"And you have made two tomb beasts in a row in just seven or eight years, cutting and installing spirit stones twice."

Qin Beiyang stared at his father, and he couldn't feel it getting along day and night, but thinking back to the scene when the father and son reunited for the first time eight years ago, how old is Qin Customs now eight years old? His hair was all white, his forehead was full of wrinkles, his originally straight body had become hunchbacked, his eyes were sunken and unfocused, and he was out of breath when he spoke.

"Yes, maybe one night, I'll leave you suddenly. You have to bury me in the ancestral graveyard outside the Dongzhi Gate. ”

"Daddy, I remember that on the Qingming Festival two years ago, we went to the grave together."

"In the ancestral grave, only the ancestors of our Qin family dating back to the Yongle period of the Ming Dynasty are buried, when Zhu Di, the ancestor of the Ming Dynasty, had just set the capital in Beijing. Further up, our ancestral tombs are all over Xi'an, Luoyang, Nanjing, Kaifeng, Chengdu, Hangzhou and other former imperial capitals. The earliest was the Yin Shang era in Anyang, Henan. ”

Qin Beiyang remembered Sima Qian's "Historical Records": "That's more than 3,000 years? ”

"At the end of the Shang Dynasty, there was a tribe called Guirong, who migrated to the Central Plains in a carriage from the far Western Regions, and was defeated by the Zhou Hou Jili in Xiluo - this Jili is the father of King Wen of Zhou. The defeated Guirong became a prisoner of war and a slave of the Shang, and there was a craftsman who was originally good at tombs and was responsible for casting bronzes for the Shang kings. Wu Yi, the king of Shang, did not respect ghosts and gods, and once filled a leather bag with blood, and hung it high to shoot it, called 'shooting the sky', thus angering the emperor of heaven. Wu Yi was killed by lightning while hunting in the Wei River. Wu Yi's son Wen Ding believed that the sorcerer killed his father, and let the sorcerer be buried together with the ghost captive. The craftsman of the ghost proposed to make a tomb beast to replace his own people, and demonstrated that the tomb beast could devour the tiger of the West Mountain, the wolf of the Northern Plains, the bear of the East Ze, and the dragon of the South China Sea...... The Shang king agreed to his generation of tomb beasts and ordered him to marry the daughter of a sorcerer. Although human martyrdom has not been abolished, the tomb beast has been passed down. ”

When Qin Customs said this, he couldn't help but rest for most of the day.

"Daddy, in this way, the ancestor of our Tomb Beast family is the descendant of the Western Regions Ghost Rong and the Central Plains Witch?"

"Well, but this skill belongs to the secret art, passed on to men and not to women, we call ourselves the gravesmith clan."

"Gravesmiths?"

"Grave as a craftsman." Lao Qin said as he drew these four words on the wall with his fingers, "The Tomb Divine Beast is just part of the work of our Tombsmith Clan. ”

"The lost-wax process we use to make bronzes has also been handed down back then, right? However, the Shang Dynasty should be dying. ”

"Well, the descendants of Ji Li, who defeated the ghosts, started an army from Xiqi to establish the Zhou Dynasty. Zhou Tianzi divided the world, no matter the surname of Ji or the country of foreign countries, every prince had the need for tomb beasts. The descendants of the tombsmith clan spread out with the vassal states to all parts of China. In the Spring and Autumn Period, the Lile expedition came out of the princes, and later the Lile expedition came out from the doctor, and the princes and generals all had tomb beasts. Beiyang, you must keep in mind that we are not only craftsmen, but also the descendants of the Spring and Autumn Scholars, we must be careful to serve the spirit of the scholars, Mencius said: the rich and noble can not be lewd, the poor and the lowly can not be moved, and the mighty can not be bent. ”

"The spirit of the scholar?" Qin Beiyang looked at his hands, as if Jing Ke was holding a short sword, "Death for a confidant!" The child understands. ”

"But the feudal system of the Western Zhou Dynasty became a county in the era of Qin Shi Huang."

It was Qi Yuanshan who spoke, and he wanted to show that he had also read books.

"Yuanshan, I'm talking to Beiyang, don't interject." Qin Customs gave a warning, grabbed his son's hand and said, "According to the old rules, I can't talk about these family memories of the past three thousand years in front of outsiders. But I'm afraid I won't even survive tonight. Beiyang, in the era of Qin Shi Huang, the tomb beast appeared at the highest level, that is, the 'emperor'. Our ancestors were conscripted to the Qinling Tomb to build the Tomb Beast, which was a magnificent project, and is still buried deep in the ground of Guanzhong. Because of the meritorious work in building the tomb, Qin Shi Huang gave the surname Qin to the tombsmith family, and the hereditary will be Shaofu. ”

"Daddy, I will obey your orders and never dishonor the dignity of the Qin clan."

