Chapter 155 Opening Ceremony
The people were obviously more interested in the sports games than in the official meetings.
The second sports meeting started on August 7th and lasted for eight days, with the first four days being the preliminaries and the last four days being the finals. Tickets were pre-sold on August 4th and were sold out within three hours.
You should know that the cheapest ticket costs 270 wen, and the most expensive ticket is 650 liang of silver. The venue sells a maximum of 5,000 tickets per day, which means 40,000 tickets in eight days. At the beginning, the Ministry of Rites was afraid that the price was too high and they would not be able to sell them. As a result, many officials themselves did not buy any tickets.
Especially for the tickets for the finals on August 15th, the regular price has been driven up to ten taels of silver per ticket, almost a hundred times the price. Even at such an expensive price, tickets are still hard to come by.
The officials in charge of ticket sales did not expect the sports event to become so popular.
In addition to the lack of large-scale entertainment activities among ancient people, it is probably also related to holidays.
The National Day and Mid-Autumn Festival in August add up to a half-month holiday, so many people from other places have time to visit Beijing. In addition, the newly built roads and trains facilitate travel, making this sports meeting very lively!
Song Yuzhu learned from the lessons of the last sports meeting and arranged 5,000 soldiers to maintain order outside the venue early on to prevent anyone from maliciously instigating trouble.
There are also soldiers in the stadium who are responsible for security, so that people can be guaranteed safety while watching the game.
*
Liu Yanzi was foresighted and had booked a private room early on and invited Charles and his daughter to watch the game.
Charles didn't refuse because he really couldn't buy a ticket.
On the seventh day of August, the audience began to enter the stadium from the hour of Chen. Charles stood outside the stadium holding his daughter, looking at the towering building with a calm face. He had become accustomed to shocks in Daqi these days, and now everything he saw seemed normal.
Little Nina exclaimed: "Wow! This place is so huge! Much bigger than our arena!"
"Yes, it's much bigger."
The father and daughter lined up and followed the crowd into the gymnasium.
Even though he was used to the outrageousness of the Great Qi Dynasty, he was still shocked by the scene inside when he came in. Looking around, he saw nearly five thousand people sitting densely on the stepped seats. Charles got goosebumps.
Little Nina also hugged his neck tightly and said, "Father, I'm a little scared."
"Xiao Cha, here!" Liu Yanzi's voice came from not far away.
Charles frowned and walked over with his daughter in his arms.
"Come on, the show is about to start!" Liu Yanzi took Nina from his arms and pinched her little face. Nina was not shy either, she reached out to grab the fan at his waist, and the two of them started laughing and making noises.
"Nina, please don't be rude."
"Uncle Yan Zi was the first to be rude~"
Liu Yanzi held her with one hand and said, "There are not so many rules when we go out to play today."
Charles shook his head helplessly and walked to the private room upstairs.
Each private room can accommodate up to six people, and there were already three people sitting inside when we came in.
Charles had met Black Knife Bai Xiu and greeted each other, but Bai Yizhou was the only one he hadn't met. Liu Yanzi introduced the two to each other.
Bai Yizhou was a little curious about this barbarian, especially since Bai Xiu and Hei Dao had just gossiped to him about their relationship, causing him to keep looking at them.
Liu Yanzi waved her fan and joked, "What are you looking at? Have you missed me after not seeing me for a few years?"
Bai Yizhou has been guarding the northwest for a long time and rarely comes back. He couldn't help but laugh and said, "You are still so thick-skinned."
Charles also revealed a faint smile when he heard that. He looked really handsome. Bai Xiu leaned next to Hei Dao and whispered a few words. Hei Dao grinned foolishly with his mouth wide open.
Bai Yizhou said: "I didn't expect the tickets to be so hard to buy. If I had known, I would have asked my subordinates to line up in advance."
Liu Yanzi said, "It's useless for others to line up. I heard that in order to prevent people from reselling tickets, the Ministry of Rites requires people to buy tickets in person with their household registration. One ticket per person, no more will be sold."
Bai Xiu cracked melon seeds and said with a smile: "Thank you for the hospitality, otherwise we wouldn't be able to see it today~"
"Why don't you two follow the emperor and watch it together?"
Bai Xiu rolled her eyes: "General Zhao is here, how can we be compared?" Listening to the tone, they were so jealous that Liu Yanzi and Bai Yizhou couldn't help but burst into laughter. However, Charles didn't understand what they were laughing at.
“Bang!” A cannon shot was suddenly heard from below, and everyone stopped chatting and looked outside.
Twelve cannons fired one after another, and the audience's enthusiasm was instantly ignited!
A ten-foot-wide red silk suddenly rolled out from all directions. Everyone felt a darkness above their heads and looked up in surprise. The red silk covered the entire roof of the gymnasium, and it seemed as if it was night for a moment.
Zhao Xiao, who was sitting in the private room at the top, was also startled and quickly stood up and asked, "What's going on?"
Song Yuzhu waved her hand to signal him to be patient: "You'll know in a moment."
"Boom, boom, boom." The drumbeats came from the center. With each beat, a glass lamp around would light up. As the drumbeats became more and more frequent, the glass lamps lit up one after another, like a sky full of stars!
"Good!" I don't know who in the audience cheered first, followed by applause and cheers one after another, and there were also whistles, which immediately brought the atmosphere in the venue to a climax!
Zhao Xiao looked at the twinkling lights and said, "This... is all your idea?"
"I don't have this book. It was thought up by the officials of the Music Bureau." It has to be said that Chinese people from ancient times to the present have had a high level of aesthetic taste and are very adept at this kind of large-scale evening parties.
