With Fa Zheng secretly mediated and stinging or cracking down on the thorns of the northern part of the country who secretly resisted the reform of the imperial examination system, the Beichang, which was the first examination after Liu Bei ascended the throne, was organized in an orderly manner.

As for the Nanchang, which was the first scientific expedition, which was the one that scholars from all counties in the Chengdu Plain in Jingzhou, Jiaozhou and southern Yizhou should refer to, it will take a certain amount of time to organize work and coordinate internal order.

Fortunately, the start time of the Nanchang exam was delayed by ten days and half a month, and the weather in the south was warmer. It would be too late to rectify and strengthen after Li Su arrived in Xiangyang.

As time goes by mid-August, northern scholars come to Chang'an one after another, preparing to adapt to the climate, water and soil environment in advance and concentrate on preparing for the exam. At the same time, they can also call friends in advance to make friends through literature. Maybe they can inquire about some useful exam news or buy some secret review materials to copy.

Although the official exam date is September 15th, there is still a whole month. If the family has a little money and can make up for the long-term travel, scholars will not be stingy in this regard.

It is better to live in Chang'an, where prices are expensive, so as long as you can improve your competitiveness in the career, spending money is a trivial matter. To put it bluntly, it would take ten years ago. You have to buy an official directly. It is not too shabby to spend money to become an official.

Moreover, after all, studying abroad does not mean buying an official position. There is a way to live in wealth and poor. There is also a way to live in poverty and poor. Rich people spend their days and wine and waste for a month in Chang'an City. If they are relatively poor, they can live in a dilapidated temple and eat braised vegetables to deal with it.

Because of Li Su's reform, the lifestyle of "the poor traveled to Beijing to take the exam" was also at least three or five hundred years ahead of schedule and appeared on the land of China.

...

The layout of Chang'an City after Liu Bei re-established the capital and repaired it was roughly the same as when the capital was built in the Sui and Tang Dynasties, and the layout of the market was mostly poor in the south and noble in the north. The palaces and the government offices of the ministers and ministers were all in the north of the city, and the people living south and the poorer the people.

Nowadays, thousands of people have flocked to the entire western part of China. Although it is not a big deal for the Jingzhao area, which is known as a million-dollar population, there are many poor scholars who accompany them to run, so the neighborhoods where the poor people live seem to be much crowded.

A young man in his early twenties, wearing torn linen clothes and gauze headscarf, was wandering around some markets in the city where picks and bookstores were gathered together, wanting to learn about the exam market and whether there is any new news.

His name is Sun Zi, and his ancestral home is from Bingzhou. His family is not very poor. Otherwise, if he was a poor peasant, he would not have studied. However, Sun Zi's lineage declined. He lost his parents at the age of three and was raised by his brother and sister-in-law. He was naturally relatively poor. His brother and sister-in-law could only prevent him from starving to death and would not support him in school all year round.

Sun Zi actually came to Chang'an five years ago. At that time, he heard that Wang Yun killed the traitor Dong Zhuo. As a scholar who knew a little, he thought the country was saved, so he traveled through Hedong to Chang'an and met Wang Yun at that time.

At that time, Wang Yun was just in power and treated scholars from other places with preferential treatment. Anyone who traveled thousands of miles to join the court could at least be recommended to study in the Imperial Academy and also gave some subsidies to some poor scholars.

Unfortunately, Sun Zi's journey to study at Imperial College did not last more than half a month, and Wang Yun was killed by Li Jue and Guo Si. The city of Chang'an was very chaotic, and he could not return to his hometown, so he had to follow the refugee team to move to the relatively fertile Fufeng County next to him.

Fortunately, he recognized some words and was not treated as a pure farmer. He finally joined a powerful family in Fufeng and became a self-cultivated farmer who was free of rent, and was considered a guest of the main family.

Later, although Liu Bei recovered Guanzhong, he could not have sought talented people that he could just give to poor officials who knew a little. In addition, Sun Zi was under twenty years old, so he continued to be a self-cultivated servant.

Until the imperial examination was held this year, the powerful family "bribed" Fufeng County Chief Du Ji, who wanted to surround a "Mingsuan" subject of Fufeng County. Du Ji was afraid that the powerful family would be fooled by the time they were cheating, so he thought that Du Ji had found a bid to run with the people, so he asked the powerful people to find someone to run with him. So, Sun Zi, a foreigner, got an opportunity and was sent by the powerful person to "support the young master."

