Leaving the small village, the sound of the murmuring stream seemed to still be ringing in his ears, Ning Yi carried a small lantern and walked along the post road with Yunzhu, and the carriage followed behind.

Looking back, the little lights of the small village had become thinner, and they dissolved with the world at night, and there was no difference to be seen. Holding her husband's hand, Yunzhu could still feel the depression in his emotions, which was caused by the war report from the Northland, but the remarks he heard on the top of the room did not become the cause of his trouble.

Over the years, following her husband with twists and turns, Yun Zhu has seen what Ning Yi, Watermelon and others are doing, and although she has not participated in them, she can already understand what they are doing. At this time, after walking a long way, Yun Zhu said this matter softly.

"That's ...... Zhong Hecheng Master Zhong, I have also seen it in the school, these thoughts, I have never heard him talk about them......"

The lantern that emitted orange light went all the way forward, and at the other end of the road, there were two people with baskets on their backs, who were farmers who didn't know where to go, and when they walked to the front, they stopped on the side of the post road with their bodies a little restrained, and let Ning Yi and the carriage and horses behind him go over, Ning Yi held the lantern and signaled to them.

The two farmers passed by, and Ning Yi watched their backs walk in the starlight in the distance before he said.

"If this Zhong Hecheng intends to meet you in the academy, he should be careful, but it is unlikely. He has a more important mission and doesn't want me to see him. ”

"Huh?" Yun Zhuxiu frowned slightly, "He's ...... Troublemakers? I thought he was influenced by Agua. ”

Ning Yi smiled: "It's not wrong to say that it is the influence of Agua." "Long look at the first release of the Chinese network.

"But as you said, Agua is extreme."

"The beginnings of thinking are extreme." Ning Yi smiled at his wife, "What's wrong with everyone being equal?" It is the direction that mankind should go for thousands of years, and if there is a way, it is certainly better to achieve it today. I'm glad they picked up the idea. ”

"Liheng is not afraid of getting burned." Seeing Ning Yi's calm attitude, Yun Zhu somewhat let go of some worries, and at this time he also smiled, his steps relaxed, and the two walked forward in the night breeze, Ning Yi tilted his head slightly.

"When talking about equality with people, one of the biggest questions is whether smart people are equal to stupid people, whether capable people are equal to incompetent people, and whether lazy people are equal to hardworking people. In fact, of course, it can't, not because it can't be reasoned, but because it can't be done at all, but what is the difference between capable people and incompetent people? What exactly are the lazy and hardworking people who are created? Yunzhu, you teach in school, there is no class, but smart children may not be able to learn well, stupid people may be more hard, if you meet a guy with rotten wood that cannot be carved, will you think that you can't teach well or everyone in the world can't teach well? ”

"Sometimes I think no one in the world can teach well." Yun Zhu smiled, and then said, "But of course, some teachers take a lot of thought, and there is always a way to teach children." ”

"In this world, anyone can become better, anyone can become useful, smart children have different teaching methods, stupid children have different teaching methods, everyone has the possibility of success. Those great heroes and great sages that people admire, they were all stupid children like this at the beginning, is there any difference between Confucius and the farmers who just passed? Actually, no, they have taken different paths and become different people, is there any difference between Confucius and Yunzhu......"

"Yes." Yunzhu hurriedly said.

Ning Yi had already taken her hand and laughed: "No." This is the equality of all people. ”

“…… Everyone has equal possibilities. Are all the wise people who can become masters? I don't think so. Some smart people are uncertain and can't delve into it, but they suffer losses. Stupid people, on the contrary, because they know their clumsiness, can achieve achievements earlier because they are poor and work later. So, is it possible for the smart person who can't delve into it to develop the character of delving? Of course, there are ways, if he encounters something, encounters a painful lesson, and knows the harm of not being able to qualify, he can also make up for his shortcomings. ”

“…… Sima Gongyun: Gai Xibo acted in "Zhou Yi"; Zhong Nieu's "Spring and Autumn"; Qu Yuan's exile is endowed with "Lisao"...... In fact, it is these tribulations that make them understand their own insignificance and powerlessness, and to explore some things in this world that cannot be changed, the richer their understanding of the world, the easier they can control the things in this world and make a dazzling deed......"

