Chapter 52 – Going Up to the Capital

Fan Xian shook his head with a smile, signaling that he was not having a hard time enduring the loneliness of the journey. He knew that ever since he had often relied on Si Li Li’s carriage, in the eyes of these people, he was afraid that he would not be able to disassociate himself from the word “flirt”. After deliberating for a long time, he suddenly opened his mouth and asked, “This has gone this many days, and all the way to the official road, the speed is extremely fast, should have exceeded the distance from the border to Kyoto …… This Northern Qi, seems to be a very somewhat large territory.”

The carriage suddenly fell into a strange silence.

After a long time, Lin Jing said with a smile, “Not bad, although last year the court grabbed a large area of land from the Northern Qi side, but if we talk about the territory and population, Northern Qi is still the world’s number one country, only perennial civil unrest, the people’s hearts are separated, so it is not our opponent.”

Fan Xian frowned slightly, thinking that if this Northern Qi could really get its act together, I’m afraid that the country he grew up living in would really be in some trouble. As he was thinking, he heard Gouda say in a deep voice, “It seems that there is still a huge piece of territory waiting for us to fight down.”

Gouda was a man who spoke very little, but in recent days, after he was no longer in charge of escorting Sean’s mission, the brief words he spoke every time were absurd and full of laughs. Fan Xian couldn’t help but lose his smile, thinking that the officials of this Qing country had indeed cultivated an extremely terrifying self-confidence under the cultivation of twenty years of victory.

On the other hand, Wang Qinian smiled bitterly and said, “I say, Mr. Gao, don’t you take away my errand of holding up the joke.”

Along the way, the delegation is to stay in the various post stations in Northern Qi, rarely to the larger towns and cities, although some of the Qing delegation is not happy, but in the other side of the official careful reception, attentive service, it is not good to say something. We all know in our hearts, this agreement, Northern Qi has lost a great deal of face, naturally embarrassed to let the people of the country to see the South Dynasty’s delegation, strutting through the city.

But there were always some ordinary people on the road. Fan Xian asked a curious question one day, “Why do these Northern Qi people not seem to hate us so much, but instead look at us with a hint of contempt and disdain, and even some sympathy?”

“In the eyes of the Northern Qi people, we are still southern barbarians after all, belonging to the unenlightened objects.” Lin Jing smiled and responded, “As for the war between the two countries, it was naturally hidden to death by the Northern Qi royal family, and although the folk in the north also know that our Qing country is now incredibly strong, they still look down on us a bit in their bones.”

Fan Xian shook his head and sighed, “Covered in a black cloth, they think they are not afraid of the dark.”

“After all, Northern Qi is the continuation of Northern Wei’s throne, they always think that they are the world’s orthodoxy, naturally, they can’t look down on the other countries.”

This is the honest truth, although the Northern Wei has been extinguished twenty years ago, but at that time that behemoth was perched on this continent, casting shadows on all the small countries around, is really the most powerful state machine in the world. That kind of might of the four barbarians still stayed in the hearts of the people in the north, so they always thought that Northern Qi still retained the glory of those years, and that they were still the people of the world’s most powerful country, and when they looked at the other nationals, they would always habitually raise their jaws slightly, and their eyes would gently droop, with self-preservation, self-pity, and self-respect.

People are willing to live in the past. Of course, the officials of Beiqi naturally knew that the world had long since changed, and this could be seen in the way they treated the manners of the Qing State’s envoys.

“There’s also a very important point.” Lin Jing continued to calmly analyze, “Beiqi inherited most of Northern Wei’s territory and officials, so all the world’s readers also basically regard Beiqi as the orthodoxy, the way of literature is in Beiqi, there is no mistake in this statement. Every year at the time of the spring exams, the imperial examinations in Northern Qi can be much more lively than our spring exams, not only the Northern Qi counties talented people will gather in Shangjing, even Dongyi City’s readers will not far away from thousands of miles to go to Shangjing.”

Wang Qinian interjected on the side and said, “Not bad, even our Qing country’s readers, some years ago there are many will run to Shangjing to participate in the imperial examinations.”

“Ridiculous.” Fan Xian laughed and scolded, “Could it be that people from the Qing Kingdom could still go to Northern Qi to become officials?”

Lin Jing laughed bitterly, “This naturally cannot be. It’s just that everyone in the world seems to recognize this, so as long as a talented person can make it to the third place in the Beiqi Chun Exam, regardless of which country in the world, he or she is considered to have the qualifications to become an official. This point is not even an exception in our country of Qing, Your Excellency has served as the Fengzheng of the Imperial College, so you naturally know that University Sergeant Shuwu, don’t you?”

Fan Xian nodded.

