Chapter 80: Longevity
Chapter 80: Longevity
At 06:09 am on June 11, the flight Zhang Yangxu was on landed at Yundu International Airport.
After getting off the plane, Ning Zhe arrived at Yundu City, the capital city of Yunzhou in Central Plains.
Yundu City is a typical plain city. The foundation of the city is the golden land. The fertile alluvial plain outside the city has accumulated silt from the Yellow River for thousands of years. Going west from Yundu City, you can see the only eye-catching mountain range on this plain, called Chuyun Mountain. After crossing this mountain, you will be out of Yunzhou.
There is a huge freshwater lake with a wide water body at the foot of Mt. Izumo, which is the Yunmeng Lake that often appears in ancient poems and story books.
The Izumo Villa where Ji Bo once lived was built between these mountains and waters.
"Famous mountains and great lakes, the old guy really knows how to choose a place." Ning Zhe rolled down the window in the car on the way to the hotel, taking in the magnificent waves: "If someone dies in such a Feng Shui treasure land in this movie, he will definitely turn into a corpse."
Yunmeng Lake is one of the largest lakes in China. Even with a telescope, you can hardly see Izumo Villa on the other side.
However, Ning Zhe did not immediately go to Ji Bochang's house to observe the situation, because he came here as Zhang Yangxu, and Boss Zhang's daily life was not idle.
New World Group expects to continue investing manpower and funds in the planning and development of the Gubei Town scenic area in the next few years. As the first person responsible for signing this contract, Zhang Yangxu cannot get away. Even if he leaves Qinzhou and goes to Yunzhou, he still has to do what needs to be done.
Besides work, you also have to worry about life.
Zhang Yangxu was not born into a noble family with a long history, but a genuine grassroots who started from scratch... Well, not really, because Zhang Yangxu was actually a son-in-law who married into the family's family. He made his first fortune relying on the connections and funds from his wife's family, and his later business development was also inseparable from the support and help from his father-in-law.
The father-in-law recognized Zhang Yangxu's personal abilities and was very satisfied with this son-in-law, but his wife was not satisfied.
Because Zhang Yangxu's wife Xia Chan actually had a first love boyfriend when she was in college, and the two were deeply in love, but her father disliked her boyfriend for being dull and introverted, and a hopeless case, so he forced his daughter to marry the potential stock he was more optimistic about, that is, Zhang Yangxu.
Facts have proved that Zhang Yangxu is indeed a potential stock, but the unhappy marriage also gave rise to his wife's deep resentment and pathological desire to control him. This woman would basically call on time every morning and evening to check on him, saying that she wanted to make sure that he was not fooling around outside, and she seemed to have an attitude that if my marriage is not happy, then you can't have an easy life either.
However, due to some factors that everyone understands, it may not be convenient for Zhang Yangxu to answer Xia Chan's call these two days. Xia Chan, who has been unable to get through the phone many times, is now very irritable. Even Ning Zhe is a little afraid to touch Zhang Yangxu's phone.
Mainly hurt the ears.
"It's not easy for Boss Zhang..." Ning Zhe sighed and stayed in the hotel that his assistant had booked in advance.
Compared to Zhang Yangxu, Bai Fugui's life was much better. His wife Feng Yushu was the kind of person who would accept being bullied and never fight back. She was quite easy to handle. However, it was useless to envy other people's wives. Before dealing with the work, he still had to coax Zhang Yangxu's wife.
It's time to use the skills I learned in junior high school to write love letters to my female classmates. I don't know if those sweet words with a hint of youthful bitterness will work on an old married woman...
The result was unexpectedly effective.
By the time Ning Zhe finally helped Zhang Yangxu coax his wife and finished his work, it was already eight o'clock in the evening and there was no dinner to eat.
"We can finally set off..."
Ning Zhe turned off the lights in the hotel room tiredly and locked the door. A beautiful figure appeared in front of him. He Nianjun held a withered almanac in her fair and slender hands, which showed the good and bad luck for today:
【Lunar April 26th】
[Suitable for: bathing, cleaning, building, and seeking children]
[Taboos: bringing out fire, releasing water, combining longevity wood, and opening graves]
After reconfirming the good and bad luck of the day, Ning Zhe opened the French window and jumped down from the 32nd floor.
