The trip to Liao made Zhao Xingde realize that there was a huge gap between paper learning and practice, especially when the two armies were fighting, and most of the literati in this era had no experience in marching and fighting. So in addition to teaching Yixue, Zhao Xingde often learned about the actual situation of the battle from the soldiers, and after coming and going, he gradually put down the shelf of the scholars, and the soldiers also felt that this Mr. Zhao was amiable. In the minds of these soldiers, Zhao Xingde is knowledgeable and a man who can speak, on the other hand, he is approachable, and does not belong to any military faction. In this way, the life and thoughts of the soldiers of the Great Song Dynasty Forbidden Army seemed to be a heavy door gradually opening in front of Zhao Xingde.

Different soldiers had similar experiences, some were orphans, and their fathers fell ill and died while out of the war. The epidemic is also the biggest cause of death of the forbidden army in peacetime, and if the epidemic is severe, the entire camp will be burned. Many of them grew up in the widow's village in the army, and now they can't remember what their father looked like, and after they could walk, they worked part-time as hawkers, and at the age of fifteen they falsely declared their age to fill in the vacancies. Some have been in the market since childhood, and joined the army in order to raise their eyebrows, but after the tattoo on their faces, they were even more looked down upon. Some of them desperately won the first rank, but they couldn't compete for the credit, and the head was recorded by the upper official to other soldiers. Some were bullied by the old pawn so much that they had to wait until they became old pawns before bullying others. The women of the Beijing division are too expensive, and many soldiers ask for a wife to go out to Hebei. Some have a way to earn money in addition to military salaries, and they can hire someone to be on duty for them, and they are envied because they have money to marry concubines. Many people in the Zhenbei Army regarded Han Shizhong, who was promoted quickly, as a role model, and heard that he deliberately humiliated people from the Jiangmen family. Everyone doesn't care much about the truth or falsity of the officer's words, as long as the salary is less and deducted a little, and Han Shizhong's military salary is the least.

As he talked more and more with the soldiers, Zhao Xingde's initial idea of just wanting to learn about the real war from the soldiers became weaker and weaker. He had read and still read many books full of myths of princes and generals, and ordinary soldiers were reduced to dull numbers, and no one remembered their names, let alone paid attention to their experiences and feelings. Zhao Xingde wanted to record these living soldiers, and this idea became stronger and stronger, filling his mind every day, and after each conversation, he couldn't wait to take notes.

On the eve of the printing of the literacy book based on Confucian and Mencian quotations, Zhao Xingde burned the manuscript, and he was determined to write the stories of the soldiers in the language of the soldiers, and use such a script to teach the soldiers to read and write. In a letter to Chen Dong and others of the Science Society, Zhao Xingde wrote: "In the past, the great talent of Bai Lotian asked the old woman for poetry, so that the people could know the way to control chaos. The name of poetry history is enough to shine for thousands of years. The sages of this dynasty do not take rhetoric, and the text carries the Tao, and the younger brother admires it. The younger brother wants to follow the example, compile this book, teach the soldiers, this book to talk about the streets, remember the trivial things, describe the hardships in the army, in order to open its mind, to achieve its words, and guide the righteousness. It is expected to make a modest effort to broaden the way of the saints. Zi said that there is no class in teaching. Encourage you to do so. ”

The new character book takes the form of a biography of characters, ten articles describe ten kinds of military stories, and every time Zhao Xingde writes a good one, he has to read it to dozens of soldiers in Yixue, but if one person does not understand or says that it is difficult to understand, Zhao Xingde changes the text to be more simple and clear, until all the testers understand the whole story without obstacles. Because Han Shizhong was quite popular among the soldiers, Zhao Xingde was ready to arrange a "General Han" at the end of the book, but Han Shizhong was a little hesitant.

"Is this really going to be printed in a book?" Han Shizhong carefully picked up the half-completed first draft with his thick and hard palm, "Just like Pharmacist Li and Yang Lao Linggong, let future generations always remember and worship continuously?" His eyes flashed with reverence and envy. The so-called people rely on clothes and horses to rely on saddles, and now Han Shizhong has Li Hongyu to dress him up, not dressed indiscriminately like before, and he really looks like a general.

"Just use the 500 guan from the Liao country, which is enough to be printed." Zhao Xingde affirmed, "It's hard to say anything else. Zhao Xingde thought for a while and explained seriously, "To be remembered for a hundred years, there must be something that can be remembered." ”

"That's what happened." Han Shizhong exhaled softly, and carefully put the manuscript back on Zhao Xingde's desk, he frowned, twisted his hands, hesitated for a long time, and finally raised his head and said to Xingde: "Dong Wei is a good man, he didn't have time to keep a queen, this is dead, and the incense of the Dong family will be broken." You are the champion of the article, can you give him this article and let future generations remember it? ”

Han Shizhong had been looking at him expectantly, Zhao Xingde hesitated for a moment, and finally said, "Okay, I'll give it a try." He put away the first draft, spread out a piece of yellow rice paper, polished some pine ink, dipped the brush used for shorthand in the inkstone, and said to Han Shizhong: "You tell me first, Dong Dutou's life strategy." After a pause, he said in an accentuated tone, "There must be something to remember." ”

"Okay, okay." Han Shizhong rubbed his hands excitedly, Zhao Xingde was even happier than he was to set up a biography for Dong Wei, he held back for a long time, and suddenly asked, "When should I start?" "How the general and Dong Wei got acquainted, start from the beginning." "That year, the military rations had not come down, and it was very cold in the cold winter, I stole the money of the prostitutes in the brothel, and the turtle man chased after me, and I hid in the coal pile by the Bianhe River, and I happened to meet Lao Dong, who picked up the coal, so it can be regarded as an acquaintance."

