It was getting dark gradually, snowflakes fell outside the door, and pedestrians passed by the roadside.
After the siege of the city for several months, the supplies in the capital have become extremely tight. The Wenhui Building has a deep background and will not close its business, but by this time, there is not much business. Due to the heavy snow, most of the doors and windows in the building were closed. In this weather, people who came to eat, whether they were black or white, were either rich or expensive. The teacher also knew the owner of Wenhui Building, so he came upstairs and asked for a In the small room, I ordered a simple vegetable rice and waited quietly.
The two armies outside the city were still confronting each other. As a senior member of the Xia Village army, Ning Yi had already secretly returned to the city. The reason for this could be guessed by the teachers. However, she doesn't care about specific things at the moment. Roughly thinking about it, Ning Yi is fighting back against the actions of others. He is not the face of Xia Village's army. He does some connections in private, and he doesn't need to be too secretive. Those who know the severity will naturally know, and those who don't know are often not insiders.
She didn't want to be an insider either. Men's affairs at this level cannot be mixed with women.
The wind and snow fell quietly outside the house. Although it was cold winter, the wind was not strong, and the city seemed to whimper in a low voice far away. The anxiety she had been worrying about for several days now became somewhat calmer. She ate something, and after a while, she heard someone whispering, talking, and going downstairs. She didn't go out to look. After a while, the footsteps started again. Come up, the teacher goes over to open the door.
"Liheng." She smiled.
"Why did you come here, you startled me."
The one outside the door is naturally Ning Yi. The last time the two met was a few months ago. Going back, most of the meetings and conversations were relaxed and casual. But this time. Ning Yi returned to the city in a turbulent manner, met people secretly, and talked about some serious business. There was a complex weight in his eyes and temperament. This may be his face when dealing with strangers. The teacher has only seen it on some big people, and it is not an exaggeration to say that it is murderous, but at this time, she did not feel anything wrong, but felt at ease because of it.
Then he told a small lie: "I was also taken aback. What a coincidence, Liheng is... dealing with those troubles, right?"
"Some people want to meet, and some things to talk about." Ning Yi nodded.
"Liheng... Have you eaten?" She turned slightly to the side.
"Someone will come soon."
"If there is anything you need to accompany you, the teacher can play the qin to help..."
"not too good."
"Um."
talking room. Someone came over and said something in Ning Yi's ear, Ning Yi nodded.
"It's not early, I'm afraid I'm very busy today. I will visit Fanlou in the past two days. If the teacher wants to go back earlier... I'm afraid I won't be able to come out to say hello."
"Don't go back, I'll wait for you here."
"I'm afraid it's going to be late at night."
"I've seen a lot of people die on the battlefield these days. I've also seen a lot of things later... I have something to tell you."
Ning Yi saw the woman in front of him looking at him, her eyes were clear, and she pursed her lips and smiled. He was stunned for a moment, then nodded: "Then I'll excuse you."
This wait was nearly two hours. In the Wenhui Building, people came and went, but the teacher did not go out to see.
She joined Jiaofangsi when she was very young, and then she grew up. He became famous in Beijing and witnessed many important events. Power struggle in Beijing. The minister abdicated, and in the fourth year of Jinghan, the prime minister He Chaoguang and Cai Jing fought in the ring. There was a rumor that the emperor wanted to kill Cai Jing. In the five years of Jinghan, the two Zhejiang salt cases, Wang Ren, the richest man in the capital, and many wealthy businessmen were executed. In the seventh year of Jinghan, the war between Beijing and the two factions fought each other, and many officials dismounted. . Living in Beijing, and being close to the circle of power, she has seen a lot of the wind and the wind filling the building.
This kind of breath is like walking around outside the room. Even if you don't know who the other party is, you know that the other party's identity must be very important. In the past, she was also curious about these shady stories, but this time, she suddenly thought of those nights when her father was arrested many years ago. She and her mother studied piano, chess, calligraphy and painting in the inner hall, while her father and his staff were in the outer hall. The lights illuminated, and there was anxiety in the coming and going figures.
