Father can be an enemy to the country

"Serve the prince well." Queen Ma wiped the tears from the corners of her eyes, and finally sighed: "Don't be dissatisfied just because he is stupid. You should do whatever you want."

"Yes, I will remember your Majesty's instructions." The ladies hurriedly responded. Then he washed the prince's feet and changed his clothes carefully.

"Lao Ba, mother is going back first." Empress Ma said to Lao Ba in the same tone as talking to Zhu Mengxuan: "You should listen to your sisters. The queen will come to see you another day."

Zhu Zi was naturally indifferent and could only giggle.

"Alas..." Queen Ma sighed and left.

~~

When Queen Ma returned to the palace, it was already dawn.

But she was walking through the Xihua Gate, so she wouldn't run into the court officials.

However, as soon as he entered the palace, he met Zhu Yuanzhang's royal chariot on the street inside Xihuamen.

Boss Zhu was pacing back and forth in front of the chariot with his hands behind his back, obviously waiting for her here.

When the emperor approached, the eunuch got off the sedan chair steadily. Queen Ma opened the curtain of the sedan chair, and Zhu Yuanzhang got in.

"What are you doing here if you're not going to court?" Queen Ma asked.

"My mother-in-law hasn't come back all night, why can't we wait for you here?" Zhu Yuanzhang looked at the exhausted queen and said distressedly: "There are so many people in the palace, and you are already an old man, why are you still going through this?" ?”

"Can I rest assured that he is not awake?" Queen Ma sighed softly.

"Are you awake?" Boss Zhu asked.

Queen Ma nodded and whispered: "But I'm stupid. I peed and didn't even know it."

"Are you really stupid?" Zhu Yuanzhang was silent for a moment after hearing this, and then sneered: "It's good if he can save his life."

Queen Ma also nodded and sighed: "Yes, what else do you want?"

After a pause, she said to Zhu Yuanzhang again: "Since people are like this, his case will not be investigated."

"..." Zhu Yuanzhang looked at Queen Ma when he heard this, and Queen Ma also looked at him. The two have been a couple for most of their lives, and they no longer need to rely on words to communicate many things.

Zhu Yuanzhang even saw begging in Queen Ma's eyes...

After another long silence, he finally nodded and said, "Okay, I'll listen to you, I won't investigate anymore."

"But his case hasn't been settled yet, so it's impossible to let it go like this." After a pause, Zhu Yuanzhang said: "Depose him to a commoner, and we will raise him for the rest of his life."

"That's very good." Empress Ma nodded, and sighed for an unknown number of times: "I still have to apologize to the emperor. It's because I didn't take care of this family well that so many things happened."

"This harem should be put in order. Hehe, if the mother-in-law can admit her mistake, we will feel much more comfortable." Zhu Yuanzhang smiled happily after hearing this. "I was thinking about how to tell you about this. Now that you are aware of it, we don't have to worry about it."

"I'm going to court." As he said this, he stretched out in relief, and then kissed her on the cheek. Then he escaped from the car before being beaten.

~~

Thus, the uproarious imperial examination fraud case in Hongwu in the 18th year came to an end.

Zhu Shan, the examiner of the subject, and Zhao Mao, the minister of the Ministry of Rites, were skinned and picked out, and hung at the entrance of the Gongyuan and the Yamen of the Ministry of Rites respectively to warn future generations.

As for the other principal criminals, Liu Sanwu, Dong Lun, and Zhang Pu were executed late.

Eighteen other examiners, eight officials from the Ministry of Rites who were involved in cheating, and fifteen examinees who spread the test questions, including Peng Kui, Yao Chuan, and Gao Cheng, were beheaded.

Besides, there were no more killings. The remaining officials and officials involved in the case were all exiled to Yunnan.

This result was a surprise to both the government and the public. It was not that Boss Zhu killed too many people, but that he did not expect to kill so many people. This is inconsistent with Boss Zhu’s temperament of cutting off the roots without leaving any future troubles.

