In the spring of the second year of the reign of Emperor Guiyuan of the Tang Dynasty, the courtyard at the foot of Kongtong Mountain was particularly lively.
The annual Taoist selection meeting is coming soon, making the children in the Jieyinyuan waiting to become Taoist priests nervous but also looking forward to it.
Starting from Emperor Xuanzong Li Longji of the Tang Dynasty, he suppressed Buddhism and promoted Taoism. He respected Laozi as the ancestor of the Li family and named him Emperor Xuanyuan. Taoism flourished from this point on.
In March of the first year of Tianbao, the emperor Li Longji came to Danzheng Gorge in Kongtong Mountain to worship Emperor Xuanyuan Laozi at the Zixiao Tiangong. He also decreed that the Zixiao Tiangong and other six palaces were the Three Pure Ones of Kongtong Mountain and were enshrined by the imperial court.
From then on, the Kongtong Mountain Zixiao Temple and its two palaces and three temples were fed with royal food, had enough food and clothing, no longer worried about survival, and did not want to associate with other wild people, and stood proudly.
This year is different from previous years. The Anshi Rebellion that has been raging for many years is about to end. Seeing that the world is at peace, Zixiao Tiangong announced that it will expand the number of candidates, making the children in the reception hall even more excited.
The more than 300 children in the reception center are mainly from Longyou, Hexi and Guanzhong areas. Most of them are seven or eight years old. There are poor children from poor families who want to enter the Taoist school and have a full meal. They are also devoted to Taoism and devote themselves to the three
A descendant of a wealthy family who came to the Qing Dynasty to pray for the family to eliminate disasters.
There are dozens of Taoist temples in Kongtong Mountain. It is not difficult to become a Taoist monk, but everyone wants to enter Zixiao Temple and its two temples and three temples, just like people in later generations want to squeeze into government agencies and institutions.
Every spring, the two palaces and three temples under the Zixiao Tiangong come to the Yinyin Courtyard to select paths. This is a big day in Kongtong Mountain.
The night is getting deeper and more than a hundred children in the second dormitory are still excited and unable to sleep, secretly talking about tomorrow's election meeting.
"I heard that sixty people will be selected to go up the mountain tomorrow, and twelve people will be selected from each of the two palaces and three temples."
"Then under what conditions should we choose?"
"Idiot, of course the selection is based on martial arts qualifications. The stronger the body, the better. When has this not been true?"
"Then 'Mowing' won't be finished again this year?"
"That's what he deserves. He is so tall, but he is so weak that he faints easily. Not even the wild Taoist temple would want him. He should have gone back to Lingzhou a long time ago, but he has stayed here for three years. He has no shame.
It’s thick enough.”
"I heard that his family does not allow him to go back. If he is not elected again today, he will have no choice but to beg for food."
"Last time, his nose was broken by Zhang Huer's punch. He was unconscious for three days. It seemed that he became an idiot when he woke up."
"Ouch! Now he can't even become a beggar." All the children laughed happily.
At this time, a roar came from the door, "Shut up, if you don't go to sleep, what will you choose tomorrow?"
There was a sudden silence in the dormitory.
There is a child huddled up in the innermost corner. His body is longer than the other children. He is covered only with a thin shabby blanket. He is sleeping on the wooden floor with no clothes on. It is early spring and February.
When the warmth turned cold, the night was very cold, and he was shivering from the cold.
This child is what other people call "cut grass". His surname is Guo. Because his body is as thin as a piece of grass, everyone calls him Guo Cao, which is homophonic to "cut grass".
His full name is Guo Song. He is eight years old this year. He is a disciple sent by the Guo family in Lingzhou to become a monk in Kongtong Mountain. His parents are dead and he is helpless, so the Guo family naturally chose him.
He has stayed in Jieyinyuan for three years. Jieyinyin only provides one meal a day. He is penniless and has been in a state of hunger and cold for a long time. Of course he is thin. Not to mention that Zixiao Tiangong looks down on him. Even the other
The Wild Taoist Temple doesn't want him either. The Wild Taoist Temple itself is having a hard time surviving, so who will add another burden?
According to the rules of the Jie Yin Yuan, if he is not elected within three years, he must leave, but the Guo family does not allow him to go back. If he is not elected again this year, he will really have no choice but to go to the streets to beg.
Guo Song has always been the target of bullying and ridicule by other children in the reception hall. Ten days ago, the strongest Zhang Huer forced him to be a sparring partner. Zhang Huer punched him and broke his nose. He fainted on the spot and lay down for the whole time.
It took three days to wake up.
But after he woke up, he seemed to be a different person. He became extremely silent. He often stood in a daze looking at the sky for a day. Everyone said that he was beaten into an idiot.
But no one could have imagined that when the bullied child woke up, he would be replaced by another soul that had lived for thousands of years.
………….
It has been seven days, and Guo Song has not recovered from the endless sorrow that has lasted for thousands of years.
In his previous life, he was thirty-five years old and was an ordinary clerk in a bank. A month of intense overtime work made him extremely exhausted. Not long after he returned home and lay down on the sofa, he fell into endless darkness.
The moment his soul left his body, the anxious calls of his wife and daughter still echoed in his ears, "Husband, don't scare me, wake up!"
"Dad, wake up quickly!"
But after waking up, he appeared in the Tang Dynasty 1,300 years ago. Thinking that he would never be able to see his beloved wife and young daughter again, great sadness struck him instantly, and Guo Song couldn't help but burst into tears.
"Guo Song, you're crying again!"
