The history of Jiangbei City can be traced back to the Neolithic Age, 20,000 to 30,000 years ago, and the people of Xianba lived and multiplied on the north bank of Jiangbei. In the 11th century B.C., it was the territory of Pakistan. After Qin destroyed the country of Ba, "Yicheng Jiangzhou" built Jiangzhou Mansion, which was the beginning of the construction of Chongqing, and the original Jiangzhou City was located near Jiangbei City, with an area of about one square kilometer. According to the record of "Huayang Guozhi 61 Ba Zhi": in the 23rd year of the Eastern Han Dynasty, Jiangbei City was the station of Jiangzhou County under the jurisdiction of Ba County at that time, and Beifu City was built. It was once the seat of Ba County. In 1913, Jiangbei Town was established in Fuba County, Chongqing, in the Ming Dynasty, and officially renamed Jiangbei City. In the nineteenth year of Qianlong of the Qing Dynasty, that is, in 1754 AD, Jiangbei Town was directly under the jurisdiction of Chongqing Prefecture, and Chongqing Prefecture moved to Yiyang Guanxia, Jiangbei City, and Jiangbei Hall was built from then on. It is the residence of Jiangbei Office. During the period of the Republic of China, Jiangbei Hall was changed to Jiangbei County, following the old system of the late Qing Dynasty, Jiangbei City has: Shangshiliang, Baogai, Yiyang, Jinsha four compartments, in 1921 was included in the scope of Chongqing Municipality.

Along the way, I was telling Hu Zongren about the history of this area, and since I was a local, I always looked a little frowning when I introduced Hu Zongren. I am a person with a very strong nostalgia, no matter how the world outside is full of flowers, I still love this land when I need to be accompanied and feel lonely, which is why I did not choose to stay with my master or establish a reputation in Yunnan, but chose to return to this homeland. Someone once made a statistic, doesn't it say that the stage is as big as the heart? But even if many people live for a long time, his stage is still a small place where he was born and raised, even if it is barren, even if it is backward, there is only one word that can be summed up, that is, home. No matter how far you go, the meaning of travel is also to make people understand that home is so warm.

Due to road restrictions, if I wanted to take a detour to Jiangbei City, I had to walk along the river to the bottom of the Huanghuayuan Bridge, and then in the direction of Central Park. The long road behind is not easy for vehicles to enter, according to the address Hu Zongren obtained. It's not that I can't enter, but because I really don't want to meet other cars on the road, so I get stuck in traffic for a long time. So we decided to park the car near the current Jiangbei City Science and Technology Museum, and then follow the newly built antique city wall, go around to the area of the old city, walk for about half an hour, and we can find the only remaining old city of Jiangbei City that has not been developed and occupied.

In fact, Hu Zongren and I did not expect this in advance. For many people who don't have our memories of the post-80s or even post-70s, Jiangbei City's impression of them is nothing more than the huge Central Park, with grass, osmanthus trees, countless dog shit in the grass, and a church on the side, but they have never seen it open the door. As a result, since the construction of this place, it has become a place for countless elegant men and women to take wedding photos and art photos. There is a science and technology museum next to it, which from time to time exhibits some exhibitions that I can't understand with my cultural level, and a big theater that makes people feel a little unreasonable, and there have been countless theater troupes to this day, but I have never seen any of them. In general, Jiangbei City has changed its taste, at least in the eyes of most modern people. So after Hu Zongren and I parked, we didn't walk towards the crowd at all, it was full of people who came here to play on the weekend, I really don't understand what these people think, they work and study in the crowd on weekdays, and on the weekend, they drill into the crowd.

Walking along the path of the river along the antique city wall, in front of me is the confluence of the Yangtze River and the Jialing River, two completely different colors of water mixed together, like a huge Taiji, churning on this wide and huge river, as if no one can obey anyone, no one can conquer anyone. I think this is also one of the reasons why Chongqing has become the metaphysical city of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, even in such a natural law that has no rules to follow, it can still be understood by many masters of various factions.

The road was very narrow, and there were many places where the stone slabs that had been used to pave the road had broken, making it difficult to walk. After walking along the road for a short time, you will be able to reach the river. As you walk down a path that leads up the slope, you will soon see a gate with a stone monument erected on it. Unlike the previous antique gates, the stone gates here are covered with moss, and the walls are full of small holes used to tie ropes, and some knife marks left by ancient wars. In addition to the sound of the surging river behind my ears, the hustle and bustle in the area of the Science and Technology Museum has long been gone, and Hu Zongren and I finally don't need to deliberately raise the decibels, we can hear it softly.

