Chapter 947: Maitreya Descends, Yaksha King

The three parties arrived at the main hall of the Medicine King Temple and worshipped the Medicine Master Lapis Lazuli Light King Buddha.

Apart from the Three Sages of the East in the main hall, the entire Medicine King Temple had two side halls. One was locked, and even the windows were covered by curtains, looking very mysterious.

The other was the location for this exchange, where an unknown deity was worshipped. It had a green face and fangs, ferocious and terrifying, looking like a Yaksha.

Seeing that both the Profound Heaven Sect and the foreigners were examining the statue for a while, Dr. Hua of the Three Emperors Society explained: "This deity is related to the origin of this Medicine King Temple, which is why it is worshipped here as an ancestor!"

Dagu is located at the transportation hub of the north and south, and there are many strange things coming and going. The Yaksha King of this Medicine King Temple is one such case.

Legend has it that the Medicine King Temple was originally a Maitreya Temple. It was an incense-burning society formed by surrounding villagers under the instigation of interested parties. Everyone pooled money to hold temple fairs, burn incense, pray for blessings, hold banquets to celebrate, and also serve some relief purposes.

Later, the incense-burning society grew larger and larger, and this Maitreya Temple was built. However, within three years, it was suddenly sealed by the imperial court!

It turned out that the two leaders of the incense-burning society were disciples of the rebellious Red Sun Sect, who came here to establish roots.

They learned the method of pooling money to start a society from the south and used the name of Maitreya Buddha to attract believers.

Initially, it was just some Buddhist believers pooling money for Buddhist affairs. Later, the two claimed that there was a surplus from the Buddhist affairs, which could be lent out, and the income would be kept to accumulate merit for the next ritual.

They began to lend money to people in the society, and everyone contributed interest to compete for that surplus money.

And another Red Sun Sect disciple intercepted that money with a higher interest rate.

After a month, it was indeed returned in full. In this way, they gradually gained credibility. People from ten miles and eight villages competed to join the society and pay money, and the two refused no one, accepting everything. Each time, they could return the interest in full, putting strings of copper coins and silver back into the merit box.

When festivals arrived, everyone would take out this money to buy wine and meat, distributing meat to eat, without any taboos.

The principal of this money remained untouched, relying entirely on the interest surplus, so people in the society could eat meat once or twice during the festivals...

As it grew larger, after a long time, naturally some people were suspicious. What kind of business were those Red Sun Sect disciples doing that could earn such large interest? Some elders in the society secretly asked the Red Sun Sect disciple who presided over the incense-burning society, but he made various excuses and did not tell them.

One day, two idlers discussed that the businessman of the incense-burning society often intercepted the society's money; he must have a unique and profitable business.

Why not steal his business secret, use our own money as capital—we won't ruin his business, just follow along to earn some money to spend...

In Dagu, when it comes to money, truly even gods and Buddhas cannot scare people.

At night, the two secretly followed the Red Sun Sect disciple and saw him turn left and right, arriving in front of a dilapidated small temple. He invited out a Maitreya statue from inside, knelt three times and kowtowed nine times, burned incense, and then threw all the silver and copper coins he had raised from the Buddha's mouth into that big belly.

The silver and money fell in with a clatter, clearly filling half of the Buddha's belly.

Then the two Red Sun Sect disciples kowtowed before the Buddha statue and said: "Maitreya descends, the Bright King manifests. The disciples have raised the blessing money of a hundred families, kowtowing to ask the Bright King to order it to mate and multiply!"

After saying this, a clatter of silver and money indeed came from the Maitreya's belly. Soon, they saw silver and money flowing out from under the Maitreya Buddha statue's belly. Each piece looked like a copper coin, but it shone with silver light.

It was indeed silver connecting with copper coins, giving birth to silver money.

The two Red Sun Sect disciples, who were neither monks nor Daoists, talked before the Buddha statue: "Why is there so much less this time?"

