The patriarch of Li Jiashan has to tell them about the blood feud of the Li Jiashan people.

Lijiashan is under the jurisdiction of Sichuan Province, at the junction of Sichuan, Shaanxi and Gansu provinces, facing Sichuan in the south, Gansu in the west, Shaanxi in the north, and the mountains leading to the east of Sichuan in the east, the whole terrain is shaped like a funnel pot, and the path facing Sichuan is just like a spout. As long as the spout leads to the three passes of Lijiashan and any one of them is jammed, Lijiashan is cut off from the direction of Sichuan. The special geographical location of Lijiashan makes it easier for people in Lijiashan to enter Sichuan from the Nanshan Pass, but it is not as convenient as from the Beishan Pass to Shaanxi and Gansu, where the terrain is not only gentle, but the roads also extend in all directions.

When they were children, Li Degui and their brothers and sisters didn't understand why their home was in this inaccessible deep mountain canyon. It wasn't until they were nine years old, that their parents, according to the rules of the mountain, brought a group of children of their size to the ancestral hall, and listened to the old patriarch with a goatee tell them a magical story, that they began to understand why they lived in the depths of the mountain.

In March of the early year of Jiajing in the Qing Dynasty, a man named Wang Cong'er in Xiangyang, Hubei Province, held high the banner of righteousness of the "White Lotus Sect" in Jiahe Prefecture against the Manchus. He had two generals under him, one surnamed Li and the other surnamed Ma. It is said that the general surnamed Li is a descendant of Li Shimin in the Tang Dynasty, not only looks talented, but also has good martial arts. The general surnamed Ma also has an extraordinary background, his ancestor is a "Huihui" from the Western Regions, with an eagle hooked nose and a pair of harrier eyes, and from a distance, he looks like a foreigner in the church. Because of their outstanding military achievements, Wang Cong'er loved them very much, and named the general surnamed Li as the "loyal" general, and the general surnamed Ma as the "brave" general. In order to be grateful, the two took the word "loyalty" that Wang Cong'er gave them as their own name, and since then, one has changed his name to Li Zhong and the other to Ma Yong. Wang Cong'er saw that the two of them were loyal and brave, and promised his two twin daughters to these two generals respectively. Later, Luo Qichang, the leader of the rebel army in northeast Sichuan, returned to the "White Lotus Sect" and held high the banner of anti-Qing Dynasty, and Wang Cong'er sent them to support Luo Qichang.

At that time, in order to extinguish the uprising of the "White Lotus Sect", the Qing Dynasty mobilized millions of Qing soldiers across the country, and ordered the governor of Sichuan, Dai Yingshan, to take command to encircle and suppress Luo Qichang. In the face of the enemy's powerful attack, Luo Qichang led the "White Lotus Sect" rebels to resist bravely. They passed from Dazhou through the Tongjiang River to Bazhou, but finally because they were outnumbered, the rebel army was scattered, and Luo Qichang was unfortunately seriously wounded. Seeing that the general trend of the righteous army had gone, Luo Qichang, in order to preserve his strength, decided to take the two generals Li Zhong and Ma Yong to lead the rest of the army, and escorted the priceless gold, silver and jewelry stored by the righteous army for many years to Wang Cong'er in Jiahe Prefecture, Hubei. They retreated from Bazhou to Baoning, intending to reach Hubei via Nanchong, through Yuzhou, and from Wanzhou. However, the Qing army blocked all the waterways and dry roads leading to the north of the lake with a strong force. Luo Qichang had no choice but to take Li Zhong, Ma Yong and the rest of the troops north along the Wulong River.

When they retreated to the mouth of the two rivers where the Wulong River and the Jinxi River meet, Luo Qichang's injuries became more and more serious, and seeing that the government was encircled and suppressed very fiercely, Luo Qichang decided to bury the gold, silver and jewelry brought by the rebels on the spot. Luo Qichang surveyed the terrain while he was sick, and quietly took a few cronies and entourage to bury the gold, silver and jewelry he brought in two unknown places.

