"But teacher, why me? You know, I..." I was about to list my shortcomings when the teacher interrupted me. The teacher asked back, "Then who are you? Think about it first, don't be impatient."
I'm not stupid. As long as you let me think for a while and don't act rashly, I can still be a strategist, because after a while I have an idea.
"It can only be me, because after you leave, I am the only one with a title in Xiangyang, and Chen Liang has to guard against the people of Xiliang in Shangyong, and Zishe and Zisheng are both in Luoyang. Only my identity as the Marquis of Ping'an Fengyun here makes it convenient for me to deal with people from other states and counties." The teacher nodded, "You are a bit careless in matters, but calm in major matters. Moreover, what is valuable is that you can listen to others, and the best thing is your ability to deal with emergencies. We once discussed things in the thatched cottage, and when other students talked about things, you kept silent, but when I suddenly asked a question and asked someone to answer it, only you could always come up with wonderful ideas that made people applaud. After thinking about it, it can only be you who can act as the governor of the state."
I was speechless for a moment. Seeing my hesitation, the teacher continued to enlighten me: "I have already told all your classmates to assist you... uh, including your sister. I will probably be away for a month and will be back. During this time, perhaps only Dong Zhuo from Liangzhou will come to trouble us. Remember, you can be humble, but you can't give in blindly. Don't lose the dignity of Jingzhou. You can make the rest of the decisions. Just don't forget this."
"Student, obey your order." Frankly, I began to get excited, but I suddenly remembered my sister's curse. Can I really hold on for a month? I don't know, but strangely, I'm not worried at all now.
"Then when will the teacher set out? Have you arranged the protection work along the way?" The teacher is a scholar. Although he has the strength to bind chickens, it will be dangerous if the opponent is a little stronger.
"I have already made arrangements. I am not as careless as you. Don't worry about this matter. You will take office tomorrow morning and I will leave tonight." The teacher left with a wave of his sleeves, as usual, without saying a word. He just patted my shoulder at the end.
Strangely, we spent dinner in silence. Of course, the atmosphere was different from the silence before I left Xiangyang last time. Kong Ming and those two had been arguing for a whole day, and they just ate. Even if they understood officialdom, it was far less tempting than the food in front of them. My sister looked at me left and right, and once she sat upright as if thinking about something, but just as I leaned over to listen to her teachings, she bent down and started to eat.
This made me feel a little bored, as if nothing had happened that day, but I still couldn't sleep that night. What kept appearing in my mind was me commanding my brothers. I finally fell asleep, but I woke up almost immediately. I got up, and it was still dark, not even dawn. I planned to go there early on the first day, so that I wouldn't fall asleep at home and not want to get up in the morning. The teacher handed Jingzhou to me, and I had to look good, at least on the first day.
But when I rode to the governor's mansion, someone was already waiting outside to receive me. What surprised me even more was what the leading veteran said: "Your Excellency is young and has taken over the post of governor. He is as diligent as Lord Han Chugong and has taken office before the hour of Yin. We admire you very much. This is a blessing for Jingzhou." It has been such a long time since the teacher took office! I didn't know what to do. I just nodded and went straight to the meeting room without saying a word. As soon as I sat down, I asked my servants to report everything the teacher had done before.
I can't remember how I survived this incense stick, but this incense stick overturned everything I had thought about. I always thought that the things in Jingzhou were too simple for me and my classmates, and our world was far beyond Jingzhou, but this time I don't think so anymore.
"At four o'clock in the morning, go to the homes of officials in Jingzhou and ask them to report to me." I only said one sentence after hearing this, and then started to read some unapproved documents.
The students who came at the hour of Mao were obviously still sleepy and expressed their dissatisfaction with me one by one. My elder sister was the one who gave me the most face. She sat in my original seat. However, when Ziyuan was the last one to arrive, I could no longer see my elder sister's delicate body.
"I know you will blame me." I started my first day of office in a bland manner. "You think I am a show-off, making fun of my brothers on my first day, but can you answer one question, just one question, do you know when the teacher comes to the office every day?"
No one answered.
