At noon on the twenty-seventh day of the lunar month, Shang Cheng returned to Zhongzhai with people.

It is a military fortress built along the path of the mountain, and it is an irregular rectangle in shape. To the west is the mountains, to the north is a large stretch of river flats, and to the east is the West River, which has been flowing in this river for an unknown number of years. The West River is now frozen, like a shiny ribbon coiled around the east wall, like a ready-made moat. The village is surrounded by a six-person high earthen wall, and there are enemy towers, arrow stacks, crossbow platforms, and Tibetan weapons rooms on the wall. As can be seen from these purely military buildings, this military village was also a famous place in history. In fact, it is indeed a place where soldiers must fight, just more than 50 years ago, a large-scale battle broke out here between Da Zhao and Tu Kuci, and more than 40,000 military forces on both sides participated in the battle. Since ancient times, in order to compete for this passage through the north and south, in order to compete for the military village that guards the passage, the agricultural civilization in the south and the grassland people in the north do not know how many times they have fought, and how many people have died one by one from the military village to the north about two miles, there is a small ravine called Guogou, and the cliffs on both sides are digging out soil pits of different sizes, and each pit is full of layers of forest white bones.

The current Zhongzhai has long since lost the magnificent atmosphere of the year. The wall, where the battle flags fluttered and the swords and guns were like a forest, is now hard to find, and only naughty children occasionally climb up to play; The crossbow platform on which the majestic giant bed crossbow was erected is now only a bare open space paved with stones; Due to the disrepair of the enemy towers, the exterior walls of several buildings have shown sporadic signs of collapse...... Only the fairly neatly laid out streets and houses in the stockade can still remind people of the past years of swords and swords. The people who live here are no longer all soldiers, but more ordinary farmers, all of whom have migrated from far and wide in the last forty or fifty years, and most of them are descendants of the warriors who have shed their blood on this land. Only in the south of the stockade is there still a military camp with a large area, but there are only 100 border troops stationed in this barracks......

There is a saying among the people, "Twenty-seven, paste the Spring Festival couplets", so when they enter the village, the doors of the courtyard gates of every household are pasted with red paper doors, "look up and see joy", "welcome the New Year", "enter and exit safely", "four seasons of blessing" and other pleasing words, can be seen everywhere. There are also some wealthy families who should pay more attention to the door and paste more elegant couplets:

"New Year's Day; Jiajie Changchun. ”

"The days increase and the years increase, the people increase the longevity, and the spring is full of blessings."

At this time, smelling the aroma of oil cakes and meat buns diffused in the air, and looking at the New Year's joy everywhere, everyone couldn't help but feel a little impetuous and flustered, especially those who had a family and a mouth, and all of them were looking directly at Shangcheng.

Shang Cheng understood the thoughts of these people and their feelings, and as soon as he entered the gate, he gave an order: "The Zhuangding border household will be disbanded on the spot." Tomorrow morning, I will pay at the military village clerk. In order to express the gratitude of the border army to you for your efforts and efforts, an additional reward of 50 wen per person will be added. ”

In the cheers of "Lord Gaoyi" and "Thank you for the reward", twenty or thirty strong men scattered violently.

Shang Cheng commanded the soldiers to lead the horses to the stables in the barracks, the forage that should be fed, the drinking water that should be drunk, the medical treatment that should be sought by the livestock medical officer, and then the people must check all the data such as the entry and exit of the horses and supplies with the military barn before he returned to his residence with Baokan.

His residence was a small compound in the barracks that had been vacant for the previous two years. A main house with two transepts, two wings. The main house was used to receive officers and gentry, and occasionally entertained guests, and the two transept rooms were his study and the other his bedroom. Baokan Stone lives in a side room by himself, so as not to disturb each other at night.

Originally, according to his identity, he didn't have to live in this almost shabby small courtyard. He is the commander of the West Horse Straight Command, and also the battalion captain of the West Malaysia Straight Border Army, and the rank is surprisingly high, five levels higher than the commander of the North Zheng Border Army, so before the person arrives in Zhongzhai, the village has already arranged a house for him, which is not only bright, but also magnificent, with servants and handymen, maids, and cooks. But he thought that the courtyard was not in the barracks, and it was inconvenient to deal with official business, and he was single, so he couldn't occupy so much space, so he didn't want to live in it anyway. In the end, he fell in love with his current residence. First, this courtyard is in the barracks, just a few steps away from his command post, secondly, it is relatively quiet here, he has time to read books and think about something, and thirdly, he can avoid many unnecessary troubles by living here, and he grasps the military with one hand and manages the place with the other, and is a veritable "number one" in the military and political affairs of West Malaysia, plus he also has the title of "fake post", maybe one day he will be promoted to a higher level, and now I don't know how many people who want to drill the camp want to make friends with him, he is going to block the door of these people......