Over the years, such an impression is actually not accurate. Thinking about it carefully, it should be the experience she has accumulated over the years, which has filled up the memory that has gradually become thin. After so many years, the person in that position is someone she really knows.
The exchanges and flattery on the Fengyue Field can't be said to be sincere. There are always some romantic and talented people with high talents and keen minds - just like Zhou Bangyan - she has never regarded each other as a private friend. She always knew clearly what the other party wanted and what she had. Even if it was Yu Hezhong, Chen Sifeng and others who thought they were friends in private, she could understand this.
For Ning Yi, after the reunion, it is neither close nor distant, which is related to the fact that the other party always maintains a measured attitude. Shishi knew that when he was married, he was beaten and lost his memory of the past - this allowed her to correct her attitude very well - lost her memory, it was not his fault, but she couldn't help but regard him as for friends.
Many things in the past, including parents, have all been reduced to the dust of memory. Those who can be connected with the original self are these few people, even if I know them, I have already entered the Jiaofang Division. , but still young, at least at that time, still retains the former breath and the possibility of follow-up...
If Li Shishi wanted to become Li Shishi—she always felt—the former self cannot be discarded. She couldn't keep these things herself, only from them, she could go back.
Now, Ning Yi has also entered the center of the storm.
And there was nothing she could do. After all, Ning Yi is different from Yu, Chen and others. Since the reunion, what the other party has done is unimaginable big things, destroying the bandits in Liangshan, fighting with people in the rivers and lakes, and then going out this time. The resentment army, and the complicated situation this time. Therefore, she remembered those nights when her father was still there.
The window was opened in the middle, and the wind and snow poured in from the window, blowing the lights and candles half out, infiltrating the coolness. I don't know when, she almost fell asleep in the room. There was another knock on the door outside. The teacher went to open the door, and outside the door was a figure of Ning Yi frowning slightly, thinking that the matter had just come to an end.
"You haven't left yet?"
"I want to wait for Liheng to speak." Shi Shi stroked his hair, then smiled and invited him in. Ning Yi nodded. Entering the room, Shi Shi went over to open the window and let the cold wind blow in. She hugged her body by the window and let the snow blow for a while, then clenched her teeth again, and came to Tining Yi to move the stool. Pour hot tea.
"It's definitely not easy to besiege the city for so long. Although I'm outside the city, I've heard people talk about you in the past few days. Fortunately, nothing happened." Ning Yi took a sip of tea. Smiling slightly, he didn't know what the other party wanted to say when he stayed, so he spoke first.
"I think... Liheng's side is not easy." The teacher sat down on the opposite side, "I have to fight outside, and I have these things when I come back. After winning, I won't be able to rest..."
"Jurchen hasn't left yet, so there's no way to win." Ning Yi shook his head.
"The teacher heard it in the city. Is the negotiation already a 100% sure thing?"
"There is a 90-for-10 guarantee that we can give what others want, and a 10-for-10 guarantee that we can get what we want, the teacher thinks. Which one will it be?"
Ning Yi looked at her with a smile, the teacher heard this sentence, holding the teacup, his eyes dimmed slightly. After all, she was in the city, and there were some things that she couldn't inquire about. But when Ning Yi said it, the weight was different. Although mentally prepared. But suddenly hearing this, still not happy.
Ning Yi reassured him, "We're doing our best. But... things are very complicated. It's hard to say whether this negotiation can guarantee what can be guaranteed, what benefits can be obtained, whether it is immediate or long-term."
"I don't know much about this either..." The teacher replied, and then smiled sweetly, "Sometimes in Fanlou, I pretend to understand, but I don't. It's a man's business after all. By the way, Liheng tonight Is there anything else?"
"There are things, but I am afraid that the next hour will be very busy. The teacher is waiting for it. Is there something?"
