The swordsman in white turned around with a kite and opened the scabbard with the tip of his sword. Pei Min had already succeeded in one move and did not make any more moves. He let the swordsman in white swing his sword away. Only this move could be fully used by the swordsman in white. , looking very chic in his fluttering clothes, which saved some face.
Look at this man's fair complexion. Although he is over 40 years old, he has sharp eyebrows and starry eyes, and his eyes are very spiritual. Three locks of mustache and beard are flowing on his chest. His hair is not tied up, and his beard and hair are flowing like an immortal. It was the "reviled immortal" whom He Zhizhang called - Li Bai.
Li Bai sheathed his sword and said, "Brother Pei has always been a good person. I heard that my eldest brother has become General Zuo Jinwu and has the heavy responsibility of defending the capital. How can I have time to see my brother?"
It turns out that Li Bai asked Pei Min for swordsmanship twelve years ago when he first entered the capital. The Pei family in Hedong has long been famous and has many talents. The army was defeated and all ten Turks were defeated. Although Pei Min was good at martial arts but not good at literature, he was also quite good at making friends with scribes. He and Li Bai hit it off immediately, and they fell in love with each other and taught each other the swordsmanship of the twenty-eight Pei family. Pei family swordsmanship is practiced both in the military and among the people. Li Bai had Pei Min personally give detailed instructions on various changes one by one. Naturally, he was much better than ordinary swordsmen. However, since Li Bai's swordsmanship was taught by Pei Min, he also had a close relationship with Pei Min. The competition was naturally restricted in every way. Although he managed to get a few sneak attacks, he changed his position within a few moves and was completely suppressed by Pei Min.
He Zhizhang was startled when he first saw a person coming out of the door. When the two were fighting fiercely, he couldn't tell who it was. He didn't know Kung Fu, so he didn't know that Pei Min had the upper hand. He only knew that the opponent's moves were fierce and Pei Min couldn't match them. Pulling out his sword, he couldn't help but feel worried. Now that the two of them were fighting, he also saw that the man in white was Li Bai. He took a long breath and said, "The joke on banishing the immortal was so powerful that I was really shocked."
Li Bai quickly abandoned his sword when he saw it, crossed his hands and saluted: "General Pei's swordsmanship is the best in the world, how can Bai defeat him? It's a luck to be able to parry one and a half moves. I didn't want to surprise Prisoner He. It's a sin, a sin." .”
He Zhizhang waved his hand and said: "How come Brother Taibai and I have to treat each other with official nicknames? We have been friends for many years, so we should still treat each other as brothers."
Li Bai stopped being polite and stepped forward to hold He Zhizhang's hands and said, "Old immortal, Brother He, you really want to kill me, my brother."
In the twenty-third year of Kaiyuan, Li Bai went to Chang'an to seek an audience but was not able to do so. When he was depressed, he wandered around the Ziji Palace in Chang'an and met He Zhizhang by chance. He Zhizhang was famous all over the world for his poetry and literary talent. He was a leader in the world of literature. At that time, He Zhizhang was the minister of the Ministry of Rites, and Li Bai was just an intermediary. However, the two became close friends throughout their lives. He Zhizhang called Li Bai the "immortal" and regarded him as his lifelong confidant.
Later, Li Bai failed to pay a visit and returned south in loneliness. He and He Zhizhang were separated and there was no news for many years. Now this long-lost friend suddenly arrived at his door. How could Li Bai not be happy? Li Bai took the hands of He Zhizhang and Pei Min and said, "Please come in quickly!"
The book boy who had just led the way was standing by the door, and a pair of children were hiding behind him, looking secretly at this side. Li Bai nodded his hand and called: "Changyang, Boqin, come quickly to see me, and then ask your mother to come and pay homage to the two uncles."
Bo Qin was young and didn't know how to hide it, so he said: "Ms. Liu just said angrily: Here comes another very poor and miserable friend. Don't ask me to serve you."
