The prince is very cruel

"Oh? A thousand years?" Guan Ning was surprised. If this thing was preserved to future generations, it would be incredible!

The old man nodded and said, "I've prepared two kilograms for you. Just consider it as my thanks for your hard work these days."

Guan Ning's eyes lit up: "Oh? Then I won't be polite to the ancestor."

"Hahaha." The two smiled at each other, as if they were friends regardless of age.

Then, Guan Ning changed the subject and asked curiously, "Grandfather, I wonder why you called me here?"

The old ancestor's smile slowly stopped, and suddenly became deep. He stood up and looked at the mountains in the distance.

"Little guy, do you know how many years I have been in charge of Bashan?" He did not directly answer Guan Ning's words, but asked this.

Guan Ning frowned and estimated that since he could be in charge of Bashan and be respected as the ancestor, he must have been very old when he took charge.

So he asked tentatively, "Thirty years?"

The old ancestor shook his head.

"Forty years?"

The old ancestor blurted out with a hint of melancholy and a sense of the passage of time: "A sixty years."

"Ah?" Guan Ning was shocked. "A sixty-year cycle is sixty years. Doesn't that mean you took charge of Bashan before you were even forty?"

The old ancestor nodded and said bitterly, "Very surprising, right?"

"The ancestor of the previous generation of the Ba people passed away so suddenly. At that time, Shu was poor and backward, with constant civil unrest. It couldn't fully establish a healthy relationship with the imperial court, so it was in a precarious situation."

"My ancestor's last words were for me to take charge of Bashan, lead the Nine Clans, and ensure that the people of Shu have enough food and clothing, and live and work in peace and contentment."

"This has been going on for sixty years!"

He seemed unusually melancholy, even preoccupied.

"Is what the ancestor wants to tell me related to this?" Guan Ning raised his eyebrows.

The old ancestor nodded, his old brows were tightly furrowed, and his white beard was filled with a knot of depression.

"I have never married in my life. I have dedicated my life to the people of Shu. Although I have not been able to make Shu prosperous, I have made more than enough for the people below. I have a clear conscience and will not be rebuked by my ancestors in the afterlife."

"But there is only one person I feel guilty about!"

Guan Ning blurted out: "Woman?"

The old ancestor nodded again, his eyes lost in painful recollection.

"I grew up in Bashan. When I was young, I traveled extensively for my people, buying supplies and seeking a way to make a living. When I was twenty-two, the previous ancestor wanted to arrange a marriage for me, but I was too proud and arrogant to accept the old man's arrangement, so the matter dragged on for ten years."

"When I was thirty-one, I fled to another land to learn farming techniques in order to avoid the marriage arranged by my ancestors. I hoped to solve the problem of the scarcity of rice in Shu's fertile land."

"But the journey was not smooth. We went to many places but could not find a solution."

"Until... I met a young girl at the foot of Qin'an Mountain. She rolled up her sleeves and planted rice seedlings, unworldly and simple. Her gentle sway in the sunlight shook my heart, which had been stable for thirty-one years."

The eyes of this centenarian man still reveal a kind of admiration!

Even after a long sixty years, the ancestor never forgot that girl. How deep was his affection!

"What happened next?" Guan Ning was curious and listened very carefully.

The old ancestor lowered his head bitterly: "Later, we fell in love."

"She taught me all the farming techniques and farmland improvements she knew for free, and asked me to take them back to Bashan and help the people in Shu with their farming."

"Half of the grain in Bashan is now produced by her."

"Then you couldn't be together?" Guan Ning opened his eyes wide, somewhat incredulous.

These words seemed to have touched the old ancestor's pain point, and a trace of shame and sadness flashed across his eyes.

"Originally, I should have mentioned the marriage to the ancestors in the second year."

"Can……"

"But at that time, the internal strife among the nine branches of Bashan was too serious. It was so serious that the Ba people could destroy themselves without any outside intervention. Coupled with natural disasters and man-made disasters, life in Shu was extremely difficult."

"I'm exhausted from running around for my people."

"I didn't have a chance to give that woman an explanation... It dragged on like this, year after year."