Tibet.

Chapter 1355: Threat Emerges
A raging fire engulfed thousands of tents. Tens of thousands of people hid in the corners. Many women covered their mouths and cried. Men watched their homes burn in silence.

A dozen elders surrounded Chief Imohe and questioned him why his home was burned down. Imohe lowered his head and refused to answer.

But the burning of the home was only the beginning. At this moment, dozens of arrows shot in from outside and exploded on the ground.

The Tang army began to use explosive arrows, which were the old-style explosive arrows that exploded as soon as they hit the ground. The arrows fell from high above and exploded when they hit the ground. The people of Shiwei were terrified. They all prostrated themselves on the ground and kowtowed to the sky desperately.

Imohe almost collapsed. He knelt on the ground, covering his head, looking at the exploding arrows falling from the sky, and shouted in despair.

An elder grabbed his chest and yelled, "You idiot, who did you offend? Do you want the whole tribe to be buried with you?"

Yimohe couldn't hold on any longer. He stood up suddenly and strode towards Yelu Salad who was standing in the corner. He said in a hoarse voice: "We can't afford to offend the Tang Dynasty. Sorry, I can only hand you over?"

Yelu Salad said calmly: "Prepare a few small boats and let us enter the river. We will leave on our own!"

"no!"

Yi Mohe shook his head decisively, "If you run away, the Tang army will definitely take it out on us."

"Brother, I'm sorry."

Yelu Salad suddenly drew his sword and pierced Imohe's chest. Imohe screamed, covered his chest, took two steps back, and fell to the ground and died.

Yelu Salad shouted, "Kill him!"

Yelu Salad's personal soldiers drew their swords and hacked at the people around them. There were screams and cries everywhere. Men, women, old and young were so scared that they stumbled, screamed and ran away in all directions.

Yelu Salad and his personal soldiers killed more than a thousand people in one breath, and then pushed open the gate at the back of the village. Outside was the river with dozens of rafts parked there.

More than one hundred people boarded more than twenty rafts and paddled into the river. There was a big river more than twenty miles away, which was the Nenjiang River. As long as the fleet entered the Nenjiang River, they would be safe.

But not long after they came out, they were discovered by Tang army scouts who were ambushing nearby, and a bright rocket shot into the sky.

Zhang Dian led 500 men in pursuit and soon blocked Yelu Salad and his personal soldiers in a river channel that was more than ten meters wide.

More than a hundred soldiers rowed desperately in an attempt to get rid of the Tang army. Yelu Salad even held a spear in his hand, ready to fight the Tang army to the death.

"Fire arrows!"

At Zhang Dian's command, 500 cavalrymen shot arrows together, and the soldiers were shot and fell into the water one after another. Yelu Salad was hit by dozens of arrows and fell into the water screaming. After several rounds of arrows, there was no one left on the twenty or so rafts. The Tang army then started shooting on foot and killed all the injured but not dead soldiers.

Only then did they start the salvage operation, and soon, Yelu Salad's body was fished out.

Zhang Dian heaved a long sigh of relief, cut off his head and put it into a bag of milk wine. Then everyone got on their horses, replenished their food from the Shiwei tribe, and rode south.

Chang'an in September is already full of autumn atmosphere. The leaves begin to fall quietly, and the weather in the mornings and evenings is very cool, adding a bit of bleakness.

In Chang'an, in the Council Hall of Daming Palace, at Li Ye's request, Li Chenghua specifically told the Council Hall about the preliminary investigation report of the Internal Guard on the Holy Maiden Society.

"Your Majesty, gentlemen, the Internal Guard has conducted a detailed investigation for more than a month and has roughly grasped the infiltration of the Holy Maiden Society in the Tang Dynasty." Li Chenghua had someone hang up a map. While the map was hanging, Li Chenghua said, "Let me first give you a brief introduction to the Holy Maiden Society. The Holy Maiden Society is a part of Zoroastrianism. It is responsible for preaching to women. Its headquarters is in the Great Light Temple in Samarkand, and half of the Great Light Temple belongs to the Holy Maiden Society.

At the top of the Holy Maiden Society is the Council of Elders, which has ten elders. Then there is the Gold Holy Maiden and two Silver Holy Maidens, who are princesses from various small countries. Below them are dozens of Holy Maidens from various countries, who command thousands of female priests and female warriors. Their main job before was missionary work. There is not a single man in the Holy Maiden Society.

But ten years ago, the Society of the Holy Maidens underwent a major change. The reason was that the Gelulu Saint Jin Shanling became the Gold Saint. She launched a coup and killed all the female elders. The two Silver Saints were also her confidants, and she firmly controlled the Society of the Holy Maidens.

