The warm sun is melting, the spring is shining, the flowers are coming, plum blossoms and peach blossoms are blooming one after another.

In Liulichang, the capital of the capital, where there are many bookstores, a handsome young man with a purple gourd jug with shiny oil hanging on his waist was sitting at the door of the shop, basking in the sun and eating a bowl of pea yellow that he bought on the way here.

, while bargaining with the shopkeeper who was familiar with the house, saying that the few books he was interested in were old girls who could not get married, he was also flirting with the proprietress of the bookstore next door who had set up a roadside stall to sell books. At the same time, he was here

Waiting for the rabbit, killing three birds with one stone.

The shopkeeper who lent a bench to the young drunkard sat behind the counter and carefully wiped a piece of imitation official porcelain. He raised his head and looked at the rogue guy outside the door who was looking sideways and flirting with the shopkeeper next to him, and said with a smile:

"Shilang Cao, if you dare to touch her hand and hug her a few more times in broad daylight, I will sell you all these books in my shop at a 50% discount. How about that?"

The young man picked up a piece of pea yellow and threw it into his mouth. He said with a playful smile: "Forget it during the day. It's a bad reputation. Can you do it at night? Just listen to the corner?"

The two men at the door spoke in very loud voices, and obviously neither of them deliberately avoided the MILF. Upon hearing this, the woman grabbed a book from the stall, laughed and cursed, and threw the book at it.

That handsome man who has never been upright all day long, "One has no eggs and one has no guts. They both only know how to talk. Isn't it interesting?"

That Shilang Cao was not just a nickname, but a real Shilang from the officialdom of Dali, and besides, he was still the official in charge of the officials.

The young man caught the "hidden weapon" without reading the title of the book. He just sniffed it and gently threw the book back to the beautiful woman's stall. "The content has no meaty taste and the text has no color. I won't read it."

It’s boring, boring.”

Cao Gengxin shifted his gaze a little and saw a few people walking out of an antique shop in the distance. They were all foreigners from Luzhou, Beiju.

The tall, middle-aged man wore a worn-out old mink hat, a cotton-padded jacket, and a pair of suede boots. His face was not bitter at all, but he looked poor.

It is none other than Liu Xu, the swordsman of the Liu family in Luomahe.

Yuan Xuan of Sanlang Temple has a young appearance and is wearing a mud-gold robe.

On this cross-continental trip south to Aquarius Island, the heir of Sanlang Temple, nicknamed "Yuan Yichi" and "Yuan Zhangshui", still only brought two followers, Fan Yu, a martial arts master on the far journey. This female martial arts master

, he once went to the capital of Dali and the battlefield of Dadu, and sacrificed his life. Therefore, the Ministry of Rites of Dali has a detailed record. Fan Yu visited the mountains and rivers in Dali, and the gods of various mountains and rivers received the customs clearance documents.

, if Fan Yu publicly reveals his identity, he must treat him with courtesy. If she intends to walk at night in brocade clothes, there is no need to disturb her travels.

The high gods of Da Li all have such a "gift list" in their hands for easy reference and hospitality at any time. Whether they are mountain monks from other places or warriors in the martial arts world, as long as they have repaid Da Li with morality on the battlefield, the court will take it seriously.

As a scholar of the country, treat him with courtesy.

Liu Wuding, an old swordsman in the Nascent Soul Realm, is different from Fan Yu, who has a similar family status. The old man is the first-class worshiper of Sanlang Temple. His annual salary is quite considerable. He gets a lot of money. In fact, he only does one thing, to give to the direct descendants of the Yuan family.

The disciple's guardian used to be Yuan Yitu, but now he is replaced by Yuan Xuan.

When the old sword cultivator was young, he was a genealogy cultivator, but later he became a wandering Shanze wild cultivator. This was because Liu Wuding had just entered the golden elixir realm, a few days after leaving seclusion.

So I secretly went to demolish another family's ancestral hall. It was my first time doing this kind of thing. I didn't have enough experience in the martial arts. I accidentally failed to hide my identity. The other party saw that my swordsmanship was weak. This caused a big disaster.

, a direct descendant of the ancestral hall who was expected to succeed as the leader, a young genius with a bright future, had to be expelled from the temple and fell into silence.

But looking back at the sword-fighting two hundred years ago, the old man never regretted it.

It doesn't matter if you are young and vigorous, I have been young after all.

