Chapter 131
Irina recounted this long-hidden secret: the situation in the Great Qi Dynasty was not good back then. The internal government was in turmoil, and the barbarians coveted it from the outside. Lin Ruofu went to Tsarist Russia, ostensibly as the ambassador, but in reality, he went there as a "hostage." His time in Tsarist Russia was not easy; he lived in constant fear and trepidation.
The situation took a turn when the Empress suddenly fell ill, leaving everyone helpless. It was Lin Ruofu who stepped forward and said that he knew a divine physician whose methods were unpredictable but whose medical skills were unparalleled in the world. Years ago, his daughter was seriously ill and had stopped breathing. All the doctors shook their heads and said that they could not cure her, but this divine physician was able to bring her back to life and cure his daughter's congenital weakness.
"The person he recommended is Zhang Jinghua," Irina said, pursing her lips.
Xue Jin'an deduced from her expression that she had some reservations about Zhang Jinghua. "What else did he do?"
Irina, having been seen through, made no attempt to hide it. She smoothed the hair that fell across her neck and chuckled, "I even helped my mother recover her health, enabling her to successfully have a child with her lover."
It can be said that he single-handedly made Irina's path to succession extremely difficult.
"Congratulations." Xue Jin'an paused, then added as Irina looked at him in disbelief, "Please accept my condolences."
Xue Jin'an was always fair. He congratulated the Empress on curing her infertility and also expressed his condolences for Irina's hardships.
Irina: "..."
Irina was amused by his words and gritted her teeth, saying, "You need to understand who your partner is. My mother harbors ambitions to annex Daqi, unlike me. I only want to cooperate with you for mutual benefit!"
“She can’t eat; she’ll choke to death,” Xue Jin’an said truthfully.
Irina was nearly choked by his blunt honesty, but she had to admit he was right. The Eastern lands and their riches had never lacked those who coveted them. For thousands of years, the surrounding barbarians had changed from the Xiongnu to the Xianbei, from the Xianbei to the Qiang... and then to the Rong and Di. Opponents changed one after another. Even when iron hooves trampled the mountains and rivers, the Han people under their rule never yielded. As long as there was a glimmer of hope, they would raise their spears, don their armor, and reclaim their lost lands.
Finally, the Rong and Di peoples concluded that the only way to conquer the Central Plains was through Sinicization.
However, the Great Empire is not like the Rong and Di tribes. It is a unified country with a long cultural heritage. Great countries with a long history share a common problem: they are corrupt and proud. Unless absolutely necessary, they will not abandon their own culture to admire the culture of other countries. Therefore, if the Great Empire really attacks Daqi, they will only use this land as a free resource to plunder and oppress, and will never want to govern it.
Similarly, the people of Daqi will not allow themselves to be oppressed; they will fight to the last drop of blood to rise up, and the two sides will eventually reach a point of no return.
It's very likely that, just as Xue Jin'an said, they won't be able to swallow this thorny pie and will choke to death.
Irina's reluctance to confront Daqi stemmed from this reason; in her view, taking down Rongdi was more cost-effective.
After silencing Irina, Xue Jin'an began analyzing the matter between Zhang Jinghua and Lin Ruofu in his mind. Irina had no reason to lie to him about this matter, and the probability of these things being true was 77%. He suddenly thought of the issue of Consort De's background, and Xue Jin'an had another guess.
Before the incident of the Third Prince's horse being startled, Xue Jin'an had seen Consort De talking to the First Prince on horseback from afar. The two were speaking an unfamiliar language, and Xue Jin'an was unable to read their lips.
Xue Jin'an retrieved the lip movements of the two people from the database, switched the system language to the Great Empire language to match it, and uttered a string of incoherent syllables.
"What do you mean, 'go to heaven'?" Irina felt like she was listening to gibberish. She looked at Xue Jin'an with a face full of doubt. "What nonsense are you talking about?"
Xue Jin'an did not answer immediately. Instead, he switched the system language again and matched the lip movements in Rongdi language. This time it sounded much better, with a few words matching, but it was still somewhat incoherent and the logic was chaotic.
Irina also understood a little of the Rongdi language. After listening for a while, she frowned. "Although I don't know what you're doing, your accent is a bit off, isn't it?"
Irina opened her mouth thoughtfully and read a word that Xue Jin'an had just said. She felt that the word sounded strange, like a tenon that had not found the right structure to accommodate it. She repeated the word over and over, making subtle adjustments to the tone and syllables each time. Finally, she suddenly realized and read the word correctly.
“This means ‘horse’ in the language of Southern Xinjiang.” Irina looked at Xue Jin’an with some surprise. “You can speak the language of Southern Xinjiang? But your accent is a bit too heavy, I can’t understand the rest.”
As expected. Xue Jin'an wasn't surprised at all by this answer. He asked calmly, "Do you speak the Southern Xinjiang dialect?"
"I know a little," Irina said modestly, gesturing with her fingers.
