Shushan: Extinction

Chapter 23 Final Speech
Because of the burden of the caravan and the fact that this place was very close to a dangerous place like the Ten Thousand Mountains, with winding mountain roads, it took the group three days and two nights just to get to the neighboring county.

Along the way, Gong Tianwu was studying the True Feather Heart Sutra carefully.

It can be seen that the corresponding content has appeared in his attribute column:

True Feather Heart Technique
Origin: Ancient secrets (incomplete)

Proficiency: A brief glimpse of the way (22/1000)

Instrument Affinity: It makes it easy for you to get started in playing a musical instrument and your proficiency will improve rapidly.

Immersive: The music you play will strongly disrupt the target's five senses, causing it to fall into a corresponding special state. This special state is very important to the content of the music you play, and is also related to your performance level.

After all, according to Kang's description, he himself is a fragment of an ancient divine object, so this heart secret must be extremely powerful. Gong Tianwu has been suffering from the lack of ways to make progress in the past few lives, and he is eager to learn even some mediocre kung fu. Now that he has the heart secret passed down by the divine object, he will definitely go all out.

After arriving at Weiting County, the caravan went to sell and receive goods, while Gong Tianwu went to Lijiaba with the village chief and Shayang.

Although this place is less than thirty miles away from the county town, thirty miles on the plains cannot be equated with thirty miles in the hilly and mountainous areas.

The master and two servants set out in the morning and walked until sunset when they finally arrived at Lijiaba.

The biggest feature of Lijiaba is the terraced fields all over the mountain. At the same time, there is a clear spring on the top of the mountain, forming a white waterfall in the air, and then flowing down one by one, soaking and watering the terraced fields on the mountain.

This kind of work is certainly not formed naturally, nor is it the work of ordinary people. It was carved out by the "Shangzhen" of Baiman Mountain himself.

The terraced fields are not planted with any grain, but a famous plant: Datura. From June to October every year, the golden Datura flowers bloom all over the mountain, which is extremely spectacular.

After the harvest, all the grown datura flowers and seeds will be handed over to Baiman Mountain. In return, the villagers of Lijiaba will be exempted from taxes.

When they arrived at Lijiaba, they found out where the Li family's ancestral home was after a little inquiry. Gong Tianwu had already thought of a reason and went straight to the door to deliver the visiting card.

Sure enough, after the servant at the door received the visiting card, he came out not long after and said to Gong Tianwu:
"Scholar, my master wants to see you."

A smile suddenly appeared on Gong Tianwu's lips.

Logically speaking, he had never met the Li family before, and there was a funeral here, so the usual practice was to close the door and refuse visitors, so he would most likely be turned away.

However, Gong Tianwu played a trick here. The visiting card read: Student Xie was shocked to hear the sad news and came to pay his respects. These few words contained multiple meanings.

1. I am not an outsider, I am your father’s student.

2. We just heard the bad news and rushed here to pay our respects.

3. I am not here just on my way here, but have come here specially to pay my respects.

After these three meanings are expressed, even if the host is unkind, he has to open the door and invite them in to burn some incense. Otherwise, if it gets out, it will be seen that the Li family is ignorant of etiquette, and even bring shame to their ancestors.

After entering the door, the village chief and Shayang were naturally led to the side room to rest, and were served local fried peanuts and oil tea.

Shayang is a straightforward person. He eats peanuts as soon as he grabs them and drinks oil tea as soon as he picks them up.

The village chief was very surprised. He thought that the young master was just looking for an excuse to play with women, but he didn't expect that he would really come to Lijiabao and be invited into the house. Could it be that the ancestor of the Xie family really appeared?

Gong Tianwu soon met Li Guihan. This former Minister of the Ministry of Revenue had an ordinary figure and appearance. He was short, with dark and thin skin. If he changed into cloth clothes, he would be no different from the local mountain people. He had a gloomy face and spoke little.

When Li Guihan heard the purpose of Gong Tianwu's visit, he nodded and led Gong Tianwu to the ancestral hall in the back to burn incense and worship.

