Chapter 15 Chapter 15 Xuanyang Cave

The three of us walked and chatted, and returned to the urban area of ​​Shanhaiguan.It's still early now, it's just in the afternoon, and there is still a distance from midnight.We happened to have nothing to do at this time, so we might as well go shopping, and just relax the three of us in the past two days looking for clues and experiencing dangerous tension. In the 14th year of Ming Hongwu (1381), the general Xu Da was ordered to build the Great Wall here and build the pass city here. Because it is located between the mountains and the sea, it is named Shanhaiguan.The plane of Shanhaiguan is square, and there are gates on all four sides. The east, west, south and north are respectively called "Zhendong Gate", "Yingen Gate", "Wangyang Gate" and "Weiyuan Gate".The Shanhaiguan city wall is 14 meters high, 7 meters thick, and about 4 kilometers in circumference.The exterior is covered with blue bricks, and the interior is filled with rammed earth.A moat eight meters deep and seventeen meters wide was excavated outside the wall to surround the east, south and north sides, and a suspension bridge was erected.There is a Bell and Drum Tower in the center of the city.Shanhaiguan's Ming Dynasty city wall buildings are basically intact. It is an ancient cultural city. Most of the main streets and alleys have retained their original history.In fact, the first pass in the world does not refer to just one pass, it includes Shanhaiguan City, Dongluo City, and the "No. 1 Pass in the World" towers, Muying Tower, Jingbian Tower, Linlu Tower, etc.The first gate tower in the world, stands on the Great Wall, overlooking the four fields.Climbing to the second floor of the tower, you can overlook the whole view of Shanhaiguan City and the wilderness outside the pass.You can see the sea in the south and the Great Wall in the north.Therefore, the ancients said that "the key to the two capitals is unparalleled, and the first pass of the Great Wall".

I, Fatty, and Shirley Yang strolled all the way, and came to the bottom of the east gate. We looked up, and the five vigorous and powerful characters "No. 1 Pass in the World" in the center of our heads were reflected in front of our eyes.These five characters were written so brilliantly that the three of us couldn't help but applaud them. "Old Hu, look, this character is so fucking beautiful. It is hooked when it should be hooked, and turned when it should be turned. It is so beautifully written. Although it is a little worse than Fatty's mine, it is already It is very beautiful, but who wrote such beautiful characters?"

"Little Fatty, you don't know this. There is a story about the origin of these words. Listen to me and tell you. By the way, more than five hundred years ago, Emperor Chenghua of Ming Dynasty had a whim and personally issued an order to A large plaque titled "The First Pass in the World" was hung on the top of the Shanhaiguan Gate. At that time, a head of the Ministry of War guarded Shanhaiguan, fat, do you know what the position of the head of the Ministry of War is?" "Old Hu, correct your attitude, stop talking and get straight to the point, Fatty, I'm waiting."

