I am fish

"Take off your clothes, sister will give you medicine."

Ah Xun put the medicinal mud made of Sufang, Angelica, Panax notoginseng, safflower and other traditional Chinese medicines on the plaster, hung it on the oil lamp to warm it slightly, and spread it on her hands to prepare for her hot compress.

Ah Xun asked Ah Lai to take off his clothes, but she clenched the front of her clothes tighter instead.

"Why are you and I so shy?" Ah Xun thought it was funny, "When you were young, your mother was in poor health, and I helped you take a bath. When I grow up, I will care about you. Hurry up, or the ointment will be cold again." To reheat."

A Lai has just arrived in Guishui in the past few days, and the two small hills on her chest are slowly rising, and some changes in her body make her embarrassed.Such a shameful thing can't let Ah Xun know.

"Give it to me, I'll do it myself." Alai reached out to her for plaster.

Ah Xun didn't argue with her, just gave her a meaningful look with a smile, as if he had seen through her thoughts.

After receiving the plaster and turning his back, Alai bent his arms awkwardly and stubbornly, reaching for the wound on his back through his clothes.

Ah Xun took a bunch of bamboo slips and a few silk cloths and sat down at the desk, turned on the oil lamp, opened them one by one, and immersed himself in the ancient books.

The warm plaster was applied to the wound, and soon his body, which had been tense for a day, relaxed a lot, and the stagnant blood began to flow smoothly in Alai's body again.Alai moved his arms and legs, and saw his sister propping her head and flipping the bamboo slips and silk cloth with one hand, as if she wanted to find the answer she wanted from the vast sea of ​​books, but she couldn't get it. direct tears.

"My sister has been running around all day, she should rest early." Ah looked at her red eyes and advised her.

Ah Xun shook his head: "It is difficult for bandits to ravage Qi County now. Although Sun Mingyi dispatched 7000 soldiers from Lin County to support, but the original [-] soldiers in Qi County and our Xie Mansion's trilogy are less than [-] in total. There are too many rogues and they have been scattered in the city. First, it is not easy to search and kill, and second, if a direct conflict is triggered, it will be the people who will suffer. I, Da Yu, was trapped by the war. The strong men fought against the enemy on the northern front all the year round, causing countless casualties. The national treasury is empty, food and grass are hard to collect, and it happens that there are bandits rampant in the year of great famine. Why is my country so lucky? Hey... I have to find a way to share my father's worries. These classics are my father who spent a lot of time and money. If they are collected here, they must be able to find some ideas from the classics from ancient times to the present, otherwise they can only be called a pile of junk. It’s a pity that after searching for a long time, they are all obscure sentences, why can’t the ancients speak well?”

A Lai stood aside, not knowing whether to laugh or not.I have seen with my own eyes since I was a child that the mistress chased Ah Xun and asked her to study more, but she refused to listen, and only liked to wield knives and sticks.As many gentlemen as she asked came back to teach her, as many as she would be pissed off.Ah Xun himself said that he is not a material for reading.But as he got older, Mr. Xie often took her to do business outside. With a broad vision, he became more and more aware that Confucian classics are the foundation of life, and wanted to read more books.But I feel drowsy when I hold the volume, and hate the awkward and jerky speech of the ancients, for the purpose of making people unable to understand.

Ah Xun asked: "Ah Lai, how long have I been teaching you martial arts?"

"It's been more than three years since I returned to my sister."

"How about reading and writing?"

"It's been two years."

"Although you can't read many words, you are still illiterate. Come and help me look through the volumes to find any ancient methods that can be used for reference to deal with the current situation."

"Yes."

Ah Lai hugged the heavy bamboo slips, sat on the ground and opened them by the light, sneaking a peek at the distressed Ah Xun from time to time, thinking that it should be a while before pretending to think of a countermeasure.No, let's talk about finding the corresponding classics, lest my sister suspect that she has already thought of a way.Grandma said to be a low-key person, she was afraid of being beaten and dared not go against it.

After spending time looking for two sticks of incense, Alai finally found a record about the management of refugees in the Benji of Emperor Guangwu of the former dynasty.

"Sister, look, we can learn from this method and disperse the Jixi refugees to various counties in Suichuan. After entering the native places of the major clans, they will be unified into the army and distributed food and salaries. The refugees will not make trouble when they are full. Yes. wrong?"

