Nongmen Shenjue

After finding this place, the three of them did not rush into the mountain, but first checked the situation.

The mountain in front of me is called Luoyan Mountain. It is undulating and stretches for twenty or thirty miles, stretching extremely deep.The mountains are dangerous, and the villages on the edge of the mountains only collect firewood and dig wild vegetables on the outskirts, and set up rabbits and pheasants. They mainly focus on farming.It is said that after walking into the mountains for two or three days, there is a small village with about [-] households who have been hunting for a living for generations. Because the village is located in a mountain depression, it is called Shan'ao Village.

Shan'ao Village is the closest village to the deep mountain.

Usually no one goes to the mountains, but every autumn there will be fur traders who go to Shan'ao Village to collect leather. People from Shan'ao Village will come out every two or three months to exchange some daily necessities such as oil, salt, soy sauce and vinegar.There are girls in the mountains who are married, but very few are willing to marry in. They are girls who marry out. Because the mountain roads are difficult and the roads are long, it is difficult to return to their natal homes throughout the year.

He also inquired about the dangerous places in Luoyan Mountain. After all, if Mrs. She was hiding here, she would definitely place her lair in a hidden place.In the deep mountains and old forests, it is hidden, and the defense is the hunters in the mountains. Of course, it is necessary to choose an area that the hunters dare not set foot in.

However, people outside know very little. If you want to find out more about it, you have to go to Shan'ao Village.

Rest for one night, and enter the mountain the next day.

This time there is no carriage, the mountain road is difficult to travel, and the road becomes narrower as you go deeper, the carriage cannot go.

With the help of Wen Jixue, ordinary people have to walk two or three mountain roads. They only took one day and arrived at Shan'ao Village that night.It really is a small village, all the houses are made of wood, the difference from the outside villages is that every household has built a yard, or built of stones, or thick logs, which is as tall as a person.

There are more wild animals in the mountains than outside, and the main purpose of the fence is to prevent wild animals.

The night was silent, and a bright moon in the sky clearly illuminated the valley.

Only a few houses were still lit, and there were no human voices. Most of the houses were on the ground, and some were built on the mountainside.There are also reclaimed fields around the col, which are very fragmented and not many in number, but there are vegetable gardens behind every house, surrounded by tree branches and fences.

Even though Wen Jixue took her lightly along the way, Mu Qingyan was tired and hungry after a day of running around.

but……

"Into the village?"

Although it was late at night, the sudden knock on the door by three men must have aroused suspicion.But this village is all hunters, so what kind of property can they have?The three of them don't look like poor money when they're all dressed up.What's more, it's not very cost-effective to go so far into the mountains, even if you want to kidnap people.

Generations of hunters have hunted and seen blood all year round. After all, they are more courageous than ordinary farmers.

They chose the one with the most and best houses.

This Shan'ao village is in the mountains. Although there are only about twenty households, there is an acting village chief.The reason why they are acting chiefs is because their village has few people, and it is merged with the village outside the mountain for management.Furthermore, it is inconvenient to find Shan'ao Village if there is anything that needs to be notified, so someone from the village outside should inform.

The acting head of Shan'ao Village is a highly respected one in the village, and everyone calls him "Uncle Shi".

It was Uncle Shi's house that Mu Qingyan and the others knocked open.

Although surrounded by stone walls, the three of them are not short, standing at the gate of the courtyard can clearly see the courtyard.Several people knocked on the door and made noises. The Shi family naturally knew that they were strangers.After asking a few words across the door, someone opened the door. Three middle-aged men came out, either holding a hatchet or a stick in their hands, and they were very cautious.

Third Uncle Shi is a man in his forties, dark and strong. After looking at the three of them, he patted his son comfortingly, went to open the courtyard door himself, and greeted with a smile: "Guests, please come in quickly."

As he spoke, he called the old wife and daughter-in-law into the house to boil water for the guests.

Oil lamps were lit in the main room, but the women and children stayed in the other rooms.

"Why did you guys come to the mountains?" Uncle Shi looked at them, and the three of them didn't look like traders, nor did they look like they came to hunt.

It was Mu Qingyan who spoke, and compared to Wen Jixue and Jiao Li, Mu Qingyan was a little more friendly.

"To tell you the truth, we came to the mountains to find medicine. My father fell ill, and the condition was recurrent and difficult to heal. Many doctors were helpless. Only one doctor said that it could be cured, but he needed a special medicinal material. The medicinal material was just a rumor. I haven’t found it for a long time, but an old drug farmer said that someone saw it in Luoyan Mountain in the early years, so we came to try our luck. After all, we have no experience, and we missed the time on the way, and we only arrived at the village after dark.”

As Mu Qingyan said, he took the initiative to hand over his identity document.

Third Uncle Shi took it over with a natural look on his face. He can be acting head of a village, so he can naturally know a few words.He held up his ID card and approached the oil lamp, his vigilant eyes relaxed slightly, but he said in surprise, "Are you from Jinyang Mansion? It's not close from Jinyang Mansion."

Not only is it not close, it is actually a long way away.

What Mu Qingyan used was his real identity certificate, but Sanshu Shi showed no abnormality, it can be seen that he had never heard of "Mu Qingyan".

This also makes sense.

To put it bluntly, despite the inconvenient transportation and stagnant information exchange in ancient times, Mu Qingyan's reputation has spread to many places after two or three years of operation.However, most of the places where information circulates are prefectures and counties, and the worst are bustling small towns. The general rural people only know about farming and family affairs, and even the county's affairs are slow to receive, let alone Shan'ao Village in the mountains.