"Maitreya is reincarnated, the Bright King has descended to sweep away the demons and raise the Red Sun Great World. Therefore, everyone is blessed and has endless silver money to enjoy. So as long as everyone listens to the Bright King and recites the 'Maitreya Rebirth Sutra,' they can accumulate blessing money for themselves. We collect their money and put it into this precious Buddha statue. Because it is fruitful and multiplies, consuming everyone's blessings, it can allow the silver money to mate and give birth to small money. Finally, we return most of the money to everyone to continue accumulating blessings!"

The two Red Sun Sect disciples naturally used deception, deliberately tricking people into seeing this scene.

Later, it was indeed as they wished. One of the two little thieves was scared out of his wits by them and dared not act, but the other was bewitched and wanted to steal the Buddha statue.

They then let the scared little thief expose this matter to the believers, gathered a group of followers, caught the little thief who intended to steal the Buddha statue, beat him to death, and then performed the blessing money multiplication before everyone again.

Thus, everyone believed it deeply, developed the Maitreya Society to tens of thousands of people, and built this Maitreya Temple.

At its peak, everyone burned incense to worship Maitreya and gathered a large sum of money in the Buddha's belly. During good festivals, the small money born from the money in Maitreya's belly amounted to hundreds of taels of silver. Leaking a little was several percent interest.

When the festivals were not good, the silver money born would turn back into copper coins overnight.

At this time, the two society leaders would say that everyone was not sincere in worshipping Buddha and that the accumulated blessing money was not enough, so it turned back from silver to copper.

At this time, the devout believers would follow the words of the two society leaders, either driving out a certain businessman in Dagu who did not respect gods and Buddhas, or beating up an official who wanted to deal with the incense-burning society.

Because the Maitreya Incense-Burning Society gathered tens of thousands of people, no official could afford to offend them. Even a county magistrate who wanted to eliminate this Maitreya Society was driven back.

Finally, this Maitreya Society attracted a big shot from the capital. After all, Dagu is only half a day's journey from the capital and is under the feet of the Son of Heaven. Gathering tens of thousands of people to burn incense, worship Buddha, and start a society had clearly become a thorn in the side of the imperial court's strategy, so they sent an expert from the Imperial Observatory to break their magic.

It turned out that the mystery was simple. Legend has it that there is a secret technique for fake silver in Yunnan, which can refine white copper, also known as arsenic white copper.

Later, the Red Sun Sect people obtained the secret technique for refining nickel white copper from the West. Combining the two could refine lifelike fake silver, medicine silver, so they created this Maitreya Buddha statue that could refine copper coins into medicine silver and sent people out to cheat for money and build momentum.

The two disciples were both extraordinary people at the second step of the Pill Master Dao path, and later promoted to the third realm, so the medicine silver could increasingly turn fake into real.

They took this medicine silver out to spend. Initially, there were some flaws, so they gathered the society members to drive those merchants who refused to accept it out of Dagu. Later, the merchants were all afraid of them, so they endured it after accepting the medicine silver.

Also because the Red Sun Sect's secret technique was truly extraordinary, the quality of the medicine silver was very high. They could buy nickel ore from overseas from the foreign merchant associations in Dagu. Because the merchants dared not refuse this silver money, and had to find ways to spend it after accepting it, initially it was spent in the countryside where people didn't know better. Because many people in the countryside knew about Maitreya giving birth to blessing money, they were actually willing to accept this kind of money.

The basis of currency is credit.

Because this kind of money could circulate, gradually the merchants accepted it. Although it was discounted by 40% compared to silver, it could actually be spent.

The two Red Sun Sect disciples didn't understand any finance or currency; it was just because Dagu was a prosperous place for business with a very deep pool, and they were cautious in issuing money. After surviving the initial stage where no one believed, and after the currency was discounted, they actually established credit for the medicine silver fake money.