"I just wanted to talk to you." The teacher sat there and smiled, "I didn't quite understand what Li Heng said to me when he left the capital, until the Jurchen came south and began to siege and attack the city. Cheng, I wanted to do something, and then I went to Suanzaomen and saw... a lot of things... "
She said so, and then, talked about her experience in Suanzaomen. Although she is a woman, she has always been sober and self-improvement in spirit. This sobriety and self-improvement is different from the temperament of a man. The monks say that she has Buddha-nature and sees through many things. But to put it this way, a woman in her teens and early twenties is growing up after all. Since these days, what she has seen, experienced, and what she thinks in her heart cannot be said to others. In the spiritual world, she will Ning Yi regarded it as a mirror. After that, the war stopped, and more and more complicated things surrounded her, which made her physically and mentally exhausted. At this time, Ning Yi came back and found him and revealed them one by one.
Ning Yi never thought that she would talk about the experiences of these days, but then she listened to it. The slightly emaciated but still beautiful woman in front of her talked about what happened on the battlefield, those soldiers with broken limbs, tragically dead soldiers, the battles of the Suanzaomen... The teacher's words were not high, nor did he appear too sad or excited. , occasionally smiled slightly, and talked for a long time, talking about the soldiers who died after she took care of them, the process of being hunted down and then being protected, the meager wishes of those people before they died, and later on Xue Changgong, He Leier and others...
Time gradually passed in these words. Among them, she also talked about the joy after receiving the news of Xia Village in the city. In the wind and snow outside, the gong for the watch had already sounded.
"...In the past few days in Fanlou, the things I heard people talk about are all about fighting for power and profit. I've seen it a lot before, and I'm used to it, but after participating in the defense of the city this time, I heard those sons and brothers talking about negotiations, talking about Outside the city, I can't take the frivolous appearance when winning or losing. The Jurchen hasn't left yet, and the adults in their family are already intriguing about these dirty things. Liheng has been outside the city these days, and he must have seen it. , I heard that they wanted to dismantle the Wu Rui camp in private. After hearing this, I was worried. How can these people do this. But... After all, there is no way... "
In the teacher's words, Ning Yi laughed: "There are a few groups of people and a few fights..."
The teacher also smiled: "However, Liheng is back today, so naturally there is something for them. In this way, I feel at ease. I don't want to ask what Liheng has done, but I want to come here for a while and then Can hear about the sullenness of those people, next. Get a good night's sleep..."
"Uh..." Ning Yi was stunned for a while, but knew that she guessed something wrong, "I came back tonight, not for this..."
"Ah..." The teacher hesitated for a while, "I know Liheng has more things to do. But... This troublesome thing in Beijing, Liheng will have a solution, right?"
Ning Yi was silent for a moment: "It's very troublesome, but I have to say how... I haven't thought of what I can do... "
"..." The teacher looked at him.
"They want to take action against Wu Rui Camp, it's just a trivial matter." Ning Yi stood up, "The room is too stuffy, if the teacher is still alive, let's go out for a walk, there is a place I've been looking at for an afternoon, and I want to go there and take a look."
The teacher nodded, it was late at night, and there were no pedestrians on the outside road. The two went downstairs. The guards followed quietly around, the wind and snow filled the air, and the teacher could see that there was not much joy in the eyes of Ning Yi beside him.
But walking all the way in this snowstorm, Ning Yi still smiled: "In the afternoon, upstairs, I saw things here. I asked someone to inquire, oh... This is the place." They couldn't walk. Far away, they stopped in front of a small yard beside the road. This place is only more than ten feet away from Wenhui Building. Across the street, the door of the dilapidated courtyard of a small house has been closed. Shishi recalled that when she went downstairs to Wenhui in the evening, Ning Yi was sitting by the window and seemed to be looking this way. But what happened here. She doesn't remember.
"The family is dead."
Ning Yi waved his hand, and the guard next to him came over. Swing the knife to split the latch. Ning Yi pushed open the door and entered, and the teachers followed. Inside was a dilapidated courtyard with three rooms, and the darkness seemed to be full of death. As Ning Yi said, everyone was dead.
