Cursed Mountains and Seas

Chapter 184 Unveiled! The Heavenly Treasure Ship, Six Heavens' Ancient Aura! (Please vote and follow!)

"Ok?"

The hermit of Fengzhou, disguised as Master Luo, raised his eyelids slightly, not expecting anyone to dare question his arrangements. He glanced deeply at the nameless monk in the Water Margin and casually said:

"You think dying sooner or later is the same? Then go die now."

In the world of this book, this fourth-rank novelist seems to have the power of heaven on his lips, and the strength he can exert far exceeds his actual rank.

As soon as he finished speaking, the talisman on the monk's body suddenly disappeared, and he was abruptly pulled back to his original storyline.

The couple, Zhang Qing (labeled "Vegetable Garden") and Sun Erniang (labeled "Mother Night Demon"), knocked him out with a bowl of sleeping potion.
Then the video speeds up.

When the monk reappeared, he had turned into a pile of hot, snow-white meat buns, which fell back into the Hall of Righteousness and rolled all over the ground at everyone's feet.

Everyone's expression changed drastically.

"hiss--!"

"This person is actually that unlucky monk who first appeared in Chapter 26 of Water Margin and was already described as a meat bun by Zhang Qing in the vegetable garden?"

"He died so quickly!"

With just a single thought, Fengzhou Shanren accelerated the storyline, leading to the monk's exit from the stage.

Seeing the pitiful monk rolling around at their feet, everyone felt a sense of shared sorrow and fell silent.

This tactic of making an example of someone to scare others successfully frightened everyone.

Especially those who accidentally became the 108 heroes, how many of them actually met a good end?

Even if they still possessed the strength of their original official positions, they would not know how to resist this attack from "fate," let alone now that they had become mortals.
Fengzhou Shanren waved his whisk again.

A group of beautiful palace maids were moved here from the palace and danced gracefully in front of everyone, their beautiful eyes sending flirtatious glances, captivating everyone's eyes and souls.

It seems that as long as they nod, they can enjoy the ultimate bliss and be treated like emperors.

Faced with a carrot on one side and a stick on the other, the more than one hundred officials, regardless of their true intentions, had no choice but to bow their heads at this moment.

Immediately afterwards, Gao Ren brought over a bronze statue and placed it in front of everyone.

[Amulet for warding off evil spirits: Keep your mouth shut (a treasure of the prefecture)]
The most revered teacher Confucius saw a bronze statue (golden man) in the Zhou Dynasty's ancestral temple, with three seals affixed to its mouth.

The inscription on the back of the statue reads: "This is a wise man of ancient times who was cautious in his speech. Take heed! Do not speak too much, for much talk leads to many failures."

It warns people to be extremely careful with their words, for trouble often comes from the mouth, and silence is golden.

Each person took turns swearing an oath before the bronze statue, promising not to tell anyone what they had seen or heard there.

Many people breathed a sigh of relief after taking the oath.

This unnecessary secrecy step seemed to give them hope that Master Luo wouldn't abandon them after they've served their purpose, provided they could actually survive to the end.

Wang Cheng also nonchalantly joined in making the oath.

“I have the strategy of ‘openly repairing the plank road while secretly crossing the Chencang,’ which can even alter the perception of the ruler of the state. As long as I become the final winner, I can naturally make the Jurchen people, who are merely ‘treasures of a prefecture,’ forget my oath.”

Then the crowd split into two groups. Those members of the Guishan Academy who were not in any life-or-death crisis remained in the Hall of Gathering Righteousness to assist the Liangshan heroes.

Shangguan is the shipwright Meng Kang, nicknamed "Jade Banner Pole," and ranks seventieth among the heroes of Liangshan, corresponding to the full star.

Because of his expertise in shipbuilding, he was appointed as the "leader in charge of all shipbuilding affairs" at Liangshan, in charge of supervising the construction of warships of all sizes.

The hundreds of civilian officials, who had no choice in their fate, were thrown by Luo Zhenren's Yellow Turban warriors to Gao Qiu's camp on the opposite side to assist the Song Dynasty.

There is also a shipwright here named Ye Chun.

When Grand Marshal Gao was campaigning against Liangshan Marsh, Ye Chun took the initiative to present Gao Qiu with his design of a sea-going boat and volunteered to supervise the construction of the warship.

He served as the "Supervisor of Warship Construction," managing the shipwrights.

According to the established plot, Ye Chun is inferior to Meng Kang and will eventually be defeated and killed. Now it depends on whether these variables can reverse the ending.

Bang!Bang!Bang!
About half of them, more than fifty book boxes, fell into the camp along with Wang Cheng and his men.

Wang Cheng had previously used the "Rare Goods for Sale" method to conduct a preliminary appraisal of all the book boxes.

The discovery revealed that there appeared to be over a hundred boxes of Zheng He's treasure maps, but if arranged by serial number, they actually only comprised at most two-thirds of the total.

About a third of it, which is also the most interpreted part in the last forty years, was left in Liujia Tukeng Port and used as a bargaining chip by the descendants of Liu Daxia.

Gao Qiu's side and Liang Shan's side continued to split the materials in half, each receiving one-third. Judging from the progress of the Liu family's decryption, these materials would be enough for them to study for a very long time.

"What are you standing there for? Get to work!"

Ye Chun brandished his whip, startling everyone awake, and they quickly stepped forward.

In front of each box stood a Yellow Turban warrior whose martial prowess far surpassed that of ordinary people. He opened the box and spread the blueprints inside onto a long table that had already been set out.

A gentle breeze carrying the scent of incense blew by, and this world within the book directly extracted the information from the drawings, presenting it in a three-dimensional form. It transformed into dozens of golden light screens reaching from the sky to the ground around everyone, ensuring that everyone could see all the information.

