Chapter 151 - 130: Why Believe?
Noen stood on the ridge of the field.
His father had returned and was at the construction site, vigorously swinging the whip in his hand, lashing at the slaves who had slackened.
The slaves, also Stone Slaves, groaned incessantly as they dragged the stones, striving to construct a small temple for the Yibia family.
Two months later, there would be a major celebration, for which the Yibia family was determined to build a small temple dedicated to the Prophetic God Kagawus.
The so-called small temple was actually in comparison to the Great Temple in the Royal Capital.
Noen watched the Kagawus divine statues gradually stacking up, covered with the sweat and blood of the slaves; outside the temple, the priests caught a lamb that was gasping its last breath, its throat cut open and blood flowing all over the ground. They held bowls, filling them with the lamb’s blood.
The priests killed the lamb and then offered its blood to the great Prophetic God Kagawus.
Watching all this, Noen felt dizzy, perhaps because he was still too young, only thirteen or fourteen, and felt compassion for everything he saw.
The priests kneeled before the statue of Kagawus, then loudly scolded the slaves who were constructing the temple, and the old slave supervising the slaves cracked his whip with a snap, like a threatening boast.
The slaves familiar with Noen looked toward the boy in the field with pitiful eyes.
Noen shivered; he couldn’t stop his father from swinging the whip, just as he couldn’t stop the river from flowing backward.