Can I get to the other side?.

Chapter 173 Heavenly Sacrifice Ceremony, Purple Air Comes from the East

The great affairs of the country lie in sacrifice and military affairs.

The importance of offering sacrifices to heaven is even greater than that of weapons.

When Liu Xie and his companions arrived at the altar in the northern suburbs, the surrounding area was already bustling with noise.

At this time, a calf was burnt in the southeast of the altar and sky lanterns were hung in the southwest, giving off a solemn and dignified vibe.

When Liu Xie stepped onto the altar, drums and music sounded and the ceremony officially began.

Kong Rong stood beside the Echo Wall and sang loudly: "The Emperor created yin and yang, and the creation expanded. The God gave birth to the seven political systems. The essence shines, and the circle covers the square, which portends the health of all things. I, your humble servant, dare to report to you and offer you my respects and title. Welcome the Emperor God!"

People watching the ceremony from a distance could hear Kong Rong's voice through the echo wall.

No matter whether they were ordinary people, aristocratic families or officials, they all kept silent, not daring to do anything beyond the rules, waiting for the emperor to ascend the altar to welcome the Emperor of Heaven.

Liu Xie's face was solemn as he walked towards the altar step by step.

The altar has three levels, each with nine steps, shaped like a circle in the south and a circle in the north, symbolizing the roundness of the sky and the squareness of the earth.

When Liu Xie walked to the middle level of the altar to worship, Kong Rong's voice rang out.

"bye!"

Liu Xie bowed respectfully towards the tablet of the Emperor of Heaven on the upper level of the altar.

"The music plays the chapter of peace!"

Kong Rong sang loudly, and ancient ritual music was played at the right time. The wood stove also lit up to burn the roasted cattle, and the smoke went straight into the sky.

After Liu Xie finished his worship, he continued to climb the steps one by one and stood on the Tianxin Stone on the third level of the altar.

On the third-level altar, the main seat is placed with the tablet of the Emperor of Heaven.

The god tablets placed on the left are Xuanyuan Huangdi, the god of night light, the god of cloud control, the god of wind and rain, the god of thunder, the god of Mount Tai, and Bixia Yuanjun.

The god tablets placed on the right are the Nine Heavens Mysterious Mother, the God of Great Brightness, the God of the Big Dipper, the God of Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal and Water, the God of the Twenty-Eight Constellations, and the stars in the sky.

"bye!"

Kong Rong's voice sounded again.

Liu Xie walked to the main tablet of the Emperor of Heaven, burned incense, and performed the ritual of three kneelings and nine prostrations.

Then he bowed to other gods.

"Reset!"

After worshipping the main gods and the supporting gods, Liu Xie retreated to the worship seat in the middle level of the altar.

"Lay down the jade and silk! Play the music of Jingping!"

The sound of ritual music has changed.

Liu Xie climbed up to the third altar again.

"bye!"

Liu Xie held jade and silk in his hands and knelt down to worship the Emperor of Heaven and the other gods in the main seat.

After the worship, three more incense sticks were lit.

"Offer silk!"

Liu Xie took a cup of sacrificial wine, poured half of it on the ground, and poured the other half on the thatched grass of the altar nearby to show the gods that they were drinking.

Finally, they presented jade and silk and kowtowed.

This was repeated four times. After four bows and four rises, Kong Rong returned to the worship position in the middle of the altar at his command of "Return to the original position".

"Present the sacrificial offering! Play the music of Xianping!"

Accompanied by ritual music, Liu Xie went up to the altar again, knelt before the tablet of the Emperor of Heaven, and offered the calf on the altar.

Bow, stand up, and return to the middle level to worship.

The ceremony of offering sacrifices to heaven is complicated and solemn, with a total of nine steps.

This was only the third one, but it made Liu Xie feel exhausted.

Fortunately, he was young and strong. If an old emperor had come, he would have been tortured to death after going through the entire process.

"The first offering ceremony is performed, the music plays the chapter of Fengping, and the dance is performed with the Ganqi dance!"

The ritual music played, and Liu Xie once again ascended to the upper level of the altar.

Below the altar, sixty-four people performed the Ganqi dance.

In front of the Echo Wall, Kong Rong held the sacrificial words in both hands and recited solemnly:

"Heaven and earth are equal, yet I alone admire them, and here I stand at the purple altar, seeking their path.

Respectfully accept the sacrifices, pay attention to the confusion, embroider Zhou Zhang, and accept the supreme god.

