One day, Qi Yuanshan walked up to the second floor and bumped into Ouyang's father and daughter pondering the new Ming Dynasty carved lacquer screen with Qin Beiyang. In contrast, Qin Beiyang has a big man, but he is a half-grown child.

Qi Yuanshan reported to the boss: "Mr. Ouyang, Miss Anna, there is a French devil downstairs, who calls himself Mr. Pierre Gauguin, and asks to see him. ”

Ouyang Sicong nodded and said, "This guy, I know, please ask him to come up." ”

Before Qin Beiyang could retire, the Frenchman came upstairs, looking in his forties, with a neatly trimmed goatee and a pair of gold-rimmed glasses.

The French can speak simple Chinese, and after a few pleasantries, Ouyang Anna emerged fluent in French. From the age of twelve, she attended a French church school, where she was taught entirely in French. Gauguin ejaculated a cloud of French like a cough and spit, and Qin Beiyang almost took a mop to wipe the floor.

"Mr. Gauguin heard that we have a treasure from the Tang Dynasty hidden in our house. If so, can you see it? As soon as Anna finished translating, she bit Ouyang Sicong's ear and said, "Dad, how did he know?" ”

Ouyang Sicong didn't ask much, Gauguin was the richest antique dealer among the foreign expatriates in Shanghai, and there were no secrets he didn't know.

As a result, the doors of the private museum opened, and countless antiquities were presented to the eyes of the French.

Gauguin skipped the other treasures and went straight to the deepest glass case. His legs were trembling, his knees were weak and he almost fell to his knees, but Qi Yuanshan still supported him.

Facing the newly modified young Qilin Town Tomb Beast, Gauguin took off his glasses and looked closely, as if he could see some kind of thousand-year-old immortal doorway from every piece of scale armor and every mane.

Qi Yuanshan was also the first time to witness the town tomb beast. He knew about the existence of the tomb beast, but in Taihang Mountain, he could never see Yuan Shikai's true face of the golden toad. He took half a step back and turned his head to look at Qin Beiyang, who was expressionless.

Gao lowered his head for a moment, his right hand was stuffed in his pocket, as if he was counting with his fingers, and stared at the pair of snow-white antlers of the small town tomb beast, and said in broken Chinese: "I quote - three thousand pieces of silver yuan!" ”

The atmosphere was slightly stiff and silent. That's enough to buy a Shikumen building in Shanghai. Thinking that at the beginning, Ouyang Sicong spent 1,000 silver yuan to buy it, and he felt extremely painful, and it tripled in just two months. At that time, the bronze market had not yet been formed, and even if it was Shang and Zhou bronzes, the market price was only a few hundred silver yuan.

"Ask Monsieur Gauguin, why do you like this treasure alone?" Ouyang Sicong asked his daughter to translate.

“C'est la vie.”

Gauguin said a French mantra and said a string of French to Ouyang Anna.

"Monsieur Gauguin said that there is absolutely no second person in this world who will make another offer of three thousand silver dollars. He is a shrewd businessman who will always undercut the price to make the other party unprofitable, but this time the bid almost bankrupts him, and he has to mortgage many treasured antiques. However, this is God's fate, and it cannot be explained by reason and science. ”

Ouyang Sicong replied: "Thank you, Mr. Gauguin, but I don't want to sell this treasure now." If there are other antiques in this room that he likes, please feel free to quote. ”

After the translation, Gauguin shook his head and said in Chinese: "Very sorry! But I'll come again, Au Revoir."

However, the hosts still treated the Frenchman as a distinguished guest and sent him out en masse.

Qin Beiyang didn't forget the German he learned before he was nine years old, and secretly scolded: "Arschloch! ”

Gauguin's ears were pointed: "Someone seems to be speaking German?" Damn the Germans! May God bless France for victory! ”

Anna was puzzled, and when she looked into the door again, she saw Qin Beiyang with a serious face.

A week later, coinciding with the full moon of the fifteenth day of the seventh lunar month, and the half of July, the Buddhist Obon Festival is also a "ghost festival" for Chinese to worship their ancestors and go to the grave.

Qin Beiyang got a lot of old books and magazines, which were left over from Anna's usual reading. He moved the books up to the three-story attic, mostly Mandarin Duck and Butterfly novels, "Saturday" edited by Zhou Shoujuan, and there was a notorious advertising slogan: "I would rather not marry a little wife than read "Saturday".

After turning a few pages, he found the Chinese translation of Verne's "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea", lit a candle, lay on the bed, and followed the Nautilus around the four oceans with relish. Compared with the spacious and bright room, he prefers the dark and cramped attic environment, as if returning to the underground palace, next to the golden well and the emperor's coffin......

