Grand cities have their own prosperity, remote small towns also have their own liveliness. This small town located in the southeast of Liyang has always been far away from the flames of war. If it was a time of peace, it would not be a big deal. But when there were signs of turmoil and unrest in the provinces and counties, this place appeared particularly peaceful. There were some villages near this small town that were named after surnames. When it came time to pay respects to their ancestors and hang up paintings, they were all extraordinary. The Song village even had a portrait of an emperor surnamed Song. Compared to some villages that had portraits of the founding heroes of Dafeng Dynasty or the ministers of small Spring and Autumn Dynasty, this village naturally felt superior. It's just that this Song village's ancestor was of high status, the few families surnamed Wen in the village could not benefit from this glory. In fact, the elders in the village, even if they had studied for a few days, even if they had carefully flipped through the family tree, they still could not tell what was the relationship between themselves and the Song emperor. It was said that there was once a busybody in the village who specially brought along a small wooden box to examine the family tree, but he also could not tell what was the reason. Who would have thought that in the end, it turned out to be the most unambitious young man in the village, a guy surnamed Wen. He went out for a stroll for three years and then returned to his hometown. He spoke with certainty, saying that after the people in the village died, there was a great deal of attention to the reason why the two words' Yinchuan 'were engraved on the top of the tombstones. At that time, the Dafeng Dynasty claimed that half of the scholars came from Yinchuan County, and the Yinchuan Song family was a first-class rich family that produced many literary and famous scholars. In the last years of the Dafeng Dynasty, the ancestor who first set up a separatist regime and then became the first emperor of the Song family, came from a branch of the Yinchuan Song family. The origin of this Song village must be that after the separatist regime was annihilated, during the famous' Ganlu Southward 'migration, they finally settled down here. After the young man with the surname Wen sorted out the context, the elders in the village more or less understood. Even if they did not understand, they pretended to understand. Just listen, not only is it the Song family of Yin Chuan, but it is also the Sweet Dew South, how grand is this? It can be seen that although our Song family village has not produced a single child in the past hundred years, but after all, our ancestors were once rich and noble. Moreover, it must be that the fortune of our ancestors was too great a few hundred years ago, so the descendants of the later generations had no choice but to be content with their lot. The young man surnamed Wen was originally not well-liked in the village. Unexpectedly, after he returned to his hometown with a lame leg and was in dire straits, it was as if he had become a completely different person. Not only did he not have the sloppy appearance of carrying a wooden sword at his side, but he also did odd jobs in the small town's restaurant. Not only did he rely on his elder brother and sister-in-law to support him, he could even send money home. What was even more unexpected was that the young man had married a virtuous and moving wife. Previously, they had held a banquet in the open space outside the village's ancestral hall. That young woman made many young men surnamed Song, regardless of whether they were married or not, stare at her.
After the young man surnamed Wen married his wife, he no longer stayed in the restaurant's miscellaneous room. He saved some money and rented a small courtyard in the small town. There were three rooms. Excluding the wedding room whose windows were covered with red festive paper cuts, a small room was used to store sundries, and the remaining room was not empty. The bedding was brand new, it was clean and spotless by the woman who kept the house. This was because her husband had said that in the future, perhaps his brothers would come to their house as guests. No matter what, they had to have a place to stay. Otherwise, it would be too improper. Moreover, to let his friends fork out money to stay in an inn or a restaurant was not only seen as an outsider, it was also wasteful and not particular. She went along with him and felt that this was reasonable in her heart. Although her family was not well-off now, she, who came from a small family, could only be considered well-off. But in fact, she was a woman with a generous mind. In the beginning, when she insisted on marrying him, no one in her family was willing to agree. They did not even give her a dowry. She also gritted her teeth and did not ask for anything from her parents. Fortunately, time revealed a person's heart. Now, she wanted to bring him back to her maternal home. Although her parents would still give her some face, several of her elder brothers had more or less untied the knot in their hearts. They knew that their father could not bring himself to do that and it was inconvenient for him to drink with that brother-in-law of his at the dining table at home. However, each of them secretly went to her courtyard and did not forget to bring wine and meat. They were already like a family. She knew that when she had a child and her parents had grandchildren, at that time, they would find a way to step down and completely forget about him. However, no matter how small the town was, the expenses were not small. Relying on the man to earn a living as a waiter in a restaurant, the two of them could still be considered well-off. But once there was a third little mouth in the family, it would be hard to say. Fortunately, her needlework skills were well-known. One of her sisters opened a cloth shop, and those exquisite little things that she sewed were placed on the counter to add to the customers who bought cloth. The shop's business also improved by two or three points. Therefore, in this month, she was able to earn two or three taels of silver. Unexpectedly, she was not much worse off than the man who was the head of the household.
