Chapter 172 Elephant Tomb (I)

Back to Chang'an at this time... Not only that, Di Renjie and Wei Yuanzhong did not return to Chang'an. Even the two aides given by Li Zhiyu, Wei Zhigu and Zhu Jingze, were left in Luoyang. Only Yao Yuanchong and Ximen Chong, were not in the imperial examination this year because of their bad years. So he accompanied him back to Chang'an.

Li Wei didn't understand very much.

Why did my father do this? Could it be that when he saw that he had a harmonious relationship with his mother, the Three Kingdoms in his heart had lost their meaning, so he simply brought himself back to Chang'an? Or when he saw that the imperial village and crops were growing well, he wanted to take this righteousness in his hands, so he let himself go back to Chang'an. Or because there were several prime ministers living in Chang'an and no one was in charge, his father was afraid that his power would be out of control, so he let himself go back to Chang'an to "supervise the country"?

When asked Di Renjie, Di Renjie answered two words: "Unreasonable."

It is not right to say that Li Wei’s idea is not right, and even Li Zhi asked Li Wei to return to Chang'an has no reason to explain.

Li Wei was not anxious either. He was worried about his mother and father. As long as he did not touch his bottom line, that is, the imperial power, he would probably be in peace. He sat down and talked to Di Huidi for a while, blew up, and told a few jokes by the way, which made the two girls laugh so hard that they were trembling. Di Renjie did not give advice this time, but instead smiled along the way.

If you are a human being, you will always have your own weaknesses. At first, you just wanted to solve a problem for the prince, but now you are taking it more and more seriously. But your Majesty and the Queen still have concerns, otherwise you will not worry about the prince dislike him if you enter the Eastern Palace...

The eunuch Jin also wanted to leave with him, begging with tears and tears, saying that the old slave was old and that if His Highness stayed in Xijing and did not come to Dongdu, the old slave would not be able to see His Highness. He also said that the old slave followed His Highness and became wiser, and even his health was better, and he couldn't bear to leave. Li Wei was so amused and crying, so he brought it with him.

Can't figure it out, don't think about it.

March comes, and the car leaves Luoyang and returns to Chang'an.

Fireworks in Yangzhou in March have spread throughout the ages. There is no boat ride, nor is there the vast blue blue flowing to the sky of the Yangtze River. There are only a lot of people. There are also many flowers on both sides of the road.

When we arrived in Guozhou, it was almost dusk and the car stopped. Because it was the road from Chang'an to Luoyang, the two emperors liked to run to Luoyang. They stayed in Luoyang for a while and then returned to Chang'an for a while. Many other museums were built on the avenue. There were also ones in Guozhou, so they settled in the other museums.

After meeting the officials of Guozhou, Li Wei looked at Ximen Chong and said, "How about I detour from Guozhou to Shangzhou tomorrow?"

"The road is not easy to walk."

"I just want to come to your house to see..." It may not be possible. Shangzhou has many mountains and there is no rush to return to Chang'an anyway. The drought has passed. Even Guanzhong, the worst last year, is growing well now. Go to Shangzhou to see the situation and you can hunt by the way.

Li Wei was still worried about his father's hunting in Ye County last year. As for returning to Chang'an to supervise the country, he just used it as a joke. Supervise the country, it's OK. If you really supervise the country, the consequences will be very, very serious.

"this……"

Ximen Chong was originally calm in behavior, but he followed Di Renjie and others, and was influenced by the influence of his character. However, the prince came to his house in person and was still very excited after hearing it. In fact, Li Wei said it at Yao Yuanchong's house, but he didn't know how to answer for a while.

At this moment, the guards outside came in to report that they were several old friends from Luma and asked to pay homage to the prince.

He said it vaguely. Li Wei thought that Lu Ma asked them to pay homage, so he said, "Let them come in."

There were three people coming in, two of them Li Wei knew each other. When he brought several younger brothers and sisters to have lunch in the Lizi Tavern, Hu Ying was among the guests, but Li Wei did not talk to them. One person had a deep memory, which was the young master who asked Hu Ying to bring a few foreign girls to Chang'an.

There was another person who was very strange, with a thin face, dark face, and seemed to be from southerners. The three of them paid homage to him in fear and fear. Li Wei asked them to sit down and said, "What's wrong with Luma asking you to come?"

"No," the eldest young master Yu realized that the reason why he was summoned so quickly was because the prince misunderstood. He was afraid that the prince would be angry and immediately explained: "Your Highness, the subjects have important things. I am afraid that your highness will not be seen. I heard that the horses were very respected by your highness, so I asked him for his name."

"What's the matter?" Li Wei was not angry either. He was not in a hurry anyway, so he listened to their "must-make things".

It's not the case, but it stunned Li Wei.

