The light of the setting sun fell on the small village in the mountains, making the mountains and forests more tranquil, the sound of gurgling water from the stream, the chimneys of several families curling with green smoke, seven or eight children chasing each other and playing beside the haystacks, and four or five farmers on the sheep intestine path were carrying or carrying a single single piece of firewood to the village, and there was not a trace of melancholy and dissatisfaction with life in their laughing expressions.

At sunset, this small village in the mountains looks so harmonious and happy.

"Xue Niu'er, I'm back for dinner."

One of the children who was twelve or thirteen years old, with two horns, replied, "Got it, mother, I'll go back." ”

He grimaced at the other children and turned to run to the women not far away, and after running a short distance, he turned around and shouted to the children, "Tiezhu, beans, don't forget the great events of the night." ”

"Don't worry, remember," one of the children replied.

Hearing his mother's urging, the child named Xue Niu'er slipped away quickly.

In the dimly lit thatched hut, an oil lamp can barely see the outline of the house, and the display in the house is extremely simple.

Next to a wooden table that was wiped black and shiny, a man in his thirties sighed: "I went to the mountains to chop wood today, and found that someone had entered the mountain, it had just rained a few days ago, and the footprints were stepped on in the past few days, but the footprints are not like official boots stepping out, but ordinary people can't step on this kind of footprints, and there are horseshoe prints, alas, this world is really impossible to live." ”

"It's better not to be an official errand, if the government finds here, will we still have a way to live? You will definitely be arrested and taken as strong men, maybe you will be killed as rogues and taken to receive merit. ”

The woman put the child in her arms on the kang head, and said with a little sadness.

The man yawned and said, " If you want to say that it is a mountain bandit or a rogue, there will not be so many horseshoe prints, but the footprints are not like the people of the government, however, in this world, the attire of the government is not easy to determine, today and Tiezhu Dad discussed it, tomorrow a few of us will go up the mountain in two ways, part of us will go to the mountains to see if anyone has come again, who is it, by the way, clean up the traces left before, and the other part of the people will look for a new location, and we will move away in a few days, for the sake of safety, whether someone is looking for it here, we can not continue to stay, we have to migrate immediately。 ”

The woman complained: "What kind of world is this, when will we end this life of homeless people hiding in Tibet?" ”

"Otherwise, you can go to Hu San's house and ask later, he used to repair shoes, and he should have seen the kind of soles you said. ”

The man replied, "Hmm." ”

Xue Niu'er, who was thinking towards the door, said, "Remember, it's better to be alive than dead. ”

Xue Niuer didn't know whether her father was telling her mother or herself.

"Xue Niu'er, Xue Niu'er," two immature voices came from the door. Xue Niu'er smiled and pouted to her parents, shook her brother's little hand lying on the kang, kissed her thin cheek, and then stood up and went out, outside the door were iron pillars and beans, both of whom were about the same age as Xue Niu'er.

Seeing that no one was paying attention, the three children walked towards the mountains and jungles.

Xue Niu'er, who was walking in front, said: "I will definitely be able to catch those pheasants tonight, but I learned that trap from Tie Zhu's father, and there is no problem." ”

"But it's so late and far away from home, my father will scold, let's go back," Douzi said with a little cry.

"Tonight, I heard from my father that there are people in the mountains, and it will be dangerous to go out at night. ”

Douzi's father was a private school gentleman before, and he was an old showman, that was more than ten years ago, in recent years, because of the war and chaos of the imperial examination system has been stopped for many years, there is no other fame, named his son Li Fu, daughter named Li Xing, I hope that the children will be able to revive the Chinese folk language in the future as their own responsibility, but the troubled times are difficult to continue, there is no revenge and blood, has been living a life of displacement with the villagers, usually teach the children of the villagers, let the children practice calligraphy.

"It's okay, there's nothing to be afraid of with us," Tiezhu said to the beans.

Because his father was a hunter, Tiezhu grew up in the mountains, and the woods were like his own backyard, so he was a little more courageous than other peers.

Xue Niu'er's father was a servant of a big official of the imperial court, because the big official supported other vassal kings to participate in the coup and seize power failed, and was sent to the northwest border by the nine clans, the family and the servants were sent to the northwest border, when he was about to arrive in Lingzhou, he encountered the official army to suppress the bandits, and the result was that the official army was defeated, and the soldiers in charge of escorting slipped away, Xue Niuer's father was accepted by the nearby villagers because of his little martial arts, and after marrying a wife, he has been living with the villagers, and in a blink of an eye, he has been the father of two children for more than ten years.

Due to the rampant bandits and rogues, the government is even more forceful to arrest the strong men and levy all kinds of harsh taxes and miscellaneous taxes, if the bandits are not good, they will slaughter the village to pretend to be military merits, in fact, many officials and soldiers are bandits who recruit An.

Therefore, in order to escape the government and bandits, the villagers moved into the mountains, and often moved their homes for safety.

From time to time, there were one or two insect cries in the quiet woods, "Tiezhu, let's go back, it's too far from home," Li Fu said weakly as he tugged at the corner of Tiezhu's clothes.

"Okay, then you go back the way you came, I'll go with Xue Niu'er," Tie Zhu threatened, "I can't guarantee that there will be wolves and wild dogs on the way back." ”

"Shhhh ”

Xue Niu'er had fallen down beside a small mound of earth.

Tie Zhu pulled Li Fu to lie next to him, and Tie Zhu stabbed Xue Niu'er: "What's wrong." "There were people in front of them, many of them, all riding tall horses, probably officials or bandits. "These children have never seen outsiders since they can remember, except for the people in the village, and their parents also told them not to go too far from home, officials, bandits, these words were still heard by Xue Niu'er from his father an hour ago.

When I looked at the iron pillar, I saw a row of ghosts riding tall horses, straddling a scimitar at their waists, holding torches in their hands, with iron armor on their chests, and wearing strange costumes, passing quickly from a hundred paces away, only the sound of neat horses' hooves falling to the ground, and the kung fu of half a pillar of incense, these ghosts had all passed in front of the three children.

"What are these, are they humans or ghosts?" asked Li Fuzhan tremblingly.

"Go back quickly and inform the people in the village," Xue Niu'er suddenly remembered that his father had said that whether it was an official or a bandit who found here, he had to move.

The frightened iron pillar turned back to Shen Tiezhu and pulled up Li Fu, whose body was trembling more and more beside him, and the three of them immediately ran towards the village by the same way.

After a pillar of incense, the three of them were exhausted.

"Iron... Iron pillars, ahh ”

The iron pillar pulled up Li Fu who fell into the haystack: "What's wrong." ”

"Ahead... There's a fire in front of you. Tie Zhu and Xue Niu'er looked at Li Fu's frightened gaze, yes, it was on fire, and it was already red through the night.