At the home of the Imperial Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who is over eighty years old, looked at the toothbrush in his hand with a look of novelty.

"Old Hou Ye might as well try it tonight, brush your teeth with this, it will definitely be refreshing!" Dingbei Hou explained.

"Hehe!" the Chancellor of the Exchequer grinned, showing the fence-like teeth in his mouth, and said: "Do you think I am Tang Tian's old immortal, and now my mouth is full of steel teeth, and my food is fragrant! My cultivation is far inferior to his, and I am old fast, and half of the teeth in my mouth have fallen out, and I can't use this little thing!"

"The old marquis can't use it, can you use it for the family, it's not a valuable thing, I brought a lot of it this time!" Dingbei Hou said, and directly took out a handful and put it on the table.

"Okay! I don't know you kid, I must have something to ask me for! Okay, if you want money, your Hongyuan City is now the food city of the empire, and it's good that I didn't build the emperor to overcharge your taxes!"

"Hehe, don't worry, I'm not looking for you for money!" Dingbei Hou explained.

"Don't want money!" The Minister of Finance asked, but without waiting for Dingbeihou to answer, he ordered loudly: "Come on, put away the gadgets of Dingbeihou's filial piety!"

"Uh!" The corners of Dingbeihou's mouth twitched twice, and he smiled bitterly in his heart: "They all say old children, old children, it's really like this!"

When the next person entered the house and took away the toothbrush, Dingbei Hou took out the white silk sent by Jiang Xingchen from his arms: "Old Marquis, look at this!"

"Huh?" the Chancellor of the Exchequer glanced at Dingbeihou suspiciously, reached out and took the white silk and opened it, looking down.

Soon, the Chancellor's expression became solemn, and he could no longer see the relaxed appearance he had just seen, and both eyes were glowing.

Dingbei Hou kept watching the Chancellor's reaction, and the corners of his mouth couldn't help but hook up a smug smile.

After a long while, the Chancellor of the Exchequer raised his head, put the white silk into his arms, and asked in a low voice: "Did you come up with this thing?"

Although the Chancellor of the Exchequer tried his best to control his feelings, his hoarse voice still showed his agitated mood now!

Dingbei Hou had long known such a result, but he was not in a hurry at this time, and thought about it deeply. It made the Chancellor of the Exchequer angry and wanted to punch him in the face.

"That's right!" Dingbei Hou raised his head and explained, "The person who made this thing, you must also know, is Jiang Xingchen, the lord under my jurisdiction...... I've come to you for the expansion of his territory!"

"Territorial expansion?" The Chancellor of the Exchequer frowned suddenly, Jiang Xingchen of course he knew, as an important minister who supported the Emperor's strategy, of course he knew the benchmark that the Great Emperor had erected in the eyes of the people. However, it was too difficult to expand the territory.

As if seeing the difficulties of the Minister of Finance, the Marquis of Dingbei smiled, lowered his voice and said: "Old Marquis, you don't know, the emperor still has Jiang Xingchen's other merits in his hands!"

"Oh!" the Chancellor's eyes lit up, and then he squeezed out a wrinkle, and made a hehehe sound at the same time as the two of Dingbeihou......

In the other direction of the capital, in the house of the chief official of the aristocratic administration, a young man was smiling and fiddling with an instrument similar to a lute, making a sound as crisp as water.

"Yuan Hao, what is this!" asked Yuan Xixuan, the chief officer of the aristocratic management department, opposite the young man.

"This is a newly invented musical instrument by Xuanyuan Tianzong, called plucked playing, which completely broke the previous form of musical instruments based on blowing, and I entrusted Mu Shaodong of Hengtong Commercial Bank to buy it at a high price!" Yuan Hao said.

"Hengtong Trading Company can get the newly invented musical instrument of Xuanyuan Tianzong?" asked Yuan Xixuan with some confusion. Although there are many trading houses that buy and sell on both sides of the enemy for huge profits, it is impossible to get something newly invented, even if it is not war material.

"Hehe! I heard Mu Shaodong say that although this instrument has not yet been promoted, it has been used by a song and dance troupe in a small area, and he spent a lot of money to buy it, and he also got the way to play it!"

After a pause, Yuan Hao changed his words and said, "I tried it today, and the sound of this plucked play can fully match the big drum...... The top prize of this Chinese New Year performance will definitely be won by me!"

When Yuan Xixuan heard this, he really didn't think about the problem of Hengyuan Trading House anymore, and asked with a smile: "You just played dance music in the Imperial Academy for a few years, have you played this new instrument, are you so sure...... Now there are many people looking forward to watching that song in the New Year!"

Yuan Hao smiled: "No problem, I can't do it for others, I joined the Caifeng Song and Dance Troupe, which was the first last year, and everyone's strength in it is second to none in the empire...... Hehe, the plucking and drumming can definitely play more bloody music, and Caifeng's people can also choreograph a dance that surpasses Xie Wanrou!"

"Hmm!" Yuan Xixuan nodded and said, "Take this opportunity to press Jiang Xingchen, he improved too quickly a while ago!"

