Mr. Duan didn't look at the lost face of the old man Huang Yao, but just stretched out his sleeves and pointed to the open space next to the house, with a calm expression, and said, "The place is borrowed from you, and you can build a bamboo house at will." ”

The old man glanced in the direction Mr. Duan pointed, obviously unwilling, and excused himself: "Xiao Duan's kindness, the old man understands it, but the old man has a place to live." Is it time to worship the teacher? ”

"It's not a consultation with you." Mr. Duan's voice was crisp and flat, and he turned around and walked towards the house.

The old man wanted to jump to his feet, but he couldn't hold it back, and muttered at the calm and silent back: "Xiao Duan, you don't think about stealing the teacher by doing this, right?" Hum! I'm telling you, you've miscalculated. ”

It's not that he's really afraid that Mr. Duan will steal his skills, but that he is always being watched by Mr. Duan, which really hinders him from teaching his apprenticeship, and then he is afraid that he won't be able to pass on his "orthodox" thoughts to his precious apprentice.

The figure on the steps was not affected by the shouting at all, and went straight into the house.

Zidi looked away from the eaves where there was no human figure, turned his head to glare at the yellow-skinned old man, shook his head helplessly, and then picked up a handful of medicinal herbs and put them into the utensils. The heart is full of contempt for the old man, thinking that her master is acting above board and is famous in Dongzhou, how can she steal these indiscriminate things? It's really a gentleman's belly with the heart of a villain.

"Alright, I'll talk about the apprenticeship when I come back from the Dark Pavilion. It's not too early, you better go quickly, go back to your broken temple to prepare, and we'll set off early the day after tomorrow, and then you will wait at the qin shop outside the city. Lu Ci frowned and showed an impatient look, and waved his hand at the old man.

The old man was not very reconciled, his eyebrows and eyes bent into a flattering look, and he stretched his neck to Lu Ci: "If you don't enter, just worship now, everything is simple, these are just nothing, and it will save trouble from simplicity." He is afraid that the night will be long and the dream will be too much, but he can't let the apprentice in his hand fly like this, the gain outweighs the loss, the key is that a good seedling is too difficult to find, and the temperament can be changed the day after tomorrow, but talent is not good.

"You see, you said it yourself, all this red tape is false, so it doesn't matter if the apprenticeship is waived, right? Let's go, don't delay our business. Lu Ci smiled playfully, and did not forget to raise his eyebrows as he spoke.

When the old man heard this, he immediately looked at Lu Ci with a bitter old face: "How can this work?" ”

Looking at Lu Ci's unreasonable appearance, the old man hesitated for a moment, and finally nodded: "Okay, the apprenticeship will be done when the old man returns." It's just this bamboo house......"

"I can't do anything, sir, let's find a way to build it myself." Lu Ci spread his hands, and there was still a piece of herb between his fingers.

The old man glanced at the open space faintly, and sighed lightly, it seems that he has to spend some silver to hire someone to build a house, which is too wrong, it is his coffin book, but it is worth it for his apprentice.

If he hadn't been afraid of it here, how could he spend money on building a bamboo house. Just give a few strong men some medicine at random, and one more threat, and free labor will come. But now this is Mr. Duan's territory, and if Mr. Duan is angered, his apprentice will be gone, so he doesn't dare to use such a method.

Soon, he swept away the gloom in his heart, and showed a big smile at Zidi: "Apprentice, I'm going to leave for the teacher, remember to be the teacher, but you don't have to worry, the teacher will go and come back quickly." ”

"It's good to go, don't send it." Lu Ci's short voice was mixed with banter, and he pointed to the winding path not far away, with a steep slope full of dead leaves on one side and a muddy ground on the other, both sides of which were overgrown with vegetation. Soon, under Lu Cihuan's interested gaze, the old man set foot on this road, the old man was a little rickety, and he was slightly lonely with the twilight that was about to come.

And Zidi never looked up at the old man, but just pouted, she didn't have a good impression of this cheap master who was hard to stick.

After Lu Ci returned from Mr. Duan, he told Jing Shenlu about the matter, saying that he was going to go to the Dark Yan Pavilion to get the antidote in person. Now there is nothing important to do in the house, Jing Shenlu easily agreed. As for his father, after all, he had been sheltered by the old man at that time, so he did not object. According to the time he set, finally, in the early morning of the last day of August, he left the Lu Mansion and set out on the road to the Dark Yan Pavilion with the old man Huang Yao.

Ling Xiao has been gone for a few days, and now that Lu Ci is gone, the mansion has suddenly become a lot deserted. More than ten days after Ling Xiao left, Jing Shenlu handed over a letter written by Ling Xiao in advance to Zhong Limu, pretending that the letter was from Qiantang, in order to put Zhong Limu at ease.

However, Jing Shenlu had indeed received the letter sent by Ling Xiao from Yiyue Palace, and for the sake of caution, the letter was sent in the name of Taozhi, but the content of the letter was Ling Xiao's handwriting, which showed that Ling Xiao had arrived at Yiyue Palace safely, and Jing Shenlu was also a lot more relieved.

