Aztec Eternals

The wind in December brings an awe-inspiring chill, and the capital in December is icy bloody.

Since the new king Avit Sotel came to the throne, the situation of the alliance has changed drastically, and too many shocking news have come, just like the God of War once again ascending the Snake Mountain, beheading the gods to dust. Even now that the blockade of the capital has been lifted, the hearts of the people cannot be calm for a long time.

For the civilians in the capital city in the lake, the most shocking news was that on the night the new king ascended the throne, Prince Texcoco poisoned the chief priest with the intention of plotting rebellion. Immediately, the royal warriors dispatched to put down the rebellion and suppressed the nobles of the Texcoco city-state.

The priests of the community explained: the chief priest sacrificed the defeated king Shu Troll, and then sent the head back to Prince Texcoco. The prince held a grudge, so he poisoned the chief priest in the cocoa, and then rebelled against the alliance to destroy the beautiful city in the lake. The Immortal Elder understood all this and stepped forward in time to save the Alliance in crisis. Then, the elders sacrificed the rebels benevolently and majestically, so that they could wash away their guilt and obtain God's forgiveness.

According to the gossip, the chief priest took the strange potion of the Texcoco city-state, laughed wildly and danced all night, thought like a fountain and wrote poetry, and then died with a smile on his face. This kind of death is full of aesthetic and poetic flavor, which makes many residents of the capital yearn for it. It really deserves to be the royal family of Texcoco who inherits poetry!

Even though the upper echelons of the alliance are turbulent, the world of common people remains calm, and life must continue normally.

The meditation in the snake house made Shulot think a lot. One by one the past emerges in front of my eyes, and another one passes away with the wind. When he finds free time these days, he asks the old carpenter Kuod to lead the way and visit Cusola's house. That was the first samurai who died for himself.

Cusola's home is a little far away, in a remote community on the west side of the capital. The walls are made of mud and stone, the roof is made of wooden beams and branches, and baked mud tiles are added on the outside. The houses here are all based on family units, and there are eight or nine neatly arranged houses inside and outside. Then dozens of people live together, and the basic necessities of life are assigned by the family elders.

The commoner's family can only support one or two warriors who can stand up to the family only if they form a group.

Accompanied respectfully by the elders of the family, Shulot entered Cusola's house. His house is not big, and a plainly dressed woman is taking care of a one or two-year-old boy. The child giggled and pushed the wooden wheelbarrow in his hand.

Yes, as early as hundreds of years ago, the Mayans invented the wheel and made it into a small toy. The Mexica city-state has small unicycles, balanced two-wheelers, and astronomical tricycles, which are sold in the central square. However, the car has never been able to go out of a toy and become a real practical tool.

The most important reason is the wheels. The wheels must be made of hardwood to ensure wear resistance. At the same time it cannot be a round plank, it must be a hollow ring with spokes. Wear resistance and fineness mean complicated processing, and in the Stone Age, the cost of processing a wheel was terribly high, and even many sets of stone tools were lost. These tools are also labor-intensive to manufacture.

Even if machined into shape, there is another problem, the lack of metal to strengthen the wheel. If you look at the wheels of the Middle Ages, you will find that there are a large number of metal nails fixed on the inside and outside of the wheel ring to ensure that the wheels are stable and will not fall apart. If there are no reinforced nails and the connection is purely made of wood, once the wheels bear gravity, the delicate structure will be easily damaged. Once damaged, it means repeating the costly production process again.

Another reason is livestock. Large-scale livestock that have not been domesticated, even if high-cost vehicles are manufactured, cannot improve the efficiency of action. Outside the city, there are forests and weeds everywhere. Without iron to build long roads, carts would not be much more efficient than walking.

After all, the lack of metal tools limited the development of Mesoamerican civilization, locked society in a long era, and waited for the "thrilling jump" in technological progress. And now is the eve of jumping.

Seeing the plain woman and the boy playing with a unicycle, Xiulot had mixed feelings. He thought of Cussola's buried umbilical cord, and of the wine left in the hands of the young warrior when he died. There is always a softness in the boy's heart, which makes him silent for a long time.

The elders of the family hurriedly let the woman lead the boy to salute, but Xiulot waved his hand slightly to stop him. He took one more look at the simple walls and all kinds of exquisite wooden furniture in the house, then turned and left silently, not disturbing the life of the woman and the boy anymore. When he was out of the house, he gave orders to his followers.

"Support Kusola's family according to the standards of an elite warrior. When Kunawa grows up, find him the best warrior teacher. Well. That child is called Kunawa."

"I will make him a jaguar warrior, a real military nobleman." Xiulot said to himself.

