Am I the old man who's always by my apprentices' side?

Chapter 225 Stay in the Qiankun Bag

On the other side, after the clerk ran back to the county office breathlessly to deliver the message, He Shilie suddenly heard that it was the sect leader's request. He immediately dispatched the Mighty Guard and personally led Guo Dingfang and Luo Youchun to clear the area.

"You are blocking the people here, preventing anyone from entering by mistake!"

After uttering those words, Zhang Chengdao immediately flew across the bridge and then slowly walked into the Qin King Temple.

This is a matter of etiquette.

The Qin King Temple was deserted; even the temple keeper had been taken away by the guards. All that could be seen was the bronze cauldron in front of the statue and the incense sticks stuck inside.

This Qin King Temple seems to have a good number of worshippers. If it were in a world with abundant spiritual energy, this "Qin King" would probably be able to attain the position of a terrestrial immortal.

Zhang Chengdao shook his head slightly and sighed.

Unfortunately, in this world with scarce spiritual energy, even the concentration of spiritual energy now that it has just begun to recover is not enough to support the cultivation of ghost cultivators. The reason why it is more difficult for ghost cultivators to cultivate than ordinary mortals is that they need more spiritual energy and have a more demanding requirement for the concentration of spiritual energy.

Because if ordinary people don't have enough spiritual energy, they can at most not cultivate, but if ghost cultivators don't have enough spiritual energy, they will dissipate!

Spiritual energy is to ghost cultivators what oxygen is to mortals—they would die without it!

Therefore, among ghost cultivators, a new school called "Incense God" has emerged.

Although the "Incense God" sounds noble and is even called a "god", it actually has many drawbacks.

The cultivation and magical power of the incense god are highly dependent on incense offerings. Once the incense offerings weaken or even disappear, the cultivation and magical power brought by the incense offerings will gradually disappear. Therefore, many cultivators who practiced the incense god practice have gone astray in order to obtain incense offerings.

The so-called "going astray" refers to the practice of satisfying the needs of ordinary people without any bottom line in pursuit of a flourishing incense offering, or inducing ordinary people to "proclaim their religion." In the beginning, this may indeed bring a very prosperous incense offering, but at the same time, the incense offerings made because of desires will also bring a great deal of "toxicity."

Of course, this "poison" is not the same as that "poison." The so-called incense poison refers to the assistance that believers seek from the incense deity when pursuing improper benefits or engaging in behavior that harms others.

In such situations, the incense-offering deity often finds itself in a dilemma.

If you help others, the karmic burdens of the believers' evil deeds will also fall on your shoulders. When they accumulate to a certain extent, they will form a tribulation of lightning. If things go wrong, you could end up with your soul and spirit destroyed.

If we don't help, the believers who gathered for profit will stop making offerings. Once the incense offerings weaken, the cultivation and magical power brought by the incense offerings during the previous heyday will also weaken, meaning that all the past efforts will have been in vain.

This is what is known as "incense poison".

However, the path of worshipping incense gods is not without its advantages.

The biggest advantage is that it is very difficult to actually die during the cultivation process.

The path of "incense god" is not exclusive to ghost cultivators. Many mountain spirits also like to follow this path. Mountain gods, river gods, and water gods all like to follow the path of incense god. However, the offerings they receive are not from humans, but from small demons and monsters in the mountains that have developed intelligence, or relatively intelligent animals, etc.

Once one has successfully cultivated, one can connect with mountains and rivers. Even if one's physical body is destroyed, as long as the mountains still stand and the water still flows, one can slowly reassemble into a new form due to the "faith" of the spirits and animals in the mountains, until one is "resurrected".

In human settlements, the incense-burning gods in human society also have this wonderful effect.

For example, if a local deity such as the City God or the Earth God is killed in physical form or in spirit, as long as the incense offerings continue and the people's wishes persist, the scattered soul will eventually be able to slowly reassemble and thus "revive".

This is the greatest wonder of the incense-burning and deity-based religion.

The Qin King Temple in front of us follows the path of incense and deity worship, but it is limited by the concentration of spiritual energy in this world, so it cannot be truly cultivated at all - there is almost no spiritual energy, so how can it survive?

Perhaps, the only way to maintain the existence of the soul is through incense offerings.

This explains why Murong Ruyan felt the "Qin King Ghost" was in a daze when she said she saw it.

To put it bluntly, if a person can only maintain physical nutrition, then they are a "vegetative state person".

A "ghost," especially one that follows the path of incense offerings and deities, is only capable of maintaining the incense offerings; it is a "plant ghost," meaning it can only continue to exist and is unable to react significantly to external stimuli because the concentration of spiritual energy is too low!

Zhang Chengdao could almost clearly "see" that the "Qin King Ghost" with a clear face and lifeless eyes was sitting in the statue. The incense in the bronze cauldron was slowly drifting into his soul, but this incense could only barely maintain the existence of his soul, and could not restore his consciousness at all.

Should we help him...?

Zhang Chengdao hesitated for a moment.

With a cheat code at your fingertips, you can certainly help. For example, if you plant some trees from the mall in the Qin King Temple, the spiritual energy there will gradually increase, and the "Qin King Ghost" will slowly "revive".

For example, you could simply take him back to White Stone Mountain and let him soak in the Heavenly Pool for a while. Water is yin, and the Heavenly Pool is full of spiritual spring water. It wouldn't take more than a few days for him to wake up.

The key question is, after you help this person, whether they become an enemy or a friend.

Firstly, although the path of worshiping deities through incense is subject to great restrictions, the cultivation and magical power gained through incense offerings are much easier to obtain than through self-cultivation. And if this "Qin King Ghost" is indeed the Qin King from thousands of years ago, the fact that it has survived for so long shows just how prosperous its incense offerings are.

