Twilight War

Chapter 52 Wine Searching for Sacrifice

Queen Frigg had two sons, one was Baldr, the son of light, and the other was Hodr, the son of darkness.

And he only loves Baldr, and hates Hodr who was born blind.

Then he dreamed of Baldr's death and begged all things in the world not to harm Baldr, but he forgot it because of the weakness of the mistletoe.

Later, Loki lured Hodur to kill Baldr with a branch of mistletoe before the gods.

??????"The Bard Says"

01

Zichen was walking on the Great Wall of Juyongguan, and the lights on the observatory in the distance were like sparks falling in the wilderness.

"Tomorrow is the young master's birthday, right?" Xiang Liu said after Zichen.

"En." Zichen nodded, if Xiang Liu hadn't mentioned it, he would have forgotten it.

In previous years, his birthday was probably spent in the monastery, where most of the monks were orphans, and without a birthday, he also forgot his own birthday.

"The birthday of the Patriarch is in the middle of summer every year, so the wine hunting festivals I have entered the Huangxuan family are all in summer. From now on, the wine hunting festivals of the Huangxuan family will be at the end of winter and early spring." Xiang Liu explain.

"It sounds a bit cold." Zichen chuckled.

His mother said that the peach blossoms bloomed early in the year he was born, but there was another heavy snowfall when he was born.

So the peach blossoms are covered with snow, and the eyes are full of concubines.

"When the calamity of alien beasts is over, we should make up for this wine hunt." Xiang Liu looked at the endless wasteland in the distance and said, no one knew how many alien beasts were lurking there.

"Just tomorrow." Zichen said suddenly.

"kindness?"

"The Huangxuan family hasn't had a wine search festival for three years, has it not? Since I've already returned, why delay it any longer."

"But now..."

"Now is the best time." He chuckled.

Before Xiang Liu could say anything, he saw the boy running up to the highest observation tower in Juyong Pass, and the huge Kui drum was sounded.

The red dyed cloth on the drumsticks fluttered.

Slaughter the cattle and sheep tonight, and tomorrow will just be able to put all the barbecue grills on the bonfire.

Take out the good wine from the cellar tonight, tomorrow just peel off the mud from the altar, and drink with the whole city.

"Holding the imperial feathers and offering sacrifices, the four directions come to worship. You can drive here in the Xuan car, and travel around the four directions."

"Auspicious days, bright days, prepare osmanthus wine and steamed delicacies."

It was the Huangxuan Family's Jiu Xun Festival.

It is the grandest day in the south of the Yangtze River. The Qinhuai River flows with fine wine, and anyone who comes to get it will be drunk. The beggar who fishes for wine will fall into the shadow of the moon through the ages.

The emperor should not, the prosperous place.

All kinds of calls, all kinds of calls, the young son swims on 36th street.

Throwing away the drumstick, Zichen clapped his hands, and shouted with a light smile, "Get ready, tomorrow, I want to see cattle and sheep on all the bonfires, and I want the whole Juyongguan to flow good wine."

"What about you, young master, what are you going to do?"

"I'm going to invite Zhou Gong to drink with me tomorrow!"

The young man jumped off the high observation deck, his fur overturned, and the red tie caused the wind to blow up.

Xiang Liu suddenly understood why so many people told the story of Huang Xuan and Chen Chen over and over again.

Who in this world can't love that romantic young man.

They are the most wanton moonlight, they take off the beetle for a drink.

That flirtatious young man took things lightly.

Realizing the boy's meaning, Xiang Liu frowned, "Isn't it just going to sleep by myself, dare we just keep us busy."

"What is the noise outside the door?" General Tanlang heard the commotion outside the door early in the morning, and for a moment he even felt that he was not at the border, but in Chang'an West City.

"I heard that the young master of the Huangxuan family wants to celebrate the Jiuxun Festival."

"What kind of wine is looking for festivals?" General Tanlang frowned, "Is there any wine to drink?"

After months of heavy security, Juyongguan seems to be suddenly bustling.

There are still many people in the city who have not left. I don't know if they believed Zichen's words and tried their best to guard, or they really couldn't think of other places to go.

Anyway, where is not drifting.

Most of the cattle and sheep in the city that were raised for the winter were killed, and even the good wine from the cellars of the general's mansion was dug out.

And the instigator of everything - the young master of the Huangxuan family was playing stone games with a child at the bottom of a tree in a corner while smelling the smell of barbecue in the air.

He held a stone and drew a crooked nine-square grid on the ground, and then shook a few stones in his hand.

Throwing stones on the Jiugong grid, Zichen counted the stones under the line.

"Four." As he spoke, he rowed in the nine grids.

"You only made three lines!" The child next to him erased the lines he had drawn.

"It's obviously four." He raised his eyelids rather rascally and said, and then touched the stone beside the line, "Look, isn't this pressing down?"

"You lied to children, you have to be ashamed." The child who was still wearing crotch pants looked at Zichen with disdain and yelled.

As a result, Zichen looked at the child with serious eyes, then touched the child's head with his dirt-stained hand, "You already know how to deceive, so you can't be considered a child."