The drums stopped, but the cheers continued. Suddenly, all the lights on the field went out again. The sudden change from bright to dark made people's vision a little uncomfortable.
But the lights in the center came back on, locking everyone's eyes on the center.
On the pure white round stage, there appeared a woman wearing pink water sleeves. She stood in the center of the light with her hands on her waist.
She just flicked her sleeves and looked back slowly. Although everyone was very far away from her, at that moment, it seemed as if everyone could see her face clearly.
Breathtaking beauty!
Song Yuzhu said, "This is Fang Ruyue, a famous actress from the capital. I heard it's not easy to watch her dance. One song is worth a hundred gold coins. After tonight, it will probably cost a thousand gold coins."
The sound of stringed instruments also rang out as she danced. This was a new piece of music composed by Yuefu for this sports meeting. Compared with the previous pieces of music called "Romance", it had more drum beats and sounds of metal and stone, making it seem more magnificent.
Fang Ruyue danced really well. Not only did she dominate the piece of music, but she also danced out the unique feminine grace and beauty.
When she danced to the back, hundreds of dancers suddenly emerged from the darkness. They were wearing the same clothes and dancing the same dance along with Fang Ruyue. The scene was so shocking that it left people speechless.
Charles stared at the midfield, it was so beautiful, such a performance was simply unheard of!
How many surprises does Daqi have that he hasn't seen yet?
In fact, it was the first time for everyone else to see it as well. Liu Yanzi and Heidao Baixiu didn't even have time to talk nonsense, and Bai Yizhou kept uttering exclamations.
The song ended and the lights went out again. Everyone had not yet recovered from the shock.
Suddenly, the sound of flutes was heard all around, and at least dozens of people were playing a tune at the same time.
The flute sounds cheerful, making everyone happy.
The central light came on again, and this time the scenery on the stage changed to emerald green.
Two people in white started to dance with swords on the stage. Thin steel wires were hung on their bodies, and someone would pull them up and down when they fought.
The dim light hid the rope, as if it was the two people's own martial arts skills!
This time it was Liu Yanzi's turn to be surprised. He had always boasted of his extraordinary martial arts skills, but none of them were this outrageous!
"This, this is too amazing!"
Heidao Baixiu also widened his eyes: "Strange, why hasn't such a powerful Kung Fu been known in Shangjing before?" The two of them have been in Shangjing for more than ten years, and have never heard of anyone with such high Kung Fu skills.
It was Bai Yizhou who first noticed the clue, "No, look at the clothes around their waists, they seem to be pulled up by ropes."
After a closer look, it turned out to be true. Liu Yanzi said, "I told you that no one is better than me in Qinggong!"
Charles glanced at him and raised the corner of his mouth, which made Liu Yanzi's heart beat faster and she fanned herself even faster.
Others didn't know that this was an acrobatic performance and thought that their martial arts skills were so superb that they were like immortals descending to the earth.
After the sword dance, there was a chorus, with more than 300 children in their teens singing "Qingxi Qu" together.
Qingxi Qu is a poem written by the great Zhou Dynasty poet He Yong to his mother. It is well-known to everyone who has read books, and many people hum along.
Speaking of the song selection, the Yuefu reported a total of three songs, one was "Saiwai Qu", the second was "Qing Ping Yue", and the third was "Duan Ge Xing".
Song Yuzhu rejected all of them as he felt that these songs lacked appeal. It just so happened that Song Yutong was learning Qingxi Qu from the tutor at that time. After listening to the song, Song Yuzhu was filled with emotion and decided to choose this song.
The Music Bureau originally planned to use 300 actors to sing in chorus, but Song Yuzhu thought that the voices of adults were not as clear and bright as those of children, so she asked them to select children around ten years old from the schools around Shangjing to sing in chorus.
The children's voices were very contagious, and the audience were reminded of their own mothers, with many of them having tears in their eyes.
Many parents bought tickets just to watch their children's performances, but ended up almost forgetting they were there to see their children. They were glad that they spent money to buy the tickets because they would talk about them in the years to come!
After the children finished singing, the red silk in the sky dissipated and the sun once again shone from the sky. Everyone was still immersed in the performance just now, as if they had had a beautiful dream.
A fat middle-aged man covered his mouth and said, "This money is not wasted! It's really worth it!"
There were many people who had the same idea as him. Everyone thought that the sports meet would be just like the previous ones, with running and high jumping, but who would have thought that there would be such exciting performances!
What a pleasant surprise!
Next was the entry of the athletes. This time the number of participants was more than ten times that of the last time, and all eighteen states in the country sent people to participate in this games.
Although the contestants were not very professional and many of them were brought in at short notice, the atmosphere of the competition was much more intense than last time and everyone was ready to compete with each other!
Among the eighteen states, Shangjing, as the eldest brother, was naturally the first to appear. Fang Ruyue came out holding a sign, and there were many familiar faces among the people who followed Shangjing to participate in the competition.
For example, Chen Liang and Du Chong’s son who participated in weightlifting last time, running champion Qing Niang, etc.
They became even more excited when they saw their acquaintances Hei Dao and Bai Xiu, and shouted their names from afar to cheer them on.
When Qingniang heard the voice, she smiled and waved at them from a distance: "Sister Xiuxiu~"
Bai Xiu waved his handkerchief excitedly. Heidao was unhappy because his view was blocked, and he hugged his arms and snorted coldly.
Bai Xiu frowned, "Don't force me to cut you in the happiest place!"
(End of this chapter)
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