The people in this mountain, even the land is scattered land for reclamation. They only care about the price of game and leather, the amount of wild animals in the mountain, and the annual tax.

Don't look at Third Uncle Shi feeling that Jinyang Mansion is far away, but he probably doesn't know Jinyang Mansion at all.

It is precisely because I have never heard of it that I feel "far away".

After seeing the identity document, the Shi family let go of most of their guard, and heard that they were looking for medicine for their father, so they naturally liked it.Without further ado, a room was cleaned up for the three of them. The conditions are naturally not good, but this is not the time to be picky.

When I woke up, the sky was bright outside the window.

Mu Qingyan was the only one left in the room.

The bed in the room is a bed frame made of wood by myself, and it is very spacious with wooden boards. If you really want to lie on three big men, you can squeeze them together.Of course, Mu Qingyan and Wen Jixue were sleeping on the bed, Jiao Li didn't dare, so he just pushed the stools together and made a thin quilt to sleep all night.

As soon as she got up, Wen Jixue came in with washing water.

"You wash your face first, and I'll serve the meal." Wen Jixue said and went out again.

He came in again later, carrying a large coarse porcelain bowl and a plate, followed by Jiao Li, also holding a coarse porcelain bowl.Mu Qingyan looked at it for a while, and recognized a bowl of sorghum rice porridge. On the plate were two rolled omelets, and in the other bowl were pickled vegetables, garlic leaves and heads, and a lot of chili was added to pickle them together. made.Those garlic heads are not big, but they are all whole. They should be small wild garlic grown in the mountains.

"Have you eaten?" Looking at these, it was obviously a meal for one person.

"Well, the Shi family has breakfast, these have been warm in the pot, hurry up and eat while it's hot."

Mu Qingyan was really hungry, so he took a mouthful of porridge, picked up the omelet and took a bite.Hmm... It's different from the egg pancakes I used to eat.Thinking that there is no poultry in this Shan'ao village, I guess it is not eggs laid by domestic chickens, but maybe wild eggs from the mountains. After all, they rely on mountains to eat mountains.

I didn't use rice for breakfast, so I don't think I'll have a lot of money in the future. This omelet must be a standard for entertaining guests.

Walking through the open door, I saw the two children of the Shi family looking at him from a distance, or rather, looking at the omelette in his hand.Mu Qingyan was embarrassed to continue eating, and he didn't mean to be greedy for this bite, so he asked Jiao Li to share the remaining omelet with the two children.

Wen Jixue said: "Although some things are grown here, but the land is small, and each family only has a bit of land, and all they grow are sorghum."

The aunt of the Shi family was angry because her grandson ate the guest's omelette, and when she heard Wen Jixue's words, she sighed and said, "It's not like what the young master said, we all live by hunting, and there are few fields that can be cultivated. Our family Having six fens of land is already a lot, and some families only have three or four fens of land, and they have to buy food for food, so they earn a lot of money a year."

It's not that there is no place to cultivate land in the mountains, the main reason is that there are many wild animals in the mountains. If the places can't be guarded, even if things are planted, they will be harmed.Therefore, people in the village only reclaim and plant near the col, and the natural area is limited.However, the village has lived by hunting for generations, and farming is only to increase income, not the main means of survival, and they will not depend on the output of farming.

"Uncle Shi went hunting?" Mu Qingyan quickly finished his breakfast, and before he could do anything himself, Aunt Shi called his daughter-in-law to collect the dishes and wash them.

"I went there just after dawn. It's already winter, and I have to pack more things before the snow falls, otherwise the year will be difficult." Aunt Shi said in a normal tone, and she was used to this kind of life.

Mu Qingyan chatted with the other party for a while, and asked: "Ask auntie something. The doctor said that the medicinal materials we are looking for grow the most in places with many poisonous snakes and insects. I don't know if auntie knows where there is such a thing in the mountains. place?"

Aunt Shi was stunned for a moment, her expression changed slightly: "Oh, the place you are going to is the Valley of Absolute People, right?"

"Valley of Absolute People?" Doesn't sound like a good place.

Aunt Shi looked a bit apprehensive: "It's in the deep mountains. From here, you have to climb three mountain ridges. Even if you travel fast, it will take two days to get there. That place is not in our hunting range. The mountains are high and the forests are dense. , there are many wolves, tigers and leopards. Although the prey is rich, we must have life. We dare not go in casually, especially when we hear that there will be fog in the morning and evening, and the fog is also poisonous. Just last year, two herbal pickers refused to listen. Persuade me, I plunged in and said, I want to dig wild ginseng, but it never came out again."

As Aunt Shi was talking, she deviated from the topic.

"Auntie, since no one dares to go, how do you know about the Valley of Absolute People? Someone can go in, right?"

Aunt Shi nodded: "In the past, we only knew that we could not go to that place. It was passed down from our ancestors, and no hunter dared to break the precept. But seven or eight years ago, the Ye family kid broke in by accident, and I don't know what method he used to get out. up.

Someone also asked him, he just said he didn't know, and some people followed him and wanted to go in, but the poison was like recognizing someone, watching the Ye family kid go in with a big thorn, nothing happened, but others couldn't, Just got dizzy after touching it a little bit.Now the Ye family boy is having a better life, he has dug good things from inside, and occasionally dug up two medicinal plants, and he can sell them for a good price.His family also has the most land in the village, one and a half acres. "

Aunt Shi raised her finger and pointed to a house on a small hill not far away, and said with emotion: "At the beginning I wanted to marry my little daughter to him, but he was lucky enough to marry a daughter-in-law himself. Now both sons and daughters-in-law are virtuous, and the days are endless." Don't mention how good it is."