"After receiving the imperial decree, the head of the Ministry of War did not dare to be negligent. He immediately sent someone to climb up the archery tower and measured the size. It was about eight feet long and five feet wide. Then he asked a carpenter to make a huge plaque. The plaque made Okay, but the most important thing is who to write? There are piles of calligraphers in the Ming Dynasty. The head of the Ministry of War pondered for a day and a night, and finally thought of a person. This person is named Xiao Mingxian. , smart, very in line with the idea of ​​the principal. It just so happened that Xiao Xian resigned because of his old age and returned home to Shanhaiguan to find a job. The chief of the Ministry of War personally visited Xiao's house the next morning and explained his intentions. Xiao Xian is not someone who thinks It can be used as it can be used. After thinking about it for a long time, he nodded in agreement. However, Xiao Xian said that writing this kind of characters should not be rushed or rushed. You have to wait until the time is right before you can finish it overnight and achieve success with the stroke of a pen. The head of the Ministry of War had no choice but to agree. But more than 20 days passed in a blink of an eye, and there was still no news. The head of the Ministry of War had no choice but to prepare a few things for his subordinates to send over, meaning to urge Xiao Xian to write. His subordinates The man came back after a while and reported: "Mr. Xiao is practicing in the side courtyard every day from morning to night, as if he is playing with a long pole." It's been so many days, not so many days. In a blink of an eye, it took another ten and a half months, and there was still no reply. The head of the Ministry of War is really impatient. Originally, he was a violent soldier all his life, but he asked for it at his door I had no choice but to bite the bullet and asked the servants to prepare some good pens, inks, papers and inkstones and sent them over. Soon, the servants came back and reported: "The old man is reciting poems. Why is there a bright moonlight in front of the bed? There is frost on the ground.” The head of the Ministry of War asked: “What did he say after seeing the gift?” “He said it would be another month.” Wait, there is finally a deadline, so just wait. An urgent letter to the central government, saying that the new governor of Jiliao will come to Shanhaiguan to inspect the matter of hanging plaques on behalf of the emperor, and it is expected to arrive within three days. The sudden incident made the head of the Ministry of War anxious. The head of the Ministry of War felt that it was not too late, so he immediately let The man carried the huge plaque and a jar of ink to Xiao's house. He arrived at the Xiao's house in a hurry, and he didn't have time to exchange pleasantries, so he explained the ins and outs. Mr. Xiao is also an extraordinary person, and he didn't dare to neglect, so he acted immediately I saw him walking up to the huge plaque with a pen in his hand, looking at it while walking, laughing for a while, nodding for a while. Then, he stopped suddenly, held his breath, and walked away with the pen. I saw him, writing like a flying swallow Food, pen writing is like a falling stone from a mountain, steady and accurate, fast and slow, the pen goes with you, in a short while, the five characters of "the first pass in the world" are written. The head of the Ministry of War is also very amazed, and hurriedly handed over Thank you. Mr. Xiao said: "I planned to read ancient poems first to cultivate my temperament for a month, but unfortunately the time is too urgent." "This is already very good, already very good." Thank you, the head of the Ministry of War entertained Xiao Xian at the "Yuexinzhai" restaurant under the Jianlou the next morning. After a few rounds of drinking, the host and guest leaned on the railing to look up, and Mr. Xiao realized that the word "下" on the huge plaque on the tower was missing. At this time, it was too late to go back to the mansion to get a pen and go upstairs to write, and the servants reportedIt is said that the governor of Jiliao has crossed Shihe, what should we do?Old Mr. Xiao is worthy of being extremely clever, quick-witted, and immediately ordered the bookboy to grind ink, then casually grabbed a piece of tablecloth from the waiter's hand, made a ball in his hand, dipped it in ink, and threw it at the giant plaque on the watchtower with all his life's strength .With a sound of 'pop', the ink cloth just landed on the lower right corner of the word '下', filling that 'dot'. "

"Haha, I didn't expect such a small plaque to have so many stories. This Shanhaiguan is really an ancient city in the true sense." "Actually, there is a more interesting story about Shanhaiguan, do you want to hear it?" I said. "Of course I want to hear it. What time is it, old Hu? What are you doing with us!" said the fat man. "Old Hu just likes to tease people's appetites, really." Shirley Yang also blamed. "Okay, okay, since you all want to hear so much, then I'll continue." I said this, and finished the history of that period of Fengyunjihui. "Today, we stand in front of the ancient city of Shanhaiguan, looking back at the present and thinking about the past, how much we should think about and how much we should leave behind."

A story about Shanhaiguan made Shirley Yang and Fatty feel a little heavy. Shirley Yang may be thinking about Wu Sangui becoming a beauty in anger, and the fat man may be thinking about how many soldiers shed so much blood here, how many families were destroyed, wives and children were separated, and the old city always Yes there are many stories. I saw that they were obviously not in a good mood, so I quickly suggested: "Come, come, since we are all here, let's go shopping quickly. I know there is a very famous market next to this tower, called Chaihuo City, what is it?" There are all for sale, delicious and fun, let's go shopping there."

As soon as the fat man heard me say that there was something delicious, he immediately cheered up and nodded in agreement. The three of us went all the way to Chaihuo City to see if there was anything interesting and delicious. There are a lot of people in this market. Some sell fruits, some sell Shanhaiguan local snacks, and many sell other messy things.Of course, the fat man's first reaction when he came to this place was to think of eating. He bought a lot of snacks and held them in his hands, eating while walking, like a gluttonous child.But Shirley Yang and I didn't have such a good appetite as he did, so we went to Chaihuo City just to look around and didn't want to buy anything.

