The city walls of Liangzhou Prefecture were built tall and solid, like a silent giant, but even such a giant could not withstand the first attack of the Huqi people, let alone protect the people of the city.
From the city wall, you can see the wide Guan River not far away. When the weather is clear, you can even see Danzhi Shuozhou on the other side of the river from afar.
The soldiers guarding the city wall saw Duan Xu coming and saluted him, calling him General. Han Lingqiu, the captain in charge of the city wall defense, also came. He was a strong and tall young man with a horrifying scar on his face, from his jaw to his forehead, which made him look a little scary. He looked serious, clasped his hands together and said, "General Duan."
Duan Xu nodded and asked Meng Wan to follow Han Lingqiu to check the defense of the city wall, then he turned around and looked at the girl holding the candy man.
She walked to the parapet very naturally, looking at the distant Guan River while licking her candy man.
The winter wind on the wall was swift and fierce compared to inside the city. Her long hair was pulled by the wind and her cloak was filled with wind, as if a lotus-pink peach blossom was blown open.
She placed one hand on the bricks of the city wall, which should feel like a knife in winter, and her fingertips were pale, and her knuckles were as red as her cheeks and nose. But she did not pull her cloak back, nor did she flinch.
Anyone who can feel the cold should not be like this.
He Simu suddenly turned around and said, "All the wind on the city wall is indeed visible at a glance. Like white spider silk, it is sparsely and densely spread across the sky and earth. You can't see where it comes from or where it goes."
Wind like spider silk, a wonderful metaphor.
Duan Xu looked over as her finger pointed, and said in the biting cold wind: "Is the white wind the same color as my cuffs?"
"Yes." He Simu smiled, and as she smiled, she suddenly asked, "General, do you have any wishes?"
"wish?"
"Yes, a wish."
Duan Xu smiled slightly and said calmly: "My lifelong wish is that the seventeen states north of Guanhe River return to Daliang."
"… "
He Simu's expression remained unchanged. She thought to herself that this was just some high-sounding official document and should not be taken seriously any more than Guan Huai's flattery to her.
Duan Xu saw that she was silent and asked, "What's wrong?"
He Simu had a sad face and said that she was afraid of blood. She was afraid of the thought of regaining the Seventeen States and the blood flowing all over the world. After a pause, she suddenly approached Duan Xu. Duan Xu smiled and calmly stepped back half a step, waiting for her next words.
"I've been around the world and have studied skulls." He Simu pointed at Duan Xu's head and said ramblingly, "General, you have a good skull. The back of your head is round, the top of your head is high, your forehead is full, your brow bones are high, your eye sockets are deep, and you have double eyelids."
Duan Xu raised his eyebrows. This didn't really sound like a compliment, but more like the experience of selecting animals in a slaughterhouse.
"A genuine Han Chinese skull doesn't look like this. I heard from my father that hundreds of years ago, in the north of Danzhi, there was a tribe called the Di clan, and their skulls looked like this. The Di clan and the Han Chinese fought for many years, and it was a blood feud, but now there is no Di clan in the world. The Di clan has merged into the blood of the Han Chinese, and into the blood of your ancestors."
Today, the Hu Qie and Han people are mortal enemies, but eventually their blood will merge, and a hundred years later, they will become fathers, sons, brothers, and close relatives.
Most things in this world are like this. When hatred is strong, blood is thicker than water. When love is deep, people become strangers in the blink of an eye. Closeness and distance are repeated and nothing lasts long.
The life-and-death struggle or the ambition to recover the country will all vanish into thin air. The world is so boring, why take it so seriously
Duan Xu stared at He Simu for a while, and suddenly burst into laughter. He held on to the city wall, bent over with his shoulders shaking with laughter.
He Simu looked at him in confusion. He felt that there was nothing funny about this topic. Why was this boy laughing like a fool
In fact, her evaluation was biased. Duan Xu looked very good when he smiled. His eyes were bright and slightly curved, filled with overflowing happiness, and his white teeth were exposed.
"Sorry, sorry Miss He, I'm just born to love laughing, it's not that I have any opinion on what you said." Duan Xu calmed down his smile, stood up and said to He Simu: "I just remembered that when I was young, I liked to build sand castles at the beach. No matter how good the sand castles were, they would be washed away by the high tide. If I had your opinion at that time, I wouldn't be so sad. After all, the sand castles didn't really disappear, they just turned into sand."
"The girl may be like me, but I am like a sand castle."
He turned his head and looked at He Simu with a smile: "I was sand before I was alive, and I will be sand after I die. I only have one moment as a fortress, and I only need to live for this moment."
What happened a hundred years ago, and what happens a hundred years later? Even if there is reincarnation in this world and he is reborn, he will no longer be himself.
He Simu looked at Duan Xu for a moment. He was standing in the bright sunshine, with the wind as dense as spider silk wrapped around him, like a butterfly in a cocoon.
She sighed in her heart that mortals, with a life span of only a hundred years, could not understand love, hate, and vengeance. However, she showed admiration on her face and clapped her hands in praise.
Duan Xu's eyes fell on the sugar figurine in her hand. He said, "I wanted to ask you just now, the sugar figurine in your hand, is it painted..."
"Shen Tu, Chen Ying and Yu Lei, two great door gods." He Simu shook the candy man in her hand that had lost half of its shoulder after being licked by her, and said, "Some time ago, a ghost appeared in the middle of the night, and Chen Ying has been very scared. Today, I got some extra maltose from Captain Meng, and I drew two door gods. It is said that evil ghosts are afraid of these, so I use them to drive away evil spirits."
As she spoke, she bit off half of the Shentu sugar man's head.
