Somewhat later, Clark flew out of the hotel and circled the top of The Great Pyramid, discovering that most of the tourists had dispersed, so the group left the hotel.
"Why do we have to sneak around?" Shiller said with dissatisfaction, turning the steering wheel, "We could even directly summon the Feathered Serpent God, but we must enter the temple like thieves."
"Because tourism is a very important source of income," Martin checked the ritual materials and said, "Although all the people who enter The Great Pyramid are in awe of the brilliance of ancient Mexico, and many sincerely seek the protection of the Feathered Serpent God, if you really call him forth, tourists would be scared half to death."
"The Lord Ye who loved dragons." Shiller thought for a long time but couldn't find a suitable translation for the phrase, so he simply said it in Chinese.
"In fact, the Feathered Serpent God isn't ugly. When I summoned him before, I caught a glimpse through the fog, and he was much more beautiful than the Ancestral God. But considering many people are afraid of snakes, we should still be cautious."
The car quickly arrived near The Great Pyramid, but since it was night and the scenic area was closed, they had to park outside the view of the guards and sneak in on foot.
Martin had already scoped out the place during the day. He deliberately made some noise on the opposite empty ground, lit a will-o'-the-wisp with a talisman, successfully attracted the guards' attention, and slipped by while they were distracted.
The Great Pyramid at night was starkly different from during the day; gone was the solemn grandeur, replaced instead with a sinister and terrifying atmosphere.
Martin found a good location to arrange the relics and said, "It's best not to get your hopes up. The situation with the Aztec Deity System in your cosmos is not good; it's very likely that their connection with the outside world has already been completely severed."
"Why is that?" Shiller asked.
"There could be many reasons, first of all, the weakening of faith." Martin paused before explaining, "Natural Deities and Natural Gods are somewhat different. Natural Deities themselves are imagined by the Human race, that is to say, humans created gods, not gods created humans."
"These gods imagined by humans need the faith of humans. If humans don't believe in them, their powers will gradually weaken, and if humans forget them, they'll disappear."
"There's also the possibility that people haven't forgotten them, but for some reason, the correct way to perform rituals has been lost; no one knows how to contact these gods properly. So, although they still believe in them, they can't communicate, and over time, the gods lose the knowledge of how to respond as well."
Shiller nodded, indicating that he understood. Martin spread a big circle of various sacrificial goods in the empty hall. Glancing over them, Shiller noticed a lot of corn, pelts, and feathers.
The only thing that puzzled Shiller was that Martin had been carrying a large bucket of water since he came down from the car. He was now holding that bucket, mumbling spells, and splashing water around as he walked.
Shiller had seen many sacrificial rituals, but this one seemed excessively primitive and simple. Amidst the chanting of spells, Martin even found the time to explain, "The Feathered Serpent God comes with the rain, and it hasn't rained during the days we've been here. This water was collected by a family during the rain, intending to use it to water the plants."
"The sacrificial ritual isn't too complicated. It's about gathering some things that the original gods like, or things related to their divine duties, arranging them together, and through the chanting of spells, opening a pathway to let them sense the presence of these things and they naturally will descend."
"It's a pity the Feathered Serpent God doesn't like live sacrifices; otherwise, the scent of slaughtering livestock is the strongest and can easily provoke a response."
Shiller looked down and noticed that not only the corn was dried out, but even the ears of rice seemed like they had been dried for a long time. Could it be that not liking live sacrifices went to such an extreme that even the plants had to be dead?
"I've already contacted the Feathered Serpent God, and I believe he is ready," Martin said. "Soon he will come, and you should be able to converse directly with him. I guess he should be much more agreeable than the Ancestral God I know."
Soon a feather placed in the center of the altar began to gently float up. Shiller and Clark stood at the edge of the altar, looking up at the feather that was rising higher and higher.
The feather emitted a hazy glow, as if it were becoming part of some enormous creature. Shiller didn't see the face of the Feathered Serpent God, just an immensely thick snake body.
From within Shiller's Tower of Thought came an unabashed "wow."
Looking into the Tower of Thought, Ye Meng Jia De's neck stretched out long. Had it not been for the many Shillers holding onto his tail, he would have leapt out of the Thought Palace in a single bound.
"Nice job!" Ye Meng Jia De opened his mouth wide and said, "How did you manage to find such a beauty?!"
"Beauty???" Shiller repeated the word in surprised astonishment.
Martin, not understanding, so he looked at Shiller and said, "Beauty? The Feathered Serpent God is not a beauty, he is genderless. Most Aztec gods are genderless, for their main god is a dual-faced deity."
"Moreover, in the Aztec belief, the Feathered Serpent God is also the Sun God, or rather, mainly the Sun God. He is also the guardian god of artisans and soldiers."
As they spoke, the colossal snake body in midair began to sway, occupying nearly all of the majestic pyramid's summit, but its movements were smooth, with countless shimmering scales forming a river of stars glinting in the light.
Shiller was beginning to understand Ye Meng Jia De's reaction.
Shiller could tell that the Feathered Serpent God was turning around; soon, a pair of huge wings appeared before their eyes. To Shiller's great surprise, the giant head that followed didn't resemble a snake's at all... wasn't this a dragon???
Shiller was truly astonished. He stared at the huge head that was slowly descending and uttered a word in Chinese, "Dragon???"
Those gigantic eyes opened, their expression as astonished as Shiller's. The huge head slowly drew closer.
"Who are you?"
Perfectly pronounced Chinese.
