Chapter 956: Stray Cats in the Forbidden City

Thinker Novel Network

As soon as you enter the unopened area of ​​the Forbidden City, it seems that you are completely isolated from the hustle and bustle of the open area. The worry of being overwhelmed by tourists at any time also disappears, and you can finally enjoy the real Forbidden City.

The first feeling when entering here is tranquility. It's really too quiet, except for one or two employees who occasionally pass by, there are basically few people on the road. The grass is desolate, the old trees are covered, and a pair of stone-bottomed copper palace lanterns stand at intervals on both sides of the road. Walking here is like wandering in thousands of years of history.

Seeing Zhang Zian looking around curiously, Wen Li chuckled, and said, "Did you think the unopened area of ​​the Forbidden City was quite mysterious before, but it turned out to be nothing more than that when you came in?"

She was partly right.

In fact, the main reason why Zhang Zi'an looked around was to look for the thing that seemed to be an elf that ran away just now, but this was inconvenient to explain to her, so he simply acquiesced in her guess.

"It's rare to come in, can I take a picture?" He shook his phone and asked her to apply.

The thing that ran away before was just a suspected elf. If you have preconceived prejudices and miss the real elf, what should you do?

"Please go ahead." She didn't stop her, and agreed graciously.

Zhang Zian followed her around while scanning the surroundings with the game capture interface, not missing any corners.

Regarding the unopened areas of the Forbidden City, there have always been many rumors that are difficult to distinguish between true and false. Some people say that these unopened areas contain treasures of the emperors of the Ming and Qing Dynasties. Some even say that the reason why the Forbidden City does not open these areas is because the Forbidden City is at night. There will be supernatural events, and these unopened areas are high-incidence areas for supernatural events.

In fact, based on what he saw and heard along the way, these groundless hypotheses can be completely overturned. The reason why these areas are not open to the outside world is that they have not been repaired and it is not time to open them.

Every time he passed a palace, he could see a corner of the courtyard like a leopard through the open courtyard door. The disgraced palace was surrounded by scaffolding, and piles of stones were placed around it, obviously under repair.

As a cultural relic with a history of hundreds of years, the repair work of the Forbidden City is much more complicated than that of ordinary houses. Any carelessness may cause irreversible damage to cultural relics.

Therefore, although it looks like a construction site, there are only a few people working there, wearing yellow hard hats and repeatedly verifying the drawings. The progress of the work is extremely slow, after all, it is slow work and meticulous work.

Of course, there are also some palaces that do not have scaffolding on the outside. It may be that the external reinforcement work has been completed and the internal repair work is in progress, or it is simply not the turn of this palace.

As for the second feeling of entering here, it is that there are really many stray cats. On the walls, corners, thresholds, and under the windows, stray cats of various colors enjoy the spring sunshine in various postures.

Most cats like to be quiet, and there are a lot of tourists in the general open area, and some bears like to pull the cat's tail, so you don't see a stray cat in the open area, and they all go to the closed area to enjoy the quiet time.

Every time she saw a stray cat, Wen Li would name them like a few treasures.

The history of keeping cats in the Forbidden City began as early as the Ming Dynasty. The Ming Dynasty even set up a "cat room" to manage the cats in the palace, and then select the best ones to present to the emperor. The emperor kept his favorite cat for himself, and rewarded the rest to his relatives.

Years of historical changes, the noble palace cats have been scattered all over the place.

Wen Li said that some of these stray cats may be the descendants of the palace cats back then, and some of them came from nearby stray cats, and they have long been unclear.

The stray cats, including Xiaoxue, had marks on their ears, indicating that they had been neutered.

Wen Li also said proudly that most of the buildings in the Forbidden City are made of wood, but there has been no rat problem for many years.

There must be some credit for these stray cats.

Looking at these neutered cats that were chubby and lazily basking in the sun, Zhang Zian had reservations about this statement. Maybe Wen Li said this to find a legitimate and reasonable excuse for the employees of the Forbidden City to keep cats and love cats.

The stray cats are the real owners of this ancient building. Some locked courtyard doors, they can dexterously slip through the gaps under the doors, through the drains on the courtyard wall, and jump over the top of the wall.

Touring the Forbidden City is a very boring thing. After all, all the palaces are actually similar, but it is different when professionals lead them. Every time Wen Li passed by a palace, she would tirelessly introduce to Zhang Zian the name and origin of the palace, which concubines lived there, and what interesting stories happened there.

Not only Zhang Zian nodded frequently, feeling that the trip was worthwhile, even the elves listened very seriously.

The further you go to the northwest, the more ... old the surrounding buildings become, and they are completely different from the bright and beautiful buildings in the open area. Perhaps this is the real appearance of the Forbidden City that has experienced hundreds of years of wind, rain and war. It is beautiful. Pretty, but not real.

"The front is our destination."

Beside the east wall of Jianfu Gate, she pointed obliquely at a building surrounded by ancient trees.

Jianfu Palace is a large area, and what they are going to is not the main body of Jianfu Palace, but a subsidiary courtyard next to it.

Seeing this courtyard for the first time, Zhang Zian couldn't believe his eyes—is this too broken?

The row of wing rooms in the courtyard can no longer be described in terms of disgrace, it is almost like a dilapidated temple, the windows are all empty, there is no glass or window paper, the paint is almost gone, just rub it with your fingers A layer of ashes.

If this is not the Forbidden City, he can guarantee that no one will have the idea of ​​entering the house.

Wen Li understood his feelings, and said with a wry smile: "There is no way, this place has not been included in the repair schedule, and the courtyard itself is not important, so we can only go to the back row."

She walked to the door of the wing room, the door was also broken, it was just a decoration.

To Zhang Zian's surprise, she didn't push the door directly to enter, but said loudly to the dilapidated wing room, "I'm coming in."

Before she spoke, Zhang Zian had already roughly seen the appearance of the room from the hole in the window. It was dark inside. Although he couldn't see clearly, it was certain that there was no one inside. Who was she talking to?

Thinking of the supernatural rumors about the gods and ghosts in the Forbidden City, even though Zhang Zian didn't believe them, he still felt chills down his back unconsciously.

Are those rumors true, that there are indeed some supernatural things here?