Nearly two years have passed since then.

During the banquet, the shadow of the flower sat down, and the broken time seemed to pass between the fingers. A lot of things have happened in the past two years, such as Sun Ce taking Lujiang for Yuan Shu, and Zhou Yu going to Danyang before him to join Zhou Shang, the uncle of the then Taishou. Zhou Yu's injuries at that time were more serious than he thought. After fainting that day, he recuperated on the sickbed for several months, and of course told his mother the news that the Gu family had been wiped out. Zhou's mother was saddened by the decline of the worldly family, and at the same time blamed herself for her stupidity and injury to her beloved son, and passed away soon after. Zhou Yu had just recovered from his injury, and before he could recuperate carefully, he was busy worrying about his mother's funeral.

It was also at this time that Yuan Shu's army attacked the Lujiang River. After Zhou Yu got the news, he took his mother's relics and spiritual position to Danyang without thinking about it. On the way to his uncle, he remembered what Gu Yao said. She said that the Gu family has fallen in this troubled world, and how can the Zhou family be alone. When you think about it, it's pretty good. He sat alone in the empty and cold carriage, holding his mother's tablet in his arms, with a self-deprecating smile on his face, trying to hold back the tears that were about to fall.

Gu Yao's curse-like words that day were really not bad at all.

At this time, Zhou Yu didn't know that as soon as he arrived in Danyang, he would receive a letter from Sun Ce, and he didn't know that they would go to the battlefield together for the rest of their lives. Later, Zhou Yu understood that he was actually a person born for troubled times.

"I have to be clear, the big thing is harmonious." When Zhou Yu led his troops to greet Sun Ce, the young friend took his hand and said so. After a long time, Zhou Yu's appearance and demeanor are still the same, but Sun Ce's eyes are no longer as innocent and chic as before. Those young and bright eyes seemed to be coated with a layer of wind and frost, and the gray mist was thinly shrouded, and the corners of the shrewd eyes were faintly hung with the knots of exhaustion and disappointment. In just a few years of commitment under Yuan Shu, the youthfulness of teaching Sun Ce has also been worn away a lot. He smiled and talked about the past, between his eyebrows was still as sharp as a sharp edge, but between the words were regret and unwillingness, even the smile seemed to be reluctantly put together for the sake of the old man, full of superficial happiness.

Sun Ce is 20 years old this year, and it has only been four years since he left Lujiang.

Compared with the words sealed in the letterhead, the frustration that Sun Ce had personally experienced was even more tormenting.

"Gongjin, let me tell you, there are really a lot of fun places along the way......"

Sun Ce untied his heavy robes and poured a glass of wine for Zhou Yu in the camp tent. He gushed anecdotes about his coming, as if the war was nothing more than a trip to him. But Zhou Yu clearly knew that Sun Ce, who was still under the fence, was just a knife in the hands of others, and Yuan Shu used him to cut off the edges and corners of the enemy, and he also wanted to sharpen the blade of this treasure knife.

"Over the years, you must have had a hard time." Zhou Yu took a sip of wine and said quietly with his eyes down.

The never-ending chatter and laughter from the beginning came to an abrupt end, and Sun Ce's smile gradually condensed on his face. He didn't look at Zhou Yu, but slowly lowered the hand holding the wine glass.

"You're still seeing it." Sun Ce chuckled. A cold voice spat out from the bottom of his throat, and the corners of his lips were stiff and far-fetched, as if he was laughing at his futile scheming: "No one has had a good time these years." You and I are still like this, and I don't know how many people have been displaced, and their families have been ruined and died overnight. ”

"The capital of the country is not a country, and it is common for families to be ruined." Zhou Yu responded lightly and raised his glass to him: "I led my troops to vote for you, just because I wanted to use my own strength to calm this troubled world." Not to mention the people of the world and the common people, at least I want to protect the people I care about. ”

When Sun Ce heard this, he seemed to suddenly remember something. He stretched out his hand to clink glasses with Zhou Yu, and said casually: "Speaking of which, I saw Senior Sister Xian when I was ordered to go to Beijing before. ”

After speaking, he quietly observed the other party's expression. I saw a rare look of surprise and astonishment on Zhou Yu's face, and he looked at Sun Ce in disbelief.

"Did you really see her? Ah Xian she ...... Is she good? He asked, a little awkwardly. It's just some inconsequential questions, but when Zhou Yu really asked, he felt extraordinarily narrow and ashamed. In case Sun Ce was just casually tempting, or teasing him to ease the atmosphere at the moment, such a question would be extremely boring.

