Tang Dynasty Xie Lu Lang

Chapter 1 The Fourteenth Year of Kaiyuan
In the spring of the 14th year of Kaiyuan in the Tang Dynasty, the sea was peaceful and the rivers were clear, and the era was prosperous and glorious.

Luoyang, the Eastern Capital, was a renowned city within China, the capital of the nation, its scenery flourishing and its beauty inexhaustible. This was especially true after the Emperor's return from his eastern tour last year, where he had resided, accompanied by civil and military officials and a cavalry entourage. This made Luoyang even more prosperous and bustling than before.

On the east side of Kangsufang in Luonan, facing the street, stood a large mansion. Its five-frame, three-room gatehouse, open to the street, was imposing and decorated with rows of spears, lending it a majestic air. In front of the gate, a sandbank ran straight through the horizontal street within the block, and then along the long street outside the block to Dingdingmen Tianjie.

This mansion was not only magnificent in its gatehouse, but also in its layout and buildings. The mansion covered nearly a hundred acres, occupying a full third of the area within the neighborhood. Some of the streets and alleys within the neighborhood became corridors and corridors connecting the various courtyards within the mansion. The buildings were lined up one after another, with magnificent halls and pavilions interspersed throughout.

According to Tang Dynasty law, spears were placed in front of the gates of the homes of third-rank officials, and sand was carried to fill the roads of the prime minister's private residence. Among the tens of millions of households in Luoyang, only a few could enjoy this honor.

The owner of this mansion was none other than Zhang Shuo, the then Prime Minister and Duke of Yan. Zhang Shuo held the position of Minister of the Central Secretariat and several other positions, a position of immense power and influence. He was equally renowned in the political arena, a respected figure in the literary world and a renowned master. Consequently, his residence resembled the grandeur of its owner, with magnificent halls and grand gates.
But even under the blazing sun, shadows are inevitable, and even amidst the splendor, there is also a sense of desolation. Behind the grand halls and towering pavilions of the Zhang family mansion, the side buildings are low and simple, with cramped spaces in front and behind. This is where the servants live.

Northeast of the mansion, near the neighborhood wall, stood a fenced courtyard. Within it stood three houses, their roofs thatched and their walls plastered with mud. In places, the plaster had peeled away, revealing the bamboo rafts that served as walls. Although a separate courtyard, it was even more shabby and dilapidated than the servants' quarters.

Though dilapidated, the courtyard was kept relatively tidy. As the morning light streamed down, a young woman in a plain dress, her hair in twin buns, carrying a clay pot, pushed through the doorway. Her face was pretty, her cheeks rosy, her eyes dark, but fatigue was evident between her brows. Her eyes were bloodshot, and her eye sockets were slightly red and swollen. After exiting the room, she pushed open the gate and headed out.

"Aying, where are you going?"

The girl walked not far away, and a middle-aged woman in a yellow skirt flashed out from the pavilion nearby. The woman had a bad face. She put one hand on her waist and pointed at the girl with the other hand and asked.

When the young girl Ah Ying heard the woman's question, a trace of disgust flashed in her eyes. She raised the empty pottery jar in her hand to show it to her, and then said coldly: "I'm going to the well to fetch water for my son Ah Lang to boil medicine. Su Qiniang, you must watch carefully, or you will be beaten and scolded by your master if you make a mistake!"

"Hmph, be careful! Your Ah Lang is wandering around and has contracted a serious illness somewhere and is now bedridden. I need to be careful to prevent you and your servants from spreading the disease to the inner house. You, a servant, better behave yourself!"

The woman, Su Qinniang, snorted coldly upon hearing this, glared at the girl, and then retreated back to the pavilion and lay on her back on the rope bed.

When the girl heard this, her eyes turned red again and tears were about to fall. She stopped arguing with the woman who was watching her in the pavilion. She lowered her head and quickly walked to the well, took a pottery jar of well water, and hurried back to the room in the courtyard.

