Because the statue is a support for the immortals to receive incense, it also symbolizes the jurisdiction. The Four Seas Dragon King is worshipped in the Dragon King Temple, and the Black Water Dragon King will have difficulty returning home. However, he always cares about his hometown, so he will secretly guard it and let Han Wu get the river pearl and put it into the mouth of the river clam in a dream. From this point, it is not difficult to see that the Black Water Dragon King is also a man who values friendship.
However, Han Xue's tragic death and the killing caused by the pollution of the river eventually aroused the wrath of heaven. If the Black Water Dragon King wants to manage this land, he must replace the Four Seas Dragon King and accept the worship of the villagers of Zhenjiang Village. So when I wiped out the immortal roots of the Four Seas Dragon King with the decree of the Supreme Lord Lao, and then canonized the Black Water Dragon King as the Dragon God of this place, the water level of the river subsided.
Looking at the Dragon King statue again, although it is only more than one meter high, the moment it fell into the river, it seemed to have taken root. The dragon head looks at the rolling river water, as if guarding the land behind him. I think Zhenjiang Village can only be regarded as Zhenjiang with the Black Water Dragon King.
The river water around was slowly receding, and a huge river clam surfaced. Its mouth opened up and down, and a deep voice came out again: "Please return the river pearl to the master. There will be a big reward in the future."
I weighed the pearl in my hand. Now that the disaster has been resolved, there is no need to kill her, so I said: "I can give you the pearl, but what if she continues to harm the villagers in the future?"
The deep middle-aged voice replied: "Master, don't worry, the heaven will see clearly. This girl will be vindicated after today. When the time comes, the master only needs to burn the manifesto by the river and let her take a look. She will be able to resolve her resentment and cultivate into a pearl to protect the area."
After listening to it, I weighed the pros and cons, and finally threw the pearl in my hand. After seeing the river clam catch the pearl, the huge shell slowly sank into the water and retreated back to the river with the retreating waves.
When I thought of Han Xue, I sighed deeply. The girl was innocent. First, her father sold the river pearl without authorization, which was a lack of virtue. This disaster was retribution on her, which led to her death from adultery and murder.
Speaking of virtue, Lao Zhang has to say something off topic. Once you become a parent, you need to pay more attention to your virtue. Don't do something immoral that hurts the world, because it is very likely that this retribution will not fall on you, but will hurt your children. This is like some people who are rich, but their children die young, unfilial, and suffer from criminal disasters. Some people, although poor, still have a golden phoenix in their thatched house.
The dark clouds gradually dissipated, and the rushing rivers around became quiet. After the flood, the land was muddy. I was so tired that I sat on the ground and took a long breath. I habitually touched my pocket and remembered that I was soaked.
I was planning to go back to the village and tell the villagers to rebuild the Dragon King Temple, but before I could get up, a pair of big hands patted my shoulders: "Thank you, young man."
The palm was thick and powerful, and the heat from the palm actually dried my clothes and swept away all the fatigue. I knew that I had met a strange man, so I got up immediately and turned around, and saw a white-bearded old man standing behind me.
The old man had white hair and a youthful face, and his back was straight. He was wearing a black cloth shirt and a pair of black cloth shoes that were spotless. His bright eyes could make you ignore his age. When I was about to look at him with my wisdom eyes, the other party pushed my forehead with his hand: "Don't look around with your wisdom eyes. If you see it, it will be bad for you."
This shocked me. Who is the person in front of me?
Suddenly, he handed me a box of cigarettes: "Here."
I said thank you and asked who he was?
The old man smiled and said, "I am the Black Water Dragon King in the Heilongjiang River. Thanks to you for moving the statue of the Four Seas Dragon King away, I was able to save the people behind me."
He is actually a dragon? Thinking of my grandfather's hardships, it was nothing more than to extend the life of the real dragon. The first time I faced the legendary creature, I was still a little nervous and stood there, not knowing what to say.
The old man said kindly, "Don't be nervous, just call me Lao Li."
I took a deep breath. Since he is the Dragon King, he must know about real dragons. This also made me full of doubts and wanted to ask him why the python absorbed my grandfather's essence, whether the legend is true, and whether the Dragon Gate in the mouth of the river clam is the Dragon Gate I am looking for.
"I stayed in the village for a while and understood what you are looking for. Li Xiaozhang had met me before. I wanted him to ask the Four Seas Dragon King to leave, but the time was not right. Later, he asked me for a way to save the dragon, but I was powerless." Lao Li said.
"Please tell me what happened to this dragon? Or, what is a dragon?" I bowed and said immediately.
"The dragon your grandfather took away is a real dragon. It was transformed from Pangu's spine after the creation of the world, and our Chinese land is located on the back of the real dragon. In ancient times, the Yellow River flooded, and King Yu controlled the flood. Later, he cast the Jiuzhou Ding to suppress the dragon's body, which brought thousands of years of national reproduction and peace and prosperity in later generations. However, the real dragon's essence is damaged now. The python your grandfather brought is a part of the real dragon's essence. If the real dragon dies, the Chinese land will inevitably suffer natural disasters and human disasters again, with millions of casualties."
Old Li's expression was serious. Suddenly, I seemed to think of the Nine Dragon Gate that Yuanshi Tianzun told me. I felt that the Nine Dragon Gate must have this inextricable connection with Emperor Dayu.