Sun Zi's knowledge is not bad, but he did not learn mathematics when he was in the Chang'an Imperial College, so his talent on the surface is only suitable for the filial piety and integrity test, and he could not do it clearly. In the past two years, he had secretly learned some mathematics in private, but the Fufeng Haoqiang didn't know it, so he felt that he would definitely not be able to pass the exam for his young master.

However, people are all ambitious. After Sun Zi got the exam quota, he used the money he had saved secretly in the past few years to come to Chang'an to prepare for the exam in advance. What if he, the runner-up person, becomes a dark horse, breaks through the siege? As long as he takes the first place in the five Ming-Suan subject candidates recommended by Fufeng County, he can immediately go back to become a county household!

However, today he obviously found nothing. After wandering around for a day, he finally returned to a shabby alley inside the east gate of the city in dejectedly. He walked into a dilapidated temple to rest in a familiar way, and prepared to take out his only few pages of "Nine Chapters Remains" and memorize the several math problems that have been memorable on it again.

Buddhism was introduced to China only during the reign of Emperor Ming of the Eastern Han Dynasty. The earliest Buddhist temple was the White Horse Temple in Luoyang in the tenth year of Yongping, which is only more than a hundred years ago. Buddhism is not an official belief, so there are very few Buddhist temples in Chang'an City, which are far from comparable to later generations after the great development of the Southern and Northern Dynasties.

Therefore, this dilapidated temple is not strictly speaking, the Buddhist temple was not a ancestral temple. This place was a ancestral hall next to the Toad Mausoleum. Not far away, the Toad Mausoleum was the tomb of Dong Zhongshu during the Western Han Dynasty.

But two years ago, Yan Xiang, the chief clerk of Yuan Shu, met with the emperor on the grounds of celestial phenomena and disasters, and asked Liu Xie to issue an edict to correct his mistakes. Later, Zhuge Liang took out the zodiac sign and refuted it to the point of being decent. After that, Liu Xie issued an order to pacify the Toad Mausoleum, and all heretical activities that worship Dong Zhongshu were abolished.

Then, all the surrounding ancestral hall buildings were abandoned and attacked by various Buddhist and Taoist civil forces. They gradually became the main distribution centers for poor scholars when they came to Chang'an. Who made it difficult for them to rent houses and live in the late Han Dynasty? There were very few places like inns? Many merchants traveled far away but rented houses and not stayed in inns.

Because of the arrival of poor scholars, the business in the originally deserted area of ​​Toadling was more prosperous than before. Vegetable vendors selling fresh vegetables set up stalls in the ruined temple gates, and even provided simple boiling, without paying for work, only charging more firewood and salt. The businessman was also poor, and it seemed very affordable.

When Sun Zi had just returned to the temple, he was stimulated by the aroma of porridge, and his stomach suddenly burst out with hunger. He had been out of the sky for a whole day and was reluctant to buy food from the rich areas in the city, so he was going to return to the slums and have a meal.

So he immediately made a quick trip and ate nine five-zhu coins and bought a large coconut bowl of coconut. The porridge was made of one liter of yellow millet, seven or eight slices of large pineapple cubes and half a pound of laceberry pieces, and a few pieces of salt were sprinkled.

Who makes the price of the capital expensive? Such a large bowl of porridge costs this money. If in the countryside, a liter of yellow millet is only two five zhu coins, and vegetables are cheaper. The total cost of salt and firewood is not more than five. In Chang'an, the poorest and most humble slums also cost nine yuan.

Sun Zi was already used to this price, and although he felt sorry, he would not say it. However, when he was buying porridge, a poor scholar in front of him seemed to have just arrived for a few days and was not used to the price in Chang'an. He also complained while paying for it:

"The "Xidu Fu" of Ban Taishi said that Chang'an's 'mizhu and firewood' is true, and these things cost nine more."

Sun Zi was impatient when he waited later, and was afraid that the people in front of him would sell porridge more slowly, so he replied: "If you like to eat, say less. 'Mizhu and Xingui' was not originally from the Ban Taishi, he just used it. The original words were found in the "Warring States Policy" by Liu Tianlu of the Han Dynasty, and the same was true for the people of Chu, not just Chang'an?"

