Chapter One: The Charcoal Seller at the Broken Temple in the Heavy Snow

Uncle, I am not cold

At this moment, he had only one thought in his mind

Li Xin shook his head, curling up in the old man's embrace: "Uncle... you drink, I am not cold."

Thus, Li Xin promptly fainted.

However, in this profession, if you can only produce ordinary charcoal, you can only earn a meager living, barely enough to survive, let alone achieve great wealth and prosperity

What the hell, it was still summer last night

Pity the one whose clothing is thin, worried about the cheapness of coal in the cold weather, this is precisely what they are referring to

At this time, it was already the afternoon of the second day. At the entrance of the dilapidated temple, a ragged old man was pushing a unicycle, leading a similarly tattered little girl, as they passed by the crumbling temple

The cold wind blew again, and both individuals huddled closer together

Strange

On this cold winter night, the two of them froze to death in this dilapidated temple

He is too weak

Li Xin staggered to his feet and barely managed to discern that he was in what appeared to be a dilapidated temple. Inside the temple, there was nothing else but a few damaged idols and some scattered straw.

The young man gritted his teeth, tucked the jade pendant into his bosom, and his eyes were faintly glistening with tears

It is evident that they make a living by selling carbon

However, unlike Li Xin, this elderly man and the little girl were covered in black soot, especially the elderly man, whose hands had almost turned pitch black, with the gaps between his ten fingers filled with black coal dust

At this moment, the wind and snow are fierce

The old man spoke while taking a small wooden jug from his waist and handing it to Li Xin's mouth

Fortunately, Li Xin is quite slender; otherwise, he would truly be unable to move this young man

wild species

However, when he knocked on the door of the Pingnan Marquis's residence with his uncle, what he received were two cold words

Yongzhou is in the south, while the capital city is in the north. In comparison, the winters in the capital city are more difficult to endure.

In the face of the cold, one must expend their own heat; at this moment, his body has reached its limit

The old man felt a bit sad in his heart. He patted Li Xin on the back, his voice faint: "Alright... tomorrow... we will return to Yongzhou."

Child, are you cold...

Damn it, are these little bastards messing with me

At this moment, it was already afternoon. An old man and a young girl passed by the entrance of a dilapidated temple. The little girl suddenly stopped in her tracks, pointed at Li Xin, who was lying inside the temple, and said in a crisp voice: "Grandpa, there is someone in the temple..."

We went to that ... ... Hou residence yesterday

Hiss... it's so cold...

Outside, heavy snow was falling, and in a dilapidated temple on the outskirts of the capital, an old man and a young boy, dressed in rather thin clothing, were leaning against the low wall of the temple, trying their best to avoid the biting cold wind blowing from all directions. Unfortunately, this broken temple was drafty, and no matter how they tried to dodge, the piercing cold wind would always find its way to the two of them.

Uncle... Uncle Gong, I... I want to go home

The carbon of this era is mostly charcoal

These two words, which Li Xin had heard for over ten years, he had gradually become accustomed to. However, when these two words were spoken by the members of the Li family, they sounded particularly jarring.

Uncle struggled to blink his eyes, curling up his whole body and holding Li Xin in his arms, his voice low: "Your father, he is out on a campaign, unaware of your arrival. When he returns, he will naturally come to acknowledge you, and by then, your days of hardship will come to an end"

The old man stopped in his tracks, set the unicycle aside, and then carried the little girl into the dilapidated temple. Upon seeing Li Xin, who was lying on the ground and still somewhat handsome, the old man bent down and probed beneath Li Xin's nose with his dark hand. After confirming that Li Xin was still breathing, the charcoal seller let out a deep sigh, his voice frail: "What a pitiful child, in this bitter cold, lying here would mean no chance of survival."

This is also a pair of an elderly person and a young child. The elderly person appears to be around sixty to seventy years old, while the little girl looks quite young, at most around five or six years old

The people in that marquis's residence ... ... also insulted me as a bastard

Winter is too cold, and the gentlemen in the city do not rely on the heat from their bodies to endure it. Instead, they set up beautiful stoves in their homes and throw a few pieces of coal into the stoves, making the entire room as warm as spring.

