Xieting, formerly known as Xietaizi, is located in the middle of the 700-mile mountain road, the cramped mountain road meets a palm flat land here, and the foot merchants who go back and forth between the ancient Yi country and the Central Plains states often rest here, and in the long run, they actually support a small town. The rest of the pavilion is named after this.

Today's Xuan Chen, compared with the ancient Yi country, has retreated to the northeast for more than a thousand miles, and the mountains and rivers that used to be the boundary of Yixia are now all under the rule of the empire.

Legend has it that this mountain Xiangshui is one of the 27 patriarchs of the Heavenly Dao of the human defense of the female body of the human defense, whether it is looking north or south or north or south, the continuous mountain is like the cheeks of a spring girl, Xiang Shui surrounds it, just like a bead chain falling on the chest, the clouds and mist are churning, as if it is coquettish, from the mouth snorting out of the trace of white vapor.

This place is as weak as water, but it also has a prestige that spreads far and wide - the corner of the flying dragon.

On the occasion of the feathering and soaring of the civil air defense clan, in order to repay the grace of the woodcutter in the east corner of the fish, she is to incarnate the mountain and water, and the natural danger is separated to ensure the peace of the east corner. After the eastern corner, there are ancient thistles and ancient swallows, which multiply here and are not affected by the continuous wars in the Central Plains. In the past hundred generations, there have been many Central Plains heroes who have raised troops to commit crimes in the east, and all of them have returned with their halberds.

And the most talked about among them is the Taiwei Blackshirt Army, known as the horn of the flying dragon, whose first silver hairpin emperor, Taiwei's princess Wanyun, and the second daughter of the first emperor also died here.

The twenty-second day of the month of sacrifice, according to the ancient Yan calendar, but it is the seventh day of the first month of winter, according to legend, it is the day of the female feather of the civil air defense clan, which has been passed down from the east corner to the present, and is called the "gift fish festival". In addition to giving fish and eating fish to every household, there are many festivals and customs of "sending the heavenly maiden" and "slaying the dragon's horn", which are widely spread in the land of Sanyan.

Cutting ice is the daughter of Chen Laosan, the old Chen family lives in the middle of the mountain road for five generations, there is a fifty acres of woodland in the foothills of Xieting West, 30 acres of Masson pine, 20 acres of Chimba, generations are farmers facing the loess with their backs to the sky, to Chen San's generation only donated a ten miles long, rounded off half a foot into the official eunuch road.

Rao is so, Chen San is also a simple mountain man who doesn't know a few big characters, half a hundred years to get this daughter, actually drove an ox cart for the first time, went to the county town outside the mountain to find four or five long-tried talents, Zhang Luo ate a table in Wangshan Tower, it turned out to be a few gentlemen to give the little girl a name of book fragrance.

At that time, it was the wax moon, and the plum blossoms outside the Wangshan Tower were in full bloom, so Wang Xiucai wrote "cutting ice" and "cutting snow" on the 10,000-year-old red rice paper prepared by Chen Laohan. Chen Laohan was very happy, and only felt that this name was elegant and white - "elegant but not pretentious, white but not vulgar", this comment was made by Liu Xiucai, Chen Laohan remembered it, and it was eleven years when it was displayed.

There are two elder brothers above Chen Jiebing, the eldest is forty-two this year, and he has already married and took over from his father to take care of the fifty acres of woodland; the second one has just turned fifteen, and he is not a few years older than Jiebing, both of them were born to the Chen Huang family, and they are not close to their half-brothers, nor are they estranged.

Today is the annual festival of giving fish, and the pavilion in the jaw mountain attaches more importance to this day than the rest of Yandi. Chen Huang and Chen Li stuck to the stove in the morning, cooking more than 10 good dishes for a family of eight.

"Let's let go, let's let go, black bean sauce dace!" Chen Huang is also more than half a hundred years old, but his clear voice is still like a sturdy peasant bride. I saw her turn around as if stepping on a flower rope, avoiding the old man's stiff sideways half of his body, and steadily put the last steaming dish on the table, filling the most central space.