Wang Cheng immediately stepped forward and eagerly examined the exhibit.

It was discovered that most of these materials contained normal text, with key, difficult-to-decipher coded text only used when dealing with specific ocean-crossing star charts, secrets of distant sea voyages, or professional shipbuilding techniques.

The arrangement of these words inherently possesses a certain power; staring at them for a while will inevitably draw you in, filling your mind with a multitude of thoughts.

"Cangjie created characters, and the writing conveyed the Way. Even if outsiders did not know the specific rules of the cryptic text, they could still use their special skills to forcibly decipher it by expending a lot of effort."

Over the years, countless members of the Liu family have probably died from exhaustion in their efforts to decipher the treasure map.

To decipher all one hundred-plus chests of treasure maps, ten, twenty, or even thirty members of the Liu Daxia family wouldn't be enough to sustain them. They probably realized this, which is why they finally gave up on trying to monopolize the treasure.

Wang Cheng sensed the lingering emotions between the lines and said somewhat uncertainly:
"I don't think these encrypted messages are intended to restrict the dissemination of knowledge or prevent others from profiting from it."

It's more like a test.

"If future generations can successfully decipher the coded messages, recreate the items on the blueprints, and pinpoint the locations on the astronomical charts, will they be qualified to undertake a certain mission?"

Let's put these speculations aside for now and look at the normal text that doesn't involve specific technology or secrets.

The light screen in front of us is a summary of the "Heavenly Treasure Ship".

The people of Dazhao all know that the treasure ship fleet is equipped with seven celestial treasure ships, each of which is at least equivalent to a third-rank living ghost or god in terms of rank, and its size is dozens or even hundreds of times larger than that of living ghosts or gods.

Like the legendary warships of the Western countries, a single divinely crafted treasure ship was enough to suppress a small country.

However, the ambitious sages of the past did not initially plan for seven divine ships, but a full thirty-six!

Wang Cheng was astonished:

"Is the reason for building so many so that, like in later generations, people are worried that the twenty-four prefectures of China will fight each other over naming rights?"

Upon further investigation, it was discovered that all of these ships had already been named in advance according to specific rules.

The fleet includes: [Beidou Qiyuan Ship], [Wanzai Kongsang Ship], [Sanyin Bishui Ship], [Shenlou Yunlong Ship], [Taixu Kunpeng Ship], [Xuanming Dinghai Ship], [Xuehe Futu Ship], [Baigu Chonglou Ship], [Jiuqu Zhuohe Ship], [Tianqian Hengjiang Ship], and so on.

Just by looking at their names, without even knowing their individual abilities, one can already feel the arrival of the mythological era.

When Wang Cheng was breaking through, he inadvertently glanced at the world outside the wall and saw the [Beidou Seven Star Ship] among them, indicating that it was one of the seven lucky ones to be successfully built.

The vast majority of these magnificent ships remained forever on paper, never having the chance to become actual objects.

The reason for this name is because the core power of these magnificent ships is that "Under the vast sky, all land belongs to the king; on the shores of the land, all people are subjects of the king."

Emperor Xuan of Han once erected a stele called "Dinghu Stele" on the northern border of the Han Dynasty to suppress the fortunes of the Hu people. It was inscribed with the words: "Wherever the sun and moon shine, all is China; wherever the rivers flow, all is Han land!"

Our ancestors gained the right to make a claim to the whole world with just one sentence, and this was deeply engraved in the "Twenty-Four Solar Terms".

According to the core principle of the Twenty-Four Solar Terms, each of the Heavenly Treasure Ships enshrines a national treasure.

Each of these divinely crafted treasure ships was transformed into an independent maritime kingdom, rapidly expanding its territory into the distant seas and establishing its own independent rules within its borders.

The larger the borders, the stronger the power!

Upon seeing this, Wang Cheng couldn't help but feel a sense of longing and wonder:

"Among the missing treasure ships were seven celestial treasure ships, as well as a large number of living ghosts and gods."

It's unimaginable what kind of power they would have if all of them were brought together.

Destroying a few small, uncivilized countries probably takes no more effort than blowing a breath.

Ordinary treasure ships may be outdated compared to Western sailing battleships, but these exquisitely crafted treasure ships will only become stronger over time! I really want one!

After a moment of reflection, he immediately activated his extraordinary skill of "listening to thunder," which far surpassed that of other court attendants, and looked at the first line of coded text in the main text.

"In the late Yankang era, immortals vied for the throne!"

In the mortal realm, demons run rampant, reincarnations are ingenious, disbelief in the Great Way prevails, simplicity and purity are scattered, the three and five principles are lost, and humans and ghosts are in disarray.
Six days of lingering energy, now officially recognized!
The followers of the devil, a coalition of a hundred spirits and five wounded demons, are defeated generals and soldiers who died in battle throughout history. The men are called generals, and the women are called ladies. They gather in a party to harm the people.

The first text you see is not about shipbuilding technology, but a sacrificial text for the treasure ship's naval crew to the three officials of Heaven, Earth, and Water before setting sail.

"Immortals vying for the throne? The ancient aura of the Six Heavens?"

Wang Cheng glanced at it and was immediately captivated by the words "immortals" and "six heavens" in the eulogy.

Because he's heard them all!

He was immediately invigorated, convinced that this was very likely an ancient secret recorded by his predecessors and a secret hidden outside the wall, and subconsciously uttered the two words at the same time.

Woo!
A chilling gust of wind suddenly blew out from the vast expanse of water behind them.

The surrounding grass and trees swayed like ghostly claws, making eerie rustling sounds that sent chills down the spines of everyone around.

(End of this chapter)