All rivers and mountains are safe

Ten days later, Shen Mingan was sitting in the courtyard of the old house with the cat in his arms basking in the sun, leaning on the recliner and rocking, his body was warmed by the sun, and when he was falling asleep, he heard the knock on the door.

He took off the white silk covering his eyes, and dared not open them until he got used to the sun's light. The outline of the courtyard gradually appeared in front of his eyes. The person standing outside the door was very vague, and he couldn't tell who it was. Shen Mingan's eyes had improved a bit these days, but he still couldn't see things clearly. He could only see a black shadow standing there.

He walked towards the door, and before he got close, he heard a familiar voice, "Teacher Shen."

"Li Xingyuan?" After walking to the door, Shen Mingan saw his blurred face and asked suspiciously, "How did you find it?"

Li Xingyuan bowed to him with his sword in his hand, and said respectfully, "It came over from behind the snow mountain."

Shen Mingan still wanted to wait for him to say a few more words, but Li Xingyuan didn't have any more to say. Shen Mingan would answer whatever Shen Mingan asked, and if he didn't ask him, he would just stand silently without saying a word. Shen Ming'an had no choice but to let him enter the door first, explaining that Lu Ciheng had gone out and might not be back until later.

He was tired and sleepy, so he asked Li Xingyuan to sit down for a while, and then he leaned back on the recliner. When he heard the sound again, it was Lu Ciheng who came back from the outside.

As the sun was setting, Li Xingyuan had been standing a few feet away. He only made a move when he saw Lu Ciheng. He knelt on the ground with his sword propped up, lowered his head and pleaded respectfully: "This subordinate has neglected his duty."

"It took more than half a month to find you. I thought you were dead."

Lu Ciheng walked past him, glanced at him indifferently, walked towards Shen Mingan, and helped Shen Mingan tie up the silk cloth that he took off, "The sun has already set, why are you sleeping outside again?"

"Too sleepy." Shen Mingan had just woken up, his eyes could not be opened, the white silk was opaque, and his eyes were covered in darkness again. He turned his head, tugged at Lu Ciheng's sleeve and said, "Li Xingyuan is here."

"I see." Lu Ciheng threw the fish he caught beside Li Xingyuan who was still kneeling, "Get up, go kill the fish first."

Li Xingyuan stood up neatly, turned around and walked towards the kitchen.

When eating in the evening, Shen Mingan brought fish soup into his mouth in small sips. After hearing Li Xingyuan report to Lu Ciheng what happened during this period, he realized that the people and the carriage were buried in the snow at that time, and there were only a few guards here and there. After surviving, they searched with Li Xingyuan on the snow-capped mountains for several days but failed to find them, so they had to go back to the mansion of Wu Jitong, the prefect of Yizhou, to report the news to the emperor, which wasted a lot of time.

Officers, soldiers and guards searched around the snow-capped mountains, but found nothing of their traces, so they began to search in Yizhou, Jiangzhou and several nearby counties.

It was only after seeing the mark left by Lu Ciheng that Li Xingyuan realized that they might still be near the snow mountain, so he went all the way across the snow mountain to find them.

In the evening, fireworks bombs were set off in Dongyang Village to send signals. Officers, soldiers and guards came to find them later, but the prince's people were the ones who found the fireworks bombs before Lu Ciheng's men.

The prince had a lot of people, and he directly cleared the snow on the road that was blocked at the entrance of the village.

The leader was the chief eunuch of the Eastern Palace, surnamed He, with a pair of hanging eyes. When he saw Shen Mingan, he began to cry, saying how worried Lu Qingshi was about his safety, and that he had trouble sleeping and eating since hearing the news of his disappearance. Ann, sent himself to find him.

He didn't find Shen Mingan and didn't dare to go back without authorization, now that he found someone, he hurriedly persuaded Shen Mingan to go back quickly.

In the evening, when Lu Ciheng's people crossed the snow mountain to look for them, more than 100 people came from the small Dongyang Village overnight. Heng found an excuse, saying that the people in the mansion reported to the officials, and set off out of the village that night.

After leaving the village, he still followed the original route. Shen Mingan had been very lethargic since a few days ago, and he was always drowsy and lacked energy. It seemed to be getting worse these days. Sometimes Lu Ciheng talked to him, Shen Mingan would fall asleep unbearably.

At first Lu Ciheng thought it was Shen Ming'an who didn't want to listen to him, but later he found out that he was really sleepy, and he was really out of spirit. He fell asleep as soon as he touched the pillow at the post station, and slept most of the time in the carriage during the day.

On the road for several days in a row, Lu Ciheng and Xiaobai, who was held in Shen Mingan's arms, stared wide-eyed at each other.

The carriage drove smoothly, Shen Mingan leaned on his shoulder, his chest rose and fell slightly with his breathing, Lu Ciheng wrapped his loose hair around his fingers, played with his hair, couldn't help but lightly pecked his face twice Down.

But Shen Mingan didn't react at all. Although he knew he was asleep, Lu Ciheng was still inexplicably angry. He lifted the curtain of the car boredly. It was now afternoon and he was about to leave the border of Jiangzhou. It's lively.

The northern border of Jiangzhou is Liuli County. Lu Ciheng remembered that when he joined the army in the Northwest a few years ago, Wuchang Liu, who took good care of him, once said that his ancestral home was in Liuli County, Jiangzhou.

Lu Ciheng asked Li Xingyuan to stop the carriage, and woke up Shen Mingan who was fast asleep, "Don't sleep, wake up."