"Old woman, you sit here. Chen Laohan moved the stool to the right, barely vacating a place for one person.

"Mother, stool. Chen Li, who was still by the stove, handed over one.

"Come here, too. The boss on the other side of the square table also called his daughter-in-law, but in order to free his hands, he hurriedly handed out the little son in his arms.

In the same family, the father and son have completely different attitudes towards their wives, compared with Chen Laohan's intimate words, the boss's greeting, saying less is bland, and saying more is ruthless. Whether the woman is holding the ice cellar or the stove every night, it can be seen from the complexion that although Chen Huang is old, his folds are full of red and fluttering smiles, and although Chen Li is young, his cheeks, from the cheekbones to the jaw, are only like bluestones sharpened by a knife, stiff and colorless.

"Big brother, give me a hug for the fat baby, my sister-in-law must be hungry after a busy morning. Although the second child asked, he had already taken the child over with both hands.

The boss didn't reply, Chen Li just smiled stiffly.

Count carefully, there are a total of fourteen dishes on the table, including three whole fish and a pot of tofu, green onion and white fish head soup. The fattest dace was caught by the boss in the ice hole, and when he brought it to his parents' house, it was regarded as a gift. Those who have no relatives and children to move around will make an appointment with the fishmonger in advance, pay for the fish before the festival, give the fish to the door on the same day, say some auspicious words, and the wealthy will also reward some rice and flour farming.

When the meal was about to be finished, Cutting Ice was kicked by a leg under the table, and the little eyebrows twisted and raised his head, and sure enough, it was the second brother with a thief smile. The second child blinked his eyes and tilted his head twice at the door.

"Dad, I'm done. Cutting Bing blinked in understanding, his eyebrows furrowed, bent into two crescents.

"Me too," the second child immediately followed, "Dad, mother, eldest brother, sister-in-law, you eat slowly, I'll take Meimei to the street first." ”

"Don't call me Meimei!" the eyebrows that had been stretched just now were twisted into two small balls.

"Don't scream, don't scream. It was Chen Laohan who answered, and he smiled with a smile while waving his hand to allow the two to go first.

There is still a mountain road to go down from the west eighty miles to the downtown of the town, you can take the mountain road, or you can pass through the forest, the latter is not a shortcut, but it is more preferred by the brothers and sisters. The mountains are full of green persimmons, there are flowers in spring and summer, fruits in autumn and winter, and they can be shaded when it is sunny and sheltered from the rain when it rains. At other times of the year, the most common flat bamboo orchid on the ground, cut the ice when I was a child, I didn't often go up the mountain, it was rare to see this kind of white-edged blue-core golden stamen mountain flower once or twice, always shouting to dig one or two plants back to plant, but later I learned the truth that less expensive and more cheap, so I couldn't look down on the flat-leaved blue flowers everywhere.

"This year's statue of the Celestial Maiden is your turn?"

The commotion could be heard in the distance, and the cutting ice deliberately turned his head, his eyes narrowed into slits, and he was very flat.

"I'm going to tie a statue of a celestial maiden with a man," the second brother smiled freely, stiff and free, "I'll send the goddess later, and the second brother will take you to see a big guy." He rubbed his sister's head indiscriminately, and Cutting Ice's head looked like a dice cup under his hands.

The second brother's hands are slender and white, the fingers are half an inch longer than the palms, the knuckles are well-proportioned, and the fingertips are as neat as obliquely cut green onions. Generally, a peasant boy of this age should not have such hands, even if it is a girl of Bingbing's age, she must hide a bit of jealousy.

These ten white jade chopstick-like fingers were not born to hold hoes, and when they were younger, the second child was studying in a private school, and Mr. Chen Laohan said: This is a piece of material that can be used to set up a monument at the east street entrance of Xieting. Chen Laohan remembered the table of wine and food in Wangshan Building, and hurriedly went back to dig out the few pieces of red rice paper in the drawer of the old wardrobe. Later, he was sent to the Jaw Lu Academy outside the mountain for further study, the second child thought that "cutting snow" was too feminine, so he changed the word and wrote "Jian Xue", the gentleman of the academy was much more knowledgeable, and the second child said that more than ten people with "snow" in the name of the minister and four or five names with "Jian" of the fierce general, only to reluctantly let him accept this name.

