Northern Dynasties Imperial Industry

After finalizing the deal, Li Tai took advantage of the situation and asked to visit the temple.

The old monk did not refuse, and thoughtfully arranged for several monks who were good at talking to serve as guides and explain along the way.

This temple is very large and can be roughly divided into several areas such as preaching scriptures and Dharma, worshiping Buddhist objects, monks' life, and storage and production. Apart from some private areas that are not open to the public, the hall dedicated to Buddhist relics is the most grand. Several monks are also trying their best to recommend their signature industry display area to Li Tai.

"Although there are many virtuous and eminent monks with profound Buddhist teachings in Beijing, when it comes to worshiping the Buddha's Dharma, the temple also has its own unique features. The Thousand Buddhas Hall here offers so many Dharma and images that many other places cannot compare!"

Li Tai listened to the monk's attentive introduction and stepped into a tall and magnificent palace.

But from the outside, this palace is comparable to the imperial palace in Chang'an City, but the inside is even more unique. Looking around, there are large and small Buddha statues everywhere, each with unique and exquisite shapes and different materials.

When Li Tai saw this scene, he was also amazed. He turned to several monks and asked: "If you want to pay homage to the Dharma here, how much charity will you need to give?"

Faced with this rare wealthy customer, several monks did not mince words and directly introduced the prices of materials of different sizes for various Buddha statues.

After listening to this, Li Tai felt that the deal was really good. There might not be as many as a thousand Buddha statues enshrined here, but if they were all sold at the price introduced by the monks, it would definitely be an eye-watering sum. of huge sums of money.

"There are many statues in the temple. Where can I get these gold and bronze materials?"

When Li Tai saw some of the monks showing signs of vigilance, he smiled again and said, "My farm produces quite a lot of copper materials, but I have been short of money in the pass for a long time. I saw that there are a lot of materials used in the temple, so I have a question."

The monks' expressions softened slightly when they heard this, but they did not ask further questions. They were obviously not very interested in this.

Seeing their expressions like this, Li Tai stopped continuing the topic. Although he has not found any conclusive evidence since entering the temple, he is basically certain that there must be a crime involved in the temple.

Such a large temple should be a popular incense resort for believers. But Li Tai and the others didn't see many believers coming to worship along the way, and the temple seemed to be heavily guarded, as if it was being secretly guarded.

Since his main business is casting Buddha statues, he refuses to talk about the source of the raw materials. Li Tai took the initiative to talk about it, and they were not curious to ask. The required materials could not be produced out of thin air.

Although it cannot be ruled out that Li Tai's preconceptions and far-fetched inferences are the reason, it is here to stay, and we will wait for a shot to see if there is any jujube.

Li Tai was guided by the monks to enjoy the tour again. In the evening, a loud and powerful bell rang in the temple. The monk explained to Li Tai that the bell was to summon the monks in the temple to gather for evening classes and sing Sanskrit, and invited Li Tai to join them. Past.

Li Tai also wanted to see how many people were in the temple, so he followed them to the square in front of the temple hall. When they arrived, many monks had gathered here, and it was completely dark at first glance.

Nowadays, it is not fashionable for monks to have a hair style with no hair left, but there is no picture of a bright head.

As a distinguished guest in the temple, Li Tai was placed in a row of seats next to the lecture platform. In addition to him, there are some male and female believers sitting here, who should be wealthy and powerful people nearby.

After Li Tai sat down, he noticed that several people among them were quite wary of their group and kept looking at them. But he still acted like a arrogant and dandy, imitating Li Ya's unruly behavior and ignored it.

After half an hour of Sanskrit singing in the evening class, Li Tai saw that there were about two thousand monks and believers in the square, and more than half of them were novice monks in their prime. This does not include the craftsmen slaves in the workshop and the monks and monks at the foot of the mountain. If they were all added up, this temple alone would have a crowd of thousands.

Seeing the crowds in this temple, Li Tai couldn't help but sigh inwardly. A temple is like this. It can be inferred how powerful the entire Kansai Samana force is. The most important thing is that if he directly leads troops to attack, he may not be able to capture the temple for a while.

No wonder the Western Wei government was so short of money that it waited until the period of Emperor Wu of the Northern Zhou Dynasty to start attacking Samananas.

Without the support of a strong national power and a relatively stable external environment, the comprehensive implementation of the policy of exterminating Buddhism will not only cause great turmoil to the world, but the temple itself is not an easy bone to chew on. Although Yu Wentai fought with Gao Huan vigorously, he only dared to beat the autumn wind like slicing sausages.

After the evening class, Li Tai and his entourage were led back to the guest house.

The old monk from before then walked in and told him that the bronze statue had been moved down the mountain as required. After the money and goods transaction is completed tomorrow, it can be shipped to Chang'an immediately.

The old monk also brought a lot of wine, meat and food. Nowadays, ascetics do not have strict dietary rules, so the food is quite rich.

But Li Tai was still worried that the temple was playing tricks on him, so he took the old monk to have a drink at the same table, and he would only eat the food that the other monk had eaten.