When I asked him about the Dragon Gate, Old Li told me a Chinese secret he had experienced. Especially when I mentioned King Yu, I could see childlike admiration in his eyes.
Lao Li told me that when King Yu was controlling the flood, he lacked manpower, so he set up the Dragon Gate on the Yellow River across both sides of the Yellow River, issued a decree, and summoned the aquatic creatures all over the world to jump over the Dragon Gate. He was the fifth carp to jump over, but his tail was burned when he was punished by the thunder, so he was a little lower than the four sea dragon kings.
Due to the establishment of the Dragon Gate, many dragons appeared in China overnight, but these dragons were collectively called fake dragons. They were registered and responsible for clearing silt and dredging rivers. Many dragons died of exhaustion in the flood control. Later, when the flood control was over and the world was peaceful, Dayu issued a decree to confer titles on the Dragon King. The four best dragons were named the Dragon Kings of the East, South, West, and North Seas, and the rest were also conferred titles in the rivers and river basins of various places. This is how the legend of dragons came about in later generations.
But I can't figure out one thing. Is the Nine Dragon Gate that my ancestor and I mentioned referring to the Dragon Gate that Lao Li jumped over?
After thinking for a while, I asked, "Senior Li, have you ever heard of the Nine Dragon Gates?"
Old Li lowered his head and thought for a while: "I only know the Tianhe Dragon Gate, and I don't know the other eight gates."
His words made me feel like I had discovered a new world. I grabbed Old Li's arm and asked excitedly, "There are eight more gates? Do you mean there are nine Dragon Gates in total?"
"In that era, the earth was unstable and the four seas were uneven. King Yu cast nine tripods to suppress the dragon body in order to suppress the nine Dragon Gates. The one I jumped out of to become a dragon was the Tianhe Dragon Gate. If you jump over that Dragon Gate, you can become a dragon. If you can't jump over it, you will still be a mortal." Old Li said.
I silently said, "Jumping in front of the Nine Dragon Gates, becoming a mortal or an immortal, that's how it is! At this moment, I figured it out.
The sudden excitement made me laugh out loud. The mystery that had troubled me for nearly a year was finally solved today. At this moment, I understood the secret of heaven that Yuanshi Tianzun said, that is, the Nine Cauldrons suppressed the dragon body to protect the stability of the Chinese land, but the essence of the real dragon overflowed from the cauldron, forming a dragon body wandering in the world. If the real dragon was damaged, then one of the nine states would inevitably be damaged.
This matter involved the real dragon, so the ancestor said that the secret of heaven cannot be leaked, because once the nine states are destroyed, no matter Taoism or Buddhism, they will all be illusions. Therefore, whether it was the Buddhist sect's efforts to link me with the cause and effect, or the ancestor's great supernatural power to reverse time and space later, the purpose was to let me break the cause and effect with the Buddhist sect so that I could compete for this world-saving merit.
Looking back at history, since the Han Dynasty, Western Buddhism has been introduced to China, and has occupied a dominant position in feudal society. Taoism has been suppressed by several generations of emperors for this, and several times of extermination of religions almost destroyed the incense. If I were Yuanshi Tianzun, I would not want Buddhism to intervene in this meritorious service.
The Jiuzhou Ding is not only the door to suppress the real dragon, but also the door for the return of the nine dragons to the earth. As long as I send the real dragon essence into the Ding and let the essence re-integrate into the earth, the lives of hundreds of millions of people in a state will be saved by me. This kind of great merit is hard to fail to become an immortal!
And I regard myself as a Taoist, and all the skills I have learned are righteous and upright. If I succeed, naturally the merit of this matter will be attributed to the Taoist.
For a while, I felt a sense of sudden enlightenment, just like when you have been guessing about something in your mind, suddenly one day, you find that all the facts are so.
At this point, I think it's time to act. Grandpa has a real dragon in his hand. This real dragon can't die no matter what. If it falls into the hands of others, it will be skinned and galled out. That will be the fate of the people of the whole continent.
Legend has it that the Nine Provinces Ding were set up in Jingzhou, Yanzhou, Yongzhou, Qingzhou, Jizhou, Xuzhou, Yuzhou, Yangzhou, and Liangzhou. If anything happens in any of these continents, it will be a disaster that will affect the foundation of the country. Even if it's not for my own life, any person with a conscience will not ignore it!
"Thank you, Dragon King." I said sincerely. He just smiled at me and told me to call him Lao Li, saying that there was no need to thank him for this.
But then his eyes turned, and he asked with a little more doubt in his heart: "Senior Li, how could you be here, a legendary figure who has existed since the time of Dayu?"
He was stunned, hesitated for a moment, and said, "As for me, I just happened to pass by and went home to take a look."
I think this explanation is a bit far-fetched. But the Black Water Dragon King told me that my grandfather went south along the Songhua River. After getting the exact news, I felt that time was running out. I didn't bother to think about whether he often came home to visit or stayed here to show me the way. I just bowed to him and asked him to help look after Han Wu, and then I hurried back to the village.
Although the flood in the village had receded, the road was still extremely muddy and difficult to walk on. It took me twice as long as usual to get back to Zhou Changfa's home. As soon as I entered the door, I saw a bloody scene. There was a high platform in the yard, and his family's big Tibetan mastiff, which was more than one person tall, was strangled to death and hung on the beam. As for Zhou Qiang, he was holding a knife and skinning the Tibetan mastiff.