“When he was a child, he was beaten by his father. He ran away in anger and fell into an abandoned stone pit in a quarry next to their village. It was a remote place and no one went there during the New Year holidays. His family looked for him for two days but couldn’t find him. Finally, he was rescued by a herbalist with his last breath. No one knew why the herbalist ran away to collect herbs during the New Year holidays… Later, he pretended to be a good guy in the county and fought with someone. The other party had a deep background and was about to be thrown into jail. In the end, he was picked up by his master and was lucky enough to be accepted as a disciple…”

“The most interesting thing is that when he was ten years old, his father praised his second brother for his good study, but he was not convinced, so he took a few taels of silver and went to the county to find a good teacher… Later he was deceived and abducted to the next county. He was about to become a beggar, but as soon as he squatted in the corner with dishevelled hair and a dirty face, someone threw a tael of silver at him. With this tael of silver, he hitched a ride back to Fengting Town…”

At night, Su Qingyu lay in bed, thinking about what Liu Juye said during the day.

She tried hard to piece together the image of Lu Bocheng from Liu Juye’s mouth. She didn’t expect that guy to be like this.

She had been with Lu Bocheng for less than a month, and she didn’t like him to the point of being inseparable from him. The two of them got married without knowing each other, and before they had time to cultivate love, he went to the front line.

Fortunately, during that time, the two of them got along pretty well and there was no awkwardness like that of a newlywed couple.

Although Lu Bocheng liked white and plump women, he did not feel repulsed by her. Not only did he speak well of her in front of Lu Shengcai and Wu Shi, but he also transferred his maternal grandfather’s land and house to her.

He also promised that she could take it away as a dowry when she remarried in the future.

Su Qingyu was moved.

She had no intention of remarrying from the beginning, but since she liked him, she wanted to keep a child to accompany her.

Lu Bocheng was reluctant at first but was eventually persuaded by her, hoping to leave a bloodline behind. Before leaving, he gave them names, Yang and Xi, probably hoping that the child would be like sunlight, dispelling the haze and bringing infinite hope.

She didn’t know where he was now but hoped he would still be alive. He was not so unlucky to die so soon, right? Wasn’t it said that he was a bit lucky? She hoped he could survive to the end…

Su Qingyu’s thoughts were a mess and finally fell asleep in a daze.

She never expected that the man she was thinking about was also thinking about her while holding the purse containing the couple’s wedding gifts.

After a month of forced march, they finally reached the camp. Every day before dawn, the horn sounded, urging people to die. Every day, they had to get up quickly, wash and dress, and assemble at the training ground. If they were a little slow, they would be beaten with a stick.

Every day, he practiced various movements such as chopping, stabbing, and picking. He was so tired that he didn’t even want to eat. He was like a dog, with only time left to catch his breath.

At night, every part of his body was screaming, sore and painful, it was unbearable. Once he lay down on the plank bed, he was too tired to move.

He could fall asleep as soon as he touched the bed.

The next day, his hands and feet were so sore that he couldn’t even lift them. He couldn’t even feel his feet on the ground, as if he was stepping on cotton. His hands were so sore that he couldn’t even hold chopsticks. He had to repeat those military postures over and over every day. If he couldn’t keep up, he would be beaten again.

Lu Bocheng was kicked many times by his superiors and beaten with military sticks many times, but he finally managed to adapt.

Now that he had the energy to think about many things as soon as he got into bed, he thought about the wife he just married.

It was all his fault. He was not good at studying. Why didn’t he think of finding a calligraphy and painting teacher to learn the art of painting? If he had this skill, it would be great to paint his wife and carry the painting with him. He could take it out and look at it at ordinary times.

If it takes any longer, he might not even be able to remember what she looked like.

That stinky woman didn’t remind him how difficult it could be to find a painter in the county.

Find an artist to paint his portrait and put it up in their room, to prevent her from going around and having affairs with other men instead of taking good care of the family for him.

The bitch must have done it on purpose.

Snort.

It must be.

Lu Bocheng muttered indignantly for a while, then recited the military book in a low voice… After reciting for a while, he counted the days. It had been fifty-four days since he left his wife. He didn’t know whether his son and daughter had found a way to reincarnate, or whether they had found their mother. He was really worried.

After mumbling for a while, he started to recite military books silently…

The next morning, the new soldiers in the barracks had sandbags tied to their legs and were taken out for a run to build up their endurance.

Running behind Lü Bocheng was his comrade from the same tent, Gou Wa. Halfway through the run, he felt the two sandbags weighing down his legs, as if they were filled with lead, trying to pull him down to the ground.
He was so exhausted that he was gasping for breath behind Lü Bocheng.

Seeing Lu Bocheng in front of him running and reciting to himself simultaneously, he was filled with admiration.

He was so inspired by Lü Bocheng that he didn’t dare to fall behind too much, and he gritted his teeth and followed closely. It was Lü Bocheng who inspired him to finish the whole run, saving himself from a beating.

When they arrived at the destination, Gou Wa lay down on the grass and didn’t move.

Just as he had caught his breath, he started to have a headache when he saw Lu Bocheng carrying him on his back again.

“Lü Bocheng, what on earth are you reciting? You recite it while you sleep, while you practice, and while you run. Where do you get so much energy?”

Lu Bocheng lay on the grass, looking at the clear sky, his eyes leisurely and filled with infinite longing.

“I’m reciting what my wife said.”

Lu Bocheng remembered what his wife had said, that the military book was not convenient to be published in the world and would cause a lot of trouble, so he decided not to tell the truth.

“Ah? Do you still need to recite this? You are henpecked! You recite it every day. Do you have so many things to say? What did you say? Speak it out loud so that I can know what you are thinking about all the time.”

Lu Bocheng remembered how Su Qingyu carefully explained the military book to him word by word, and how he asked her why she did this or why she did that, but he couldn’t answer and got so angry that she called him a poor student.

She said she had never fought in a war, so she asked him to remember it first and figure it out himself when he got to the battlefield.

Lu Bocheng wanted to laugh when he thought of Su Qingyu’s disappointed look when she scolded him for being a poor student.

“My wife said that more sweat in peacetime means less blood in war.”

Sweat more in peacetime, bleed less in war? Gou Wa held it in his mouth and silently recited it. Huh? It seemed to make some sense.

Just as he was about to ask, a man who looked like an official came over and asked, “Does your wife know anything about the battlefield?”

“Captain!”

When the two recruits saw that the person questioning them was their infantry captain, they jumped up from the grass and stood up straight.

The captain smiled and said, “This is not the time for training, so relax.”

Seeing the two of them sighing together, he smiled and asked, “What’s your name? Did your wife tell you about the battlefield?”

“Your Excellency, my name is Lü Bocheng, and I am from Fengting Town, Pingchuan County, Guangning Prefecture. I just married a woman before I joined the army, and she didn’t want to be a widow, so she told me something.”

“Oh, what did she tell you?” the captain asked with great interest.

(End of this chapter)