"Chou Shi! Then you all don't need to do it. You must not know how much the teacher does every day?" I looked around at my classmates, "Everyone down there is not laughing as much as before. Is he the governor of a state and is talking about his power? In fact, if I hadn't been unable to sleep today and had a headache and came early, I think I and everyone else might never know about this. The teacher is almost dead from exhaustion!" I felt my eyes getting wet, I covered my mouth with my hands, trying to calm myself down first, "We always think that daily things are simple and can be done in a short time, that's because the teacher has done everything. After everything was done, the only thing left was for one person to execute an order. He never blamed us for going to work after noon, because in his heart, we were just children, his group of inexperienced students, and he was afraid of tiring us. He kept us in office for the sake of our future career. Therefore, it was almost the teacher who was supporting the situation in Jingzhou alone, and we were just doing some trivial things. Although these things are important, compared with what the teacher did, we were just sleeping all the time. The teacher really did everything himself. "
The students were surprisingly quiet, no one spoke, I raised my voice and continued, "The teacher asked us to hold a morning meeting, saying it was to ask for advice, to discuss together, or to report our duties. In fact, if we want to make a plan, the teacher has already made up his mind, but he just wants us to make the decision. As for reporting our duties, the teacher actually already knows everything. We are here just like going to school. The teacher just wants us to improve our ability to deal with things and cope with situations."
I raised my voice a little more: "Teacher, he won't be back for a month. I hope he won't come back for half a year and take a good rest away. I hope that when teacher comes back, he will see that we can handle Jingzhou very well. Teacher must have told you to be diligent and help me. He may be worried that once he is away, Jingzhou will be in chaos. Now the situation is peaceful, and it is the beginning of spring, and the seeds will be sown. There will be no war in the world at this time, so teacher dares to stay for a while. If we can handle the affairs of Jingzhou properly within this month, it will be the greatest reward for our teacher. I hope that starting from tomorrow, everyone can go to their posts at the hour of Mao." After that, I waved my hand to let everyone go.
My first day in office was officially started. I wanted to do everything as efficiently and quickly as Teacher Wei, but I found that thinking and doing were two completely different things. In the end, I had to invite my classmates one by one. With their help, I finally managed to review more and more documents. When I asked them questions, they told me that the teacher had given them all a very complete explanation after he came back. At noon, I asked Shi Cong, who had been beside me, how much the teacher could review in the morning. Shi Cong told me that it was about 100 kilograms. I told him to go down. The things we reviewed were bamboo slips for state affairs and silk for inter-state affairs. Recently, there were fewer inter-state affairs. I only received a scroll of orders from the imperial capital to raise military funds from King He Jinlai. And silk was not heavy. I took all the bamboo slips I had reviewed in my hands, and they only weighed more than ten kilograms. I shook my head and continued to concentrate on reading the next scroll of bamboo slips.
My elder sister brought me lunch that day, and I happened to have some questions for her. I was turning over a scroll of bamboo slips when someone suddenly reported to me, "Sir, there is someone outside the mansion who claims to be an old friend from Luoyang."
"What does this person look like?"
"A fifty-year-old man, and next to him was a twenty-year-old woman holding a child. Judging from her expression, she seemed to be the old man's wife."
"Oh, he's here, let him in." I knew who it was. My sister was very surprised, so I smiled and asked her to sit next to me and let someone lead them in.
The merchant, dressed as a farmer, came in with his daughter-in-law's daughter and his grandson-in-law's son. As soon as he came in, he led the woman to pay respect to me.
"It's okay, it's okay, please stand up, you are finally here."
"I am not worthy of being called the master. I am just here to make a living."
I beckoned him over alone and whispered, "Your son, I am your eldest son, or does your father-in-law know that you are here?"
"Your Excellency!"
"You're so loud. I asked you to come here alone because I didn't want to embarrass your wife. Why are you so loud?"
"Sir, I am old and it is impossible for me to run around. I told him that I am old and want to live in the warm south to do business and retire. I can't run around anymore. My son wanted to follow him, but I stopped him. You know what happened in our family. It is really embarrassing to tell others. Now, I hope... you are a marquis now. Can you give us a bite to eat."
