"I heard that His Highness the Fifth Prince came to visit me, and I felt really happy." Before Qi Dan's carriage had stopped, there was already someone waiting in front of the door - the person who came was about sixty years old, with gray temples and a long beard. He has a dignified appearance and a lively look, with two cloud-patterned white jade rings on his waist, and a Guhong brocade fan in his hand. It is Yang Qingzheng who is offering wine at the Imperial Academy.
Before the person here landed, his voice came out of the car curtain: "Yang Jijiu is really hospitable. I'm afraid that Yang Jijiu will be offended by my unexpected visit today, so I prepared a small gift and asked Yang Jijiu to accept it."
"Your Highness is so polite. You are here and why are you bringing any gifts?" Yang Qingzheng stroked his long beard and shook his head with a smile.
The person who got out of the car first was not Qi Dan, but an ordinary-looking man in his prime. He held a valuable wooden box in front of Yang Jijiu in both hands. Yang Jijiu was about to send someone to take it. "A small gift", but accidentally met the eyes of the man opposite.
When he saw this person's face clearly, Yang Qingzheng's expression suddenly changed and his smile disappeared, and Qi Dan happened to say: "Yang Jijiu, I also brought a friend here... He is also an old acquaintance of you! Jushan , why don’t you quickly pay your respects to Master Jijiu?”
"Your Highness... what does this mean?" Yang Qingzheng raised his eyebrows. Since Qi Dan could dig out this person and bring him in front of him, he must know what happened to him. Although this person is not famous, Yang Qingzheng has a good memory, and he just remembers his last name.
"As you said... Since you are all here, why don't you invite us to sit in your house?" Qi Dan parroted, looking at Yang Qingzheng with a smile, but there was a hint of teasing in his eyes.
The official position of offering wine in the Imperial College may not be big or small, but this position is of great importance.
First, let’s talk about the concept of the Imperial College—it’s very simple. It is the highest academic institution in the Sheng Kingdom and a stepping stone for scholars to become officials. Its status is higher than that of the Shanhe Academy.
No certificate is required to enter Shanhe University. As long as you pass the government examination, you can enter the government school. After graduating from the government school, you will either stay in the government school or participate in the imperial examination of that year. However, you can skip the "rural examination" in the normal imperial examination system and go directly from the "huihui examination". At the beginning of the "Examination", it was considered an advantage, but considering that the prefecture examination in Shanhe Prefecture was more difficult than the provincial examination, and the "special talents" cultivated here, it was understandable. The imperial students admitted in the Imperial College are generally divided into two categories, namely "Gong students" and "Yin students" - the former are outstanding scholars from local places such as counties and counties and are selected to study in the Imperial College, while the latter are He was able to enter prison through his father's shadow and his ancestor's shadow. The former is further subdivided into those who failed the examination and wanted to continue their studies, called "jujian", and those who had not participated in the provincial examination but had excellent qualifications, called "gongjian"; the latter is subdivided into those who have served for generations. Officials rely on the "Yin Jian" who has the remaining shade at home and the "Ring Jian" who donates money to the Imperial College or other official offices. Of course, if it can be divided into further subdivisions, I won’t go into details here.
In short, they are repeat students, fresh graduates, the second generation of officials and the second generation of rich people. In the Imperial College, the Yin prison has the highest status, followed by the imperial prison, and the tribute prison and the regular prison are at the bottom. However, in recent years, the status of merchants has increased, and the regular prison has a vague sense of suppressing the tribute prison, and even some people with relatively humble backgrounds. The eunuchs did not dare to compete with him for favor - although the eunuchs were already qualified to be officials, those who had not yet taken office were certainly not as good as the jingle in their pockets now.
By the way, before the opening of Shanhe Prefecture, the Imperial College only admitted students who were "officials of the eighth rank or above within three generations." However, during the reign of the late emperor more than 20 years ago, Li Zhanchun, who was over 40 years old, defied all opinions and risked his life. After admonition opened up Shanhe Mansion and Shanhe Academy, the Imperial College was able to provide a second way for poor disciples to study in Beijing. Even so, Li Zhanchun still offended many officials and officials, after all, he allowed those low-ranking people to discuss things with them. ——It’s okay if you win, but it would be embarrassing for Dafa if you lose.
