Zhouyuan is located in the westernmost part of the Guanzhong Plain a small plain, its range is roughly between today's Shaanxi Baoji and Fufeng, and the famous Wuzhangyuan across the river. At this time, the sky above Zhou Yuan was gray, and the heavy snow fell from the sky, and the mountains, woods, villages, and fields in the distance became a white expanse, as if the heavens and the earth were all connected.

Beneath the snow, a trail that is almost indistinguishable bypasses a small dirt slope and stretches into the distance. The sparse trees on the mound have long since lost their leaves, leaving only bare branches. A rickety figure moved slowly under the tree, it was an old man in rags, holding a stack of dead branches and broken trees in his arms, his eyes searching the ground. He spotted a small branch that was not completely covered by the snow, and immediately bent down, about to reach for it. Suddenly, he heard the neighing of horses, which made him stand up straight in surprise and look down the hill.

It turned out to be a convoy slowly driving along the path down the hillside. Most of the countrymen like this have only seen ox carts, and horse-drawn carts have only heard of them from other people's mouths. At this moment, seeing this convoy of six carriages, the old man seemed so stunned that he forgot to pick up firewood.

At the head of the convoy was a strong man on a tall horse. The horse under his crotch had black coat and was taller than the old man collecting firewood; But this strong man's figure is too burly, but it makes the horse a little thin. His face was full of beard, and his eyebrows were so thick that they almost joined his beard. Snowflakes fell on his eyebrows and mustaches, blocking his view and making him wipe a handful on his face from time to time.

This strong man wears a bronze hat and black rhino leather armor. He held the reins in his right hand, and his left hand held the hilt of the long sword at his waist, and his eyes narrowed as he looked at the old man collecting firewood on the hillside.

Behind the strong man, all the carriages were carried on two horses, each flanked by two knights. These knights were dressed in red lacquered cowhide armor, wore red leather helmets, held long ge, and carried short bows on their backs.

The first carriage had a lid on top of it, and the inside of the carriage was covered with thick leather felt, and the two men in the carriage sat opposite each other. Sitting at the head of the left is a middle-aged man in his forties, wearing a silk crown and a short blue shirt on his upper body. Sitting across from him was a young man of fifteen or sixteen years of age, with clear eyebrows, a fair complexion, his hair tied back behind his head, and a white robe.

There was also a lid on the second carriage, and a beautiful woman in a fox fur was leaning on the railing, and next to it sat a boy in his teens. The next four cars had no covers, except for a large piece of felt cloth on the roof. The felt cloth was raised high, and it was evident that the cart was loaded with something, and it was all tied with ropes.

The convoy continued to move eastward in the heavy snow, and after a short time, after entering a forest, the old man was no longer visible.

Most of the trees in the forest are poplars with straight trunks and sparse branches, and sometimes a few juniper and maple birch trees can be seen. An old crow jumped between the trees, making noise far behind the convoy, and occasionally a deer chirped from behind the bushes in the distance. The convoy traveled through the forest for a while, and the middle-aged man in the first carriage suddenly shouted: "Mane bear." ”

The strong man who walked in the front turned his head and said, "Here, Lord Zhouhou." What are the commands? ”

It turned out that the middle-aged man in the car was Zhou Chang, time passed like a white horse, and he had been canonized by the king of Shang for twenty years. Zhou Chang said to the bear: "It is getting late, so we will camp here and hurry again tomorrow morning." ”

The bear bowed slightly on the horse's back and answered the "only". He raised his right hand, and the whole convoy slowly stopped. Then the bear commanded the coachman to drive the carriage to the side of the road, ordered the cavalry guards to gather firewood in the woods, built two earthen stoves on the ground, set up a tent, and arranged for several guards to keep watch around.

Zhou Chang opened the back door of the car at this time and got out of the car. His waist is still straight, but there is a sense of majesty between Gu Pan. The young man in the same car also followed Zhou Chang and got out of the car, only to see that he was tied with a leather belt on his white robe, and a jade pendant was tied to the leather belt. Zhou Chang said to the young man, "Zhou Kao, go and invite your mother over." ”

Zhou Kao responded: "Only, father." When he came to the second carriage, he bowed to the woman and said, "Mother, get off and rest." ”

The woman smiled slightly, and was about to get up, when the boy next to her suddenly got out of the car, hugged Zhou Kao, and shouted, "Big brother." Although the boy's eyebrows were still childish, his eyes were extremely lively and alert, and his eyes couldn't help but look around at this strange place.