Ah Xun frowned, and took the bamboo slip in her hand: "Where is it? Let me see."

"Well...that's it."

Ah Xun looked at A Lai in surprise after reading it:

"Emperor Guangwu recruited refugees in the third year of Jixi. With just one sentence, how did you expand so much?"

A Lai was really blocked by her.

In fact, the word "incorporation" has already summarized a lot of information.According to my mother, the solution to the disaster of refugees throughout the ages is basically the same routine, breaking up, naturalizing, recruiting, filling their stomachs and sending them to the front line.One can eliminate disasters and the other can enrich the army, killing two birds with one stone.

Unexpectedly, my sister couldn't figure it out. This rhetorical question made Alai startled, and then said: "Sister, have you forgotten? Last year, the teacher Xie Gong invited for my sister told the story of Emperor Wen's personal expedition to Zhensuidong. In the story It mentioned the method of collection. At that time, you dragged me to listen together for three months, but unfortunately, A Lai was so stupid that he forgot after listening, and it was only after seeing Emperor Guangwu Benji that he remembered that there is still such a way."

"Is there?" Ah Xun did have the allusion of "Emperor Wen Zhen Suidong" in her memory, but she had no impression of the method of collection. She glanced at A Lai slightly, and was a little surprised by her good memory.But this method is not bad, and he said to Alai: "Forget it, I will go and mention it to my father tomorrow, in case it is useful."

Alai accompanied Ah Xun to scroll through the scrolls until midnight before returning to his room.

The door opened, and the sound of "creaking" echoed in the empty room.She didn't light the lamp, so she tiptoed into bed for fear of disturbing her mother's sleep.When I reached out to touch it, it turned out to be a cold blanket.

Grandma isn't here?

A Lai got out of bed and turned on the lamp, looked around the room, but there was indeed no sign of Grandma.

Didn't she come back early?Where are you going so late?

Thinking of the tragic death of the fourth aunt today, when Ah Lai was anxious to go out to find Xiaoshi, he happened to bump into Xiaoshi who followed into the house.

"Mom? Where have you been?"

Xiao's face was tired, his eyes were lowered, and even his voice was soft.She stroked the back of Alai's head and said, "It's okay, the room is too stuffy, so I'll go out for a walk to get some air. Go to sleep."

It's so cold and windy outside the house, not to mention breathing, it may be blown to suffocation.

Grandma obviously lied, but Alai didn't expose it, and helped the exhausted her to bed to rest.

When helping grandma take off her shoes, grandma's hand gently stroked her head again.Alai squatted under the bed and looked up at her and smiled obediently.

The candlelight was flickering, and there were scars on the back of Grandma's hands that had darkened over time, and some calluses on the palms that could not be erased.These hands are totally different from other people's hands. When Alai asked her how she got these scars when she was a child, Alai was just perfunctory.

Grandma didn't want to say it, and from then on, Alai didn't ask any more. Being an obedient and sensible daughter is more important than anything else.

As usual, she fell asleep on Mom's arms after massaging her legs and knees.

The dew was deeper, and the cold wind came in from all directions in the dilapidated house.The room where the house slave lived was near the avenue outside the mansion, and screams from outside could be heard from time to time.That was the rebellion of the refugees.

But as long as she was with her mother, she felt extremely safe.

"What? You and Ah Xun proposed to recruit refugees?"

I fell asleep with each other last night, and woke up early this morning to talk about what happened yesterday.The Xiao family was thinking about the next strategy the Xie family might adopt, but A Lai slipped his tongue and revealed the matter.Sure enough, he was scolded by Xiaoshi.

"Alai, what do I tell you repeatedly on weekdays? Tell me once!"

Alai lowered his head: "Mother said, unless it is absolutely necessary, you are not allowed to reveal your martial arts and Confucian classics."

"Then how did you do it?"

"But it's the time when love is the last resort. The refugees are besieging the city, and the fourth aunt has suffered a catastrophe. Since she was a child, her mother taught Alai that to receive kindness from others should be tied with an inch of grass and repaid like a dog and a horse. Xie Mansion Everyone treats me as a servant, only my sister recognizes me and teaches me to read, learn to write, and practice martial arts to strengthen my body. Besides my mother, my sister is the only one who treats me the best, how can I see her in danger and ignore her?"

