In the second year of Shengyou, the imperial court was extremely corrupt and the people were in dire straits. After hundreds of years of ups and downs, the Shengyuan Empire still could not escape the historical gear of the transition from Shengyou to decline. After Taizu founded the empire, it took more than two hundred years and eight generations of emperors to experience After the empire's heyday, it gradually fell to its bottom.

The ninth emperor, Li Hang, was mediocre and immoral. He drank and had fun every day and carried out large-scale construction projects, which made the people miserable. There was a fierce struggle for power within the palace. Whoever wins, power and money will follow. .The emperor completely became a puppet, abandoned the government, ignored the country, and the entire empire faced huge changes.

There is restlessness within the court, and the world is still bloody. The major forces in the Central Plains are engaged in a desperate struggle with the demon sect, and it is difficult to determine the winner. This has added a bit of misery to the innocent people. The people have been displaced, and the situation of mourning and mourning has become the norm. .

Compared with the bloody rivers and lakes, there is such a pure land without blood and peace. It is a small continent located in the southernmost part of the empire. It is separated from the mainland by a river, and this river is called Lingjiang. This small continent has a name. , called "Changting Island".

At this moment, it is the season when the grass grows and the eagles fly. Everything is lush and green, and the interior of Changting Island is full of life. The area of ​​Changting Island is not very large, only equivalent to the area of ​​a valley. There is also a river in the island that divides the entire small continent into unequal parts. There are two parts, the northern area is small and the southern area is large. The northern area is far away from the mainland across the Lingjiang River.

The main reason why this small island is called Changting Island is that there is a long pavilion on the south bank of the small river that runs from east to west in the island. The name of the pavilion is "Changting".

In the pavilion, a middle-aged man was looking at the chessboard in front of him and fell into deep thought. Looking at the black and white chess pieces on the chessboard, he didn't know where to start for a moment. He picked up and put down the white chess pieces in his right hand. In the end, he could only He sighed helplessly and said to himself: "Life is like a chess game. If you make a wrong move, there will be no turning back. No matter which dynasty you are in, it is the same. If the emperor makes a wrong move, it is the defenseless people who will suffer. Alas! "

The middle-aged man leaned on the railing and looked into the distance. Looking around, he saw a vast expanse of white on the water, and reeds in the water rushed out from under the water. Not far from the pavilion, a boy was cleaning the empty area in front of the attic. .

??                                                                                            This Changting Island is different from the Central Plains of the mainland, where good and evil are at war, the court is fighting openly and secretly, and the people are miserable.

"Xing, the common people are suffering, and the king's common people are suffering!" The middle-aged man muttered to himself a few more times, his eyes fixed on the misty river surface.

"Sir, the wind has picked up, let's go back to the house first!" The boy behind him put down the broom in his hand at some point and came to the middle-aged man's side.

?? When the middle-aged man heard the sound of the wind chimes hanging in the corner of the pavilion, he sighed helplessly.

?? “Xiao Mu, what do you mean by the way of the world? What is the human heart?”

? The boy didn’t understand what the middle-aged man was talking about, so he scratched his head and looked confused.

?? “Xiao Mu doesn’t know!” The boy couldn’t answer the middle-aged man’s question and lowered his head in embarrassment.

?? Only then did the middle-aged man realize that a child's voice came from behind him, with a smile on his face. How could he ask a child who has not yet entered the world these questions? He picked up the wine bottle at his waist and poured it into his mouth.

He took a sip, smiled, patted the boy's head and said, "Haha... How can you possibly answer my question? Let's go!"

??The boy raised his head and saw the middle-aged man's kind eyes. He picked up the broom next to him and trotted out of the pavilion. He followed the middle-aged man and walked towards the attic at the back.

??Only the clear sound of the wind chimes was left in the pavilion, and the lingering sound lingered.

??????

??"Catch her, she's right in front, catch her quickly!"

??A group of masked people were running quickly on the forest path, each holding a shining sword. There was still blood on each sword blade, which looked particularly eye-catching under the sunlight.

.

??Not far ahead, a woman covered in blood was hiding in the nearby bushes. She was holding a small wooden basin in her arms. In the wooden basin, a several-month-old baby was sleeping soundly, unaware of the outside world.

The woman watched the group of masked men pass by her, and then quietly breathed a sigh of relief.

??Not far from her is the Lingjiang River in the southern part of the empire. She originally lived in an ordinary family near the Lingjiang River. Her husband went to Beijing to take the exam a year ago, and there has been no news about her husband.

Like other scholars, he aspires to obtain fame and return to his hometown in fine clothes. His wife also supports him very much and takes care of her meticulously every day. Before taking her away, her husband swore that he would definitely come to pick her up after seizing a world in the capital, but at that time

He didn't know that she was pregnant.