And for the nobles and warriors in the capital city in the lake, the most frightening news is the three-day grand sacrifice after the suppression of the rebellion. The blood of thousands of great nobles returned to the Kingdom of God, the Texcoco royal family was completely wiped out, and more than a dozen great nobles were purged. And hundreds of small nobles and hundreds of noble warriors are still imprisoned in prison.

The upper echelons of the Texcoco city-state have since been wiped out. The exalted name of the elder was shrouded in bloody terror.

Of course, the aristocrats in the capital were equally jealous in the face of the large amount of land and properties left by the prince and nobles, as well as thousands of vassal warriors. Aristocrats, big and small, gathered in secret to discuss whether there is a chance to obtain the rich fiefdom on the east bank of the lake, succeed the position of the lord of Texcoco, and pass on the immortality from generation to generation.

The wishes of ordinary warriors are much smaller. They hoped to be loyal to the royal family, dedicate their military force, and receive a high-yielding Chinanampa. From then on, he was able to support many children and build his own family.

Only those who are interested will pay attention to the low-key behavior of Prince Totok of Tlacopan. Totoki handed over the jurisdiction of 6,000 directly subordinate warriors, and also handed over a large area of ​​Chinanpa on the west bank of the lake. Then he divorced his former wife, married the high priest's grand-niece, who was only fourteen years old, and crossed the bridge west the next day.

When it comes, it shouts and hugs back, with a great momentum, and when it goes away, there is a breeze and duckweed, quietly.

Kepana saw off her cousin on the long white bridge. The two put flowers on each other, embraced and cried, and missed their kind and kind grandfather, Prince Texcoco, who hated the beastly man. Accompanied by Akap, he looked at his newly married wife tenderly. Shulot had just returned to freedom, so they joined in the fun.

Prince Totokki is about thirty years old, with a round face, smiling, chubby, and looks amiable. He is completely inconsistent with the samurai beauty admired by this era. He is not like a king admired by all, but like a wealthy businessman.

Seeing Shulot, he enthusiastically took the young man's arm, greeted him loudly, and sent someone to send him a long crown of feathers, a costume of precious stones, and shoes of crocodile leather. Then he happily commented on the delicious and exquisite food, the jewelry of gold, silver and jade, and the singers of various tribes in Mexico.

Shulot silently looked at Prince Totok for a long time. He thought to himself that he should still be able to see this face for many years.

Saying goodbye to her cousin, Kepana touched the dagger hidden in her chest with nostalgia. This was a gift from her grandfather before she got married, and there was also a bottle of light yellow potion. Thinking of her grandfather's last order, she sighed softly.

"My beloved grandfather. Akap has been very kind to me, and the king you are worried about has not harmed the family. I should never use your potion."

If she had married the king, would her grandfather have given her the dagger and the potion? There was no answer to that question, and Kepana didn't want to know, so that was fine for now. She smiled in relief, and then hugged Akapu happily.

Akap, who was wearing a black high priest's attire, also smiled and held his wife tight.

He has changed his attire to become the youngest priest elder in the group of twelve. Although many people in the line of chief priests opposed it, relying on Kepana's identity and the support of King Avit, he still overwhelmed everyone and succeeded in inheriting part of Kechar's position.

For the priests of the capital city in the lake, the most noteworthy news is the merger of the chief priests and the high priests. The twelve-person central priests and elders became the only and highest center of theocracy in the alliance, and the high priest Shuttle served as the leader of the order. Under the call of the leader, the upper echelon of the High Priest came in a hurry from the holy city.

The first thing the priests and elders met was to sort out the five levels of priesthood.

Everyone quickly reached a consensus that the priests and elders of the two major priesthoods were equivalent to the suzerain, and the priests and elders of other city-states were divided into chief priests and accepted the direct management of the suzerain. The coyote priests of the fifth level are the chief priests, the city priests of the fourth and third levels, and the village and community priests of the second and first levels. The five-level structure is distinct from top to bottom, with promotions and strict order.

Apparently, given the size of the Eleven States of Mexico, the priesthood level setting for the priests is really too high. But in the early days of reform, it was time to appease the priests everywhere. Once the overall situation is settled, there will be opportunities to clean up slowly in the follow-up.

Next, there are the fundamental classics and religious laws and regulations that the elders are most concerned about.

Because the elders granted Xiulot the important position of participating in the compilation of classics, he was also able to go a step further and was promoted to the chief priest. Now, his most important job every day is to go to the temple of the priests, teach the priests and elders the words, and participate in the discussion of new teachings at the same time.

Chinese characters are the main carrier of Mexica's new writing. In the process of combining with Nahuatl, the first problem is pronunciation. Most of the Chinese characters adopt Xunyi, that is, the shape and meaning of Chinese characters, and the pronunciation of Nahuatl. For some special Chinese characters, the corresponding concepts cannot be found in the existing language, so phonetic reading is adopted, that is, the sound, shape and meaning of Chinese characters are fully used.

