Fighter of the Destiny

The middle-aged man left after saying this. Chen Changsheng stood on the mountain path, feeling very confused and naturally a little annoyed. After a while, he remembered that the man last mentioned that someone was looking for him in front of the mausoleum. When I came to the mausoleum, I saw that the stone door was still closed. I remembered the scene of Xun Mei walking out of here last night. Just when I was feeling a little sad, I suddenly heard someone calling my name.

He followed the sound to the side of the stone door and saw a small window on the wall, where Priest Xin was waving to him. He was a little surprised, saluted to the small window, and asked, "Why are you here?"

Priest Xin handed something over from the stone window and said, "The bishop wants me to come and see you."

Chen Changsheng took those things and asked, "The luggage is all in the car. We were not allowed to bring it in yesterday."

Priest Xin said: "This is the rule of Tianshu Mausoleum. After the inspection is completed, it will be sent to you. It should not be later than today."

Chen Changsheng thought about the sour and smelly beddings in the hut, and tried to ask: "Can you please send us a few more clean beddings?"

Priest Xin was stunned and said, "It's not difficult."

"Since the luggage will be returned to us, there is nothing more needed."

Chen Changsheng looked through the things sent by Priest Xin and found that there was a bag of hard-boiled eggs inside. He couldn't help but asked out of curiosity: "Do you have to provide for all three meals in the Mausoleum of Heaven's Book by yourself?"

Priest Xin explained: "Each college and sect has made preparations and will send them in every day. As for the private students, the imperial court will provide them with daily necessities, but the quality is poorer. The National Education College is now full of waste, and you and Tang Thirty-Six There is definitely no preparation, the Bishop has already made arrangements, so don’t worry.”

Conversing through the small stone window, Chen Changsheng felt a little weird, like visiting a prisoner.

Looking at the expression on his face, Priest Xin guessed what he was thinking and said, "The Tomb of Heavenly Books is a holy place and a prison."

Chen Changsheng was slightly startled, remembering what happened to Xun Mei, and said, "It makes sense. Thank you for your warning."

Priest Xin said: "I can't say anything that makes sense. These are the words of the previous pope. The bishop asked me to tell you."

Chen Changsheng said: "Understood."

Priest Xin looked into his eyes through the stone window and said, "Anyway, you have to remember that Zhou Garden will open in one month, and you must come out before then."

Chen Changsheng did not reply to this sentence, but told the story about the domineering monument attendant he met on the mountain road.

"How can this be?"

Priest Xin frowned and said: "Those academic sects may find ways to make friends with and please these monument attendants for the convenience of their disciples in the Tomb of Heaven's Book. In addition, they have special status, so they are indeed a little aloof and arrogant, but they are all It is supported by the state religion, so how dare I offend you?"

Chen Changsheng did not understand the logic in this sentence and asked in confusion: "Don't you dare to offend me?"

Seeing his dazed look, Priest Xin smiled and said, "Now the entire continent knows that you are the person favored by the Pope and the Bishop. Offending you means offending the state religion."

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When the tablet attendant taught him a lesson, he said that no matter how great his background was, he should still be in awe in a holy place like the Mausoleum of Heavenly Books. After listening to what Pastor Xin said, Chen Changsheng naturally had a new understanding when he thought about this sentence. He secretly guessed whether it was because of his background in the national religion that made these monument attendants in Tianshu Mausoleum innately disgusted.

Thinking about these things, he walked back to the thatched house. There was no one in the room, and the young men should have gone to the Tomb of Heavenly Books to view the monument. The large pot of white porridge cooked before dawn was all eaten, the pots and pans were washed and set out, and even the water in the jar was refilled. Although I didn't see who made it, for some reason, he It was definitely Gou Hanyi's arrangement.

Although there would be new bedding, Chen Changsheng still took off the three beddings left by Xunmei and washed them carefully several times until he was sure that all the sour smell of sweat for thirty-seven years had been washed away before hanging them in the courtyard. on the rope, and then he walked through the orange grove and came to the vegetable field in the distance. It's early spring now, the time when the harvest is slow. There are no fresh vegetables in the vegetable field. The only green ones that can be seen are onions, garlic and leeks. He took a few fingers of spring onions, dug a few pieces of potatoes in the ground, and returned. Go to the yard and start preparing lunch.

Boil water in a large iron pot, cut a strip of bacon sent by Priest Xin in half, throw it in, and then start steaming rice on it. Potatoes cut into fingernail-sized pieces were mixed into the rice. The green onions were washed and chopped and placed on the edge of the stove. The cooked eggs were also taken out and can be placed next to the steamer at any time. After all this was done, he nodded with satisfaction. Nodding, he went to wash his hands.

Although salted fish and bacon are delicious and go well with meals, they are not very healthy. Eating too much is bad for your health. Priest Xin said that the bishop has arrangements, and the Lishan Sword Sect will also find a way to send things in. I don’t know what will happen every day in the future. Whether fresh meat and vegetables could be guaranteed, he sat on the threshold and thought about these things. I was a tourist for a day yesterday, am I going to be a cook for a day today? In the Mausoleum of the Book of Heaven, he didn't look at the monument or think hard, but he thought about these things. If others saw him in a daze on the threshold, I don't know what kind of reaction they would have.