This matter starts with the southerner. This person's surname is Mo. This is a very unpopular surname. It may be a descendant of the Liao people, including the eldest son Yu, named Yu Nuo, who is probably a descendant of the Hu people. Now the ethnic integration of the Tang Dynasty, there are countless Hu people and foreign people in the country, which may account for one-fifth of the proportion. Li Wei was not surprised.

Jimo was from Luzhou. Later, Luzhou, Sichuan, was not very remote, but in the Tang Dynasty, it was equivalent to a border. When we went south, most of them were in vain. I had a few money at home and studied since I was a child, but when I grew up, I liked to study. I also visited Chang'an several times, not only Chang'an, but also other places. I arrived in Nanzhao the next year.

The Tang Dynasty called Nanzhao Liuzhao, Liaozi tribe, Heman tribe, Jinchi tribe, Wangzi tribe, Puzi tribe, and Mang tribe. Among them, the Liaozi tribe, which is located in the West Daojiang and Yushui, and the Heman tribe on the south side of the West Daojiang River, had already surrendered to the Tang Dynasty, and the other four tribes did not surrender. Or the Tang Dynasty was not interested in this.

In fact, this is not the case. There were countless tribes in the Tang Dynasty or Nanzhao, including Baiman, Wuman, Mozhiman, Jianwangman, Daboonan, Xiaoboonan, Jingkeman, Chongzhouman, Dongxie, Nanxie, Yizi, Xizhao, Kunmingman, Erheman, Yongchangman, Wangman, etc. None of the officials of the Tang Dynasty could fully explain it.

The people in the capital of the Tang Dynasty believed that these were barbarians, backward and ignorant, and even at some point they were even a little scared. In fact, this was not the case. The various tribes in Nanzhao admired the Central Plains culture very much, especially after Zhuge Liang captured Meng Huo for seven times. However, the border disputes continued, part of the reason was that the tribes were barbaric and uncivilized and wanted to plunder wealth, most tribes were very friendly to the people of the Central Plains, and many tribes even wanted to marry their women to Han.

But the facts disappointed them very much. The woman didn't want to marry into the Han family. Unless she stayed in the tribe, she would not have a good ending once she left the tribe. This is a personal grudge. There are also grudges among officials. Because it is a wild land, officials transferred by the court were either military generals and prepared to suppress them at any time, or were bad officials. Especially the exiled officials, except for those who were exiled due to political struggles, most officials either made mistakes or embezzled. It is conceivable what kind of actions such officials would do when they arrive in the border area. In fact, sometimes tribes rebelled and were forced by officials.

Hearing this, Li Wei was stunned.

Jimo continued to talk further.

After arriving in Nanzhao, the tribes were very friendly to him, so they were no longer happy. They traveled more and more to Vietnam, and to the former county town of Yongchang, Zhuge Liang City, and when they were about to return, they entered a village. They saw an old elephant walking alone to the south. They couldn't help but wonder. Along the way, they saw many elephants, including wild ones, and a small number of domestic ones. The artificial ones were not counted, but most of the wild ones were in groups. As they saw more, the artificial elephants and the wild ones could be separated.

So asked.

The local people said that the elephant is an animal given by the gods and is very spiritual. Before dying, it has a premonition, and it will automatically leave the elephant team and rest alone in the elephant tomb.

When Jimo heard this, he asked strangely what the Elephant Tomb was. The first time he heard it, he didn't understand it. The locals stopped talking. Jimo was really curious and drank a lot of wine with a person, and finally got into a conversation. The Elephant Tomb was just a legend. No one knew where it was. He only knew that every elephant would have to rest here when he died. No one has seen it since ancient times, so there were all kinds of strange legends, and gradually the locals regarded it as a taboo topic.

The locals were taboo, and Jimo did not have this awareness. He immediately thought of another thing, ivory. At this time, how many wild elephants were there in various places in Nanzhao, and how many elephants were born and died in a year? The dead elephants are not worth money, but there is one thing, that is ivory.

Shangguan Wan'er had already covered her mouth, and Wei Yue's eyes were not blinking, and she was counting.

A ivory can be sold at a sky-high price in Chang'an. How many ivory will be in the elephant tomb? Are there tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands? How much will this be worth? It will definitely be many times more than the money sold in a year by Yangxuetang.

After having this idea, Jimo had no intention of traveling again and returned home. His family was very rich, but he never found this Elephant Tomb in history. It would definitely be difficult to find it. So he thought of his friend from the capital, which is this Yu Nuo. He ran to Chang'an.

After discussion, Yu Nuo immediately agreed. He would use a lot of funds, but it did not require money, but needed silver. These silver was not used for circulation, but for creating jewelry and utensils. It was not only beautiful, but also for warding off evil spirits at some point. If you want to find a tomb, you must use local people as guides and mobilize local people to bribe them. However, it is also very dangerous to bring a lot of silver into Nanzhao. Even if the local people are simple, there are also villains. Therefore, you must have more people and bring some weapons. Weapons are easy to deal with. Except for a few controls in the Tang Dynasty, such as Modao, most weapons were not controlled. Besides, the government soldiers system, for the people in idle time and for soldiers in war, could not achieve comprehensive weapon control. The main thing is people. Wherever you go, it is very dangerous and requires some strange people. This is also the main reason why Jimo looked for the help of Master Yu.

