Chapter 13
The teacher asked questions, and the first one to be called up was the eldest prince. The other princes followed suit and asked questions one by one, and some asked more than once.
Avoid the mentality of taking chances and then just relax and think after asking the questions.
Qu Dubian listened and found that Tutor Fang mainly asked questions to the three older princes.
The content of the questions is quite diverse, most of them are from the four books of "The Analects of Confucius", "Mencius", "The Great Learning" and "The Doctrine of the Mean". The difficulty of the questions is specially formulated according to the knowledge of each prince, with a focus on the teachings of Confucius and Mencius.
The youngest, the Sixth Prince, is four years old. He entered school at the age of three and a half, and has only been studying for half a year.
Now he was mainly learning to read from his brothers, so Master Fang only asked him some questions about the Three Character Classic, similar to answering the previous sentence.
It seems that although there was no such dynasty as the Great Zhou in history, its cultural background is very similar to that of all dynasties in Chinese history.
The ones who were finally slapped on the hands were the eldest prince and the fourth prince.
The eldest prince was discovered because his study partner secretly gave him a hint, while the fourth prince was discovered because he kept yawning and looked like he was about to fall asleep when the tutor was asking him a question.
After being beaten, the eldest prince glared at his tutor fiercely. The tutor's face turned pale and he unconsciously twirled his sleeves with his fingers.
The fourth prince rubbed his eyes and sat down as if nothing had happened.
Only then did Master Fang officially begin the class.
Even when teaching two groups of princes with completely different progress, he seemed to be at ease.
He first distributed single-question test papers to the older princes, and then led the younger princes to read "Three Character Classic" and "Thousand Character Classic". He stopped after reading one-third of the way and began to go back and explain the meanings of some words.
When Master Fang was giving lectures, he liked to walk around the classroom, and would occasionally sit down on the chair behind this table. Qu Dubian noticed that there was a patch of the same color as the shoes sewn on the edge of the old man's shoes.
He listened very carefully, muttering to himself silently, relying on his memories from his previous life to accurately locate where the tutor was talking about.
The charcoal pencil in his left hand occasionally made circles and dots, which were characters with more complex strokes that he had not memorized in his first try.
There were also some characters whose pronunciation and meaning were somewhat different from those of his time, so he marked them all with pinyin or simplified Chinese characters. Anyway, no one could understand them except him.
Understanding the meaning of words is the most difficult thing for other princes, but it is very easy for him. What he has to do now is to integrate these words with the memories of his previous life, and then he can master them quickly.
Qu Dubian is only two years old now. If Master Fang were to observe carefully, he would definitely find that his learning progress is not much worse than that of the child prodigy who can compose poetry at the age of two or three.
-
Outside the Sixth Palace of East Garden.
Wen Xiaochun and Ye Xiaoyuan waited nearby for a while, like two parents who had just sent their children to kindergarten, squatting in the corner anxiously, and glancing into the garden from time to time.
Fortunately, there were no patrol guards nearby, otherwise the two of them would have been arrested or interrogated for sure.
They hadn't eaten when they came out in the morning, and were already starving.
Ye Xiaoyuan swore that he heard Wen Xiaochun's stomach growl at least five times.
He looked at the sun and said, "Unlike the older princes, who have to continue their classes in the afternoon after lunch, the younger princes only stay in the East Garden to study in the morning and leave in the afternoon. You should estimate the time and go in when the sun is almost up, and take the little prince out during the break from school."
Wen Xiaochun nodded.
Ye Xiaoyuan: "I'll go prepare some more food. Your Highness should study hard, so you must eat more good food."
"Take this," he handed the snack hidden in his arms to Wen Xiaochun, "and you have to carry His Highness back, otherwise he will fall because of hunger."
"good."
Ye Xiaoyuan gave a few more instructions before leaving the vicinity of the Sixth Palace of East Garden.
-
The sun was approaching noon.
Master Fang closed the book and assigned homework to the four, five, and six princes who were not attending class in the afternoon. "As for the content of today's class, you must not slack off. Remember it well when you go back, otherwise you will not only be spanked next time."
The three little princes responded in unison.
After they packed up their things, the eldest prince and his two brothers bowed and said goodbye to Master Fang, then went to a side hall to have their meal and rest before continuing their classes in the afternoon.
The relationship between them is naturally one of strict teacher and respectful students, and of brothers being friendly and respectful to each other.
After the six princes walked out of the school, they immediately split into small groups.
The eldest prince and the third prince had a quarrel, and the second prince tried to mediate, and then they walked towards the side hall together.
After the youngest Sixth Prince walked out of the East Garden, he threw the scroll in his hand at the Fifth Prince, "Hey, hold it for me."
The fifth prince lowered his head, picked up the scroll, and followed the sixth prince silently.
The fourth prince didn't seem to see this scene. He turned around and stretched out his hand to the eunuch behind him, saying lazily: "I'm sleepy, hold me."
Under the desk.
Qu Watanabe has fallen asleep.
He originally had the body of a child, and it was easy for him to get sleepy if he overworked his brain. When he had finished reading about one-third of the Three Character Classic, the Grand Tutor asked the three young princes to copy the book and practice calligraphy, and then he turned to teach the other three, changing the content of the Four Books.
Qu Dubian listened reluctantly for a while. He had no book to read and no way to learn by reference. As he listened, he could not suppress his body's instinct. He hugged the half-eaten cookie in his arms and began to feel sleepy.
When there were sounds of reading and teaching in the school, he was still subconsciously alert and slept very quietly. Now that the princes had left, the child under the table began to snore.
"call……"
Master Fang, who was tidying up the books on his desk, paused.
"call……"
Master Fang rubbed his ears, walked to the window and stuck his head out, but he didn't see any stray cats wandering around the palace in the cold weather.
