Infinite Puzzle City

Chapter 451 Daxiangguo Temple
The Ullambana Festival, commonly known as "Mid-October Festival".

Every time there is a grand event, people from nearby villages and towns come to visit, bringing their old and children with them. The city is bustling with people and traffic.

As a grand Buddhist ceremony, the Ullambana Festival is naturally held in the Daxiangguo Temple.

It should be mentioned here that this Daxiangguo Temple is not the Daxiangguo Temple in Kaifeng in reality, but the Daxiangguo Temple in Chang'an.

(Note: Opposite to the People’s Theater on Xidajie, Lianhu District, Xi’an)

The carriage did not reach the gate of Xiangguo Temple. It was still very far away from the temple, but the streets were already congested and vendors were hawking their wares along the street.

Of course, there are also various wandering performers who occupy the land here to perform and make a living.

The group simply got off the carriage and walked along the street on foot.

There were a lot of people on the street, and Xiao Ran was a little uncomfortable at first, but gradually he began to find some things that interested him.

"Tanghulu, sweet and crispy Tanghulu."

I saw a small stall standing on the street. The stall owner was sitting behind it, stringing fresh hawthorns together, coating them with syrup, and then quickly throwing them on the chopping board.

"Crack!" There was a crisp sound.

The syrup on top quickly solidifies into a crispy sugar shell.

This technique may seem simple, but it is actually the essence of making candied haws. Without this drop, the syrup will solidify very slowly, resulting in uneven wrapping.

A gentle drop is a trick to quickly solidify the syrup and make the sugar shell crispy.

Therefore, the old-fashioned candied haws had one side of the sugar shell flat, which was due to the fall.

But it's hard to control the force of this fall. If you fall too hard, the syrup will be gone, and if you fall too lightly, it will be useless either.

If you don't have a master to teach you, you won't be able to find the tricks unless you study it for five or six years on your own.

In reality, many people selling candied haws simply coat the candied haws in syrup and hang them on the shelf. Naturally, the taste becomes increasingly unpalatable.

After watching the boss's technique of breaking the candied haws for a while, Xiao Ran bought three candied haws and shared them with Gao Yuting and her two sisters.

Continuing forward, we heard martial arts performances with the sound of gongs and drums.

This category has been mentioned before. Although the performances are all the result of hard work, most of them are just for show for laymen.

For example, locking the throat with a golden spear, breaking stones with the chest, throwing flying knives, holding a water tank on the head, etc.

Everyone took a look, enjoyed the fun, and gave some coins as gifts.

People in the underworld call him a fake master.

Are there real tricks? Yes, there are, but they are few. The main reason is that outsiders can't see the tricks.

For example, if you slap tofu, the surface of the tofu may not break, but the inside will be turned into a paste.

This is something that only experts can see. Outsiders cannot see it and find it boring. Who would give you money for it?

The road leading to Daxiangguo Temple is very lively with the martial arts performances, hawking and gong sounds in the first half.

The group walked and looked around, and they never let go of various snacks.

The second in command who followed behind also benefited a lot. There were many snacks. Gao Yuting and the others only ate one piece to taste the flavor, and the rest were left to the second in command to deal with.

As we walked further along the street, it gradually became less loud.

The back half of the street is full of literary businesses, such as storytelling, crosstalk, riddle guessing, and fortune telling.

There is a crossroads between the two, and it is obvious that there is someone responsible for dividing the area.

As the saying goes, there is a ten-foot distance between people who are close to each other, scholars are not adjacent to martial artists, and storytellers are not adjacent to fortune tellers.

In this era, these rules almost need no explanation.

"Get out of the way, get out of the way!!"

A sedan chair rushed through the crowd.

The two night watchmen in front had sticks in their hands and would hit anyone who was blind.

When the people who were beaten saw who was coming, they shut their mouths and stood aside obediently.

Some outsiders were unaware of the situation, but were also pulled over by kind-hearted local people.

"Don't block the way. This is someone from the Zou family. They are not easy to mess with. If you kill someone, even if you report to the police, no one will respond."

Xiao Ran and others were watching this scene from a distance, only to hear Gu Baifeng frown and say, "The Zou family is too domineering, more vicious than bandits. No wonder they hacked down the gambling house and burned the dock."

"Yes, you deserve it."

Xiao Ran stood aside, looking at the sedan chair going away, curled his lips, turned around and said to Gao Yuting beside him:
"Yuting, you guys go first later, I'll go do something else."

Seeing that they had reached the gate of Xiangguo Temple, Xiao Ran motioned to Gao Yuting and the others to go in first.

"it is good."

Gao Yuting nodded, knowing that Xiao Ran left suddenly because he had something to do.

Without waiting for her two best friends to ask questions, she put her arms around their arms and pulled them together and walked quickly inside.

The second in command glanced at Xiao Ran, exchanged glances with Xiao Ran, then released a crow from his arms, let it fly away, and it circled around.

If anything goes wrong, the second in command can use a crow to quickly find Xiao Ran and inform him of the situation.

Similarly, Xiao Ran's every move can naturally be relayed to Gao Yuting through the second in command, so that Gao Yuting can come to support at any time.

Xiao Ran quickly disappeared in the crowd. After a while, when he appeared again, he had changed into a nightgown and was standing on the beam, looking around.

Finally, his eyes were fixed on the direction of the Daxiangguo Temple in front of him.

There was a faint fluorescent light flashing in the black and white eyes, and in the air around the Xiangguo Temple, there was an indescribable charm shrouding the huge temple.

"No wonder those ghosts could only follow the lama to the gate of Xiangguo Temple and dared not follow any further."

Xiao Ran squatted down, and a huge chessboard seemed to have emerged in his mind.