Who would have thought that Chen Qianxue went out of the mountain, and instead of going to the academy for three days, he went to the tailor's shop and carpenter's workshop. These things are not absent in the mountains, but the ones in the city are always exquisite. For example, this statue of the goddess, the pavilion sends the goddess every year, and every year it is ordered to the jaeyin county outside the mountain. The second was ingenious, and ran into the shop a lot, and every master carpenter recognized him as half an apprentice, and gave him some delicate work that he liked, so that he could get over the clumsy apprentices.

It's just that after reading this book for a few years, the second child couldn't even pass the county test, and seeing that he was getting older, Chen Laohan no longer dreamed of erecting a monument, cut off the tuition fee, and thought about buying dozens of acres of mountain land and sharing it with him to live. Chen Qianxue didn't tell her family about helping, except for cutting ice - how many delicate things this skillful hand has produced, they have all been given to her sister as gifts.

Once you hold the hoe, there will be one less pair of such treasures in the world. Cutting Bing also prayed in his heart that the day when the second brother held the hoe would come later.

In the bazaar of the pavilion, the heads of people are already crowded, the highest of which are children, and the lowest are children: the low ones are those who are undisciplined, who treat the legs of adults as woods, and here they get out of their heads, and from there they show half of their faces, giggling, and always make people feel a little ashamed of being teased, but they can't really touch their backs and check the shops; the high ones all borrow the topography of their parents, sit on their shoulders and give orders, and from time to time they point forward, and from time to time they shrug up and down. Flapping his arms like swimming in water, there are younger, coldly giving a hot compress to the stiff and sore back of his father's neck, in exchange for the envious laughter of the family around him.

The women covered their mouths with one hand, but they couldn't stop the smile from the corners of their mouths to the tips of their brows, and the other hand slapped the air strangely. The mother of the child was the first to put her hand down, and with great difficulty she smiled, and reached out to hug the little one, and those who could not stop laughing and even became more and more rampant, one holding her brother's shoulder, the other leaning back, presumably an aunt or aunt, etc., did not forget to pretend to hand some straw paper rags.

"Brother, look!"

Cutting Bing grabbed the four fingers of the second brother like a white onion with one hand, his head looked wildly, and suddenly froze in the direction of the street.

Knock knock!

The heads of the whole market looked at the street like an autumn wind blowing through a wheat field, like fingers brushing through fur.

The second child is half a beat slower than the people on the whole street, and a full beat slower than the cutting ice. Just now he didn't know where to look at Cutting Bing, but now everyone looked there, but he couldn't see anything clearly, just followed the direction of the sound, and estimated that he followed the trend.

Chen Qianxue's eyes are probably broken down by doing too much delicate work, and a pair of eyes are attached to grasshopper-sized devices and more subtle bolt buckles day and night, and over time, these eyes can no longer cope with larger and farther things.

He vaguely saw a multicolored hill moving up and down in a very disciplined manner not far away, and at his feet were two clusters of blurred ghosts, blue and gray.

Knock knock!

After two bursts of gongs and drums, more musical instruments joined the battle: the most piercing is the suona of the Liu family, this brilliant brass suona is passed down from the previous generation of Liu Laoqi, and it has been dangling many people's eyes in the red and white ceremonies in the Xieting area - the second generation of Liu Laoqi became a tailor, and the third generation only entered the private school to study, and was pinned on by the family, and this real gold-like brass suona will no longer haunt the red and white venue. But every time the third day of the winter month of the ancient calendar is a fish festival, the new generation of Liu Laoqi always has to take over the burden of the older generation and play a festive tune that is actually not very good for the ears - after all, the tune is secondary, and the festive is the most important.

