The Great Qin Empire---Qin Li

"You mean, the Ruo'ao clan has been passed down for six hundred years, and has continued for dozens of generations. They once dominated the Chu State and almost killed King Zhuang of Chu?"

Heifu didn't expect that from the time of dawn to the time of cockcrow, the story about the Ruo'ao clan told by Li Xian accompanied him through the long night in this wilderness.

Just now, after Heifu and his team captured the tomb robbers, they immediately questioned them, wanting to find out the fact that the tomb robbers colluded with the prison gate of Chaoyangli. But the leader of the tomb robbers, the red-faced and short-bearded thief, was stubborn and refused to tell even if beaten to death, which made Dongmen Bao so angry that he wanted to kill him with a halberd.

But the tomb robbers were not of one mind, especially the Chu boy "Xing" who was forced to join the tomb robbers. Because he hated the beatings and abuses of the tomb robbers, he told everything he knew like pouring beans.

Xing also said that at dawn tonight, the prison gate of Chaoyangli would personally drive a bullock cart to pick them up and help transfer the stolen goods...

So Heifu discussed with several people and decided to let Dongmenbao and Xiaotao drag the five tomb robbers behind the hill and hide them and seal their mouths. Heifu and Lixian pretended to be tomb robbers, holding iron hoes, sitting by the tomb, and playing a "wait and see" for the prison gate of Chaoyangli...

It was cold at night, and time passed slowly. Anyway, Heifu was shivering with his arms when he was free, so he chatted to pass the time. He asked Lixian about the origin of the owner of the tomb, "Ruo'ao".

Lixian was not surprised that Heifu didn't know Ruo'ao. After all, it had been more than 50 years since the Chu State withdrew from Jianghan. As time went by, the common people only recognized who the government was in front of them. Except for the little nobles of the Chu Dynasty who were still talking about the old feelings, who would remember the former feudal lord?

He told Heifu that the Ruo'ao clan was the descendant of "Ruo'ao", the 14th king of Chu. After Chu became king, the Ruo'ao clan gradually grew and became the most powerful royal family of Chu. Later, the Dou clan and the Cheng clan were separated, and many Ling Yin and Sima were born, who served in important military and political positions for a long time, such as Dou Gu Yu Tu (Zi Wen), Cheng Dechen, Cheng Daxin... It's a pity that Heifu didn't know any of these people.

After listening patiently for a long time, Li Xian finally talked about someone he knew: King Zhuang of Chu, who was amazing when he made a name for himself.

Heifu now knew that the reason why King Zhuang of Chu didn't fly for three years was because the Ruo'ao clan was so powerful that they had undermined the king of Chu. It is said that at that time, the Ruo'ao clan had six private soldiers, which together accounted for half of the Chu army.

In the end, King Zhuang of Chu went to war with the Ruo'ao clan and finally won the victory, which led to his going north to compete for hegemony and the importance of the throne.

"Did the Ruo'ao clan perish after that?" Hei Fu asked.

"How is that possible?"

Li Xian waved his hand and said, "The King of Chu remembered that the Ruo'ao clan had been loyal to the Chu State for generations, so he left a line of descendants and granted them the title of Anlu. At that time, this place was still called Yun County, and the Dou clan became the Duke of Yun County."

When the Chu State and the Wu State fought a war, Wu Zixu and Sun Wu led their troops to defeat the Chu army and invaded Yingdu, and the Ruo'ao clan had another opportunity.

At that time, King Zhao of Chu fled to Anlu, and Dou Xin, a descendant of the Ruo'ao clan, followed him and made some contributions to protecting King Zhao of Chu. So when rewarding for merit afterwards, King Zhao of Chu promoted Dou Xin to be the You Yin, whose position was below Ling Yin and Sima, but above ordinary county lords.

These deeds are all engraved on the tripod that was taken up by the tomb robbers. This large tomb is exactly the tomb of Yun Gong Dou Xin. No wonder the specifications are so high. Not only are there chariots and horses buried with him, but there are also tomb guardian beasts, which can be compared with those of the princes.

Hearing this, Hei Fu was slightly surprised: "Wait, this Ruo'ao is the Duke of Yun, what is the relationship with the family of the county left lieutenant Yun Man?"

"Yun?"

Li Xian was stunned, and subconsciously spat, saying with contempt: "How is it possible, Ruo'ao is the descendant of the prince of the Chu State, the Duke of Yun. Although the Yun family claims to be aristocrats, they are only the remnants of the ancient Yun State, just like my Li family, just a doctor, just a minister of the Ruo'ao family. I'm not exaggerating, my Li family was in charge of the classics for the Ruo'ao family at that time, but what about the Yun family? They are just in charge of the stables and gardens, not even worthy of carrying shoes for the Ruo'ao family!"