The boy's tall and straight figure transformed into a gray-feathered peregrine falcon in the night, flapping its wings and flying over the misty Yunmeng Lake. It is one of the fastest flying birds on earth.
After a few days of running-in, Ning Zhe has become more and more proficient in mastering the rules of Taiyi. The gray-white peregrine falcon rushed past the water surface, with hazy smoke rising between its feathers. It seamlessly switched to an owl during the flight and flew into the night curtain of Izumo Mountain. With the help of the owl's excellent night vision ability, Ning Zhe stood on the branch of a mulberry tree in the forest and looked at the quiet mountain villa surrounded by the vast forest at the foot of Izumo Mountain.
That is the Izumo Villa where the funeral is about to be held.
On both sides of the gate of Izumo Villa, there is a stone statue. They are not the common stone lions, but two sheep standing on two legs, which look inexplicably weird.
Yundu City has always advocated the elegance and sentiment of literati and poets. Ji Bo once built a house and lived in seclusion in the forest under Mount Izumo, also learning from Tao Yuanming. Unfortunately, he did not grow beans, and his wife and children did not starve to death.
And there are quite a lot of people living in seclusion here.
Ning Zhe flew all the way here from Yunmengze and saw at least a hundred or eighty mountain manors and villas similar to Ji Bochang's. Living in seclusion alone is called seclusion, but can a group of people living in seclusion together be called seclusion? That's called moving the capital.
Ning Zhe flew over the branches speechlessly and landed on a tree close to Izumo Villa. He used the terrain to look down at the architectural layout of the villa from above.
Is it a coincidence? The tree he landed on happened to be another sancao tree, and it was unusually tall.
"This tree looks familiar... I think I've seen it before." Ning Zhe tilted his head and thought about it. It seemed that he had seen it when he was a child with his grandfather herding cattle in the mountains. This tree would produce red fruits similar to mulberries, which would soothe your throat. However, I had never seen any trees here bear fruit.
Gathering his messy thoughts, Ning Zhe concentrated on observing Izumo Villa.
Izumo Villa faces south, with its back against Izumo Mountain and in front of Yunmeng Lake. It is surrounded by a lush forest that has obviously been artificially maintained.
The villa itself has a classic square layout, with high walls, large courtyards and glazed tiles. The main building is a mixed structure of stone bricks, bamboo and wood. Several load-bearing columns lift the main building high off the ground, making it look very similar to the traditional southern dwellings - stilt houses.
There is a couplet pasted on the gate of the stilt house. Judging from the handwriting, it should be written by Ji Bochang himself.
First couplet: [The door welcomes blessings of spring, summer, autumn and winter]
Second line: [The household receives wealth from the southeast, northwest and northeast]
Horizontal banner: [Long live forever]
Weird statues, weird couplets.
Ning Zhe flapped his wings and left the treetops, flew to the eaves of the stilt house and stopped. He looked down and couldn't help feeling puzzled.
"what happened?"
Tomorrow is the day of the funeral for old man Ji Bochang, but there is almost no sign of a funeral at Izumo Villa.
There were no wreaths, no white silk, and even the mourning hall for the corpse was not placed in the main building’s first floor hall. There was only a black coffin, placed alone in the open space directly below the stilt house.
There were still lights on in the stilt house, so there must be people living inside.
"Eating, drinking, defecating and urinating on a dead person's head? This is a big taboo." Ning Zhe frowned. What on earth are the people here thinking?
Ning Zhe left the eaves and glided silently to the open space under the stilt house, where he saw a black lacquered coffin placed directly on the ground in a rather shabby manner. There was not even any decorations such as pine, cypress, chrysanthemum or the like around it to express mourning. It was completely a bare coffin.
When I looked closer, I saw a golden word "Lu" painted on each end of the coffin.
…Shouldn’t the word “Shou” be written on the coffin of a deceased old man? At the very least, it should be “Fu”.
(End of this chapter)