Then the Holy Maiden Society began to expand, not only preaching, but also monopolizing trade and gold and silver mines, and owning a large number of wheat fields and half of the water sources. Soon, Jin Shanling controlled the Daming Temple and was called the Holy Maiden of Light. A large number of male priests also became her subordinates.

Under her leadership, the Order of the Holy Maidens began to have an army, which we infer is about 50,000 people, and was involved in politics. The kings of the Shi Kingdom, Bukhara Kingdom, and Xiaoshi Kingdom were all held by the Princess Holy Maidens, and the other Sogdian countries were basically controlled by the Illuminati. "

At this time, the map was hung up, and Li Chenghua picked up the wooden pole and said: "Next, I will talk about the infiltration of the Holy Maiden Society into the Tang Dynasty. The Holy Maiden Society has been in contact with the Tang Dynasty since the Wu Zetian era. The Empress Wu Zetian admired the Holy Maiden Society very much, but she was very principled and did not approve them to preach in the Tang Dynasty.

It was not until the early years of the Tianbao period that the Society of Virgins began to expand eastwards, as the Qarlugs began to convert to Zoroastrianism and sent their princesses to the Da Guangming Temple. However, they were all on the periphery of the Tang Dynasty until the Society of Virgins helped An Lushan become the Eastern leader of Zoroastrianism. In return, An Lushan began to allow the Society of Virgins to preach in Youzhou.

During this period, An Lushan's daughter Anjia became a saint. Now she is Jin Shanling's confidant and serves as the Silver Saint. Five years ago, she took over the female slave trade. Tens of thousands of Tang girls were sold and eventually came into her hands. They established the Dongfang Camp to train Tang girls. Now there are more than 300 female missionaries in the Dongfang Camp, all of whom were girls sold during the early Kaiyuan period. Now they have grown up and become accomplices of the Saint Girl Society.

Since the year before last, Anjia has led more than 300 female missionaries to come to the Tang Dynasty to preach, starting with the Sogdians in Helong. A large number of Sogdian women have joined the Holy Women's Society. So far, there are nearly 200,000 of them. "

"Two hundred thousand!" everyone exclaimed.

Wei Jiansu asked hurriedly, "General Li, are all these 200,000 members of the Saint's Society Sogdians?"

Li Chenghua shook his head. "Among these 200,000, Han women account for half. And this is just an estimate. There may be more. Let's take a look at this distribution map!"

Wei Jiansu looked very unhappy, and waved his hand, saying, "Please continue, General Li!"

Li Chenghua pointed at the map with a wooden pole and said, "This is the distribution of the Saint Maiden Society in various roads. Currently, it has appeared in Helong Road, Guannei Road, Jiannan Road, Shannan West Road, Hebei Road, Guanzhong Road, as well as Chang'an and Luoyang."

Liu Yan asked: "How did they spread the gospel?"

Li Chenghua nodded. "The Saint Maiden Society is very wealthy. They bought the City God Temples in many remote counties and made some modifications. They covered the gods in the City God Temples with yellow cloth and replaced them with their flame and iron ring three holy swords logo. Then they mobilized women to listen to the sermons. They paid 300 coins for each sermon. A large number of women flocked to them. It is said that after listening to the sermons ten times, they would join the Saint Maiden Society."

"Don't the county governments care?"

"It should be profitable! The county government made a lot of money from selling the City God Temple, and the missionaries were all women, that is, the more than 300 female missionaries. They preached abstinence, love, and redemption for family members, and they did not make a lot of money. Therefore, many county officials thought that they were harmless and not a cult, so they turned a blind eye to their preaching and did not report it to the government. In just two years, the number of female missionaries has grown rapidly."

There was a lot of discussion in the round hall. At this time, Li Ye waved his hand and said, "Everyone, be quiet!"

The round hall immediately fell silent, and Li Ye slowly said to everyone: "The Saint Lady Association started out as a harmless organization, neither collecting money nor disrupting order, and it looked harmless.

But this is only a superficial phenomenon. With the financial support of the Holy Maiden Society, these female believers will carry out various businesses to accumulate wealth for the Holy Maiden Society. At the same time, they will control their husbands and children through these female believers. Just like a rolling snowball, it will get bigger and bigger, controlling the wealthy gentry, the prefectures and counties, and even the army. Their ultimate goal must be to control the Tang Dynasty.

But this is only part of the harm. At the same time, the Saint will also greatly reduce the population of the Tang Dynasty. According to investigations, after many women become members of the Saint Society, their daughters will soon become members as well, and then choose to abstain from sex and will not marry again. In the long run, the population of the Tang Dynasty will experience a cliff-like decline. This is something I cannot tolerate, even if the Saint does not threaten the court, I cannot tolerate it.

Therefore, the next step is to start cracking down on the Saint Maiden Society, and completely eradicate them from the Tang Dynasty before they become too powerful."

(End of this chapter)