It can be seen that the Yun family has been thriving in recent years and has become the largest local snake in Anlu. The Li family, who was on equal footing with it back then, is a little jealous. Heifu smiled but didn't expose the truth. For him, it was troublesome enough to have an enemy with the Yun family. He was glad to hear that these old nobles were not united.

In the more than two hundred years after King Zhao of Chu and Dou Xin, although the Chu State had undergone several changes and was even reformed by Wu Qi, the essence of aristocratic rule remained unchanged. Ruo Ao continued to rule Anlu as the "Yun Lord" from generation to generation.

Time seemed to stand still, just like the stagnant class and society in Chu, except that the nobles lived more and more luxuriously, squeezing countless wealth to decorate their own palaces.

But the outside world, especially the Qin State in the north, was undergoing earth-shaking changes!

Until one day, a Qin general named Bai Qi led his army across the Yangtze and Han Rivers, captured Yan and Ying in one battle, burned Yiling in another battle, and the King of Chu fled east in a hurry in the third battle. Qu Yuan drowned in the river in grief and anger... The Chu State, which had continued to rule here for hundreds of years, collapsed overnight.

The descendants of Ruo'ao in Anlu also fled in a hurry. Since then, the deeds of Ruo'ao have become a thing of the past. Even Dou Xin's tomb has become a pile of weeds because no one has eaten blood.

The only thing left in the folk is the legend that Ruo'ao has a big tomb in Anlu, but no one knows where the tomb is.

Unexpectedly, the legend is true, and today, by chance, they found it.

At this point, Li Xian couldn't help but sigh: "Ghosts still seek food, so won't the ghosts of Ruo'ao be hungry? Unexpectedly, the words of the ancestors of Ruo'ao have become true! After the Ruo'ao clan was dispersed, even Dou Xin could not enjoy blood food. It's really sad and lamentable!"

As the saying goes, people feel sorry for their own kind. As a descendant of the nobility, although he is now only a pavilion servant, Li Xian still feels sorry for the decline of the Ruo'ao clan. The nobility that has been passed down for 600 years is now unable to continue with blood food. Is there anything more shocking than this?

But Hei Fu's heart was not moved.

…

When Li Xian sighed, Hei Fu nodded, but he didn't think so.

"If the Ruo Ao family declines, then so be it. What's there to be sorry about?"

Perhaps because of the influence of his previous life, or perhaps because of his identity in this life, Hei Fu has never been interested in aristocratic rule.

Missing the "aristocratic spirit" of the Spring and Autumn Period? Listen carefully! In addition to the nobles' self-promotion and the elegance of living a life of luxury, how do the national customs of various countries praise this kind of life?

"Wei Feng" says: Big rats, big rats, don't eat my millet! Three-year-old girls, no one cares about me... The aristocratic feudal system from top to bottom makes the nobles of all sizes exploit the peasants in turn, and the savages are like pigs and dogs.

"Bin Feng" says: Without clothes and brown, how can one survive the year... The peasants worked hard for a year, but all the silk and fox fur were sent to the nobles to "make clothes for the princes", but they could not even afford brown clothes.

Look at the tomb of Dou Xin of Ruo'ao clan in front of you. It is true that the country is bigger, the family is richer, and the burial is more generous. Inside the coffin, there are toys, treasures, bells, tripods, pots, chariots, horses, clothes, and countless burial objects. These things are all the blood and sweat of the common people under his rule. Although Chu also has laws, they are in name only in the feudal lords' territories.

Unlike the aristocratic friends that Li Xian heard from his elders, Hei Fu also heard his mother talk about his "grandfather" and "grandmother" from the perspective of the common people. In the eyes of the common people, compared with the Chu State, Anlu under the rule of Qin State was still very hard, but life was a little better than before.

The Qin State today is not the period of the reign of Qin II. Although the laws and decrees are strict, there is still a limit to everything.

Farmers no longer have to pay tributes to nobles of all sizes. They only need to pay the grain rent and head tax to the county officials of Qin State and serve one month of corvée every year. Although the labor is heavy, at least there will not be the past when some nobles get carried away and organize the people to repair cities and hunt tigers and leopards during the busy farming season.