He dreamed of a teenager.

The skin is like white paper soaked in water, translucently radiating dark light. With his eyes closed, the corners of his mouth were slightly upturned, as if he was asleep but not asleep, as if he was smiling but not smiling, as if he was thinking deeply for a long time. The long, dense hair is concentrated on the top of the head, turning into a cupola bun, wrapped in golden silk cloth.

The young man opened his eyes, revealing a pair of clear eyes, black eyeballs and pupils, staring directly at Qin Beiyang's eyes.

"Persuade you to be kind to the nine colors."

A young boy has a delicate voice. Strange dialect, I don't know if it's Guangdong or Fujian? It is not Beijing, Tianjin, or Shandong. The boy didn't open his mouth at all, and a pair of bright lips were tightly closed—could it be the "ventriloquist" technique? No, this sound did not pass through the ears, it directly penetrated the scalp and entered Qin Beiyang's brain.

"Who are you?"

Qin Beiyang shouted loudly and woke up from a dream.

Another burst of heat hit his face, accompanied by a certain rustling sound. When I opened my eyelids, the moonlight shone in through the narrow panes, illuminating the green gaze.

Qin Beiyang opened his eyes.

The first reaction was to return to the valley of Taihang Mountain, surrounded by wild wolves, and these unfriendly animals were going to bite his throat for revenge.

It jumped on the bed, its mouth arching over his neck. Half-asleep and half-awake, Qin Beiyang was powerless to resist. Fortunately, the throat was not bitten off, and this monster is not here to take his own life, it seems that he is here to play with him?

Where did the big dog come from?

The coat color is red and white, except for the dark snout. A Tibetan mastiff that resembles a big lion's head, especially with its fiery red mane. It is also like a strong Chinese Chow Chow. Its movements were flexible, and its eyes glowed with a glass-colored gaze, just like Ouyang Anna's eyes.

The eyes of these beasts looked at Qin Beiyang silently, looking at his eyes, the bridge of his nose, the corners of his mouth and his chin, listening to his gasping when he was tired, and smelling his body odor when he was sweating like rain.

Its owner, if not unfortunate enough to die, but to grow up to seventeen years old, must be the same, the same physique, the same eyes, the same breath, and even the same voice. When he repaired the nine-colored shell, it seemed that there was a kind of power from the depths of the underground palace, which came from under the golden well, and it was transmitted to the body of the young beast through the palms of the young man, so that the heart of the tomb beast was back to beating. It is like covering the naked people in the ice and snow with quilts, and drinking a whole skin and sweet spring for the people who are dying of thirst in the Gobi Desert.

Its steps are light, because the soles of its feet grow fleshy pads, like wearing a thick layer of socks. Its five senses of sight, smell, hearing, taste, and touch have all been restored. The sixth sense, like the rapid growth and spread of roots after rain.

A full moon in the midyear festival, through the high and narrow windows, pierced the top of the nine colors' heads. Qin Beiyang buried his hand in the mane on the neck of the "big dog", and faintly felt a pair of folded and shrunken antlers.

Qin Beiyang brought this small town tomb beast back to life!

"Jun, it's the nine colors?"

Listening to his question, Jiu Se bowed his head silently, but he had to inch in and press Qin Beiyang under him.

It saw that on the boy's chest, there was a blood warm jade from Kunlun Mountain, like a fake bag - seventeen years ago, the meeting gift given to him by Jiushi in the depths of the underground palace was like a small golden lock and a small golden foot girl given by the Chinese to newborns.

Qin Beiyang exposed the smooth back of his neck, and the moonlight illuminated a pair of red antler-shaped birthmarks, along the back of the ears on both sides, and the flames soared into the sky.

I haven't seen him for seventeen years, this little baby who was born in the autumn wind Bailuyuan, on the coffin of the little prince of the Tang Dynasty, and almost died prematurely, has grown into a young man.

Suddenly, Jiu Se opened his mouth and spit out a cold jade ring.

Qin Beiyang took it in his hand and looked at it carefully by the moonlight. The hole in the ring was a little small, and he put it on his left little finger, and it was really tightly fitted, as if it was tailor-made. Looking at this jade ring again, it seems to be a pair of warm blood jade on his chest. It must be the tomb beast of the young Qilin Town brought out from the underground palace of the Tang Dynasty, and it was commonly used by the tomb owner during his lifetime. From the day the Bailuyuan Tomb was excavated, the jade ring had been hidden in the mouth of the Nine Colors for more than two months.

It's just that the owner of the tomb is gone......