Chapter 11: Offering sacrifices to the heavens
The Zuo Zhuan said: The most important affairs of a state are sacrifices and wars. In sacrifices, one must hold the meat, and in wars, one must receive the meat. These are the great etiquettes of the gods.

From this perspective, ancient ancestors already regarded sacrifice as an important means of communicating with gods.

Sacrifice has always been a very solemn matter since ancient times.

From the grand sacrifices of the country to the small sacrifices at home.

People who offer sacrifices often choose the time and place to show their respect for the gods or ancestors.

Therefore, a series of sacrificial rituals were derived.

There are rituals of offering sacrifices to heaven, rituals of offering sacrifices to ancestors, rituals of offering sacrifices to gods, and many other types of sacrificial methods.

The sacrificial rituals recorded in "Stealing the Secrets of Heaven" seem a bit casual.

There are no fixed postures or etiquette requirements.

The sacrifice can be completed by building a five-colored earth altar, offering sacrifices and chanting sacrificial texts.

Of course, this is just what Li Zhi understood literally.

As to whether there are deeper uses, he doesn't know.

But he had a vague feeling that it might not be that simple.

However, mortals have limited knowledge, so no matter how many ideas they have in their minds, they are just fantasies.

The method of offering sacrifices to heaven and borrowing luck as recorded in "Stealing Heaven's Secrets" is very simple.

There is no need to choose a special moment or hold a sacred and solemn ceremony.

Therefore, Li Zhi built a five-colored earth altar with a diameter of one meter and a height of one foot in his backyard.

Then the purchased cow heads, pig heads and sheep heads were placed in the center of the altar.

Then place the five grains according to the attributes of gold, wood, water, fire and earth on the soil areas of corresponding colors on the altar.

The five grains here are not the small five grains that ordinary people know. The so-called small five grains are rice, millet, sorghum, wheat, and beans.

But they are the five great grains mentioned by Taoism, namely, water grain, fire grain, gold grain, earth grain and wood grain.

Mugu refers to edible things that grow on trees. For example, fruits and nuts that grow on trees, such as apples and walnuts, are all considered mugu.

Fire Valley refers to edible things with seeds growing on the head. People mainly rely on Fire Valley for their livelihood. For example, the rice, wheat, millet, etc. that we often eat are all Fire Valley.

Tugu refers to food that is thrown out from the soil, such as potatoes, sweet potatoes, peanuts, etc.

Jingu refers to the fruits produced by vine plants, such as grapes, pumpkins, watermelons, etc.

Water valley refers to the fruits produced by plants that grow in water, such as lotus root, water chestnut, etc.

So, the five grains that Li Zhi prepared were actually three pounds of wheat, three pounds of walnuts, three pounds of peanuts, three pounds of pumpkin, and three pounds of lotus root.

According to Li Zhi's understanding, the reason why the sacrificial method recorded in "Stealing the Secrets of Heaven" does not require the selection of special time and place is precisely because the object of sacrifice is the universe.

The up and down and the four directions are called Yu, and the past and present are called Zhou.

Therefore, any time and any place in the universe is actually the right time and the right place. There is no such thing as wrong time or bad location.

Of course, Li Zhi’s understanding might be wrong, but this is the extent to which he could understand it literally.

In other words, as long as there are enough sacrifices, sacrifices can be performed anytime and anywhere, thus borrowing the good fortune of the universe for one's own use.

Of course, Li Zhi would not be so superficial as to think that his current understanding of sacrifice is always correct and unchanging.

There must be a more profound truth behind it, otherwise there wouldn't be professions like Feng Shui Master, Yuan Tian Master, and Dragon Seeker in the world.

However, those things are not something that the current mortal Li Zhi can understand.

Li Zhi, who believed he had a thorough understanding of the book "Stealing the Secrets of Heaven", began to prepare for the first big gamble in his life.

The best offerings can be purchased as long as you are willing to spend money.

The cow's head was taken from an old yellow cow with human nature, the pig's head was the head of a black boar that was more than five years old and used for breeding, and the sheep's head was the head of a wild yellow goat.

Just the three sacrificial animals cost Li Zhi 50,000 yuan.

Spending money is a small matter.

The construction of the five-colored altar is something that really takes a lot of effort.

Although the altar is not big, with a diameter of only one meter and a height of only one foot, it took Li Zhi ten full days to build it.

The steps of selecting soil and tamping are relatively simple.

What is really complicated is that while tamping the stone, runes have to be carved on the altar using the blood of three animals mixed with cinnabar.

As for the origin of those runes, there is a 300-word sacrificial text recorded in "Stealing the Secrets of Heaven".

Li Zhi needed to use cinnabar blood to neatly imprint the oracle bone inscriptions one by one inside the altar.

While imprinting those oracle bones, Li Zhi couldn't help but recall the original work he had read. In the Perfect World period, the ancient ancestor from a foreign land once used a decree to destroy the sky outside the original imperial city.

The golden runes flying on the edict seemed to be threatening the sky.

While branding the oracle bones, Li Zhi was fantasizing in his mind that one day he would also be able to have such a glorious moment.

Perhaps the true meaning of this sacrificial text written in oracle bone script is, as its literal meaning suggests, a decree that can communicate with heaven and earth.

It took Li Zhi seven full days to imprint the 300 oracle bone characters in the sacrificial text intactly inside the five-colored earth altar.

After more than ten days of careful preparation, the moment of formal worship of the gods finally arrived.