Cao Gengxin hurriedly swallowed the last mouthful of pea yellow, shook his sleeves, stood up, shook his robe, smiled and waved: "Liu Jianxian, Mr. Yuan, Liu Jianxian, Grandmaster Fan. Ha, Liu Liu has the same pronunciation. If I had known, I would have only called one person."

.”

The young minister spoke in a very authentic and elegant dialect of Luzhou, Beiju.

Liu Xu frowned and asked, "Are you from the Ministry of Punishment? You want to check our identities?"

The mountain people from the Da Li Dynasty who dealt with monks from other places were usually worshiped by the Ministry of Punishment in name. If Da Li monks were sent to accompany the army, it would not be hospitality.

However, Yuan Xuan recognized the other party's identity and said with a smile: "Uncle Liu, he is not from the Ministry of Punishment. He is the Minister Cao of the Li Ministry of Lijing City. He is a very famous person in the mountains."

This person was indeed very famous, and he was able to make an exception for Emperor Song of Dali to allow Cao Gengxin to bring a jug of wine to the Yamen, but the rule was that he could only drink one jug of wine a day, and no more wine was allowed that day. If he was on duty during the overnight ban, he would also

As a reward, Cao Gengxin was given a jar of Changchun Palace Immortal Wine as a reward, euphemistically called fishing with wine, so that Cao Gengxin would not have to find excuses to ask for leave and not order Mao. There were rumors in official circles that Cao Gengxin, who had returned to Beijing and became a minister, had prepared more than a dozen of them early.

He used this excuse to avoid all kinds of official duties, which he felt would be the same with or without him, and he would do it all over again every time he used it.

To the north of Luzhou, the north-south Zhongtiao Mountain runs along a large river. The mountain is long and narrow, and the entire majestic mountain range is like a god with his eyes raised between his eyebrows.

The Liu clan of Luomahe and the Yuan clan of Sanlangmiao are located to the east and west of a mountain range extremely rich in mineral resources, occupying a cornucopia and an armory respectively.

Cao Gengxin gave Yuan Xuan a thumbs up, "Young man is so knowledgeable!"

Yuan Xuan smiled and said: "Servant Cao, actually I am not young anymore."

Cao Gengxin nodded and said: "Then we are the same, with a tender face, so we have an advantage."

Liu Xu asked: "People from the Ministry of Civil Affairs? What do you want from us?"

Cao Gengxin smiled and said: "Actually, I am not looking for you, I am waiting for someone with you. I have been his neighbor for many years, but I have never met him. After thinking about it, I always feel uncomfortable."

Yuan Xuan asked: "Is it Master Chen Shan?"

Cao Gengxin smiled and said: "Young Master Yuan is so smart, he guessed right."

Yuan Xuan secretly murmured, "You will wait for whomever we look for. How hard is it to guess? Besides, the Longquan County Kiln Supervisor Building Office and the Luopo Mountain are neighbors."

Liu Xu said: "Why do you see him?"

In fact, this question is a bit inappropriate.

The official Cao Gengxin didn't care what Liu Xu did when he came to Dali, and the swordsman Liu Xu certainly didn't care who Cao Gengxin wanted to see.

But it can be seen that the relationship between Liu Xu and Chen Ping'an is definitely not as ordinary as he and Yuan Xuan said.

However, Cao Gengxin didn't look annoyed at all. He patted the wine gourd on his waist, turned to the beautiful woman who was setting up a stall to dry out books, and asked with a smile: "Shopkeeper Nangong, what do you want to say?"

The woman smiled and said: "One of Su Zi's famous chapters is in order, 'The woman said that I have a bucket of wine stored away for a long time, just in case my son needs it from time to time.'"

Cao Gengxin said with a smile: "I still need to introduce myself. My name is Cao Gengxin. I am named Shucheng. I am a native of the capital. I worked as a kiln supervisor for many years. I got along like a fish in water at the old site of Lizhudongtian. Now I am working as an official.

Working as an errand to earn a living means you are depressed and frustrated. If there are no noble people in the court to support you, it will be very difficult to become an official."

Cao Gengxin turned his head and said with a smile: "The rightful master is here."

Liu Xu and Liu Wuding looked at each other.

This man surnamed Cao is not only a Qi practitioner, but also has a very high level.

Cao Gengxin glanced at Liu Xu and Liu Wuding.

