I am collecting entries in reincarnation

Chapter 895: Preaching is Difficult

Three months passed in the blink of an eye. Under Li Ming's guidance, the Cheng family not only overcame the difficulties, but even Mr. Cheng, who was on the verge of death, has basically recovered. Although he is still not as good as before, he can finally get out of bed.

Cheng Yunyuan also began to rebuild his family business with the support of Li Ming. Li Ming used a little trick to send the original unjust, false and wrong cases back for retrial. Up to now, most of the Cheng family's property has been recovered, but the deficit is really not small. Only two or three of the shopkeepers who betrayed and absconded with the money were caught, but overall it is considered a good result.

This also made Cheng Yunyuan and Old Master Cheng grateful to Li Ming. Today happened to be the Double Ninth Festival, so they held a banquet at home and invited Li Ming to come.

Although Li Ming stayed in the Cheng Mansion for three months, he spent most of his time quietly studying ancient books in the guest room. Although Li Ming had deduced some causes and effects at the beginning, he was not so clear about the details. Now, after reading it carefully, he finally understood the inside story.

The immortal ancestor of the Cheng family was called Cheng Zhantu, who was a person who had attained enlightenment a thousand years ago and inherited the Taoist tradition of the ancient great power Great Sun True Lord. He was blessed with great fortune. After attaining enlightenment, he practiced hard and achieved the Nascent Soul stage before going down the mountain. Relying on the magic weapons and secret techniques left by Great Sun True Lord, a rare treasure from heaven, and his powerful Great Sun True Yang Profound Art, he traveled around the world and made a great reputation, and was respected as Master Qingdeng.

It was just because he had a green lamp in his hand, which was left by the Great Sun True Lord. He refined fire from the sky, fire from the stone, fire from the wood, fire from the water, fire from the earth, and fire from the sun, and practiced it for many years. In addition to seven fire seeds, there were also five fire dragon spirits in the lamp, so it was called the Five Dragons and Seven Fires Lamp. It was extremely powerful. When combined with the Great Sun True Yang Gong, it could emit the demon-refining true fire. No matter what kind of demon or monster you are, it would turn into a handful of ashes.

Yes, Cheng Zhantu made a great name for himself with the lamp, and later he practiced all the way to the realm of overcoming tribulation. It was a pity that although it was the right way, it did not count as cause and effect. He inherited the Taoist tradition but did not resolve the cause and effect. As a result, the tribulation was very great, and he could not survive it with his cultivation and achievements, and ended up dying.

The ancient books he left at the Cheng family were the ones he had in mind when he came down the mountain after he became an Nascent Soul cultivator, specifically to look for his descendants. Unfortunately, no one in the clan had the aptitude to cultivate immortality at that time, so he had no choice but to leave behind these ancient books and letters written in Taoist seal script, hoping that some of his descendants would have this opportunity.

If we talk about the Taoist book of the Great Sun True Lord, it is naturally extremely powerful, and is by no means inferior to the "Taiyin True Text", and may even surpass it. However, what is left in the Cheng family now is the handwritten notes and insights of Master Qingdeng himself, and Master Qingdeng was only at the Nascent Soul stage at that time. So in Li Ming's opinion, there are some tricks in it, but it is a pity that it is incomplete. Otherwise, it would also be an excellent Taoist book that directly points to the Primordial Spirit.

Judging from the notes left by the Taoist Master Qingdeng, this person seemed to have a very casual temperament. In addition to the Taoist mantras, the notes also contained many confusing insights and essays. If one was not a Taoist practitioner, he would probably be confused by them.

What's even more difficult is that in addition to the cloud seal characters commonly used in the Taoist world, this note also contains Taoist seal characters from ancient times, as well as texts from thousands of years ago. Li Ming also suspects that the Master Qingdeng may not have received a very systematic education, and what he expressed is not clear. Many of the words in the notes make people dizzy. If Li Ming did not have [General Knowledge of Characters], it would be really difficult to understand.

In this respect, he is far inferior to Yu Hua. Although Yu Hua went astray in his comprehension of the "Taiyin Zhenwen", he himself has a profound cultural background, and what he wrote is well organized. Even if it is not as well organized and rigorous as the inheritance of those famous sects, it is definitely understandable.

That's why these guys were able to start practicing Taoism so quickly. If someone else got this notebook, it would be very difficult for them to enter the Tao.

It’s no wonder that after so many years, no one in the Cheng family can understand this note, and it has been kept in the study gathering dust.

In other words, the pages used in this notebook are extraordinary. Even after so many years, they are still very intact and have not been damaged by insects or rats. Otherwise, it would be much more difficult to comprehend.

Of course, this isn't to say that Master Qingdeng's aptitude for cultivation isn't as good as Yu Hua's. In fact, he's likely superior, otherwise he wouldn't have earned such a reputation and reached the Tribulation Crossing realm. Ultimately, it's a question of expressive ability. Yu Hua's family tradition of poetry and literature runs deep. Even if he hadn't pursued Taoism, he would have at least achieved the status of a scholar. With some effort, he could have even hoped to become an official. His listening, speaking, reading, and writing skills were naturally strong. If he could understand ten points, he could at least express seven.

But this Master Qingdeng is different. Perhaps in his time, his family and fellow townsmen were familiar with his way of expression, such as the meaning of some slang in the book, and could understand five out of ten of it.

But now, times have changed. Some of the original words and the current words have different characters, and some have completely changed characters. The original dialects have also changed.

The Cheng family itself has moved several times. Now it is difficult to go back and visit their ancestral home, let alone understand the dialect spoken in their hometown thousands of years ago. This is almost impossible.

Therefore, the handwritten notes of Master Qingdeng, who originally had poor expressive ability, might have been able to write down one-third of what Master Qingdeng had realized in the past, but now, it is less than one-tenth.

Li Ming could also see some notes taken by the ancestors of the Cheng family while flipping through this notebook. There was confusion between the lines. This book was probably a heavenly book to them.

Therefore, Li Ming understood more clearly the importance of the carrier of cultural knowledge inheritance. It is said that the dragon and phoenix seals, the highest level in the Taoist world, are a kind of Taoist text in the world. You don’t need to understand them. As long as your comprehension is high enough, you can instantly understand the meaning of them by looking at the shape of the characters.

Moreover, the dragon seal and phoenix seal can be said to be concise and to the point. The same character has this meaning here, but if it is moved to another place, the meaning may be completely opposite. One character may have hundreds or thousands of meanings, and how to understand it depends entirely on the individual.

This is bad news for people with poor comprehension, because it would take an unknown amount of time to understand and comprehend this ancient heavenly book, and it might also be wrong, leading people astray. But for true geniuses.

As long as your understanding is sufficient, you will be able to comprehend the profound secrets of the Heavenly Book even from a short passage of a few hundred words.

It is precisely for this reason that no matter how the characters in the secular world evolve and change, the true heavenly book must be written in the ancient dragon and phoenix seals.

The cloud seal script is more widely circulated in the Taoist community today. The Taoist seal script is just a simplification of the dragon seal and phoenix seal script, but it is also considered the mainstream font today.

Therefore, an uneducated casual cultivator has no qualifications to practice cultivation even if a genuine heavenly book is placed before him.

How difficult it is for a casual cultivator to achieve enlightenment!
(End of this chapter)