Shen Mingan looked sleepy, opened his eyes with difficulty, and asked in a hoarse voice: "Have you arrived at the post?"

"What's going on with you recently, you're so sleepy." Lu Ciheng took off the white silk from his eyes, and replied, "No, I'm still in Jiangzhou, there's no sun today, get out of the car and walk."

Dongyang Village lacked supplies, and Lu Ciheng found that white silk casually. It was sweaty and airtight. After leaving Dongyang Village, Shen Mingan's eyes have improved a lot, except that things are blurred at night and when the light is poor. There was nothing wrong with everything, so Lu Ciheng changed him into a translucent silk that could block the light without causing him to wear a black piece.

Today was a cloudy day and the light was not strong, so Lu Ciheng simply took it off for him, took him by the hand and led him out of the car.

Shen Ming'an just woke up, and he shivered from the cold as soon as he got out of the carriage, and Lu Ciheng led him to walk in the alley in a zigzagging way.

Lu Ciheng walked for a long time, as if looking for someone, walked through several houses, and finally stopped in front of a dilapidated hut, Shen Mingan raised his head, the house was dilapidated, the outer walls were covered with moss, The roof tiles are broken, and it looks like no one has lived in it for decades.

Just as he was feeling strange, he saw Lu Ciheng knock on the door with the rusty door knocker in his hand. After waiting for a while, no one answered, but an old woman with white hair stood on the side of the road and looked at them strangely, " Who are you looking for?"

Lu Ciheng turned his head and asked her, "Excuse me, is the Liu Chen family living here?"

"Liu Chen?" The old woman held the bamboo basket in her hand, showing doubts, "Liu Chen lives here, what do you want her for?"

"I joined the army a few years ago. I was with her husband in the army. He took good care of me in the army. Before he died in battle, he often mentioned his wife and children. I passed by today and I wanted to take a look. His wife and daughter."

"But Mrs. Liu and Chen died more than ten years ago."

"Dead?" Lu Ciheng frowned, "What about his daughter?"

"Dead too." The old woman sighed, "Didn't Jiangzhou encounter a great famine more than ten years ago, and everyone had no food to eat, and it happened that the imperial court conscripted the army, and each person who went to join the army gave three stones of rice. The husband went there, but not long after, her daughter fell ill and sold rice to treat the child’s illness, but in the end the illness was not cured, and the food was gone.

Lu Ciheng was speechless.

Wuchang Liu guarded the Northwest for more than ten years for the sake of three stones of rice, and finally died on the battlefield. The nameless man didn't even have a monument, and he still couldn't let his wife and daughter survive the famine in the second winter.

"But every August and September, Wuchang Liu will receive a letter from home, just a few years ago he also received..."

"You said that." The old woman's voice was old, with regret on her face, "I helped send it out. Mrs. Liu Chen didn't want her husband to know, and hoped that he could live in peace. Before he died, he wrote twenty letters to his family. The time of writing on one letter is one year in the future, let me help her send it to her husband who joined the army in order."

She paused, then pointed to the back of the house and said, "Her husband also sends home a letter every year, and I burn it to them every year when I receive it. Later, when the news of her husband's death came back, I never went there again." , the graves of Mrs. Liu Chen and her daughter are just behind the house, are you going to visit them?"

Lu Ciheng still remembers the joy on Wuchang Liu's face when he received the letter from his family, his longing for returning home, his longing for his wife and daughter, and the eight words on the signature of the family letter - the family is safe, and I hope you will return soon .

The tombs of Mrs. Liu Chen and her daughter are two small earthen mounds, on which stand two uneven wooden boards. The lettering on the wooden boards has faded from the rain and sun, and the grass on the grave is half the height of a person. .

Shen Mingan knelt down to remove the grass from the grave for them, and heard Lu Ciheng's voice behind him.

"I was so envious of him at that time, he would receive a letter from home every year, and would read it to us." Lu Ciheng smiled self-deprecatingly, "I didn't, I have been in the Northwest for five years, and I haven't received one. Pass."

"When Wuchang Liu died, there were still three months before he was discharged from the army. At that time, he thought that his wife and daughter were still alive. only their graves."

"That day the Rong people attacked at night and set fire to the food. Less than eleven people survived. Liu Wuchang blocked an arrow for me. The arrow hit his thigh. In fact, it was not fatal, but it dragged on. His actions were inconvenient, and he was stabbed several times, and his intestines were pulled out by the enemy, and his blood flowed all over the place."

"I was hacked on the back by the Rong people. My bones were almost cut off. It hurts so much. Shen Mingan, why do you want me to go to the northwest?"

Shen Mingan trembled violently when he heard the words, and when he stood up he was dizzy for a while, his eyes were covered with mist, but he just looked at him and didn't speak.

Lu Ciheng didn't expect him to answer, and said to himself: "If I died in the northwest, would you regret it?"

When he was in Dongyang Village, Shen Mingan couldn't see him and was completely dependent on him. He also enjoyed Shen Mingan's dependence on him very much.

He deliberately didn't think about these problems, but not thinking about them didn't mean that these things didn't exist, these things were like a thorn in his heart, and always between him and Shen Ming'an.

"You won't die." Hearing what he said, Shen Mingan felt a little nauseous for no reason, as if he was also on the battlefield, as if the smell of blood was lingering at the tip of his nose, and he remembered that it was the same when his mother died, the intestines were pulled out, blood Flows everywhere.

He looked at Lu Ciheng for a moment, muttered and said again, "You won't die."

I don't know whether to tell him or tell myself.