Duan Xu couldn't help laughing. He crossed his arms and shook his head, but saw He Simu holding up the candy man and handing it to him: "Would you like to try it?"
The amber sugar figure was crystal clear in the sun, sparkling like a gem. Through the cracks in the sugar figure, you could see her smiling face, open and warm.
Duan Xu then reached out his hand, broke off the left foot of the candy man that she had not yet poisoned, and put it into his mouth. He frowned slightly, then smiled: "Miss He, it's too sweet."
He Simu approached Duan Xu and teased him, "General, what do you mean by sweet?"
The girl in front of me had a red face due to the cold, but she had a sweet smile.
The boy's eyes flickered, but he remained calm and said, "Sugar man."
“Sweet?”
“Too sweet.”
"Everyone has different tastes. Who can blame me for being sweet?" He Simu took another bite of the candy man. She looked at the frozen Guanhe River in the distance and suddenly said, "Four days later, on the eighth day of the eleventh month, at midnight, there will be an east wind and snow."
Duan Xu understood, bowed and thanked her, and then he heard her voice ringing in his ears.
"Do you really have to go?"
Duan Xu raised his eyes and saw the girl looking straight into his eyes with a hint of compassion in her eyes.
"I heard from Captain Meng that the general was not originally a general of Tabai, and he was only appointed in times of crisis. With your distinguished background, if you do more mediation, you should be able to escape and return to the capital."
Duan Xu sighed and said, "Why are you all like this? It makes me feel like I'm trying to stop a chariot with my bare hands. It's so sad. Don't worry, young lady. I had my fortune told when I was a child, and the fortune teller said that I would be able to turn misfortune into fortune in this life."
He Simu thought, this man had risen from a Censor-in-Chief to a candidate for Prime Minister, then to a Guard Officer, then to a Border Guard Commander, and finally to a general on the verge of life and death, but he had always encountered misfortunes, so how come he didn't turn things around
"If you are not trying to stop a chariot with your bare hands, what else can you do?"
Duan Xu paused for a moment, then said with a relaxed smile: "I will go even if there are tens of thousands of people against me."
He Simu had no choice but to nod and ate the last bite of the candy man.
That's true. How can one wield the Sword of Breaking Delusion without a strong destiny
Please don't die, young general. The owner of the Sword of Delusion Breaking should be more than just this, right
Duan Xu sent He Simu all the way back to her courtyard. From a distance, he saw Chen Ying hugging his knees, sitting obediently at the door and looking around. When he saw her, he ran over with shining eyes.
This child has become even more clingy since his last encounter with the evil spirit.
He Simu said goodbye to Duan Xu, took Chen Ying to the courtyard, and said nonchalantly: "Have you finished eating the sugar man? What do you want to eat next time?"
"I still want to eat the candy man! Miss Xiaoxiao drew the candy man really well this time, but it's too light and has no sweetness at all." Chen Ying has become a little plump recently, and she pulled He Simu's hand and acted coquettishly.
He Simu paused, she looked down at Chen Ying: "Not sweet?"
Chen Ying was born in a poor family. He had rarely eaten sweets since childhood and he was very honest. If he said it was not sweet, it really was not sweet.
Just now Duan Xu said that this sugar man was too sweet. Was it just a joke
She was moved, and squatted down and said to Shen Ying: "What color are the cuffs of the little general who sent me back today?"
Shen Ying thought for a moment, raised his finger to the sky and said, "Blue! The color of the sky."
—Is the white wind the same color as my cuffs
He Simu was silent for a moment, then played with the jade pendant around his waist with a half-smile.
Well, the young general was testing her, and she was too careless.
His intuition was obviously much better than Meng Wan's, and he actually managed to detect this little fox.
She sent Chen Ying out to play, and as she watched him gradually disappear from her sight, she took out the pearl from her arms and called out, "Feng Yi."
After a while, a voice came from the pearl: "Grandfather, what happened again?"
"I still remember you said that Duan Xu was sent back to his hometown in Daizhou to serve his grandmother when he was seven years old in Nandu, and he returned to Nandu when he was fourteen."
"That's right."
"There is no sea in Nandu, and Daizhou is even more separated from the sea by 108,000 miles. He should have never seen the sea. Where did he build sand castles in the sea when he was young?" He Simu shook the pearl and said leisurely, "This guy is not right. Help me check him out."
Duan Xu left the gate of He Xiaoxiao's courtyard and walked back leisurely with a smile on his face. When he was almost at the gate of the prefect's mansion, a few children were playing Cuju on the street. One of them lost his strength and the sepak takraw flew towards Duan Xu. As soon as the children's exclamations sounded, he turned sideways and raised his hand faster, and his five fingers firmly grasped the sepak takraw.
A little boy ran over, and Duan Xu handed him the sepak takraw ball. The boy looked up at Duan Xu and asked curiously, "Big brother, why are you smiling so happily?"
Duan Xu squatted down and touched his head with a smile: "I met a very interesting friend today."
“A person who can see the wind may not be able to distinguish the five colors, know cold and warm, or know the five flavors.”
The little boy showed a puzzled expression and said in confusion: "What a strange person! Isn't this scary?"
"Scary? What's scary about it?" Duan Xu turned his head and smiled even brighter: "This is so interesting."
The little boy shuddered. He now felt that this older brother was also scary.
"General!"
Duan Xu looked up and saw Xia Qingsheng and a group of soldiers walking towards him. He stood up, and Xia Qingsheng saluted with his fists, and said with a worried look on his face: "General, this is not like Nandu, you can't always act alone..."
Duan Xu patted Xia Qingsheng on the shoulder, neither refutating nor agreeing, and just said, "Is Wu Lang coming?"
"Waiting inside."
"Okay, let's go in."