"It's okay. I've been here before. If you come to me, I will be able to arrange things for you. You used to be a traveling merchant, but now, you want to be a local merchant?"
"Thank you, sir. I wonder what kind of goods Xiangyang City needs right now. I have many familiar sources of goods."
"I can lend you the capital for cloth and food, give you a place, and let you bring these things to me in Xiangyang in the name of an official merchant." This was from my sister, and I was surprised. I looked at my sister, and she glanced at me and continued, "You go down and rest first. For specific matters, come to Xiyuan here at 3 p.m. and find me." My sister quickly wrote a few words on a piece of wood and handed it to the old man. "With this, someone will take you to my place. Go down and rest first."
The old businessman left. I stared at my sister. She clearly saw the strange light in my eyes. "Why? Why are you looking at me so strangely? I'm just helping you. Let's eat now!"
"You let that old man do the cloth and grain business? You didn't do anything wrong, did you? Didn't you let him compete with Uncle Jiang and Uncle Zhong for business? You should know that Uncle Jiang is the largest grain merchant in Xiangyang City, and the largest cloth shop is the Zhong family, and they have always had an ample supply of goods. Without Uncle Jiang last year, people in Xiangyang would have starved to death. You did this..."
"Don't you know that Uncle Jiang and Uncle Zhong have come to see me? They both don't want to do it anymore, but they're afraid that no one will take over their business, so they went to Xiangyang. What a coincidence that this person came. How do you know him?"
"They don't want to do it anymore?" I felt that their reluctance to do it had something to do with the letters from the two grooms in Luoyang, but I didn't know the specific reason yet.
"Hey, what are you thinking about? How do you know him? He is so old and has such a young wife, and she wants to leave his son. What's going on?"
I told my sister the complicated, tortuous and bizarre story of their family. After I finished, I helped my sister close her mouth, which was so surprised that she couldn't close it. My sister looked up and fell into deep thought, but in the end, she lowered her head and shook her head: "It's so stupid." I knew that she and I did the same thing at that time: thinking about the complex structure of their family and the relationships between people.
"I'm leaving first. I still have something to arrange." My sister left the hall. Before she left, she turned around and nagged, "Work hard after you finish eating. You must live up to your teacher."
After she left, I remembered that I still had something to ask her.
I am a very lazy person, but I admit that I seem to have changed. Although I still don't care about my own affairs, I am very serious about official business. I feel that I am becoming more and more mature, and slowly I have changed from being at a loss to being able to handle things with ease. Although I still stumble sometimes, it is much better than at the beginning. At least I can score about 100 kilograms every morning, but it is a little tiring. In order to ensure that I can start work early every day, I brought my bedding roll to the government office. My sister also acquiesced to my approach. But she thought it was convenient for me to find a place to sleep at any time.
There were some interesting things during this busy and somewhat boring time. The emperor sent someone to buy a house for me in Xiangyang. It was the mansion of the former Xiangyang County King. After it was renovated, I was allowed to move in. My sister went to see it, but she gave up the idea of moving in. She also advised me not to move in. I also went to see it, but after leaving, I still didn't understand. When I went home and saw my sister looking for Kong Ming everywhere again, this time including Pang Tong and Xu Shu, I immediately understood that after moving there, my sister would be exhausted to death sooner or later.
These guys are getting better and better at hiding. We only have a few rooms in our house, but they can hide in a variety of ways every time. Kong Ming once installed a pillow. If he hadn't moved because he was tired, my sister would have never been able to find him. For example, this time, they all hid in the stove. If Aunt Zhang hadn't wanted to light a fire to cook, she wouldn't have been able to find these black balls.
Half a month passed like this. It went slowly at first, but then it started to go faster. I knew more and more, and I became more and more efficient in doing things. However, I also had more and more questions in my mind. I thought that when the teacher came back, I must ask him.
The weather was a little weird. When it was time to sow seeds, it was very hot. In a few days, all the seeds sprouted. The fields were full of life. I sent the thick quilt back home. Summer is coming so soon
On the twentieth night after the teacher left, I was woken up by the cold in my residence in the government office. When I opened the door, I saw a sky full of snow flowers.