(7)
Zhao Kuo and Bai Feng, who rushed out of the house, were watched and criticized by the Miao people along the way, wandering aimlessly in the Miao village like headless flies.
The two walked to a wine shop. Zhao Kuo saw the large and small jars placed in a disorderly manner. The aroma of wine lingering in his nose was intoxicating, so he walked in without saying a word.
The owner of the wine shop greeted the unfamiliar Han Chinese with a bowl of wine and greeted him with a bowl of wine. Speaking in unskilled Chinese, he called Zhao Kuo, the leader, to try the wine made by his Miao family.
Zhao Kuo followed his instructions, tasted a bowl, and exclaimed: "This wine is so sweet and mellow, completely different from the strong northern wine! This kind of wine is probably the only place that is stable and isolated from the outside world. , can it be brewed.”
Later, Zhao Kuo asked for two or three kilograms of finely brewed rice wine, poured out all the water in Bai Feng's gourd, and then filled it with wine. Although Bai Feng was reluctant at first, in order to find out why Zhao Kuo was so angry about the incident just now, he had to accommodate the latter first...
The two of them sat on the simple wooden benches furnished in the wine shop, passing the temporarily good time with wine.
Zhao Kuo tried several times to exchange cups with the friends in front of him, but Bai Feng refused. In addition to repeatedly complaining about Bai Feng's lack of humor, he also knew that the other party had dissatisfaction and doubts in his heart. So he took advantage of the wine and said, "I know it's my fault. I'm going to delay Brother Bai's trip for a few days!"
"Brother Zhao, actually I want to know more, why?" Bai Feng replied.
"Haha." Zhao Kuo sneered: "You can't solve the problem even if you talk about that kind of thing..."
Ajuan, who had been asking around in the village for a long time, finally found the young men in the wine shop. She walked slowly to Zhao Kuo, fearing that he would suddenly disturb his elegance, and immediately said: "Master Zhao, it's time to set off back to Qianfeng Town. If we delay the time, the journey will be difficult at night."
After Zhao Kuo heard about it, he still drank wine and ignored it.
Seeing this, Bai Feng hurriedly called Zhao Kuo and said, "Brother Zhao, Miss Ajuan is talking to you!"
"Huh? What did she say?"
Bai Feng repeated what Ajuan said. After Zhao Kuo listened, he seemed to deliberately use an uninterested tone and replied to Bai Feng: "You tell her that after I finish tasting this wine, I can go on my way." It’s not too late!”
"Uh... Miss Ajuan..." Bai Feng just called Ajuan, then watched her walk to the door without looking back, leaned against the door, and waited quietly.
Bai Feng looked at the slightly sobbing figure outside the door, and looked at Zhao Kuo at a loss, as if saying to him: "Look, what should we do now?"
"She is crying over such a trivial matter. Does she really think she is a child?" Zhao Kuo sneered loudly toward the door while holding the wine glass in his mouth.
After a while, the two teenagers walked out of the wine shop. Bai Feng looked at Ajuan, who was still lowering his head and wiping his eyes. He stepped forward and said caringly: "Miss Ajuan, are you okay?"
"Me?" Ajuan blinked her reddish eyes and said in a panic: "I...I didn't cry! Come on, let's set off now!" After saying this, she lowered her head and hurriedly rubbed shoulders with Zhao Kuo. And passed. After walking two or three steps, I realized that this was not the direction, so I turned back and said to the two people: "Yes... go that way..."
Seeing Ajuan in such a depressed state, Bai Feng became more puzzled by Zhao Kuo's behavior and looked at him slightly dissatisfied. But Zhao Kuo just took Bai Feng's gourd and said with a relaxed smile: "Well! This wine is good..."
The three of them immediately began to return to Qianfeng Town, but the atmosphere was completely different from when they came. It was obviously a sunny day, but I could often feel the cold wind coming from the mountain shade hovering around a few people. Especially Zhao Kuo and Ajuan, who are supposed to be familiar with each other, have only been together for half a day and have gone their separate ways as if they were strangers. In order to alleviate the suffocating silence, Bai Feng, who was usually taciturn, actually started to talk some gossip to warm up the situation, but unfortunately it had little effect.
"Miss Ajuan, your new shoes are so beautiful?" Bai Feng said with a very reluctant voice. But all he got was Ajuan's cold "Really?" in response. After that, the helpless young man had no choice but to be sandwiched between those two people, and returned to Qianfeng Town with great difficulty. From then on, he realized that the silence he had long been accustomed to could sometimes be so painful!
The sun was setting over the western mountains, and it was almost dusk. The three of them walked slowly from the mountain road at the other end of the town, without speaking to each other on the way.
