Luang Prabang.

A group of young men in ragged clothes were bound upside down, most of them young men, divided into two long groups according to men and women, each with a slight look of confusion and despair on their faces, staggering forward, flanked by many soldiers with muskets.

The road was soaked and soaked with mud everywhere due to a spring rain, but most of the people seemed to care about it, except for a young man at the front of the line, wearing a brocade robe, frowning and wiping his boots with a handkerchief.

"Hey, how long will it take to get to Myanmar? I can't waste my time on this, young master! ”

A middle-aged man dressed as an officer hurriedly smiled and said, "Shaojun, it should take us another day to walk from here to Myanmar...... Let's hurry up today, and we expect to be there tomorrow morning. ”

The young man spat lightly, looked back at those people who were like pigs and dogs, but snorted coldly: "Forget it, find a place to rest for a while today, if you go again, I'm afraid that you will have to die seven or eight, or go slowly, and my loss will be lower if I die a few less young masters!" ”

The officer waved his hand helplessly, beckoned a soldier, and said in a low voice: "Hurry up and send someone to greet you!" Today we are resting at the border, so that they can prepare their accommodation, but we can't delay Shaojun. ”

The young man is not named Shaojun, but the son of one of the dozens of feudal monarchs in Myanmar, originally a son of the Zhang family, named Zhang Ziying, because his father made contributions to the great cause of reunification, he was crowned a king, so he followed his father to Myanmar, and since then he has begun his days of dominating and hegemonic in Myanmar.

After the death of the king of the Lancang Kingdom, Suriwangsa, due to the lack of heirs, the Prime Minister Dian Tara established himself as the king, but because of his lack of strength, he was quickly killed, and then the Lancang Kingdom fell into the dilemma of the princes competing for the throne.

At this time, the two brothers Gisara and Intara, the grandsons of Suryawangsa, occupied Luang Prabang and refused to recognize the rule of their uncle's new king, Saitatila II, and then Saitatila II sent his younger brother to attack Luang Prabang, Gisara was defeated, and Luang Prabang was successfully recovered by Saitadila II.

Later, when the brothers saw that they couldn't see it, they asked for help from the Kingdom of Ayutthaya, and the Siamese king Suriya Thatie Bodhi had long wanted to interfere in the internal affairs of the Lancang Kingdom, so he chose to immediately send troops to invade Vientiane, forcing Saitatila II to sue for peace with Siam and recognize the throne of Gisara.

Since then, Lancang was divided into the Kingdom of Luang Prabang and the Kingdom of Vientiane, Gisara was the King of Luang Prabang, and Setatila II was the King of Vientiane.

As for the feudal lords in Myanmar, their business in Myanmar was quite regular at the beginning, recruiting a large number of landless civilians to go to Myanmar to farm, but these feudal lords found one point, that is, the reclaimable and arable area of Myanmar is too broad, and they can also grow Champa rice with three crops a year, and the harvest is naturally much higher than that in China, but the problem is that there are not enough people to farm.

Naturally, these people did not come to Burma to build great rivers and mountains, but were forced by the profit needs given by the emperor and the Imperial Court, and in essence, turned the feudal system into a game of colonial companies, to put it bluntly, they took advantage of the contradictions between the Luang Prabang Kingdom, the Champasak Kingdom and the Vientiane Kingdom to take advantage of the chaos - like these slaves were all sold by King Intara of Luang Prabang to the young monarch of the Zhang family.

Zhang Ziying bought more than 800 slaves from Intara, all of them young and strong, but dozens of people had died along the way, which made him feel a little painful - only a little painful, after all, the price of these slaves was not high, and each person was only worth ten silver dollars.

Through the efforts of feudal lords like Zhang Ziying, they can transfer a large amount of rice, logs, sawn timber, agricultural products, aquatic products and tropical water to the country, and part of the income obtained from this goes to the state treasury, and the other part goes to themselves, so as to make profits.

