Even after she reached the age of 15, Lin Wanwan still behaved as she pleased. Her hair was still messy, and her clothes were dirty from working in the fields all day. Even Hu Niu couldn't help shaking her head when she saw her. She had dressed so beautifully before, but after one night, she immediately returned to her original state! It was really a headache...
Since she came of age, matchmakers have always come to her house. They were either scholars from the county or young men from some wealthy family. This made Lin Wanwan very annoyed, but she couldn't kick them out. In the end, she didn't even show up and just told them to reject the match.
In early August, Fu Junyi sent her an urgent letter, saying that all shops in various places were operating as usual and the sugar business could continue.
At the end, she wrote that in this year's palace examination, Shen Li, who was from the same village as her, won the first place and had been admitted as the top scholar. Someone would come to announce the good news soon.
Lin Wanwan couldn't see what was written below. She only knew that Chen Li passed the exam and became the top scorer! What kind of person could do that?
She leaned on the table for a long time and decided not to tell everyone the news first, waiting to give them a "surprise"!
Two days later, someone came to the village to announce the good news that Shen Li had won the first place in the imperial examination. Everyone was stunned. Sun Zhenzhu was so happy that she cried and took a bag of silver to reward the person who came. She could really go to the capital in the future! She became the mother of the number one scholar! She could finally live a good life!
After waiting for a few more days, Shen Li rode a tall horse and returned home in glory. He first went to pay a visit to Magistrate Gao, then went back to Lushui Academy to thank his teacher, and then picked up Shen Mo and returned to Linjia Village together.
Lin Wanwan had already prepared a banquet in the village, waiting for them to come back. The two brothers were riding horses. Although one was as gentle as jade and the other was extremely graceful, they each had their own merits, which was really the envy of others!
Chen Li walked forward, greeted his mother, then went to pay his respects to the village head and clan elders, then walked up to Lin Wanwan to thank her for her help all the time.
Lin Wanwan quickly waved her hand, pushed him to take a seat first, and started the banquet.
During this period, many wealthy businessmen came to congratulate Shen Li and gave him a lot of gold, silver and jewelry, but he declined them all. The wealthy businessmen were not unhappy, but drank with him more enthusiastically. They also wanted to marry their daughters to him, no matter whether she was a wife or a concubine, but he declined again, saying that he wanted to wait two years to stabilize before discussing marriage. The wealthy businessmen had to give up and said no more.
The happiest person was Lin Wanwan, whose mouth was almost grinning from ear to ear. Shen Mo glanced at her and picked up a piece of duck neck and put it on her plate.
"You've been tired today, eat more."
Lin Wanwan didn't even look at it, just picked it up with a smile and put it in her mouth.
"Cough! Cough cough cough cough..."
She didn't pay attention and was choked by the spicy duck neck. She hissed and looked for water to drink. After drinking several glasses of water, she stared at Shen Mo but couldn't say anything to him.
Shen Mo looked at her innocently, picked up a piece of duck meat and put it in his mouth, "This meat is delicious, I thought you would like it."
Lin Wanwan snorted and ignored him. Instead, she glanced at all the dishes and finally saw a dish of fried pork with peppers.
The bright red chili peppers are very spicy. She uses them to stew duck. Duck is so spicy, let alone chili peppers.
She picked up a few pieces of chili for Shen Mo and said with a smile: "This is also delicious, you should eat more!"
Shen Mo looked at the red unknown vegetables and meat slices in the bowl, a hint of doubt flashed through his mind. He picked up a piece of chili, tasted it, and then nodded.
"Mm, fragrant and spicy, it tastes great."
Lin Wanwan stared at him for a while, and when she saw that he could laugh, she felt very frustrated. She glared at him, then turned around and started eating seriously.
Although Shen Mo didn't show it on his face, his left hand on his leg was so tight that it turned white, and the veins on the back of his hand were bulging. It was obvious that the spiciness was very severe. After glancing at Lin Wanwan who was no longer looking at him, he picked up the teacup and took a big gulp of tea.
Hiss... This Lin Wanwan is really vindictive.
This year's palace examination, as in previous years, began with poetry and prose. Chen Li was already very talented in writing, and stood out from the crowd. The main topic of the examination happened to be the flood in the south, and he wrote down the prevention and control methods he had sorted out some time ago.
On the second day in Chengde Hall, eight ministers appointed by the emperor as readers conducted the initial review. Each of them had more than fifty volumes. After reading and marking them, they took turns to review those read by other readers. After comprehensive evaluation, those with the most circles were presented to the emperor.
Emperor Hui's brows never relaxed when he was marking the papers. Some common current policy questions were acceptable, but the answer to the flood problem was mediocre. Looking at a series of useless papers, none of them made him particularly satisfied.
Gradually, I felt more and more depressed. Was it going to be like the previous years, picking the best from the worst? So I picked up the remaining papers and roughly flipped through them.
Suddenly, he paused. He saw a test paper with vivid handwriting. The strange thing was that there were only two circles on the test paper. The other test papers had at least four marks from examiners before they were presented to him. What was wrong with this test paper? So he curiously picked it out to see what was so strange about it.
The previous treatment of current policies was relatively standard, but nearly two pages were spent on flood prevention and control, detailing the different prevention and control methods in various places. Although some of the remarks were rather bold, it was not a bad idea to break down and then build again.
The more Emperor Hui read, the more satisfied he was. At the same time, he was furious. He called the examiners forward and asked Eunuch Cao to give them the test papers for review.
After reading it, several of them immediately knelt down and begged for mercy, "Your Majesty! I know I was wrong!"
"Your Majesty, I know I was wrong! I don't know how this test paper was presented to Your Majesty. I must have picked up the wrong one when I closed my hand!"
Seeing the emperor's grim expression, Imperial Censor Yu Yansong hurriedly explained, "Your Majesty, I put this test paper here! I think the method of flood control described above is unheard of, but it is not impossible to find another way. Moreover, this person's writing is brilliant. I just feel a little sorry, so I dare to present it! I hope Your Majesty will show mercy!"
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