Beacon Smoke Illuminates the Snow Tower

The snow in Jiangnan always has a bookish air. When Shen Yan fled with half a volume of "Duanshui Knife Manual", he still didn't understand why his father hid the knife manual in "The Analects of Confucius". It wasn't until the one-armed blacksmith on the Hanjiang River burned the word "Qingming" on his palm with a red-hot iron that he understood: some truths must be explained with a knife. When the Xuan Tie Order came out, the world went crazy. The vassal king wants to use it to plot rebellion, the prince wants to use it to seize power, the Jianghu people snatch it to command the martial arts, and even the female doctor hiding in the market has fragments of military talismans that can overthrow the dynasty hidden in her medicine box. Shen Yan held the knife and walked from the mist and rain in the south of the Yangtze River to the wind and snow in the north. He has seen scholars pick up pens to scold treacherous people and still smile "Spring and Autumn are with me" even though their blood was spattered three feet; he has seen swordsmen cut off their fingers to express gratitude to their teachers, and before they died, they chose the place where they can see Chang'an; he has also seen refugees holding half a piece of frozen cake and saying, "As long as you live, you will always wait until the snow melts." Later, someone asked him: "What exactly are you trying to protect with this knife?" Shen Yan looked at the flying snow in the sky and remembered what his father said before his execution: "The sword can kill traitors and drive away barbarians, but it can only be truly unsheathed if it can protect one person's food and clothing and peace." ——This is a story about swords and snow, and also a story about a group of people fighting for their lives in troubled times for the word "living".