With a crisp whistle, the soldiers escorted the slaves to continue limping, Zhang Ziying They could rest on the way, but the slaves could only walk slower, and could not really stop, otherwise they would not be able to catch up with Zhang Ziying's riding speed, if there were those who could not walk at all, they often died directly on the road,

In fact, in the records of later generations, this kind of painful march is not uncommon, and it is almost widespread with the expansion of the empire, and a large number of people from Southeast Asia, Japan, Korea and even the Far East have become these silent groups, who have established the vast empire of Great Chu with blood and sweat.

.........

In May, the sunlight in front of the Nanjing Prison Prison is slightly dazzling, especially when people who have been inside for a long time just come out, they will be very unaccustomed to this kind of light, they will often bow their heads slightly, and hold their eyes with their sleeves all the way forward, as if they have done a great sin and are repenting.

Among these 'repentant' crowds, Shen Luochuan does not seem too special, and this is the second time he has entered the palace, no different from the time he went to prison a few years ago - when the emperor announced the new rules for the civil service examination, he took people to the street again to make trouble, but this time he did not make a fuss, he was arrested by the police of the Nanjing Police Department, and then handed over to the Dali Temple of the Mansion and sentenced to the crime of "illegal assembly" and "illegal procession", and squatted in the bureau for a month.

As soon as he thought of this, Shen Luochuan's eyes couldn't help but shed two lines of tears, not because the sun was too dazzling, but because he was really sad - this time he didn't even make a name for himself, and he didn't even see the army, and he was still cleaned up by the army before.

For Shen Luochuan, this means that he has become more and more unable to shake the huge imperial court, and there is no need to kill him at all.

Standing in front of Shen Luochuan was not his other friends, but a person he hadn't seen for a long time - Shen Weijun, both of them could be regarded as romantic figures in Shilin back then, but now the situation is very different, Shen Luochuan has been released from prison twice, but Shen Weijun seems to be magnanimous.

"Brother Luo Chuan, the younger brother was entrusted by his sister-in-law to welcome you out of prison...... You can rest assured that the bail has been paid in full, and as long as you keep your duty in the future, there will be nothing to do. ”

Shen Weijun had a slight smile on his face, and it was obvious that he did not have a bad impression of his fellow countryman.

But at this time, Shen Luochuan only glanced at this person lightly, turned his head and walked behind him, looking like this, he seemed to want to re-enter, which made Shen Weijun a little curious.

"Brother Luochuan, could it be that something was left in prison? If it's something that doesn't matter, forget it, why bother going in again? ”

However, Shen Weijun didn't expect that Shen Luochuan stopped, still turned to look at him coldly, and said softly: "It was you who betrayed your fellow Shilin back then, causing them to go to prison, not to mention, but also causing the world to become so contemptible ........ Hmph, the smell of copper is really unbearable, I would rather go to prison than be with you! ”

"You!"

Shen Weijun snorted coldly, nodded to Shen Luochuan twice, and finally endured this breath, and said coldly: "You can go in as you want, but I want to tell you that this time, in order to save you, Mrs. Sister-in-law not only sold the family's fields and houses, but also paid a large sum of money to the clan, so that the bail was paid, so you can do it yourself." ”

After saying this, Shen Weijun no longer paid attention to this sour Confucian, and left this place directly, for him, it was purely entrusted by others to come at the moment, but when he saw such a person, he was naturally unwilling to continue talking.

With this spare time, it is better to serve your own big animals well and earn more money!

Shen Luochuan saw that Shen Weijun had left here, so he had to return to his inn in Nanjing alone, but at this time, he found that his mother-in-law and three-year-old daughter were also in the inn, waiting alone, this scene made Shen Luochuan even more angry.

"Why did you two come here? As women, you should observe women's virtues, stay at home honestly, and don't come out, let alone cause trouble for me! ”

The woman, who was in her twenties, looked like a woman in her thirties because of her years of hard work, and she lowered her head to wipe her tears and muttered, "How can I want to come out?" But you violated the king's law, and I had no way to know your news, so I had to entrust my clansmen, sell the house and land, and borrow money from my mother's family as travel expenses, so I went to Nanjing and entrusted your brother to ransom you......"