The officials originally planned to write a letter to rescue the arrested officials and officials, saying that most of them were innocent and the emperor did not want to be too implicated. Now I am completely speechless...

Even the only person they felt was punished too severely was His Highness Prince Tan who was involved in the case and was deposed as a commoner. In the eyes of the officials, King Tan just sympathized with the civil servants and did not take the initiative to do anything. The punishment did not need to be so severe. A one-year salary fine and half a year of studying behind closed doors were enough.

The emperor was so "disciplined with strict self-discipline and lenient with others" that the ministers were naturally speechless.

On the same day, Zhu Yuanzhang also announced that the competition would be held again ten days later. This time, the prince would organize the questions and he would personally supervise the marking.

The edict also mentioned that in order to reduce the burden on candidates, this time the re-examination will no longer be divided into separate hall exams, but will be combined into one, with only one exam. Moreover, there will be no arithmetic test this time, and the scores on the day of the palace examination will be used directly.

The announcement of the news did not cause much disturbance, because the candidates had already expected that they would have to retake the exam, so they have been seizing the time to prepare for the exam.

~~

In the blink of an eye, ten days later, on the sixth day of June, the gate of Gongyuan opened again. Thousands of candidates and college students carrying examination boxes and baskets came bustling into Gongyuan, were searched, and then entered the dragon gate, entered the examination room, received examination questions, and entered the number. I put my things away and started to examine and answer the questions.

Everything was as orderly and calm as if nothing had happened. Missing those four or five hundred moves has no impact at all.

And I don’t know whether it was because of familiarity, or because the emperor personally proctored the exam. This exam was extremely smooth from beginning to end, without any trouble.

After the exam, two days later, the list was posted on the south wall of the Ministry of Rites again.

This time, at a glance, the imperial list was full of college students from Guozi University.

According to the last statistics, a total of 1,000 Jinshi students were admitted to the undergraduate program, including 880 college students. Among the remaining 120 students, 72 were admitted from the South and 48 were admitted from the North, a ratio of exactly six to four.

Although the number of people admitted to the examinations in the north was still the smallest, they were still very happy. First of all, this was the smallest gap between them and the examinations in the south among all the examinations since the founding of the People's Republic of China.

Furthermore, among the college students at Guozi University, there are more northerners than southerners.

This shows that the northerners are no worse than the southerners, completely overturning the previously commonly held fallacy that northerners are not as good as the southerners.

And this time, we finally realized the selection of scholars by subject, and the lists on the imperial list were also divided into five groups——

Among them, there are 420 Jinshi in Legal Studies, and Huang Guan ranks first.

There are 212 Jinshi in household studies, and Xia Yuanji is the first.

Ninety-two people were awarded Jinshi in Engineering, and the first was Hu Yan.

There are one hundred and seventy-eight scholars in etiquette, and the first one is Jian Yi.

Ninety-eight people were awarded Jinshi in Science, and Liu Xiang ranked first.

Liu Xiang is also a graduate of Guozi University, so the five leaders in this imperial examination are still from Guozi University.

At this point, Hongwu's twelve-year imperial examination reform was finally implemented six full years later. People all over the world have finally clearly realized that times have changed, and the old imperial examinations in which one article determined life have become history...

And this time Boss Zhu wants to completely erase the traces of the old imperial examination and completely replace it with his new imperial examination that selects scholars by subject!

For this reason, he canceled the previous top pick, second pick, and top pick, and gave the glory to the top five, that is, the first place in the five subjects. This is obviously to promote science, engineering, and household studies, elevating them to the same level as the other two subjects.

In the past, not a single candidate was admitted to these three subjects. This time, Boss Zhu directly admitted more than 400 people, accounting for nearly half of the total admissions. It completely opened up the situation for these three subjects.

No wonder some old scholars who read the list shed tears on the spot and said: "I can't go back, I can't go back anymore..."