Northern Prefecture Rivers and Mountains

Chapter 72 Buddhist Temple
In less than two breaths, a loud shout rang out from the bandit camp: "Thieves attack! Thieves attack!"

Liu Daogui suddenly felt strange. He never thought that one day he would be mistaken for a thief...

Cao Ji's constant claim of being a veteran of hundreds of battles was a complete lie. In fact, the mountain path was not that steep, and it was unknown how the soldier slipped and fell.

After flapping his legs twice, he climbed up again and stood at the foot of the mountain in a daze...

But he was stunned, but the bandits in the village were not stunned. A barrage of arrows and stones poured down from above.

Old soldiers are old soldiers. They scattered and hid behind the trees, and no one was hurt.

The shouts and footsteps of thieves were heard from all directions.

Liu Daogui didn't care about the Cao family members below and shouted, "Charge! Charge quickly!"

A brave man meets another on a narrow road.

"Run!" The Cao family member shouted and turned around and ran.

Liu Daogui nearly spat out a mouthful of blood, "Damn it!"

Liu Heibi beside him also cursed loudly, "It must be the old cripple from the Cao family who did it!"

"kill!"

But the old soldiers of the Northern Palace did not hesitate and climbed up quickly.

Liu Guangzhi moved the fastest. He climbed up the stone wall in just a few steps, jumped up, and swooped down. Then a cloud of blood splashed out.

Blood mixed with mist was blown away by the morning breeze, and the thin mist in the mountains was suddenly turned light red, and a bloody smell spread out.

The soldiers were stunned at first, then they started yelling, their eyes turning red.

Liu Zun, Zhou Zheng and six or seven other soldiers moved the fastest. They cooperated with each other, stepped on the big trees and easily climbed over the stone wall.

In an instant, the blood mist turned into a blood rain, spraying down from the top of the head.

The soldiers became increasingly excited, charging forward fearlessly. The two soldiers in the front, struck by four arrows, continued charging forward with a sinister grin...

Liu Daogui also felt a surge of blood rushing to his head. He had long since put life and death aside. Everything before him seemed to be covered in a layer of blood. There was only one thought in his mind: kill all the enemies who stood in his way...

The Cao family members behind fled to the foot of the mountain and stared blankly at the fight above.

The sounds of fighting, roaring, screaming, and crying echoed back and forth in the mountains.

The arrows and rocks above his head suddenly became sparse.

The moment you climb up the mountain, the outcome is already decided.

Moreover, in the narrow bandit camp, the bandits' military advantage could not be fully utilized. The soldiers were divided into small teams of five or six people and large teams of more than ten people. Liu Guangzhi, Liu Zun, Liu Heibin, Zhou Zheng and other armored soldiers rushed in the front, and the archers and crossbows followed behind, coordinating with each other.

The enemy troops fell like wheat.

The Northern Army fought more and more bravely, fighting from the front camp to the back mountain, and from the back mountain to the east mountain.

While killing, he shouted: "Where is the money?"

I don’t know how long it took, but a gust of mountain wind blew and Liu Daogui was sitting on the corpse, surrounded by broken limbs, body parts, and internal organs, with blood flowing slowly.

“Mercy, mercy—”

With a scream, the begging for mercy stopped abruptly.

The battle had ended long ago, but the killing had not stopped. The soldiers, blinded by rage, were searching everywhere for any living thieves.

Liu Daogui did not stop them. The soldiers had accumulated a lot of resentment in their hearts during this period of time and needed to release it.

"Agui..." Liu Guangzhi's face was heavy.

Liu Daogui followed him to the back mountain. There were Buddha statues and shrines all around. It seemed that the predecessor of the bandit camp was a temple.

After searching everywhere, they found a stone plaque with the words "Qingguang Temple" written on it.

Shi Hu moved millions of Hu people from the Western Regions to the Central Plains and also brought Buddhism with him. Shi Hu believed that Buddhism was a Hu religion, so he promoted it vigorously. Buddhism then flourished and blossomed all over the northern country.

Fu Jian annexed the Former Yan and also respected Buddhism...

In front of a Buddha statue, there were piles of white bones, and the top layer was still covered with a thin layer of flesh and blood, which was obviously cut off with a knife.

