Today he's not here to listen to the storytelling, but as the host, he wants to invite Xu Qing and a few others to join him in watching the Baishui Festival.
The so-called Baishui Festival is the ceremony at the mouth of Baisha River to worship the River God. The Crown Prince chose to hold the Qushui Liushang two days later also for this reason.
Today the Dayong Dynasty is troubled with disasters, half natural and half man-made. The people are ignorant of the truth and mostly lean towards superstitions of ghosts and gods. Emperor Longping, worried about finding a reason to shirk blame, happily embraced this convenient excuse, pinning the years of bad fortune entirely on external forces like ghosts and gods.
Thus, the Imperial Court has spent large sums of money over the past few years to build a Heavenly Sacrifice Platform over a hundred feet tall and promote ceremonial rituals, advocating sacrifices where things go awry.
