It was impossible for Marquis Anding to rest at home every day. The busy day of Daliang's civil and military officials usually started from dawn to dawn. A few idle officials could go home to their mothers at 3 p.m., but Gu Yun was obviously not an idle official.

Even after leaving court, he would usually be visited by either the Emperor or his colleagues. If he finally had a day off and no social engagements, he would go to the Beidaying Camp for a walk and rarely returned home before sunset.

In short, they live a life worse than that of chickens and dogs.

Therefore, if one wants to receive personal guidance from Marshal Gu, one has to catch up with him in the morning when he stretches his muscles before going to court.

Chang Geng started to get up at five in the morning and stay up at midnight from then on. Every day when the roosters were still sleepy, he would lead his sword puppet to wait in Gu Yun's courtyard.

A tall and thin young man walked in front holding his sword, and the sword-serving puppet followed closely behind, with a pair of iron arms stretched forward, a gas lamp hanging on the left arm and a food box hanging on the right arm, just like a night wandering god delivering food.

When they arrived at Marshal Gu's place, the old servant who had woken up early would take the food box and simmer it over a low fire. Gu Yun began to give his godson morning lessons.

The night-wandering god who delivered food thus became the night-wandering god who was beaten, and was treated like a slave, which was very miserable.

After a fantastic class, breakfast was heated up, and the two of them ate their meals. Then they went about their business. Gu Yun was about to go out, and Chang Geng went back to wait for the teacher to lead him in his studies. After noon, he had to practice martial arts with the retainers of the Marquis' Mansion.

Gu Yun was not really a good teacher. Like Shen Yi, he also had the problem of thinking of things one by one. Often, just after he had immobilized the iron golem, he would already be talking about how to deploy heavy armor, how to allocate the ratio of heavy armor to light armor to save the most purple gold, and even the difference between the horse breeds in the Western Regions and the Central Plains, which sorghum is the most resistant to hunger, etc...

After this topic went around Daliang for a while, Gu Yun came back to his senses and asked Chang Geng, "I'm off topic again, right? What did I want to say at first?"

Chang Geng: “…”

The two of them had no choice but to sit on the iron golem's big feet, listening to the "creaking" sound of the gears turning in the iron monster's body, and pondering together what the theme of their journey of tens of thousands of miles was.

At the beginning, when they heard that Marshal Gu was personally teaching them martial arts, Fatty Ge and Madam Cao were extremely excited. They overcame all difficulties, yawned all the time, and ran over to listen a few times. Unexpectedly, they only got one thing from the whole experience - what a crap!

Ge Pangxiao commented privately: "I feel it's better to listen to Mr. Shen chanting."

"It's General Shen. Why can't you remember it?" Madam Cao corrected him unhappily, then touched her conscience. She chose her conscience over the handsome man, and added, "I feel the same way."

Only Chang Geng had no objection to this. He was willing to spend some time with Gu Yun every day, even if he had to stand guard at the door all night long. He would have recurring nightmares when he fell asleep anyway, so there was nothing to be nostalgic about.

Just as he believed that he could calm down Urgu, he believed that he could become a sharp blade, grinding away some of the unnecessary and bad things every day, including his fantasies about his young godfather.

Besides, Gu Yun was just disorganized. If you really listened to him, what he said was at least true and reliable.

When Gu Yun was very young, he was taken to the battlefield by his careless parents. He did not live a comfortable life of luxury in the palace for several years. At the age of fifteen, he followed a deceased old general to the south to suppress bandits. Since then, he has been in the army.

Of the seven major military branches, except for the Iron Dragon Walking in the Water, which he was not too familiar with, he had fought against all the others. He had won battles with them, as well as suffered many losses. Therefore, he knew the advantages and disadvantages of each of them like the back of his hand.

Chang Geng listened eagerly. Gu Yun was like a mountain to him. Every time he looked up at it, he would find a direction to move forward for the whole day, and then he would suppress the inappropriate thoughts in his heart step by step.

However, Gu Yun himself did not think this was teaching.

He also specially invited a teacher and a martial arts master to teach Chang Geng and the others. Every morning, whether he was instructing Chang Geng in fighting the Iron Golem or telling him about his experiences from all over the world, in Gu Yun's view, he was just squeezing out some time to play with Chang Geng.