Both Boqin and Changyang were born to Li Bai and his ex-wife Xu. Mrs. Xu came from a prominent family in Anzhou and was a well-known and well-educated lady. However, Mrs. Xu died of illness three years ago. The current wife, Mrs. Liu, is Li Bai's successor in Nanling. Therefore, Bo Qin called her Mother Liu. The child said such vulgar words in a milky voice, which made Li Bai quite embarrassed and his face turned red immediately. The book boy frowned when he saw this, and turned around to go back to the house. After a while, he heard the sound of rapid footsteps, and a woman ran out. She was still pretty, but she looked like a village woman. , with a smile on his face, he said flatteringly: "It turns out that two third-rank courtiers are here. I'm so polite. Please sit in the room." He also ordered the boy to catch a fat chicken and cook it in the pot for the guests. .
He and Pei looked at each other and smiled bitterly, both thinking that Brother Taibai was such a broad-minded person, but Xu Xian was such an ignorant and ignorant country woman who also tended to follow people's influence.
Li Bai said: "I'm not going to the house anymore. You two will follow me to the back."
Li Bai led He and Pei around to the back of the house, where there was a huge rock. Li Bai asked the child to light a torch and lead the way. A narrow gap was exposed between the rock and the ground, which could only allow a person to bend down. Li Bai made an invitation gesture. , and everyone filed in.
The entrance to the cave was very low, so only the children did not have to bend down. The rest of the people walked with their heads down and their backs hunched over. After walking a few feet, the cave suddenly opened up and turned out to be a rather high and spacious natural stone chamber, shaped like a giant upside-down urn. From the outside, the giant rock looks like a single piece of rubble. In fact, it is made up of many huge rocks piled up naturally, as if they were built piece by piece by skilled craftsmen. However, the stone chamber is ten feet wide and more than ten feet high. It is definitely not manpower. Can for.
At this moment, the sky outside the cave is still bright, but the skylight pours down from the gaps in the rocks, forming intricate light pillars in the room, illuminating a brilliance, really like a paradise in the cave. In the center of the cave, where the terrain is slightly flat, there is a bronze alchemy furnace. The color of the copper has turned dark, and the characters engraved on it are ancient and difficult to read. This bronze alchemy furnace is two people tall and wide enough for two people to hug it. I don't know how it was moved in.
Li Bai saw that He Zhizhang was looking at the alchemy furnace in a trance and knew what he was suspicious of, so he said: "Brother Jizhen, this alchemy furnace was not moved by Li. When he and Tong'er were hiking in the mountains that day, Tong'er stumbled and fell. When entering the cave, we saw this cauldron. Dan Qiusheng said that it was an ancient thing from the pre-Qin Dynasty. Dan Qiusheng could not fully recognize the large seal script of insects and birds cast on it. It was just covered with dust for a long time, and he was afraid that the furnace had not been raised in thousands of years. He expected that the original owner had already emerged. Ascend, leaving this cave-like paradise for only those who are destined to be together."
At that time, Li Bai was already in his prime, and his official career seemed increasingly hopeless. After discovering this cave, he often came here to meditate and practice cultivation. He also asked his friend Taoist Yuan Danqiu to help him start an elixir, hoping that the golden elixir would be ready soon. , and the whole family flew together in the daytime, but after all the money was spent, nothing was gained.
Pei Min didn't know anything about the alchemy cauldron, but he was very surprised. He approached the alchemy furnace and touched it with his hand. He found that the alchemy furnace was actually warm and quickly withdrew his hand.
Li Bai smiled and said: "Brother Pei, be careful. This alchemy furnace is very magical. It is a suspended cauldron with three layers of rotating cores. The elixir is suspended in the furnace. There is no fire inside the outer furnace. If Dan Qiusheng had not known this mechanism, the fire in the furnace would never have been rekindled."
He Zhizhang knew that the Dan Qiusheng mentioned by Li Bai was Zhongnan Taoist Yuan Danqiu, who was a master of alchemy. He asked casually: "I wonder how many times you have refined pills?"