Neither of the two individuals stutter, yet due to the extreme cold, their speech is halting, and it takes them quite a while to barely finish a sentence

Soon, the biting cold completely awakened Li Xin

Li Xin spoke in a halting manner, his thin lips nearly bitten to the point of bleeding

However, as soon as this thought flashed through his mind, he felt a darkness before his eyes, and then he collapsed to the ground, losing consciousness

When it is cold, one tends to miss home

Winter has always been a season when the heavens claim lives. Some wealthy individuals, even in their old age, cannot survive the winter, while the impoverished endure even greater hardships. The winter of the seventeenth year of Chengde was particularly frigid

The old man also reluctantly opened his eyes, turned his head to look at the young man, and said with a trembling voice: "Xiner... you... your mother has passed away. Before she left, she asked me to bring you to the capital to find your father. From now on, this capital will be your home..."

The young man appeared to be around fourteen or fifteen years old. He was shivering all over from the cold, his body constantly shaking, and he turned his stiff neck to look at the old man, his upper and lower jaws clattering incessantly.

When Li Xin woke up again, the only sensation he felt was the bone-chilling cold

... ...

The elderly man is his great-uncle, which means he is his mother's uncle

For more than a decade, Li Xin had been dependent on his mother. His mother had been insulted as a shameless woman for over ten years, and naturally, he was called a bastard for just as long. As he grew up, he often got into fights because of this. Later, his mother simply took him to live in the deep mountains, and the two of them rarely interacted with outsiders.

Then he saw that there was an old man lying beside him, the old man seemed to be holding him tightly in his arms, but his complexion had already turned into a lifeless grayish-blue, clearly indicating that he had been dead for quite some time

When he opened his eyes, he saw a sky full of white.

The young man's name is Li Xin, and he is fifteen years old. In the middle of this year, his mother passed away due to illness. Until her last moments, this woman, who had been scorned as a "shameless woman" for over a decade, finally revealed Li Xin's true identity, stating that he is the son of Li Shen, the Pingnan Marquis of the capital. She also instructed her uncle to take Li Xin to the capital to search for his relatives.

The young man struggled to finish this sentence, using authentic Yongzhou dialect

Charcoal is produced through human burning, which gives rise to the profession of logging and charcoal making. In winter, one goes up the mountain to cut down trees, then burns them into charcoal to sell to the gentlemen in the city

Li Xin felt a bit warmer, his body curled up in the old man's embrace, faintly carrying a sobbing tone: "Uncle, I don't want to stay in the capital, can we go back to Yongzhou tomorrow... it's so cold here..."

In my memory, I was drinking with those little bastards last night, and then a few of them got me drunk. I collapsed on the ground and fell asleep. How is it that when I woke up... it is so cold

He glanced around, and the sky was filled with white.

This young man, who has been scolded for over a decade, came to Beijing this time with hope. He wanted to see what his father was like and to ask him why he had not visited him and his mother for so many years

Come, open your mouth and take a sip, it is too cold, a sip will warm your body

Speaking, he bent his body and walked to the entrance of the dilapidated temple, pushing the unicycle inside, and then with considerable effort, he lifted Li Xin onto the unicycle

The wind and snow outside are fierce, and the heavy snow has blocked all the roads, sealing the fate of the old and the young, who will forever be unable to return to Yongzhou.

The small wooden pot contains an exceedingly murky strong liquor, which the old man brought all the way from Yongzhou to the capital.

The great-uncle's face was aged, having exhausted the last bit of his strength to pour the remaining dregs of poor wine from the wooden jug into Li Xin's mouth

Thinking of this, the young man reluctantly lowered his head and glanced at the snow-white jade pendant in his hand. The pendant was engraved with the character "Shen," which was a token given to him by his mother, instructing him to carry this jade token to the capital to search for his father