The gifts on the stalls are divided into two levels. One level is for gifts that can be exchanged for one to ten strips of cloth, which are some small items that are not very valuable. The second level is for pens, ink, paper, and inkstones, which are practical and exquisite.
A group of stall owners jointly set up this lantern riddle party because only a few people can guess ten riddles in a row. Most people only have a few strips of cloth and can only exchange them for gifts that are lower than their original value.
Although the tall and thin boy did not guess the last extra question, the first fifty strips of cloth were still there.
If all these cloth strips were replaced with pens, ink, paper, and inkstones, the organizer would suffer a loss.
Seeing that he was alone and unfamiliar, the stall owner hesitated and said, "Red paper is fine, but other people need to exchange for pens, ink, paper and inkstones. If you have exchanged them all, what will others exchange for? Young man, I don't think you are a person who likes to take advantage of others. Please understand the difficulties we merchants have."
The young man blushed and moved his lips a few times as he said, "I am really useful... I will give you the money later when I have more money, okay?"
The stall owner still looked embarrassed and unwilling.
After hearing this, Shen Cui couldn't stand it anymore and stepped forward and said, "Stall owner, what do you mean by this? Since you have set up such a rule, you said at first that as long as you win a red ribbon, you can come here to exchange it at will. What and how to exchange it depends on your mood? Otherwise, I will be regarded as someone who likes to take advantage of others?"
Chen Cui's face has always been sharp. Usually she is gentle and doesn't show anything. But when she speaks in a sarcastic way, her edge is revealed and she is difficult to deal with.
The stall owner recognized her from her voice and said awkwardly with a red face: "Madam, please don't shout. I... I didn't mean that. It's just that you are the winners, right? I thought that you haven't received it yet, and it's not good for others to exchange all the pens, ink, paper and inkstones. That's why I said something to stop you..."
"We don't want the King of Lanterns, nor do we want to exchange for other gifts. We just want to convert it into cash. So this young master's exchange request... should be no problem?"
“Yes, yes, yes.” The stall owner agreed with a wry smile, and gave Chen Cui ten taels of silver with a painful heart. He then took down the things that the tall and thin young man wanted from the shelf at the back, placed them on the table, and attached a few sheets of red paper that he needed.
The young man smiled and thanked Chen Cui, wiped his hands on his clothes, and happily began to pack his things.
Chen Cui put the silver into her purse, turned around and walked a few steps away from the stall, then saw Wei Shu, who was hesitant to speak and deliberately did not come forward.
She looked at him inquiringly. Wei Shu called them aside and whispered, "Remember the unlucky guy I mentioned earlier who caused the fire in the exam room and helped me find my purse? That's the guy. But he didn't seem to see me. Let's go quickly, lest he recognizes me and runs away in a hurry like last time."
Several people cast sympathetic eyes at the embarrassed young man and nodded in agreement with Wei Shu's idea of leaving.
But Shen Cui didn't move. She vaguely guessed something, but she wasn't sure, so she said, "Then you guys just stand there for a while, I'll go over and ask him a few questions."
Returning to the stall again, the young man was still happily wrapping something. Noticing Chen Cui approaching, he smiled warmly and asked, "Madam, have you changed your mind and want to exchange for something else? I can give you some."
Chen Cui said no, but asked tentatively: "I see you look unfamiliar, so I want to ask, are you from Hongle Academy?"
The smile on the boy's face froze, "How did you know?"
As he said this, he looked behind Chen Cui. Lao Buyu and the others were standing far away. Although he couldn't see their faces clearly, they were all dressed like scholars.
His face turned red, and he asked with trembling lips: "You...you are not the headmistress of Cuiwei Academy, are you?"
Shen Cui smiled and nodded, then turned and waved to the others, signaling that they could come forward.
The boy's face turned even redder and he retracted his bare foot. He also moved his body outward, and if it weren't for the fact that he was missing a shoe, it would have looked like he was running again.
"Greetings to the headmaster." With nowhere else to go, he could only suppress his embarrassment and bow, "Greetings to the master."
When he saw clearly that Wei Shu was among those people, even his ears turned red.
"Let's go, take all his things and we'll talk when we get back." Shen Cui assigned tasks to everyone. Thinking that it would not be a good idea for him to go barefoot, she asked Erpang to buy him a pair of shoes.
When Mu Erpang took the money from her, he couldn't help but ask, "How did you guess that he was the new classmate?"
Except for Zhou, those who stay in the village on a daily basis can be said to be reclusive and rarely come into contact with city people. They can be said to be strangers. Most of the people on the street are strangers to them.
Shen Cui explained in a low voice: "It's definitely not because of 'unfamiliarity', that's what I said casually. I can't just ask him directly. We have a new student who is coming from outside and is full of knowledge. He is half a month later than the agreed time and still hasn't shown up. I know you are a notorious unlucky person. This kind of thing seems very reasonable for you, so may I ask, is it you?"
"Thank goodness mother thought of it, otherwise if we listened to Brother Wei and went back directly, I don't know how much effort it would take for this brother to find our home."
Mu Erpang held back his laughter, took a few coins, asked the boy about his size, and ran to the next street to buy a pair of new cloth shoes.
The boy put on his new shoes, and Zhou and Wei Shu helped him put away the prizes he had redeemed on the table.
At this time, the Lantern Festival was coming to an end, and the group returned to the village.
Everyone on the road was curious about what had happened to him along the way, but meeting and recognizing each other in such a scene was already quite awkward, so everyone suppressed their curiosity and didn't ask.
When they returned to the academy, Zhou went to the kitchen to boil water for him to wash, and everyone else went into the main room.