Walking around, suddenly we saw a lot of people gathered in front of us, and we went to join in the fun, and when we got closer, it turned out that it was a middle-aged man who was selling antiques with a big piece of cloth on the ground. The seller yelled: "Come, come, come, don't miss it when you pass by, take a look! These are old antiques I collected, very valuable for collection, and now the family is in urgent need of money, so I sell them all at a low price , all of them are on sale at a low price! Come and see them all!” Maybe it's a matter of professional ethics. When the fat man and I heard the word "antique", our eyes lit up immediately, and we couldn't move our feet any longer.We pushed aside the crowd of onlookers and squeezed to the front. An old man happened to be playing with a pottery pot on his stall. The old man asked, "What is the age of your pottery pot? It looks good. New!"

The man replied: "Master, this is your eyesight problem. Is this clay pot new? It's not new at all. Look at the pattern, look at the fineness of the soil, and then look at the inscription on the bottom of the pot. This is a typical Song Dynasty pottery pot. If this pot is sold in a big city, then this pot can be sold for tens of thousands of dollars. My family is in urgent need of money, so I sold it cheaply. Three hundred dollars. What do you think? Okay, just take it away, if you think it’s not good, you can leave it alone until someone who really knows the goods comes.” The old man was probably generalized by the stall owner, and he couldn't help but say, "Why don't I know the goods? I've already seen the pattern on it from the Song Dynasty, and the inscription on the back of the jar. You can see it, I want this can, and I'll get you the money right now." The old man took his wallet out of his pocket while talking.

Fatty and I saw it in our eyes, and we were anxious in our hearts, because this clay pot can be seen as a modern product at a glance. The patterns and inscriptions mentioned by the stall owner were all added later. There are plenty of such tricks at Panjiayuan in Beijing.Seeing that this uncle is about to pay for it, and he doesn't look like a rich man in his clothes, three hundred yuan is definitely not a small sum for him. If this black-hearted stall owner cheated him for nothing, then Isn't it a pity. In a hurry, I stepped forward and said, "This stall owner, I am a tourist from Beijing. I saw you selling this clay pot just now. This clay pot is a good thing. How about it? Hearing that the uncle offered three hundred yuan, then if I do this, I will give you three thousand, and you can sell it to me."

