Luoyang, the imperial capital, is located on the banks of the Luoshui River, which is the oldest and most majestic city. It has a history of thousands of years, much older than the Great Qin Empire, and was one of the earliest settlements of mankind.

Jing Ge stared at the giant city in front of him. The tall, mottled walls are nearly 100 meters high and are made of bluestone weighing more than several tons, and the walls are coated with black tung oil.

The battlements on the wall are lined with armor, the dragon flag is fluttering, there are only four city gates in Luoyang, and when the city gate suspension bridge is raised, the whole city is a fortress. In the Central Plains, where the demons were raging three hundred years ago, Luoyang was one of the few cities that did not fall, and it held out for three years under the siege of hundreds of thousands of demon troops, as long as the food in the city was endless, there was almost no possibility of being breached.

Jing Ge led the horse, walked into the imperial capital Luoyang through the east city gate, walked through the bustling crowd, and felt the heritage of this thousand-year-old capital and its prosperity.

"Yue'er, we have arrived in the imperial capital." Jing Ge took a deep breath.

"Yes, we're back in the imperial capital." Shangguan Junyue smiled lightly.

......

Zhenguo Mansion.

A dignified and beautiful woman is holding a kettle and carefully watering the flowers, her expression is peaceful and peaceful, and her gestures show everyone's bearing. She is always so calm and calm, and she will not panic easily.

At this moment, she saw the figure that appeared in the doorway. The kettle in her hand fell unconsciously, smashing her favorite peony flower.

"Lan, he's back?" She couldn't suppress the joy in her heart, and asked with a trembling voice.

"Yes, madam, Brother Jing is back." The middle-aged woman in a pale yellow dress knelt on the ground and replied.

"Thank you, Lan." The woman stepped forward and lifted her up. "You and I are like sisters, why be so polite."

But the woman refused to get up, and there was shame in her eyes.

......

Luoyang, Weijia.

In the luxurious study with a collection of thousands of volumes, there was a boy in brocade clothes, staring at a copy of "Business Strategy" in front of him with a sad face and empty eyes, and there were two people playing Go next to him.

This person is Wei Zijie, the only son of the Wei family, who is rich enough to rival the country. The Wei family is the richest family in the world, inherited for thousands of years, and operates businesses all over the world, involving most industries.

Three hundred years ago, when the First Emperor first raised his army, he received the full support of the Wei family, providing grain, grass and weapons to help the First Emperor rule the world. The first emperor once said that to stabilize the world, the Wei family merit accounted for seven points.

The other two were Guan Shicong, the son of Tobe Shangshu, and Meng Lun, the son of a scholar of Hallym University. They were playing chess for fun, waiting for Wei Zijie to finish reciting the book before going out to play.

Wei Zijie's empty eyes slowly focused, looking at the silver figure that appeared out of nowhere, and exclaimed in surprise, "Blade, Brother Jing is back?" ”

The figure hidden in the silver cloak nodded, and said in a hoarse voice, "Three years, a total of fifteen shots, fifteen thousand gold." ”

"Fifteen thousand gold, no discount?" Wei Zijie couldn't help but shout, fifteen thousand gold is also a huge amount for him, after all, the Wei family is not under his control now.

"Well, it wasn't discounted, but there was an accident, and I only charged 10,000 gold." Blade said hoarsely.

"What accident?" Wei Zijie hurriedly asked.

"He fell off a cliff, and I didn't have time to save him, and I hurt my soul and forgot something." Blade said.

Wei Zijie was furious when he heard this, and jumped up in front of the desk to reach out and grab the silver man. "Before leaving, you promised not to let anyone hurt a hair of him."

"It wasn't anyone who hurt him, he was standing on the edge of a cliff and looking out into the distance. Someone tried to attack and kill him, and I solved it. But for some reason, the cliff he was standing on had an extremely strange fracture. fell, and I rescued him back to a ruined temple. The blade slid two steps back, dodging his hand and replied.

He recalls the scene when the sky and the earth changed color and the cliff breaked, and he still feels very weird.

Wei Zijie is not an unreasonable person, after listening to Blade's explanation, he was a little angry, and immediately said, "So it's no wonder you, I'll give you the money later." Ah Lun, shallot, Brother Jing is back, leave quickly while my sister is away. ”

Wei Zijie beckoned the two to slip away. The three of them jumped up and ran out in a hurry.

