Longzang

Chapter 34 The Beginning of Humanity
After the ceremony to worship the ancestral master ended, classes began the following day.

Before dawn, Wei Yuan had already washed up and gone to the small square at the valley entrance to wait. The classroom was located in Qisi Hall, which was thirty miles away from the valley. Every morning at a fixed time, a carriage would come to pick up the new disciples and take them to Qisi Hall. If you missed the time, you would have to go on your own.

When Wei Yuan arrived at the plaza, he saw several carriages already parked there. The carriages were pulled by tall, pure white horses, each over ten feet tall at the shoulders, with faint clouds emanating from their hooves. Each carriage bore a different emblem, indicating its destination. Wei Yuan quickly found the carriage heading to the Qisi Hall, verified his identity with the driver, and boarded.

The carriage was two zhang tall, like a small mobile building, and its interior was very spacious, with rows of seats that could easily accommodate fifty people. After Wei Yuan boarded, other people gradually boarded, but no more people boarded after about twenty people.

Once everyone had arrived, the monk closed the car door and drove away from the square.

As soon as they emerged from the valley, Wei Yuan suddenly felt as if someone had stepped heavily on his chest, pressing his body firmly against the back of the seat, rendering him unable to move! The scenery outside the car window rushed past in an instant, but the car remained unusually stable, with only slight vibrations.

Wei Yuan had barely recovered from the pressure and hadn't even caught his breath when the car suddenly jolted, and he was thrown forward again. Luckily, he reacted quickly, grabbing the back of the seat in front of him and bracing himself to avoid a full-blown crash. But the other children weren't so lucky; some didn't react in time and crashed headfirst into the front seats, their foreheads and faces visibly swelling up.

In an instant, screams and shouts filled the carriage.

Amidst the screams, the view outside the window changed again, revealing a three-story pavilion.

The car door opened, and the driving monk laughed, "We were in a rush this time. If anyone is late again tomorrow, we'll have to rush even more."

Immediately, a boy with a bruise on his forehead complained, "How can a driver be so arrogant? Besides, the Taichu Palace is stingy. What kind of crappy car did they give us? They don't even have a wind-controlling formation!"

The monk smiled and pretended not to hear.

The boy was about to speak again when his companion covered his mouth.

Wei Yuan alighted from the carriage and saw the three characters "Qisi Hall" written on the plaque of the building in front of him. The courtyard of Qisi Hall was very quiet and secluded. A clump of green bamboo was planted against the wall on the side. The leaves were lush and green, and a refreshing fragrance rose from the bamboo leaves from time to time.

Wei Yuan followed the other disciples into the Qisi Hall and saw rows of desks inside. His name was flashing on one of them, so he went over and sat down.

After everyone was seated, a smiling young cultivator walked in from the side; it was none other than the cultivator who had driven the carriage. He stood in front of the hall and said, "My name is Feng Chutang. For the next year, I will be responsible for teaching 'A General History of the Human Race'."

The boy who had just been shouting was taken aback and immediately dared not raise his head. The Taichu Palace attached great importance to this intensive instruction, and the teachers they assigned were all extraordinary individuals; it was said that several of the young teachers were geniuses with the potential to become True Lords. Even powerful and influential families would try to win over these teachers if possible, and would never want to incur unnecessary enmity. Every scion of a powerful family was instructed by their elders before class to ensure they made a good impression on the teachers.

Fortunately, Feng Chutang didn't seem to care about the little thing that happened in the car, and said, "Our human history can be traced back to 300,000 years ago..."

The earliest recorded history of the human race can be traced back 300,000 years ago, but there is no history before that. At that time, the human race was just a small race among many races, scattered in what is now the eastern Luzhou and Hedongzhou, occupying only a few counties, surrounded by other races.

At that time, humanity was weak, and many other races not only invaded the borders, burning, killing, and looting, but some even ate or sacrificed humans. Therefore, the first chapter of the general history of humanity is titled "The Chapter of Other Races," covering the first two hundred thousand years of humanity's history.

Feng Chutang's voice was gentle and warm as he recounted ancient secrets of the human race. As he spoke, several lifelike images appeared before the lecture hall: a man, a woman, and two children. They resembled humans in some ways, but were much taller and stronger. The man was roughly a head taller than Feng Chutang, while the woman was about his size. The boy was marked as ten years old, already nearly as tall as an adult human male, and the girl was marked as six years old, equivalent to an eleven or twelve-year-old human child.

The most striking features of these people are their gray eyes, pointed and long ears, and four fingers on each hand.

"This is the Han Hai Liao people, also known as the Liao people. Many books refer to them as the Northern Liao. In fact, this name is not accurate. The Liao people do not only live in the north, but are also distributed in the northeast and east. The Liao people are numerous, with many tribes of all sizes, and there are nine states with their own kingships. Today, the various tribes of the Liao people share a border of 1.5 million li with our Great Tang, making them arguably the foreign tribe with the deepest entanglements with us."

"In ancient times, our entire human race was seen as a small, foreign tribe by the Liao tribe in the vast sea. They would occasionally send troops across the border to plunder some food and supplies. They would only start killing those who resisted. If we obediently offered supplies, we could usually pass through safely. Therefore, many people chose to offer tribute to ensure their safety. Occasionally, some nobles of the Liao tribe would want to hunt for fun. At that time, the human tribe would send a team of warriors into the designated hunting grounds to act as prey. They could either run away or resist. If they survived, they would be rewarded."

Many of the students in the audience were furious. Most of them came from prestigious families and were proud and arrogant, so it was naturally difficult for them to tolerate hearing about this dark history from ancient times.

Feng Chutang's voice seemed to carry a strange undertone as he said, "The Hanhai Liao tribe does not eat people or kill indiscriminately. In their eyes, human women are ugly, so there are not many acts of debauchery. In the first tens of thousands of years, because many human tribes often offered tribute, the Hanhai Liao tribe gradually regarded the human race as a vassal tribe and protected them. Without the initial protection of the Hanhai Liao tribe, there might not have been a human race later on."

"Compared to other alien races, the Han Hai Liao tribe was the most lenient and gentle towards humans. Although humans were considered inferior, they were still able to live. Thus, the ancestors of humans endured humiliation and hardship, multiplied and thrived, until the great war between the Wu Yu tribe and the Han Hai Liao tribe broke out."

"At that time, our human territory was located on the edge of the border between the two races. The location was not particularly important. In addition, there were several True Monarchs in our race at that time, so our strength was not too weak. We were not good at advancing, but we were more than capable of defending our territory. Therefore, the Liao race of the Vast Sea entrusted this section of defense to the human race and dispatched a large army to advance westward. But they did not expect that the human race would open the border and allow the Wuyu race to drive straight in and outflank the Liao army's rear."

Everyone, including Wei Yuan, was taken aback. History was Wei Yuan's forte, so he asked, "Sir, hasn't the Wuyu tribe always used our human race as sacrifices to the heavens?"

(End of this chapter)