As soon as he entered the ancestral hall, Gong Tianwu was shocked.

It turned out that he thought he was just burning incense in front of Li Jixian's tablet, but it turned out that this place was actually a mourning hall, and he was burning incense in front of a coffin.

This is a bit strange. After all, what matters at this time is to be buried in peace. The body must be buried after the seventh day. Those unlucky people who died in other places will even ask corpse drivers to bring their bodies back to their hometown for burial.

According to Gong Tianwu's previous investigation, Li Jixian had been dead for at least a year.

Although the exact time is unknown, this great scholar wrote a poem half a month before his death, which was published in "Tianxia Wenshi". Two lines of the poem quickly spread throughout the world:
"The breeze sprinkles the orchid snow, standing alone between heaven and earth."

This shows that it snowed before his death, which means it has been at least half a year now. There must be a reason why the coffin is still kept in the ancestral hall and refused to be buried.

This time, Gong Tianwu came to perform the disciple ceremony, so the worship process was quite complicated:

Burn incense and worship,

Perform the three kneeling and nine kowtows ceremony.

Offering a memorial ceremony,

Reciting sacrificial texts, recalling the achievements of ancestors,
Walking around the tomb (coffin) to express grief,
Burn paper money and pray for blessings.

Seeing Gong Tianwu completing all the etiquette meticulously, Li Guihan's expression gradually eased up. After leaving the ancestral hall, he said with a serious face:

"My father was famous throughout the world when he was alive, but after he passed away, only three or five people came to pay homage to him, and there was not even a single disciple who came to pay homage to him. You are the first one who dared to come!"

Gong Tianwu was shocked, but he couldn't ask directly, so he started to ask indirectly. Finally, Li Guihan got to the point:
"I know all of my father's dozen disciples, but I don't recognize my junior brother."

Gong Tianwu had prepared a plan before coming here, and immediately said:

"My teacher once gave public lectures in Nanchong, Wanxin, Huiye and many other places. I happened to pass by and was fascinated by what he taught. As a result, I happened to use the content taught by my teacher in the provincial examination that year, so I was lucky enough to be on the list. From then on, I vowed to learn from Mr. Qingteng. (Li Jixian's nickname is Li Qingteng)"

To simply summarize Gong Tianwu's statement, I know Master Li, but he doesn't know me. However, it is normal for me to come and pay my respects since I have received the old man's kindness, right?
This statement was reasonable and there was no flaw in it. Instead, it showed that he was loyal and righteous. After hearing it, Li Guihan nodded slightly, expressing his approval.

Seeing that the conversation was almost heated, Gong Tianwu finally revealed his true intentions:
"I have two major wishes for coming here today. One is to pay homage to Master Li."

"Another big wish is that I heard that Master Li had a masterpiece, "Ci Shuo", which he had worked so hard on during his lifetime. People have said that this book suppressed the literary movement in Jiangnan for three hundred years. I have been looking forward to it for a long time. I hope I can have the chance to see the manuscript."

Gong Tianwu had already prepared a lot of arguments, but he didn't expect Li Guihan to just nod slightly after listening to them and said:
"Okay, come with me."

Soon, Gong Tianwu followed Li Guihan into the house and came to a study. Above the door there was a plaque with the words "Yinlu" written on it.

It can be seen that this place is actually quite simple, and it seems that no one has been here for a long time. There is a thin layer of dust on the table and benches. The interior of the study is full of bookshelves, which are filled with thread-bound books and even bamboo slips.

There was no decoration in the study except for a landscape painting of ordinary quality hanging next to the desk.

However, there are two lines of poetry inscribed in the lower left corner of the painting:

The floating life is temporarily entrusting to the dream within the dream,
Don’t let the world’s affairs get in the way.

Li Guihan and Gong Tianwu continued to walk inside and found that there were actually two rooms inside, which were also filled with books.

For this era, such a huge collection of books is already amazing enough.

Then Li Guihan said to Gong Tianwu:

"The words say it's right here, but this thing is spiritual and can only be seen by the destined person. Even I have only seen it once at my father's memorial service."

