Louis was already fourteen years old in 52, which is generally accepted as the age of majority, but in the time of Hertale, the Queen Mother was reluctant to hold a coming-of-age ceremony for the king in a small place with no name, and when she arrived in Paris, between the aggressive Prince Condé and the ill-intentioned Duke Gaston, the Queen Mother lost all interest in it— For to her, Parisians were half rebels and half thugs, and they were not qualified to witness such an important event, and at that time the Bishop of Mazarin had retired to Bouillon again, although the Queen Mother did not like this man very much, but she had to admit that without the bishop, the royal family in Paris was simply missing an arm.

After the victory of General Schaumberg and Viscount Tillenne in Paris, the people of Paris, from the judges of the High Court to the lowliest of commoners, came to ask the king to return to Paris as soon as possible, but Louis reacted much more coldly than their eagerness, as he had told his brother Philippe, that if he returned to Paris, he would never allow himself to be expelled again— In addition, Versailles was more concerned than Paris, and he estimated the time, summoned the abbot of La Rivière, and asked him to pick out a suitable date, whether it a saint or a saint, and in any case he was going to celebrate a great mass, followed by a special blessing ceremony.

Speaking of this blessing ceremony, in fact, it is also a bit risky for Louis, because this so-called healing ritual requires close contact with lymph node tuberculosis patients.

The founder of this ritual was none other than Clovis I, the founder of the Frankish kingdom, and one of his courtiers was suffering from lymph node tuberculosis, which was of course known only as white plague at the time, because the patient's neck grew a blister the size of an egg at the largest and the smallest the size of a pea, and when the pus accumulated to a certain extent, it flowed out of the festering fistula, and it was said that neither doctors nor wizards could cure him.

And one night, Clovis I saw an angel in a dream, and the angel told him that if he touched the sick with his holy hand, the sick man would be cured, and after hearing this, Clovis I did so, and the minister miraculously recovered.

However, in the case of Louis, it is likely that this legend stems from two pressing needs: Clovis I, who had only been the leader of a few Frankish tribes before him, and only defeated Siglius, the last governor of the Roman Empire in Gaul, in 486, and took over all of Northern Gaul and called himself king of the Franks, just as every Roman emperor would deify himself, and he also needed to detach himself from the mundane to ensure that this noble throne was not shaken, and the other was the Church, at that time, most of the Franks, starting with the king, still believed in the Arian sect, which was considered heretical, and this of course needed to be corrected, as it should be, one is good for the king, and for the miracles of the church.

Clovis I informed his subjects that he would periodically perform such ritual rites to exercise divine authority so that his people could bathe in the grace of God, and that the kings who would come after him would not only inherit his scepter, but also inherit his "divine powers" In the 11th century, the king of England also claimed to have mastered this skill, and with great fanfare, he touched and treated patients including but not limited to lymph node tuberculosis, and even his father was beheaded by the mob, and he was expelled from his homeland.

Of course, Louis was not unprepared for this, and the royal physician Vesalius prepared a potion of paralysis according to the king's request, refining a wine of high purity, and every patient who came to ask for treatment had to drink the potion, wipe his face and hands with wine, so as to minimize the chance of infection, and as long as he was healthy, lymph node tuberculosis was not a susceptible disease...... On the day of the ceremony, nearly seven or eight hundred strangers came to Versailles, from all over the world, with the fervent hope that the king was waiting for them under a cross standing in the wilderness, and although some insisted that such a sacred ceremony should be held in the church, the chapel of Versailles could not accommodate so many people, and some said that the ceremony should be moved to the Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris, but the king refused—he chose it because the wind and the fresh air could carry away most of the germs.

During the ceremony, one by one, the patients went up to the king and knelt down, Louis touched their foreheads and cheeks lightly with his fingers, and then took a white ribbon hanging from the hands of Abbot La Rivière, and hung it around the patient's neck, and the whole process was finished.

Louis had wondered how such a healing could heal the sick - it was true that the king did have such abilities in the records he had seen and the words of the clergy, but he had repeatedly asked Marie and Vesalius to test him, he was not a wizard, no, it should be said, as long as he was a king, he could not be a wizard.

If there has been a wizard in the royal family before, yes, like Vesali's father, but such members will soon be "killed" or "accidents", not only the church, or the inner world and the surface world, but also a king who is a wizard will inevitably pose a threat to the royal power - just like the vampire hidden alliance is quite consistent in not choosing people who are too close to the royal family as their descendants- Because the balance that can barely be maintained today will be completely disrupted, and wizards and vampires have their own ambitions, but they don't want to see a shattered, chaotic hell.

Looking at it this way now, Louis thought to himself, it may be because some of the lymph node tuberculosis patients are likely to recover on their own—especially since the people who can get the news and rush here are almost impossible to be poor farmers or artisans, who already have a healthy and resistant body, and then there is something like a "placebo"- At a time when religious forces still occupy the spiritual world of people, such a miracle can definitely make a person hopeful, and finally the gold louis that the king hangs around their necks, maybe there are some unfortunate people who are really strapped for money, then the gold louis worth twenty livres can also make him live a good life, and there are many people, who can get a little respite and get back on their feet.