On the day of the Double Ninth Festival, after breakfast, Jing Shenlu took Zhong Limu and the others out of the city, wanting to climb high and look far away and enjoy the autumn colors. At this time, Jiang Tingxue, who was in Anyang County, also walked out of the courtyard where they had lived for half a month with Gu Minluo, and the two rode horses and played all the way.

The sky is high and the clouds are light, the sun is warm, and autumn is everywhere, which is pleasant to be physically and mentally comfortable, but the final destination for the two is a cemetery. Buried underground are Gu Minluo's parents and the people who died in the family in one night, and he came here to pay his respects today. They were supposed to come to worship during the Qingming Festival, but at that time, they were busy deploying plans to unify the rivers and lakes, and it was difficult to get out for a while.

The withered yellow leaves on the ground were spread in a layer, and the breeze swept by, rattling, and the dozen or so graves were covered with dense weeds, but they were already withered and yellow, and everywhere was gloomy. Jiang Tingxue stood a little back in front of the tomb, and when she saw this picture, a trace of desolation arose spontaneously from the bottom of her heart.

With her dress fluttering, she felt as if even the wind was a little sad, and she couldn't help but shiver slightly. She watched silently Gu Minluo's every move in front of the main tomb, from him lighting the oil lamp, to kneeling down to offer incense, to the toast in the back, and speaking to the stone tablet. It went on like this for a long time, until he finally got up after this, she didn't move a single step, and even lost her mind a little.

Not perceiving the movement behind him, Gu Minluo couldn't help but glance back, inadvertently hooked the corners of his lips in a shallow arc, and asked, "Listen to Xue, what's wrong?" ”

A light call pulled Jiang Tingxue's thoughts back, and she couldn't help blinking her smart eyes, smiled awkwardly at the figure in front of her, and shook her head calmly: "It's okay." ”

Gu Minluo seemed to understand what Jiang Tingxue was thinking at the moment, so he just nodded to her and said, "Wait for me for a moment." With that, he rolled up his two wide sleeves, went around the back of the grave, and began to weed with his bare hands from the edge.

On weekdays, although this place is guarded by the ancient Minluo, at most these people only sweep the tomb and clean up the perimeter of the cemetery, as for the weeds on the grave, they have no right to pull out the weeds, after all, this involves a tradition, climbing the grave is a great disrespect to the deceased, unless it is their own close relatives.

Jiang Tingxue stared at the cigarette curling Nana in front of the stele for a while, and then fell on the inscription. After looking at it carefully, she realized that it was a joint burial tomb, and judging from the content of the inscription, this should be Gu Minluo's parents, and the two died on the same day, otherwise the tomb would not be like this. Was it an accident? Otherwise, how could there be such a coincidence in the world, and the husband and wife died on the same day. It's just that the two have been together for so long, and he has never said this to her.

"I'm all right." Gu Minluo straightened his sleeves and walked from the side of the grave to Jiang Tingxue, and some dirt was stuck to his shoes. A long time had passed, and all the weeds had been removed from his hands. But it's just the main tomb, and the rest is just incense one by one, and after a few simple words, he didn't care about it anymore.

The green silk fluttered on her shoulders, Jiang Tingxue raised her eyes and looked at the person in front of her, her heart was a little more complicated, she smiled reluctantly, and the question in her heart couldn't help blurting out: "These are Gu Gongzi's family members?" ”

Jiang Tingxue's eyes trembled slightly, she was startled when she asked such a question, this was too abrupt, and more importantly, this was a sad thing for others, it was really inappropriate for her to ask it so openly, it was no different from revealing other people's scars.

"Well, it was my parents who just worshipped." Gu Minluo seemed very peaceful and frank, in front of Jiang Tingxue, he didn't feel anything, and was more willing to be honest, so without waiting for Jiang Tingxue's reaction, he continued to elaborate: "When I was young, they left, I was raised by my father-in-law, and he regarded me as his own. ”

Seeing that Jiang Tingxue was listening carefully, Gu Minluo looked into the distance, and then said: "My father and stepfather are brothers, and our family was originally in Anyang County, which was originally a small merchant family.

That was sixteen years ago, when there was a great drought in Anyang County, and the county guard Zhao Xuqing was unfavorable for disaster relief, resulting in countless people dying of starvation.

Naturally, those wealthy and wealthy families became the targets of the bandits, and my family was not spared, and they were all wiped out overnight. At that time, I was only six or seven years old, and I was taken to Shu by my stepfather to play with my sister-in-law, so I escaped. Later, when our stepfather rushed back with us, all we saw were rotting corpses and dried blood.

Later, in less than two years, my sister fell seriously ill and passed away with her parents. Since then, I have been the only one left in the Gu family, in fact, I have already been adopted as a righteous son by my father-in-law at that time. After being destroyed, he rarely returned to Anyang County. ”