"You can quibble. Since you remember the retribution of an inch of grass, you should also understand the truth of not betraying your relatives. I warn you every day, and it is by no means a casual gossip. Lai, you are smart, but unfortunately sometimes It’s too shallow to see things. It’s understandable to think of repaying Ah Xun’s kindness to you, but Ah Xun is not stupid. If you want to help her, you only need to mention a few words, and she will understand. You may hurt her self-esteem if you talk eloquently, and it will even arouse suspicion."

"What my mother said is that I will pay attention to it in the future."

"Hey... don't blame grandma for being long-winded. Even if Ah Xun treats you as a younger sister, you can't really treat her as your older sister. We are just servants of the Xie family, and we shouldn't and cannot have any schemes. You want Remember that Muxiu is bound to be destroyed by Lin Feng. Grandmother taught you martial arts just in case one day, she doesn’t want you to become famous. Grandmother’s biggest wish is that you can live well and live safely, do you understand? "

Alai nodded in confusion: "Alai understands, but what will happen someday, Aunt? What if?"

Xiao looked at her daughter's face that resembled her own, as if promising: "With Grandma here, there will be no accidents."

It took some effort on Yao's side to persuade Xie Taixing to calm down, knowing that he was going to sleep in another courtyard tonight, he didn't stay any longer, and took someone to the ancestral hall to see his son.Although Xie Taixing didn't blame her for the fourth aunt's matter, he must be unhappy in his heart.It's just that because of his Nanya Yao family's family background and the credit for having a son and a daughter for him, it's not easy to get angry with him, so he can only vent his anger on his son.Although Cheng Yi did this thing without thinking, it can be regarded as a crooked attack to get rid of a thorn in her heart that has been stuck in her heart for many years.

Xie Taixing's unhappiness made her feel a little happy, and she couldn't help but curl her lips while walking on the road.

The deep love between her and Xie Taixing in the past is now only about interests.She used to have ambitions in all directions, but now she has spent half her life in this backyard for several concubines.

Fortunately, she has a son.

Even if she is ineffective, as long as she, the mistress of the Xie family, does not fall, Cheng Yi's position as the heir of the Xie family will be as secure as Mount Tai.

Xie Suishan, who was kneeling alone in the cold ancestral hall, saw his mother coming, so he hurriedly knelt in front of her and called out, "Mother!"

Yao shi didn't have a good rest all day, and was running around at home. The cold wind blew his head and gave him a headache: "Your father just punished you to kneel in the ancestral hall, which is already the lightest punishment."

"This time, the son was reckless, and the son accepted the punishment. But mother, it was obviously Alai's lowly slave who let her fourth aunt escape, causing her to die at the hands of refugees, but my father put the blame on me. The slave mother and daughter have not been punished at all! And Ah Xun, she and I are the same mother and brother, and they spend all day with the lowly slaves, but today they beat me with a whip! There is no respect for my brother! Look, this whip The marks haven't receded yet."

Yao frowned slightly: "Your father won't let you ask about Alai's mother and daughter, so you should think about it here so that there will be no more trouble. I will tell her about Axun. If you want her to respect you, you should respect her." You must first establish the majesty of your elder brother."

Seeing that Yao Shi didn't care about Alai's mother and daughter, Xie Suishan couldn't help but anxiously said: "Mother, father has clearly ignored Alai's mother and daughter these years, and even allowed the servants in the mansion to bully them wantonly. But today not only stopped my son Isn’t it weird to kill them without even punishing them? My father was drunk and made a mistake, but Alai’s appearance can also tell the color of Xiao’s back then. It’s hard to guarantee that Xiao’s will not become the second fourth aunt. Make a plan early! We must not leave this mother and daughter alive!"

Yao Shi originally thought that Xie Suishan could make some progress after this incident, but he didn't want him to be so short-sighted. He didn't understand after talking about it many times, and still missed the internal disputes, and cursed bitterly:

"You often complain that your father values ​​Ah Xun more, but look at yourself! A man who has read poetry and books should have high aspirations! What about you? Do you have other important things to worry about? Your father really punished you lightly!"

Xie Suishan didn't expect that he said the wrong thing again, and hurriedly apologized, but he was not angry.

He is the son of the Xie family, why doesn't he do anything in the eyes of his parents?Ah Xun is just a daughter, and her biggest role is to marry the Xun family to consolidate the power of his Xie family.What he said just now was all for the sake of his mother, but he got a lot of scolding in exchange.

I am really old and confused, and my brain is not working well.