"Where?" Before they could run out of the study, a beautiful woman in palace clothes blocked the door.

"Brother Jing is back, I'm going to look for him." Wei Zijie said stupidly, he was very afraid of this woman, and the other two were also afraid of her.

"Don't go to that stinky boy." The woman said coldly.

"Sister, I beg you, I will definitely endorse it when I come back." Wei Zijie pleaded.

"Recite the fifth chapter of "Business Strategy", or walk out from under my whip of beating insects." The woman drew a dark green wooden whip and swung it twice in the air.

"Brother Jie, you have achieved great success recently, you will definitely be able to easily avoid this dragon whip, let's go find Brother Jing first." Guan Shicong patted Wei Zijie's shoulder, pulled Meng Lun up and ran out.

Wei Zijie took a deep breath and rolled up his sleeves. Inserted the jade folding fan into his waist, tied up his long hair, his eyes were firm, his muscles and bones moved, his head shook from side to side, and the joints of his whole body crackled. said word by word, "Sister, I am out of the door today." ”

The woman was slightly surprised, unable to understand the so-called brotherhood between the little boys. In order to go out to find him, aren't you even afraid of being beaten? In her eyes, these people are just little children, not sensible at all, although they are only a year younger than her.

This brother and those two or three people have lived in the shadow of this whip since childhood. This special whip is extremely painful to people and does not hurt their internal organs, so it is best used to teach them a lesson.

It seemed like she hadn't been whipped in a long time, the woman thought to herself, thinking about being more ruthless this time. As a result, after Wei Zijie finished exercising his muscles, he returned to the desk and recited the book loudly under her stunned gaze.

"The Way of Business......

When Jing Ge was eleven or twelve years old, he went to Wei's house to play with Wei Zijie. Seeing a girl in the courtyard holding a wooden whip to practice martial arts, he stepped forward and tried to tease, but was whipped to the ground by the girl's three whips and couldn't get up.

This girl is Wei Zijie's sister, Wei Zifu. Jing Ge rolled on the ground and shouted, "The stinky woman dares to attack me with a sneak attack, isn't this the legendary dragon whip?" The brothers singled her out together. ”

At that time, Wei Zijie was often bullied by her, of course, on Jing Ge's side. However, the sad thing is that the four of them singled out her and couldn't beat one of them, and they were all pumped to the ground.

Especially Jing Ge scolded her stinky mother-in-law, and she was worried about seeing her once and smoking once, and she didn't dare to get close to the Wei family for two or three years after that. She named the whip the Insect Whip, and often used it to teach Wei Zijie Menglun these worms.

Over the years, she has practiced literature and martial arts, and she is more diligent than ordinary children, and she doesn't know how many grades she is in, just Wei Zijie's three-legged cat work, where can she hide from her whip.

......

Weiyang Palace.

"Empress Qiyu, the son of Jingqing, the prince of Zhenguo, has returned to the imperial capital." A purple-robed eunuch said sharply.

The golden-robed woman who was intently reviewing the recitals said without raising her head, "If you report to me next time you report such a trivial matter, you won't have to stand here." ”

"Yes, the minion knows his mistake." The purple-robed eunuch fell to his knees, drenched in cold sweat.

......

On the streets of Luoyang's East Gate, there are many vendors selling all kinds of things, and children are playing and chasing on the road.

Jing Ge looked around casually and accidentally knocked down a child. He was only about four or five years old, white and chubby, wearing a white-washed linen shirt and a handful of bangs on his forehead, which was very cute.

He bumped into Jing Ge and fell to the ground, didn't cry or make a fuss, just snorted softly, and then got up awkwardly, patted the dirt on his body, picked up a small fruit on the ground, and apologized to Jing Ge timidly.

"Big brother, I'm sorry!" He stood in front of Jing Ge with his head down.

Jing Ge squatted down and gently scraped his nose: "It's okay, you have to be careful, don't run around the street." ”

He listened to Jing Ge's words and nodded his head seriously a few times to show that he knew, "Big brother, do you want to eat begonia fruit?" He handed a fruit to Jing Ge.

Jing Ge noticed that he had two fruits, one of which fell to the ground and the other clutched tightly in his hand when he just fell. He picked up what had fallen on the ground and carefully wiped the dirt off his clothes.

And at this moment, what he handed Jing Ge was the fruit that had not fallen to the ground. This small detail touched Jing Ge quite a lot.