Later, just the plate for issuing currency had tens of thousands of taels of silver a year, and the banking business based on medicine silver could earn hundreds of thousands of silver.

Finally, this self-issuing financial institution actually attracted foreigners to invest. The big merchants in Dagu all secretly colluded to maintain credibility and facilitate their own capital turnover.

If it weren't for this, it wouldn't have made the imperial court so anxious that their butts were on fire, finding an expert of the fourth realm to break their magic.

The Red Sun Sect leader went north in person, triggering the first battle between great cultivators in the Eastern Continent due to financial sovereignty.

In order to break the magic of the medicine silver, the imperial court brought the mother coins and molds from the mint, and the Red Sun Sect also had the help of foreigners. Later, they actually cast silver and copper together, turning fake silver into real silver.

Finally, the imperial court asked a great mage worshipped by the royal family to take action, which broke the magic of the medicine silver and turned all the medicine silver money in Dagu back into copper coins.

It almost caused a riot among the merchants. It was just that seven or eight families of big merchants in Dagu City hanged themselves.

It can be called the first financial crisis of the previous dynasty...

After the Maitreya Society was ruined, the temple here was also leveled by the imperial court!

Another thirty years passed, and an expert in treasure-hunting in Dagu City found this place, saying that the Maitreya statue had been refined by the Red Sun Society and worshipped by hundreds of thousands of people, so it had actually developed spirituality.

The copper-cast golden body had been refined into real gold.

And because the two presiding disciples of the Red Sun Society failed to promote to the fourth realm, and the imperial court's expert wanted to cast spells to kill them, they hid their souls in the copper Buddha and then sank three hundred zhang into the ground with the help of the accumulated gold and silver wealth.

The various strange things above the abandoned temple in these thirty years were all caused by their souls, wanting to attract people to worship and turn into evil gods.

And to fish out this golden Buddha, one needed a braid from a girl who had never cut her hair in her life and was still a virgin at fifty.

With the help of a pure yin energy, one could fish up the large golden Buddha that had sunk three hundred zhang into the ground, was attracted to the gold energy of the mineral vein, and weighed over ten thousand jun.

So the treasure-hunter invited three grave robbers, gambled with a young and vigorous Daoist at the Tianhou Palace, and calculated a fifty-five-year-old virgin woman in a nearby village who had never cut her hair.

But when taking the treasure, the yin spirit in the copper Buddha still came out to cause trouble, smashing two grave robbers to death. After it was fished up, there was a stench of copper, which suffocated the treasure-hunter and all the villagers bewitched by the golden Buddha.

In the end, only the fifty-five-year-old virgin survived.

And even more bizarre things happened later.

The fished-up large golden Buddha had its magic broken, its golden body rusted with copper, and it was completely destroyed. Not to mention that, the fifty-five-year-old old maid became pregnant after returning, and her belly grew bigger day by day. People from ten miles and eight villages all felt it was a strange thing.

Virgin pregnancy—hearing this, the foreigners who understood some Eastern Continent language changed their expressions!

"Blasphemy!" A foreign priest interrupted Dr. Hua and said angrily: "I want to burn this place down and burn that witch who blasphemes the sacred!"

Dr. Hua hurriedly laughed it off: "It's just a story, something from the previous dynasty hundreds of years ago! Why be nervous? Why care about the words of village women and foolish men?"

But Deacon Jing beside Wu Ya sneered, looked at the group of foreigners, and said: "Let him try!"

Wu Ya also said faintly: "You continue. You keep saying you want to burn something that sacrifices to evil gods. Our Profound Heaven Sect can also burn, and burn better and more wonderfully. When the fist-practitioners were rioting back then, the Sect Master hadn't joined the sect yet, but he led us to see through the Profound Heaven of this realm! Missing the good show of burning the sheep back then, it wouldn't hurt to have another one now!"

The foreign priest sat down obediently and never mentioned the word blasphemy again. ===== CHAPTER 948 =====