"The person who was called by the security guard in the afternoon carried the body in here. I looked upstairs and asked someone to inquire. There are three people here, and it was just fine." Ning Yi walked towards the inner room, talking, "Grandma, father, a four-year-old daughter, when the Jurchen attacked the city, the family had nothing to eat, not much money, the man went to defend the city, and the chief caretaker took care of the two people who stayed here, and then the man was on the city wall. When she died, the security guard couldn’t take care of her. As for the old man, she was suffering from a cold, and she was also afraid of chaos in the city. Someone entered the house and robbed things and locked the door. Then... The old man was sick, cold, and hungry, and slowly died. Four The year-old girl also starved to death here..."
The room was filled with the stench of corpses. Ning Yi stood at the door and put a torch in, a cold and messy ordinary family. Although Shi Shi was used to the odor on the battlefield, he still covered his nostrils, but he didn't understand what Ning Yi meant by saying these things. Things like this happened every day in the city recently. The people who died on the top of the city were even more miserable.
"I heard about this upstairs, and I was thinking, many years later, others will talk about the Jurchen going south this time, and the Bianliang incident. It is said that tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of people died, how cruel the Jurchen is. They started to scold the Jurchens, but in their hearts, they didn't have any concept at all. They scold, and more often they did it very happily. They felt that they had repaid a responsibility to be a Han Chinese, even if they actually didn't know anything. No. When they talk about hundreds of thousands of people, all the weight is no more than 1/10,000th of what happened in this house. An old man was sick, cold, and hungry, and died while suffering. That little girl... no one cares, her stomach is getting more and more hungry, first she cried, then she couldn't cry, she slowly stuffed the mess into her mouth, and then she starved to death... "
Ning Yi said this calmly, the torch hung down, and he was silent for a moment.
"I didn't go to the city to argue with those people. If they want to demolish it, we'll fight him and take care of him... Qin Xiang is running around for the negotiation, and he's not in the mansion during the day. I'm here to meet some people and arrange some trivial matters. A few months ago, I got up and headed north, wanting to do something to organize Jurchen to go south. Now things are done, and more troublesome things are coming. Unlike last time, this time I haven’t figured out what I should do, what I can do. There are a lot of things to do, but no matter how you do it, it is very difficult to open the bow without turning back the arrow. If it is possible, I would like to retire, and it is best to leave... "
The teacher was a little confused. She stood by Ning Yi's side at this time, and gently and carefully pulled his sleeve. Ning Yi frowned, showing her anger, and then smiled slightly. smiled.
"You are on the city wall, and I am outside the city. I have seen people die like this, their stomachs were cut open by knives, their hands and feet were chopped off. Just like these people in the city who were slowly dying of starvation, they died, It has weight, it can’t be dropped, and it’s hard to pick it up. How to hold it is a big problem after all.”
When he said these words, there was an undisguised hostility in his eyes, but then he turned around, waved his hand towards the door, and walked over. The teacher asked hesitantly, "Could it be that Liheng... is also disheartened and wants to leave?"
"It's not the same as this, I'm still thinking about it." Ning Yi shook his head, "I'm not a murderer, so many people have died in front of me. In fact, what I think is similar to yours. It's just more complicated. It’s hard to tell. It’s getting late, I’ll go to the Prime Minister’s mansion later, and I’ll send someone to take you back. No matter what you’re going to do next, you should know. As for the troublemaker in Wu Ruiying Help people, in fact, you don't have to worry, the clown jumping on the beam, even if there are hundreds of thousands of people following, a coward is a coward."
The teacher also nodded. After a few months of reunion, she still couldn't see Ning Yi this night, which was different from before.
The courtyard door closed behind.
The wind and snow were still falling, and the carriage, with lanterns on, passed in different directions in the city. On the streets, watchmen carry lanterns, and patrolling soldiers walk through snowflakes. When the teacher's carriage entered the Fanlou, several carriages of Ning Yi and others had already entered the Right Prime Minister's Mansion. He passed through the strips of Langyuan and walked towards the Qin Mansion's study, which was still lit up.
The night is deep, and the thin lights are moving... ()
ps: This chapter is a bit vague, I haven't written the clues so vaguely for a long time, but anyway, it's a necessary chapter. The seventh episode will be closed, I have thought about it for too long, and finally I have to pull the update back.
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