Early the next morning, Wei Ran didn't even have time to eat breakfast after getting up, so he said that he was going to go to the mountain castle to visit.
"Are you leaving now?" Xia Shushi, who had also just gotten up, asked in shock.
"Let's go now"
Wei Ran had already packed his small luggage while he was talking, "I checked last night and found that there is no direct flight there. It was almost ten o'clock in the evening when we got there, and it's still quite a long distance from the airport.
, so I’d better drive there.”
"Drive over there?" Xia Shushi subconsciously glanced at the sky outside the window, "Why are you in such a hurry? We have..."
“It’s already September”
Wei Ran paused and said very seriously, "Let's investigate everything before the National Day. Just treat it as a gift."
Hearing this, Xia Shushi, who was originally lazy, became more serious, "Okay, I will help you search for literature later."
"Then I'll leave it to you." Wei Ran patted the other party's shoulder and hurriedly walked downstairs.
He said hello to Mr. Jiang, Uncle Jiang, and Aunt Yang Jin, who had also gotten up early. Wei Ran did not mention that he was leaving. He just said that he was going out for a walk, and then left the small courtyard filled with the scent of medicine alone.
Setting the navigation address to the Memorial Hall of the Battle of Mountain Castle, Weiran started the car and waited for a while, taking the opportunity to take a piece of cold medicine, then stepped on the accelerator and left this plateau town, following the direction of the long march that year.
Went to the meeting place.
The reason why he chose to drive there so hard was because he was in a hurry. He just wanted to continue walking the road he had not finished with the little lama and others - in another time and space, in another way.
If only there had been such an easy road back then...
While Wei Ran was distractedly admiring the scenery along the way and the large trucks and cars passing by from time to time, he couldn't help but feel more and more sad in his heart. He couldn't help but think of his assumptions before entering that historical episode.
If those soldiers who could not get out of the grassland could see the grassland today, even the flat roads and the busy cars on the road, would they sigh and sigh, or would they laugh with relief.
This time, he already had an extremely certain answer in his heart.
After walking and stopping along the way, when he arrived at the Mountain Castle Battle Memorial Hall, it was already past one o'clock in the night. Fortunately, the huge monument was only less than 200 meters away from him.
Parking the car on the roadside beside the entrance archway, Wei Ran pushed the door open and got out of the car, looking at the railway viaduct on the other side of the road, and then turned around and looked at the towering monument behind him.
Was it here that Li Zhuang died...
Wei Ran looked around blankly, searching for something. Although he spoke clearly to Xia Shushi, he could not figure out how Li Zhuang, the leader of the cooking class, died in this battle.
In the end, he could only get into the car, dig out a bucket of instant noodles he bought at the service area on the road, then take out an oil bucket filled with hot butter tea, and fill the bucket of instant noodles half full.
Absently eating the butter tea instant noodles that tasted rather weird because they were randomly put together.
Wei Ran was secretly looking forward to it. He hoped that after dawn, he would be able to find stories about Li Zhuang, photos about him, or...even his name.
After finishing the last sip of soup in the instant noodle bucket with extra care and putting away the trash, he flattened the back of the seat, covered himself with a Soviet cloak and fell asleep.
That night, he had an extremely clear dream.
He dreamed of young Li Zhuang and the equally young lama walking hurriedly on the high loess slopes carrying buckets, but they could not hear him shouting at the top of his lungs over and over again.
He also dreamed that a bullet hit Li Zhuang and penetrated the kettle hanging on his body. He also dreamed that the little lama ran away crying while carrying the injured Li Zhuang, waiting for him to finally deliver Li Zhuang to a cave dwelling.
By the time, Li Zhuang had already stopped breathing.
"Bang bang bang!" The knocking on the car window woke him up instantly, and the clear dream turned into countless fragments like a shattered mirror.
I squinted my eyes and looked out the window. At this time, the sun had already jumped out of the horizon, giving the huge monument a golden halo.
Rubbing his face vigorously to wake himself up, Wei Ran sat up straight and lowered the window, looking at the security guard standing outside the car door.
"Young man, please drive into the parking lot, please?"
The uncle's attitude was quite polite, "There will be several big sedans with students coming later, so I'm afraid it will be inconvenient for you to park here."
"Okay, I'm... a sneeze!"
Wei Ran quickly turned his head and sneezed at the co-pilot, and continued, "I'm going to drive into the parking lot right now."
"I have hot water there"
The security guard pointed to his office enthusiastically, "Park the car, go over and have a glass of water to warm yourself up."
"Thanks"
As Wei Ran spoke, he took out a pack of refreshing cigarettes bought on the road from his pocket, took out two of them, and gave one of them to the security guard outside the car door.
After starting the car and driving into the parking lot, Weiran opened the door and got out of the car, finished smoking the cigarette that the security guard had just helped light, and then walked towards the exhibition board not far away.
