Yefutidaolu

Chapter 76 Teahouse Surprise
Rumors are still spreading.

Among them, there are only two that are most widely spread.

Teahouse, brothel.

There are so many people and forces in the outer city of Cangzhou, and there are quite a few people with spare money among them. Some of them are like "foremen", who control a group of people and live a comfortable and affluent life relying on their support.

There are also some people, such as carpenters, goldsmiths, tailors, etc., who have a skill and their life is definitely better than that of the hard-working people.

Around them, another group of places that specialized in their business emerged, namely teahouses and brothels.

Teahouses are cheaper, and many wealthier coachmen, craftsmen, and the like come here to hang out. Some foremen also come here, because the teahouse is divided into the first and second floors.

The first floor is the lobby, where you can drink tea, listen to music and books, but it is crowded and noisy. Generally, a seat costs two or three cents, and with a cup of tea and a few rice cakes, you can spend the whole morning there for seven or eight cents.

Seven or eight cents is a day's wage for a Kudali, or even less, so naturally he dares not come in. However, for the craftsmen, they earn several times more than the Kudali, so it is not a problem for them to come and sit every now and then.

The second floor is for big shots like foremen and martial artists who are not short of money. There are maids on the second floor, but they don't drink tea in large bowls. Instead, they drink tea in small pots brewed in porcelain. Most of the tea leaves are carefully selected. From here, you can also more easily see the operas, storytelling, and singing below, and you can even request a singer or musician to sing.

Sitting on the second floor, looking at the crowds below, people below can only watch what is sung on the stage, but on the second floor you can order songs and guests. It is fragrant and elegant, and you can enjoy it naturally. Generally speaking, it costs dozens of coins to sit on the second floor. If you want to order songs and guests, drink a pot of good tea, and eat some exquisite snacks, then you will have to spend hundreds of coins.

Teahouses are the most well-informed places. Firstly, all kinds of people gather here, and there are no screens or anything to separate them. A group of people are crowded in the lobby, and you talk yours and I talk mine.

Although it seems that what everyone is talking about is not a secret, it is common sense to each other.

But the common sense of a carpenter and the common sense of a lumberjack outside the city are certainly not the same thing.

Your common sense is other people's secrets.

The speaker may not mean it, but the listener may take it seriously. Sometimes a casual remark from a passerby can enlighten a person about something that has troubled him for a long time.

When two carpenters talk, even if they are just talking about common things, such as red wood is better than yellow wood in humid weather, so it is better to buy more red wood if it is about to rain.

If a lumberjack heard this, he might be able to cut more redwood and earn a few dozen more dollars.

Or maybe two foremen casually mentioned which dock would be loading goods recently, and when that news got out, it would naturally be very valuable to the Ku Dali people.

But this kind of information is not sure whether it is true or not, and it is mixed with good and bad information. It is actually not very useful, and you can only rely on your own judgment.

In addition to these news, the most popular thing circulated in the teahouse is naturally various gossips.

A woman from somewhere cheated on someone, a man from somewhere killed his adulterer, or someone got rich, or so-and-so did something great, some were true and some were false, but when they gathered in the teahouse, it became a melting pot of news.

Now, the most famous rumors in the teahouse are "The evil captain killed hundreds of gods in anger, and the rain stopped and killed the people!" and "The poisonous worker killed his master, why is he so disloyal and unjust?"

The reason why it spread so widely was mainly because the incident was indeed a big deal, and some storytellers adapted their own novels based on the incident, describing in detail the viciousness of the evil captain.

It is said that this person came from outside Cangzhou City and had a powerful background, so when he first arrived, he was directly promoted to a seventh-rank captain!
As soon as he came to the city, he rode his tall horse and rushed around the city every day, but he went nowhere else but to those evil places. He dealt with evil spirits every night and was said to be good at exorcising ghosts that harmed people.

Moreover, many people saw that he would kill people every night. After killing them, he would carry the human heads to those evil places and offer blood food to them.

I heard that the backers behind him are too powerful, so no one can touch him!

Many gods wanted to take action, because gods can suppress evil spirits and protect the peace of an area, but these gods who took action were all killed by this man!

Without the protection of the gods, it didn't rain in the whole of Cangzhou for a whole half month, so everyone had to buy drinking water from water trucks, wasting a lot of money.