Irina saw through his intention and readily recited all the Southern Xinjiang dialect she knew. She wasn't being modest; her Southern Xinjiang dialect was far inferior to that of the Rongdi dialect, and she only knew some everyday expressions.
This was because Irina wanted to find someone to learn the Rongdi language, but her subordinates accidentally captured a Southern Frontier man who came to preach. Just as the people of the Central Plains thought that all the barbarians looked alike, the people of the Great Empire also thought that the Rongdi, Southern Frontier, and Western Region people looked alike.
That's not wrong, after all, these three families trace their lineage back to the same ancestor a thousand or eight hundred years ago. It's just that they eventually fell apart, their environments changed, and their languages changed as well. The Western Regions were a hub of commerce, with their trade reaching as far as Europe and as far as Southeast Asia. They also absorbed many different ethnic groups, which led to the most dramatic changes in their languages, resulting in many branches, much like the saying "every ten miles in the southern mountains, the pronunciation can be different."
Under the influence of the prime minister, the Rong and Di peoples tried to Sinicize, and their language incorporated many elements of the Central Plains Mandarin. When placed together with the Qizhou dialect, it is difficult to distinguish them.
Southern Xinjiang, having long been confined to its small territory and governed itself, has experienced the least change in its language. It has preserved most of the ancient pronunciations and characters, and is also more difficult to pronounce. At first glance, it sounds very similar to the languages of the Rong and Di peoples, with many words having similar pronunciations.
Irina learned her Rongdi language from the people of southern Xinjiang, and inevitably picked up some of the southern Xinjiang dialect as well. She can say a few words about the similarities and differences between the two languages.
“If you want to learn the language of Southern Xinjiang, I can send you a teacher. But that guy is obsessed with missionary work, so he will inevitably mix in some of his own teaching methods. If you get impatient, just beat him up, and he will behave for a while.” Irina shared her experience of persecuting missionaries from Southern Xinjiang with Xue Jin’an.
Xue Jin'an politely declined, saying, "This is enough."
Given enough samples, Xue Jin'an could figure out the patterns through data analysis. He didn't necessarily need to know what the eldest prince and Consort De had said at the time; he just needed to confirm that the eldest prince was speaking the Southern Xinjiang dialect, thus confirming that Consort De came from the Southern Xinjiang region.
This raises serious questions about Consort De's motives for entering the palace. Was it merely a coincidence, or was it at Zhang Jinghua's behest? Did the First Prince know about this?
"What else do you know about Zhang Jinghua?" Xue Jin'an continued to press.
Irina pondered for a moment, then hesitated, "There is indeed something you want to say, but I'm not sure. When I asked someone to get information out of him, the missionary was already out of his mind."
Irina phrased it delicately, and Xue Jin'an roughly understood that the missionary must have been interrogated before he was allowed to stay and teach under Irina's tutelage.
This is understandable; after all, she is a princess of a country, while the missionary is, frankly speaking, a prisoner of another country. It is fortunate that he is still alive.
Seeing that Xue Jin'an remained silent, Irina coughed and explained, "It's not that I'm ruthless; it's just that those people from Southern Xinjiang have gone too far. They've been spreading their religion too aggressively. They said that people from Southern Xinjiang would stay at home and not want to go out."
“I asked someone to ask that missionary, and he said that so many people came out to preach because the Southern Frontier was not convinced by the newly appointed God-King. They were all followers of the old God-King. He greatly admired Zhang Jinghua and said that Zhang Jinghua did not step down voluntarily, but was tricked by the new God-King and forced to abdicate because he broke the precepts.”
“As far as I know, their religion has only one commandment that cannot be broken, and that is that one cannot lose one’s virginity.” Irina tried to sift through the information in her head. “It seems that Zhang Jinghua married someone in the Central Plains back then, and the other party even had a daughter.”
"Zhang Jinghua resigned from his position as priest and left the Southern Frontier for the Central Plains again. According to the missionary, he was going to find his daughter. I asked around, but the people of the Southern Frontier are too wary, and it's difficult to get any useful information. There are only some vague rumors. One time it says his daughter is widowed, another time it says she married into an extremely wealthy family and lives a life that ordinary people can only envy, and yet another time it says his daughter married his only disciple... There are also rumors that his daughter is destined to be a cursed star, killing her husband and son, and finally even herself. There are also rumors that his daughter has an incurable disease, and Zhang Jinghua wants to use a 'longevity gu' to bring her back to life..."
"Anyway, there are all sorts of rumors, but the southern border is closed off and xenophobic, so it's impossible to find the source of the information. I can only treat it as a rumor. As for Zhang Jinghua himself, we've been out of touch for more than ten years." Irina shrugged. "If Zhang Jinghua really had a daughter, he would be old enough to have a house full of children and grandchildren by now."
What was said in jest was taken seriously by Xue Jin'an. He picked out a few words from the rumors: widow, cursed relative, incurable disease, cure... He almost immediately identified a person.