“…… Equality of all people is equality in possibility. Everyone can gain wisdom through learning, through self-discipline, through continuous induction and thinking, and finally achieve equality, and become excellent people. But to do nothing, to be born wanting to be equal, to sit at home with your head in your hands, and to expect to be as equal as those who work hard, is a joke, of course...... It would be nice if it could be done, but it definitely won't be possible. ”

Ning Yi looked back: "The two peasants who walked over just now, when we first came, they would kneel on the side of the road. They don't have the idea of equality in their hearts, and it's not their fault, for them, inequality is a matter of course, because they have lived in inequality all their lives, even if someone wants to be good, no matter how smart they are, they don't have money, they don't have books, they don't have teachers. It's unfair to them. But if someone is excellent, hardworking, desperate, and exhausts everything to become more powerful, someone is lazy and lazy, and he regrets his life when he sees big things, and forgets his righteousness when he sees small profits, the equality of these two kinds of people is the greatest irony of equality. ”

"It is a matter of thousands of years to plant a sense of equal identity in the hearts of a generation, and to find out how to be equal. Someone is lazy to eat, why is he lazy to eat? What kind of environment has he experienced since he was a child and developed such a character, is it because life is too good, then, for children who have a good life, is there a way for the teacher to teach them a sense of urgency to empathize? ”

"A person who can work hard, why can he fight because his family was too poor before, or because he enjoys a sense of achievement? In fact, if a person is willing to read books, he already understands everything by the time he is thirty years old, and the difference is only in how to do it. Diligence, restraint, hard work, conscientious...... Tens of millions of children in the world are born, how to have a powerful system, so that after they learn, inspire their excellent things, when everyone in the world begins to become excellent, that is everyone is equal. ”

Maybe he thinks a lot about these things on weekdays, and while walking, Ning Yi said it softly, Yunzhu was silent, but he could understand the sadness behind it. The sacrifice of Zhu Biao and others - if they really sacrificed - this is the value of their sacrifice, or rather, this is something that her husband "has to do" in his heart.

The dirt road turned a corner, and under the canopy in the distance, there was the fire of the Huaxia Army barracks spreading, and the stars reflected the Milky Way in the sky. The couple paused for a moment, carrying the small lantern, and stood under the tree by the side of the road and watched.

"In our life, I'm afraid we won't see everyone equal." Yunzhu smiled and whispered.

"That's thousands of years, tens of thousands of years." Ning Yi looked over there and responded softly, "When everyone can read and write, it's just the first step." It is very easy for the truth to hang on people's lips, and it is difficult for the truth to dissolve into people's hearts. cultural system, philosophical system, education system...... Exploring for a thousand years, it may be possible to see the true equality of people. ”

"So, even the most extreme equality, as long as they really study it, discuss it...... It's all good too. ”

When Ning Yi said this, his words had become softer, he smiled slightly in the dark, and then Yun Zhu seemed to hear a sentence: "I have to thank Li Pin......"

This sentence seemed to be a rumor, and Yun Zhu looked over: "...... Well? ”

"What?" Ning Yi looked over with a smile, and before Yunzhu could speak, he suddenly said, "By the way, one day, men and women will also become equal." ”

"Huh?"

"When men and women are equal, everyone does similar work and has similar responsibilities, and no one can marry as many wives as I do...... Well, by then, when everyone turns over the old accounts, I will probably let the people punish them. ”

As he said this, he pressed Yun Zhu's hand to his lips, and Yun Zhu's eyes narrowed with a smile: "Then you want to come...... It's also interesting......"

“…… But in this life, let me take advantage of it like this. ”

After he said this, he looked at the military camp in the distance, and the couple stopped talking, and soon sat down on the grassy slope by the roadside.