Ban Taishi is Ban Gu. "The Fu of Xidu" was written by Ban Gu in the early Eastern Han Dynasty. Liu Tianlu can refer to Liu Xiang, Liu Xin and his son, both historians and astrological mathematicians. "The Strategies of the Warring States" was written by them, father and son in the late Western Han Dynasty.

From the two of them’s answers, we can see that they are both a bit knowledgeable, at least the lyrics and chapters in "The Strategy of the Warring States" and "The Strategies of the Warring States" are cited by classics.

After buying the porridge, the two of them sat down next to them and started drinking the porridge. The Qishengshi changed his traitor's resentment just now and came over to accompany him to ask for advice:

"Brother, I heard that you have a Hedong accent? It's really rare to meet an old friend in a foreign land. Jia Kui from Xiahedong, whose name is Liangdao, was 23 years old. I came to take the exam for the calculations today. You are also from Hedong, and you must have taken other subjects.

I know all four other people in the Ming Suan subject mentioned by Zhuge Fujun of Hedong, but they are not like you. I heard that you are quite talented and so poor, so I must have come to other subjects to accompany those big-name young men. It's a pity."

Sun Zi did not pay attention to it immediately, but Gudong Gudong had seven or eight more mouthfuls. After a little hunger relieved, he wiped his mouth: "You guessed it wrong. I also came to take the exam for the Ming Dynasty. However, I am not from Hedong. Sun Zi, whose courtesy name is Yanlong, was from Bingzhou. However, Wang Situ came to Chang'an when he was in charge of the fifth year. Later, he was in trouble with Li Guozhi.

In this world, if you want to take other subjects, you can't hide your own knowledge and make a special chance to make a splendid trick. Do they dare to let me accompany them to take filial piety and integrity? Only by taking the exam clearly, no one knows how to do it before the calculation. Even if I learn a little, I will secretly learn it. As long as it is not exposed, they will dare to invite me."

Upon hearing this, Jia Kui showed a "comrade" smile: "So that's it. I guess Brother Sun is just as poor as me, so he has only knowledge but has to give people a foil. He has to try this way.

My Jia family in Hedong was not a poor family, but my life was not good. I was lonely and poor when I was a young man. When I was a few years old, my parents were gone. I rely on my uncle and uncle in the clan to help me. When I was young, I couldn't even afford to wear a fur coat in winter. After reading a little, I couldn't continue reading. I could only farm and study by myself.

We are both sick and we have to help each other this time. Brother Yu should be richer than you now, but you are more familiar with Chang'an. I will help you with some money, teach me some of the customs and personalities of Chang'an. Let's take a test together to get back.

Then we will rectify and rectify those things that have been involved in the households! Even though they have eaten the black account, they still dare to ask the past prefects and county magistrates to accept their favors!”

Sun Zi turned his eyes and felt that since the current way to obtain officials was to settle the matter separately (Maocai still settled according to the state, because Maocai had only one per year in each state during the previous inspection system), then he and Jia Kui were divided into Fufeng County and Hedong County, so there was no competitive conflict of interest.

In this case, it is also a benefit for many friends to help those rich young men from different counties who have no competition, don’t they also buy high wine every day to learn about each other’s information? If the poor scholars who run with different states do not find ways to communicate with each other, then there will be no need to fight.

"Okay, then just make a decision. My Sun Zi made a friend, Brother Jia."

Seeing that Sun Zi had released his kindness, Jia Kui immediately took out more than a dozen dollars without saying a word and invited Sun Zi to have a piece of dog meat. It was a gift for the two to make friends.

While treating guests, Jia Kui also said, "It's really not worth it to ask me to say that eating vegetarian food in Chang'an is really cheap. The vegetables in the countryside are so cheap. The prices in the city are higher than rice and there are more meat. Although the meat is still expensive, a pound of dog meat in the countryside can be exchanged for more than ten kilograms of laijiao, but in Chang'an it can only cost five or six kilograms."

Sun Zi shook his head while gnawing on the dog meat: "You are content now. Rice meat is easy to store, transported thousands of miles without rotting, but vegetables are easy to rot. The more a city there are, the more expensive the vegetables are.

