If you are a novelist, flipping through books in the study, drinking tea, napping, and enclosing yourself in a small space will make you stable and comfortable. Along the huge night window, you can see the lights, see the depth of history in the air, see the overlapping lives that others can't see, and hear the faint thunder. So it's really interesting to create, you play countless characters alone, and let yourself take the place of these characters in turn.
Opening the secret book of the Ming Dynasty, the huge sense of historical depth wrapped me like an abyss, and the events and flocks of people came like birds and butterflies, as if they had experienced it myself. I have seen many lives, and I have written many lives, lamented countless times that people are in the fate of the ups and downs, and countless times surrendered to the infinite potential and human light that people bloom at the threshold of fate. And the elaborate personnel affairs in "Jiangnan Campaign" are like being illuminated by a beam of light leaking from the clouds of history. In this small piece of bright light, we can't help ourselves, and we hesitate to move forward, which is life.
The "Hero of The Golden Dress" Chosen by Fate
All novelists have probably been fascinated by various stories in ancient and modern China and abroad, in the sky and on the ground. To say that among all the special forces from ancient times to the present, the most controversial and secretive one is the Jinyiwei, the military and political intelligence collection agency of the Ming Dynasty. Full of controversy, there is writing, there is tension, there is infinite possibility. I am willing to visualize this mysterious organization in my mind, like sketching a long scroll, or composing a slow poem, cultivating rhyme, and thinking of a mighty style, until one day I see a handsome figure dressed in a flying fish suit and carrying an embroidered spring knife around his waist, coming from the bright light of the clouds.
This tall figure, sometimes Tian Xiaoqi, sometimes Kunlun, sometimes other people, is a character in every blue blood Dan heart in the "Jinyi Hero" series of novels. "Jiangnan Campaign" is the second in my series of novels "Jinyi Hero", inheriting the first "Wind and Dust", in this part, Tian Xiaoqi went south to Zhejiang and competed with Wukou agents in Hangzhou City. Following this clue, in the third "Kunlun Sea", Tian Xiaoqi's younger brother Kunlun in the orphanage will take over Tian Xiaoqi's "cause" and dig up traitors in Taizhou to destroy the headquarters of the Japanese secret service. There are also fanwai "Divine Machine Camp" and "Grain and Grass Officer" slowly coming. Tian Xiaoqi and his brothers are all orphans of the martyrs of the Liaodong battlefield and are all military families; at the same time, they are also the children of the auspicious orphanage, a drop in the sea, and also a civilian hero among mortals.
The vastness of time and space together constitute the magnificent worldview in the "ancient spy world" that I am building. In this world, I often see Tian Xiaoqi standing tall and wandering freely, saying a board and a glance, occasionally looking at the water waves that Jiangnan is accustomed to, thinking of his beloved girl.
A foggy world of ancient spies
By chance, I flipped through the books at home and turned to a historical material by Zhu Yijun, the "lazy man" Wanli Emperor who had not been in the dynasty for 28 years, and the idea of blending the ancient historical background with espionage wars lingered. Ancient and espionage, tradition and modernity, a distant, a secret, at any time can form a strange magnetic field to suck people in.
Without any modern communication technology, what would intelligence warfare look like in the era of cold weapons? All kinds of scenes were thrilling in front of my eyes. Listen to the urn; the code is implied in the beat of the toes in the dance; the fireflies transmit the sound; the dumb auspicious man understands the secrets of the world by communicating with animals; the small cute ocelot specially used to transmit information; the uncirculated Arabic numeral arrangement code is secretly faxed... Top agent duels and smart games, such as the master in the martial arts, one move is careless, one life is whining. As a result, the historical plot of a few strokes to the end was abruptly revived in front of me, as if the pipa was half-covered, tactful, tortuous, and vivid.
History spans thousands of years, dynasties change dozens, anecdotes countless piles, folklore has been passed down for hundreds of generations, and it is a fertile soil for cultivating espionage warfare. So in the cracks of the historical materials, espionage, suspense, reasoning and martial arts dance together, in "Jiangnan Campaign", the fog is everywhere, the bat demon case makes people panic, the Wokou step by step, and the Liuhe Pagoda is a thousand guns. So Tian Xiaoqi began to reason step by step according to the clues left by firearms expert Zhao Shizhen, the Jinyi League of Heroes was full of special skills, the martial arts moves were presented in a dazzling manner, and the chivalrous wind and bones in the deep cold of the sword light reappeared in the human world.
In each of our hearts, we will probably experience such a moment of intersection of espionage, suspense and martial arts.