The method of alchemy lies in continuous refining. Put all kinds of precious medicinal materials and ores used in alchemy into the alchemy furnace and smelt them together. If they can be condensed into an elixir, it will be a turn. Then use the elixir as a guide to put more medicinal stones into the furnace to restore the elixir. Refining and then condensing it will form two turns, so nine times is the "Nine Turns". The most commonly used material in alchemy is cinnabar, so the first-turn elixir is vermilion, and it is called "dan" because of its red color. However, the world believes that the "Nine-turning Pill" is golden and is called the "Nine-turning Purple Golden Pill". Ge Hong, the Baopuzi scholar, said: "Nine-turning Pill, you will become an immortal in three days." What he means is that if you take the Nine-turning Golden Pill, you will be healed within three days. But the Tao ascended and became an immortal.
Li Bai laughed at himself: "Brother is laughing at me, and I will change my mind at most..."
As the three of them chatted and laughed, it was almost midnight. Tong'er returned to the house and brought a large plate of cooked fat chicken, paired with several seasonal dishes. Although it was not an expensive dish, it was fresh and delicious. Tong'er brought another pot of yellow rice. Li Bai took a look at it and asked Tong'er, "Why don't you make Diaohu rice to entertain guests?"
Tong'er replied: "It's been cold recently, the price of wild rice is high, and the housewife won't let it be used."
Li Bai said angrily: "This woman... you two are my best friends, do you have to be so arrogant when serving meals?"
He Zhizhang said hurriedly: "There is a poem by Master Meng in Xiangzhou that goes: 'An old friend has chickens and millet and invites me to the field's house.' It can be seen that these fat chickens and yellow rice are the joy of farmers. Why are they so shameless? It's just that friends come from far away, but there are Food without wine is not the way to treat guests."
Li Bai then woke up and said: "Quick, quick! Cinsha, go and prepare wine!"
Pei Min asked curiously: "This little boy's name is Cinsha?"
Li Bai chuckled and said, "He didn't have that name at all. When I adopted him, I was obsessed with alchemy, so I gave him the nickname Dansha just to get some credit."
Tong'er responded to the order and went to get the wine. Pei Min waited for him to walk out of the stone room and asked Li Bai quietly: "Is he an orphan?"
Li Bai said: "He is a Jiangliuer..."
At that time, many poor families on both sides of the Yangtze River in the south of the Yangtze River could not afford to raise their children, so they put their pre-term children in wooden basins and floated down the river. Such children were called "Jiangliu children". If you are lucky enough to be adopted by a kind person, you will have to live. If you are unlucky, it is common for you to land on a deserted beach and be picked up by a wild animal. He Zizhang was from Yongxing, Yuezhou, Jiangdong, so he naturally knew the saying "Jiang Liu'er". He couldn't help sighing and said: "I didn't expect that the little boy was also a miserable person. Brother Taibai picked him up and accumulated good karma."
Li Bai said: "It wasn't me who found him, but Mr. Zhengjie. It's quite a legend. Normally, children in the river flow down the river, but this boy's barrel went upstream. At that time, Mr. Zhengjie was going upstream. I was swimming in a river in a boat, and when I was sailing down the river, I saw a wooden basin coming upstream. I was so surprised that I ordered the boatman to drive the boat closer, only to find that it was a baby."
Pei Min wondered: "How can the wooden basin go against the current?"
Li Bai said: "Mr. Zhengjie already understood the reason when he rescued Tong'er. It turned out that it was the migration period in late spring, and there were a school of phoenix fish swimming upstream in the river. It happened that the wooden basin hit the phoenix. There was a large number of bream fish and phoenix bream, but they didn’t know how to get out of the way, so they pushed the wooden basin up the river.”
Pei He and Pei He clicked their tongues in unison, and Li Bai smiled and said, "Mr. Zhengjie also said that children have profound blessings... Speaking of which, this spring, I heard that Mr. Zhengjie was ordered by a saint to enter the imperial court and serve as a scholar?"