I came to Chang'an five years ago when Wang Situ was in power. At that time, the poor had no fresh vegetables and could only eat dried vegetables. Moreover, dried vegetables were two or three times more expensive than now! Now we poor scholars can afford fresh vegetables, and we have to thank the fifth lady of the Zhen family, the foreign relative. This business was the first thing she started.

I heard from the praises of those rich and famous children taking the exam these days that the fifth lady of the Zhen family is a kind fairy who knows the sufferings of the people. Anyone who came to Chang'an a few years ago and who came again this year said that the market this year is very different.

The Zhen family organized people from a hundred miles around to grow vegetables, and then transported grain from other places to feed them. In exchange for millions of people in Jingzhao to eat fresh vegetables. This business actually doesn't make much money, and it has to work hard to coordinate. A fleet of vehicles and ships that have not calculated the harvest period or have not calculated the good days, the vegetables will rot in the fields.

It is not as good as those businesses that sell brocade and cotton, and you don’t have to count your days. You won’t be afraid after stocks are piled up for a long time. You earn no brainstorm. The hard money of this fresh vegetable business is something that is not something that the benevolent merchants who are sympathetic to the suffering of the people will never think of doing it.”

After all, Jia Kui was from Hedong, and the time when the Hedong region was included in Liu Bei's rule was the latest in Guanlong region, so Jia Kui did not know the senior officials of Liu Bei's camp. He couldn't help but be fascinated by the words, and asked:

"I wonder what the fifth lady of Zhen Family is going to be like this year? Since she can get involved in the family business, she should be quite a small matter. I wonder who she will marry. I heard from my brother, could this fifth lady of Zhen Family also learn arithmetic? Otherwise, how could she do such a business well?

There are so many strange women in this world that even women can learn to make a mistake. If they are allowed to take the imperial examination, I wonder if they can get a clear fortune."

Sun Zi showed off his face: "What's strange about this? If you want to talk about the strange women who are familiar with calculations in the world, they were the sisters of Zhuge Envoy (Zhuge Jin) and Zhuge Fujun (Zhuge Liang). Later, there was the newly married wife of Zhuge Fujun's family, and now there is the fifth lady of the Zhen family.

I heard that the wife of Zhuge Jun was the fourth lady of the Zhen family. The Zhen family and the Zhuge family had a relationship with each other. It is not surprising that the fifth lady of the Zhen family was 14 or 15 years old and had no one yet.

However, looking at the powerful and powerful people whom her four elder sisters married, you know that her family is definitely not simple. If you want to marry her as a wife, you are not a young man or above, you should not even think about it. If there is a general with a miscellaneous number who has not married yet, you dare not ask for it lightly. As for taking her as a concubine...

Haha, in the world, except for Your Majesty, there is only the Taiwei who can take the Zhen sisters as concubines. How dare people with lower status than Taiwei have such inappropriate thoughts?”

Sun Zi and Jia Kui were bragging there, and suddenly there was a burst of noise coming from the gate of the ruined temple. Soon a large number of scholars rushed out. But not everyone rushed forward. Most of them followed him and asked about the situation, then came back to rest.

Sun Zi and others had delayed the chat just now, so they hurriedly stopped a poor scholar who had returned and asked: "I dare to ask this brother, what happened just now?"

The dejected poor scholar shrugged: "What does it have to do with me? I heard that a batch of goods was received by Zhen's bookstore in the south of the city. It was edited by Li Sikong and proofread by Zhuge Changshi. It was said that it was a court favor, but considering that there were many incomplete mathematical textbooks in the world before.

In order to give all Maocai who are required to take the math and Mingcai candidates for the current subject, the imperial court has launched the official version of the textbook. This year's math papers were issued by Li Sikong and Zhuge Changshi. People who want to take the math and mathematics exams will do it themselves. Anyway, I am not from Mingcai, so it has nothing to do with me."

After hearing this, Sun Zi immediately took seven or eight steps back and almost failed to stand firm.

In fact, it is not the first time that Li Su has made a "teacher guide". When Li Su first debuted ten years ago, the first thing he invented was the "Xiaoyi Lu" that promoted Liu Bei's "abandoned his official position and organized righteous soldiers to suppress his rebellion and rescue his uncle" and other filial piety deeds.

The textbooks that time were actually endorsed by the "top leader of the education department in charge of the Han Dynasty" at that time, and later the rebel Liu Yan.