After snatching all the fried melon seeds from the child's pocket, Zichen kowtowed the melon seeds while basking in the sun with a bunch of old men beside the earthen wall.

Some of them were left behind by those who fled, and some were widowers and childless. They lived like cattle and sheep in this city with no farmland but pasture grass.

"You are old!" Zichen kowtowed the melon seeds and asked the old man next to him. The old man was shaving his head, and his gray hair fell to the ground with the razor.

"It's a good day today!" The old man replied very happily.

"I said how old are you this year!" Zichen continued to ask relentlessly.

"The sun is so good today!" The old man sitting on the soil bench looked up at Zichen and said, his wrinkled face sunken in a smile, and only one front tooth remained.

"Okay, today is a good day." Zichen lowered his head and spat out the melon seeds and muttered.

The barber sharpened the water knife twice with a whetstone, tore off the shawl from the old man, and shook it twice, "Alright, sir, what do you think?"

"Good day!" the old man said with a smile.

It is indeed a sunny day, Zichen raised his head and looked at the sun in the sky and thought.

Frontier soldiers were rolling wine jars on the ground, and several women were rubbing marinade on the scorched meat.

Zichen wiped the skin of the melon seeds on his hands, and ran over to help the women wipe the marinade.

"Which family's little brother was born really handsome."

Zichen didn't answer, just smeared thick chili noodles on several pieces of mutton with a smile.

After wiping the cured meat, he took a wine gourd and filled a gourd full of wine, and lay down on a low wall in Juyongguan to take his afternoon nap.

There are hundreds of black forehead belts fluttering in the wind tied to the trees beside the low wall.

The owners of those forehead bands are gone.

There are dozens of such trees in the city.

He tore off one and covered his eyes.

Then lie back on your back.

Big dream fainted.

Skylight shines through the black forehead band.

Zichen vaguely remembered that his father had told him that black was the color of the sky.

A long time ago, people believed that the blue in the daytime is not the color of the sky, but the color of the sun, and the black at night is the color of the moon.

And the true color of the sky should be seen when the sun has set and the moon has not yet risen.

So black is not black, but a slight red in black.

He raised his hand upwards, as if to cover the sky from all eyes.

"Young Master Jin, it's time to wake up."

Zichen tore off his forehead strap, looked at Chu Wu who was standing by the low wall, "accompany me to take a walk outside the pass."

"It's uncertain when a bunch of strange beasts will come out of the pass and bite you into meat paste." Chu Wu said.

"Let's go, I want to take a look."

The two rode across the Wanglong River, the heavy snow hadn't completely melted, and a large piece of weeds grew under the snow.

Withered yellow and gray and white scattered, like a chessboard between heaven and earth.

Zi Chence immediately climbed to a high place and looked at the Wanli Rivers and Mountains in the pass.

"What is the young master looking at?" Chu Wu followed Zichen.

"I want to see the rivers and mountains that made half of the rivers and lakes come here 800 years ago." Zichen said.

"You know that I have been away from home for several years, right?" Zichen asked.

"know."

"At that time, I admired the rivers and lakes in the book and wanted to find the girl in red and Mo Dao Ke, but that was the rivers and lakes of 800 years ago. Now I only see a few taels of silver, the wanderer draws his sword, and only officials. Brother Pao on the road was talking nonsense. At that time, I felt that Jianghu was gone."

"But I understand now. There is only one woman in red, and there is only one old man in green coir. And 800 years ago, there may have been such a world, but no one cared about it. So there should be 1 1 waiters pour tea and sell wine, 1 vagabonds draw swords for broken silver, and [-] paoge worship Guan Gong."

That is also the arena.

Even if there is no storyteller to tell them.

But they are still Jianghu.

The boy immediately stood on the mountain.

This is Mobei, the northernmost frontier of Donghuang.

Countless wanderers were buried here, and countless frontier soldiers died here.

The interlaced Great Wall stretches like a sand line.

And that Juyongguan is like a sand table in the thousands of miles of mountains and rivers. On the sand table, there are wine, meat, and living people.

"There must be countless people like this in the half of the rivers and lakes that came here."

They held a city and the northernmost frontier of the country.

But they are really just a group of nameless wanderers.

"Since the young master understands everything, why did he come out in person?" Chu Wu asked.

"If you don't see it with your own eyes, how will you know the beauty of the mountains and rivers?"

The young man let go of the black forehead band in his hand, and said with a smile, "Let's go, I've seen all these thousands of miles of mountains and rivers."

Back in the city, it was nightfall.

Meat was roasted on the bonfire, and everyone drank and sang.

A few drunk people danced the Chudi sacrificial dance around the bonfire.

Zichen picked up the wine gourd on the horse, and watched the dancers while drinking.

"The young master is back?" Xiang Liu led Zichen's horse.

"What are they doing?" Zichen looked at the chaotic crowd at the gate of the city.

"It's arm wrestling. General Tanlang has already won many people." Xiang Liu said with a smile.

"I'll go and have a look too." Zichen jumped off the horse.Zichen took a jug of wine, put it on the table, looked at General Tanlang, "How about a match?"

"You?" General Tanlang looked at the boy's figure like a girl, "I don't compare myself to you, for fear that others will say that I bully girls."