Cities have texture and imprint, just as words have context and breath. Jingcheng is the starting point of Jinyiwei and the place where the story of the first "In the Wind and Dust" unfolds. Needless to say, the storm in beijing must be intertwined and surging dark tides. The second "Battle of Jiangnan" let Tian Xiaoqi go south to Hangzhou City, historically, there was indeed an invasion of wukou here, the Liuhe Pagoda was also damaged, and the ancient traces showed the tragedy and glory of the past, and under the peaceful and prosperous scenery of Jiangnan, there were bottomless conspiracies and tricks. And Taizhou, precipitated by a Ming Dynasty thousand households called Taozhu, this is the place where Qi Jiguang resisted the Wokou, the cry of national righteousness washed away this land, here is one of the places where the third "Kunlun Sea" I am creating takes place, this story will be from the Taizhou secret war to the Ming Dynasty spy war in Dongying.
Standing under the long sky of these cities, the story has not yet begun, and the storyteller has not yet started, as if he has heard the rolling thunder coming from the sky. Just like in our lives, there are always things that come unexpectedly without warning.
A special inspiration for historical novels
I don't like the story of rigidity, when the autumn waves of the West Lake came at the right time, I let Tian Xiaoqi pull his legs out of the deep wall of the palace and run out, running to the city of Hangzhou, where I had known and lived for many years, to the interesting folk.
I love this steamy, lazy capital of the Six Dynasties, where steaming vapor embraces everything. Tian Xiaoqi tracked down the case, and I followed behind to depict the pagoda temple lined with trees on the lakeside, the bricks and tiles on the shore, the miscellaneous dramas on the street, the temple fair, the "Five Hangzhous", the Guan Tide Festival in the empty alleys, the red bean paste and Dingsheng cake that Zhao Shizhen grabbed at will, the stir-fried snails sucked by the guards under the city wall, a certain ordinary sun foot, the fried fried shallots braised in the scales, glutinous rice wine, the West Lake lotus powder, the Xishi tongue... I am almost obsessed with the engraving of this detail, crushing the Hangzhou atmosphere into the depicted text, so that this long scroll of customs grows warm and cruel. This is the Hangzhou I can't see, the exposure of my introverted emotions, the blood and bones of mine, and the sense of reverence for history.
This is a semi-fictional spy movie, a sparkling scene in a fictional life. Looking back, you can still see footnotes of solid history: for example, ming jiajing invaded Hangzhou in the twelfth year of the Wukou invasion, and the Liuhe Pagoda was destroyed; for example, the shell of the "Demon Book Case", one of the four major mysteries of the Ming Dynasty; such as Zhao Shizhen, the historical prototype of Zhao Shizhen. Different from complete history, literature is also close to the truth and authenticity in another brushwork, writing human nature in a precisely amplified imaginative space, allowing readers to more or less touch the temperature of history in the language of poetic extremes, and perceive part of the humanities and care.
When I dig up the minutiae of history like an archaeologist, history is like a gentle-looking behemoth, and I stand in front of it and let me look at myself, at the present. At the end of the novel, I let Tian Xiaoqi, the adult of the Jinyi Wei Qianhu, fade out of everything, and run an orphanage with Zhao Kexin. He did not want to be the emperor's sword anymore, and the arrogant and sharp Tian Xiaoqi put away the embroidered spring knife, took off his flying fish suit, transformed into the gentle and dancing young man, and ran to the evening photo. At the same time, Tian Xiaoqi's younger brother Kunlun was still a layman, became a Jinyi Wei Kunlun, and embarked on the road of defending the family and defending the country, I think, whether it is "born" or "joined the world", it is a faithful choice in their hearts, and if they meet in the future, they will still look at each other with all their liver and gallbladder, and they will be bright and upright.
Now, the sound of swords faded, the dark clouds dispersed, the Six Harmony Pagodas regained their might, and winter seemed to pass ahead of schedule. After many years, I probably remember the Tian Xiaoqi who showed a white tooth when he smiled, standing in the warm sun at the entrance of the orphanage, or under a cloth banner in Hefang Street, Hangzhou, and smiling at me. I said, this brother, please greet the tide gate how to go?
Please come with me. Tian Xiaoqi turned around after saying that, and then I must be able to see Tian Xiaoqi walking in front of him, walking in a large area of time leaked from the historical clouds, with a resolute gait and a firm gaze. (The author is a well-known screenwriter and writer, whose representative works are "Sparrow", "Sting", etc.)
Author: Haifei
Planner: Xu Yang
Editor: Wang Xiaoli
Editor-in-Charge: Huang Qizhe
*Wenhui exclusive manuscript, please indicate the source when reprinting.