Even so, Zhou Yu almost couldn't help it, and added a few more sentences in a row: "When you saw her, did you mention me?" Or I can go and see her when Ah Xian is free. ”

Facing Zhou Yu's earnest eyes looking at him, Sun Ce couldn't help but laugh out loud.

"Hahahahaha-Gong Jin, you should run around with me next, but you don't have time to go to Beijing again!" He laughed loudly and shook his head again: "You are really, just like before." ”

"You're used to scolding me, and now you're still here?" Zhou Yu scolded half-jokingly, but there was not even a momentary smile between his eyebrows. He stretched out his fingers and gently rubbed the willow tabletop, and sighed lightly from between his lips and teeth: "Sister Xian is also in her teens this year, and I don't know if she has married someone else's wife." ”

Sun Ce could hear it clearly, and the last few syllables of Zhou Yu's words were clearly sluggish.

"Nope." Sun Ce shook his head, "You told me about you in your letter earlier, although I felt sorry for her, but I also thought that she would find another lover. Who knew that the last time I went to Beijing to see her, my sister was still alone. ”

Zhou Yu was silent for a long time, and his expression was not a little more relaxed than before. He cast his gaze outside the account, and the decaying grass in the field reflected in the morning light, and cast a deep light and shadow between his pupils: "Bo Fu, you might as well tell me the scene of that day." ”

It has always been Sun Ce who listened to Zhou Yu play the piano, but now Zhou Yu also quietly listened to Sun Ce tell the story not long ago.

On that day, Sun Ce went to Beijing for the first time, and he knew that Luoyang was ruined and decayed under the ravages of Dong Zhuo. In the past, Luoyang was prosperous in one place, and it also made Sun Ce, who lived far away in Jiangdong, haunted his dreams. When he was young, Sun Ce and his father got together less and separated more, and when they met rarely, they asked about the grand scene of Luoyang. If Koto is a painting boat wrapped in a clear sky and mist, then Luoyang, Kyoto is a night when fire trees and silver flowers bloom. In my father's mouth, even after the panicked Yellow Turban Riot, the lights of Luoyang Street Market are still thriving, and the people living in Beijing are still acting as usual. The rich wore ayara, the poor wore sackcloth, and each lived their own lives. They laugh arbitrarily and worry when they are sad, just like the world.

However, today's Luoyang has become the remains of the capital after Dong Zhuo's large-scale burning, and it is not an exaggeration to say that it is a ruin. The walls were crumbling, the buildings were crumbling, the ragged homeless people were scattered all over the city, and the so-called houses were nothing more than mud and bricks with a little shade. The people who walked slowly through the ruins were all the color of earth, and their weak spines could not support their heads. As soon as Sun Cefu entered the city, the strong rancid stench attached to the dust and penetrated into his nose, which stimulated him so much that he couldn't help covering his mouth and nose. The entire Luoyang City is like the remnants of raw meat that has been eaten by Dong Zhuo, with severed limbs and broken bones scattered everywhere, and the people eat like beggars.

Sun Ce was originally on official business and should not stay for a long time, but he couldn't help but be delayed by such a scene.

This is the prosperous capital described by my father in my memory, but now it is such a tragic and tragic appearance.

He walked slowly along the broken path. The stone slabs on the road had long since broken into jagged pieces, and jerky earth spilled from the cracks in the stones, filling the stench of dead rats and blood and sweat. Further on, Sun Ce saw a crowd of hungry people bustling around the end of the road. He looked over and saw a simple grass hut that seemed to have been built improvise, with a man and a woman dressed neatly and neatly in it. Men sit and see people, while women stand by and give porridge to the people. Behind them was a young man who looked like a scholar, busy grabbing medicine for the sick victims. The hungry people, in rags, were so hungry that they lost the strength to scream, and they did not fight or squeeze, but stood silently and stretched out their broken bowls, and surrounded the hut with water.

Unexpectedly, in Luoyang, where everyone is in danger, there are also children of rich families with good intentions. Sun Ce sighed secretly in his heart, and walked a few steps in the direction of the grass shed.

He approached, his gaze falling on the young woman through the crowd of heads. She is slender and delicate, her demeanor is straight and upright, and a few locks of sideburns under the corners of her forehead are like spring willows blowing in the river, and she shallowly sweeps her jade-like chin. The woman combed her delicate hair in a delicate bun at the back of her head, and was casually pulled up by a delicate and low-key silver step. The cool sun shines through the pearl and green on the back of the neck, and the snow-white neck is dyed with mottled light gold. The woman lowered her eyes, and her slender wrist kept taking the empty bowl handed by the people, scooping up millet porridge with one hand and pouring it into the bowl, and then handing over a bowl full of porridge steadily. The people who received the porridge thanked her, and she smiled, but this smile was not deep or shallow, but it was quite familiar for many years.