In addition to training and reading, there is a pseudonym system that has just begun to develop. That is to borrow the shape of Chinese characters and endow them with localized meanings and even localized pronunciations. Combined with the characteristics of Mexica graphic text, extremely simplified hiragana can be developed to allow warriors and civilians who have no cultural foundation to quickly master simplified writing. The phonetic hiragana is similar to the pinyin of Nahuatl.

Of course, for senior priests, mastering complete Chinese characters is a symbol of identity and status. They also have enough wisdom to learn and master Chinese characters, and even draw inferences about other cases from one instance.

At this time, Shulot was wearing a black priest's uniform, sitting at the lower center of the priest's temple hall, next to a pile of wooden boards with engraved characters. Opposite him was the majestic grandfather wearing a divine crown, surrounded by priests and elders of the same age. The feather crown is slender, sandalwood is lingering, and turquoise is entwined on the four walls like vines. On the periphery are priests of all levels listening respectfully.

The high priest smiled slightly, and motioned for Shulot to speak.

After much deliberation, Xiu Luote still started with the thousand-character prose that he had memorized in the past. This is an enlightening reading, but also quite meaningful. After speaking a thousand characters, the general writing system will come out.

So the boy straightened up, pointed to the top board, and said solemnly:

"Ilhuicatl, tlalli, tliltic, coztic; universe, universe, ixachipul, huahcatzin."

"The sky and the earth are dark and yellow, and the universe is vast. The sky is black, the earth is yellow, and the vast universe is infinitely large and infinitely far away."

Here, Tiandi Xuanhuang and Honghuang are both the training readings of Nahuat. But the young man weighed it carefully, the concept of the universe is not clear in this era, so the pronunciation of Chinese characters is still used.

The priests and elders thought about the meaning of this sentence, and with their abilities, these Chinese characters were not difficult to learn.

An elderly priest and elder thought about it and spoke. He slightly admired.

"That statement seems to have a deep meaning."

Shulot lifted his spirits and looked expectantly at the wise men of these times.

"Ilhuicatl is the sky, but also the beautiful kingdom of God. Tlalli is the earth, farmland, and the underground of the world. Tliltic is black, it is a figure, and it also means the dead. Coztic is yellow, it is gold and brass, and it can also be an underground mine. "

Hearing this, another hale and hearty priest and elder clapped his hands and laughed loudly.

"Yes! The deep meaning of this sentence is: those who obey the gods will ascend to the kingdom of heaven after death and enjoy infinite beauty. Those who disobey the gods will sink to the ground after death and solidify into an inextricable gold stone. God The power is infinite, covering the endless land, spanning the time of generations, infinitely large and infinitely far!"

Hearing this, all the elders praised together. Priest Shulot is really young and promising, and he has learned a lot from others.

Immediately, a middle-aged elder looked at the high priest and made a respectful and serious proposal.

"Priest Xiuluote said it very well! This sentence is in line with the fundamental classics, so it is better to write it into the first chapter of the doctrine. The world is dark and yellow, and the universe is wild. Those who obey the gods will ascend to the kingdom of heaven and enjoy peace forever. Those who disobey the gods will sink into The abyss, turned into gold and stone, will never be freed. Believe in my god Vizilopochtli, His power is infinite, from the past to the future, control all existence, until the end comes!"

The high priest nodded in satisfaction and smiled gratifiedly. Everyone looked at Shulot, seeing that his expression remained unchanged, neither arrogant nor impetuous, the elders praised him again.

Hearing the praises from the elders, the young man's heart was galloping, and his face was stunned.

When the teaching of characters and the collation of teachings were carried out at the same time, the ensuing discussion entered a track that the teenager had never thought of.

"The sun and the moon are in full bloom, and the celestial places are listed."

"The changes in the sun, moon, and stars are all the power of the Lord God. He gave us sunlight, revealed the truth with the moon and stars, and then taught the truth to the priests."

"That's right, the lord god brings the light, and the priest listens to the will!" The hale and hearty priest and elder shouted loudly.

"Priest Xiuluote is right, this is worth recording in the doctrine." The middle-aged elder suggested again.

Hearing this, the high priest nodded in satisfaction again.

"Cold comes and summer goes, autumn harvests and winter hides."

"Autumn, winter? Is there any difference between these two words?" Ugel was a little confused.

"Ugel Patriarch, it was mentioned in the inheritance sacrificial plate of the Chief Priest. Winter is a divine disaster in the far north. It is a white and terrible cold that can destroy farmland and freeze people and poultry to death." The elderly elder explained.