Then Li Guihan walked forward, bowed to the statue of the Great Sage and Teacher next to him, and lit a stick of incense and inserted it:
"My late father left a will. If you can find the words within one stick of incense, you can read them at will, but you cannot take them out of the hermitage. If you still can't find them within one stick of incense, then you are not destined to be with me, so please go back."

Then Li Guihan smiled bitterly and said:

"This is my father's legacy. I am no exception. There is no room for compromise, so please bear with me."

After hearing this, Gong Tianwu did not expect it to be like this. He had originally predicted that the difficulty would be how to get the Li family to take out the words and show them to him, but he did not expect that the difficulty would be how to find this thing.

Seeing that the countdown of one stick of incense had begun, Gong Tianwu did not go to look in the bookshelf.

Because Li Guihan himself had only seen this strange book once, given his master's status, if he could find it in the bookshelf, then this thing would have been discovered sooner or later.

Moreover, Gong Tianwu only had one stick of incense to go through. How many bookshelves could he flip through in such a short time? Two? Three?
Suddenly, Gong Tianwu thought of something:

"This Kang is usually very low-key. I have never seen it in my previous lives. Why did it suddenly appear in the past few days, and guide me to use the cause and effect points to get the Ming Pan, and teach me the secret technique? Could it be for this moment?"

Therefore, Gong Tianwu simply took out the Mingpan and started to play it. There was no way to play any music, so he could only play the introductory song "Youlan Cao".

At this time, more than a dozen people had come in from outside. They were all students and scholars from Lijiaba. They had also heard that someone wanted to challenge to watch "Ci Shuo", so they gathered outside the window to watch the fun.

"How dare this little brat covet the Ci Shuo?"

"Don't look, you won't find it!"

“I don’t think I can find it either.”

"Look at this stupid face with a pointed chin and monkey cheeks. I don't know how he passed the imperial examination and became a scholar."

"."

As the saying goes, scholars look down on each other. Of course, the scholars in Lijiaba would band together to exclude Gong Tianwu, the outsider, and think that he was overestimating his own abilities.

When Gong Tianwu took out the Ming Pan and started playing, everyone burst into laughter, rocking back and forth:
"I am dying of laughter, I am dying of laughter!" "My girl can play better than him."

"Is this guy stupid? He actually wants to lure her out of here just by saying this nonsense, You Lan Cao?"

"Wishful thinking, wishful thinking!"

Gong Tianwu started playing the piano intermittently, and his playing technique was unfamiliar and clumsy, just like a pupil in elementary school. After all, there is a huge difference between playing the piano and playing the pan.

But his two days of practice were not in vain, and soon the whole piece began to flow smoothly.

Gong Tianwu took a look at the incense stick at this time and found that only half of it was left, so he began to recite the True Feather Heart Sutra silently, and then started to play music by beating the cymbals.

This was a typical case of multitasking. Gong Tianwu obviously did not have the talent of Guo Jing, so even after practicing many times on the road, he was still very clumsy.

However, even while listening to Gong Tianwu's simple and awkward tapping, Li Guihan, who was standing next to him, suddenly had a strange feeling. It was as if a solitary orchid appeared before his eyes, lonely and self-pitying. After seeing it, he actually felt a faint sadness in his heart.
"What's going on?"

Li Guihan was shocked.

In just the next second, Gong Tianwu staggered and supported himself on the edge of the table with one hand.

He was gasping for breath, and he saw golden flowers in front of his eyes, which became dark, and the Ming Zhang in his hand almost fell to the ground.

Of course, the clear sound of the chimes also came to an abrupt end, and the orchid illusion also disappeared.

"What's wrong with me? Yes, this is the first time I use my mind to play along with the music, trying to influence the things around me. How could it be so exhausting?
Gong Tianwu was extremely shocked and immediately checked his personal data. He found that his energy and spiritual power had dropped sharply at the same time and had reached the bottom. No wonder he was so tired.

The other Lijiaba scholars who were watching from outside the window were not affected accordingly. When they saw Gong Tianwu's embarrassed look, they immediately laughed and scolded even more loudly:
"Go back!"

