A Gui had joined He Shen in suppressing the rebellion. After suffering defeat, he too sought excuses, so in his memorial reporting the military situation, A Gui repeatedly mentioned that there had been too much rain locally, that the downpour was torrential, and that the troops had found it difficult to advance.
Yet the Qianlong Emperor had received reports of drought in Gansu year after year. Why had there been so much rain this year?
He therefore ordered a thorough investigation into Gansu's weather over the past several years. The results soon came in: Gansu had enjoyed favorable weather and abundant harvests for several years, so the local wealthy households had considerable grain reserves. This happened to allow those purchasing student status through donations to take out their surplus grain, sell it, and donate the proceeds. These grain supplies flowed into the civilian market, while of the more than 800,000 shi of grain reported to the Emperor, not a single grain actually existed. To "dispose of" this paper grain, Wang Danwang fabricated a story about opening the granaries and distributing relief grain. That more or less balanced the accounts, except that there were now an additional 19,000 students who had purchased their status through donations.
In previous years, Gansu had only around 8,000 such students in an entire year. Yet this continued from the thirty-ninth year of Qianlong to the forty-sixth year of Qianlong. Over seven years, Gansu took in 270,000 students, bringing in more than 12.27 million taels through donations for student status. Fujian, where the provincial graduate was from, really had suffered a drought, yet had no grain for relief. During the preceding years, the massive influx of Gansu examinees had created fierce competition, so he had not gone to the capital for the examinations. He only left