Let’s talk about the official position of the Imperial College—the official in charge of the Imperial College, or to put it simply, the principal. The Guozijian Jijiu is not only in charge of teaching students and leading all teachers, but also has considerable say in the imperial examination - the examiner of the examination is the Minister of the Ministry of Personnel, followed by the Minister of Rites and the Guozijian Jijiu, and other marking officers and Most of the invigilators came from the Ministry of Officials and the Ministry of Rites. To avoid suspicion, they did not take exams from doctors and teaching assistants in the Imperial College. This was a rule set by the Sheng Kingdom since the founding of the country. However, despite this, the opinions of the Imperial Academy's wine ceremony are also a decisive factor in determining whether a candidate succeeds and ranks.
Let's go back and talk about our Yang Qingzheng and Yang Jijiu. He was a fierce man back then - he won two yuan in a row in the imperial examination. Although he failed to get the top prize in the final imperial examination and achieved the rare feat of "winning three yuan in a row" A strange move, but it is only two steps away. "Tanhua" is one of the three tripods. At that time, when he went to the temple to meet the saint, he was dressed as he is now - holding a brocade folding fan and wearing two jade rings on his waist, which means that he won two yuan in a row and was the best among all the heroes, eclipsing all the scholars in the same hall. , The response was so arrogant that even the late emperor praised him, so he was given the title of "Jin Fan Exploring Flowers". He was in the limelight for a while, and his reputation even overshadowed the number one scholar at that time. And since he became an official in the imperial court, he has devoted himself to giving lectures in the Imperial College - this is his cleverness. The arrogance in the palace at that time was just a way to publicize himself and frighten his opponents. After becoming an official, of course he was wise and protective. , It's good to have both sides - there is not much room for promotion in the Imperial College, and you will be just a fourth-grade sacrificial wine at the end of the job, let alone compared with the hot and famous departments like Zhongshu Province and Liubu. The Prince's Zhanshi Mansion in the East Palace has a better future than this one, so those with superior qualifications are unwilling to come and those with inferior qualifications are still unable to come. Yang Qingzheng can serve as a sacrificial wine here until his death; secondly, many officials' children have to stay in the Imperial College Studying is the link that connects Yang Qingzheng. It is good for him to make friends with those high-ranking people. Anyway, his position does not conflict with them. Even if he cannot be friends with them, he will not have any grudges. But after he and they are on the same front, those who Officials who were originally at the same level as him had to curry favor with him to "train" his heirs. Those who pass the three-year scientific examination are counted as the examiner's disciples. If his disciples later become successful, they will inevitably "honor" their "mentor".
After all, the oil and water involved is really huge.
Yang Qingzheng is neither "clean" nor "righteous". During his years in office, he has done many things such as cheating for personal gain and leaking examination questions, which has enabled some sons of high-ranking officials with mediocre qualifications to achieve quite dazzling results. What he is best at is "building publicity", creating a "Jie Yuan", "Hui Yuan" or even "Two Yuan" by missing questions or cheating, and writing big books or even making up stories that reflect the student's intelligence. He spread the anecdotes vigorously, and demonstrated his ability to teach effectively and discern people with circumstantial details, further gaining fame for himself. He also gave this method an interesting name - "Win at the starting point." And even if the student's true nature is exposed and his performance is poor in the palace examination, he can still use the excuse of "fearing the emperor" or "being good at writing but not good at talking" as an excuse. Anyway, the title of Jinshi is already confirmed, and anything higher is just a matter of appearance. The son looks better. Anyway, these powerful and wealthy dandies have plenty of ways to get promoted.
And his method of cheating is also very interesting - in order to prevent cheating, the examination room also has its own set of systems, such as covering the candidate's name with a cover paper or a dog-eared corner, numbering it in red, and then the transcription officer will copy it with a red pen. , called "Zhujuan", all examiners only read the Zhujuan, the deputy examiner will mark the word "take" on the favorite Zhujuan and then send it to the chief examiner. If the examiner also likes the paper, he will mark it with "中文" ", and these successful red scrolls will be retrieved and unsealed according to the red number before the list is released, and the corresponding black scrolls will be recorded, and finally the list will be written. This triple insurance does increase the difficulty of cheating, but as the saying goes, there are countermeasures. Yang Qingzheng came up with these mistakes as soon as he hit his head - the first is to miss the question. As the Imperial College's sacrificial wine, even if it is to avoid suspicion when the test questions are given They also have a certain degree of say. Secondly, the transcription officials are also human beings. Just bribe the transcription officials to let them make marks on the red scrolls. The third is to secretly change the scrolls when the results are released. Yang Qingzheng himself is a calligraphy master and copies other people's handwriting. It can be said to be at your fingertips.