"Just you? A toad wants to eat swan meat."

"Two knocks? That's it?"

"That's ridiculous. How arrogant."

"."

However, just as they were laughing and cursing, the bookshelf next to them moved, and a thin book with a green cover slowly floated out and landed on the desk in front of Gong Tianwu.

Suddenly, the noisy sounds around stopped abruptly. Everyone looked surprised and suspicious, and stretched their necks to look inside, like a group of chickens being held by the neck to be slaughtered. It was so pitiful and ridiculous.

Others recalled what they had said before and couldn't help feeling hot on their faces, as if they had been slapped twice. They walked away in silence and shame.

Gong Tianwu took a breath and looked at the thin book with a green cover. He found a large dark stain on the cover, and three words were written in small characters next to it:
Words say!

After seeing this scene, Gong Tianwu was a human being for several lifetimes after all, and he had escaped death many times before, so his psychological quality was much more stable.

Therefore, he did not rush to look through it, but said solemnly to Li Guihan beside him:
"Sir, please give me a basin of clean water and a stick of incense. I want to cleanse my body and face, be sincere and sincere, and then I dare to read this masterpiece of Qingteng Gong!"

Li Guihan nodded slightly and immediately gave the order. Needless to say, Gong Tianwu carried out the following series of processes slowly and seriously, which could be said to be impeccable. Then he sat at the table and looked at this strange book.

The first thing Gong Tianwu noticed was the dark stain on the cover. The more he looked at it, the more it looked like blood. People describe writing a book as "working hard", which should have been an adjective, but now it seems to be realistic.

Not only that, when Gong Tianwuduo looked at the book "Ci Shuo" for a while, the corresponding explanation suddenly appeared in front of him:
Name: Words

Quality: Yellow (medium quality)

Introduction: This is a classic manuscript of Confucianism created by the great scholar Li Jixian with great effort. He has nurtured it with his noble and upright spirit for thirty years, and it has already transcended the realm of ordinary things. After Li Jixian's death, his resentment remained and directly entered the book as a weapon soul. Therefore, it was directly promoted to a medium-grade yellow weapon.

Enlightenment: Those who read this manuscript in its entirety for the first time and gain recognition from the weapon spirit will have a high probability of improving their understanding slightly. However, this special effect can only be triggered once every three years.

Enlightenment: If someone who has obtained the recognition of this treasure worships it, there is a certain probability that the wisdom of nearby newborns and children will be enhanced. It has no effect on adults and the impact range will not exceed ten miles.

A gathering of literary luck: If a person who has been recognized by this treasure worships it, then his family, neighbors, and friends will most likely be in the best condition when taking exams, with inspiration flowing like a spring and writing like a god.

Resentment (negative effect): The soul of this treasure, Li Jixian, suffered humiliation during his lifetime and died of resentment. Although Li Jixian was a great scholar, the resentment in him would not disappear. Therefore, when offering sacrifices to this treasure, this resentment would attract some troubles.

As the explanations in front of him gradually faded away, Gong Tianwu once again focused his attention on the book "Ci Shuo" and then reached out to open it.

But at this moment, there was a sudden "buzzing" sound in his head, and everything in front of his eyes went dark, and then his vision gradually began to recover.

But when Gong Tianwu regained his sight, he found himself in a large and luxurious house. People in official uniforms were walking around, most of them holding cases and documents in their hands, and they looked very busy.

In this scene, Gong Tianwu found that he could not move or speak at all and could only play the role of a bystander.

Soon, he noticed the three words "Tiwen Pavilion" written on the plaque next to it.

Gong Tianwu immediately recalled that this place was the central secretariat of Nanyi Kingdom. Documents, memorials, and expedited files from all over the country would flood here like a tide.

Then, a dozen or so Zhongshu Sheren in the Tiwen Pavilion worked together to handle it. First, they picked out the files according to their type, and then sorted them according to the severity of the content.

Then the eunuchs would deliver these classified documents to the Wenyuan Pavilion and present them one by one to the officials in charge of the corresponding categories.