The old monk at the table also hinted that he wanted to take stock of the goods that Li Tai had brought. Naturally, Li Tai would not comply with his wish. He changed the topic with a haha, and after a while, he simply pretended to be drunk and started having fun. .

The old monk saw that he was already drunk and was a bit dissolute, and he was gradually losing his ability to drink. He could only get up and leave first, but he still left more than two hundred monk soldiers guarding outside the courtyard.

When the old monk left, Li Tai's eyes suddenly became clear. He ordered Zhang Shi Nu and others to go into the house and put on armor. At the same time, he ordered the monks outside the courtyard to come in, sprinkled gold and silver in the courtyard, and ordered these monks to compete for wine.

No one could refuse such entertainment activities, not to mention that these monks were not well-trained and disciplined elite soldiers. They soon joined in. Without wine, they competed. The whole courtyard was filled with joyful laughter.

Seeing that the atmosphere was almost right, Li Tai also took the opportunity to get up and leave the table, went inside to put on armor, and when he walked out with a knife again, his style was completely different from before.

Several monks noticed the abnormality and the smiles on their faces were restrained. Just as they were about to ask what was going on, the doors of the nearby guesthouses opened together, and the well-armed troops surrounded the monks. Just as someone was about to shout for warning, an arrow pierced his throat!

Immediately, the monks started to run and shout, and the scene was in chaos for a while, but from outside, it was not much different from the previous frolicking.

Li Tai chopped several monks who were attacking with sticks with his sword, and the bloody scene made the nearby spectators silent.

"The Buddha is compassionate and helps the poor, so today I came to borrow some materials. If you don't want to go to the afterlife quickly, quickly abandon your weapons and go into the house, otherwise you will be killed by the sword today!"

Li Tai swung his sword and beheaded another monk, and then shouted loudly.

Some panicked monks hurriedly threw away their weapons and ran straight to the guest houses after hearing this, but there were also some who were still determined to protect the law with their lives. Faced with the siege of fully armed soldiers, they could only ask for mercy.

Soon, the two hundred monks in the courtyard died or surrendered, and the situation was under control.

Li Tai first ordered Zhang Shi Nu to lead 30 soldiers to capture the bell tower that had been clearly observed during the day, and he himself took out several monks and soldiers, put the knife on their necks and asked: "Did you monks go to Sanyuan ten days ago? Where are the soldiers and materials now?"

The faces of several captives changed drastically after hearing this, and only then did they understand the real purpose of Li Tai and his party.

"No, I didn't go... I don't know!"

A monk soldier denied it, but as soon as he said it, his head rolled to the ground, and the blood spurted out of his chest directly hit the head and face of his companion next to him. The man was frightened and collapsed into a puddle of mud, trembling: "The materials are behind the temple, and the soldiers buried them in the East Valley..."

When Li Tai heard this, his expression froze again, and he ordered an attendant to continue to interrogate in detail, and he led fifty people to rush out of the courtyard. Many monks could be seen running in panic in the temple. All the monks who saw the formation of the array immediately led the crowd to rush up, and several teams were defeated in a row. The riot had spread to the entire temple.

Many monks who were awakened from their sleep had no idea what was going on. They rushed to the lecture platform square in panic. Some high-level monks also came here and shouted loudly to restrain the crowd.

When Li Tai led the crowd to the bell tower, hundreds of monks had gathered here and were waving swords and guns to attack desperately. Zhang Shinu and others were also struggling to resist, and there were already piles of corpses in front of them.

Li Tai was about to lead the crowd to fight forward to support, but arrows fell from the walls on both sides, and hundreds of monks were shooting at random on both sides, making it difficult for people to move forward, so they had to withdraw helplessly.

"Master, please attack other key points. We will defend here, and the thieves will never make any noise!"

In the firelight, Zhang Shinu saw that Li Tai led the crowd to attack several times and was repelled, so he shouted loudly, and chopped the two monks with the big knife in his hand, splitting them into two pieces.

Seeing that there were more monks with swords and guns shouting and rushing from behind, Li Tai did not want to fight anymore. He led his men directly into the scattered crowd of monks, slashed a bloody path with his sword, and followed his memory during the day to kill towards the storage place in the temple.

"Go up, go up, take back the bell tower! Send people on horseback to inform the village, and ask the villagers to come to the rescue quickly!"

Several old monks who were usually graceful were now terrified and issued various emergency instructions.

At this time, the sound of horse hooves was thundering on the mountain road. Liu Min took the lead and kept urging the soldiers to speed up. On the way, he saw monks who fled in panic or reported the news, and he shot them directly with bows and rushed into the temple, and joined several hidden insiders, and followed the instructions to kill into the temple.

This temple is indeed large in number, but it rarely encounters such a sudden change. There is no flexible and effective command and dispatch. Although there are many beautiful buildings everywhere, it cannot be effectively defended. When these thousands of strong soldiers rushed into the temple, the situation suddenly became more chaotic.