The Exam Begins, Stakes Raised

"Since you two gentlemen are in the mood, I'll handle it!" A scholar stepped forward, raised his hand, and produced a sheet of golden paper, upon which he wrote the contract:

Terms of Agreement:

Party A and Party B shall wager on their examination results. The higher-ranked party wins; the lower-ranked party loses. The loser must run naked around Haining City three times and shout ten times, "I am trash." In addition, the winner may ask the loser one question, which the loser must answer truthfully and in full detail. Both parties shall abide by this agreement. Should either party fail to comply, their Literary Root shall sever itself, and both Heaven and man shall forsake them.

With the agreement in hand, Zhang Haoyue signed first.

He then passed it to Lin Su.

Lin Su accepted the paper, somewhat hesitant. "We're writing this with Precious Paper and a Precious Brush?"

"A pact between scholars, a promise worth a thousand gold. Precious Paper and a Precious Brush were unnecessary to begin with, but since Brother Lin wishes to create a fine tale, how could we possibly lack them?"

Zhang Haoyue replied lightly.

Lin Su picked up the brush, still wavering. Everyone's hearts sped up as they waited for him to put brush to paper...

"Hehe, don't dare sign? Fine if you don't. Slap yourself across the face ten times and declare that what you just said was no more than farting, and we'll let it go!"

Lin Su flew into a rage. "I'll sign!"

He raised the brush and wrote down his name: Lin Su!

"Since it's to be a fine tale, I'll add to the excitement. I'll wager with you too!" The man who had drafted the agreement raised his brush as well and signed his name: Zhao Ji. His name was also written under Party A.

"You're making it one against two?" Lin Su stared, dumbfounded.

"Of course. We never said Party A could only have one person!"

A third person stepped forward...

"Wait!" Lin Su raised a hand to stop him. "What if I beat one person but lose to another? How does that work?"

"The agreement states it plainly. If you lose to Brother Zhang, you act according to Brother Zhang's arrangements. If you beat Brother Zhao, Brother Zhao acts according to yours!"

Lin Su pondered for a long while before nodding. "That's fair enough. Fine, whoever wants to sign, sign. Come to think of it, the more people who sign, the safer I am. If the winners make me suffer, I'll make it up double from the losers!"

For a time, twenty-three scholars signed their names under Party A, representing Lin Su wagering alone against twenty-three people.

Once all signatures had been made, the agreement was copied in duplicate. Zhang Haoyue accepted one copy on behalf of the twenty-three, while Lin Su picked up the other and slowly turned his gaze toward Lei Dongyang. "Professor, is it really all right to start gambling before the examination?"

Lei Dongyang seemed quite pleased at the moment. "Why wouldn't it be? Didn't you just call it a fine tale for the Literary Altar?"

Lin Su nodded. "Professor Lei, would you like to sign as well?"

Lei Dongyang's face darkened. "Nonsense! You are wagering on the examination, but I'm not taking the Provincial Examination!"

Lin Su said, "We can wager on something else."

"On what?"

"On my Metropolitan Examination results this October. We'll see whether my results are better than yours were back then."

Lei Dongyang's eyes slowly narrowed. "What if you cannot take this autumn's Metropolitan Examination?"

"Then naturally, I lose!"

"The stakes?"

"The same as theirs!"

Lei Dongyang's expression shifted like storm clouds. "Fine. It's a wager!"

A different sort of agreement was drawn up, and Lin Su and Lei Dongyang added another wager.

While they were making all this fuss, those outside the red rope knew nothing of it. Yet someone within the circle sent a message to a distant place.

When Ding Hai received that message, he nearly jumped eight feet into the air!

"Idiots! Fools! So ignorant!..."

He strode back and forth across the rooftop, utterly frantic.

A beautiful woman landed before him. "Boss, what happened?"

Ding Hai let out a long breath. "The Baiyunbian Wine recipe can't be kept secret anymore!"

"Why?" The beautiful woman was shocked.

Ding Hai told her what had just happened at the dock. Lin Su had wagered against twenty-three scholars, and the loser would run naked... The naked-running matter was beside the point. If Lin Su lost, it would only ruin his reputation and destroy his future; it had nothing to do with Ding Hai, and he did not care in the slightest. The problem was that the agreement included a second condition: the winner had the right to ask the loser one question, and the loser had to answer it truthfully and in full detail!

That bastard Lin Su might have thought those scholars would ask about private matters that could ruin his reputation, but Ding Hai knew that what they would surely ask was the wine recipe!

Otherwise, why would twenty-three scholars wager against him at once?

No one who learned the wine recipe would reveal it to others. If Zhang Haoyue learned it, he certainly would not tell his fellow travelers of the Literary Altar. That was why these people had personally entered the fray. They wanted the recipe too.

Among those twenty-three was the Ninth Young Master of Haitian Prefecture, Quzhou's greatest power. He was Zhao Ji! Recently, Haitian Prefecture had sent three groups to approach Lin Manor, and all had been dealt with by Dark Night. They were determined to obtain the wine recipe.

Throughout the whole affair, Zhao Ji had been actively pushing things along. That alone was proof enough.

More fatally, Zhao Ji was highly accomplished in literature and one of the hottest favorites to become the top scorer of this Provincial Examination.

No matter whether the others won or lost, Zhao Ji was certain to win!

