Father can be an enemy to the country

"What do you mean?!"

Faced with the prince's question, Zhao Hao said bravely: "What Wei Chen means is, is it possible that the examination level is higher than that of college students? So in fact, this is the real result?"

"You fart!" Zhu Zhen scolded on the spot: "The students of our Guozi University are the best students of the Ming Dynasty!"

"Isn't the prince's words a bit exaggerated?" Zhao Hao suppressed his fear of Lao Liu and wiped his sweat and said: "I remember that in those days, the first batch of students at Guozi University were all admitted by the emperor with special kindness. At that time, the country The Confucian Academy didn’t want them, so it was delayed for a year, and it wasn’t until the prince restructured the Confucian Academy into a Guozi University that they were able to enroll.”

"I remember it!" Zhu Shan said with a sudden look on his face: "The students at that time were all officials who had served the emperor in Jiangxi, and they were even accountants and brokers recruited by the prince from the people."

"Yes, there was no one available in the court at that time. It didn't matter who they were, as long as they could write and do calculations, they were all recruited by the prince. These people may have no problem doing things, but how can they pass the exams that have passed the examination for ten years? Really?" Zhang Pu also echoed.

"Aren't you talking nonsense?!" Zhu Zhen said angrily: "The batch of college students admitted by the emperor did not study the Four Books and Five Classics. They studied engineering and household studies, and they did not follow those who promoted people. Competition. And there are only a thousand of them in total, and more college students are admitted from local government schools. Their academic quality is already better than that of their fellow villagers, and they have studied hard in Beijing for so many years. How come they can’t pass the exam for any one of them? middle?"

"The principle of southern orange and northern orange, has the prince never heard of it?" Zhu Shanyi came to Lao Liu and his words immediately became unscrupulous. "There must be something wrong with the education of Guozi University. No matter how good the seedlings are, if they are not cultivated by qualified gardeners, they will grow crookedly!"

"Maybe that's the truth." Zhang Pu also spread his hands and said, "Why is it that none of my students failed the exam? I'm afraid the prince will have to go back and find out the reasons within Guozi University."

"Anyone can be the sacrificial wine, but not everyone can be a good one!" Zhao Hao also added.

"Shut up!" The prince couldn't stand listening and scolded the three of them: "Officials who graduated from Guozi University are more capable and knowledgeable than others, and they are diligent and honest. This is recognized by my father and I. Do you want to say that I Are you and your father also blind-sighted?!"

"I don't dare." Zhu Shan raised his head and said, "But Prince, doing things and taking exams are two different things! What we are talking about now is exams, not doing things."

"The questions were all given by the prince himself. As a result, his students failed the exam and now they blame the examiner. This is as unreasonable as blaming a mother-in-law for not having a child." Zhang Pu also said in an increasingly loud voice. : "If the prince and prince don't believe it, just mark the papers again and see whose fault it is!"

"I have this intention." Zhu Biao said with a flourish of his sleeves.

~~

So after a while, Jinyiwei brought in several heavy large boxes, with seals from the Ministry of Rites, Jinyiwei and the supervisors on them, which were the original examination papers for the eighteenth year of Hongwu.

Zhu Biao nodded, and Zhao Hao tore off the seal, opened the first box and said, "These are the test papers for all Chinese-style lifts. Please read them personally, the prince and the prince."

The eunuch brought up a long table and two brocade piers, and placed stacks of examination papers on the table for the two highnesses to review.

Zhu Zhen and the prince sat down at the table and conducted an on-site review in front of the emperor and all the examiners.

The prince mainly read the Confucian classics section, and saw that every article that was selected was coherent in text, rigorous in structure, and cleverly matched. The fonts were square and large, shiny and full, and it looked like they had been rigorously trained.

To be fair, if it were placed in the imperial examination before the reform, each of these articles would have made its owner a gold medal.

'But now it's not enough to just rely on a current article...' The prince thought of this, looked at Lao Liu aside, and said in his heart: 'If you are not good at mathematics, you will be doomed. ’

But he saw Zhu Zhen's expression was serious, as if he had seen a ghost.

The prince took the stack of papers that he had reviewed and looked through them.

Because the examiners were marking copied papers, the marking marks on the original papers were all left by Lao Liu.

After the prince flipped through a paper, he saw that from beginning to end there were ‘〇’ indicating correctness, and there was not a single ‘×’…

Look at the next paper and it’s still the same. I flipped through dozens of papers one after another, and almost all of them were correct and got full marks. Only a few copies contained one or two minor errors, but they were completely innocuous.

Time passed little by little, and the shadow on the ground had grown long. At this time, Li Yuanming, the left minister of the Ministry of Rites, was outside asking for an audience.

Zhu Yuanzhang ordered him to come in and asked, "What's the matter?"

"Your Majesty, the candidates are waiting impatiently outside the yamen of the Ministry of Rites. They are starting to clamor and ask when the results will be announced." Li Yuanming carefully reported: "I would like to ask your Majesty whether you should let them continue to wait or tell them to wait another day. Come again?"

"Wait a moment." Zhu Yuanzhang motioned for him to stand aside. Asked the prince and Lao Liu: "How is your review going?"

"Back to my father, I read some of the Chinese Confucian classics examination papers and didn't see any problems." The prince stood up and clasped his fists and replied, "These candidates' writings are very solid. You can tell from one glance that they have real talent and learning."

Zhu Shan and Zhang Pu were secretly proud. This was a wave of essence that had been accumulated for more than ten years. How could it not be awesome?

"Where are you, Lao Liu?" Zhu Yuanzhang asked again.

Zhu Zhen closed the test paper in his hand, stood up and replied: "There is no problem. Most of the papers are full marks, or at least close to full marks."

"..." The smile on Zhu Shan and Zhang Pu's face became even brighter, and his ears were perked up to listen to what the emperor had to say.

"Do you want to continue the review?" Zhu Yuanzhang asked coldly.

"The time is too short to..." The prince was mid-sentence, but was interrupted by Lao Liu: "Brother, there is no need to review again. The two examiners are so confident that it will be in vain for us to review again."

"Your Majesty, you are ridiculous. We are just honest and responsible." Zhu Shan smiled slightly and said, "Every paper we approve can withstand scrutiny."

"Yes, all Chinese-style papers will be collected into volumes in the future and distributed internally and externally." Zhao Hao also echoed: "The two chief examiners and all the co-examiners will not dare to be careless in the slightest."

"Then let's release the results?" Zhu Yuanzhang looked at Lao Liu again, and the father and son had a brief but intense exchange with their eyes.

"Let it go." Zhu Zhen nodded slowly.

"Still..." The prince glanced at him, then at his father, and swallowed the words as they reached his lips. "My son, I have no objection."

"Let's release the list." Zhu Yuanzhang waved his hand and cursed: "It's a waste of our day."

"The Emperor has decreed that the examination results will be released!" the eunuch's loud singing voice spread out from the Golden Palace, and the honor guard team who had been waiting for most of the day outside the palace was beating and sending the examination results of Hongwu's eighteenth year out of the Forbidden City.