In order to prevent the leakage of secrets and the smuggling of the treasures by those who knew the location of the treasures in the future, Luo Qichang drew the terrain of the two treasures on two sheepskins respectively, cut the two sheepskins into two, and buried two halves of them in the two treasures respectively, and then reluctantly killed several cronies and followers of the treasure.

After Luo Qichang did all this, he handed over the remaining two and a half treasure maps to Li Zhong and Ma Yong, and instructed them: "If you retreat to Hubei, give the treasure map to Wang Cong'er, if the rebel army is defeated, you will destroy the treasure map, and you are not allowed to swallow it privately and sell it to the government." ”

Li Zhong and Ma Yong took the treasure map and swore to Luo Qichang: "Remember the entrustment of the leader and never betray the secret!" ”

Luo Qichang gave up his last wish, looked at them with satisfaction, and passed away with a smile. Li Zhong and Ma Yong buried Luo Qichang in tears, and with the righteous army, they went upriver along the Jinxi River and retreated to Jinxiba. They saw that this place is surrounded by mountains, the dam is wide, the only Jinxi River leads to the outside, and it is in a canyon more than 30 miles long, and there are layers of passes and natural dangers that can be used as barriers, which is an ideal place to preserve the strength of the East Mountain and make a comeback. They decided to stay here temporarily, collect grain and grass, raise soldiers, and set up the battlefield to fight to the death with the officers and soldiers.

There was a gentleman in Jinxiba, named Xie Ze, who was a scholar, and this man seemed to be well-informed, and he was deeply sympathetic to the actions of the rebels. He often went to the camp of the rebels to visit Li Zhong and Ma Yong, and invited them to Xie Mansion from time to time to discuss the current situation. The three of them went back and forth and gradually became friends, and Xie Ze heard that the rebels had brought a large amount of gold, silver and jewelry, so he became ill-willed. He first lured Ma Yong into the water with a woman, and then secretly colluded with the government to coerce Ma Yong to mutiny. Li Zhongshi was alone and outnumbered, so he had to flee to the mountains north of Jinxiba with more than a dozen of his cronies and more than 50 soldiers.

After Xie Ze instigated Ma Yong to drive Li Zhong away, the imperial court promoted Xie Ze to be a county magistrate and pardoned Ma Yong's capital crime. As soon as Xie Ze was in power, he turned his face and denied people, and began to ask Ma Yong for the treasures of the rebels. Although Ma Yong was afraid of power and greedy for women, he preferred Luo Qichang's gold and silver treasures buried at the mouth of the two rivers. He knew that he couldn't fight Xie Ze, so he lied to Xie Ze that the secret of the hidden treasure was taken away by Li Zhong, and pleaded with Xie Ze again, saying that he was from the Pingba area and was not used to living in the mountains, and begged Xie Ze to let him settle down at the mouth of the two rivers. Xie Ze saw that he couldn't squeeze oil and water out of Ma Yong's body, and he didn't want to raise Ma Yong for a lifetime, plus the mountains were safer than Pingba, and the generally powerful local tyrants and inferior gentry liked to settle their nests in the mountains, Xie Ze couldn't wait to send Ma Yong's family to Pingba to live, so he agreed to his request.

A few years later, when the news of the failure of the "White Lotus Sect" uprising came, Li Zhong, who had fled to the mountains, learned that the leader Wang Cong'er had been killed, and he was so angry that he could not afford to fall ill. Before he died, he first called his eldest son Li Yingwu to his side, handed him half of the sheepskin of the hidden treasure, and after some advice, he summoned other children and subordinates to him and admonished them: "You are not allowed to serve the Qing court for the rest of your life, you are not allowed to associate with traitors surnamed Xie, and you are not allowed to climb relatives with traitors surnamed Ma." ”

From then on, the descendants of Li Yingwu and Li Zhong's subordinates kept in mind Li Zhong's teachings, and they took the mountain as the boundary, and never had any relationship or contact with the Xie family in Jinxiba and the Ma family at the mouth of the two rivers at the foot of the mountain.

Li Degui thought about the past and the precepts of his ancestors that he had remembered in his heart since he was a child, and his heart was stunned for a while.