The forces on the chessboard were complicated, and the emperor was sitting in the center of the palace, shrouded in a huge haze. On the left was the jackal-like Zou family, on the right was the Daxiangguo Temple, and the Huaxue Temple, about which no definite information had yet been heard.

Like guards on a chessboard, surrounding the emperor.

In front of the emperor was the leader of the imperial guards who had never appeared before.

Looking at the other side of the chessboard, those scattered and neutral underworld forces are scattered in every corner of the chessboard. They look like neutral parties that no one cares about, or like traitors wearing masks.

Huang Chao and his group stood in the middle, changing their positions from time to time, making it hard to figure out what this guy was going to do.

Xiao Ran and Gao Yuting stood together with a group of people from the martial arts world, but they were obviously out of tune with the people around them. Although their positions were clear, they formed a clear gap with the people around them.

Many forces on the huge chessboard appeared under Xiao Ran's nose, and the situation was not optimistic.

Whether it is killing the emperor, killing Huang Chao, dealing with Huaxue Temple, or dealing with the Zou family, any one of them is not easy.

Xiao Ran looked at the many forces on the chessboard and suddenly frowned. A ghost climbed up from downstairs and said a few words to Xiao Ran.

"Hey, it's good that you're here." Xiao Ran nodded, took out a stack of Yin banknotes from the space and handed it to the ghost.

Then his thoughts were fixed on Huang Chao.

"This move still depends on you!"

As he spoke, Xiao Ran stood up, and his figure quickly shuttled across the beams of the pavilion, climbing over the wall from an inconspicuous corner on the right side of the temple.

The Daxiangguo Temple, as the most famous Buddhist temple in Chang'an City, was once the largest in the world.

Until Emperor Wuzong's suppression of Buddhism, more than half of the temple buildings of Daxiangguo Temple were demolished, nearly two-thirds of the monks were forced to return to secular life, and a large number of scriptures were burned.

After that, the status of Daxiangguo Temple fell into decline until the current emperor welcomed the Buddha's bones again and rebuilt Buddhist temples, but Daxiangguo Temple was never able to recover to its original size.

Can't say it's a pity, can only say it's what he deserves.

Even now, Daxiangguo Temple is far from its heyday, but the number of properties and land deeds under its name is still outrageous.

It is conceivable that when this dilapidated temple was in its heyday, it occupied countless people's money.

Xiangguo Temple is divided into two sections, the front section is newly built and the back section is the original one.

Ordinary pilgrims could only burn incense and worship Buddha in the front. The Ullambana Festival was also held in the front. Xiao Ran walked towards the back, climbing over eaves and walls all the way. Instead, the place became more and more quiet as he walked.

"The little ghosts said that the lama came to Xiangguo Temple three days ago and has not come out since then. But it is not easy to find him in such a big courtyard."

The further you go inside, the more you can feel the Buddhist energy floating in the air.

This Buddhist energy, according to what the Taoist of Yinshan said in the [Zhen Jing] he gave himself, can also be understood as evil.

It's just that this is a kind of evil formed by mental power.

Taoists regard the beauty of mountains and rivers as evil spirits, while Buddhists regard the power of people's thoughts as evil spirits.

At the end of the day, there's not much difference.

However, neither of them is possible for ordinary people to control, so the [Zhen Jing] does not mention how to make use of this evil spirit.

But it is also mentioned above that the thoughts of all living beings, although seemingly the power of Buddhist piety, are actually the most poisonous thing in the world.

Those who are not well versed in Buddhism will suffer the consequences if their thoughts are disturbed.

"My lord, please come this way."

At this time, Xiao Ran heard footsteps, and saw from afar two young monks and a middle-aged man walking in.

Seeing this, Xiao Ran simply followed behind and walked inside.

The only difference is that they walked on the ground, while Xiao Ran was on the beam.

His steps were so fast and silent that the three people below didn't even notice Xiao Ran above their heads.

"Om~"

After passing through a small door, a courtyard appeared in front of us.

The two young monks stopped and stepped back with their hands clasped together.

The middle-aged man took off his shoes and socks and walked barefoot on the bluestone slabs.

He clasped his hands together, looked humble, took a few steps forward, then knelt on the ground, prostrating himself.

He bowed every step and kneeled every three steps, and continued kneeling all the way to the door.

Then he took out a letter from his bosom and said, "Master Lingfa, I am here to greet you. This is a letter from my grandfather."

As he spoke, the middle-aged man took out a letter from his arms and raised it above his head with both hands.

"It turns out it's him!"

When Xiao Ran heard the middle-aged man talking about the master of spiritual techniques, he was suddenly surprised. This master of spiritual techniques was the one who had just been selected as one of the judges of this sword review.

"Om..."

At this time, the door of the room slowly opened a crack, and a breeze blew in, blowing the letter in the middle-aged man's hand and floating it into the door.

After a while, I heard someone say, "Your Excellency has come from afar. I am sorry for not welcoming you. Amitabha."

The middle-aged man kneeling on the ground heard this and was horrified: "Master, why do you say that? Is there something wrong with my Zou family?"

"Zou family?"

Xiao Ran narrowed his eyes and looked at the middle-aged man, thinking back to the Zou family team he had seen in front of the mountain gate before. He didn't expect that they were here to find this monk.

This is not surprising. Since this monk is from the imperial court, it is natural that he is in collusion with the Zou family.

Just as Xiao Ran was thinking about it, he heard thunderous voices coming from behind the door: "How long are you going to hide? Why don't you come out!"

As he spoke, a golden light flew out from the crack in the door, and it turned out to be a golden Zen staff.

The Zen stick jingled, like a flying rainbow, and it actually smashed towards the place where Xiao Ran was hiding.

(End of this chapter)