Sun Ce was in a trance for a while, and he couldn't remember who the woman's surname was. And the man beside her who was checking the pulse and the young man who looked like a scholar were even stranger, and Sun Ce concluded that he had never seen them before.

Could it be ......

He was about to ask, but suddenly he heard a complaining mutter.

"It's obviously a family, so take some tasteless porridge to give alms, it's really stingy, but I should let these black-hearted rich people die."

It's not very loud, but it's clearly recognizable because it's so close. Even the man who had been sitting on the sidelines and carefully checking people's pulses couldn't help but raise his head when he heard this.

Sun Ce frowned, turned his head and glanced in the direction of the sound. It was a patched young man, squeezing others all the way to the front row. As he said this, the hand that was clutching the earthen bowl still stretched forward with great effort, and the old bowl had a few holes in the edge, and the sharp edge almost scratched the face of the girl who bowed her head to divide the porridge.

"Hey, you're ......"

Sun Ce was about to teach him a lesson, but he felt that the corner of his clothes was being grabbed, and when he looked back, he saw that it was the young man dressed as a scholar. The young man didn't say a word, just shook his head lightly to signal that he didn't want to interfere. Sun Ce turned his eyes again, and saw the woman who was cooking porridge with her eyebrows tightly locked, and suddenly a cold look appeared in her eyes, just like a cold glow out of the sheath. However, only after a moment, the cold and cold eyes converged a little under the drooping eyes, and a soft sigh drifted into Sun Ce's ears.

She didn't give up, but raised her hand neatly, snatched the broken bowl from the young man's hand, and then flipped her wrist, as if inadvertently, throwing the earthen bowl at the stone wall not far away. The bowl smashed against the wall with a dull thud, and in an instant it fell apart, and it was difficult to hold anything anymore.

The crowd, which had been a little noisy, suddenly fell silent. The disrespectful young man looked at the smashed earthen bowl, and still stood in place, still holding his hand to beg for food. saw the woman glance at him with a slanted glance, and suddenly grabbed his wrist and dragged him, pulling him in front of him.

"A man with hands and feet eats and waits for death all day long, and he still has the face to be so disrespectful." The corners of her lips lowered, and she looked very unhappy: "Don't eat it, my family doesn't owe you." ”

After speaking, the strength in her hand increased a little more. The man's palm turned horribly pale for a while, and he screamed in pain, but his mouth was still unforgiving: "You, you shrew—"

“…… Ha. It's just a villain, why should the eldest sister be angry with him, she dirty her hands. The scholarly boy stepped forward with a smile and took the young woman's hand from the side. When she heard this, she didn't say anything else, but only followed the young man's strength and let go of the five fingers that clenched her wrist. The young man hurriedly withdrew his hand to cover his heart, and glared at her with a pained expression.

"Why don't you get out of here? If you really want to make Miss Sima angry, your hand will be broken at this moment. The man who was sitting next to him also spoke in a deep voice. He picked up the teacup on the table, and took a sip at the sound of the porcelain lid bumping against the rim of the cup. The warm water steam caressed his eyebrows, and under the mist, the faint alienation and light crumbs became more and more clear.

When the man said this, everyone yelled and scolded the young man. Although he was unwilling, he had to hold his tail in the scolding of everyone and run away in dismay.

Sima ...... Girl? Then you are really a string sister! Sun Ce, who was watching from the sidelines, didn't know whether he was surprised or delighted for a while, and he couldn't help blurting out the words. There really is such a coincidence in the world, but it is just a coincidence that I came to Beijing, and I can really see the old people.

"Is it such a coincidence? I'm just lying to me when you're lying to me again. Zhou Yu's wine glass on his lips paused, and he raised his eyes to look at Sun Ce suspiciously.

"Don't, don't, how dare I lie to you?" Sun Ce was angry and funny, "I know you don't believe it, I even brought a token, you see-"

He took out a jade pendant from his sleeve and placed it in front of Zhou Yu. The jade pendant under the fine carving is in the shape of a blue bird, smooth and warm, and the jade surface of the snow is glowing with a slight green aura.

"This token is for you?" Zhou Yu half-jokingly picked up the jade pendant, and slowly rubbed his fingers between the wings of the blue bird.

"It's really for me. She only has you in her heart, how can she still have me, a senior brother. Sun Ce shrugged angrily.