This is Xiao Liu's first performance on stage, and the red ribbon flower ball hangs on his thin shoulders that he has just unfolded, looking cramped and cute. The band even walked in front of the statue of the Heavenly Maiden, passing in front of the Chen brothers and sisters, the little musician's cheeks bulged like blistered goldfish, and a pair of light eyebrows that seemed to be out of ink were twisted into two points on the word "head", which made the brothers and sisters laugh for a while.

Jian Xue is half an adult, holding her sister's shoulders with both hands, and her face only shows a decent or even kind smile, but Cutting Ice is only a little older than Xiao Chen, a girl of this age often secretly despises stupid boys of the same age in her heart, and Cutting Ice clearly puts this sense of superiority on the table.

- Because I have an older brother whom none of you can match. Bing Bing wouldn't reveal the reason to anyone, not even herself, she didn't make a connection between the two, she just thought that these kids were so stupid and rude, as if they weren't of the same species as herself.

Such a generous arrogance has attracted more courtesy for cutting ice than girls of the same age, and the boys always have to fight for a breath, whether it is to this woman who always pouts to deal with him, or to other men who are also looked down upon by this woman.

In the noisy sound of gongs and drums and the sound of suona that he puffed up and squeezed his lungs, Xiao Chen didn't notice the sound of the girl on the side breaking through his mouth with a little smile, let alone the magical ridicule that could stimulate the boy's self-esteem, competitiveness and desire to conquer.

The band was followed by a procession carrying the statue of the Celestial Maiden. After approaching, a pair of eyes can only accommodate a small section of this long dragon: the townspeople carrying flowers and auspicious clouds are the first to come into view, children hold hundreds of flowers, women hold auspicious clouds, one tall and one short, separated from heaven and earth.

The procession then widened, on one side was a half-round table, curved on the outside, straight on the inside, on the table was a plate of roasted fish, still steaming in the cold and freezing, I don't know what the mystery was, on the other side was a narrow bed, a young man dressed as a woodcutter slept in his clothes, lying on his side, sleeping quietly—Chen Jianxue suddenly thought that if this woodcutter was not lying on his side but lying flat, he would probably be recognized by people who did not understand the legend and story as a corpse board.

The woodcutter's head is up, there is a slender hand tied with white paper - ordinary portraits, the bare skin is tied with yellow paper, Xie Ting spent a lot of money to use many rare colors for the statue of the goddess, but he didn't dare to use it at all, even the woodcutter's peaceful sleeping face, the paper is much worse.

- Maybe this is the difference between immortals and mortals, and when you are shy, you must always be relieved.

The palm of the hand is downward, the index finger and little finger are slightly upturned, and the middle and ring fingers are naturally bent, as if caressing the woodcutter's cheek through the air. The procession was still marching, following the slightly bent arms of the Celestial Maiden wrapped in the wide sleeves of the feather yarn, and the eyes of the brother and sister crossed her fragrant shoulders surrounded by colorful silk.

Carrying the statue of the Heavenly Maiden is the youngest and buriest man in the pavilion. On top of the flowers and auspicious clouds, the goddess is graceful, soft and smart, and she is like roaming the clouds together. It is unimaginable that such a delicate and natural trajectory beat came from the hands of a few middle-aged croppers.

After the Heavenly Maiden, there are lion dances, sedan chairs, fire-breathing jugglers, etc., and at the end, there are local bands that play and sing, and the queue seems to have no end. But the onlookers had begun to disperse slowly, and the shop should have gone back to see the shop, and the hot urine on his father's back had been as cold as ice, and it was inevitable that there would be a wind chill at such a season, but no one thought that he should go home first and change into dry clothes. If the Gift Fish Festival is the most important festival for the people in the Pavilion, sending the Heavenly Maiden is the most important part of the Gift Fish Festival, and it is a grand event that the mountain people can remember and prepare for six months before the festival, and can discuss and reminisce for six months after the festival.

As the gong hand at the end of the line lingered on his neck, the last onlooker turned and walked away in silence. At this time, Bing Bing and Jian Xue were already on their way to Wang Lun'er's house in the east ten miles.

The second said that he was going to take his sister to see a big guy.