Lin Jing sighed, “This Shu University Sergeant, back then, was the one who took the exam in Northern Qi, and his seat teacher was Zhuang Mo Han, which is why he claimed to be Zhuang Mo Han’s student in his life……. Adults think about it, this Shu University Sergeant obviously won the Northern Qi’s lift, but he can go back to Qing as an official, so he knows that Northern Qi’s literary style is flourishing. ”

Fan Xian smiled and shook his head, “No wonder His Majesty has been vigorously grasping the rule of literature all these years, probably he can’t stand this kind of nuisance either.”

“Not bad, when it comes to martial arts, there is no one in this world who can compare to our country.” Lin Jing said, “It’s this literary path that has never seen a few real talents.”

“Literature is the final path.” Fan Xian said.

Lin Jing thought of something and laughed, “Of course, Lord Tiji came out of nowhere and provoked that Northern Qi great Zhuang Mo Han to vomit blood, since then, I think no one would dare to say anything about my Qing country.”

Wang Qinian said yes in a loud voice, and Gouda nodded as well. Although Fan Xian’s rise in Kyoto didn’t necessarily make all the forces feel comfortable, but when put on this level of foreign affairs, to be able to have one more talented person outside of the sands who suppressed the Northern Qi’s anger, I thought that it was a situation that all of the people of the Qing Kingdom were willing to see.

This kind of boring journey without the company of beautiful women, Fan Xian hoped to be able to end earlier, but that long official road seems to never end, the four wheels of the carriage brought up the yellow dust, in the wide road to rise, like a yellow dragon, just by the two rows of trees beside the road firmly bound in the middle of the road, unable to leap out, it looks as if in a non-stop pathetic struggle, non-stop strangling.

The trees on both sides of the official highway were blocking the gray, their leaves were either big or small, but on the whole, compared to the leaves of the trees in the country of Qing, they appeared to be much wider. The trunks of the trees were thick and sturdy, and there was one every few feet. Fan Xian stuck his head out of the carriage window, squinted his eyes against the wind as he watched these trees pass by his eyes, and somehow remembered the world that he hadn’t thought about in a long time. He remembered many years ago when he rode the train, sitting on a train bound for Beijing, passing through Hebei, when both sides of the tracks, and this very same kind of trees, kept smashing backward in this same boring way.

There was no dust raised by the windows of the car, for Fan Xian, as the main envoy, rode in the first carriage, and the ones who ate the dust were naturally those poor subordinates and the reception officials of Beiqi.

Without warning, a black shadow appeared at the end of the road, piling up abruptly right above the parade of trees that were tapering into thin spikes, looking somewhat appalling.

Fan Xian thought it was a dark cloud and could not help but smile, and although he was not prepared to call out to everyone to collect their clothes, as he had done on the roof of Tanyuzhou, he was prepared to remind the driver of the one who drove the carriage to put his poncho on.

The carriage gradually moved forward, and the crowd finally saw that gloomy shadow clearly, and at this time the clouds in the sky also suddenly dispersed, as if to welcome the guests from afar, casting down the warm light of spring, shining on that shadow.

It turned out …… to be an extremely large city.

This city is even taller and more majestic than the Kyoto of the Qing Kingdom, made of large blocks of green stone, up to three feet high, the city wall is slightly tilted, but still gives everyone who comes from afar, an indescribable sense of oppression, as if that city wall may crush you underneath at any time. The city still has heavy eaves and pavilions, perhaps used as a corner tower, there are soldiers are walking back and forth on the high city wall patrol.

A feeling of solemnity and loftiness emanated from this huge city wall.

The area in front of the city gate had already been cleared long ago, no idle people were lingering here, and the officials from the relevant divisions of Northern Qi were waiting for the arrival of the Southern Qing delegation in that square.

On top of the official road, the speed of the carriage gradually slowed down, and Fan Xian squinted his eyes and withdrew his head from the window. He hadn’t expected that this capital city would appear before his eyes in such a stunned manner that he wasn’t prepared at all.

Northern Qi’s upper capital had arrived.

The ceremonial music rose, and both sides greeted each other. The Beiqi officials were sharply dressed and very ostentatious, while the Qing State’s envoys were traveling and not without some comforts, and the comparison between the two appeared to be very obvious.

Fan Xian calmly watched all the tedious procedures in front of him, and only nodded slightly when he was introduced to himself. In the eyes of the Bei Qi people, this handsome young official was a condescending villain, while Fan Xian did not care at all about leaving the other side with any impression.

All of his attention was focused on the buildings of the Northern Qi’s upper capital. This huge city had been standing on this land for an unknown number of years, and had experienced many winds and rains, and the outer edges of the huge lapis lazuli were already somewhat weathered, but still remained stubbornly hard.

Fan Xian had some feelings, his feelings were different from all the travelers, he just felt that after 17 or 18 years of coming to this world, he seemed to finally be able to touch the history of this world, although it was only some remaining traces of history. Although the Kyoto of Qing Guo was also extremely grand, everything seemed to have a certain fresh flavor, and Fan Xian knew that that flavor was left behind by his own mother, so today he was able to see the buildings of a very long time ago, and felt some inexplicable vicissitudes.