"Smoke Keeper"
——The struggles of little people in troubled times
Their names are not included in the history books of the Tang Dynasty.
They are the "dead" garrison soldiers in Yingchou Gorge, the craftsmen who escaped from famine after removing their pills, the medicine ladies who were sold in Liangzhou, and the Hu'er who herds sheep in Qilian Mountain -
A group of ants that should have remained silent to the end.
But when Hexi fell, the officers and soldiers were dispersed, and the imperial court fled far away,
It was them who lit up a wisp of smoke with wolf dung under the beacon on Baishitai.
Not for the restoration of the country, not for rewards, just to tell the child hiding in the cave ten miles away:
"Dad is still here."
When the food ran out, he had a bowl of snow water, and during the siege, he hid three hundred refugees in the tunnel.
When he met the Holy Spirit, he refused to accept the general's seal and only asked for a copper whistle——
"Those who hold this whistle are all smokers." They can cross Tangguan and save fellow travelers.
They took back Xiedan, but they did not sit in the yamen, but only opened "Anminsuo":
Distribute food, patrol the streets, take in orphans, and teach children to whistle.
There is no Tang flag hanging at the top of the city, only a wisp of blue smoke rising——
It was a letter that the people ordered and a promise they kept.
"Smoke Keeper" has no aura of protagonist and no magic weapon descended from the sky.
Victory is not a feat of one person, but rather:
The old farmer lit a cigarette on the edge of the field to report the weather,
A mother teaches her young son to blow a whistle to signal peace.
When a business traveler sees the green smoke, he knows the way forward.
The copper whistle on the child's waist jingles like a song when he runs.
True resistance never means killing the enemy;
But live a life that your enemies cannot destroy.