There was also a middle-aged woman sitting by the window in the room, spinning. Seeing the girl coming in with a pottery jar in her arms, she frowned and said softly, "Aying, stop arguing with Su Qiniang. She is being sent by the mistress..."

"So what? The mistress is jealous of Alang because he's not her son. She took advantage of Alang's illness to drive us here and even sent spies and minions to watch us outside! My mother always tells me to swallow my anger. Even if I don't make a fuss, will Su Qinniang treat me kindly?"

The girl Aying said this angrily. After hearing this, her mother sighed, stopped talking, and just lowered her head to spin.

Aying stopped arguing with her mother. She found a clay stove in the room and moved it outside to light a fire. Then she put the washed herbs one by one into the clay pot, poured water and started to boil them.

Aying carefully observed the changes in the fire in the clay stove, occasionally using bamboo chopsticks to pick up small pieces of charcoal and put them into the stove to keep the fire stable. At the same time, she frequently turned her head to look into the inner room of the house.

After a while, the medicine in the earthenware pot began to boil. The girl then removed the charcoal fire, scooped out the medicine residue with a gauze sieve, filtered the medicine into a earthenware bowl, and let it warm before bringing it into the inner room.

In the inner bedroom, a wooden couch lay across the room, and beneath the curtains, a young man lay flat on his back, covered in a blanket. He looked about fourteen or fifteen, handsome and handsome, but his face was pale and sickly, and he kept his eyes tightly closed, showing no reaction to the girl's arrival.

Aying stood beside the couch for a while. Seeing that the young man on the bed still showed no signs of waking up, she could only sip the medicine in her mouth, and then gently held a reed tube with her teeth. The other end of the reed tube was inserted between the young man's lips and teeth. Then she gently passed the medicine in her mouth into the young man's mouth.

This process requires slowness and caution. If you are not careful, the medicine will overflow from the corners of the boy's mouth or choke him. Fortunately, the girl is very attentive and no such situation occurred during the process of feeding the medicine.

But this also made her very tired. After feeding half a bowl of medicine, a layer of fine sweat had already formed on the tip of her fair and small nose. But when she saw that the boy's pale cheeks seemed to have added a few blushes, the girl seemed to be encouraged, and hurriedly held her breath, concentrated her mind, and fed the medicine carefully.

"Alang, Alang, wake up!"

After feeding the boy a bowl of medicine, the girl leaned close to his ear and whispered softly, her beautiful eyes full of anticipation.

The young man on the couch still did not respond, only maintaining a weak breathing. The girl's eyes dimmed. She picked up the empty bowl and was about to leave, but the boy's body suddenly trembled, and his tightly closed eyes slowly opened, but his vision was blurred and unfocused.

"Alang is awake, Alang..."

Seeing this, Ah Ying leaned over to the young man with a look of surprise. The woman who was spinning outside also stood up suddenly after hearing this and rushed into the bedroom in two steps.

"I, I'm awake, you, you..."

Zhang Luo's vision gradually came into focus. He first looked at the pretty yet unfamiliar girl before him, then at the woman who had walked into the room. Then, he looked around the unfamiliar room, his mind already filled with uncertainty. "Where is this? Who are you?"

His memory was still stuck on the time he passed his thesis and celebrated with his faculty and friends. He was so happy he got drunk, and when he woke up, he found himself in a completely unfamiliar environment. The people around him were people he had never seen before, and their clothing was completely different from that of modern people. "Alang, did you fall into the water and get frightened? I'm Yingniang, and this is Aying!"

After seeing this, the smile on the woman's face froze. She hurried over and looked at the boy with concern, "Ah Lang, have you really forgotten about human affairs?"

"Yingniang, Aying..."

After hearing this name, Zhang Luo seemed to have received some kind of instruction in his mind. A large amount of information suddenly emerged, especially the personnel scenes related to the two people around him, which almost burst his brain. The severe pain made him hold his head and cry out.

"Don't be alarmed, Alang. It's all right, it's all right!"

Yingniang and her daughter came close to him and comforted him in a gentle voice.

