Chapter 21: Advent
Zhou Cheng's heart instantly jumped up.
Zhou Cheng hurriedly followed Wang Zhe to the research room filled with various skeletons and bottles and jars, and saw archaeological experts led by Professor Wang Liyun carefully studying a stone slab.
Seeing Zhou Cheng come in, Wang Liyun immediately said, "Zhou Cheng, come and take a look at this."
Zhou Cheng leaned over and saw a simple picture engraved on the stone slab.
In the painting, a full moon hangs suspended in the sky, and next to it, a few small figures kneeling on the ground are sketched with just a few strokes.
Zhou Cheng noticed that there was no image of a baby on the full moon in the painting, which seemed to mean that the painting was created after the Yangjiagou tribe lost their fertility.
Also, the little figures kneeling on the ground were slightly different from the human-shaped traces found before.
These little figures had some lines hanging down from their heads, which looked like hair, and their backs were more curved.
This should be the characteristics of an old man. The lines hanging down from the head are beards, and the curved back is a hunchback.
"Overall, this should be a painting showing the Yangjiagou tribe's priests offering sacrifices to the Moon God."
Zhou Cheng murmured, "This doesn't look unusual."
Professor Wang Liyun said, "There's nothing wrong with the figures, and there's nothing wrong with the moon either, but... the placement is wrong."
"Wrong location?"
Zhou Cheng was a little confused.
In his view, the portraits symbolizing sacrifice were nothing more than people and the moon, with no difference.
Professor Wang Liyun pointed to a previous portrait and said, "In normal sacrificial ceremonies, the moon portrait is smaller and higher. But the moon here is larger and lower.
This technique is often used by the Yangjiagou tribe to depict objects that are relatively close, such as this one..."
She flipped through a stack of atlases and found a picture depicting a tribal hunt. She pointed to a wild boar in the picture and said, "Look, this wild boar looks different from the others."
"So what does this painting mean?"
Zhou Cheng pondered carefully: "Is the moon closer to them?"
Suddenly, Zhou Cheng's eyes widened.
"No, that's not right. Here, the moon should represent the image of the 'Moon God'.
It was not the moon that approached them, but the moon god!
Taken together, this image should mean that during this sacrifice, the Moon God descended before them!"
Influenced by the Yangjiagou tribe, people began to habitually call the unknown existence that caused the disaster, which made human civilization unable to reproduce offspring and gradually began to die out, the "Moon God."
But at this moment, this stone carving shows that the Moon Goddess, who has always been hidden behind the scenes and no one has ever known any details about her, has actually come in person?
Has it ever actually appeared in front of people?
Zhou Cheng subconsciously looked at the skeleton of the Yangjiagou tribe priest that had been collected nearby.
Could it be that this skeleton had personally seen the Moon God descend to Earth from the unknown before his death?
"Although there were images of elderly people in the murals and stone carvings we found previously, they were relatively few in number. Why are all the people participating in the sacrifice on this stone carving elderly? What about young people? Perhaps... that was already the twilight years of the Yangjiagou tribe?
Because they have lost their reproductive ability, are there only elderly people left in the tribe? "
Wang Liyun nodded: "Judging from the style and shape of the burial objects, yes."
After losing their fertility, the casting styles of the Yangjiagou tribe's pottery, jade, stone carvings, bronzes, etc. all underwent drastic changes, and the further away from the time of losing their fertility, the greater the change in style.
This is a perfectly normal phenomenon. When a person experiences a major change, their personality often changes. Even today's human civilization, after this catastrophe, has seen a dramatic shift in its literary and artistic style, from its former vitality to a nostalgic and decadent one.
"Based on their shape and artistic style, these burial objects were made at least 50 years after the Yangjiagou tribe lost their fertility."
"For a primitive tribe, 50 years old is already very old, a true elderly person. This is consistent with the elderly features on the stone carvings."
"During the Yangjiagou tribe's heyday, its total population was approximately 50,000 to 60,000. Based on ancient medical conditions and life expectancy, it's estimated that 50 years after the loss of fertility, the tribe's total population should have dropped below 1,000.
There may even be fewer than 100 people.
This is the true end of the tribal era, without any exaggeration."
Zhou Cheng closed his eyes.
A picture suddenly emerged in his mind.
Thousands of years ago, on this very land, the once prosperous Yangjiagou tribe had completely declined.
The frantic fertility worship and sacrifices to the Moon Goddess, which had lasted for decades, had no effect. Still, not a single baby was born in the tribe.
The total population of the tribe has been reduced to only a few hundred people, or even less than a hundred.
At this moment of utter despair, the remaining population once again offered sacrifices to the Moon Goddess.
Unexpectedly, this time, the Moon Goddess showed up.
The priests who participated in the sacrifice faithfully recorded this scene on the stone slabs and placed them in their tombs as their own burial objects. Thousands of years later, it was unearthed by human civilization that had also suffered a disaster.
An obvious fact is that even if the Moon God appeared, the fate of the Yangjiagou tribe did not change, and they were still lost in the long river of history.
But it doesn't really matter.
What’s important is…
Why did the Moon God, who had never appeared before, appear during this sacrifice?
After the Moon Goddess appeared, did she communicate with the priests of the Yangjiagou tribe?
If there was communication... what was communicated?
Was the content of this communication also recorded by the priests of the Yangjiagou tribe using stone carvings, murals, pottery paintings, jade artifacts, etc.?
If even the scene of the Moon Goddess's arrival could be recorded by the priests using stone carvings, then if the Moon Goddess had given any "oracle" at that time and had any communication with the priests, the content of that communication was also very likely to have been recorded!
And it is obvious that the content communicated with the Moon Goddess is very likely the important information that they have been pursuing for a long time!
Zhou Cheng's eyes suddenly opened.
"Is it possible that this carving is a fake? Perhaps it was created artistically, imaginatively, or under the influence of hallucinogens?"
Professor Zheng Yunong, sitting in a wheelchair, shook his head. "It's unlikely. The Yangjiagou tribe's creative style is extremely realistic, and there's no evidence of them being exposed to natural hallucinogens."
Professor Wang Liyun said, "If this scene really happened, then this stone tablet should not be an isolated case. We should be able to find more records of this incident in the future."
"Okay. Let's wait and see if similar images are unearthed later."
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