Thousands of children danced into eight overflows, and the effect was good and Yu Taiyi was happy together.

The nine songs are played with great splendor at the end, and the music of the harp and the harp is accompanied by the music.

The bells and golden drums are filled with joy, and hundreds of officials are here, each doing their own thing.

When the animals are in full bloom, they go in and smell the ointment. The gods are about to stay, and they must be shaken before they come.

The light in front of Changli shines brightly, and the cold and heat are not too severe.

Exhibition poems respond to the rhymes and jade sounds, and letters to the palace spit out horns to conquer the Qing Dynasty.

Send Liang Yang and Yu Shen to business, creating a new sound that will last forever.

The sound of the phoenix is ​​far away, and the gods are silent at night, covering the whole place with joy."

The ritual music stopped temporarily, and the long and obscure prayers were transmitted to all directions through the echo wall.

After Kong Rong finished reading, the ritual music began again.

Liu Xie continued to perform the ritual of three kneelings and nine kowtows, and then offered wine in front of his companion.

The ceremony of offering sacrifices to heaven was carried out in an orderly manner. After more than an hour, the seven major processes of welcoming the emperor and gods, laying down jade and silk, offering sacrificial offerings, performing the first offering, performing the second offering, performing the final offering and removing the food were finally completed.

"Send off the Emperor and God, and play the music of peace and tranquility!"

When the process came to the part of sending off the emperor and gods, Liu Xie took a deep breath and stepped onto the upper level of the altar.

What he wanted was the prestige of an emperor, the divine right of kings, and the orthodoxy of the Han Dynasty. It all depended on whether the "auspicious sign" after sending the emperor and god away could convince those present.

"bye!"

After Liu Xie finished the final three kneeling and nine bowing ritual, he walked to the incense burner, held a prayer in both hands, and read aloud:

"In the 3195th year of the Yellow Emperor's calendar, the 400th year of the Han Dynasty, the third year of Jian'an, on the auspicious day of May, Liu Xie, the emperor of the Han Dynasty, led all the officials and subjects to prepare a grand sacrifice and to declare before the Heaven and Earth, the Sun, the Moon, the Stars, the God of Wind and the God of Rain, and all the holy emperors of all generations:

Alas! Only Heaven can benefit the people, and the earth obeys Heaven; Heaven has a clear way, and its principles are manifest. I bow down to the Supreme God, who bestows blessings and auspiciousness on the three realms; He is high and listens to the humble, and is the true ruler of the ten directions.

May the gods of yin and yang, who are unpredictable, show their selflessness. May they exert their magical powers and bring great auspiciousness. May they respond to all requests and bring good weather and no disasters. May the crops be plentiful and the livestock be prosperous.

All sentient beings in the world will eventually find their spouses; all people living in this peaceful and prosperous world will live long and healthy lives.

The grace of heaven is overflowing, celebrating the longevity of the noble wisdom. The virtue of the world is overflowing, creating auspicious signs of prosperity and peace.

I choose this day to look up to the heavens and worship the Holy One. The world will be forever peaceful and we will be happy and prosperous.

However, since Dong Zhuo, the world has been in turmoil, with rebels rising up everywhere, causing the country to be in danger and the people to hang in the balance. This is truly a critical moment for the Han Dynasty's survival!
When I ascended the throne in times of crisis, I was assisted by good ministers, and I rebuilt the Yan Han Dynasty three times. I must be lenient to the upper and loving to the lower, and run through everything, guide the middle and the right, revitalize the nine states, help the dangerous and the ominous, and eradicate evil and lewdness.

I hope that the gods will be sent by heaven to revive the majesty of the Immortal Palace and save the world from disaster. Not only will the great Han Dynasty be blessed with immortality, but the people will also enjoy boundless blessings! I hope you will enjoy it! "

After reciting the prayer to heaven with great emotion, Liu Xie threw it into the incense burner to burn it as a token of his gratitude to God.

At the same time, two chemical substances were secretly thrown in - copper sulfate and potassium iodide.

The reaction of these two at high temperature can produce a large amount of purple smoke. Liu Xie wanted to use this to create the "auspicious sign" of purple air coming from the east!
In order to extract these two things, he has been working very hard during this period, even returning to the time when he was studying chemistry in high school.

Among them, copper sulfate is easy to find. There is no shortage of alchemists in this era, and the alum in their hands is copper sulfate.

What really troubled him was potassium iodide.

Unlike copper sulfate, potassium iodide cannot be found directly in nature.