"You come." General Tanlang got up from the willow bench and patted a frontier soldier beside him.

The frontier soldier was showing half of his arm, Zichen looked at it, and tore off half of his sleeve as well, for courage, who wouldn't.

"Come on." He looked at the man provocatively and said.

"This time, don't bet on it." The few Huangxuan family members next to him frowned and said.

"That can't be done. When you General Xiangliu came up just now, you were the ones rushing to arrest him." The frontier soldier on the side of General Tanlang yelled.

"Okay, I'll give you a penny." Fu Zhu frowned and took out a penny.

"Two Wen." Xiang Liu generously handed over two Wen.

Zichen looked back at Xiang Liu, "Is this how you treat the future Patriarch?"

"Young master, no, you have to recognize yourself. If you beat the wooden fish with the opponent, I will definitely bet you with all my money." Xiang Liu said.

"But I...don't remember how to knock." Zichen frowned.

"Then I have no choice."

"Two dollars."

"Three coins."

"..."

The frontier troops on the opposite side pressed their side one after another.

"What about you? Even if you win, you will still share the three pennies." Zichen frowned: "The three pennies will have to be broken into several pieces by you."

The opposite side looked like we couldn't lose anyway.

Compared with the other side, Zichen's wrist looks like a piece of bamboo that can be broken at any time.

However, even though the opponent had exhausted all his strength, he still couldn't break Zichen over, and there was a mistake on the opposite side, and Zichen suddenly exerted force to break the opponent over.

"Drink!" Zichen said proudly.

"Impossible! Impossible!" The person opposite said in surprise.

"The young master is mighty!"

"Come, come, bring the money!" Fuzhu shouted.

"This bowl of wine, drink it." Zichen pushed the wine over.

Zichen competed with the frontier army a few more times. Although they were deadlocked for a long time, Zichen won them all.There are more and more people around.

In the end, General Tanlang pushed away the people on the bench, "I'm coming! I still don't believe it, such a big frontier army can't cure a girl."

Both sides bet.

Although the Huangxuan family didn't really believe in their young master, Zichen had just won a few bets, so the bets on both sides were not much different.

General Tanlang thought he would be able to knock Zichen down, but suddenly found that he couldn't pull the boy's wrist away.

The two sides are deadlocked.

Everyone was staring at the wrists of the two men.

The wind blows through the border city of Guancheng.

"It's not bad." General Tanlang smiled.

"It's okay." Zichen smiled reluctantly.

Suddenly, with a crisp sound of metal breaking, Zichen's wrist was pulled away.

"what!"

Zichen had no choice but to raise his wrist, half of the sharp broken blade was inserted into the table, and the handle of the other half was tied to his wrist and hidden in his sleeve.

There is a complicated ingenuity on the handle of the knife, which is obviously a retractable buckle.

"Well, you Huangxuan boy, you are playing dirty with me." General Tanlang slapped the table and shouted.

"If it weren't for this, how could we have such a game with the general." Zichen smiled like a rascal.

"The wine here is not good enough. One day I will send the general a vase of flower carvings to apologize to the general."

Zichen got up from the willow bench.

The drunken people around the campfire were still dancing.

Lu Shen helped several women cut and roast meat, and those women who had been at the border all the year round joked that Lu Shen looked good and would definitely find a good husband.

The little monk in the ruined temple on the Yuntai couldn't bear the excitement outside, so he ran down to play.

"Little monk, read some scriptures for me, how about I share some meat with you." Xin Yi couldn't calm down and teased the blushing little monk.

"Monks... don't eat meat and fish. My Buddha is merciful, my Buddha is merciful." The little monk bowed his head and recited.

"You Buddha is merciful. You won't even let you eat meat. How can you be merciful?"

Lu Shu cut some meat and said he wanted to give some to Princess Yingluo.

Xiangliu arranged people for the changing of the guard outside the crowd, even if the entire Juyongguan passed out drunk, there must still be sober people.

He remembered that a Wuxian teacher in the Huangxuan family had told him a long time ago??????Actually, the Huangxuan family is just a group of people who want to dance together.

A long time ago, in the distant past.

The word Huang has not yet been occupied by emperors. It is the great beauty between heaven and earth, and it is the white feather crown of the young leader in the sacrificial ceremony.

The female dance with a feather fan in hand is called the imperial dance, and the priest wearing a feather crown on his head is called the emperor's sacrifice.

And in that long time ago, those people slaughtered and sacrificed, danced in the wind, beat drums and played music, between heaven and earth.

It is the most sincere, primitive, warmest and cleanest emotion.

All the people danced in the days when winter passed and spring came.

In that day, there were flowers and plants, bird feathers, men and women who liked each other, children and old people.

Huang is the feather of a bird and a free soul.Xuan is a car that can go to the world, from Kunlun to Fusang.

We just want to dance freely between heaven and earth together.

He remembered that a beggar asked him a long time ago, "Boy, what do you think you have lived."

If he could still see that beggar now, he would say to him: "Anyone who comes to this world once is considered to have lived."

In this bonfire-burning city, Zichen picked up a wine gourd and took a sip of wine.