Whether you can truly steal the secrets of heaven depends on this one shiver.

After bathing and changing clothes, Li Zhi, standing in front of the altar, lit three incense sticks and began to recite the sacrificial text.

After reciting the sacrificial text nine times, he began the next step, using yellow paper to burn all the grains and animals on the altar.

Li Zhi felt that this step should be to use magic power to offer those sacrifices to heaven and earth.

However, he has no magical powers now, so he can only use the traditional method of burning sacrifices.

As flames blazed on the altar, Li Zhi began to feel inexplicably nervous.

Suddenly, he seemed to feel that someone was peeking at him, and he quickly turned his head to look around the yard, but found no trace of any living creature.

The feeling of being watched came and went quickly, and it was very strange.

When everything on the altar was burned to ashes, the vision from heaven that Li Zhi expected did not happen.

It seemed like after working hard for more than ten days, I was just entertaining myself.

Recalling the sacrificial process confidently, Li Zhi did not find any mistakes.

With deep doubts, Li Zhi returned to the house.

He sat on the sofa and thought about it for a long time, and even turned the original book of Stealing the Sky over and over again, but still had no clue.

"Xiao Zhi, are you home?" At this moment, the big iron gate of his house was suddenly knocked on by his neighbor Li Zhong.

"Uncle Zhong, I'm home." Li Zhi immediately responded loudly, and then went to open the door for him.

Just before the sacrifice, in order to prevent being disturbed, Li Zhi locked the door of his courtyard.

After seeing Li Zhi open the gate, Li Zhong quickly said, "I'm glad you're okay. What happened to your house just now? There was a thick smoke coming out, and there was a smell of meat. Was there a fire?"

Li Zhi naturally would not tell Li Zhong the truth, but said uncomfortably: "I'm sorry to make you laugh, Uncle Zhong. I just tried to roast a whole lamb in the backyard, but I didn't control the heat well, and the lamb was burned to ashes."

Li Zhong smiled and said, "If you want to eat barbecue, why do you have to do it yourself? Barbecue is a craft. We have those mobile roasted whole lamb vendors here. Just make a phone call and they will come with tools and live lambs. We don't have to do it ourselves, and we can eat fresh and delicious roasted whole lamb."

Li Zhi's eyes lit up and he said, "There is such a service. I must try it. Uncle Zhong, can you please order one for me? We will have a roasted whole lamb today."

Li Zhong smiled and said, "It's no trouble. You've been eating at my house these few days, and we old couple have followed your lead to improve our meals."

Seeing this, Li Zhi suddenly said, "Uncle Zhong, please wait a moment. I'll give you some more money. If we want to eat, we should eat the best sheep. Don't save money."

Afterwards, Li Zhong took the 10,000 yuan in cash given by Li Zhi and arranged for the best roasted whole lamb for him.

Li Zhi returned to the house and continued to think about the previous ceremony of offering sacrifices to the heaven, wondering what went wrong.

Why hasn't anything changed in him?
Could it be that the so-called “stealing the secrets of heaven” is just a joke played by our predecessors on future generations?
Li Zhi picked up "Stealing the Secrets of Heaven" and read it carefully again. It was still no different from the previous time he read it.

Soon, Li Zhi seemed to realize something, and he rushed out of the house, picked up a shovel and went to the backyard.

He dug the ground again with great effort, and then took out the original copy of the secret of stealing heaven from the cellar.

Afterwards, Li Lixing followed the original Daotianji to recite the sacrificial text, and instantly felt an unusual artistic conception emerging in his heart.

Subconsciously, he began to practice the breathing method recorded in the book.

In a moment, Li Zhi entered into a state of meditation.

Then he felt as if something from the outside world was beginning to drill into his body.

However, that feeling only lasted for less than three seconds before disappearing, as if it was due to lack of stamina.

At the same time, a sudden enlightenment arose in Li Zhi's mind.

Within three years, his practice will go smoothly.

Offering sacrifices to the heavens to borrow their luck,

Stealing the secrets of heaven really allowed him to borrow good fortune for about three years.

Li Zhi's intuition told him that in the next three years, he would be able to turn misfortune into good fortune, turn disaster into blessing, meet the right people, and achieve what he planned.

Li Zhi was extremely happy and had a great appetite. When he was having roasted whole lamb in the evening, he ate half of it by himself.

That’s more than twenty kilograms of mutton.

Li Zhong and his wife were stunned by what they saw. Even the barbecue guy advised Li Zhi to eat less and not to hurt his body.

But Li Zhi turned a deaf ear and continued to do as he pleased.

In fact, it’s not that Li Zhi can eat, but because of his sudden enlightenment, his body needs to replenish a lot of energy.

Roasted lamb is undoubtedly a food with extremely high energy density.

That's why Li Zhi ate more than 20 kilograms of mutton.

But there was no discomfort in the body.

It seemed as if the mutton was digested and absorbed immediately after it was eaten.

People are happy when they are happy.

The next morning, Li Zhi, who had just finished breathing, received a call from Zhou Mei.

On the phone, she told Li Zhi that Ye Fan had gone to the store to look for him three times.

Li Zhi was also very curious as to why Ye Fan wanted to find him, so he packed up and prepared to go back.

Before leaving, he took everything in the cellar.

He cut open the five-colored earth altar in the backyard, moved it into the cellar for storage, and then sealed the cellar again.

After that, he left Dali Village without any worries.

(End of this chapter)