Distant Mountain Battle Song

Chapter 66 Subtle Integration (Three chapters, please vote and subscribe)

Eji was a pure Han Chinese, possessing all the virtues of Han Chinese, as well as most of their shortcomings.

She is as resilient as a wild grass. Even if no one appreciates her, she will bravely stretch out her leaves and present her unique beauty. When she has no mate, she will beat a drum in the wilderness, hoping that the sound of the drum will help her bring back a man with whom she can reproduce.

Yun Ce arrived, and then he became her man.

She acknowledged that it was given to her by the Dragon God.

Eji didn't really understand what love was, nor did she know how to express her love. Giving birth to ten sons for Yun Ce was her ultimate answer to her love for him.

She wanted a home. Before, her little wooden house was her home. She hoped to build a home with Yun Ce in the little wooden house. Then, when Yun Ce left, she followed him, abandoning the wooden house that had sheltered her from the wind and rain for many years.

She has been working hard to build her home, a home that not only needs money, but also people.

Yun Ce didn't ask E Ji, because everything E Ji did touched his heart perfectly.

According to Feng An, he and Liang Kun had become retainers of the Yun family.

The craft of carving characters and seals on wood was not uncommon in the Han Dynasty; it was a skill that every scholar possessed.

Yun Ce had Feng An and Liang Kun carve characters on more than a dozen wooden blocks, then rearranged the blocks, tied them together with rope, applied ink to them, and pressed them onto Feng An's arm.

Feng An looked at the words on his arm and read them aloud in confusion: "Isn't it a pleasure to have friends coming from afar?"

Liang Kun leaned over to look at the words on Feng An's arm, and said to Yun Ce with a puzzled look, "What do you want to do? Just say it directly. When we're doing things for you, the two of us will put our hearts into it, but not into you."

Yun Ce looked at the two somewhat bewildered people with suspicion and said, "If you carve all the words on wood and arrange them according to the contents of a book, wouldn't you immediately have many books?"

Feng An's eyes lit up, and he immediately took out a blank silk scroll, picked up the wooden block that Yun Ce had tied up, and pressed it on the scroll. Sure enough, a line of clear words appeared on it: "Isn't it a pleasure to have friends coming from afar?"

Before Feng An could express his joy, Liang Kun said, "This is a waste of silk scrolls. It would be better to write the words on the silk scrolls out; it would be more beautiful that way."

Yun Ce said, "Using it on silk would be a waste, but it's different on paper."

Feng An immediately pulled a wad of paper from his sleeve, it seemed they had also learned to use this to wipe their bottoms.

The wooden block was pressed down on the paper, and the line of words immediately appeared, but it quickly bled out, leaving Feng An somewhat disappointed.

Yun Ce laughed and said, "The bark of the Cloth Tree can be used to make the best paper. It is not only suitable for writing, but also for storage. It is also very good for writing with pen and ink."

Feng An and Liang Kun remained silent, focusing instead on untying the wooden blocks that were bound together, scattering them, and packing them into a small cloth bag, which Feng An then gave to E Ji.

"You don't believe this can work?"

Liang Kun glanced at Eji and Feng An, who had just entered, and said, "I believe that both papermaking and printing will become a reality as you say. Now, I want to advise you that these two things should remain a secret between the four of us."

"Once you become the dominant force in your region, we can then discuss the possibility of implementing these two things."

Looking at the darkening sky, Feng An bit his lip and said, "We already understand how important these two things are; they are enough to form the foundation of a family that lasts for generations."

But definitely not now.

Liang Kun stood up and said, "I will go to the school to encourage those students to petition the governor's mansion again. This time, even if it means bloodshed, we must make sure you are qualified to participate in the competition."

Feng An also said quietly, "That woman from the noble family is insatiable in her desires, but she is also stupid. I want to use her to open up a channel for the head of the family to rise in rank."

Yun Ce didn't stop them; he also wanted to see if this universal approach could really work.

Through this incident, Yun Ce had already sensed that the sky over the Han Dynasty was dark, and he wanted to see just how dark the sky of the Han Dynasty could be.

Yun Ce understood perfectly well that the Han Dynasty on Earth was a family-run empire. If Huo Qubing was taken as the timeline and Yun Ce as the origin, then the Han Dynasty had been developing for 2143 years. Not only had it become stagnant, but it had even regressed somewhat, which was unforgivable.

Seeing the Han Dynasty in such a dark state, Feng An and Liang Kun were somewhat indignant. However, after experiencing the Pingyuan City Uprising and the Sheyang City Uprising, their emotions had been worn down.

It was because he saw clearly how dark the road ahead was that he thought of joining Yun Ce's side and gambling on a different future.

Yun Ce didn't feel much indignation about the darkness of Han society. As the direct descendant of an old rebel family, he genuinely felt that the darker Han society was, the brighter his future would be. When having dinner with E Ji, E Ji clearly sensed that Yun Ce was very happy. She poured him another bowl of bean porridge and sat down beside him, saying, "What's making you happy? Tell me."