The woman's chatter, coupled with the poor little daughter on the side, but for some reason suddenly extinguished the resentment and anger in Shen Luochuan's heart, he looked at the two in front of him blankly, and finally couldn't bear it anymore, hugged the wife in front of him and began to cry bitterly.

"What do you think I'm trying to do....... Why am I so stupid....... They took me as a joke, and I lived myself as a joke, and I was in my thirties, what the hell was I doing! ........”

The sadness that has not been inhumane for many years turned into rolling tears, which ran across Shen Luochuan's face, but caused the woman and the child to cry together, but this cry could not be stopped until the shopkeeper downstairs couldn't bear it, he ran up and patted the door panel several times.

"I said, 'Are you mourning?' I'm an inn, and if you're like that, others think we're dead! ”

The short and fat old shopkeeper was also merciless in his mouth, and he muttered: "Hey, since your husband came back alive, it was earned, didn't you see, how many people jumped in front of this city tower a few days ago, these sour talents who can only read, can be regarded as finding the reason for their death, if you want me to say, this person, as long as he is alive, then there is hope, isn't it?" ”

Hearing the old shopkeeper's persuasion, Shen Luochuan stopped his tears, looked at his wife and daughter in front of him, and said in a low voice: "I have figured it out, this world has completely changed, and I will definitely not be able to get out of it with those few broken books alone, we are still hometown, and when the time comes, with the relationship between the clan, I can even go farming!" ”

The woman was overjoyed, and she hurriedly went to pack her baggage, and whispered as she cleaned up: "If you thought like this earlier, why did you suffer so many grievances? Your brother also said earlier that we can choose to work in his factory, and you can at least be an accountant or something! When the time comes, several silver dollars a month will be counted, and it will be no problem to support the family! ”

"What? When Mr. Bookkeeper? ”

Shen Luochuan's head was a little buzzing, he didn't feel lowly, but subconsciously looked at his hands, he was really capable of doing this job?

But no matter what, life has to go on. When the Shen family walked out of the inn, Shen Luochuan suddenly felt like a new life, this time he cried out all the unwillingness and grievances in his heart, and after crying, the whole person felt more or less like a rainy day.

However, just as the Shen family was about to walk through the street, there was a dull crashing sound from the front, as if a bag full of things was smashed on the ground, but it couldn't help but attract everyone to look ahead, only to see that the cyan stone slab was full of bubbling blood, and the whole scene looked terrifying and bloody.

After a while, the crowd gathered, and many others were whispering.

"I heard that the scholar from Sichuan, he has just passed thirty, and he has no chance to take the imperial examination, and I heard that the family's fields and fields have been sold, and there is no way out at all, so he can only die!"

"Hey, these sour Xiucai aren't dead one or two, if you want me to say that you can't survive by doing something in Da Chu now? My nephew goes to work in a rice mill in the east of the city, and he has two silver dollars a month! ”

"That's it, these people are just stupid to read their heads, if you want me to say that it's good now, I can earn more than 100 silver dollars a month just by opening a restaurant!"

"Yo, master, are you still short of a cook? I was an old connoisseur in the capital back then, and I burned a good lion's head! ”

"Cheng, go to the master's restaurant to try it in a hurry, if it does, I will open you ten silver dollars in a month!"

.........

Seeing that the direction of everyone's chat was getting more and more deviated, Shen Luochuan couldn't help coughing, and was about to say something about the deceased, but at this time, someone from the police station also came, and they cleaned up the body of the jumper, and then put it in a bag and carried it away, it seemed that it was going to be sent to the incineration plant in the east of the city to be burned.

Shen Luochuan couldn't help but sigh, he looked at the bloodstains on the ground with a complicated gaze, but he couldn't help but think in his heart, if he was still obsessed, he was afraid that he would be the one who died here at that time.

Hey, this hurtful world!