Chapter 133 Chapter 132: The No. 1 Scholar and the No. 3 Scholar
Upon learning that all the officials from the Ministry of Rites who participated in this year's imperial examination had met with trouble, Cao Zhiqing felt as fortunate as he was when his son ruined his job.
During the meal, he rarely picked up a chicken leg for Cao Peng himself.
Cao Peng, who was still spoiled by Mrs. Du, disliked that he didn't use the shared chopsticks, so he picked up the food and threw it under the table, where it was eaten by Mrs. Du's favorite cat.
One can imagine how unhappy Cao Zhiqing's expression was when he saw his son despise him so much.
Thinking of his other son who had never come to pay a visit to his father since arriving in the capital, Cao Zhiqing's expression became even gloomier.
He already knew that his son had passed the imperial examination and ranked first in this year's spring examination, which was much better than his own performance that year when he only ranked at the bottom of the list.
But since Li Ziyu never came to see him, Cao Zhiqing knew that this evil son hated him because of past events. Originally, it would have been fine if he had failed the exam.
But now...
A gleam of light flashed in Cao Zhiqing's eyes, and suddenly he revealed a smile with an ambiguous meaning.
*An Xin received a belated gift from someone she had almost forgotten about, who sent it to Li Ziyu and others.
Although he was still pretending to be sick and unable to go out in person, he still sent Ling Yun, who was beside him, to deliver six gifts.
Li Ziyu and Leng Xiangbai knew that the gift was sent by Kong Xun, so they accepted it silently. After all, they had some friendship with him at the literary meeting last year.
There is also the Chen Bo Mansion, the family of Zhu Shijing's aunt's husband. He knew about his aunt's family before he came to Beijing. Because their father-in-law and uncle had passed away, they had gone back to their hometown to mourn for him and had not returned.
However, this aunt was still thinking about her nephew, and upon learning that he had passed the imperial examination, she sent a message to a nanny who stayed in the mansion as a dowry to deliver a silver note of 1,000 taels.
After An Xin learned about it, he laughed and said that it is more practical to send gifts from relatives, as for those who send gifts because they are thinking about their future career, let’s not talk about it.
First, make friends with those officials from a distance. With this awareness, she may not be able to resist the temptation and accept all of them.
Li Ziyu, Leng Xiangbai, Zhu Shijing and Jiang Zhou couldn't help but smile slightly when they saw their little boss being so obsessed with money.
Several people knew that in order to prevent them from giving others an advantage in the future, An Xin, who protected them like a hen protecting her chicks, would never easily accept gifts from people who obviously had ulterior motives.
This is also the reason why they trusted her so much and handed over this matter which was neither important nor unimportant, but which could have a great impact on the careers of several people if not handled properly.
Even Li Ziyu and Leng Xiangbai felt that as long as An Xin was happy, their careers didn't seem that important, because with their abilities.
Whether it was Li Ziyu who traveled thousands of miles to find her husband but was cruelly abandoned, or was assassinated on the way back, or his mother who died of complications during childbirth, he wanted to seek justice from that man.
Or Leng Xiangbai wanted to completely get rid of the troubles caused by his selfish brother and sister-in-law.
They both have confidence that even if they don't choose this career path, they both have countless ways to achieve their dreams.
An Xin wrote a letter and put it together with the letters from the other four people, and sent it to the post station to be delivered by a courier.
However, such departments only deliver official documents and letters from officials, and generally do not accept correspondence from ordinary people.
However, for people like Li Ziyu who have already stepped half a foot into the officialdom, as long as the courier gives them some extra benefits, the post station will also deliver a few letters from home to them.
Soon, Uncle An and his wife in Lin'an County, the Zhu family whose son and nephew were going to Beijing to take the imperial examination, and Jiang Zhou's parents received the letter.
When they learned that their own children, who were once looked down upon and secretly called losers, had passed the examination, they were so excited that they almost wanted to take a heart pill to calm their overly fast beating hearts.