"Well, heroes start at the end of the day." Zhao Xingde nodded, but he didn't put pen to paper, and asked, "What else?" ”

Han Shizhong continued: "As soon as I asked Lao Dong, everyone came out of a battalion, and since then, they have been brothers in life and death......" "Dong Wei is the most literate in the camp, and I usually hand over the military books to him to write, if there is a chance to go to school, he will definitely be able to enter the ........ of the sergeant" "Chongning for three years, patrolling the border with the Xiaowu army, Dong Wei won three heads by himself, and he won the ........ of the whole battalion" "After five years of fighting, the original good friend was also sold by the ruthless father, and Lao Dong has been looking for this woman........""In the second year of Zhenghe, his subordinates died of their mothers, and there was no money to mourn, so Lao Dong poured his money into help........ "When you ran a righteous school, half of the twenty times I praised him. ”

Han Shizhong slightly with some sad reminiscences, so that Zhao Xingde was quite moved, under the end of the pen, slowly sketched the image of a good person Dong Wei, when Han Shizhong finished speaking, the pen and ink have been full of three pieces of paper, only need to be slightly deleted, it can be used as the last article of the word. After thinking about it repeatedly, Zhao Xingde added a paragraph at the beginning of the whole story: "Dong Weidutou, a subordinate of General Han Shizhong, died heroically in the battle with horse thieves. At the time......"

After the first draft of the ten articles was completed, Zhao Xingde found many more people to see, both ordinary soldiers and ordinary people in the market, he sent the manuscript to Chen Dong and other friends of the science society, asking them to review whether there was any injustice between the texts, and asked the gentleman of Yixue to try the content of the text several times, and the response of all parties was okay. Deng Su mentioned in his reply that Xingde wanted to educate the head of Qiantou with words and etiquette, and spread the way of etiquette and righteousness, the original intention was good, but the slang was neither elegant nor accurate, and he suggested that Xingde should at least be slightly refined and modified in the text, so as not to be smiling and generous, as if the gentleman in the society knew the cause and effect of nothing, if this word fell into the hands of others, I was afraid that Xingde would not write articles. After pointing out the points of righteousness and reasoning in Xingde's text, He Fang and Zhu Sen's reply said: "When the world is declining, Dong Jun's biography makes people know that righteousness still exists, and people's hearts are right. ”

On Chinese New Year's Eve, when heavy snow covered the road, Zhao Xingde spent time at Han Shizhong's house with several officers of the Zhenbei Army. The red clay stove charcoal warm wine, the unique spirit smell of Liao wine sweat made Xingde almost forget what the light wine in Bianjing tasted like.

From time to time, there were a few bang-bang-bang-firecrackers outside, and everyone was drinking while waiting for the master Han Shizhong to come back. The red man in front of the big marshal is not easy to be, and the big New Year has to accompany the adults in the Shuai's mansion to deploy adults for Chinese New Year's Eve.

Since Li Hongyu married Han Shizhong, her original bold nature has become more and more obvious, the man in the family is not there, she doesn't care about those taboos, and personally comes out to entertain Shizhong's friends, the big guys are even more unrestrained, and they make wine and anger lively, which is no different from when Han Shizhong was there.

Just as he was dripping with joy, two soldiers in front and one behind him were carrying lanterns, and Han Shizhong, the commander of the Second Army in Zhenbei, came back. His face was a little cloudy, "Thousands of Hu cavalry have been recruited, and Tong Shuai will be built as the Fifth Army in the north of the town." "What?" "How unreasonable!" Several generals of the Zhenbei Army shouted at that time.

A few days ago, when the elite of the Hebei camp was selected to enrich the Zhenbei Army, they were all scattered and incorporated, so the old people of the Zhenbei Army were really promoted step by step, and even the chief was promoted to the head of the capital, the deputy head of the capital, the head of the capital was promoted to the commander of the battalion, and the commander of the battalion was promoted to the commander of the army, and Han Shizhong was promoted from the commander of the battalion to the commander of the army, and he was envious of others. At present, there are only 3,000 troops in the north of the town, and they are far from the full quota of 5,000 people.

Everyone scolded with their mouths, but provoked the hostess here, Li Hongyu glanced at Han Shizhong, put the wine jug on the table, and said angrily: "On the night of Chinese New Year's Eve, I just mentioned these things, if I want to talk about it, the concubine will avoid the inner room." ”

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