As soon as he returned to his lodgings, he ordered him to boil hot water and prepare a meal, when a group of officers and scribes gathered in the courtyard. These people are here to do things with him. There are those who want to be approved, those who have to wait for the reply slip, those who wait for him to approve money and materials, and those who ask him for annual leave to visit home...... By the time he had prioritized everything, the outside of the hall had already quietly changed to a drooping twilight.

He delivered the last document to the door of the hall, watched the man's back disappear outside the courtyard door, and then let out a long sigh of relief, and while ordering someone to bring hot water for the bath to the bedroom, he gently rubbed his sore right eye through the blindfold, and returned to his bedroom with tired steps.

By the time he had taken a shower and changed into clean clothes, an oil lamp had lit up in the hall.

It's completely dark outside.

He saw a figure swaying in the study, so he stepped on thick-soled cotton shoes and walked over.

A border soldier on duty was lighting a few oil lamps in the study with a fire matchmaker.

His study was small, with nothing but a table and three or four chairs. In addition to pen, ink, paper and inkstone, there are also a lot of dossiers on the table. Some of these things were case files that he had borrowed from the command post, and some were backlogs of official documents and military newspapers that had been accumulated during his absence. There was also a book on the table with an unknown cover. The edges of the book's paper were already sanded, and the yellowed edges were rolled upwards page by page; The binding cotton rope also seemed to have been broken, and after being re-tied, it was tied in a large and ugly knot, and it was protruding on the spine of the book.

He noticed that there was a stack of red papers neatly stacked in the middle of the table.

He walked over and sat down at the table, picked up a piece of red paper on the top, and opened it to see a few lines of words written in neat block letters:

"I wish you a happy New Year. West Malaysia Naokan. Feng Yilang Guan Xuan. Date. ”

It turned out to be Guan Xuan's annual sticker. He pursed his lips and smiled, looked at the post upside down, and flipped through it in a pile of red envelopes, but he didn't find what he was looking for, and there was no gift list one by one, it seems that this New Year's card is a New Year's greeting card. He laughed and scolded Guan Xuan in his heart: This stingy ghost; He gave his two brothers a "Fengyi Lang" for each of them, but the two of them didn't have any other "meaning" except for coming to the village to see themselves once, and they didn't even invite themselves to a meal......

The other red envelopes are also New Year's greeting stickers, subordinates, soldiers, and surrounding squires; It's all a simple single post, with neither clips nor gift lists. The most exquisite New Year's note is not eye-catching, but it is a cliché of "wishing the adults a good New Year" and "I wish the adults to look up and see joy", but the payment is a large piece of black pressure, counting there are seventeen, Ren Er, Lu Shi, Zhou Qi, Luo San...... He frowned and thought about it, only to remember that these people were all border households in Zhongzhai. But more than half of them had just gone with him to deliver supplies to Shangzhai, why did their names also add to this post?

He immediately understood that this was a joint gift from seventeen border households, and one by one the men were not at home, so the women asked the person who wrote the post to add their men's names.

He memorized the people who sent these posts in his heart, thinking about how to give them gifts in return. Because of the gap in status, it is obviously not appropriate to send back the New Year's sticker, even if he sends it, others dare not accept it, so he can only think about the gift. It is easy for the border households, a can of oil, a few liters of rice, and dozens of New Year's money for the dolls to give blessings to the old people, this is enough, and any more will make them panic; What about the soldiers? What to send them? And what about the officer's clerk's office? What should the gentry send?

You have to buy something, and it's best to actually order something that will come in handy.

He pushed the blindfold to his forehead, took a cotton handkerchief and slowly rubbed his right eye, slowly pondering in his heart what kind of gift people could accept and be satisfied with.

He didn't think about how much it would cost him to get the gifts. According to Bao Kan, the salary during the period of waiting is the same standard as the salary after taking office, and it is all directly allocated to West Malaysia by Yousi after he takes office. He is a seven-grade official, and he has actual errands, such as salary, lu, jin, job, and material...... The salaries and subsidies of various names are converted into cash, and he can receive more than 30 yuan a month, and this money alone is enough for him to give a gift to everyone who gives a New Year's sticker, and he has not received a salary for three months, this money has exceeded 100 yuan, which is a very objective amount......

It occurred to him that he had done the same thing this time last year. On the twenty-seventh day of the lunar month last year, he and Lianniang, they were a small couple, hugging each other and lying in the futon, carefully calculating for how to spend the New Year in a dignified and economical way, and they also looked forward to their future, and quarreled over whether their son would be more like him or more like her when he grew up......