??A year later, what greeted her was not a team returning home in full glory, but a group of masked uninvited guests. As soon as these bloodthirsty madmen entered the village, they started killing without saying a word. She didn't understand what she had done wrong.

, and didn’t understand why her village encountered such a disaster.

??Taking advantage of the chaos, she ran out of the village, but the mysterious group of people obviously did not intend to let everyone in the village go. When they saw her escaping, they immediately sent people to chase her.

??On the one hand, she was secretly glad that her husband had not come back and escaped the disaster. On the other hand, she was worried about whether the child in her arms could escape the disaster. Looking at the sleeping child, the woman shed a few tears on her face.

It fell on the sleeping child's face. The child seemed to feel something and blinked a few times. The woman was even more sad when she saw this. Her tears couldn't stop flowing down. She quickly covered her mouth for fear that she would cry out.

.

??The masked men returned to their original place again, and were looking for something everywhere. Seeing this, the woman became even more flustered. She quickly carried the wooden basin to the Lingjiang River and looked at the quietly flowing river.

, the woman looked at the child in the tub with a gentle expression, then took out a letter from her arms and put it in the tub, kissed him on the face and then placed the tub in the water tremblingly.

Watch it drift away with the current. The children in the basin are neither crying nor fussing, just like the water of Lingjiang River is gentle and quiet.

??The woman felt the masked man outside the bush behind her getting closer and closer. She watched the wooden basin getting further and further away. Finally, she covered her mouth, reluctantly turned around and ran towards the other side of the trail.

??"She's here!"

?? The voice of the masked man came from behind. At this moment, the only thing in the woman's mind was the weak figure in the wooden basin.

??"Child, I hope you can survive in this troubled world. Mother failed to leave you anything..."

???……

???

"Sir! Sir..." The boy named Xiaomu in the attic of Changtingzhou opened the attic door with a panic on his face. The middle-aged man was reading an ancient book leisurely in the room. At this time, he saw

The boy put down the book in his hand, looked at him doubtfully and said:

"Xiao Mu, why are you so panicked?"

Before Xiao Mu could reply, he grabbed the middle-aged man's hand and hurried to Changting. The middle-aged man let him hold his hand and followed him. He also wanted to know what happened.???

?? “Sir, look over there!”

Xiao Mu pointed to the river not far away, turned to look at the middle-aged man beside him and said.

The middle-aged man followed his hand and saw a wooden basin floating swaying towards the pavilion on the vast water waves. The middle-aged man was shocked because he looked carefully and saw the inside of the wooden basin.

There is a baby.

"Xiao Mu, wait for me here!" After saying that, the middle-aged man crossed over and flew above the water. Wherever his toes touched, microwaves rippled. When the middle-aged man was still ten feet away from the wooden basin

, he took off the green sword from his waist and threw him to the water next to the wooden basin. The strange thing was that the green sword did not sink into the water and floated on the water like duckweed.

The young man took two steps and stood on the blue sword. He bent down and picked up the wooden basin. The baby looked at him curiously, his eyes full of yearning for the world.

The middle-aged man looked at the baby in the basin and showed a loving smile. He twisted his body and crossed the water with his sword. After a while, he returned to the pavilion.

Xiao Mu hurriedly stepped forward. When he saw the baby in the tub, his face showed excitement: "What a cute doll!"

The middle-aged man smiled and touched his head and said: "Xiao Mu, go to the attic quickly to find some clothes, don't let him freeze!"

After listening to the middle-aged man's words, Xiao Mu quickly ran to the attic. The middle-aged man looked at the baby in his arms and saw that the baby was not afraid or hesitant, and he loved him even more. He

Picking up the envelope on the tub, he opened it and read it carefully. As he looked at it, he couldn't help but frown. When he saw a name mentioned in the letter, he trembled all over, with a gloomy expression on his face.

Uncertain, he finally sighed helplessly.

"Is it really God's will?"

The middle-aged man looked at the baby in his arms again, and saw his own reflection in it through his clear eyes. The child's innocent eyes suddenly hurt his heart. He thought of the child who had been inseparable from him many years ago.

That figure continued to expand in the depths of my memory, and finally gradually disappeared into the deepest part of my mind.

Time can really change a lot of things. Even the purest soul cannot escape the fate of being assimilated into this dirty world.

Just when his thoughts were filled with emotion, the baby in his arms moved. The middle-aged man came back to his senses and saw one of the baby's little hands playing with the green sword on his body, making a few soft noises from time to time.

laugh.

"Do you like this sword?"

The middle-aged man held the sword in front of him. At this moment, the baby was even more excited and dancing, and a smile appeared on the middle-aged man's face.

"Since you don't have a name yet, and you love this sword so much, the name of the sword is 'Qing Ming', then from now on your name will also be called Qing Ming!"
Chapter completed!