But then, after he walked all the way from the display board to the exhibition hall and finally to the monument, he panicked.
He didn't find the story of Li Zhuang or the little lama or Nurse Ji here, he didn't find their photos, he didn't even find their names.
How could it not be...
Wei Ran stood in the square and looked around blankly. There was no trace of Li Zhuang and others here, not even the photo he found in his bamboo basket.
The only thing that responded to his inner doubts was the whistle of a high-speed train speeding past on the viaduct in the distance.
never mind...
Wei Ran sighed and walked towards the parking lot not far away. He decided to immediately check out the coordinate point more than two hundred kilometers away.
This chapter is not finished yet, please click on the next page to continue reading the exciting content! When he walked to the car, he found that the security uncle in his fifties or sixties was holding a thermos and waving to him, in the pickup truck
On the hood of the car, there were two stacks of paper cups.
"Come on, come on, have a cup of hot water to warm yourself up."
While the security guard was talking, he had already poured a cup of hot water for Wei Ran and was minding his own business, "I saw your car when I got up last night. Young man, where did you come from?"
"Gan...Chuanshu" Wei Ran answered as he took the water glass, "I stopped by here to have a look. I'm causing trouble for you."
"No," the security guard waved his hand, and also gave Wei Ran an orchid boat.
"Thank you, I'll give you a cigarette." Wei Ran quickly put down the paper cup, took the cigarette with both hands, and helped him light the cigarette.
"You are so polite young man."
The security guard took a puff of his cigarette happily, pointed to the license plate of the pickup truck, and asked casually, "Did you drive here?"
"right"
Wei Ran nodded, "I'm going on a self-driving trip to Yan'an."
"I really envy you young people."
The security guard said with a smile, "Now that living conditions are better, you can get on a car and go wherever you want. Unlike our time, not everyone had a bicycle."
"yes"
Wei Ran pointed to the viaduct in the distance where a high-speed rail train was passing by, "If you don't want to drive, there is a high-speed rail. That thing is very fast."
“Not very pleasant”
It seemed that it was rare for the security guard to find someone who was willing to chat with him. He said in a sultry voice, "It went by in a flash, like a flash."
"yes"
Wei Ran paused, changed the topic and asked without giving up, "Uncle, I want to ask you something. Is there no martyrs' tomb here? Is there a martyrs' cemetery or something?"
"Martyr's Tomb?"
“The Tomb of the Red Army Martyrs at Dashan Castle”
Wei Ran raised his hand and pointed to the monument in the distance, "A lot of people must have died at that time. Where are their martyrs' tombs?"
"Where are the tombs of martyrs..."
The security uncle pointed to the high loess slopes in the distance that were still green and golden from the harvest. "When the Red Army fought here, they fought in the surrounding ravines. Those who sacrificed their lives also died in the mountains and ravines around here."
The surrounding mountains are full of ravines.
When I was a child, I heard from my grandfather that it was difficult to get water in those years, and the war was chaotic. How could we bother to build martyrs' tombs? Many Red Army soldiers who died here were buried with the help of us ordinary people."
"Where is it buried?" Wei Ran asked hurriedly.
"Where is it buried?"
The security uncle pointed around again, "There are them all around. Some are buried in the ravines, and some are buried by the villagers in their own graveyards. I heard from my grandfather that there are ten buried in our graveyard.
There are quite a few.
In those days, it was not like you can take photos now, so you could no longer tell who was your ancestor and who was the Red Army."
The security uncle threw the burnt cigarette butt at his feet and crushed it, then bent down to pick it up and put it into his pocket. He said matter-of-factly, "We are all a family anyway, and my grandfather sent it to the Red Army pawn in my family's cemetery."
Where is the godson?
I am almost seventy, and I still get up early on the Fourth of July festival, bringing fruit cakes, cigarettes and wine to kowtow."
At this point, several buses also drove over, and the security guard said quickly, "You can drink the water in the kettle as you like, and leave it here after you drink it."
Before he finished speaking, he had already run towards the entrance of the parking lot, directing the buses to park one after another.
As the car door opened, little Douya, who was wearing school uniforms and red scarves and looked to be about seven or eight years old, also came down carrying schoolbags of various colors, talking and playing babblingly, and under the teacher's exhausted mind and spirit.
The commander formed a not very neat formation and marched towards the monument that seemed to hold up the sky.
After taking the last puff of the cigarette and drinking the last sip of hot water from the paper cup, Wei Ran took out most of the pack of cigarettes in his pocket and placed it on the lid of the thermos as a token of gratitude, looking towards the security guard who was helping the young teachers maintain order.
The uncle waved his hand as a farewell, and in response to the other party's wave, he drove away.
"Beep——"
A high-speed train passing here sounded its whistle as usual, as if it was expressing its longing.