The warm yellow light was like a gathering of fireflies, Yunzhu sat there, turning his head to look at Ning Yi beside him, since they met and fell in love, more than ten years have passed.

Except for the calm of the first few years, for more than ten years, they were like riding a boat in the stormy seas. Even when she came out of the eunuch's house, Yunzhu never thought that she would experience such a changed life later, at that time she lived in a small building by the river, watching the scholar run past the door every day, they occasionally had a quiet greeting and greeting, she fantasized that this life could be her concubine or outer room to pass quietly.

Jiang Ning has finally become a thing of the past, and since then it has been an experience that even the most bizarre imagination has never had. At the beginning, the calm and calm young scholar turned the world upside down, and gradually entered middle age, he is no longer as calm as he was back then, the small ship sailed into the sea, sailed into the wind and waves, he is more like fighting for his life meticulously and the huge waves are fighting, even if the demons are feared by the world, in fact, they have always gritted their teeth and tightened their spirits.

Over the years, Yunzhu has been teaching in the academy, and occasionally listening to Ning Yi and Watermelon talk about the idea of equality, she can understand it, and she will feel a hot feeling in her heart. But at this moment, she looked at the man sitting beside her, but she only thought of Jiang Ning at the beginning. She thought: no matter what I do, I just hope he can be well, and that will be good.

She reached out, trying to smooth his frowning brow. Ning Yi glanced at her, but didn't hear her heart, but just hugged her easily, and the couple sat next to each other and sat in the yellow light under the tree for a while. Under the grassy slope, the sound of the stream really flowed past, like Jiangning many years ago, they chatted under the trees, and the Qinhuai River flowed in front of them......

Soon after, Ning Yi returned to the courtyard and summoned people to continue the meeting, which lasted for a moment, and that night, it was raining outside.

**************

Time never stops.

On both sides of the Yellow River, heavy rain poured down. There are many, many things, like every raindrop in this great rain, which takes care of itself and keeps crossing the heavens and the earth, gathering in the direction of streams, rivers, and seas.

When they come together into a piece, we can see where it's going, its destructive power. But when it fell, no one cared where every drop of rain went.

In the Central Plains, it has been raining for a year.

This is one of the ordinary rains......

Night.

Rumbling sounds roared, water swept over the villages, washed away houses, and in the midst of the rain, some shouted, some ran, and some scurried through the dark mountains.

Lightning streaked across the night sky, the white light illuminated the scene ahead, under the hillside, the water was so vast that it flooded the place where people lived on weekdays, countless debris rolled in the water, roofs, trees, corpses, Wang Xing stood in the rain, trembling all over.

On the hillside, a small number of people who escaped were still shouting in the rain, and some were crying out the names of their family members. People went up the mountain, muddy water flowed down the mountain, some people fell into the water, tumbled down, and in the darkness there was a hysterical cry.

The rain continued to fall, and during the day, people who climbed to the top of the mountain were able to see their surroundings clearly. The river burst its banks in the dark of night and rushed down from upstream, and despite reports, only two or three out of ten survivors escaped from the village. Wang Xing dragged a small bag of dried fish out, and all his belongings were gone.

The rain did not stop, he hid under the tree, built a small shed with branches, and shivered all over, and more people cried far away or not far away.

Many family members died in the flood, and the survivors not only had to face such sadness, but even more terrible was that all their belongings and even food were washed away by the flood. Wang Xing shivered in the small shed for a while.

At dawn, the rain gradually lightened, and the surviving villagers gathered, and then, a strange thing happened.

They saw Wang Xing carrying the bag of dried fish, and there was half a pot in his hand that he had found out of nowhere: "There are only these things at home, it rains, and it will be moldy in the future, so cook it and eat it." ”

Wang Xing is the most stingy and slippery settlement in the village on weekdays, he looks sharp-mouthed monkey cheeks, lazy and timid, he does not dare to come out when he encounters big things, he is ugly when he can get a small profit, he is the only one in the family, and he has never married a daughter-in-law at the age of thirty. But at this time, the expression on his face was very different, and he actually took out the last food to distribute to others, which startled everyone.