Begonia fruit looks like an apple, but it's much smaller, a little bigger than a thumb.

"It's delicious, sweet and sour." Seeing that Jing Ge didn't take his fruit, he said in a childish voice, his bright eyes as pure and immaculate as black gems. And with some light of hope. He simply wanted to share what he thought was delicious with Jing Ge, and people couldn't bear to refuse.

Jing Ge took the fruit and said, "Thank you, what's your name?" ”

"My mother calls me Xiaobao." He said crisply.

"Xiaobao, what are you doing there, come here." A plainly dressed lady called out to him anxiously.

Jing Ge stood up, and the little lady protected Xiaobao behind her. He said with some anxiety, "Children are not sensible, if they collide with adults, please don't blame adults." ”

There are many big people in Luoyang City, and these insignificant people can't be touched a little. Especially the person who followed such a stunning woman behind him.

"Eldest sister, don't panic, I'm not an adult." Jing Ge saw her panic and nervousness, and said gently.

"Xiaobao is very sensible and well-behaved, and invited me to eat begonia fruit." Jing Geyang raised the small fruit in his hand.

"If you don't dislike it, take more." The little lady was relieved when she saw Jing Ge like this, and pointed to a stall not far away.

"No need, one is enough, thank you eldest sister." Jing Ge said, it is not easy for these small people in the market to make a living, and Jing Ge and Yue'er are penniless at the moment, how can they go to take other people's fruits again.

Jing Ge walked down the street with the mother and son to his stall and found a worn-out book on her stall.

"Can I take a look?" Jing Ge was a little curious.

"Yes, sir." The little lady replied.

Jing Ge looked through it and said in surprise, "This is a military book?" ”

The little lady nodded with a red face, and said with some embarrassment, "This is the military book left by the late husband, and the concubine knows a few big characters." I thought about looking through it to see if I could understand a little bit and teach it to Xiaobao in the future. ”

"When I grow up, I'm going to be a herald, like my father. My mother said that if you want to be a good soldier like your father, you must study hard and practice martial arts. Xiaobao said in a childish voice on the side.

"I'm sorry, I didn't know your husband died." Jing Ge said apologetically.

"It's okay." The little lady said with a somewhat gloomy look in her eyes, "People are inherently dead, and they only hate their ancestors not for dying on the battlefield but for dying at the hands of traitors." ”

"At whose hands did he die?" Jing Ge asked, just for this begonia fruit, he wanted to know who that person was.

"The traitor is dead, and my husband is a herald under Generalissimo Jing Qing in the Northwest Army. Three years ago, he was killed with the generalissimo on his way back to Beijing. The little lady said calmly.

"Didn't the DPRK give pensions to the soldiers who sacrificed their lives?" Jing Ge asked, he was very uneasy in his heart, the mother and son in front of him actually had some relationship with him, and they were actually the widows of his father's heralds.

"Where will the big men in the court care about the lives and deaths of the families of those unknown soldiers, but the generalissimo's wife is worried about us. The generalissimo's money was distributed to us, but the concubine declined, the concubine was still young, and she had hands and feet, so she could support herself and Xiaobao, and more than 100 soldiers died with her on that trip, and the pension should naturally be reserved for those who need it more. The little lady said lightly.

Would you rather live a harder life and leave your pension to those who need it more? Jing Ge was deeply moved, and didn't know what to say for a while.

"Big brother, can I touch this sword?" Xiaobao walked to the horse, stood on tiptoe and pointed at the long sword hanging on the horse.

"Xiaobao, don't be so rude." The little lady scolded.

Xiaobao retreated.

Shangguan Junyue took off the long sword, squatted down and put it in front of him, and said softly, "You can pull it out and take a look, but be careful not to cut your hand." ”

Xiaobao immediately became very happy, but instead of stepping forward, he looked back at his mother and asked for her opinion. Seeing that his mother nodded lightly in agreement, she stepped forward excitedly, holding the hilt of the sword with all her strength and pulling the long sword out of the scabbard a little bit.

He looked at it for a while, inserted the sword back, politely thanked Shangguan Junyue, and then obediently returned to his mother to sit cross-legged.

Shangguan Junyue hung the sword back on her horse and whispered to Jing Ge, "Your mother is here, and I should leave too." With that, she turned and walked away, disappearing into the crowd.

Jing Ge didn't answer, he stared blankly at the simple carriage galloping at the end of the long street.