Zhou Kao held the boy in one hand and helped his mother get out of the car with the other. The woman walked up to Zhou Hou and gave a salute. Zhou Chang hurriedly stretched out his hands to support her and said, "Madame has worked hard. ”

The strong man stood aside and saluted the woman, "Mrs. Taiji is well." "This woman is the original match of the Marquis of Zhou, and the whole Zhou family respectfully calls her Taiji. Tai Ji also returned a salute to the bear, and said, "Lord Mane." ”

The boy was suddenly happy when he saw the bear, and laughed, "Master Huo, how did you become a white-bearded husband?" The bear was stunned at first, but when he looked down, he saw that his face was covered with snowflakes, and at first glance he looked like a white-bearded old man, and he himself couldn't help but look up and laugh.

Tai Ji said: "Fa'er, don't be rude to Master Huo. Zhou Fa stuck out his tongue playfully, and then pestered the bear to hunt the hare.

Zhou Chang asked Mane Bear, "How is Fa'er's archery practice?" Mane Bear replied: "The second son has been practicing three times recently, and he has entered the country. It's just that the arm strength is not enough, and he can't pull a strong bow. Zhou Chang nodded and said, "In the future, if you are free, you will start teaching him swordsmanship." ”

When Tai Ji heard that Zhou Fa was going to learn swordsmanship, she couldn't help but recall that when Zhou Kao started practicing swordsmanship two years ago, he had bruises and bruises on his body almost every day, and he personally treated him with medicine. Although there are fewer and fewer injuries in the weekly examination now, those scars seem to be vivid. Now Fa'er wants to start learning swordsmanship, and he has to endure hardships again. But Taiji also understood that as Zhou Chang's son, such cultivation was inevitable, and although she was distressed, she couldn't persuade her.

While Zhou Chang and the others were talking, the campfire had already risen, and everyone was sitting around the fire, and several guards took a few leg of mutton from the last carriage in line, and set up the leg of mutton on the fire to roast. For a moment, the cold woods were filled with the aroma of mutton fat and the laughter of everyone.

After the leg of lamb was roasted, the bears cut off a large piece of meat and handed it to Zhou Chang. Zhou Chang distributed the meat to a chauffeur who was about fifty years old, the oldest of the people. It turns out that the Zhou people have always had the custom of respecting the elderly, but whenever they distribute anything, they always give priority to the elders in the clan.

The coachman took the mutton, but did not eat it immediately, but waited until Zhou Chang had distributed all the mutton, and everyone feasted together. After eating the barbecue, someone took a clay pot, filled it with snow, and hung it on the fire. When the snow melted, everyone drank the snow water together.

The bears gulped down the snow water, wiped his mouth with his hand, and said, "This snow water is also sweet to drink, but it is not as mellow as fine wine." I just hope that if I can come to Chaoge as soon as possible, I can drink the merchant's wine. ”

After Zhou Fa was full, he was sitting next to Tai Ji to rest, and after listening to the words of the bear, he asked Tai Ji: "Mother, I have heard that the merchant has so much wine that he can't drink it all like water in a river, is this true?" ”

When Tai Ji was asked by him, he couldn't help but recall that when he got married, the capital of the Shang King was still in Yincheng, and the memories of the past were like ripples in the water, constantly emerging in his mind layer by layer.

That year, she was still an innocent girl, like the eldest ladies of those rich and noble families in Yincheng, every day she was either playing in the mountains and rivers, singing and chanting, or learning needlework and cultivating flowers and plants at home.

Until one day, she and a few sisters had made an appointment to go out of the city to play, but the city gates were closed in all directions, and no one could enter or leave. When she returned home in a daze, she heard that there was a man named Zhou Chang, who led thousands of clansmen to attack Yincheng, saying that he wanted to avenge his father, and Lord Shang Xian was leading the army to fight outside the city.

She still remembers the mocking tone and contemptuous look at people talking about Zhou Chang. Regarding the fact that Zhou Chang brought thousands of people to attack the royal capital, everyone said that this person must be a madman to make such a move of hitting a stone with an egg. But at that time, she was indifferent to this matter, because she never imagined that she would have anything to do with this man.

A few days later, when her father suddenly came to tell her that Lord Shang Xian personally promised to marry the man named Zhou Chang, she was stunned.