After entering the city gate, there is a stone staircase that winds upward, which is very similar to the shape of the eighteen stairs old road, and it is also the most significant style of the town in eastern Sichuan. I've never been here, and when Jiangbei City was still around, we used to go to the most lively places, and at that time, there were occasional Sichuan opera performances on the stage. This should be regarded as the edge of Jiangbei City near the east side, because there is a city gate and city wall, that is the city root area. The address in Hu Zongren's hand only wrote a house number, and he didn't even write the surname of the person we were looking for this time, and the phone number. On the way, we met some middle-aged people wearing colorful jackets and carrying cameras, who were probably tired of the hustle and bustle and came to find a quiet place in the middle of the city. I once heard of a way to distinguish the city by musical instruments, such as Chengdu, which may be expressed by musical instruments as a kind of flowing water and birdsong in the depths of the bamboo forest, but there is a melodious guqin feeling, leisurely. And in Beijing, it may be the kind of traditional Beijing that blows and blows accompanied by the sound of sugar gourds. In Guangzhou, it may be a southern picture of beating gongs and drums, dragon and lion dances, while in Chongqing, it is the feeling of having a loud flute and accompanied by the horn of the Sichuan River. And at this moment, there is nothing in the root of Jiangbei City, it is a black and white painting, and the person in the painting moves slightly, and you still can't notice it.

Situ reminded us on the phone earlier to pay attention to someone following, and this case was originally given by the other party, so the other party must know where this place is. When I pretended to be looking for a place to buy cigarettes nearby, I looked around, there were many houses and few people, so this small number of people only needed a glance to get a full view. And at this moment, except for the old people who sit in front of their own rooms and smoke dry cigarettes with their legs crossed, it is the photography enthusiasts who come here like me, the only very lively place on the street is a small restaurant that eats bean curd rice, and there is a teahouse on the side, and the teahouse is full of old men and aunts playing mahjong. Perhaps the word teahouse has a different meaning in Chongqing, usually in other places it refers to a place to drink tea and chat, and in our case, it has been a place to play cards since ancient times.

After seeing that the time was also up for dinner, I suggested to Hu Zongren that we should eat something and go again, there is bean curd rice here. Hu Zongren likes to eat bean curd rice, and almost all the delicious bean curd rice he can find in Chongqing is what I took him to eat, so he readily agreed, and boldly and generously proposed that he would treat this meal, as if it would cost a huge amount of money to eat bean curd rice. After sitting down, in the loud noise of the store, I drank the spice after the green pepper was greasy with sesame oil, drank the water, and shaved the steamed rice, in fact, there was only one bean curd as a dish, but it was delicious.

After eating, I looked at the time, and at about this time, everyone else was still preparing lunch, and no one was sleeping. So according to the house number, in a smaller road on the side of this path, after many twists and turns, I finally found this house number. But the door was closed, and even the curtains in the room were closed, so I didn't know if there was no one.

Hu Zongren asked me, why don't we knock on the door? I looked around, and there was almost no one else except me and Hu Zongren, and the people I was talking about were people who didn't live here. Of course, diagonally across from the family, there was an older sister who was looking at us with curiosity, and then washing clothes in the laundry sink. This is the case for almost every household here, and the entrance is either an outdoor stove or a sink for laundry. I took a look at the one we were looking for, and to my surprise, the slope in their laundry sink turned out to be a stone tablet engraved with words, but I was quickly relieved, because judging from the distribution of those words, it was not someone else's tombstone, otherwise, I don't think it would be surprising that the family hit the ghost.

So I started knocking on the door, and after knocking a few times, through the framed window of the door, I saw the lights on in the house. The houses here are relatively low and very densely built, so the lighting is not very good, and if you don't open the doors and windows, you definitely need to turn on the lights in the house. After the lights came on, I heard a woman's voice asking, "Who is it?" I didn't know how to make up my identity for a while, so in a panic, I said, it's me.

Fortunately, the woman still opened the door, and after opening the wooden door on the inside, through a net door with iron railings, a woman who looked to be about thirty or less than forty years old looked at me very curiously. Her door was only half open, and she must have dared not open it because she didn't know Hu Zongren and me. She asked us, "Who are you?" Who to look for? There was some wariness in his tone. I turned my head and glanced at Hu Zongren and said to this woman, eldest sister, this is a bit long, you don't know us, and we don't know you, but we were entrusted by others to come to you.

The woman made a gesture to close the door, and then said, I don't know you, maybe you've got the wrong person. Seeing that the door was about to close, Hu Zongren said loudly, We know what happened in your family, and we are here to help you solve this matter. With a bang, the door was still closed, and Hu Zongren shouted again, it's completely free!

So the door opened again.