If the minister encounters difficulties with his own authority or a problem that he cannot handle, he will submit it to the prime minister at the top. If he cannot make a decision, the cabinet will discuss it together.

For example, if a memorial says: A flood broke the dike in this prefecture, causing millions of victims, then this memorial would be selected together with all the memorials that talk about water conservancy, and then placed at the top and handed over to Mr. Lin, who is in charge of water conservancy classification.

In this way, the efficiency of the cabinet can be greatly improved.

However, at this time, there was a thin old man standing in the Tiwen Pavilion. He had a sad and solemn expression, and he was wearing cloth clothes, which seemed out of place with the surrounding environment.

This old man was none other than Li Jixian.

Immediately, a man strode out from inside.

This man was surrounded by many followers. He had eyebrows as black as knives, a broad forehead and a big mouth. He looked proud and intimidating without even getting angry.

More importantly, he was wearing a scarlet python robe with a jade belt around his waist. What was even more exaggerated was that the black python on the robe had five claws.

When Gong Tianwu saw this man, eight words immediately popped up in his mind: He has great power in the government and is the most powerful official in the country! !
The man strode up to Li Jixian and smashed a folded book on his head. With a "crack", the folded book broke and the papers inside flew all over the place.

It could be seen that blood immediately flowed down from Li Jixian's forehead, but the old man still stood straight with a calm look in his eyes, with no intention of kneeling down and begging for mercy.

Witnessing this scene, most of the people around knelt down instantly and said:

"Please calm down, Lord!"

"Don't get angry, sir!!"

"Please cherish your life, my Lord. The country cannot live without you for a day!"

"."

After hearing these words, Gong Tianwu immediately realized the identity of this person:
Civil servants keep climbing up the career ladder, and their ultimate goal is to enter the cabinet.

Once you enter the cabinet, you can be called Xianggong or Xiangye.

However, there is a distinction between the primary and the secondary in the cabinet. The one who ranks first and has the greatest power is called the Chief Minister, also known as the Elder of the Cabinet. He is the head of all officials and is second only to the emperor.

Some powerful ministers could even suppress the king.

At this time in Nanyi Kingdom, there was only one person who could be called the elder: Yan Fenyi, the elder Yan!
The experience of this elder is also legendary:

He passed the imperial examination at the age of seven and became a juren at the age of fifteen.

At the age of twenty-one, he made great contributions while on a diplomatic mission to the neighboring country of Yelang, and became a Jinshi at the age of twenty-three!

At the age of 31, he was the Minister of Revenue.
He entered the cabinet at the age of 34, becoming the youngest prime minister.

When he was 38 years old, the king passed away. Originally, all civil and military officials recognized that the crown prince should ascend the throne, but Yan Fenyi stepped forward and pushed the two-year-old Prince Lang to the throne. Needless to say, there was a lot of blood and gore involved, but Yan Fenyi's bet was successful.

With the help of this contribution, Yan Fenyi naturally became a cabinet minister. On this day, he was three months away from turning 40.

Today, Yan Fenyi has been in control of the government of Nanyi Kingdom for twenty-one years. During his reign, the country's power has been booming and the territory of Nanyi Kingdom has expanded three times.

At the same time, Mr. Yan was an excellent calligrapher and painter, and was ranked fourth in the world by Yan Renying, the Emei Zhenren. He also created the Guixue School on the basis of Confucianism, and was an absolute master of literature.

Although Li Jixian was also a world-renowned scholar, he was nothing compared to Yan Fenyi. In terms of his status in the academic world, he was far superior to Yan Fenyi, not to mention his official position and power.

At this time, Yan Fenyi's face was as gloomy as water, and he looked at Li Jixian with a condescending attitude, but Li Jixian still looked back stubbornly and proudly, letting the blood flow from his forehead, without any intention of giving in.

There were at least thirty or forty people in the entire Tiwen Pavilion, but they all stood there like statues. The air was filled with a terrifying silence as dead as death, and even the sound of breathing could be heard clearly.

(End of this chapter)