Therefore, he hooked up with a big butcher dealer in the East City of Chang'an, Ye Yi, the fat man sitting at the bottom. He took more than thirty people to Nanzhao. This happened about shortly after Ji Tianji, when he passed by Jimo, he brought more than a dozen servants. The journey reached a population of forty-nine people!

Li Wei told many interesting stories before, but they were all made up and were not credible. Now it is a living thing, and even Yao Yuanchong was impressed. However, Yao Yuanchong shook his head. He had never heard of the elephant tomb in Lizhou. However, the terrain in the south was remembered in the mind, the mountains and forests were complicated, and there were miasma in many places. Although Jimo said that the people were simple, some people liked to raise Gu, but it was very terrible. There was no Gu, and there were many insects and snakes. If it was an ordinary trip, one person and two people were enough. It might not work to find this elephant tomb. However, this legend also attracted him and did not interrupt Jimo.

Jimo spoke very slowly. After all, he was from the south and had many different accents. Fortunately, he had been to Chang'an several times and spoke non-standard words, so he might be able to say something. Everyone could understand it.

In addition to the three Jimo, these forty-nine people also had warriors with superb martial arts and Onmyoji who were good at watching terrain. Three of them even often appeared in Nanzhao to make a living, proficient in the language customs of various tribes, as well as other strange skills. They were also very prepared. They set out again all the way, and arrived in Zhuge Liang City in early July last year.

With money, the devil can push the mill. When he heard the search for the tomb of the elephant, the locals immediately avoided it as if they heard something. They almost caused the siege of the locals. However, six young people agreed to join the ranks of this vocation. With a guide, they searched for the solemnity. It took nearly a month for two heroes to come from Chang'an, but because of the unacceptable environment, they died of the epidemic. Four people also had to withdraw back to Luzhou to recuperate due to serious illness. But when everyone was impatient, the local guide finally saw an old elephant and began to look for a place to rest south.

"Have you found it?" Bier asked nervously.

Not long after Jimo and others returned to Chang'an, but the incident of the palace was rumored. They knew something about Bi'er and did not dare to neglect it. They said respectfully: "Miss Jiang, please listen to me."

Li Wei was also curious about this. There are still various legends about Xiang Tomb being so developed in later generations.

Jimo continued to say: "This elephant continues to look south, but is very alert. We dare not follow too close, and follow us all the way. Fortunately, the target is huge and we are not lost. But when we go to Vietnam, the fewer people are there. There are many snakes and insects in the jungle. Although we bring medicine, six people are bitten by poisonous insects one after another and die one after another."

"The land of the Southern Wilderness is indeed dangerous." Ximen Chong sighed.

Yao Yuanchong shook his head and said, "No, they are following this wild elephant returning home. They are all walking in remote roads, so there are more insects and snakes. In fact, many places have been plowed by barbarians, which may not be so terrible."

"Yao Dialogue, this is the case," Jimo didn't know that Yao Yuanchong had been in Yizhou for a while, and thought that the prince had a conversation, and knew everything, and it was reasonable. He continued: "Actually, when people mentioned Nanzhao, they thought of Zhuge Liang, but they didn't know that Nanzhao was named Ailao Kingdom. During the 12th year of Yongping in the Eastern Han Dynasty, the chief king Liu Mao led 77 kings, more than 500,000 households, and more than 500,000 people to attach the country. This time, the inner 3,000 miles east and west, and 4,600 miles north and south, the entire Ailao land was under the management of the Han Dynasty. Emperor Ming of Han specially gave Liu Mao a seal and established Yongchang County.

This sinicization, coupled with Zhuge Liang's appeasement, would have been a county or a land of our Tang Dynasty. But at that time, not all the people in Ailao were willing to be attached to each other. Some tribes resisted Liumao and had many wars. However, the territory was far away, and the imperial court opened Yongchang County, which was just a lie. Historical books did not record. Some tribes who were unwilling to be attached to each other were defeated and moved south. This shows that during the Han Dynasty, the population of Nanzhao was at least 550,000, or even 700,000 or 800,000. Not all places were barbaric."

Not only Nanzhao, but also in various parts of the world, including the current North and South America, there are also their own civilizations, but Han culture is at the peak of the world. But it does not mean that the people in other regions are really stupid and are not even as good as livestock. But when they know it, Li Wei did not say it.

Jimo continued to say: "This journey is getting farther and farther away. When I came to a mountain, the wild elephant finally slowed down."
Chapter completed!