"Three thousand!" The crowd exploded with a "wow". The fat man hurriedly came to my ear and said to me: "Old Hu, are you crazy! This is a fucking broken fake jar, it's not worth ten yuan, and you even offered three thousand yuan to buy it! You Is the head broken!" I turned around and smiled at the fat man, and said quietly, "Don't worry, just watch how I'll fix him." When the fat man heard what I said, he immediately felt relieved. At this time, the crowd began to surge, because in a small town like Shanhaiguan, three thousand yuan is equivalent to the income of ordinary people for ten or even twenty years. It was the first time in their lives that they saw it, so they all wanted to squeeze in to see who would spend 3,000 yuan to be the big guy.The crowd was crowded, and Shirley Yang, me, and the fat man were also squeezed around. Suddenly, Shirley Yang's backpack was squeezed out by a person.The backpack fell to the ground with a bang, and the words written by Daoist Li Yeying rolled out. When I saw such a precious thing dropped on the ground, I quickly squatted down to pick it up and put it back into Shirley Yang's backpack. At this moment, I heard the stall owner next to me shouting: "Don't fucking squeeze it, anyone who squeezes it Lao Tzu’s antiques, Lao Tzu asked him to pay ten! If anyone crushes my friend who came from afar in Beijing, I will let him go around without food!” When the people heard this, they immediately quieted down. The stall owner saw that the crowd was no longer commotion, and quickly said to me with a smile on his face: "This little brother looks young, but he is really a man of knowledge. This Song Dynasty The earthenware jars are priceless, not to mention three thousand yuan, you can buy them for thirty thousand yuan, and when you return to the big city of Beijing, I will guarantee you that someone will ask for one hundred thousand yuan!" I pretended to agree with him, and said to him: "I bought your clay pot for 3,000 yuan, which is really cheap. You, the stall owner, are really kind enough to sell it at a loss. There are really kind people in this world!" The old man next to him who offered 300 yuan was even more fascinated when he heard this, and shouted at the stall owner: "You sold it to me for 300 yuan just now, how can you not be trustworthy when doing business?" ! You have to sell it to me!" The stall owner didn't even look at the old man this time, and said: "You old man, where should you go? Who the hell just said that I will sell it to you. I signed a contract with you or you will give it to me." I’ve paid a deposit, and if you don’t have anything, why don’t you give me credit? If you continue to make trouble here, I’ll break your legs!” As soon as the old man heard being scolded, he immediately became angry, and was about to go up to argue with the stall owner. At this moment, the fat man suddenly came up, pulled the old man aside, and whispered something to the old man. At first, the old man's eyes were still confused. When he looked at the clay pot in the hands of the stall owner again, he felt suddenly enlightened.The fat man must have told him about the fake and shoddy workmanship of this pottery pot. This kind of thing has no technical content at all, and it can also deceive laymen and such elderly grandparents. After the old man understood, he yelled at the stall owner: "You bastard, you will die badly." After speaking, he left resentfully. Although the stall owner was very angry after hearing this, the most important thought in his mind now is how to defraud me of the three thousand yuan in my hand first, so he didn't have the same knowledge as this old man, and hurriedly piled up his face again. He smiled and said to me: "Young master, you see, no one has snatched this clay pot from you. I think we can pay for it and deliver it. You and I are just trying to have fun." Seeing his flattering face, I felt extremely disgusted in my heart, and said, "Actually, boss, I like everything you see at the antique stall, and I want everything!" As soon as the boss heard this, he almost knelt down, his eyes glowed green, and he trembled excitedly and said, "This, this, this young master, you, you, really A master who knows the goods, what kind of luck do you think I am, to meet someone who knows the goods like you today. If you take all this away, I will give you excellent, excellent, special discounts! Big discounts! "The stall owner was so excited that he stuttered. "Okay, what you said, give me a discount, then I want it!" When the stall owner heard my words, his legs and feet were unsteady, and he almost staggered and knelt down on the ground, saying: "OK! OK! OK! Big discount! Big discount!" "Okay, but I have a request. If I buy so many antiques, my friends and I won't be able to take them back. In this way, if I pay, every friend present will get one! Anyone who sees them will have a share! First come, first served! Take it quickly! I'll pay! Antiques for you!" I said. When everyone heard it, it was okay, and a commotion broke out in the crowd.People couldn't hold back any longer, and they all rushed towards the booth regardless of men, women, young or old, high or low, fat or thin, and scrambled frantically.The whole stall was in a mess, the stall owner didn't expect me to make such a move, he was dumbfounded, and didn't know what to do. Taking advantage of the crowd's crazy time, I quickly pulled the fat man out of the crowd. "Hahahaha, Old Hu, you really have it! This stall owner is probably going to be out of business for a long time, hahaha." Fatty and Shirley Yang both said. "Who told this unscrupulous stall owner to stop doing good things and earn such unscrupulous money! He won't know how to stop unless he is given a lesson. He even lied to the old man, is he still human!" I said. "It's true, people are doing it, and the sky is watching. This kind of person will have retribution after all!" It was getting late at this time, and the three of us walked back while talking. "I found a very serious problem. No matter where the people are, no matter what cultural habits they have or how different languages ​​they speak, they all have one thing in common, that is, they love to join in the fun! Hahaha ” said Shirley Yang. "Indeed, those people who watched today didn't squeeze me to death, and