Of course, at this time, there was a sudden catastrophe, and the doubts in their hearts turned into doubts, and then everyone started a fire, divided the dried fish, and ate it to satisfy their hunger. While eating the dried fish, the survivors in the village found no trace of Wang Xing, and shortly thereafter, a child turned over the boulder behind the mountain and saw something strange.

Wang Xing squatted behind the stone, digging something with stone chips, and then dug out a long object wrapped in oilcloth, opened the oilcloth, and inside was a knife.

At this time, there was still rain falling in the sky, Wang Xing was drenched in heavy rain all night, soaking wet, his hair was sticking to his face, like a lost soul of a water dog, plus he was not good-looking, this scene looked chilling.

The child was frightened, and soon after telling the adults in the village about the matter, the adults were also shocked, some people said that there was nothing left, this guy was ready to kill people and grab things, and some people said that Wang Xing's timid character, where he dared to take a knife, it must be the child who saw it wrong. Everyone searched, but since then, they have not seen the dilapidated settlement in this village.

While they were looking around, Wang Xing was already walking on the mountain road far from here.

The heavy rain in the Central Plains has actually been falling for more than ten years.

From the first time the Jurchens went south, to the establishment of the pseudo-Qi, and now to the present, life has never been easy. The Yellow River has been the mother river since ancient times, but the residents who live on both sides of the Yellow River both love it and fear it, even in the prosperous period of the reign of the Wu Dynasty, the cost of controlling the Yellow River every year is sky-high, to Liu Yu ruled the Central Plains, looting property, every year of the Yellow River control work, has also stopped.

In the past ten years, the banks of the Yellow River have become worse and worse, and in addition to floods, plagues, displaced people, conscriptions, and exorbitant taxes have long pushed people to the line of life and death. As for the spring of the tenth year of Jianshuo, what is striking is the rebellion of the Jin land and the fierce battle of the daimyo's mansion, but long before that, the flood above people's heads has already surged.

Since the Jurchen expedition began in the second half of last year, the conscription and excesses of taxes in the Central Plains have reached the point of knocking out the bones and sucking the marrow. After Yan Chang took over Li Xizhi's territory, in order to support the southern expedition of the Eastern Route Army, the tax on money and grain in the Central Plains was increased several times, and he ordered the Han officials to deal with the matter.

In the first few months, almost half of the officials on Li Xizhi's territory were replaced, and as for those who were "replaced", their heads had been hung on the city wall for public display. The grain stocks in the Han families in the Central Plains have been completely emptied, and as long as the officials are brutal enough, there is basically a way to live.

As for the other way to live is to be a soldier to eat food, when Li Xizhi died, nearly 200,000 troops were scattered, after Yan Chang took over the military affairs, he mobilized the remaining army in a short time, and launched a conscription at the same time. In the days of the siege of the Daimyo's Mansion, the Han soldiers who rushed to the front line ate like beggars, some died in the war, and some were scattered, and by the day when the Daimyo's Mansion was broken, the Han army in this vicinity, together with the garrison "troops" in various places, had reached as many as 400,000.

The combat strength of these "troops" may not be high, but it is enough for them to be able to snatch money and food from the people, and this part of the money and food will go to themselves, and some of it will be sent to the south. As for March, when the city of the Daimyo Mansion was broken, the north of the Yellow River was no longer just a sentence that could be described as a poor life. Cannibalism has already appeared in many places.

Wang Xing is a coward.

There were a few people who knew that he was forcibly conscripted to serve as a soldier, and when the soldiers went to attack Xiaocanghe, he was afraid, so he ran away, and after Xiaocanghe's affairs came to an end, he secretly ran back again. He was still young when he was captured to serve as a soldier, and over the years, the situation was chaotic, the people in the village were dying and walking, and the people who could confirm these things gradually disappeared, and he returned here to live a timid and obscene life.