Yun Ce pointed outside and said, "It's so dark."

Eji glanced outside and said, "The full moon is getting smaller, and the weather will gradually get colder. There will be frost in fifteen days. Sleep with me tonight, it will be warm."

She never hid that she was the matriarch of the group. Even when Angie and the other women heard this, they pretended not to hear and happily drank their porridge.

"Feng An and Liang Kun gave the patriarch some excellent advice today. I'm planning to reward them each with one hundred coins. What do you think, young master?"

When Yun Ce saw An Ji eating intently, his ears twitched. He knew that the idea of ​​determining rank and status through rewards must have come from her, and he was willing to strengthen E Ji's position.

He laughed and said, "Anji is also quite good, let's reward her as well."

After the meal, Yun Ce felt that he had completely become a Han Chinese. He ate Han food, spoke Han language, and followed Han rules. He had completely integrated into the Han people. If Zhang Min were to call him a pig demon again, it would be too insulting.

Zhang Min easily found Liu Chang'an from Pingyuan City among the seven or eight hundred application cards from candidates from other places applying for the imperial examination.

Seeing the clear seal of Zhang Gongyaliang on the recommendation letter, she took out the seal from her sleeve, put some ink in it, and stamped it all over the silk recommendation form.

As dawn broke, Yun Ce woke up. In fact, he had been awake for a while. He couldn't sleep for twelve hours like the Han people. When it got cold, the way rich people in the Han kept warm was to stuff as many women as possible into the bed. With more people and less space, it would naturally be warmer.

Eji meant to get all the women, including Anji, to sleep in his bed, but Yun Ce declined, worried that the younger ones would wet the bed.

Seeing that Yun Ce only wanted the big ones and not the small ones, E Ji simply didn't want either of them. She stripped naked and climbed up, claiming that her body had always been as warm as a small furnace since she was a child.

In fact, when a woman is sleeping, it is difficult for her body to generate much heat. However, Yun Ce was covered with a thin blanket, and his body was as hot as the small stove that E Ji had mentioned.

The weather turned cold very quickly. Instead of the frost that Eji had said would only begin to fall after fifteen days, Yun Ce saw a layer of frost covering the stone pavement when he walked onto the street.

His destination today was the school dormitory, where there were many books and he could borrow them, but he had to pay.

He's been very studious lately, but unfortunately his family's situation doesn't allow him to buy more books. Besides, he always feels that even if he brought a cartload of books home, it wouldn't be enough for him to read in one night.

People used to say that Qin Shi Huang had to read 200 jin (100 kg) of memorials every day. Now that we actually see those piles of bamboo slips and wooden tablets, 200 jin is indeed not much.

Reading books became a physically demanding task, which filled Yun Ce with resentment towards the Han Dynasty, which had been developing for 2,100 years.

Two hundred and fifty years after Huo Qubing's death, Cai Lun invented real paper. This group of people worked for two thousand one hundred years, and the paper they created required caution even when going to the toilet.

The streets were already crowded, mainly with caravans. These caravans, which traveled all year round, provided food and clothing for everyone in Izumo City.

That's right, Izumo City has no agriculture; it's a purely commercial city. Every day, thousands of caravans enter Izumo City, bringing products from small villages like Hekou Village to the city.

Yun Ce originally thought that an economy without agriculture was a deformed economy. Logically speaking, at this time, farming should be the most important thing in the world.

The strange thing is that the people of Chuyun City live very well. Most of them seem quite wealthy. Even though there are many slaves, they look like human beings. There is no tyranny like in Pingyuan City, nor cruelty like in Sheyang City.

The school was just ahead. After turning past the courtyard of a wealthy man, you would see the school. Just as Yun Ce was about to turn, the gate of the wealthy man's house opened, and Zhang Min walked out, smiling at Yun Ce and saying, "You pig spirit, where do you think you're going!"

Upon seeing Zhang Min, Yun Ce immediately wanted to run away, but he managed to control his legs because Gouzi told him that there was no one else around.

"I'm not a pig demon, I'm just a poor student. Please have mercy on me and let me go."

“If you hadn’t put your hands on your waist, I might have believed your pitiful words.” Zhang Min seemed to be talking to Yun Ce, but her attention was entirely focused on an exquisite cage hanging at her waist.

Yun Ce naturally noticed the cage as well. There were no birds in the cage, but a greenish-blue insect. The insect was about half a foot long, with chubby big eyes, and it was quite cute.

I couldn't help but ask, "What is this?"

Zhang Min, barely suppressing her disappointment, said, "Spirit-detecting insect, if you are a pig spirit that has come into contact with the Dragon Spirit, its body will turn pink."

Yun Ce was not used to Zhang Min speaking to him so politely, so he asked warily, "I passed your test, right?"

(End of this chapter)