He also instigated the laborers to gather together their former foremen, beat them up and killed many of them.

One storyteller couldn't stand it anymore, so he wrote a book called "The Evil Captain". The book was very lifelike and fully displayed the ugly face of the captain.

The protagonist of "The Evil Captain" is called Gao Yi. Although his name means "righteousness", he has no sense of righteousness in his actions and only does evil things.

In this way, the story of a person who colluded with evil spirits, killed innocent people indiscriminately, and killed hundreds of gods, making it difficult for everyone to get water, spread among the storytellers.

During this period, many people said that Captain Gao was not as evil as he looked... After his daughters died, they came back to tell him in their dreams that Captain Gao had saved them. For this, they even built a shrine for Captain Gao, but this only confirmed the reputation of this evil captain.

Your daughter is dead, and she came back to you in her dreams. It's clear that she was enslaved and driven by him. Why don't you build a shrine for him? Why don't you destroy it and rescue your daughter? !
When this news spread, many people thought it made sense and destroyed Gao Jian's ancestral temple.

The reputation of the evil captain has spread.

Most of this news was spread around teahouses, mainly because the story of "The Evil Captain" was so exquisitely written and extremely infuriating that it was very popular. Everyone liked to listen to it, so it was widely spread.

The most famous teahouse in the entire outer city of Cangzhou is called "Yuemingguan".

Yueming Pavilion has seven halls, each of which can accommodate more than a thousand people. Every day, no less than ten thousand people come to the pavilion to have fun.

Listen to operas, books, music, dance dramas, and southern and northern dialects. Various troupes take turns performing, attracting attention in Yueming Pavilion.

Especially when famous actors from big opera troupes perform famous operas, it is even more lively. A theater can seat several thousand people, and it is crowded and pushing and shoving. Tickets are hard to come by, and the gongs and drums are deafening, and the cheers are often like the crows competing with each other.

Today is one of those days.

Because the storybook "The Evil Captain" has been adapted into a drama today.

It was performed by a large troupe of several hundred people, the Sixi Ruyi Troupe, which also featured famous actors. The play was called Tianfu, which was quite well-known.

The big opera troupe, famous actors, and the eye-catching new script stirred up a lot of drama fans, and also mixed in with some people who like to watch the fun and follow the trend.

Thousands of people gathered in the theater, and the second floor was also full.

There are many resellers out there who rely on their own connections or other chance to get tickets, and then resell them at high prices to people who want to see the show, sometimes even getting hundreds of dollars per ticket.

A few hundred coins was the amount of money one could only earn after working hard for several months. Even for the wealthier craftsmen, it was not a small amount of money.

But there are always people willing to pay for it.

The extremely bustling Yueming Pavilion was crowded with all kinds of people, including those selling snacks, flowers, various vendors, tea and dim sum.

There were also people from a troupe circling around, seemingly performing some kind of opening ceremony.

After all, there are tens of millions of people living in Cangzhou's outer city. If there is only hellish suffering but no prosperous sights, why would others come?
Where some people suffer, others have sweetness.

There are also some people who sometimes suffer, but do so for a little sweetness.

It was so bustling. When I walked into the garden, I saw hundreds of tables in front of the stage, all of which were already full. Only seven or eight tables in the middle were still empty. However, red papers with words like "Booked at Huihong Martial Arts Hall" or "Booked at Baishan Academy" were posted on the tables.

Even so, people kept coming and we kept adding tables. When there was no more space, we would move in a short stool and put it in the gap. As long as there was a place to sit, it would be fine.

People greeted each other and chattered. Because there were too many people, it was hard to hear what they were saying. The only thing you could hear was words like "Gaoxue Wei" and "Gao Yi" being mentioned frequently in the conversation.

The opening of a troupe usually does not start directly.

According to the rules, the last act is the main play, called the "big axis", and the second to last act is called the "finale" because it is right after the big axis. The act before the finale is called the "central axis".

Further ahead, it is called the "small axis".

The first opening play is called "Kailuo".

This is because they are afraid that the level of the actors in the previous parts is not good enough and the performance is lackluster, which will make the audience unable to continue watching. Therefore, the wonderful plays are arranged in the finale and the main part, so that the audience will not leave after enjoying the previous parts, and will be kept on waiting for the big plays later.