After a long period of observation, Gu Yun did not think that Chang Geng was suitable to follow his old path, because Chang Geng was always gentle and restrained in front of him, a little stubborn, but generally very reasonable.

Gu Yun felt that he would be a gentleman when he grew up, rather than a killer general that gods and ghosts would fear.

In the blink of an eye, it’s the end of the year.

In the first year of the new emperor's reign, he offered sacrifices to heaven and changed the reign title to Long'an. On the same day he announced a general amnesty.

Since it is the whole world, it certainly includes the barbarian prince Galai Yinghuo who is imprisoned in the imperial capital.

The emperor had been holding back for more than two months, and used this method to express his opinion in a roundabout way - the old wolf king's condition of increasing the annual tribute by 10% was too tempting, and he did not want to offend Gu Yun in person, so the matter was postponed again and again, and the memorials from the Ministry of Revenue and Marquis Anding were all withheld and delayed until the emperor offered sacrifices to heaven, when the result was finally known.

The two lines of imperial guards separated on both sides. Shen Yi rode his horse straight in and ran straight to Gu Yun, who was wearing a light fur armor, before he stopped with a "whoa".

Gu Yun glanced at him, then slowly turned his horse's head and walked back. Shen Yi hurriedly followed him and whispered, "General, I think the emperor is determined to let the tiger go back to the mountains this time. What should we do?"

"The emperor's words of sacrifice to heaven are golden words, and he made a great wish to God. What can I do?" Gu Yun said expressionlessly, "In order to appease me, he promised to give the Black Iron Camp thirty chariots and four hundred steel armors. The decree has been sent to the Lingshu Academy. He has done so much for me. Do I have the nerve to keep going on about such a small matter?"

The new emperor, who had just turned thirty, was tougher than the old emperor who was in his twilight years.

Gu Yun had no intention of abusing power, and he did not care whether the emperor was tough or not, but the problem was that the emperor's policy on the border was even more short-sighted than that of the previous emperor.

The two of them stood side by side in silence for a moment, and Gu Yun said, "But it is also true that the treasury is empty. The emperor has just ascended the throne, and he is somewhat impatient. You don't know, yesterday the foreign 'big hat' sent a sharp-nosed and monkey-faced envoy over, and he chattered all afternoon. My ears are buzzing now."

"..." Shen Yi was stunned for a moment before he reacted, "Are you talking about the Western Pope?"

In the minds of most people in Daliang, the foreigners are very unruly. Instead of burning incense in the temple, the "Pope" wears a tall hat and shows up everywhere all day long, trying to get involved in everything. The emperor's words are of no use - isn't this going to be a big upheaval?

Gu Yun nodded: "They said they wanted to open up trade. I listened to them for a while yesterday. They wanted to expand the ancient Silk Road into a major trade route along the Western Regions. Both sides would send troops to guard it to ensure the exchange of goods. They talked about it in a very exaggerated way. They even drew maps and imaginary pictures of real objects. They deceived the emperor."

Shen Yi smiled and said, "Trade is a good thing. What are you talking about?"

"I'm not saying no - it's just that I don't know much about business," Gu Yun said, "but I still feel that if foreigners trade with me, they may not gain any advantage."

This is the truth.

Western goods began to flow into Daliang during the reign of Emperor Wu. Those glazed lamps, Western scenery and other gadgets were very novel for a few years, but unfortunately they did not last long. Although the Western artifacts that flowed in were exquisite, many of them were burned with purple gold. Once they entered the Central Plains, they indirectly heated up the black market for purple gold.

At that time, Emperor Wu felt that if this continued, the country would no longer be a country. In order to strictly control the private use of purple gold by the people, he prepared both soft and hard methods. He issued four decrees in one day, ordering all places to strictly investigate the private use of purple gold, arrest and kill as many as possible, and charge them all with treason. No leniency would be shown, and he used high pressure and an iron fist to strangle this lifeline of the country.

Afterwards, Lingshuyuan took the lead and gathered a large number of folk long-arm masters, who quickly worked overtime to imitate a bunch of Western-style products with similar functions but powered by coal-burning winding.

The hard knife blocked the export of purple gold, and the soft knife directly cut off the market for Western goods - even if they could get purple gold, who would not be willing to burn some cheap fuel? Moreover, Western paintings were gaudy and fancy, and in the eyes of the people in the Central Plains, they were somewhat not up to standard.

