Not only me, but everyone also thought of this-that old Yuan Tou, could it be Xuanheng's descendant? Everyone's eyes looked at their cousin in unison.

Sister Li asked tentatively: "Do you mean that that old Yuan Tou is actually Xuanheng's descendant, and he is guarding the tomb here, is he also guarding Xuanheng's tomb?" ”

The cousin nodded, his speculation shocked Mr. and Mrs. Chen. If Lao Yuan Tou is Xuan Heng's descendant, and that Xuan Heng mysteriously disappeared into this pit with Zhu Leting, the vassal king of the Ming Dynasty, and it was not a normal death, how could Lao Yuan Tou be to guard Xuanheng's tomb?

"Since that old Yuan Tou is guarding the tomb, have you two seen the tomb he guarded with your own eyes?" The madman asked Mr. Chen and the old couple.

The old couple shook their heads again and again, saying that they had never seen a grave in the surroundings, and they had never even seen a tombstone, which made it even more strange - since Lao Yuantou was guarding the tomb here, there should be a grave nearby, but in fact, why not?

The cousin groaned for a moment, and then said to Mr. Chen Lai, "If it's convenient, can you take us to visit that old Yuan Tou?" I had a vague feeling that he should be a very unusual person. ”

Old Mr. Chen didn't agree immediately, but after thinking about it for a while, he made up his mind and said, "Okay, although that old Yuan Tou is silent, his personality is relatively peaceful, I should be fine with you." ”

Because there are only three or four miles away, everyone will go to find the old Yuan Tou under the leadership of Mr. Chen.

Coming out of Mr. Chen's courtyard, passing through the crater and continuing to walk back, there is a sheep intestine path, go up along this winding sheep intestine path, after turning a few small hills, a clearing appears in front of you, and in the open space, there are two or three houses built of stone and wood, needless to say, this is the residence of old Yuan Tou.

Because it had just rained, there was a puddle of water on the ground, and water droplets kept falling from the roof.

"Brother Yuan, are you at home?" Mr. Chen came to the door, banged on the door and shouted - although he already knew the old man's surname Xuan, he might have been used to it, so Mr. Chen still didn't change his words.

There was a coughing sound in the room, and then the door slowly opened—the old man who had opened the door looked very ordinary, the kind of person who had seen it a few times, but still couldn't remember it, and his face was wrinkled and very old, and his hair and beard were all white.

When he saw so many people standing outside the door, the old man was surprised, he opened his eyes wide, first looked at us, and then at Mr. Chen, obviously he couldn't figure out what was going on.

Mr. Chen smiled and explained: "These people are from the Provincial Cultural Bureau and the Institute of Archaeology, and they have come here to do cultural exploration and archaeological work, and they know that you have lived here for a long time, so they want to visit you and ask you some questions." ”

Mr. Chen's rhetoric was discussed before we came, because this identity makes it easier to understand some information we want to know.

After listening to Mr. Chen's introduction, Lao Yuan said "uh-huh" twice, not particularly enthusiastic, but not cold, and let us into the house.

The room looks a little gloomy, but it is very clean, and there is a kind of sandalwood fragrance, which makes people very comfortable, and feels very quaint, and there is a big bookshelf in the house, which are all thread-bound books, and there are a few large characters on the table that the ink has not dried.

My cousin walked to the table, looked at the words seriously, and couldn't help but admire: "I really didn't expect that your calligraphy attainments are so profound, old man." ”

Listening to my cousin say this, everyone leaned over to see, found that the font was very strange, we looked at it for a while, even a word could not be recognized, which reminded us of the kind of font on the well-shaped canyon stone - "seal grass", listen to the madman six said, that kind of font, in the Warring States period to the early Han Dynasty was more popular, but then slowly lost, and then the great calligrapher Yu Youren, once according to the unearthed bamboo slips, the font was restored.

I couldn't help but ask the madman next to me, "Is this also the kind of 'seal grass', the kind we have seen on the stones of the well-shaped canyon?" ”

The madman shook his head: "At first glance, it looks a bit similar, but when you look closely, you find that it is very different, the structure and writing method of the characters are very different from that kind of 'seal grass'." ”

After listening to the discussion between the two of us, my cousin smiled and said: "Ha, the kind of 'seal grass' you are talking about is a font that has been widely used, that is before the official script and regular script are mature, a fast way to write the seal, that font, from the Warring States period to the early Han Dynasty, has been popular for a long time, and the font written by Mr. Yuan is called 'grass seal', which is just the opposite of the name of the font you said, but the two are completely different - the font written by the old gentleman is the late Ming Dynasty, Created by the famous calligrapher Zhao Huanguang, I think its skill and elegance are not under Zhao Huanguang. ”

Perhaps it was his cousin's erudition that moved the old man, after hearing these words, the old Yuan Tou immediately became awe-inspiring to his cousin, and waved his hand again and again and said: "Awards, awards, you are really knowledgeable, this font, even ordinary calligraphy and painting experts, may not know." ”

Next, Lao Yuan's attitude towards us was much more enthusiastic, and his expression was not so indifferent, and he and his cousin discussed Zhao Huanguang's words again, and it seemed that the more they talked, the more speculative they became.