However, the finale is often more exciting than the main performance, because the people who sing the main performance are mostly old seniors with rich experience, but they are old and somewhat weak after all, while the finale is different. Most of them are the most popular young celebrities today. They have less experience, but their level is mostly better and they are on the rise.

In addition, the main performance is often late, many people have already left, and the finale is just right.

The finale of tonight is the play "The Evil Captain".

Everyone is waiting for a good show.

Not long after, a servant came up with a gong and started to hit it hard!
The sound of the gong drowned out the noise below, making the surroundings quiet.

Now it's time for the actors and actresses to go on stage.

But at this moment, in the silence, a tall galloping horse broke the silence and the peace.

There was a young man on the horse, wearing a black captain's uniform, with a long sword on his waist, looking mighty and handsome.

The person who came was Gao Jian.

He did not hide his identity, but rode his iconic walking dragon to Mingyue Pavilion.

What a coincidence.

The scalpers outside and the spectators inside all saw a man wearing the iconic black official uniform of the Demon Suppression Bureau, who broke in without buying a ticket.

Some people already want to run away.

But no one ran.

At this time, no one dared to be the first to speak out.

Even the servant holding the gong above was stunned.

Gao Jian walked up to the ticket checker and asked, "Are there any seats left on the second floor?"

"No...yes! Yes, there is a seat!" The servant was stunned for a moment, then immediately answered.

"how much is it?"

"Seventy coins..." the servant said weakly.

Gao Jian took out a string of money and carefully counted seventy coins, not more, not less, and then put them in the basket on the servant's chest.

Then he went up to the second floor.

On the second floor, someone was already wiping his sweat while leaving through the back door.

Those in power are more timid than those below them.

However, surprisingly, not many people left, only a few.

Although the scene was a bit awkward, there were many people whispering, but not many people left.

Gao Jian was on the second floor. He found a place to sit down and waited to watch the show.

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At this moment, backstage.

There are many props piled up backstage, which are the troupe's test of their skills. The more these things there are, the more powerful the troupe is.

In the middle of the backstage, there was a Lingyou who had already put on makeup. She looked a bit like Gao Jian, but upon closer inspection, they were not very similar.

He is Tianfu, a famous actor here.

Most opera singers would give themselves a lucky stage name to bring good luck, but Tianfu’s is not a stage name but his real name.

He was an orphan who was picked up by a troupe owner when he was seven years old. The owner felt sorry for him and thought that he had red lips and white teeth and had a potential to be an opera singer, so he kept him by his side and had him practice singing since he was a child. He also named him according to the troupe's rules.

Tian Fusheng has an androgynous appearance. Although he is a man, he looks as beautiful as a woman when dressed up. He has no Adam's apple and can sing both male and female roles. His voice is like that of a yellow bird, melodious and moving, so he is very famous.

Just as he was sitting backstage, waiting to go on stage, a fellow student from the troupe suddenly ran over and said in a panic, "Big Brother, it's bad, the real boss is here!"

"The real boss is here? Gao Jian is here?" Tianfu's expression changed.

"Well, he's here to listen to the opera, what should we do?" The junior fellow was shaking like a sieve, it was obvious that Gao Jian's reputation was not light.

And he was so scared... Actually, there was one more thing.

The previous owner of the troupe, their master, was killed by Gao Jian a month ago.

At that time, Gao Jian broke into the troupe, without saying a word, stabbed the master to death with a knife, cut off his head, turned around and left, but scared a lot of people.

It is precisely because of this that the Sixi Ruyi Class and Gao Jian have a blood feud, so they would accept this script.

Tianfu pulled up her wig and said calmly, "Don't worry, we have people behind us. This time, it's the master in the inner city who ordered us to do it. He doesn't dare to do anything to us."

"Tell the front desk to act as he should. Don't be impatient. Wait and see what he is going to do."

"Okay, I'll go tell him right away." The junior brother nodded and ran out in panic again.

Soon, the sound of gongs was heard outside.

As the gong was struck, other musical instruments outside also started to sound, and along with the instruments, the singing began. As the 羯鼓 opened the door, the gongs and drums clashed, and there was a sudden singing voice, every word was clear and crisp, every sound was melodious.

The show begins.

Tianfu took a deep breath and looked at a man hiding in the background.

The man was soaked, but he didn't feel uncomfortable. He just waited quietly.

(End of this chapter)