Yuan Hao pursed his lips and said lightly: "It's just a little baron with no background, even if the Marquis of Dingbei appreciates him, it is estimated that it is because of Xie Wanrou, this song and dance performance did not win the highest reward, and the Marquis of Dingbei will throw him aside!"

Yuan Xixuan smiled, didn't speak again, didn't know what he remembered, lowered his head and pondered......

In the Imperial Academy in Hongyuan City, Jiang Xingchen had a bitter face, and was thinking about how to give Wanrou, and there were several judges who explained what strings were.

In order to cooperate with the big drum, Jiang Xingchen proposed the concept of string music as soon as he came, and several people were dumbfounded, Wanrou was okay, they had already seen Jiang Xingchen's magic, but several judges were completely stunned, they still wanted to tell Jiang Xingchen what they thought, how could they think that as soon as people came, they directly said something they hadn't heard.

Actually, Jiang Xingchen originally wanted to make suona, and the original song of the man's self-improvement was suona, but that one needed reeds as reeds, but now where to find reeds.

The pipa would do just fine, after all, that thing goes best with the drum. But thinking that he hadn't even seen the pipa up close, how could he get it out.

As a last resort, he thought of the guzheng, at least there were female classmates in the previous class who practiced it, and he had seen it a few times. Although I don't know the specific principle, I know the shape, and I also know that the bottom of the panel of the guzheng is empty, and the sound of the strings vibrating is transmitted through the empty box underneath the guò.

As for explaining strings to a few people, he was really embarrassed, and after thinking about it for a long time, he finally borrowed a bow from another department of the Imperial Academy, and after plucking the strings to make a vibration, he told them that this was strings.

A few people were stupid again, what kind of principle is this, can a bow be able to interpret music.

When plucking the bowstring, Jiang Xingchen was pleasantly surprised to find that he was able to accurately grasp the position on the string where the vibration was triggered, as well as the amount of force he used to trigger the bowstring, according to the subtle vibration, and then judge how much vibration frequency would be emitted if it was extended to both sides of the bowstring.

In other words, he can locate the sound produced in each position.

"No, could it be that the development of the Knowing Array to the knees is just to make it easier for me to play the guzheng?" Jiang Xingchen smiled helplessly in his heart, although this effect is a bit pitted, it is undoubtedly the most useful now, otherwise it would be in vain if the guzheng could not be played.

Wanrou and the others looked at Jiang Xingchen while pondering, and at the same time plucked a different sound on a bowstring, their calm expressions were surprised again......

Subsequently, they began the long process of making zuò.

Jiang Xingchen thought very simply, what the ancients on the earth could make was something that he knew about it, and it would definitely not be difficult to do it.

But this is not the case, compared to the big drums, the guzheng is simply difficult to make the sky. Just looking for air-dried wood was wasted, and it lasted more than 20 days, and I can't count how much wood was destroyed.

At first, Jiang Xingchen and the others used all hard solid wood, but the timbre was not good, a little dull, and there was no crisp and bright feeling of the guzheng at all.

They then kept changing the wood, experimenting with the size and shape of the box. With Jiang Xingchen's dexterous hands, he was a little overwhelmed in the future, and it was difficult to hold the knife.

And what made Jiang Xingchen even more depressed was that he forgot how many strings there were in the zither strings: "How many strings did the zither I saw at the beginning, twenty-one, eighteen, or seventeen ......"

Finally, according to the size of the body and the width of the required vocal range, eighteen strings were used.

Mei'er watched her brother go home so tired that he fell asleep every day, and she wanted to cry when she was distressed, but she knew that this was a big deal and couldn't be delayed, so she could only cook every day, boil hot water, and try to take care of his daily life.

Wanrou and several judges are responsible for the most critical judgment of pitch, sound quality, and timbre. After more than 20 days, everyone listened to it with big heads.

At this time, Jiang Xingchen understood the wisdom of the ancients, and shouted in his heart: "Don't dare to underestimate the ancients in the future, this Nima is simply not a human being!"

In the end, when Jiang Xingchen was so tired that he wanted to vomit, they finally found that it was best to use a soft pine wooden zuò resonance box, and a hard solid wooden zither head, tail and beam, which could be regarded as determining the main body of the zither.

Then they studied the problem of the bottom plate, where to leave the sound port, how many sound ports to leave, what shape, this has to be tried repeatedly.

After a few more days, several boxes were scrapped, and Jiang Xingchen determined the position, front, middle, and back, and opened three sound outlets.

The strings are still used with animal tendon wires, but after using them, they are not comfortable, and the fingers are too wrenched, and the strings will be cut if they are not done well with the picks.

After thinking about it for a long time, he found the old man and asked him to go out to help find silk threads with good tenacity and strength.

Of course, the old man couldn't let go of such an opportunity, Jiang Xingchen promised to make him something good that he had never eaten before, and the old man left satisfied......

And just when Jiang Xingchen and the others were concentrating on making zuò guzheng, in the imperial capital, the Caifeng Song and Dance Troupe, which won the highest award last year, began a continuous performance.