even squeezed your backpack, and the words of Daoist Ye Ying came out. Fortunately, we found it in time, otherwise we would have spent a lot of trouble If you just lose the words you have found so hard, you will really dig a hole and bury yourself!" I said. "Yeah, yeah, if the words are lost, then..." Suddenly Shirley Yang stopped, took off the backpack, and quickly touched it with both hands. We don't know what she was touching. "It's broken! Daoist Ye Ying's words are gone!" Shirley Yang shouted. "What?" Fatty and I were taken aback, "Why did the words disappear? I clearly remembered to pick them up and put them in your backpack!" "I don't know either! It's already in the backpack, how could it be gone! It's so strange!" Shirley Yang was so anxious that she almost burst into tears. Yes, I clearly remember that I put this word in Shirley Yang’s backpack with my own hands, and then picked up the backpack from the ground and handed it to her to carry on her shoulders. Could it be that it was squeezed out when the crowd was crowded at the end? ?As soon as I thought of this, I quickly dragged Fatty and Shirley Yang to the place where the street stall was set up before. While running, I suddenly heard someone calling us from behind: "Young man, young man, wait a minute!" I turned around to see who it was. It turned out to be the old man who was almost cheated just now. "Grandpa, what's the matter with you? If you want to thank you, you don't need it. We didn't do this only because of you. The main reason is that we really can't see the stall owner earning black-hearted money, so we give it to you." You have taught him a lesson, so you don't have to thank us, and we have important things to do now." I said hurriedly, very anxious about that picture. "Young man, I'm here to thank you, but not just to thank you." The old man said. "How do you say that?" I was surprised. "Did you lose something?" the old man asked. The three of us were shocked when we heard this, and hurriedly asked: "Yes, yes, what did you see, old man?" "Yeah, after I left just now, the more I thought about it, the more I felt uneasy, so I turned back and wanted to expose the stall owner's false face in person, but I saw a group of people grabbing the stall owner's things. I thought it was I'm glad that someone has finally taught him a lesson. But I looked and saw a man in the crowd put his hand into your lady's backpack, as if he took out something, and then I just walked away, I wanted to go up to the front and tell you, but there were too many people and it was too noisy, I couldn’t get close to you at all, after the crowd dispersed, I found that you had already disappeared, so I've been following you all the way." "Grandpa, we did lose something, and this thing is very important to us, we must get it back, can you tell who stole our things?" "I saw it. This person is none other than the famous rogue king of Shanhaiguan. This rogue is idle and likes to take advantage of things like gambling, drinking, and stealing. His family lives in In this small alley at the east gate of the city tower, you go to his house to look for him now, he just stole your things, you must go home and hide them first." The old man said. "Okay! You really helped us a lot. We are in a hurry. When we get our things back, I must thank you very much!" I said. "It's okay, it's okay, you have helped me so much, I haven't said anything yet, this little favor is nothing, you go, don't let Wang Er take your things elsewhere!" "Okay, let's go now, just leave it alone!" We bid farewell to the old man, and ran quickly to Wang Er's house. It was not difficult to find Wang Er's house, and we arrived at the door of his house in a short while. The door was closed tightly. We can only lure him to open the door for us.I asked the fat man to stand at the door and call Wang Er's name, and after calling a few times, Wang Er answered from inside the room: "Who is it?" The fat man replied: "Wang Er, it's me. I'm the waiter in the hotel next door. Today is the first anniversary of our hotel. The shopkeeper ordered me to bring a pot of good wine for the second master." Wang Eryi heard that there was still such a good thing, so he hurried over and opened the door: "Your shopkeeper is wise, the second master is not good... Ouch!" The fat man landed on Wang Er's face with a forceful and heavy punch. "Let you idiot steal! Let you idiot steal!" Fatty cursed and rained down his fists. "Grandpa, you are merciful, I don't dare anymore, I don't dare anymore..." Wang Er begged for mercy. "Quickly tell me, where did you steal Grandpa's characters!" the fat man asked while typing. "It's on the top of the kang at my house. It was well preserved for grandpa. You can go and get it." Wang Er replied. Shirley Yang strode into the inner room, found the writing, looked carefully, and found that there was no damage. He nodded to us, and our hearts that had been hanging were relieved immediately. "Let you fucking steal again, fat man, I'm going to beat you up today!" The fat man beat down hard again. After this combination of punches, Wang Er was about to die.Shirley Yang and I hurriedly stopped the fat man, took the calligraphy and painting and headed home. The fight was over, the anger was out, and the writing was brought back. The three of us were so happy, we went to the restaurant to have a good meal, and then went back to the hotel to rest, waiting to read the writing at night. There are clues inside.According to Li Da's meaning, at midnight, the clues we want will appear in this word. The wait is always long, and finally at midnight, I, Shirley Yang and the fat man took the calligraphy to the hotel yard, moved a table, laid the calligraphy on the table, and waited for its change. About ten minutes later, under the moonlight, a strange thing happened. All the previously written characters on this painting disappeared, and a large shining character flashed in the place where Li Yeying inscribed it. This character is "hole" Character! so amazing!Is this word the clue we are looking for this time?Combined with the previous clues, the character "Xuan" found in Xichen Temple, the character "Yang" found in Laolongtou, and the character "Dong" discovered this time, if these three characters are combined, it is not It is "Xuanyang Cave"!