Behind him, another child, Han Xiaowu, patted him on the shoulder and comforted him in a low voice: "Don't cry. I really can't choose. Let's become a monk. It's a good place to go."
Guo Song quickly wiped away his tears and whispered: "I'm fine, Xiaowu, go to bed early!"
"Yeah! I'm sleeping." Han Xiaowu muttered vaguely, and soon he snored softly.
However, Guo Song could not sleep. He forced himself to temporarily forget his sadness, but another emotion quietly emerged, that of deep confusion.
Seven days ago, when Guo Song woke up from the Taoist boy with the same name, he soon discovered that the world was very different from the Tang Dynasty he had learned about in history books.
The Anshi Rebellion was about to end, but it was not Tang Suzong Li Heng who put an end to the Anshi Rebellion, but Li Longji, who was unwilling to be the supreme emperor and launched a successful coup to seize the throne.
There was no such thing as Concubine Yang in the Tang Dynasty. Li Longji only doted on Concubine Xiao, which led to the ruin of the government, the decline of national power, and triggered the Anshi Rebellion.
I wonder at what point in history something went wrong, or has a forerunner already been here? Or is this just the Tang Dynasty in a parallel world?
The Tang Dynasty in Guo Song's memory became fragmented and unfamiliar.
The Hexi Corridor had already been occupied by foreigners two years ago, taking advantage of the Tang Dynasty's empty military strength. However, it was not the Tubo who occupied the Hexi Corridor, but the Shatuo people who only emerged after more than a hundred years. The people who gradually began to harass Longyou were not the Tubo but the Shatuo people.
Tuyuhun is about to decline in history.
As for their suzerain states, Uighur and Tubo, they were competing for thousands of miles of territory in the Western Region, and a war broke out between the two countries in Tochara.
Guo Song's heart was full of confusion and worry. He didn't know where to go?
………….
At dawn, the children drank a bowl of wild vegetable porridge and ran to the courtyard to wait impatiently, but Guo Song still stayed in the dormitory.
In fact, he also wanted to be chosen. Although becoming a monk was not his original intention, it would at least give him a place to stay and shelter before he came of age.
Otherwise, with his thin body, in this troubled world where there are no antibiotics and wars everywhere, it would be difficult for him to survive to adulthood, and a small pneumonia could kill him.
But why was he chosen? He doesn't know martial arts, has no potential to practice martial arts, and his physical condition is even worse.
The only thing Guo Song has that he can offer is his literary talent. He has insights that are unparalleled in this era. He has read many books, and he can also write beautiful regular script.
But after experiencing the tragic Anshi Rebellion, the world has changed, literary talent is no longer valued, and martial arts training has become the consensus of the entire Tang Dynasty society. Only by practicing strong martial arts can you protect your family from the military disaster and protect yourself a little bit.
Property will not be stolen by robbers.
Only those with strong martial arts skills will be valued by their families and receive various opportunities.
'Bai Wuyi is a scholar!'
This was what Han Xiaowu told him, which deeply hurt Guo Song's self-esteem.
Guo Song sighed. He took a piece of paper and pen and ink from the room next door where the sundries were piled. He had stolen them from the accounting room and hid them in the utility room.
No matter what, he still wanted to try his luck.
He filled himself with ink, took a deep breath, and wrote:
The Tao can be Tao, but it is not Tao; the name can be named, but it is not named.
Nameless, the beginning of heaven and earth, Named, the mother of all things.
………..
Guo Song didn't know much about Taoism. The only thing he could memorize was the Tao Te Ching. Today he wanted to try his luck. I wonder if the people in Zixiao Tiangong could appreciate the Tao Te Ching he wrote silently.
When he was about to finish writing, he suddenly felt someone next to him. When he turned around, he saw a tall old Taoist priest standing aside with a smile and watching him write.
The old Taoist priest has white beard and hair, his face is full of vicissitudes of life, he wears a Taoist priest's clothes covered with patches, and has a wooden sword on his back.
Although Guo Song had never met this old Taoist priest, his predecessor had stayed in Jieyinyuan for three years after all, and some knowledge of his predecessor had been left to him.
Guo Song naturally knew why this old Taoist priest appeared here.
This is a wild Taoist priest. In Kongtong Mountain, all other Taoist temples except Zixiao Temple and the two palaces and three temples attached to it are called wild Taoists.
The wild Taoist priests do not have the guarantee of royal food, so they can only rely on themselves to cultivate a few acres of barren land or forage for food in the mountains. They live an extremely hard life. You can tell by looking at the old Taoist priest's robe. He has worn it for at least twenty years.
There are no less than two hundred small patches.
Various wild Taoist temples also want to recruit some malleable talents as disciples to chop wood, forage for food, carry water, and farm for them. The so-called malleable talents are young men with strong bodies who can work to support them.
Therefore, they would appear secretly at the annual Dao Selection Meeting, trying to steal something from Zixiao Tiangong.
"Little guy, your handwriting is very good!"
As soon as Guo Song put down his pen, the old Taoist priest gave him a thumbs up and praised him, "This is the first time I have seen you able to read and write at such a young age. You have actually practiced calligraphy. It's rare! What's your name?"
"Guo Song, the Song Dynasty of Song Xianggong, a native of Lingzhou."
The old Taoist priest pointed to the words written by Guo Song and asked with a smile: "Do you want to be selected based on this today?"
"Yes!" Guo Song answered affirmatively.
"I'm afraid you are going to be disappointed. Those old bastards and young bastards in the Two Palaces and Three Views have always only cared about martial arts and not literature. If you write for them, you are just playing the piano to a cow. Why don't you follow me!"