—Consort Hui.
Consort Hui, née He, was a widow who had two sons who died, and eventually she herself also died. Coincidentally, the elusive Zhang Jinghua had once entered the palace to treat Consort Hui's illness.
According to Zhou Yushu, Zhang Jinghua was a rather eccentric person who didn't care about human life. Although he had a reputation as a divine physician, he had probably killed more people than he had saved. It was truly unbelievable that such a person would enter the palace to examine and treat Consort Hui. If Consort Hui was related to him by blood, it would make sense.
However, Consort Hui is dead, and Zhang Jinghua is nowhere to be found. To verify this matter, it was impossible to find the parties involved for a while.
Irina had completely racked her brains for information about Zhang Jinghua, and only when she couldn't find anything relevant was Xue Jin'an finally let her go.
Irina was also good at taking advantage of the situation; she immediately used the favor to ask Xue Jin'an for a favor in return.
Both parties parted ways satisfied.
The envoy from the great empire left the capital early the next morning, and the imperial examination in March was fast approaching.
Speaking of the imperial examination in March, there was an interesting incident. The Empress Dowager and the Emperor both wanted to appoint their own people as examiners, and they were deadlocked. At this point, Grand Secretary Jiang Wen stepped forward and proposed the names of Master Cen and Cui Pengfei. These two were highly respected and could keep the situation in check. Although they were not in court, there were many of their supporters there.
—Master Cen was a great Confucian scholar of our time, with countless disciples serving as officials in the imperial court; Cui Pengfei, a prime minister of his generation, retired in his prime due to political issues and returned to his hometown. Afterwards, he traveled all over the country, teaching without discrimination, and casually guided countless students.
Once these two names are mentioned, no one from any political party dares to utter a sound.
Two retired elderly people were thus forced to re-employ themselves and take on the role of chief examiners for the imperial examination, with the added responsibility of setting the questions.
To prevent cheating, two separate question-setting groups would be formed, with each person as the center. Before the exam, the questions from both groups would be combined and printed in a random order. Only then would they know what the complete exam questions were.
People in the court all thought Jiang Wen's idea was brilliant, while the two old people at home were cursing and swearing, wishing they could curse Jiang Wen, who had caused the trouble, to death.
These two old men were unhappy with themselves, so they decided to make everyone else unhappy as well. That very night, Xue Jin'an was the first to receive a letter from Master Cen, which was burning ashes and asking him to solve a math problem.
"It has to be the kind you usually do, the kind that calculates the national treasury's silver." Master Cen emphasized this point.
Xue Jin'an readily provided the answer, setting the scenario as a three-way confrontation between the Northwest Army, the Rongdi, and the Great Empire. Given the number of Northwest Army soldiers, the distribution of heavy cavalry, light cavalry, infantry, and archer battalions, and providing information on the daily rations for one person and one horse, the tax revenue and grain output of Qizhou, the monthly salary of soldiers, and the military pay provided by the imperial court, he asked: "If the imperial court does not support the war, how much money would the Northwest Army need to destroy the Rongdi?"
Of course, under Master Cen's repeated admonitions, Xue Jin'an restrained his blatant ambitions and changed the plan from destroying the Rong and Di tribes to fighting a six-month war.
After Xue Jin'an finished setting the math problems, the next day Cui Zui entered the palace with Cui Pengfei's instructions, asking Xue Jin'an to draw several pictures as problems.
"How can this be a topic?" Fu Lu Shou Quan and his companion made ignorant remarks.
“You wouldn’t understand,” Cui Zui said smugly, flicking the paper with his finger. “At first glance, this is just an ordinary landscape picture, but it contains a lot of information. Where it is, what season it is, what kind of mountains and rivers it has… it’s all hidden in it. All the test takers have to do is to see clearly what place is in this picture, and then write a relevant governance plan based on the place. You can write whatever you want, agriculture, economy, etc., there are no restrictions on the content of the article.”
This question isn't difficult, after all, it's a picture-based writing exercise. Even the dumbest person can see something in the picture. But if you think it's easy, you'd be sorely mistaken. The more open and restrictive the question, the more you can write, and the more you can write, the greater the probability of making a mistake.
Fu Lu seemed to understand but not quite, and asked again, "Then why are there so many pictures?" There were so many pictures that they could make up a separate exam paper.
"To prevent cheating," Cui Zui chuckled, "these questions will be printed in equal quantities on the exam papers, ensuring that everyone around you receives different questions!"
"Wow, that's amazing!" Fu Lu Shou clapped their hands.
Xue Jin'an thought this idea was right, so he turned around and sent Master Cen a few more questions to be used in the separate papers.
And so, when the questions from both sides were combined and printed into one exam paper, the two rehired examiners looked at each other speechlessly.
Master Cen's hand trembled slightly.
Cui Pengfei closed his eyes, unable to bear it any longer.
They now have only one question on their minds: Will anyone actually pass this year's imperial examination?
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