Frankly speaking, if this "Qin King Ghost" were to revive, with his existing incense offerings, he could recover in less than half a month. At that time, with his abundant incense offerings, his strength would probably far surpass mine. If he were an enemy rather than a friend, wouldn't that be digging a hole for myself?

But Zhang Chengdao couldn't simply wipe out this "Qin King Ghost".

First of all, there's no grudge between them, so why would he go crazy and insist on carrying this karmic burden?

Secondly, he was genuinely curious about how "incense and deity" could have appeared in ancient times when martial arts didn't even exist. Moreover, the conditions for this "Qin King Ghost" to survive from thousands of years ago to the present day must have been extremely demanding. How did this "Qin King" foresee this day while he was still alive?

Zhang Chengdao didn't believe it was just a coincidence, because it was too much of a coincidence!
Unless this "King of Qin" isn't from this world, or is also a time traveler, or...

In an instant, Zhang Chengdao suddenly remembered the few words he had heard from the "National Preceptor Mingjing" when he killed him some time ago, such as that he and the other person were both imprisoned beings. In particular, the path of this "National Preceptor Mingjing" was obviously a cultivation path born from a very mature cultivation system - even if it was a crooked path, it was still a mature system, not something he had explored on a whim. This was very intriguing.

Could it be that this "King of Qin" and the "Master of the Mirror" are from the same place?
Or, according to the rules of Diaoniang novels, this world is some kind of hidden world, which is why the "National Preceptor Mingjing" said those words back then.

With too little information available, Zhang Chengdao was unable to draw any further conclusions, especially since he was completely unable to communicate with the "Qin King Ghost" in front of him.

But...

Zhang Chengdao took out a Qiankun bag he had made himself, threw in a few high-grade spirit stones, then circulated his spiritual power to slowly "pull" the "Qin King Ghost" out of the statue and finally stuff it into the Qiankun bag.

In any case, he couldn't let such an uncertain factor remain under his rule. At worst, he could cultivate for a longer period of time and reach the Nascent Soul stage. At that time, even if the incense god who had been weak for thousands of years recovered, he probably wouldn't be able to contend with him at all.

The cultivators of the incense-burning deity path can only rely more on incense offerings, but that doesn't mean they don't need to cultivate themselves—if they don't cultivate, no matter how much incense they have, they can't use it for their own benefit!
Before you get to a certain level playing Bubble Bobble or Candy Crush on your own, you should stay in the Qiankun Bag for now!
With the matter resolved, Zhang Chengdao flew out of the Qin King Temple and landed back beside Heshilie Tudi, who was waiting by the bridge.

"This area can be released now. For the time being, it will not appear in this city again."

Zhang Chengdao nodded slightly to He Shilie and said.

He Shilie suddenly responded and then ordered Guo Dingfang and Luo Youchun to withdraw the Weiwu Guard.

As he gave the orders, his heart pounded with anxiety.

The sect leader only went in for a short while, and he came back so easily, even saying that the ghost "wouldn't appear again." This...

Doesn't that sound a bit brutal?
Did he accidentally beat someone to death?

Although He Shilie's mind was in turmoil, he showed no sign of it on his face. He only mentioned his "work" during this period: "Sect Master, Chengji County and the other two counties have been sorted out one after another. Moreover, I have ordered people to remake the boundary markers and change the words on the city gates. According to the standards, they will be Chengji City and the other two fourth-level cities in the future."

"The fields in the three cities of Chengji have been allocated. After dealing with some wrongful cases, as the sect leader predicted, the local people have great trust in the Mighty Army. However, it is still difficult to control the Mighty Army to do things such as building houses and helping to cultivate the fields. After all, the Mighty Army members are all of high birth, and it is uncertain whether they are willing or not to do it. Therefore, I did not force them."

"Fourth Senior Sister is still setting up the teleportation array. When we captured Xiangwu City, I captured a total of eight thousand enemy soldiers. As per Fourth Senior Sister's request, two thousand were allocated to each city, all to be used for building 'passenger teleportation stations.' Xiangwu City is the largest city, and its population is already considered a second-tier city, so I left four thousand people to build the teleportation station. The innermost part, where the teleportation array is set up, is almost finished and will be usable in about two or three days. However, it will probably take at least two months for the entire 'passenger teleportation station' to be completely completed..."

After listening for a while, Zhang Chengdao stroked Heshilie's fur with satisfaction: "No rush, you've already done very well, even better than your father."

Sure enough, upon hearing his sect leader say this, He Shilie's face suddenly turned even redder with excitement. Because of his dark complexion, it appeared reddish-black, which looked quite comical.

Zhang Chengdao wasn't deliberately praising him; rather, it was because Heshilie had suddenly and genuinely understood part of his meaning and was even able to take initiative and adjust specific strategies at any time, which was the most valuable thing!
Especially since Heshilie Tudi himself came from a noble and aristocratic family, it was easy for people of that background to understand, but difficult to get them to genuinely agree and put it into practice.

Who wouldn't want to enjoy privileges when they have power in their hands? Who wouldn't want to solidify a society where they can enjoy privileges for a long time?
Even in another time and space, among so many people throughout history, those who were born into the ruling and aristocratic classes but devoted themselves to progressive ideas are few and far between.

They betrayed their families, their relatives, and their social classes, risking everything and dying one after another, all for the sake of fairness for the poor, for our fairness.

Such precious sentiments are truly rare.

You should know that you don't need much; just learning even a fraction of that idea will make you a force to be reckoned with in this time and space, and a flame that will soon ignite the entire world.

(End of this chapter)