"Horse?" The person asking the question stood up excitedly and looked outside.
"Wind." The person who answered waved his hand and lowered his head in depression.
No caravans.
At the gates of the north and south gates of Gucheng, men braved the cold weather and waited from morning to lunch, and then continued after lunch. After a while, they waited again for Shen Zheng.
The already gray sky in the cold winter began to darken early.
Not to mention the caravan entering the city, after waiting for such a long time, they didn't even see a single passerby.
"So, those of us who are heartless, we wait all day long for someone else's caravan to be hit by heavy snow on the road. We will rush here with one breath and be slaughtered as fat sheep... We deserve retribution. It won't freeze this time. It’s almost like starving to death.”
"It's true, so you see, Buddha and Bodhisattva have never protected us."
"Bless your ass, there's not even a temple in this hellish place for a hundred miles."
The men were talking like this, but this was not really reflection, it was actually just venting. At this point, someone told another story that has been mentioned frequently in recent years.
The story is said to be true. It tells that in the early years, two old ladies who opened an inn and a medicine shop in Gucheng went to the temple outside the city to burn incense together during the severe cold weather, praying for heavy snow, wind and cold, so that the merchants would fall ill in the shop... …
In the end, they both died of the cold, and the only small ruined temple within a hundred miles of Gucheng collapsed.
The men laughed because of the familiar story. After laughing, they started to curse.
However, after scolding them, they will continue to wait.
At this time, the businessmen in the city who were stranded by the heavy snow began to come out for activities because they really couldn't live in their homes or were unwilling to spend more money to buy carbon.
There are few places to go in Gucheng itself, not to mention it is still a snowy and cold day.
So soon, the business of the small teahouse on the main street became booming, especially the storytelling area on the second floor, which was much more lively than usual.
In Gucheng, wine shops may still be open to locals who are addicted to drinking and would rather drink than eat food. But teahouses are different. They exist almost exclusively for passing merchants.
People in Gucheng really can't imagine why they should go into a store and buy a bowl of tea at their doorstep.
They really like to listen and want to hear the old man tell stories, but if they want to go up to the second floor of the teahouse, they must first buy a bowl of tea. Secondly, during the story telling time, the dragonfly girl comes out again and again with a tray to ask for reward money. , it’s really hard for them, uncles and brothers, to do it, they don’t give a penny from the beginning to the end.
Therefore, most locals in Gucheng rarely go to teahouses to drink tea and listen to books.
Among them, Ye Yuzhou is an exception.
Whenever he had free time on weekdays, he would almost always sit in the corner of the second floor of the small teahouse, listening to old storytellers and history stories, and talking with merchants from all over the world.
This is the most important way for Ye Yuzhou to learn and understand the world in Gucheng, besides books.
"I'm going to sit in the teahouse for a while. Call me when I enter the caravan." The sky was so dark that it was hard to see the words on the scroll. Ye Yuzhou stood up and told everyone around him.
"Okay, you can go warm up later."
"Come in and we'll call you."
A group of people squatting and standing at the foot of the wall responded one after another.
Then he started muttering:
"I guess there won't be any more."
"Fuck."
"Drinking the wind again."
…………
The small teahouse is already old, with large areas of the walls blackened and mottled. The wooden boards on the stairs creak as people move around, and with every sound, handfuls of dust fall in the gaps... In the middle of the lobby, which has a few potholes, there is a The huge charcoal pot is baking.
As soon as he walked in, he felt warm all over his body and his hands and feet were no longer stiff. Ye Yuzhou was familiar with the road and made himself a large bowl of tea. Without looking at the bowl, he carried it up to the second floor.
Push the door, close it, and go straight to the corner where there are few people around.
At this time, there was no old man in front of the storytelling table. Only her sister Zheng Yunniang stood in the middle, with a wooden fork propped up in front of her and a small red and white drum with broken edges and peeling skin placed on it.
It looks like Yun Niang is going to sing.
Fortunately it came in time.
Ye Yuzhou was in the corner, put down his tea bowl, straightened his body unconsciously, and waited quietly for his sister to speak.
Usually, the sense of familiarity between relatives will erase many emotions that are more likely to arise when distance is needed, such as admiration and worship. However, after six years, Ye Yuzhou still feels amazed every time he hears his sister Zheng Yunniang's voice. Worship.
Yun Niang was born with a good voice. The old storyteller praised her more than once, saying that even if she went to Chang'an, she would still be able to make a name for herself.
"Ta, ta...dong!"
Regardless of the noise of the crowd, the wooden drum was struck from the side to the center, making a sound with a simple and powerful rhythm.
I heard from merchants who passed by before that the singers in Chang'an like to use pipa as accompaniment these days. Zheng Yunniang doesn't know how to do that. What she sings is not the tune of Chang'an City, but a tune that is only popular among the people in the northwest area of Yanzhou, locally called Xiaogu Ci.
Tu is more earthy and has no formal rules, but it has its own flavor that no other style has.
On the spot, the drums dropped.
Yun Niang said: "Hey...ah!"
Snare drum poetry is not a gentle tune from the south of the Yangtze River. In the early years, a celebrity who accidentally heard it commented that "the sound is sharp and sharp to the listener, like a sharp arrow piercing the heart." As soon as Zheng Yunniang's voice opened up, it sounded as high as a suona, and the originally noisy scene was completely suppressed in an instant.
Everyone fell silent.
Yun Niang spoke again:
"The white jade mirror cracked out of the black sky, and I saw in a trance, hundreds of ghosts crouching and weeping, and the wandering ghosts of the dead country were afraid of the bright moon.
"Thousands of miles of yellow sand, a scratch of soil, princes, princes and ministers will gather grass cores.