Genuine Western goods were soon replaced by imitations, and foreign merchants' goods could not be sold at a high price in the Central Plains.

On the contrary, delicate items such as silk are said to be very popular among foreigners.

Gu Yun said: "Since there is no benefit, it may not be a good intention."

Shen Yi was silent for a moment: "What does the emperor think?"

Gu Yun's mouth curled up, revealing a smile that was hard to tell whether it was sour or spicy, and said: "The emperor is confident. He thinks that with my Black Iron Camp guarding the northwest, Daliang will be invulnerable. I didn't even know I had such a great ability. Do you think I am worried?"

Shen Yi thought for a moment and asked, "Did the emperor say this in front of you?"

Gu Yun smiled bitterly: "Not only did he say it in front of me, he also gave me a fox fur coat."

Everyone in the court knew that Marshal Gu only wore thin clothes all year round. He would only put on more clothes when he encountered a white-hair wind outside the Great Wall. It was hard not to be suspicious of the emperor's intention in giving him winter clothes.

Shen Yi was silent.

Gu Yun: "After the New Year, I should go back to the northwest. The Black Iron Camp is always staying in the North Camp, and the emperor is having trouble sleeping."

Thousands of miles of rivers and mountains, beautiful rivers and mountains condensed into a line in the new emperor's words and pressed on the shoulders of Marquis Anding.

They felt that he controlled the three major camps of Xuantie and was invincible and omnipotent.

They both rely on him and fear him.

Gu Yun joked, "What do you think I would do if I suddenly died one day?"

Shen Yi's face changed: "Where did you get such nonsense from? Bah!"

Gu Yun said nonchalantly, "What's there to be taboo about? Life and death are determined by fate, and wealth and honor are determined by heaven. Our Gu family has no longevity. Not only that, but even our children's luck is like a weasel giving birth to a rat, with each generation being worse than the previous one. The old marquis sighed every day when he saw me, and it's even more so with me... There's no one to carry on the family."

Shen Yi: "Isn't there still the Fourth Prince?"

Gu Yun shook his head: "That child is not destined to eat sand - Tsk, it's New Year's Eve, why are we talking about these annoying things? Go and order a 'Red Head Kite' for me, I'll go home to pick up my son."

After saying that, he rode forward, leaving Shen Yi behind.

Shen Yi roared angrily: "Why didn't you tell me earlier that there are only twenty red-headed kites in the whole city? How can we order one today?"

Gu Yun: "You decide—"

The word "办" floated down and covered Shen Yi's face with the northwest wind. The Marquis of Anding had already disappeared.

Chang Geng was reading a book in his room when the door was suddenly broken open from the outside. A strong wind and snow rushed over him. The rice paper on his table that he had not had time to hold down flew all over the place.

The only person who would think of this annoying person who disturbed the peace and quiet was Gu Yun. Chang Geng turned around helplessly and said, "Adoptive father."

Fatty Ge and Lady Cao followed behind Gu Yun like two generals, waving at him together: "Brother, the Marquis said he would take us out to ride the Red Headed Kite."

Chang Geng: “…”

Chang Geng was born not to like going out. He preferred quietness to noise and got annoyed when seeing crowds of people. He went to Jiangjunpo to practice swordplay before because his yard was not big enough. Ever since he came to the Marquis' Mansion, he had no desire to go out for some fresh air.

In his opinion, wouldn't it be nice for everyone to spend the holidays together at home, sitting around a small fire, warming up a few glasses of wine, and chatting?

Do you have to go out to drink and watch people? What kind of interest is this?

Gu Yun had already taken off his outer robe on his own initiative: "Hurry up, don't dawdle, Uncle Wang said that you haven't left the house since you moved into the Marquis' Mansion, are you growing mushrooms?"

Thinking of the "grand scene" of the huge crowds of people in the capital, Chang Geng got goose bumps all over his body. Even if he wanted to go out with Gu Yun, he was unwilling to do so. So he lingered on the spot and made excuses, "Godfather, there are rules for staying up all night to celebrate the New Year. Someone has to stay behind to look after the house. I...ah!"

Gu Yun rolled Chang Geng into his outer robe without saying anything, and carried him on his shoulders like a barking beam, dragging him out of the house: "Little boy, why are you so particular?"