"Qin II died, Chu and Han fought for hegemony, Liu Bang pacified the world, and the tombsmith family repaired the emperor's mausoleum for the Han Dynasty, a hereditary master. Liu Bang was originally from Chu, and the tomb beast of Chu was the most exquisite, so the tomb beast of the Han Dynasty reached the point of reaching its peak. The Changling Tomb of Gaozu of the Han Dynasty, the Baling Tomb of Emperor Wen of the Han Dynasty, the Yangling Tomb of Emperor Jing of the Han Dynasty, and the Maoling Tomb of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty all have the credit of our Qin family. As for the vassal kings, princes, and even the big families all over the country, they have also asked us to build tomb beasts. The Western Han Dynasty died, the Eastern Han Dynasty flourished, and then the Three Kingdoms. ”

Qin Beiyang still remembers the conversation in the underground palace back then: "Cao Cao sent troops to rob tombs, making it a difficult problem for future generations to prevent tomb robberies." ”

"Yes, the role of the tomb beast is getting bigger and bigger, after two Jin Dynasty, five chaos in China, chaos in the north and south dynasties, and the world was finally unified by the Sui and Tang dynasties. In the Southern Dynasty, we were called the master craftsmen, the Northern Dynasty was the master craftsman of the temple, and the Sheng Tang Dynasty was the hereditary master of the prison. But in the vast expanse, the gravesmith clan was still particularly tight, and from time to time people were executed for failing to complete the construction period. ”

"Just like the Empress Dowager Cixi? No, more than that. ”

"In Wu Zetian's time, there was the biggest crisis in the history of the Tomb Maker Clan - the female emperor hoped that the Tomb Beast would help her sit in the world forever, but this violated our principle - the Tomb Beast could only protect the dead, and could never be used by the living. Wu Zetian was furious, and wanted to exterminate our clan, and then ask the evil sect to protect the tomb. At this time, there was a little prince, who was also the grandson of Wu Zetian and Gaozong Li Zhi, the sixth son of Ruizong Li Dan, and the king of Zhongnan County, Li Longqi. ”

"Li Longqi?"

Qin Customs nodded slightly, and coughed a few times in pain: "Listen to me, Li Longqi is a god-like existence to our tombsmith clan...... But his secrets, it's better that you never know! ”

"It's a long story."

"Five generations and ten kingdoms, the gravesmith clan fell apart. In the two Song dynasties, the Qin family made tomb beasts for the Song, Liao, Western Xia, Dali, Jin and other dynasties at the same time, until Kublai Khan the Great unified the world. At that time, the Mongolian burial customs were unique, and after death, they were placed on the steppe, and thousands of horses galloped by. There is only the emperor of the Yuan Dynasty, and there is no need to worry about robbing the tomb after his death, because there is no tomb to rob. During that time, it was the low tide of our tombsmith clan, and we were forced to mix with the people to make a living. ”

"When Zhu Yuanzhang established the Ming Dynasty, he invited our family to re-emerge."

"Yes, we are royal craftsmen again. Nanjing Ming Filial Piety Mausoleum, Hubei Ming Mausoleum, and Beijing Changping Ming Tombs, all the tomb beasts are made by our family. Jiashen was shocked, the Ming Dynasty died and the Qing Dynasty was prosperous, and the masters in the Forbidden City were replaced like a marquee. The tombsmith clan could not be loyal to Emperor Chongzhen like the eunuch Wang Chengen, and could only be forced to shave their heads to show their allegiance to the new master. ”

"Damn braids!"

Qin Beiyang subconsciously scratched the back of his head, but fortunately, he had already cut it clean.

"In the early years of the Qing Dynasty, it was another catastrophe. The regent Dolgon ordered the extermination of the tombsmith clan in the whole country, keeping only one large clan, and placing him under house arrest in the craftsman village in Beijing, serving the Qing Dynasty royal family. Dolgon believes that the important weapon of the tomb beast must be controlled by the emperor, and if this technology is lost to the people, there may be a new Li Zicheng. Therefore, the tomb beasts of the Qing Dynasty were the most rare and precious, and even the eight iron hat princes who were hereditary were not eligible to enjoy the tomb beasts after death. ”

Hearing this, Qin Beiyang thought of Yuan Shikai's Golden Toad Town Tomb Beast: "The Town Tomb Beast of the Republic of China, isn't this the only case?" ”

"Perhaps!" Qin Customs covered his heart and said, "Beiyang, of all the tomb beasts in the world, the most peculiar and spiritual is the tomb beast of Li Longqi, the little prince of the Tang Dynasty. ”

"Or Li Longqi? , as you said - in the year of Gengzi, I was born in Bailuyuan, in the underground palace of Li Longqi, the king of Zhongnan County. ”

"Your mother is still buried in that Tang Dynasty tomb." A tear slipped from the corner of Lao Qin's eyes, "It's a pity that before I die, I can't go back to Bailuyuan to see ......."