After a long while, the impact of the information in his mind gradually subsided. Zhang Luo also sorted out some memories and connected them together. He immediately realized that he had traveled through time and arrived in the Tang Dynasty thousands of years ago.

In his later life, he was a graduate student majoring in ancient history, and the young man in this life was named Zhang Luonu. He fell into the water a few days ago and was unconscious for several days before he was eventually killed. When he woke up, Zhang Luo's soul was already in his body, and his mind was filled with the remaining memories of the young man.

After confirming this basic information, Zhang Luo suddenly smiled bitterly. In his later life, he had just completed a fulfilling but boring academic career and, after passing through numerous rounds of selection, secured an administrative position at the research institute. He was about to begin his life as a winner, only to wake up one day and find that everything had been taken away from him!

"Why do you still feel it's wrong, Alang?"

Seeing that the young man no longer held his head and cried in pain, Yingniang asked again in a low voice.

"I'm fine, Auntie. I'm just a little hungry."

After integrating the relevant memories, Zhang Luo also realized that although the mother and daughter and the young Zhang Luonu were nominally master and servant, they were actually relatives who depended on each other for survival. The young man had lost his mother at a young age, so Yingniang was his adoptive mother, and he had always called her aunt.

After hearing this, Yingniang wiped away her tears with excitement and said repeatedly, "Now that you know how to be hungry, it seems you've really recovered! Ah Lang, please wait a moment. Ah Ying, you continue to guard here!"

After saying this, Yingniang hurried out again, and the girl Aying came up and stared at Zhang Luo, as if something wrong would happen in the blink of an eye.

"I, I'm really fine. Ying, you don't need to get too close."

Their faces were only a few inches apart, far exceeding the so-called social distance. Being stared at by such a pretty and bright girl, Zhang Luo couldn't help feeling a little embarrassed. He shrank back and then spoke softly.

"Oh."

The girl's eyes dimmed slightly upon hearing this, and she stepped back. Although they were master and servant, they were also childhood sweethearts, playing together and rubbing shoulders with each other. However, as they grew older, Ah Lang began to find her a burden and no longer liked her to accompany him when he went out to play. They were no longer as close as they had been when they were young.

Zhang Luo was unaware of his daughter's feelings. He was still unfamiliar with this new identity and environment. The memories of some personnel details in his mind had yet to be integrated, and he had to carefully examine everything he saw.

Yingniang left the room to light a fire and cook. In the pavilion outside the courtyard, Su Qinniang noticed that her expression was different from before, so she quickly walked over and shouted from outside the fence, "Yingniang, what happened in the room?"

Although Yingniang was older, she was a cautious person. She did not dare to argue directly with her daughter Aying. After hearing the question, she just bowed and said, "My Alang has woken up and recovered from his illness. It is not troublesome for you, Su Qinniang, to stay here to take care of him."

"All right?"

When Su Qinnan heard this, her face suddenly changed. She wanted to go into the room to take a look, but she stopped in front of the door. After glancing at Yingniang, she hurried out of the yard and went straight into the house.

The woman walked quickly through the servants' quarters and arrived outside a white-walled, red-tiled Buddhist temple in the inner courtyard. She took the whisk from the maid outside and gently brushed off the dust on her body. Then she slowly walked back into the room, bowed, and said, "Madam, Liu Lang, Liu Lang has woken up."

"understood."

In front of the shrine in the inner room, a woman in brocade clothes was reciting Buddhist scriptures. She nodded slightly at first, but soon her expression turned angry. She suddenly threw the scroll to the ground and said bitterly, "This evil creature has a stubborn fate and still hasn't died. Who else does he want to harm? Keep an eye on him. Report him if he does anything wrong!"

Upon hearing this, Su Qiniang quickly bowed in response. Seeing her mistress's anger, the other maids standing in the temple also fell silent in fear. After a while, the mistress finally calmed down, realizing her loss of composure. She lowered her head, picked up the Buddhist scriptures, and asked someone to bring her writing brush and ink. She knelt before the shrine and copied the scriptures to atone for her sins.

A new journey, a new beginning, please support me! ! !


(End of this chapter)