She secretly asked her brother what kind of person Zhou Chang was this time. The elder brother didn't know that she was going to get married, so he told her: "I heard that Zhou Chang is a demon who kills people without blinking, he killed hundreds of merchant soldiers alone, and his whole body was injured, but he refused to retreat a step, just like a monster." ”

When she heard her brother say this, she was so frightened that her legs went limp, and she ran to her mother's room, crying and begging her mother not to marry her to a demon. But the mother, who has always been obedient to herself, just sighed this time, and the two hugged their heads and cried together. Only then did she realize that her fate might not be able to change.

She couldn't remember how many nights she had been awakened from a dream by a monster covered in blood. It wasn't until he left Yincheng accompanied by his brother and walked for many days before he came to the shore of Weishui.

On the banks of the Weishui River, she saw this man named Zhou Chang for the first time, and remembered that he was covered with animal skins, wearing straw sandals on his feet, and all the exposed parts of his body were still wrapped in healing cloth belts, but he kept smiling at herself stupidly. She secretly speculated in her heart: This is the murderer? I'm not even twenty years old, but I'm not a very vicious person.

However, what surprised her even more was that this man with a rough and savage appearance was polite to himself. She asked Zhou Chang to wear the clothes of a merchant and get married according to the etiquette of a merchant, and Zhou Chang followed suit, and even built a palace for her, although it was not as good as his family's mansion in Yincheng. In this way, twenty years passed in Qizhou City, and she never returned to her parents.

recalled the past so many years ago at once, Tai Ji had mixed feelings in her heart, and she was just distracted. Zhou Kao sat aside, and when he saw that his mother did not answer Zhou Fa, he said to him:

"I heard from a man who went to Chaoge to sell cattle that all the surplus grain harvested by the people in the world was transported to Chaoge in exchange for seashells. The millet wheat and rice of Chaoge are piled up, and if they can't eat it, they use it to make wine; Sometimes, when you can't finish brewing wine, you just pour it out. Therefore, the wells and ditches in the castle of Chaoge have the smell of wine. ”

Zhou Chang listened to it next to him, although he felt that it was a bit exaggerated, but it was not false that the singers were addicted to alcohol. Seeing that Taiji was silent, he asked with concern, "Madam, what are you thinking?" ”

Taiji was asked by Zhou Chang, and then she came back to her senses and said, "It's nothing, just remembering some childhood memories."

Zhou Chang laughed and said: "It turns out that Mrs. is a little timid in her hometown, but we have only been gone for two days, and we are still far from Chaoge." ”

He listened to Tai Ji talk about the past, and he couldn't help but recall the life-and-death battle twenty years ago. That battle was different from Tai Ji in his memory: although he led his people to kill thousands of merchant soldiers, the enemy seemed to be endless and could not be killed. After only one day of fighting, only half of the 4,000 people he brought with him were left. When the troops were withdrawn in the evening, the bitter wails of the wounded kept Zhou Chang awake all night, and it was not until the next morning that the screams gradually subsided—due to the lack of wounded medicine, most of the wounded soldiers died before dawn. If Shang Xian's envoy had come a little later, he might have to retreat on his own.

For twenty years, Zhou Chang has been reflecting on how reckless the behavior that could have led to the destruction of the entire clan back then. In the past 20 years, although he has been trying to restore the Zhou people, he has always been troubled by the lack of capable talents. Therefore, Zhou Chang also wholeheartedly accepted foreigners like Mane Bear and recruited them widely.

He also recalled the last time he saw his father: he was probably only the age of Zhou Fa, and his father Zhou Li was about to go to Yincheng to meet Shang Wang Wending. Unexpectedly, Zhou Li never came back as soon as he went, and the back of the horse became the last image left by his father in Zhou Chang's memory. A few years later, some people told him that his father was dead, but some said that Zhou Li died of illness, and others said that he was beheaded by the king of Shang. There is only one thing that is certain, my father has been imprisoned by the king of Shang for several years.

At that time, Zhou Chang's mind was full of thoughts of avenging his father, and while losing his father, he also lost the direction of his life. It wasn't until he experienced that tragic battle that he slowly came to his senses.

Zhou Chang, who recalled the past, raised his head, looked at the night sky, and said, "Let's go to bed early, get up early tomorrow and hurry." When the guards heard this, they spread their fur felt on the snow and slept around the fire. Zhou Chang and Tai Ji took Zhou Fa into the camp tent and let Zhou Kao and the guards sleep out together.