Ten thousand steps back, can the man who has deteriorated or simply gone to see God, and his relatives, still complain about God or the King?

The ritual of touching the cure thus consumed a whole day in the constant belly of the king, Louis had a sore arm, a bitter tongue, and gave away more than a thousand gold louis—some commoners may have come only for this golden louis, but it was not without reward, and they would bring Louis's name everywhere, so that more French people would know that they already had a holy and merciful king, not to joke, and in general, outside of Paris, few people would care who their king was, or even who their lord was— Anyway, as long as you don't add their taxes.

After this work was done, Louis began to prepare to return to Paris, and the Queen Mother decided to hold an incomparably grand banquet to celebrate Louis's coming of age, and Louis reminded her that Philippe's "slingpants ceremony" should be held first, so that Philippe could follow him as the Duke of Anjou, which made the Queen Mother hesitate for a moment, but agreed.

As soon as Louis returned to his bedchamber, his brother Philippe appeared outside the door, and when he had received permission, he went to the king in joy and bowed his knees to him.

"I have come to thank you, Your Majesty. Philip said: "I've been looking forward to this day for a long time. ”

"I know," said Louis mildly, "I will say that so am I." "Although I understood the intentions of the Queen Mother and Bishop Mazarin, I forgot it when I was five or six years old, and when I was eleven or twelve—thanks to Louis's careful feeding, and his insistence on adding fencing, throwing, and horseback riding to Philip's lessons, Philippe now has five rulers, which is equivalent to a height of one and a half meters, and his facial contours are not as round and amiable as before, in short, Philip is no longer so suitable for wearing skirts, and two years later, that is, when he reaches Louis's current age, he will enter the period of voice change...... If he still had to wear a skirt at that time, it would have been torture for many people.

Philippe pressed his lace nightcap, as he said, he didn't hate women's clothes, but he also knew very well that he was the Duke of Anjou, not the Princess of Anjou, although the teachers almost never gave any kind feedback on the courses of horseback riding and martial arts, but Philip thought that his talent in these two courses was not inferior to that of female red and copying, and he was not stupid, and Louis did not have many credible or usable people around him- Especially the marshals and generals, he also knew, otherwise his brother would not have so easily forgiven their former enemy, the Viscount of Tyrrena.

There were not many people who entered the army at the age of twelve, fourteen, or sixteen, as was the case with General Schaumberg, and so with the Viscount of Tyrrenne, and with the Prince of Condé, and certainly with the Duke of Anjou, but Philippe also knew that he still had to wait for the moment, or that his brother's trust in him—the royal brother warned him not to be hasty—and Louis was already quite lenient with him, especially not with a brother, but with a king.

"A gold louis, change what you are thinking now. The king said.

"I'm wondering how I can repay you. Philip said as he reached out and helped the king to remove his heavy coat, which was his duty and authority as the king's brother.

"Loyalty. Louis said without thinking: "And love, that's enough." ”

"You'll see," Philip handed his coat to the warden, "I'll dig out my heart and put it on a plate and give it to you." ”

"Let your heart stay in your breast, Philip," Louis said more gently, "as long as it doesn't break my heart." ”

When the Duke of Anjou was about to say something, Bontang suddenly appeared, as the king's first attendant, the head of the palace, he had always been cautious, and generally speaking, he would not insert himself between the king and the Duke of Anjou so inconspicuously, since he did so, it meant that there must be something urgent to return.

"Mr. Sébastien Le Prettel de Vauban, requests to be seen. ”

It was an unfamiliar name, but Philip immediately told the king that he was tired and asked the king to excuse him from his work for the day, and then, with permission, the duke quickly left the king's bedchambers.

"To my surprise," the king nodded, and Bontang helped him put on his coat that he had just removed, "bring him—I'll see him in the inner chamber." ”

Bontang bowed and departed, and the king calmly walked to the inner chamber, which was part of the king's private suite, just outside the bedrooms, but according to Louis's needs and preferences, the walls were full of bookshelves, and the shelves were filled with all kinds of books, and there was a hidden secret door, in which some of the priests would have been shocked to see the shoddy prints, and in front of the glass window inlaid with black lead, there was a dark brown walnut desk, behind the desk there was a chair, two in front, the backrest and cushions of the chairs were filled with horsetail hair or silk cotton, according to the king's request, and covered with rich jacquard velvet。

The moonlight was shining through the windows, but by the time the servants lit the candles, the thin silver veil vanished in the brighter light.

But when the sun rises, the candlelight will be eclipsed again.

This is what Sebastian, the young man who had volunteered to lead the way for the king and his soldiers at the Red Kids' Bazaar, thought of him the moment he stepped into the room.