However, all three methods have their drawbacks. The number of missed questions cannot be leaked. After all, at least a dozen or so people are required to write out the paper each time; not everyone dares to do this. Moreover, the number of copying officers is compared with the number of question writers, There are only a lot of marking officers, and it is impossible to get everyone. As for secretly changing papers to change the rankings - to be honest, just think about it. At best, it is used in hospital examinations and rural probation. This is done under the eyes of the emperor. If the trick is discovered, it would be a light punishment to punish you for committing the crime of deceiving the emperor, even if you lose your head.
After all, Yang Qingzheng was a talented man who had won the second prize in a row. After studying cheating for several years, he finally came up with an extremely complicated method that consumed a lot of manpower and energy but was extremely safe. In the words of one of his playboy disciples, " My master is really too steady." - Before the exam begins, Yang Qingzheng will give each student who goes through the back door a different "secret recipe", and he will keep a copy of the secret recipe to avoid forgetting how to identify it. Of course, as mentioned above Yang Qingzheng has a very good memory, so he basically has no need for these copies. These secret recipes record some quite recognizable writing methods, such as "What is the first character to start with, what is the second character in the second column, and what is the sixth character in the third column..." And so on, until what word ends with the last word?" or "How to arrange and use empty words such as zhi, hu, zhe, ye, yan, zai, ye, 椤", or the two are combined and supplemented by other writing methods to identify this. Whose paper? This method was a bit tiring, but he couldn't stand "he gave too much", so Yang Qingzheng could only bite the bullet and mark the exams, and this kind of code-like and cumbersome thing was also named by his disciples It's called "Copycat Code". After discovering that this method was indeed effective, in order to reduce the workload for himself and his accomplices, he even inadvertently invented the prototype of punctuation marks... that is, he asked the candidates to put a dot at the end of each sentence to indicate the sentence pronunciation. , clicking two dots means exclamation, and clicking three dots means questioning... Today's Shengguo has gradually popularized this kind of punctuation mark. It is a lot more convenient, that is, paper The wear and tear also increased... Many literati who pretended to be mysterious even wrote every word and symbol. People at that time called this "dip ink", which meant that the people's books had been read into the dog's belly, and the only culture was this A little bit, so I can only use this method to show off.
No matter how later history books evaluate Yang Qingzheng and what he did in his life, but for this alone...he can be regarded as famous in history.
All in all, he has done a lot of such things. Even if there is something that really arouses the emperor's suspicion, he will just let it pass. He does not look at the monk's face or the Buddha's face. The emperor must also make certain compromises with the powerful ministers and nobles and give them a taste of the sweetness. Only by hammering properly can you better maintain your position. The emperor gained the support of his ministers, the officials' children gained prominence, and Yang Qingzheng himself could get a lot of "gifts" from it. This win-win situation for all three parties would not be exposed as long as it did not go too far.
But as is the case in this world...if you win, you lose. The winners of these three parties have both fame and fortune, while the only losers are Xin Xin and the poor family.
The poor families were all trying to get into the Shanhe Mansion, which made Yang Qingzheng feel particularly unhappy. After all, there were far more children from the poor families than the powerful clans in this world. These people took the name of their old enemy Li Zhanchun to life. He was raised above himself - why is he said to be an old enemy? Because Li Zhanchun achieved the first and only case of "three yuan in a row" in the prosperous country six years before Yang Qingzheng's reign. It is inevitable that his "two yuan" will be He was compared to the former, and later Li Mastiff even gave him the nickname "Gong Mastiff" because the late emperor was on his deathbed and dying.
They are also the relatives of the late Emperor Jinkou Yuyan. Compared with the "Gong Mastiff", "Jinshan Tanhua" can only be said to be weak.
However, the current emperor Qi Changgeng's attitude towards Li Mastiff has always been tepid. Although he made him the crown prince's tutor, Qi Changgeng felt resentful because Li Mastiff opposed His Majesty's frequent changes in tax laws. Moreover, Qi Changgeng did not care about Shanhe University. Not as supportive as the Imperial College, and even more unhappy, which made Yang Qingzheng secretly proud.
