Nanny Zhao quickly consoled him, "It's nothing. I heard that tomorrow night is the once-in-a-century river sacrifice ceremony. The Emperor asked the Prince to come to the palace. They should be discussing tomorrow's river sacrifice."
"oh!"
Yu Chenfeng never told her these things. Shu Jiaying knew that although Zhao Ma Ma wanted to harm her, this matter had nothing to do with her. She guessed that Zhao Ma Ma would tell her what the river sacrifice ceremony was all about.
Shu Jiaying asked this question to Aunt Zhao very humbly.
"You don't know about the river sacrifice?"
Shu Jiaying shook her head.
"Madam Zhao, you should know that I'm just a wild girl from the countryside. Ah Chen never told me about this, so how could I know all this?"
"That's true, but you're now a princess, so you really need to know these things. Speaking of river sacrifices, according to historical records, our Luosuo Kingdom basically conducts one every hundred years. I heard that this is to appease the anger of the river god and protect the people of our Luosuo Kingdom from natural disasters."
"oh!"
Shu Jiaying nodded, not quite understanding, because in her opinion, all natural disasters were caused by environmental factors or changes in the earth's crust. If there were really any natural disasters or man-made disasters, no matter how many ceremonies they held, it would be useless, because what was going to happen would eventually happen.
But on second thought, everyone has the same idea. Knowing the existence of these things, sometimes they perform targeted sacrifices. Although they may not be useful, at least they can give the people who do them psychological comfort. This has been the case since ancient times, so she thinks it is normal.
In Shu Jiaying's opinion, this was not an ordinary ceremony at all. However, in the palace, Yu Chenfeng quarreled with Yu Jianxuan over this ceremony.
"I don't agree with sacrificing people to the river anymore. It's a complete disrespect for life."
Hearing Yu Chenfeng's words, Yu Jianxuan laughed, and it was a laugh full of sarcasm.
"Contempt for life? Prince Chen... do you think you are too soft-hearted?"
"All this king did was throw an innocent girl into the river to drown her. This is simply an atrocity."
"Heh...according to what you mean, then am I not a cruel and inhumane person?"
"That's not what I meant."
"No need to explain, your expression says it all. But Prince Chen... I want to ask you, emperors of all generations have always adopted this method when handling river sacrifices. Now that you deny me, does this also mean that you have overturned the practices of all previous emperors?"
"I dare not!"
"You don't dare? Seventeen years ago, it was Qin Susu who was supposed to be sacrificed to the river, but your father loved you and only knew that Qin Susu could cure your heart disease, so he turned a blind eye and let you let Qin Susu escape. Now, eighteen years have passed in the blink of an eye. The high priest said that if we miss this blood moon night again, our Luosuo country will suffer a devastating disaster. Are you willing to bear this responsibility?"
"I……"
Yu Chenfeng really couldn't bear it, but he and Shu Jiaying had the same idea. If a natural disaster really came, it would be useless to sacrifice one living person, even if ten living people were sacrificed in the river. Moreover, his father had told him before he died that if one day he recovered from his illness and took back the throne, the first thing his father asked him to do was to abolish the practice of sacrificing living people in the river.
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