Of course, no one will know that he was once arrested by the Huaxia Army and went to the southwest.

He was too afraid of death, he was arrested and sent to the southwest, after a period of preaching, the life of the Huaxia Army was not easy, there were many military regulations, and he was hungry during the initial period, Wang Xing couldn't stand it, and later lied that he had an old mother at home, and was released back by the Huaxia Army.

This coming and going, traveling thousands of miles, has worn out Wang Xing's burden even more, this world is too terrible, he doesn't want to die - he doesn't want to rush ahead and die suddenly.

Over the years, life has been extremely difficult, and in this year, soldiers with requisitioned food rushed into his house and beat him half to death, he almost thought that he was really going to die, but he slowly survived. The Jin land is still fighting, the Daimyo's Mansion is still fighting, and those heroes and heroes who have courage in their hearts are still resisting.

I can't become such a person, and many people can't become it, this is human nature. Wang Xing told himself in his heart that in this world, as long as there are such people and people like Huaxia Army who are constantly resisting, they will not be destroyed after all.

During his time in the Huaxia Army, at least some of the things he still remembered: sooner or later, people would drive away the Jurchens.

When that day comes, good days will come eventually.

But not a hero himself...... I'm just afraid of death, I don't want to die in front of me.

He thought to himself.

Until that day in April, when there was a big flood by the river, he was lucky, and he took the opportunity to catch some fish and take them to the city to exchange for something, when he suddenly heard Jurchen propaganda.

The Daimyo's Mansion was broken, and the Black Flag Army was defeated.

His heart suddenly fell.

He waited in the city for two days, and saw the convoy escorting the prisoners of the Black Flag Army and the Guangwu Army into the city, some of these prisoners had mutilated limbs, and some were seriously injured and dying, but Wang Xing could clearly identify them, that is, the Chinese soldiers.

Soon after, they were all beheaded on the execution ground, their heads rolling down.

In the propaganda of the Jurchens, the Guangwu Army and the Huaxia Army were all wiped out.

No matter how hard life is, there will always be some people who will live.

Some people want to live ambitiously, some people want to live like people, and some people just bend over and don't kneel...... Someone will eventually rush ahead.

I don't care, I'm just afraid of death, even if I kneel, I don't care, I'm different from them after all, they are not as afraid of death as I am...... I'm so scared, there's no way to do it. Wang Xing thought so in his heart.

The Wu Dynasty was defeated, there were still rebels from all walks of life before, and the rebels gradually disappeared, and then there were Guangwu troops and Jin kings, even if the Guangwu army and Jin were defeated, at least there were black flags. But that's gone...... But we have not yet defeated the Jurchens.

The lid of the Central Plains has been pressed down, and no one will resist anymore. Back in the village, Wang Xing's heart gradually died, and after two days, the water came from the night, Wang Xing was cold and shivering. In fact, since he saw the scene of beheading in the city, he has already understood in his heart: there is no way to live.

He kept a few dried fish, divided the rest among the villagers, and dug up the rusty knife. Two days later, the killing of a Han soldier who had been robbing grain occurred on the side of a mountain road dozens of miles away from the village.

Wang Xing took the little food he had snatched after the killing, found a small sampan, chose a day when the sky was slightly clearer, and began to cross the river in the face of the wind and waves. He heard that there were still Huaxia troops fighting in Xuzhou.

Growing up on the banks of the Yellow River, he understood from an early age that half of those who crossed the river in such a situation would die, but it didn't matter, those who resisted were already dead.

The most timid people have no way to live.

The rain in the Central Plains is still falling.

A lot of things gradually fermented in the torrential rain......

At the same time, under the command of Wan Yanchang, an army of more than 200,000 began to besiege in the direction of Liangshan Shuibo. After the Guangwu Army and the Huaxia Army were destroyed, there were still tens of thousands of family members living on the islands in the water. There were only more than 2,000 troops, and they were there at this time......