Liu Xie first used iron filings and iodine to produce iron hexaiodide, then added potassium carbonate, heated and concentrated it to obtain potassium iodide.

As for the potassium carbonate used to synthesize potassium iodide, he used the oldest wood ash method to extract it from wood ash burned from various plant shells. The efficiency was extremely low and it cost him a lot of effort.

In order to successfully create the auspicious sign of purple air coming from the east, Liu Xie conducted experiments no less than a hundred times.

"Look at the fire, and play the chapter of peace!"

As soon as Kong Rong finished speaking, Liu Xie immediately walked to the position where the burning was taking place and watched the sacrificial text burning in the furnace.

At this point, all that remains is for the sacrificial text to be burned completely, and the entire ceremony of offering sacrifices to heaven will be completed.

Just as Kong Rong was about to shout "Play the chapter to protect peace and return to the palace," a thick purple smoke rose from the incense burner.

The purple smoke became thicker and thicker, and soon spread out into a large area, covering Liu Xie's head.

"Purple air floats overhead!"

Kong Rong was shocked and stared at the scene in amazement.

His eyes were as big as bells and he couldn't come back to his senses for a long time.

When Guo Jia saw this scene, he was stunned at first, and then his face was filled with excitement.

When the emperor offered sacrifices to heaven, such an auspicious sign appeared.

Doesn’t this prove that the Mandate of Heaven rests with the Han Dynasty? Doesn’t this prove that the Mandate of Heaven rests with the Son of Heaven on the altar?
Regardless of the fact that the ceremony had not yet ended, Guo Jia shouted loudly to the people around him: "The purple air is floating above your Majesty's head. This is a sign of a saint. Your Majesty is really the reincarnation of the Purple Star Emperor!"

Under his leadership, Zhang He and Gao Lan reacted instantly and excitedly shouted in unison with the imperial guards.

In this era, Emperor Ziwei occupied an important position in folk beliefs.

Even though most of the people were ignorant and did not know what Purple Air Coming from the East meant, they still knew about the Purple Star Emperor.

When they saw that there was indeed thick purple smoke covering the emperor's head and heard Guo Jia and the imperial guards shouting that the emperor was the reincarnation of Emperor Ziwei, they knelt down excitedly.

Xun Chen and other representatives of Jizhou's noble families were all staring in amazement, terrified by the scene before them.

The so-called "auspicious signs" are nothing more than a fox calling at night, a turtle carrying a stone tablet emerging from the Luo River, and so on.

They all knew that these auspicious signs were artificially fabricated in order to fool the ignorant people.

But just as the emperor burned the tablets to offer sacrifices to heaven, a thick purple smoke rose above his head. They were completely unable to explain this scene, and had no idea how to fake it.

"Your Majesty will live forever and ever in happiness!"

While many representatives of aristocratic families were staring at the auspicious sign in amazement, Xun Chen, like the common people watching the ceremony, knelt down before Liu Xie.

He took the lead, and the representatives of the aristocratic families in Jizhou also knelt down in unison.

For a moment, the eight words "Thousands of years and generations, forever long" resounded throughout the altar.

In front of the Echo Wall, Kong Rong had come back to his senses. He knelt heavily on the ground, staring at Liu Xie with an extremely burning gaze.

With dry lips, he shouted tremblingly: "Your Majesty, may you live forever and enjoy eternal happiness!"

Purple air floats above the head!

In the face of this auspicious omen, even if Liu Xie is fake, so what? There is no need to distinguish between the real and fake emperors!
Among the crowd, a young man with the eyes of an eagle and the gaze of a wolf was staring at Liu Xie on the Temple of Heaven with scorching eyes, and he knelt on the ground with the people around him who were watching the ceremony.

The mountains in my mouth shout out for eternity and eternal joy.

"I have always been concerned about the world. The emperor offered sacrifices to the heavens, and purple clouds floated overhead. Isn't this the wise ruler I am looking for?"

……

On the altar, Liu Xie felt in his heart that if he learned physics and chemistry well, he would not be afraid to travel around the world.

Although the chemical reaction just now is simple and even middle school students can do it, the effect is surprisingly good.

Not far away, the attendant and the historian were both writing furiously with their heads down.

Jiu Ji Lang: ...When the emperor offered sacrifices to heaven, the gods were moved and a vast purple aura appeared. All the spectators were shocked and said that the emperor was the reincarnation of Ziwei.