Of course, not all poor families choose Shanhe Academy. For example, the one in front of me has chosen it secretly - Ji Jushan was originally the Jieyuan of Haigong County. In order to further advance his career, he also relied on his identity as Jieyuan, so he did not join Shanhe Academy. Instead, he entered the Imperial Academy. Logically speaking, although Jie Yuan's identity is not unique in the Imperial College, he is still one of the best, but he... It's okay to say that he has bad luck. The year he participated in the examination coincided with the year when Qi Changgeng was the first After a general examination, those relatives, officials, and businessmen who helped Qi Changgeng rise to power will also have to ask for some favor from His Majesty, right? So back then, his qualifications as a Jinshi were forcibly eliminated...
Of course Ji Jushan was dissatisfied with this. He had to know that his usual grades were counted from the top, so after trying every possible means to inquire, he finally learned that his place had been replaced by someone else, so he ran away in anger... Someone may ask if he is not Jieyuan? But it should be noted that it is difficult to find an expert with three yuan or two yuan. There are many Jieyuan who are in their twenties or teenagers. He, a Jieyuan who is nearly thirty years old, is just like that. He is as useless as Chicken Butt——Although a county can only have one Jieyuan in three years, a chicken can only have one Butt in its lifetime...
Some people may also ask him, wouldn't it be okay to wait another three years to take the exam or just become a minor official? It's better than being nameless and statusless - you know, for such a proud and arrogant person, he also feels that he can't hold his head high, and being a small official is not what he wants, and he feels that he is incompetent, which makes him so frustrated. He felt that his face was shameless, and since he couldn't stand up to those dignitaries, he just ran away and went home. Maybe he could still leave a reputation for integrity in the capital.
In fact, no one cared about a person like him at all... As mentioned before, a plaque dropped from a restaurant in Beijing could kill a high-ranking person, let alone him, so he did it at the county magistrate's house. After a few years as a retainer, he came back to see if things could turn around. After all, his hometown of Haigong County was next to Haiyin County, so they were almost inseparable.
Then someone may want to ask again, since he has made up his mind to be aloof, why did he come back to the capital? Isn't this a slap in the face? Let's start from the beginning again - a person who doesn't think he is from a poor family, so he didn't join the Shanhe Mansion, but was severely slapped in the face by the Imperial College, then he might as well slap himself again. Face is important, career is important ah?
Face is the sole of your shoes. This truth is very simple. Everyone will say it, but not everyone can adjust this mentality. It took Ji Jushan a full eleven years to overcome this hurdle.
Simply put, there is always a road ahead. This time when he returned to the capital, he was the first to visit the House of Secretary of the Ministry of Finance. Why? Because Zhu Yong was his examiner back then. Although he was not the right minister of the Ministry of Rites at that time, he had a considerable status in the Ministry of Rites. There were too many candidates that year, so Uncle Zhu, who was still teaching the new chefs in the imperial kitchen, was also asked to be an examiner - looking at their level, the chefs had to ask others for advice - I'm going too far. Let’s go back to the origin of these two people. In short, Ji Jushan felt that he was destined to win, so he paid a visit to the so-called "mentor" in advance and considered himself a disciple of Zhu Yong. After all, he also aspired to become an official in the Ministry of Rites - he also thought that he was quite handsome. . However, he felt guilty after learning that his name had been lost to Sun Shan, so he did not see his "mentor" again until he left the capital.
Today, Ji Jushan, who firmly believes that "face is the sole of your shoes", shyly visited Zhu Yong again. Although Zhu Yong didn't have much impression of this person, he still vaguely remembered that this kid was a very energetic child. In addition, He had an easy-going temperament, so I chatted with him for a few more words, and just in time I was waiting for the order to send Zhao'er home.
Looking at Ji Jushan's face full of frustration, Qi Dan knew that this guy might be a chess piece worth using, so the two of them connected, and after Ji Jushan's long sigh, Qi Dan also understood that Ji Jushan Today's situation.
Hence the matter of Qi Dan bringing Ji Jushan to "give a gift" to Yang Jijiu today.
This gift... is naturally evidence of Yang Jijiu's fraud. In fact, Qi Shan had heard a little bit about the fraud in the imperial examination. After all, he knew so many dandies. He could tell how much those people were worth just by looking at them, but he was too lazy to talk to them. A group of people come into contact with each other. Anyway, these people are causing harm to his father's country, and they are also passing it on to his elder brother.
But things are different now. Now that Qi Dan has obtained tangible evidence of Yang Qingzheng's fraud and perversion of the law, it would not be Qi Dan if he did not use it to exploit his bones and extract his marrow.