"The deep meaning of this sentence is: the main god controls the changes in the temperature and temperature of the world. He bestows rich harvests on those who obey, and brings disasters on those who disobey, so that the land will have no harvest, and all humans and animals will die. And the priests will guide the agricultural production of believers, Reap the bountiful harvest of the gods."

"By the way, I have to add a sentence to the doctrine that those who die from a divine disaster will also sink into the abyss." The middle-aged elder added after thinking.

Shulot was at a loss again, and his grandfather smiled and patted him on the shoulder. "continue."

"Run Yu is a grown-up, Lu Lu tunes Yang."

"Run Yu? This seems to be something in the Mayan lunar calendar. It's not in our solar calendar."

A learned elder thought back.

"Then use the last evil day of the solar calendar instead. God will review the sins of the year on the last five evil days of each year. Let the believers come to the temple to repent during these five days and get rid of their mistakes." The old man The elder pondered.

"That's right, Lulu is music. Music is loved by God. He uses music to adjust social disputes and divide hierarchies. We need to formulate different music norms, and at the same time expand the singing team of the temple to absorb outstanding civilians."

"Very good! The believers in the village love music the most. You can write poems to match the music and guide the hearts of the believers," the hearty elder suggested loudly.

The thousand-character text tells all aspects of life, and the priests and elders also extend the teachings to all aspects of society.

Hearing the elders' compliments, Xiulot recited the thousand-character prose in a sluggish and exhausted manner. In the end, he received a very high evaluation: "Excellent knowledge, not to be surprised by favor or humiliation. Believe in gods, enlightened by wisdom."

The high priest Shuttle gently pinched the boy's face. Seeing the young man's tired expression, he asked him to go down to rest with concern.

Shulot then went to the periphery, sat next to Acap, and watched the elders in the center continue to argue about the doctrine. As the youngest priest elder, Akap hadn't spoken much just now. He just smiled and looked at the radiant young man in the center.

Xiulot looked at the friend he had known since childhood, touched his arm, and asked in a low voice.

"Why are the priests and elders so enthusiastic?"

Akap smiled warmly. He leaned close to the boy's ear and whispered in a low voice.

"You were imprisoned by the elders for a week, and you were unscathed. After you came out, you compiled the classics. The chief priest was busy for a week, and finally died strangely, and the family was inherited by me. Then the group of priests merged, and the high priest served as the leader. You say, priest What would the elders think?"

It was only then that Xiulot suddenly realized, and laughed at himself slightly, this is the prestige of a fox pretending to be a tiger!

After thinking for a while, he sighed softly again: "The thoughts conveyed by words will always be interpreted by the people of the times according to the wishes of the times."

Throughout December, the Temple of Priests was the center of Shulot's activities. He got up early and returned late every day, taught characters, recited different articles in his memory, and watched the basic classics gradually thicken.

During this period, he did not forget to order the old carpenter Kuod to continue to expand the manufacture of longbows. The current production capacity is rapidly expanding, and dozens of longbows can be produced every day. Kuod has now been promoted to the craftsman director of the capital, and he has thousands of craftsmen under him. He was also responsible for acquiring copper mines and copper wares, which were used to make bronze tools and improve production efficiency.

And in daily leisure time, Shulot will return to Montezuma Palace to accompany his beloved elf, the beautiful and pure Alyssa.

"You are the flower of the world, blooming in my lonely heart." The boy held the girl's hand and wanted to lean forward to kiss her cheek.

The girl smiled slyly, and sealed the boy's attack with her fingers. She lowered her head and blew into the boy's ears.

"The flowers haven't bloomed yet. I haven't seen your heart yet! You bad brother."

After speaking, the girl drifted away like a gust of wind.

The young man stood for a long time looking at the departing figure, feeling lost in his heart.

It wasn't until a light cough came that Shulot saw Gilliam standing beside him, and he didn't know how long he had been standing here.

Gilliam was wearing a plain brown robe and smiled slightly.

"The princess is still young, so there is no need to be in a hurry, Your Highness."

Shulot blushed. When he came back from a near-death situation this time, his state of mind changed a lot. For the people and things I like, there will always be a sense of urgency that I can't wait for time, and I am really impatient.

Afterwards, Gilliam saluted solemnly.

"His Royal Highness asked several times about the land situation in the capital. It happens to be fine tomorrow, so I can take His Highness for a visit."

When Shulot heard this, his face was serious. Land is a major issue of the state, and it is necessary to consider on the ground and grasp the status quo of distribution before agreeing on state affairs.

Thinking of this, he lowered his head, bowed deeply, and returned the salute respectfully.

The English words in this chapter are translated from the Mexican Nahua-English dictionary, and the meanings are explained in the text. Work hard to code and read the materials carefully. Thank you for your support. Ask for a recommendation ticket on Monday!