someone was disrespectful to the Buddha and beaten to death by fanatical believers; at that time, brothers from the Blood God Sect were extremely dissatisfied with this and nearly started a huge fight, but the Prefect managed to placate both sides. Truthfully, the friction of brothers from the Blood God Sect and Buddhist believers looking askance at each other will cause trouble sooner or later, and I don't think the Prefect can suppress it, but your arrival settles things."

Zhao Changhe turned his gaze back, looking in the direction of the temple fair in the south of the city.

His aura-viewing technique quietly activated, as if he could see a vortex of the power of faith gathering in the sky above, flowing into some unknown place.

Da Zhou’s voice drifted into his ears in snatches: "I feel... this is just a milder version of the Maitreya Sect, inherently there isn't much difference... of course, the Blood God Sect isn't anything good either, just a bunch of firecrackers that explode at a single spark..."

Zhao Changhe pondered for a long time, then suddenly asked, "Is Daoism here completely silent, without a single sound?"

"They have a presence. But it seems as if someone is suppressing them, they keep a much lower profile, mostly staying in the Daoist temples outside the mountains... actually, the late emperor didn't eradicate the Daoists in the past, and the power of Daoism has always been very prosperous, but they never show their faces or reveal their waters, so I don't know if that's just their nature or if they are hiding something."

Zhao Changhe thought for a moment, then suddenly asked, "Who is the abbot of the Buddhist monastery here? Why does the Prefect trust him so much?"

Da Zhou said, "This also has to do with you. This abbot is none other than Master Yuan Cheng, whom you once dragged along to fight Maitreya; although they haven't used your name to conduct business, in the eyes of local officials, that halo naturally exists."

Zhao Changhe suddenly recalled the dregs of tea on the table in Tang Buqi’s courtyard back then, and he began to laugh: "I see, then there's no need to sit here and think about this matter, I'll go explore this temple and have a chat with Master Yuan Cheng."