"The wild hemp blooms out of the Jiangnan brocade, which vaguely shows the old banners and the old banners, and the thousands of horses and troops that no one knows.
“Thunder and heavy rain wash away the dry bones, and the springs in June are still bloody.
"..."
In the high-pitched and sharp voice, a desolate atmosphere spreads out like a tide along with the lyrics.
Gradually and slowly, as slowly as the river tide on a cool night, Yun Niang sang at the top of her voice:
“On the eight thousand miles journey, I found jackdaws roosting in trees and iron armor marching in places, only then did I realize that I had been let down.
"In the past fifty years, the hairpin is still there, but the beloved has taken care of it, and it has changed into a beautiful and decayed tree.
"Don't you see, no one lives in the northern land for thousands of miles. In those days, Yu Lang was holding a handkerchief and crying.
"Don't you see, there is a gray old woman stumbling on the yarn beside the Nanguo Bridge.
"..."
The lyrics and music are all unknown. I think the storyteller may have made it up by scratching his own hand. A regular customer who frequented the poem took it upon himself to pick out the first sentence and call it "The White Jade Mirror Cracks Out of the Black Sky."
Half a cup of tea, just one song.
There was silence everywhere.
The entire second floor of the teahouse seemed to be shrouded in a desolate scene of an old battlefield, and the emotions of the merchants present were also pulled into it.
You must know that before the establishment of the Great Zhou Dynasty, what the world had just experienced was a period of dark and bloody wars and changes in imperial power that lasted for more than seventy years.
Even after the establishment of the Great Zhou Dynasty, sporadic wars on the border never stopped for a long time.
Therefore, among those who are risking their lives to travel north and south these days, who doesn’t have a sense of historical family and country sentiments in their hearts? Who has not seen several broken bones exposed in the soil after being washed away by rain?
There are twenty-four states in the Central Plains, and there are several households. No one in the family died in the battle, and the bones have not been returned?
"Okay!" After waiting for a while, someone finally cheered.
"Okay, okay, I didn't expect to hear such singing in this remote town."
"It's rare even in Chang'an."
For a time, everyone in the house was clapping their hands and cheering, and there was endless praise.
Amidst the cheers, her younger sister Li Yingyue, who had already taken off her wolfskin hat, quietly walked out from one side holding the reward plate in her hands...
Although the clothes on the twelve-year-old girl's body are simple and plain, she is clear and pleasant everywhere.
It has been six years. Li Yingyue has lived in this poor place where there is either yellow sand or wind and snow every day for six years. Although she is often dirty and dusty, as long as she is clean, no matter whether her skin, lips, teeth or her eyes are clean, His bright eyes still looked as if they had just been washed out of a clear spring.
The Feng Daozi in this city seemed unwilling to hurt her. The native people of Gucheng are not good at praising others, so they usually just say that she doesn't look like a Gucheng native.
"The guest officer is offering me some money."
"The guest officer is offering me some money."
"Hey, why didn't you say a word about the other part of the sentence? It's just a favor for someone who has no money." A merchant quipped as the reward plate was handed to him.
It was a joke, but if Dragonfly really followed his words and said half of the sentence, he would have laughed and thought that he had no money, so he would save the reward.
Then other guests followed suit.
"Every guest is blessed by the God of Wealth. Trade is booming and wealth is spread all over the world. Naturally, all of you are rich. How can you be without money?"
Li Yingyue opened her lips and teeth with a smile.
"Oh, little girl, you are quite powerful."
"Very well said."
"What a smart girl."
The merchants laughed and praised her when they heard her response.
In fact, dragonflies have always been clever and intelligent. This is not only the view of the merchants here today and Ye Yuzhou himself.
In Gucheng, there is a story about her wit, which has been often told by parents to their children over the years.
The story happened three years ago, when Dragonfly was nine years old. One day, while playing with a female companion of the same age, he unconsciously left the city gate and ran to the southern suburbs of the city.
Just at this time, two merchants who were leaving the south of the city passed by. They saw it, rode away and came back. They said they wanted to ask for directions, but first they asked why are you two little girls here?
There is obviously only one way to go south from Gucheng.
So, without hesitation, the dragonfly held the little friend who was about to answer with one hand, pointed to the woods on the roadside with the other hand, and said:
"No, my brother and uncles are hunting in the forest. We are waiting for them here."
The merchant then left without asking for directions.
Afterwards, people in Gucheng said that if Dragonfly had not responded in this way, she and her friend would have been kidnapped and sold in the mainland. There are all kinds of people hiding among the merchants traveling in the world. Such things did happen in Gucheng in the early years.
Then Dragonfly was beaten so hard by her sister Yunniang that her skin and flesh were torn apart.
"Your Majesty, please give me some money." Dragonfly asked again amid the praise.
"Okay, okay!" "Wow!" The first guest who tipped was generous, raising a handful of coins, and more than twenty copper coins were spread on the plate.
The sound of jingling, clanging, and falling coins can be heard all the time.
After walking around in this way, the plate was almost half full of copper coins, and there were also two or three very small pieces of silver mixed in.
Dragonfly turned around from the back row and finally walked all the way to his brother.
"The guest officer is offering me some money."
She stood close, looked at him with her head lowered, and pursed her lips into a snicker.
Ye Yuzhou reached out to the plate and quietly pinched two copper coins.
Question: "How much coarse tea?"
"One article." Dragonfly responded crisply.
"Ding!"
"Ding!"
Ye Yuzhou raised his hand and threw it gracefully. The two copper coins fell into the plate one after another in a parabola. They hit the money with two distinct sounds.
One penny for tea, one penny for reward.
At this moment, the old storyteller finally came back with tea, walked slowly to the old rectangular table and sat down.