Historian: On the third day of the fifth month in the third year of Jian'an, the emperor offered sacrifices to heaven in the northern suburbs of Yecheng. When he burned tablets to heaven, a purple cloud rose from the incense burner and reached the top of the emperor's head...

Liu Xie tried hard not to wipe his eyes which were about to shed tears from the smoke. He turned around and looked at the large group of emperors, ministers and common people kneeling under the altar, and a great sense of pride rose in his heart.

"Everything in the world is the land of the king, and the shores of the land are all the ministers of the king."

"However, since Dong Zhuo, treacherous officials and rebels have brought chaos to the government, causing the people of the country to suffer."

"At that time, loyal ministers praised Wu Fu, saying that his heroic spirit was unparalleled in the world. His reputation of killing thieves in the court still lives on, and he will be regarded as a real man for all eternity!"

"Although Dong Zhuo has been eliminated today, the land of Kyushu is still in constant strife."

"Liu Biao of Jingzhou refused to obey the imperial edict. Zhang Lu of Hanzhong refused to respect the king's authority. Sun Ce of Jiangdong resisted the king's army. Cao Cao of Yanzhou pretended to be the emperor."

"Since I inherited the throne, I have worked diligently to relieve the suffering of the people and have not dared to slack off in the slightest."

"As long as the people can be happy, I will not hesitate to suffer the pain of hell."

"As the saying goes, every man is responsible for the fate of his country. In this precarious time, it is the time to employ talents. I have issued a decree to recruit talented people."

After Liu Xie finished speaking, Guo Jia stood up holding an imperial edict, stood in front of the crowd, and read aloud:
"Since ancient times, the rulers who have been appointed as the rulers of the country and have restored the country have never failed to find virtuous people and gentlemen to rule the world with them! When they find a virtuous person, he has never been out of the streets. Is it just a fluke? The superiors just don't seek him. Today, the world is not yet settled, and this is a particularly urgent time to seek virtuous people... How could Qi Huan dominate the world?
Is there no one in the world who fishes on the banks of the Wei River wearing a coarse cloth and holding a jade in his arms? Is there no one who steals from his sister-in-law and receives gold without being met with ignorance? You two, please help me to promote the humble and the ignorant, and select only the talented, so that I can use them. "

The imperial edict, which consisted of hundreds of words, progressively introduced the examples of Duke Huan of Qi employing Guan Zhong, King Wen of Zhou meeting Jiang Shang at the Wei River, and Emperor Taizu Gao using Chen Ping.

The meaning is very clear. In the past, monarchs recruited talents by either sitting back and enjoying the fruits of their labor, meeting them by chance, or choosing people with both ability and moral integrity.

However, how many such people can there be? The emperor believed that in extraordinary times, people should be selected based on their talents, and their morality was secondary. Just like what Emperor Taizu Gao did to Chen Ping, that is, "It is an urgent time to seek talents!"

This was originally an innovation of Cao Cao after the Battle of Chibi, but was now plagiarized by Liu Xie in advance.

This order to recruit talents changed the court's standards for recruiting and selecting people in one fell swoop.

From the previous priority of morality and the selection of filial and honest people, it has become the selection of talents only.

If this decree had been issued during the reign of Emperor Ling, Guan Yu would not have had to wander around hiding his identity and would have been highly valued by the court much earlier.

This move is naturally risky, as it will recruit a group of talented people with poor morals, which will in turn lead to some bad consequences.

But even the Han Dynasty's long-standing policy of selecting filial and honest officials gave rise to traitors such as Dong Zhuo and Yuan Shu.

Many places even sell the quota for filial and honest officials at a fixed price!

After weighing the pros and cons, Liu Xie believed that the pros outweighed the cons.

At worst, we can make improvements after we unify the country in the future.

Among the people watching the ceremony, many showed expressions of surprise after hearing the imperial edict.

Before this, they had no way to serve the court.

Those who rise quickly to the top are either born into noble families or are recommended by someone.

Without a family background, it is almost impossible to get ahead.

Now the imperial edict clearly states that as long as one has talent, he or she will be given important positions regardless of his or her social status.

This undoubtedly provides a way for the grassroots and people with stains to rise.

Among the crowd, the young man with the eyes of an eagle and a wolf had a bright look in his eyes.

He thought to himself: "With this imperial decree, talented people from all over the world will flock to him! Although the emperor is young, he will definitely be the lord who will revive the Yan and Han dynasties! Why don't I help the emperor, show what I have learned in my life, and become a loyal minister?"

(End of this chapter)