There was also his uncle Jiang Zhou, who had replaced Zhang Qi Guang, who was beheaded for smuggling salt, and became the acting county magistrate. After County Magistrate Sun learned that his nephew had passed the imperial examination.
An official document was immediately written to protect Fang Zhijin, allowing him to remove the word "acting" as he wished, and he was officially promoted to the second-in-command of Lin'an County.
Although there is only one level difference between the county magistrate and the chief clerk, both of them are officials of the eighth or ninth grade at the bottom of the local government, the difference of this one level means a qualitative leap.
It is possible to get this position after the county magistrate is transferred out after his term of office expires. If he has enough ability and makes some achievements, it is not impossible for him to be promoted to a higher position.
From the initial acting county magistrate to the final destination of their promotion to official status in this way, they became an official county magistrate.
But these are just possible things that may happen, and they have little to do with An Xin and the others right now.
After they informed their families of the good news, the palace examination was about to begin.
Prime Minister Xiao has been extremely cautious since he learned that his son, whom he always valued, used his connections to cheat in the imperial examination.
He who originally did not take sides also began to lean towards a direction, but the person not being the virtuous concubine and her son who had been secretly trying to win him over was someone else.
What made Prime Minister Xiao make this decision was an incident that happened before.
Xiao Wenrou, the only daughter of the Prime Minister's Mansion, encountered a villain on her way to burn incense and was rescued by a master and servant who passed by. However, no one knows who helped her.
When the prime minister's daughter, who had been seriously ill due to excessive fright, woke up again, she looked into the ancient room and saw that the furnishings were exquisite and elegant.
His eyes changed from initial confusion, surprise and disbelief to joy.
6◇9◇Book◇Bar
*In the magnificent hall of the imperial palace.
The seats were filled with hundreds of students who had passed the imperial examination this year. Emperor Sheng An set the questions himself, and everyone competed with each other in either flowery rhetoric or practical policy essays.
No matter how you answer, once the time is up, the paper will be taken away by the palace historian.
After the palace examination, the papers were marked the next day and the results were announced the next day.
Emperor Sheng An picked up an answer sheet, read it, and nodded with a smile. The official who accompanied him in marking the papers glanced at it and had an idea in mind.
Although they can't see the name and hometown, there is still writing on it.
The person who finally answered the paper unsurprisingly became the top scorer in the palace examination, commonly known as the top scholar.
The second place winner was a student over 30 years old with solid academic knowledge, selected by Emperor Sheng An.
Leng Xiangbai never thought that he would miss out on the chance to be the runner-up for a thousand years, one day, by being named the third place winner in the palace examination by the emperor just because of his moderate age, fair complexion and handsome appearance.
If the candidates do not make major mistakes, the results of the second list of the palace examination and the ranking of the metropolitan examination will not change much.
Zhu Shijing ranked fourth in the imperial examination. I don’t know whether it was because Emperor Sheng’an intentionally let him off or if he really had the ability.
After the palace examination list came out, his ranking remained the same as in the joint examination, except for the top three.
He firmly ranked first in the second list and became the winner of this session.
Jiang Zhou and An Rui were also in the top 100. Only Liu Boxing, who preferred martial arts to literature, was outside the top 100. It was unknown whether they would be able to pass the exam to become Shujishi, but they would definitely not be reduced to the same rank as Jinshi.
Although the rankings of Li Ziyu, Leng Xiangbai and other six people were eye-catching, they were not the first to become popular.
Because a group of top scholar, second place scholar and Jinshi will emerge every three years, but there are not many people who can teach the top scholar, third place scholar, Chuanlu scholar and three other Jinshi at the same time.
An Xin, whose past was exposed by the princes, nobles, aristocratic families, and officials of all ranks in the capital, now wants to see if there is a rat hole in her house that she can hide in.
(End of this chapter)