At that time, Sima Xian reunited with him, but at first glance he didn't recognize Sun Celai. He has grown from a young man to a brave general, not only has his voice become thick and magnetic, but his physique is much stronger than before, as if he is a man in charge of himself. It wasn't until Sun Ce looked at her stunned in place and couldn't help but smile heartily at the corners of his mouth that Sima Xian overlapped the man in front of him with the shadow of the young man in a trance.

"Senior brother, it's you." She sighed, and for some reason a thick mist covered her eyes.

They walked side by side. Along the way, they talked about the river flowers when they were young, the twilight of the distant mountains, the hunting and swords, and the ethereal piano and flute, and the tone was all the beauty left behind them.

Sun Ce has changed a lot, but his appearance is still so beautiful, and he still loves to talk and smile as before. As the twilight fell, the sunset gilded his wheat-colored skin with a pale red gold, and the corners of his backlit lips looked particularly blurry when he spoke.

"After a long time, your girl's temperament is much calmer, and she has learned to give when she goes home." Sun Ce said casually and joked, "Why didn't I see that you had such kindness back then, and you would help the poor." ”

"Hey, my brother used to make fun of me. However, if it weren't for my father's efforts to save me, even if I didn't die in the catastrophe back then, I would have been destined to become a homeless. Sima Xian turned his head and glanced at the two brothers who were collecting the stall: "Now in Luoyang, the Sima family may not be very rich." It's just that when my eldest brother and I saw those hungry people who were as poor as beggars, we remembered my origins and naturally wanted to help them. ”

"It's a good thing, but I see that kid just now didn't have a clean mouth, and you let him go like this? I wanted to teach him a few words, but I was dragged by your brother, and I was really ......angry when I mentioned it" Sun Ce recalled the young man just now, and still felt angry, and even clenched his fists unconsciously. Seeing him like this, Sima Xian only lowered his head and shook his head frequently, and sighed softly: "Senior brother, after so many years, how can you still be like this." ”

Seeing that Sun Ce was puzzled, she explained helplessly: "He's just jealous, what can he earn besides being quick to speak?" Since the man didn't know what to do, I naturally didn't have to be polite to him, so I simply threw his bowl. I have no official title or title, so what does it matter if I speak and act willfully. But if the famous Sun Bofu argues and entangles with the homeless people on the street, I am afraid that he will lose his identity if it spreads. If you want to set up a big business, how can you worry about small things? Not to mention that this matter has nothing to do with you, even if it is you who have this experience today, you must not be reckless......"

"Okay, okay, don't talk about it, I know." Sun Ce had a headache when he heard this, and he hurriedly interrupted without thinking about it: "When did you know how to preach like this?" I haven't seen her for a few years, but this girl of yours is becoming more and more similar to Gongjin. ”

As soon as he said this, he regretted it. The light in Sima Xian's eyes flickered a few times, but finally it was extinguished as the sun fell. The broken sentence froze in her throat, and she pursed her lips a little crampedly, swallowing the rest of the words into her stomach.

"Hey, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to...... I mean, you—aren't you married? ”

She shook her head.

"Gong Jin is the sweetheart of my life. He doesn't have to wait for me, but I can't forget him. ”

"That'...... Is there anything you would like to say to him? I may have to go to Lujiang, and if I meet Gongjin, maybe ......"

Sima Xian lowered his head and took out a delicate jade pendant from his arms and stuffed it into Sun Ce's hand. The glossy white jade is still carrying her body temperature, and a light and delicate fragrance of orchids.

"What should have been said has been said a long time ago, and there is nothing else to say." She smiled and closed Sun Ce's fingers holding the jade pendant, and her eyes were shining: "This thing was carved by myself a few days ago. The craftsmanship is naturally not good, but it is thinking about the pattern carved by Gong Jin...... I didn't think I would have a chance to give it to him again, but luckily you came. ”

The bluebird was carved so delicately and beautifully, I don't know how many days and nights it took her to carve out the jade. When Sima Xian was carving, his rusty fingers stroked and explored it countless times. The hands that had drawn the bow and stroked the piano had now dripped blood for a piece of cold jade. On every night when the candle is long, the buds that bloom reflect the dim candle flame, and layers of flowers bloom at her fingertips.

These things that she had never mentioned to others, Sun Ce naturally did not understand. But the moment Zhou Yu touched the jade, he felt a warm heart's work.

The blue bird, in ancient mythology, was a messenger who carried a message to the Queen Mother of the West. He rubbed the wings of the blue bird, as if clasped with the hands she had carved all night.

Then he was silent and didn't say a word, and put the jade pendant around his waist.