Things went surprisingly smoothly and a little unexpectedly.

It seems that this old man Yuan is not deaf at all, but he is not willing to talk more with people who are not speculative, although Mr. Chen is very good to him, but after all, Mr. Chen is a botany, and his knowledge of calligraphy and history is very limited, which is too far from Old Man Yuan's hobbies and interests, so because there is no common language, Old Man Yuan does not like to talk to Mr. Chen, which makes Mr. Chen mistakenly think that Old Yuan is a little behind his ears.

Uncle is a first-class expert in the field of literature and history, of course, the accumulation of knowledge is extremely profound, after the two people talked about calligraphy, they began to talk about seal carving, the old Yuan Tou seemed to meet a bosom friend, and took out a few of his favorite seal carvings, so that his cousin appreciated. My cousin's comments on these seal carvings were extremely in place, and the old Yuan nodded again and again.

And we sat next to us, and we couldn't say a word, because we didn't understand what the two of us were saying.

I was secretly glad in my heart, fortunately my cousin came this time, otherwise, we wouldn't have been able to talk to this old man Yuan at all, let alone want to hear any news from him.

But we didn't come to talk about calligraphy and seal carving with Lao Yuan, seeing that the sky outside was getting darker and darker, we were all a little anxious, and the madman Liu secretly gave his cousin a few looks, but his cousin didn't seem to see it, and he still talked and laughed with Lao Yuan.

After a long while, my cousin coughed and changed the subject: "We are here today mainly to ask you about something, old man, I heard that you have lived here for decades, and you should know this area very well. ”

Old man Yuan took a sip of the teacup, and did not follow his cousin's topic, but asked his cousin rhetorically: "Have you gained anything from your investigation in this area?" There aren't many monuments here, right? ”

The cousin smiled slightly, looked at Old Man Yuan, and said unhurriedly: "There are not only historic sites here, but also extraordinary, there are many unbelievable strange phenomena here, and they have also appeared here. ”

Hearing his cousin's words, Old Man Yuan seemed to be taken aback, and when he saw that we were all looking at him, he hurriedly forced his composure: "Oh? A strange phenomenon? What's so weird here? I've lived here for decades and I've never seen one. ”

The cousin remained silent, his eyes were firmly fixed on Old Man Yuan and said: "Zhu Leting, the vassal king of the Ming Dynasty, disappeared in the nearby crater back then, and disappeared with him, as well as his advisor Xuan Heng, what is even more unbelievable is that for some reason, Zhu Leting and Xuan Heng did not die, they lived for more than three hundred years, and they hid under that crater. ”

None of us expected that my cousin would be so straight to the point, without beating around the bush, and say these things directly.

At this time, I only heard the sound of "pop", it turned out to be Old Man Yuan's teacup, which fell to the ground and shattered, only to see Old Man Yuan's eyes wide open, staring at his cousin in a daze, as if he had been electrified, he opened his mouth in horror, but he couldn't speak, his face was frightened, and his face became extremely pale.

The atmosphere in the room suddenly became tense, and we all shrank in our hearts, not knowing what would happen next-whether Old Man Yuan would be furious and blast us out; Or will you faint because you are too excited? The air seemed to freeze and leave us breathless.

After a minute or two, Old Man Yuan recovered a little, his face was full of wrinkles, still as if he was trembling slightly, Hongmei hurriedly poured a glass of water and handed it to Old Man Yuan, and asked in a low voice, "Are you okay old man?" ”

Old man Yuan took the water, took a few sips, and then let out a long sigh, in this short period of time, he seemed to have gone through a lot of struggles in his heart.

"How do you know this?" When he asked this, Old Man Yuan had a lot of helplessness in his tone.

At this time, my cousin said in a very earnest tone: "We have come to you without any malice, but sincerely come to ask for your help. ”

Immediately afterwards, my cousin told Old Man Yuan about the struggle with the blind man, the events we had experienced, and the Qiē we encountered next to the crater.

It was until the time of the lamp, and we also added on the side, Old Man Yuan listened very carefully, and did not insert a word.

At this time, we all breathed a sigh of relief, it seems that my cousin's strategy of "smashing the Yellow Dragon" has worked, coupled with our frank attitude, so that Old Man Yuan did not show any resistance.

After listening to us talk about this, Old Man Yuan let out a long sigh and said with emotion: "I can see that several of you are good people, and I understand more or less what you said, although some of your guesses are accurate, but there are also many errors. ”

It seems that our efforts have not been in vain, listening to Old Man Yuan's tone, he seems to be willing to tell us a lot of secrets, it seems that in many ways, he does know more than us.