Chen Cui introduced him: "Our academy is small, with only a few rooms. You will be able to recognize them all after walking around. The last one is the desk you prepared. The pens, inkstones, and other things are on the shelf in the room. You can use them at will. In the dormitory, we have a big bunk bed. The bedding has been dried in the sun, and other daily necessities have also been purchased. If you need anything later, just tell me directly. Other things..."
She paused, thought for a while and smiled, "I can't remember it right now, I'll tell you when I remember it later."
In fact, when Shen Cui was talking, the young man had been hesitant to speak for several times, but he didn't want to interrupt her, so he finally said, "Don't worry, I have a letter from our headmaster that I want to pass on to you, please read it... Read it and then decide."
Shen Cui nodded and motioned for him to take out the letter.
The young man said sorry, turned around, rustled out an inner pocket sewn into his clothes, took out an oil-paper bag from the inner pocket, and handed it to Chen Cui.
The oil paper package was tied with three hemp ropes and was very tightly wrapped, but I don’t know what it has been through, it is dirty and wrinkled.
Chen Cui didn't find it strange, she found a pair of scissors and opened it on the spot.
The old headmaster's familiar handwriting came into view. After reading a few lines, Shen Cui couldn't help but reveal a look of surprise.
The young man neither sat down nor touched anything since he entered the room. At the same time, he carefully observed Shen Cui's expression when she read the letter. Noticing that Shen Cui's expression was not right, he moved towards the door embarrassedly.
Shen Cui noticed his movements from the corner of her eye, and quickly said, “Don’t get me wrong, that’s not what I meant.”
The old headmaster had asked him to bring the letter personally, so there was no need to worry about it falling into the hands of others, so he wrote about every detail.
This young man grew up under the care of the old headmaster. He was gifted since childhood, had outstanding literary talent, and was extremely diligent.
But the old headmaster said before that his situation was special, and what made him special was that he was extremely unlucky.
It's not so bad in daily life, at most I fall down easily when walking, lose money easily when going out, fall into the water easily when going to the river, and get teeth hurt by eating stones easily when eating...
In fact, Shen Cui felt that she was unlucky enough here, and it was definitely not to the extent of being "okay".
Then she saw later - when the child was twelve or thirteen years old, the old headmaster felt that he was ready to become a master and allowed him to start taking part in the imperial examinations.
But every time he had to take an imperial examination, his unlucky streak became worse. He broke his arm, sprained his ankle, and was hit by a carriage. Each time he was injured and had to be carried back before he even entered the examination room.
He is almost eighteen years old now, and there was only one time when he suddenly had a high fever and forced himself to pass the county exam...but he failed afterwards, so he has not even earned the title of scholar until now.
This year, only his shoes were cut off by the sergeant for search, but he somehow got into the examination room successfully and thought his luck was changing. However, just as he lit the candle in the examination room, an evil wind blew out from somewhere and blew down his candlestick... Although he called for help in time and no major disaster occurred, half of his examination paper was burned in the fire and he was carried out.
After the students of Hongle Academy learned about this, although they did not exclude him, they were a little scared when they saw him - they were all going to take the imperial examinations, and they were afraid of being contaminated by his bad luck, so almost no one dared to deal with him.
Many parents of students came to the academy several times to negotiate, wanting the principal to send him away. After all, he was unlucky only himself before, but now his misfortune has implicated others.
How worrying would it be if this fire happened in the academy? Who among those who can be admitted to Hongle Academy is not the best among people? They are all highly expected by their families.
In addition, the young man himself felt a little guilty, so after returning from the provincial examination, he asked to leave the academy, saying that he would rather go back to his hometown to farm and herd cattle than to see the old headmaster in trouble.
The old headmaster then had no choice but to send him out of the academy.
He didn't want to write too much detail in the letter at first, for he was afraid that if the letter didn't get delivered, it would fall into the hands of others and confirm his nickname of 'bleeding bad luck' - after all, even the old headmaster who had trained and cared for him for so many years acknowledged it in his writing!
However, the news of his trial burning of the examination hall spread quickly, and other academies got some information and did not dare to accept him.
Finally, the old headmaster also said that if Cuiwei also minded this, then just let him stay for a few days, or find another place for him to stay temporarily. In short, just let him come out and relax, instead of transferring this difficult matter to Cuiwei Academy.
And there is no need to waste educational resources on him. No one needs to worry about his talent!
Although the course of events was bizarre and tortuous, Shen Cui had long heard from Wei Shu about the trial fire in the mansion, so overall she was not particularly surprised.
What surprised her was that the young man was called Mei Ruochu! It was the 'child prodigy' that Lao Buyu mentioned by chance before!
At that time Lao Buyu felt sorry for him, thinking that he was like the story of "Shang Zhongyong" who was smart when he was young and would become just like everyone else when he grew up.
Unexpectedly, Mei Ruochu didn't grow crooked, but moldy... Well, this statement is a bit strange. Anyway, the child prodigy is still the same child prodigy!
Shen Cui gave him a comforting smile and explained, "I saw that your name is Mei Ruochu, and I thought it was a coincidence. Our teacher mentioned you before, but I didn't expect that we would meet today!"
"Are you Mei Ruochu?" Lao Buyu had originally wanted to pretend to be mature and dignified in front of the new students, so he hadn't said anything more since he met this young man. After hearing this, he could no longer sit still and stood up.
Mei Ruochu was frightened by his hungry tiger-like momentum and took a step back, saying hesitantly: "I... I am."
"Okay, okay!" Lao Buyu became more and more excited. "I heard your name when I was traveling earlier, but when I found your house, they said you were no longer there."
Mei Ruochu's face darkened. "When I was seven years old, my parents were killed by bandits. My uncles and aunts divided up the family property, and I was sent to Hongle Academy."
This... this is a bit too tragic.
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