Chen Changsheng sat on the threshold, looking at the courtyard outside the thatched house, at the half-fallen fence, and at the unattractive green trees in the orange garden not far away. He was very quiet and did not change his posture for a long time. Of course, things like diet don’t need to be thought about for so long. Things between men and women have never been related to him, so what is he thinking about?

Looking at the fallen fence and the mist in the woods that was gradually dispersed by the sun, he was so focused that he didn't even notice that the luggage left outside the Mausoleum of Heaven's Book yesterday was delivered to the courtyard.

The chirping of birds woke him up from his deep thoughts, and then he noticed the luggage piled up like a hill on the side. He walked forward, found his package, took out the pen, ink, paper and inkstone, sat back on the threshold, and continued to look at the fallen fences and green forests, but now there was an extra pen in his hand, and the stone inkstone beside him The ink has melted.

As time goes by, the sun gradually rises, and the angle of light falling on the courtyard also changes.

The fence was sparse and crumbling, but there were a few thick stakes in between.

As the light changes, the shadows of the wooden piles on the ground also change, and the branches of the green trees in the orange garden also change. The wooden piles begin to become shorter, and the thin bamboo slices next to them begin to become shorter. Wide, some twigs on the green tree branches are about to disappear in the brighter and brighter sunlight, but some branches become more and more clear due to the contrast of light and shadow.

Chen Changsheng watched this scene quietly, watching these changes, his consciousness returned to the stele house in the early morning. At that time, the morning sun was rising, and the lines on the surface of the stele were changing with the red and warm glow, as if to As if alive, the edges of the deep lines are illuminated and become thinner, while the superficial lines become wider.

Those complicated and inexplicable lines on the stone tablet are the inscriptions. Those inscriptions have withstood countless winds and rains for countless years and have not changed at all, but are they not changing all the time? If the information hidden in those inscriptions is certain, why do the interpreters of the inscriptions interpret it with completely different meanings? Yes, it's all because of these changes.

Chen Changsheng dipped his pen in the inkstone with some ink, opened the book, and began to write and draw on it. He did not record his thoughts and gains in words, but strictly followed what he saw in front of him and his general deductions. , began to trace the lines on the Zhaoqing Monument, and the tip of the pen walked particularly heavily on the paper.

I don't know how much time passed, but he stopped writing and redrawn the lower right corner of Zhaoqing Monument in his notebook. Then he took out the rubbings of the Tianshu stele that he had taken out at the inn, found the page of the Zhaoqing stele, and began to compare it with his new drawing, and found that there was a very big difference between the two. Compared with the inscriptions on the Zhaoqing Monument, the patterns he drew on the notebook were obviously more vivid. If his writing skills were better, it could be described like this - the patterns seemed to jump out of the paper and come alive.

The fog in the woods has disappeared, the bamboos on the fence have become drier, and the light in the courtyard is extremely bright. Unknowingly, it has already reached noon.

Chen Changsheng rubbed his sore eyes, closed his eyes and rested for a while, then got up to prepare lunch. Only then did he realize that no one came back. It was quiet around the thatched house. Because of the rising temperature, even the birds in the woods were too lazy to sing. He stood alone in front of the threshold and felt so lonely.

The rice had already been steamed and was set aside to simmer. The fragrance of potato chips mixed with the aroma of bacon grease turned into a very strange but very attractive smell. He took out half a strip of bacon from the pot and thought After thinking about it, he cut off only a small section with a knife, cut it into fine pieces, poured it into a rice bowl, peeled a hard-boiled egg, and finished his lunch hastily with a bowl of light tea.

After eating, he took a casual walk along the courtyard. He went back to the house and rested on the bed with his eyes closed for a while. Then he sat back on the threshold, holding a notebook in his left hand and a pen in his right hand, and continued to look at the scenery around the courtyard. In a daze, the light changes with time all the time, so he must observe all the time.

As the sun gradually sets in the west, the color of the light falling in the courtyard gradually becomes thicker, and the wooden stakes and bamboo pieces in the fence, as well as the thin branches in different directions on the treetops, also change. Chen Changsheng, who had been watching quietly for a long time, finally started to write again. All the changes he had observed throughout the afternoon were transferred to the tip of his pen, turning them into lines on the paper that were not precise and only represented some kind of obsession.

In the evening, he redrawn most of the inscriptions on the Zhaoqing Monument on paper.

He knew that he was not far away from understanding these inscriptions.

At this time, people staying in the thatched houses also returned to the courtyard one after another.

The first person to come back was Liang Banhu. Chen Changsheng nodded to him. But he didn't seem to notice it at all. He went directly into the kitchen, filled a large ladle of water and drank it all. Then he walked back to the courtyard, stepped on the fence that Tang Sanshiliu had pushed down yesterday evening, and looked to the west. The sun was setting, and his face looked sad and happy.

Qi Jian then returned to the courtyard. The young man's expression was a little confused. Although he did not forget to salute Chen Changsheng, when he entered the house, he almost bumped into the door. After a while, he walked out of the house. , for some reason, he lowered his head and started walking around the courtyard, mumbling something, not knowing what he was saying.

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(The next chapter will be out before eleven o'clock.)