Murong Yan and Zhao Xiaomei, who had been waiting at the inn for almost a day, stopped and looked into the distance. Seeing that the long-awaited person had finally returned, they felt extremely excited and hurriedly asked the waiter to prepare a meal to cleanse them after a day of adventure.
Unexpectedly, when the three people approached, they saw strange expressions on their faces, as if they were each thinking something. This made the two people in the stack, who were hoping to bring good news, suddenly feel a little worried on their faces. As soon as Zhao Kuo entered the inn, he took the gourd and ran straight to his room. He also told his sister: "Don't let anyone come to my room!"
The little sister felt confused, so she asked Bai Feng: "Bai Shaoxia, what's wrong with my brother?"
Bai Feng sighed, looked helplessly in Ajuan's direction, and said, "Let Miss Ajuan talk about this matter..."
After a while, at the dinner table, Ajuan explained the ins and outs of the matter to the two people who did not know the facts. Both Murong Yan and Bai Feng were puzzled by Zhao Kuo's actions, and even scolded him for letting down Ajuan's sincerity, hoping to comfort the extremely lost Miao girl. Only Zhao Kuo's sister expressed sympathy for what her brother had done and explained the story behind it to everyone...
"Although the name of Yuyi Town is a town, it actually has the scale of a county. The Yao family, the prefect of the town, is a family friend of the Zhao family, so Yao family's daughter Yao Caiwei has known her brother since childhood. Caiwei was born in a scholar's family. She was required to be proficient in playing the violin, chess, calligraphy and painting. When she was practicing the piano, her brother would run to her house just to listen to the beautiful music she played, even if he risked being detained by his father. In the end, my father could no longer stop his brother from falling in love with what he called useless things, so he had no choice but to let his relationship with Caiwei grow deeper and deeper. Until one day, they even made a promise to 'hold your hand and grow old together' A vow made privately for life..."
After hearing this, Ajuan couldn't help but repeat the poem: "Holding my son's hand, will I grow old together with you?"
"However, things in the world are unpredictable." The younger sister took a sip of light tea and continued: "When Sister Caiwei reached the marriageable age, she followed her father's request and married the son of the minister of the imperial court. I heard from my father that this was their Scholars often intermarry in order to prevent the descendants of their families from being tainted by the so-called worldliness. The worldliness refers to us merchants and common people who are mixed in the rivers and lakes and busy cities. After my brother heard about it, he naturally became dissatisfied in every possible way. Understood. He went to Yao's house to make trouble almost every day, and was beaten all over his body every time. The relationship between the two families was also almost broken. If it weren't for the fact that the Zhao family was in charge of Yu Yi's economic lifeline, his brother would have been... raped. Harmed by people.”
"Then what?" the other three said in unison.
"Then... on the day Sister Caiwei got married, my brother locked himself in the room for three days and three nights. When he came out, his hair was disheveled and his temples were slightly white. He looked like an old man in his dozens of years. It scared everyone!" The little sister continued to recall with tears in her eyes: "I still remember the first words he said after leaving the room that day, which was when he knelt in front of his father and said..."
"Dad, I want everyone in the world to know that Yuyi is so prosperous and stable because of our Zhao family!"
Several people felt sad and sad after hearing the stories of the past. Bai Feng and Murong Yan looked at each other, both feeling guilty for what they had just said to blame Zhao Kuo. Ajuan, on the other hand, suddenly said: "Is Mr. Zhao so angry because he still misses that girl in his heart?"
"This..." the younger sister said hesitantly: "Actually, it's not that there are no girls who admire my brother, but he has always treated him with courtesy, and he has never reacted like this to Miss Ajuan..."
"I knew I would not see the wrong person!" Ajuan stood up and declared, "I have decided, I want to go with you!"
Everyone in front of the case was in a panic, watching Ajuan's figure walking towards Zhao Kuo's room. Zhao Kuo, who was drinking alone, heard the footsteps approaching outside the door and was about to get up and bolt the door. When he walked to the door, Ajuan opened the door just in time, as if by design. With his figure half a head shorter than Zhao Kuo, he regained his former lively atmosphere, pointed to his temples playfully, and said: " I know what’s going on here.”
After Zhao Kuo touched his temples, he just reacted and replied with a smile: "You know, so what?"
"I know you must like me in your heart!" Ajuan said with a smile: "You are so angry because you are afraid of breaking your promise!"
"You...what are you talking about!" Zhao Kuo said angrily.
"I have decided to go with Mr. Bai and the others, but I am not following you!" Ajuan continued: "I must see what kind of person that Miss Caiwei is, who can make you obsessed with her like this. Hum!" After saying this, Ajuan turned around and returned to the dining table downstairs, leaving Zhao Kuo, who still thought he was drunk, standing at the door stupidly.