Shiller was somewhat bewildered and looked at Martin, who was also showing a puzzled expression because he didn't understand Chinese.
Shiller instinctively reached out his hand, and as a dragon whisker slid past his hand, the Feathered Serpent God seemed to suddenly remember something. All the dragon whiskers gradually faded away, and the dragon face that Shiller found familiar became more resplendent and dangerous.
Soon, the dragon features completely disappeared, leaving only the serpent face that Shiller had been expecting, which suited the gloomy and mysterious atmosphere of The Great Pyramid better than the solemn and majestic dragon head.
"What matter do you summon me for?"
Shiller could tell he was speaking an Indian language, but Shiller also didn't understand the Indian language. Martin immediately leaned in, rattling off a long string in an Indian dialect accentuated with Spanish intonation.
But after a while, the Feathered Serpent God began to speak Chinese. He looked at Shiller and said, "Tell this kid to stop talking. I don't know where he learned his Indian language, but it's so poorly done, I can't understand what he's saying."
"He wants you to stop talking," Shiller said in English to Martin. "He says your Indian language is terrible."
Martin's face fell with an expression of hurt.
"I don't understand," Shiller looked at the Feathered Serpent God and communicated in Chinese, "why would you be a dragon?"
"Why can't I be a dragon? Have you read the Classic of Mountains and Seas?"
Shiller was completely dumbfounded.
"The Classic of the Great Wilderness: North says: In the northeast corner of the Great Wilderness, there is a mountain called the Malignant Plow Mound. Ying Long lives at the South Pole, killing Chi You and Kuafu. Unable to return above, hence droughts often occur. In drought, one assumes the aspect of Ying Long, and then great rain will fall."
As this standard passage of ancient Chinese echoed inside The Great Pyramid, Shiller felt his CPU was overheating.
"So you are Ying Long??"
"Indeed."
"Then what's your relationship with the Feathered Serpent God?"
"I am both," the Feathered Serpent God answered, "I, the Great Yellow Dragon Deity, once bestowed the River Luo writings upon the human ancestor Fuxi and later aided the Yellow Emperor in defeating Chi You, opening the Dragon Gate to carry the Yellow Emperor to the heavens."
Shiller suddenly realized something. Martin had just mentioned that the Feathered Serpent was born from feathers, and in ancient Chinese myths, Ying Long was the first generation Rain God and Thunder God, capable of moving clouds and bestowing rain, managing the winds and the weather.
The Classic of Mountains and Seas also recorded that the southern winds were rainy because, after Ying Long defeated Chi You, he journeyed southward, creating thunder and pouring rain along his path.
Moreover, both in Mayan mythology's depiction of the Feathered Serpent God and the ancient Chinese mythology's Ying Long, the descriptions of their appearances were completely consistent: they were giant snakes with wings.
Unlike the dragon perceived by later Chinese people, with antlers on its head, Ying Long more resembled a snake with wings; actually, the wings were the most important aspect. Ying Long was the progenitor of both dragons and phoenixes, thus possessing traits of both, distinctly different from later Jiao dragons and Li dragons.
But the question remained—how could gods from places as far apart as China and Mexico be the same entity?
Shiller posed his question, and Ying Long sighed, saying, "In those years, the battle between the Yellow Emperor and Chi You shook the heavens and the earth, darkening the sun and the moon. After the Yellow Emperor triumphed, although Heaven's Gate was opened and ascendancy to the Heavenly World imminent, he, out of gratitude for the humans' aid and the joint effort of heaven and earth, commanded me to move clouds and rain down blessings to nourish the plants and beasts..."
Shiller gradually understood, then said, "So you two got a little overexcited and went off course?"
"Not too far off course," Ying Long said evasively, "The main thing was that opening Heaven's Gate caused too much of a commotion."
"Anyway, the Xuanyuan Clan and I have ascended to the heavens for thousands of years. Since the Dragon Clan's progeny flourished, I received fewer sacrifices. But one day, I suddenly heard someone summoning me. When I looked down, it wasn't the land I was familiar with."
Shiller fully understood and said, "So you two caused such a commotion that the Mayans saw, and they thought you were the god controlling the wind and rain?"
"Not only did they see, but the rain at that time also fell upon this land, and at a time of drought here. Naturally, the people revered me as a god."
"But what about those myths and legends? Do you have a father and three siblings?"
"They were also real. At that time, they worshiped me as a god, I accepted their sacrifices and thus bestowed my grace. However, I didn't become a god because of their faith, so I didn't need their offerings. I chose to leave the sacrificial victims for those newly born gods."
"But later, this system of gods gradually weakened. To prolong their lives, I started accepting animal sacrifices. One of them expressed dissatisfaction with me. We had a big argument, and then I went eastward, home."
Shiller recalled the mythological stories he had heard from Martin earlier. It turned out that when the Feathered Serpent God felt heartbroken, he didn't run home to his father but rather went back to the Yellow Emperor.
Seeing the evasiveness in Ying Long's expression, Shiller understood there must be more to the story. His curiosity drove him to press on, asking repeatedly until Ying Long finally confessed hesitantly.
"I couldn't be bothered to argue with them, but... but the gods over here were indeed a bit too unrestrained..."
Ying Long hesitated, then finally bit the bullet and said, "The one I quarreled with retaliated by committing incest with our mutual older sister. He thought it would humiliate me... It was truly an affront to decency."
Watching the vivid range of expressions cross Ying Long's serpentine face, Shiller couldn't help but burst into laughter.