Later, the "The Theory of Refuting Disasters and Disasters" written by Li Su and Cai Yong were also included in the category of the "Six Books and Five Classics" of the basic courses of the imperial examinations today (the traditional Four Books and Five Classics plus these two books are collectively called the Six Books and Five Classics)

Now, Li Su's third wave of imperial examination textbooks is here. Let's do it yourself. "The Father of the Imperial Examination" Li Sikong personally wrote it.

"Buy, buy, buy, buy! Brother, don't hesitate! If you can't afford it, let's buy it together. If there are several rolls, let's change it. If you have enough money, you have to buy two sets. Because we hit it off at first sight, you also told me a lot of things in Chang'an. If you almost have a little money, Brother Yu will lend you some."

Jia Kui was watching Sun Zi fall into a loss of memory while watching him wake up, and quickly pulled him to run to the Zhen family bookstore, fearing that he would be too late to buy the books.

Sun Zi followed him in a daze, and then said as he ran, "It's not about selling it out, right? The woodblock printing has been printed for nearly ten years, and that was invented by Li Sikong. Nowadays, those rich merchants can release tens of thousands of rolls of goods at once.

There are only a thousand students coming to Chang'an for the imperial examination, no more than two or three thousand. There are less than five hundred students in the Ming Cunning Department, and only how many people can get a set of them? Let ordinary officials who are interested in learning to calculate can't buy them together."

Jia Kui cursed with regret: "Brother! Although you come to Chang'an many times, you are really not as good as your fool in terms of experience. A book costs only a few hundred yuan? You are not afraid that those wealthy families can't buy 100,000 yuan at a time, so that other candidates can't buy 100,000 yuan at a time, and they don't need to store the exam after one month!"

Sun Zi's heart skipped a beat, and then he realized the sinisterness of human nature: Yes! A few hundred dollars a volume of book will not be sold out under normal circumstances.

But what if someone thinks that his or her own imperial examination interests want to temporarily monopolize knowledge? Even if he or she pays 10,000 yuan to buy a few million yuan, it is only enough to buy an official from a small county town ten years ago.

Books themselves are not valuable, but if they are tied to the interests of temporarily monopolizing the rights of an official, they will be valuable countless times instantly.

When they rushed to the Zhenjia Bookstore in Chengnan, they saw that there was a long queue. They secretly complained in their hearts, thinking that this time it was a bad luck. Among the people in front, there were many rich people with luxurious clothes. Just a few people were cruel to monopolize them, and the people behind were finished.

However, just when they were desperate, they suddenly heard a declaration like the sound of blessing.

It turned out that it was the clerk of the Zhen family's business knocking on the gong at the door to maintain order: "Listen, my lady is ordered by Li Sikong Jun. Today, the purchase of "Nine Chapters Collection" is limited, and everyone can't buy more than ten volumes in line. Even if it is bought for friends of the peers, it is not allowed to buy more than ten volumes! No hoarding!

The production capacity of the Lingtai Printing Bookstore in the imperial court is absolutely sufficient! Even if the account is sold out, it will be replenished at any time! This account promises that from now until the tenth day of September, the time for this book to be out of stock will never be overnight! After selling out that day, it will be replenished tomorrow morning!"

The clerk from the Zhen Family Store called out more than a dozen times, until everyone saw several more cars coming with new books, they realized that the court had sufficient stock for the fairness of the imperial examination.

In particular, the client of the Zhen family business also temporarily drew ink marks on the arm of the person who bought the books that were not easy to wash off for the time being to ensure that everyone could not buy the books and queue up to buy them again. The families who were preparing to spend money to find people to line up to squeeze out and stock up finally dispersed.

This attempt to temporarily monopolize mathematical knowledge by trying to make the time difference is of course doomed to fail. After all, they don’t see who they are fighting with?

With Li Su's experience in fighting with scalpers who tried to break the real-name restrictions in the future, he still couldn't cure the profiteers in the late Han Dynasty who tried to spend money to find people to line up to run and grab stocks? Li Su had never seen anything he had ever seen to grab Moutai and graphics cards!

At the same time, Sikong Li Su rarely visited Zhen Yao's house today and listened to the delivery of goods.

Li Su himself was very concerned about how to "how to regain the imperial examination system when Fa Zheng pretended to give in to the bidding of profits and lure the great families of all over the world to accept the imperial examination system."
To be continued...