The cold wind blew through the bare branches, making a ghostly cry wolf-like sound, and the faint of heart would be frightened to hear it.

Two figures, one large and one small, kept shuttling through the mountains and forests, as if they were looking for something.

"Grandpa, didn't you burn incense when you went out this time, you have been in the Lost Mountain for seven or eight days, and you haven't found a single good herb. ”

It was a boy of eleven or twelve years old, wearing a dogskin hat and a sheepskin jacket on his upper body, which was tightly tied around his waist.

Both the sheepskin jacket and the hat are obviously larger, and it is a little awkward to wear on the boy's body. It's just that the sloppy appearance can't hide the pair of bright eyes.

The other is tall, although the waist is not bent and the back is not hunched, the layers of wrinkles on the face still suggest that this is a weathered old man.

The Lost Mountain is not a mountain, but a mountain range that covers thousands of miles. It is said that no one can go deep into the mountains, and those who go deep will get lost in the mountains. That's why it's called the "Lost Mountain".

Standing on the top of a mountain, the young and old looked around carefully.

"Grandpa, look over there, it's very similar to the growing environment of a medicinal herb. It is the herb mentioned in the book that Shopkeeper Shen specially gave us. The boy pointed to a mountain in the distance and exclaimed in surprise.

Shopkeeper Shen is the doctor and shopkeeper of a medical center called "Relief Hall" in the town. There are only two people in the "Relief Hall", one is the guy who grabbed the medicine, and the other is the shopkeeper Shen. This kind of small medical hall is extremely ordinary among the more than 30 medical halls in Huangpo Town.

The old man's surname is Xiao, and he is a well-known herb picker in Huangpo Town, and the price of the herbs purchased by the shopkeeper Shen from the previous year is much higher than that of other medical centers. After a few dealings, all the herbs picked by the old man were sold to Shopkeeper Shen.

The boy is a child picked up by the old man a few years ago, and with the help of the shopkeeper Shen, he has his own name: Xiao An, I hope the boy can grow up safely.

Xiao An is smart and studious, and when he followed his grandfather to the medical hall to sell medicinal herbs, he learned a lot of words by observing the names on the herb cabinet. To the great surprise of the shopkeeper Shen, he taught Xiao An to read and write in his spare time.

As he spoke, the boy took out a thick book from his chain, and after a while rummaging, he finally found the information he was looking for.

On the top of the page that opens, a clump of herbs with roots and stems like thin lines is drawn. There is also a small print next to it to record the name of the herb and the growing environment.

The person who drew the picture must be very familiar with medicinal herbs, and Liao Liao depicted the medicinal herbs vividly with a few strokes.

The peculiar thing is that the book, which is obviously made of paper, has been in the blanket for so long, and there is no sign of moisture or damage, and even the dirt on it has become clean under the rude pulling of the young man.

The old man came over and looked at the appearance of the herbs, "Gua Wazi, I've picked herbs all my life, and I've never seen anything like this, what is written on it?"

"Grandpa, this herb grows in the crevices of the stones, but its roots need to be warm all year round, and the branches and leaves must be cold all year round.

Grandpa, look at that mountain, there is snow on the top of the mountain, and there are faint clouds above, there should be a hot spring, otherwise how can it be cloudy in winter?"

Although it has entered winter this year, it has not snowed yet, so the snow on it must be the snow of the previous year, and the situation of this mountain is indeed somewhat consistent with the growing environment of this herb.

......

"It took a long time to finally find this herb, it was not easy. The boy let out a long breath, and still felt afraid,

The herbs did not grow on the top of the mountain, but on the cliff on the side of the mountain, and while collecting the herbs, the violent mountain wind almost blew the boy down.

The young man sat on the bluestone at the top of the mountain, holding the herbs in one hand and taking out the book of herbs from the chain with the other.

The book was turned straight to the last page, which had no pictures or text, just a palm-sized piece of yellow paper filled with strange lines of cinnabar.

The young man's hand quickly stroked the yellow paper, and the yellow paper unfolded like a flower blooming into the size of a sea bowl. The boy carefully placed the herb in the middle of the yellow paper and folded the yellow paper back into its original form.

When the book was placed in the chain, a faint yellow light flashed from the yellow paper, and the messy lines and folds on the yellow paper had disappeared, and it had completely become an ordinary yellow paper.

This book of herbs was given to Mr. Xiao by Mr. Shen last year, and he wanted Mr. Xiao to pay attention to the herbs recorded in it.

But the old man found that most of the herbs in it were something he had never seen before, and he was not familiar with the growth characteristics of these herbs, and the old man was illiterate, so he couldn't pay attention to these herbs just by pictures. Fortunately, Xiao An was already able to recognize a lot of words at this time, so the book was given to Xiao An.

When Old Man Xiao and Xiao An were leaving, Shopkeeper Shen patted his head again, as if he had forgotten something just now, and hurriedly entered the house.

After a while, Shopkeeper Shen walked out with a piece of yellow paper full of strange lines, and he didn't see Shopkeeper Shen smearing anything, so he only put the yellow paper on the last page of the book, and pressed it a few times to stick it firmly.

At that time, the shopkeeper Shen solemnly told the old man and Xiao An that if he found the herbs recorded in the book, he must wrap them in the yellow paper at the back of the book, and gave Xiao An a set of techniques to open the yellow paper.

Xiao An clearly remembered the shopkeeper's words at the time: as long as the herbs recorded in the book were collected and preserved on yellow paper, they could be sold for at least ten taels of silver. But if you don't keep it in this way, you can give hundreds of copper plates at most.

And there are only dozens of copper plates for an ordinary medicinal herb, and the annual expenses of ordinary people are no more than 3,000 copper plates, and ten taels of silver is a sky-high price for the ancestors and grandchildren of the Xiao family.

When the yellow paper flickered, a fat man who was lying on a chair basking in the sun suddenly jumped up, quickly took out a jade pendant from his body, and carefully looked at a small white point of light in the jade pendant.

The fat man with a big belly ran into the house with a puff of smoke, and it was hard to believe that such a fat man was more agile than a civet.

This fat man was the shopkeeper Shen, I saw him standing in front of a map, holding a jade pendant in one hand, and constantly calculating in the other, and finally pointed a location on the map with his hand, which happened to be where the ancestors and grandchildren of the Xiao family stayed.

After doing all this, Shopkeeper Shen laughed a few times.