Was he hallucinating? Touching his still shiny black goatee, he thought to himself that he wasn't that old.
"Huh...Huh...Separate."
Master Fang turned his head and looked towards the desk!
Great! So here it is.
The sound doesn't sound like a wild cat, but rather like someone hiding there.
Tutor Fang snorted in his heart. This is where the princes study. He wants to see who dares to hide here!
Not knowing what was going on in his mind, Master Fang raised the ruler, his beard almost standing up, and walked over with big strides. If there was someone planning to do something bad to the princes, he would make sure that person saw what it meant to have the martial virtues of the Great Zhou...!
Boom——!
The curtain was lifted.
A sleeping child smacked his lips, and the tattered "Three Character Classic" next to him fell to the ground with a thud.
Taifu Fang: "..."
Mr. Fang: "!!!"
The little old man closed his eyes, then opened them, closed them again, opened them again, and then suddenly opened his eyes wide.
ah? ?
Amitabha, Wuliang Tianzun, Confucius, who can tell him why there is a baby here? ! !
The curtain was lifted, and a slight cool breeze blew in. Qu Watanabe slowly woke up, rubbed his eyes, sat up, checked the time on the simulator, and stretched.
Then he turned his head and saw an old man with wrinkled face who was looking at him seriously.
Qu Watanabe: “…”
OMG!!
His first reaction was to turn around and crawl, but the old man blew his beard and quickly pulled him out with one hand, "Still hiding? Come out here!"
The voice was familiar; it was that of the teacher who taught the princes.
Qu Dubian was lifted into the air. He tried to paddle in the air with his hands and feet, but when he realized he couldn't struggle any further, he forced a smile at Master Fang and started to act cute.
"Master, let me down first, and we can talk it over."
Master Fang was shocked by the subtle familiarity between the child's delicate features. His eyes flickered, and then he put him down, but still held one of the child's hands, "Speak."
He noticed a bruise on the back of the child's hand, frowned, and subconsciously reduced his force.
"This is where the princes have classes. Where did you come from, little kid? And why are you here?"
Master Fang looked him up and down.
The child was probably only two or three years old, very thin and small, and the clothes he wore...it was hard to tell what material they were made of, but they looked a bit old. He used his other hand to take out other things from under the table.
There were bits and pieces in the package.
Half a piece of cake with holes in it, one and a half charcoal pencils, three pieces of paper, and the only valuable things were two old books, one "Three Character Classic" and the other "Thousand Character Classic".
The page of "Three Character Classic" was folded, and Master Fang spread it out and found that this was exactly the position he had just talked about. There were many circles and dots in the front with charcoal, and some strange tadpole characters, which looked like children's scribbles, or like some kind of annotation.
This posture seems to be learned here secretly.
The more Master Fang looked, the stranger his expression became.
Qu Dubian wailed in his heart.
A bad start!
Got caught on the first day!
It was all because of this useless body, otherwise how could he fall asleep? Qu Duanbian was afraid of being grabbed and spanked, so he considered whether to reveal his identity.
But it seems that it is not difficult to guess whether it is revealed or not? How many children are there in the palace in total?
"Are you the child of that palace maid who had an affair with the maid?"
Qu Watanabe's eyes widened slightly: "Maid...?"
Master Fang told him something with a serious face.
The late emperor had poor personal ethics and his harem was in chaos to such an extent that it is still criticized by the court today.
When the current emperor had just ascended the throne and was cleaning up the mess, there was a palace maid who was in her twenties but unable to leave the palace. She had a secret meeting with a guard and soon became pregnant. She gave birth to the child in an abandoned palace somewhere in the harem.
Later, the matter was exposed. His Majesty conducted a thorough investigation in the palace and found two more such cases. However, those children were secretly sent out of the palace when they were just born.
His Majesty was furious and executed all the palace maids and guards. The child was taken away by the shadow guards and disappeared.
What really made the emperor angry was not that the palace maids and guards had defiled the palace, but that a living baby had gone out right under his noses, and the servants outside the palace who were checking the palace people coming in and out didn't even notice it.
If they can sneak a child out today, they can sneak in a rebel tomorrow!
From then on, all the dishonest guards and maids in the palace were replaced, and the inspection of entering and leaving the palace became extremely strict.
Master Fang simply mentioned it without going into detail, "Are you the child secretly born by a palace maid?"
Qu Dubian blinked and continued his conversation: "If I were really like this, would the master hand me over?"
Master Fang raised his eyebrows slightly, and the serious expression on his face had faded away. He picked up the "Three Character Classic" on the ground and flipped through it casually.
"How long have you been here secretly? Can you recognize words? How much have you learned?"
"I just came here today. I have learned a little before, but at most I only know what the teacher talked about." Qu Duanbian gave a progress cautiously.
Master Fang remembered that he had only explained one-third of the meaning of each character in the Three Character Classic, and that was actually mainly for the Sixth Prince, who was the slowest in progress.
"Have you learned everything you said?"
Qu Watanabe played dumb: "Some do and some don't."
Master Fang smiled, "Then I will test you. If you answer correctly, I will let you go and pretend that I didn't see anything. The affairs of the palace have little to do with an outsider like me, so I don't want to get involved. Of course, if you answer incorrectly, I will have to hand you over to the palace servant on duty here."
Being discovered by Master Fang was an accident, but it wasn't that bad. Qu Duan thought about it and agreed. Maybe he could make more of a presence in front of his cheap father.
He said, "I will keep my word. I swear by my ancestors that whoever does not keep his word will become a poor ghost without a partner in the underworld."
Master Fang's hands trembled, two strands of his beard fell out, and he coughed violently a few times.
“…”
Yi Twelve considered it for a long time and finally wrote this sentence down.
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