These two days, the town was bustling with activity. Before and after the summer heat, the Hungry Ghost Festival had been a custom in the southeast area of Liyang since ancient times. There were also some activities to worship the ancestors and welcome the autumn. Although the Hungry Ghost Festival was called the Ghost Festival in their dialect, it was said that the King of Hell was merciful and specially opened the Ghost Gate during this period of time to let the deceased return to their hometown to see their descendants in the world of the living. In fact, it only sounded a little scary, but adults and children did not avoid it. They only felt that it was something that could be enjoyed. Monks and Taoist priests would begin to give alms to the poor. Ordinary people would also erect lanterns and light up river lanterns. Especially young children, who could be in the arms of their parents, tiptoe on the bridge railings, or lie on the bluestone slabs of the river bank. Their eyes were filled with colorful lotus lanterns, and their hearts were filled with joy. It was no less than the Mid-Autumn Festival when they could eat mooncakes. Yesterday, he went to the village to pick up his nephew. He planned to let his wife take the child shopping. Coincidentally, his wife was clever and skillful with her hands. She made two large bamboo baskets of river lanterns and wanted to sell them by the bridge. He believed that with her craftsmanship, they would soon be snatched up by the customers who went out for a night trip. He had seen her weaving lanterns in the courtyard before. There were many kinds of lanterns, flowers, birds, fish, insects, lotuses, turtles, cranes, dragons, and phoenixes. He really did not know how there could be such a skillful pair of hands in the world, so he sat on the bench to cool off. In any case, he could not help, and even if he helped, he would only be more of a hindrance. He could only be secretly happy. After his scholarly nephew arrived in the small town, he was a little reserved at first. During the day, he would first bring him to the restaurant and obediently listen to the storytellers in the corner. He listened with great interest. The child's temperament was like his father's, introverted and honest, and did not speak much. As the uncle, he liked but was also worried. He liked the child's honest temperament, but was worried that if he was too honest, he would easily be taken advantage of when he grew up. The restaurant that the waiter surnamed Wen worked in was now considered a famous place in the small town. Although most of the restaurants in the town had hired storytellers to tell stories of Jianghu, only their restaurant always told the freshest and most novel stories. All of this was naturally due to him. Earlier on, it was he who successfully persuaded the restaurant's manager to not be stingy with the storyteller's travel expenses to the county or even the provincial capital. Therefore, when this restaurant first told the story of the female Wulin chief of Great Snow Plateau who comprehended immortality by watching snow for a night, the debate between Buddhism and Taoism on Mount Wudang in the northwest Taoist ancestral court, the turmoil and unforeseen events in the holy land of Jianghu, and the Wu family's Sword Tomb's journey to Beiliang, it could be said to be a sensation in the small town. The people were led by the nose by the restaurant's storyteller during their leisure time, and the restaurant's business naturally rose. However, the waiter surnamed Wen, who deserved the title of the number one hero, secretly paid for the storyteller's first travel expenses to the county capital. He had never asked the restaurant's manager for a dividend. Other than the copper coins that the restaurant's customers tipped him after they drank too much, the restaurant's pay for him was still the same as it was on the first day he entered the restaurant. There was not a single copper coin increase. Every day, the shopkeeper would stand behind the counter with a smile on his face, watching the waiter with the surname Wen running errands attentively, and watching the lively young man serving tea, wine, and smiling apologetically every day. No one knew what this old man was thinking.
Today, the storyteller in the restaurant was in high spirits, his spittle flying everywhere as he talked about a strange incident. He said that there was a grandmaster of swordsmanship named Qi Jiajie in the capital of Liyang. As the master of swordsmanship for many of the sons and grandsons of aristocratic families in Taian City, for some reason, he went to the Dongyue Sword Pool with high mountains, long rivers, and high Sword Qi to forge a peerless sword. Then, Qi Jiajie went to the foot of the Wudang Mountain in Beiliang first, a small town that was not much more famous than the one they were in. His flying sword arrived later, crossing thousands of miles in one go, and he thrust his sword at the young king with a different surname who was in charge of the northwest border. It shocked the heaven and earth and made ghosts and gods cry. The sea of clouds opened up for thousands of miles, and the sword Qi reached into the sky. Unexpectedly, the young king was even more amazing. He rose from the ground and stood proudly on the sea of clouds that bordered the border between Beiliang Road and Lianhuai Road. He actually blocked the flying sword that had the power to kill immortals! The storyteller talked endlessly. When he got to the part where he talked to his heart's content, even the old man himself was dumbfounded, not to mention the listeners who were drinking and eating in the restaurant. They were all speechless and stopped drinking and their minds were shaken. When they came back to their senses, the story was not over yet, and they had not heard the most annoying sentence, "Listen to the next part of the story." Of course, they had to ask the restaurant for one or two more pots of wine. The waiter's nephew, whose surname was Wen, was listening to a storyteller for the first time, and it was also the first time he heard about Jianghu people. He was even more dumbfounded, as if he was listening to a book from heaven. He sat on the small stool in the corner that his uncle brought for him, clenched his fists, pricked up his ears, and widened his eyes. He felt that listening to Jianghu stories was more interesting than reading the books of sages.
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