The Buddha's kind eyes were looking at the pile of bones, which was strange and terrifying... Liu Guangzhi pushed open the door of the Buddhist temple, and the morning sun poured in, and there was a burst of terrified crying inside.

A fishy stench hit me in the face, making me want to vomit.

The huge Buddhist temple was filled with women and children, some of whom were terrified, some numb, and some desperate.

More than a dozen pieces of bloody bones were hung on the beams, dripping with blood. A dozen bloody human heads were enshrined on the Buddha statue in the main hall...

Liu Daogui was also an expert at killing and arson, but he was stunned by this scene.

In troubled times, there is nothing they can't do, only things they can't imagine...

A chill ran up from the soles of his feet. Liu Daogui reached out and closed the door. "Take a few brothers and guard this place. No one is allowed to approach."

The soldiers were in high spirits, and it would be disastrous if they discovered this place.

Liu Guangzhi nodded.

The fighting continued, and the soldiers became more and more excited, leaving almost no prisoners.

There were screams everywhere.

Liu Daogui did not stop him, "Have you found Zhang Fonu?"

Someone responded: "Just now I saw Ah Zun leading people to chase after him."

The temple is quite large, almost the size of two or three fortresses.

In addition to the women and children in the Buddhist temple, there were groups of slaves in the back mountain with chains on their feet.

There was chaos in the north, and countless refugees fled south. The Jin army robbed and killed them, and of course the bandits would not let them go either.

Land and population have always been the most basic wealth...

Although the soldiers were murderous, they did not attack these powerless slaves, but instead searched everywhere for money and women.

The richest place in the world is the Buddhist temple.

Zhang Fonu occupied this place for more than ten years and accumulated a lot of wealth.

The soldiers were covered with money and silk, and were so happy that they couldn't stop smiling. They even lost interest in women and rushed to search everywhere.

It was not until two hours later that the soldiers calmed down.

All the bandits were killed, and not a single prisoner was taken.

The corpses scattered all over the ground made the Cao family members who followed them vomit.

In addition to money and silk, there was also a bronze Buddha statue as tall as a person in the Buddhist hall. Liu Daogui's gloom was mostly gone. This Buddha statue alone was worth tens of thousands of coins!
There were more than a hundred stones of grain and hundreds of jars of wine in the back hall, and more than a hundred sheep and more than twenty horses in the back mountain.

The moment he saw the food, Liu Daogui's anger grew even stronger. The bandits weren't cannibalizing people out of hunger, but because it was a habit...

"Why the hell do we still need to farm? If we rob a few more bandit camps, everyone will be rich." Liu Heibi's eyes widened.

Liu Daogui said, "This bandit camp used to be a Buddhist temple. It's extremely wealthy. Other bandit camps may not have so much money."

Since the Yongjia period, not only did Shi Hu worship Buddhism, but Fu Jian also vigorously promoted Buddhism. He summoned eminent monks in Chang'an to translate Buddhist scriptures, opened the Mogao Grottoes in Dunhuang, and sent eminent monks to deliver Buddhist scriptures and statues to King Sosurim of Goguryeo. From then on, Buddhism was introduced to Goguryeo and became the state religion.

To believe in Buddhism, one must make offerings. Moreover, many Buddhist temples are actually owned by local tyrants. They occupy land, own tenant farmers, and lend money at high interest rates called "Sengqisu".
The bandit chief was named Zhang Fonu, and it is very likely that he was a monk in this Buddhist temple before.

After the soldiers calmed down.

Liu Daogui then released the women and children in the Buddhist temple and the slaves in the back mountain, and asked the soldiers to cook some porridge for them.

They all ate voraciously, looking really pitiful.

"Don't be afraid, we are soldiers from the imperial court, and we have come to rescue you." Liu Guangzhi brought his troops to calm them down.

It's fine if you don't say it, but once you say it, you'll burst into tears...

After counting the number of people, there were 472 women, 327 children, and 219 slaves.

Liu Daogui asked them to find their families.

After searching for a long time, only a dozen people found their wives and children. The others were all alone. They had been imprisoned here for nearly two years, and their parents, wives, and children had long been preyed upon by the bandits...

(End of this chapter)