Once upon a time, a Yuanying realm qi practitioner, not to mention a swordsman, was already so unattainable. Now looking at old gods like them, it seems that they are just like that.

Just like when Cao Gengxin was young, he remembers the first time he went to visit Liu Gao in the alley outside Renyun Yiyun Building. Because he knew the realm of the old immortal beforehand, he was still a little uneasy. Even after carrying two jugs of good wine, he still had to worry about etiquette.

If it's not enough, will he be rejected? Looking at it now, he can still drink with Brother Liu.

If he were younger, when he was young, Cao Gengxin would inevitably be a little worried about what he saw and heard among his family elders and what they discussed about state affairs. Even if it was a temple calculation that was sure to win, he would deliberately pretend to be unsure.

Now we, the children of the Great Li Dynasty, all regard the Great Li Dynasty as one of the most powerful countries in the world, and regard this kind of thing as the most natural thing.

Especially the gang of bastards in Yichi Lane and Chier Street have begun to calculate their respective advantages and disadvantages with the Daduan Dynasty and Xuanmi Dynasty in Middle-earth, and speculate on when the Great Li will catch up.

Actually, it wasn't like this before.

I remember that when I was young, Cao Gengxin once asked my grandfather about an official story that was famous in both the government and the public. Shen Chen, Minister of the Ministry of War, really scolded Cui Guoshi? Since Shen Chen resigned from the Ministry of Civil Affairs, with his stubborn character, he founded everything in his hometown.

After studying in the academy, why did he later want to return to officialdom? Was it really Cui Guoshi who personally came forward and actively invited Shen Chen to join the capital to take charge of the military department?

After all, Cao Gengxin's grandfather was the head of the Cao family in Shangzhu Kingdom. The outside world could only rely on guesswork, but this old man could ask Shen Chen face to face to find out the truth.

It turns out that Cui Guoshi visited the local academy and indeed personally invited Shen Chen to return to officialdom. The reason for convincing the stubborn and tempered Shen Shen was very simple.

Cui Chan asked Shen Chen to raise his eyes and take a longer view.

Since it will all be the land of Da Li soon, why do you, Shen Shen, care about those trivial things?

If the anecdote was limited to this, Cao Gengxin actually felt that Cui Guoshi was so talented and powerful that it would not make the young man's scalp numb and his back chilly.

It turned out that the old man had told his most valued grandson a more "trivial matter" at that time, saying that when Cui Guoshi showed up at the private academy, the academy that Shen Shen had worked so hard to establish with all his family property had already been converted into a government-run institution, and the new appointee

The mountain chief is already on his way to take office, and that mountain chief is a literary scholar whom Shen Chen originally disliked. He has three generations of scholars and five Jinshi. Once this person takes over the academy, there will be both public enmity and conflict.

Personal grudges, I guess Shen Shen will be disgusted to death. The so-called resigning and living in seclusion in his hometown is really a miserable attempt to get water in vain.

Cui Chan gave you a choice, and there is no second choice.

You Shen Shen can either suffocate in your hometown until you die, or you can obediently go to the capital of Dali to become a high official, serving the country and the people as your own, and serving the common people and the country as three immortals as your ambition, working hard and displaying your ambitions.

So Cao Gengxin came to the conclusion very early that the smarter the person, the more afraid he is of Cui Guoshi.

Cao Gengxin has been the kiln affairs supervisor for so many years. Do you really think that Cao Gengxin doesn't want to make a successful career? It's just that Cao Gengxin is smart enough and doesn't dare to be smart.

After leaving Qianbu Corridor, Jiang Shangzhen said he was going to Changchun Palace to attend to some personal matters.

Xie Gou is still at the Fire Temple.

Chen Ping'an, with only Xiao Mo by his side, came here to find Liu Xu and his party.

Cao Geng bowed heartily and took the initiative to apologize: "I have been an official in a small town for many years, but I did not go to Luopo Mountain to visit Master Chen. I am very rude."

"I didn't go to the Yamen Supervisory Office to visit my parents, so I think it's even."

Chen Ping'an returned the salute with his hand and asked with a smile: "Why is Minister Cao here, waiting for me? Are you waiting here?"

Cao Gengxin smiled and said: "Sure enough, I can't hide it from Master Chen."

Chen Pingan asked: "Do you have anything to discuss?"
To be continued...