Because Qin attaches great importance to farming, the villages were organized into production teams. The people could borrow oxen and iron farm tools from officials and try their best to cultivate their own land. There is no need to worry about the princes riding horses, chasing foxes and rabbits, and being overbearing on their own fields, but they don't have to pay any price. Although merchants are lowly, there will be no prince reining in their horses in front of them, eating for free, and forcing buying and selling.

While Qin law restricted the freedom of the common people, it also restrained the recklessness of the old nobles.

While the Qin Law prevented the nobles from controlling the local areas, it also opened a door to class mobility for the common people.

The government no longer appointed officials based on family lineage, but had to test their mastery of laws and regulations and examine their real talents and knowledge. In addition, with the military merit system, people who were destined to be farmers and common people forever seemed to have a hope...

After decades, the people of Anlu County still spoke the Chu accent, but they no longer considered themselves Chu people, but Qin people.

They began to forget the Ruo'ao clan who had ruled this place for hundreds of years, but began to remember the Qin laws and regulations that were related to their lives.

This patriarchal aristocratic era that lasted for more than a thousand years, after the Spring and Autumn Period, the baptism of fighting in the Warring States Period, and the pervasive Qin Law, became shaky together with the symbol of the aristocracy, the tripod and the gui...

Such an era was an opportunity for a small person like Heifu to emerge.

Heifu knew this very well.

The time traveler is the sharpest awl of this era. He only needs to be put into the pocket to stand out...

Now, he has been in the system, looking for any opportunity to rise.

Just as Heifu and Lixian had many ideas because of the story of Ruo'ao, the crowing of cocks came from the houses in the distant village.

The crowing of cocks has passed, and dawn has arrived.

The sky is still dark, but a little fire is lit on the road in the direction of Chaoyangli...

...

A gust of cold wind blew, and sitting on the ox cart, Chaoyangli's gatekeeper Bo Wu shivered and suddenly became much more sober.

After he separated from Chang last night, he didn't sleep all night, tossing and turning, always worried that the matter would be exposed.

Too many accidents have happened in the past few days.

The grave digging should have been smooth, but it encountered a rare heavy snow.

On the first day of his appointment, the head of the pavilion, Heifu, came to Chaoyangli, where there was nothing going on, to inspect the place...

Without any warning, the peaceful official Quji from Lidong was suddenly arrested by Huyang Pavilion on the charge of picking up lost money in the county?

All kinds of things were intertwined in these two days, making Bowu very nervous.

He also knew that he had violated the law and must be severely punished because he colluded with tomb robbers to rob tombs for greed, bought tools for them, and transferred the stolen goods!

So, he must not be exposed!

Unfortunately, he failed to persuade Chang. Now that the matter is done, he can only bite the bullet and drive the ox cart to meet the tomb robbers as promised.

What else can he do now? He can only pray that Heifu didn't find any problems, and quickly transfer the last batch of stolen goods tonight and send those tomb robbers away.

The share he got was enough to sell for tens of thousands of dollars, making him rich overnight. This was also the reason why the prison guards would rather take the risk of cooperating with Chang than report him to the government. The money earned from committing a crime was much more generous than the reward for reporting.

So Bo Wu accelerated his journey. When he arrived at the agreed location, he saw torches lit in front of the mound and two figures waiting for him behind the cemetery.

Bo Wu stopped the cart and took a closer look, only to see that there were already a lot of lacquerware and bronzeware piled up beside the cemetery...

"It seems that the tomb has finally been opened. Not bad, not bad. Chang is quite punctual."

He felt relieved and walked towards the two figures, smiling and saying, "Chang, we have such a rich harvest tonight. I am really ashamed. I really shouldn't have asked you to stop just because the pavilion chief Heifu walked around in Chaoyang..."

At this time, the two figures also came over. One of them swung his torch forward. The scorching flame and smoke made Bo Wu close his eyes and cursed, "What are you doing?"

"What? Of course, it's to see who the criminal is." There was a hint of amusement in his voice, not Chang!

Bo Wu was terrified and wanted to escape, but his retreat was blocked by another person. He was caught in the middle and had to avoid the torch that was getting closer and closer while trying to open his eyes and look at the person in front of him.

But he saw that this person was wearing a red cap and a red robe, and was looking at Bo Wu with a smile, as if he was looking at the steps to his promotion and wealth.

"Huyang Pavilion Chief... How could it be... you..." Bo Wu's face turned pale, and he couldn't believe his eyes.

The person who came was Hei Fu. He stood in front of Bo Wu, shaking the rope in his hand and smiled:

"Li Jianmen, we meet everywhere in life! We meet again!"

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