From the distant river came the sudden toll of a Golden Bell. At its sound, the morning mist covering the river vanished abruptly, and a beam of golden light arrived across the waters, laying down a great golden road.

Upon that golden road, a strange great ship broke through the waves. Its shape was peculiar, like an open book, its oars like pages fluttering up and down...

"The road of the examinations is the great road of the mortal world. Wherever the Book Boat arrives, evil and corruption dare not draw near. Idlers, stand aside!" A clear voice from atop the Book Boat pierced cloud and fog, heard throughout all of Haining.

Countless people stopped to watch, solemn and reverent.

"Examination candidates, board the vessel!"

The instant the words fell, the Book Boat shook. Countless pages split away from it and stretched beneath the feet of the scholars on the dock, carrying them into the air and depositing them aboard the Book Boat.

Lin Su turned his head and saw the three large characters written upon the page beneath his feet: Feichang Dao.

The page beneath the feet of a scholar beside him bore the words: Ming Ke Ming.

The page beneath a scholar in front of him read: Dao Ke Dao.

"The Tao Te Ching serves as the vessel!" Lin Su sighed.

A White-clothed Person to his left smiled faintly. "Virtue as the vessel, the saints as guides. Though the mountain of books is perilous, one still presses onward without turning back. Junior Brother, today is your first battle upon opening the mountain. Give it your all!"

Lin Su was slightly startled. "You are...?"

"I am Qiu Mochi, a disciple of Mr. Bao Shan. Today, I am the examination guide."

"Bao Shan... How is Mr. Bao Shan?"

"Teacher has broken through to the Ultimate Literary Heart and is currently consolidating his realm. He cannot leave seclusion for the time being. Before I departed, he instructed me to take good care of you, Junior Brother. Yet Teacher never expected that you would actually participate in this Provincial Examination."

"It isn't just Mr. Bao Shan who didn't expect it. My elder brother didn't either. He originally hoped I would take the examinations three years from now. I only came to join the excitement and get an early taste of the examination atmosphere."

"It is good that Junior Brother thinks this way. The examinations come once every three years. You are still young, Junior Brother. Take gains and losses lightly; improving yourself is what matters most..."

This exchange between the two shocked the other scholars around them, but it also put them at ease.

They were shocked because the famed scholar Mr. Bao Shan, whose name hung over the whole world, was actually this brat's teacher?

Could there be some unexpected twist?

But the brat had said it himself: he had only come to join the excitement, to experience the atmosphere of the examinations...

Hehe, joining the excitement!

Brat, do you know? You've made quite a spectacle of yourself. Once this spectacle is over, your literary path will be gone, and your recipe will be gone too...

The delight blooming in the hearts of the people around him did not escape Lin Su's eyes. He was rather excited inside as well.

A bunch of dirt chickens!

Your feathers haven't even grown in yet, and you think you can play me?

Let's see who plays whom!

The Golden Bell rang twice. The Book Boat approached Qiankun Academy, and the examination candidates disembarked.

Lin Su lightly waved at Qiu Mochi. "Brother Qiu, come drink at the Lin Family's place when you have time!"

A page carried him flying upward. Excitement gleamed in Qiu Mochi's eyes. It was because his teacher had drunk Lin Su's wine that he had broken through a ten-year shackle and entered the Literary Heart Extreme Realm. His wine had become the shared anticipation of all his fellow disciples...

Someone beside Lin Su laughed.

Go drink at your house?

By then, your Baiyunbian would be sold throughout the city. Where couldn't they drink it? Why would they have to go to your house?

Qiankun Academy rested against rolling mountains and faced the rushing Yangtze River. Since the academy bore the name Qiankun, its grandeur naturally stretched across Heaven and Earth. The moment Lin Su stepped onto the square before the academy, he saw today's examination grounds.

Though the Provincial Examination was the second of the four-level examination system—the Tong Sheng Trial, Provincial Examination, Metropolitan Examination, and Palace Examination—and overall still a lower-tier examination, it was in truth extraordinarily important. It could practically be called the most important of the four levels.

Why? Because passing the Provincial Examination earned one the title of xiucai.

A xiucai need not kneel before a county magistrate and could work in county government. What did that mean? It meant shedding one's status as a farmer and crossing the boundary between social classes.

Crossing class boundaries was a carp leaping over the Dragon Gate.

Thus, the vast majority were extraordinarily nervous. They had studied bitterly for ten years, all for this day.

Lin Su was not nervous.

Because he knew that today's examination would be fair.

No matter how unfair Feudal Society might be, the examination hall was absolutely fair, because the examinations were not controlled by those people in the political arena.

The examinations were the saints' private domain.

No matter how far the Minister of War's hand could reach, it could not reach into the examinations.

No matter how fatuous the emperor might be, at most he held the power to bestow Jinshi status. He could not alter the main course of the examinations at all.

So long as his results were good enough, not even the emperor could block the road ahead of him!

No one could cheat in the examinations!

That was the foundation of his confidence to look down upon all else!

(The readers spat tea all over their screens. Damn it, you make it sound like you don't cheat yourself.)

The Golden Bell rang three times, and the examination candidates entered the grounds.

Lin Su's gaze swept over Zhang Haoyue's obviously smug face. He stepped into the examination cubicle on the left marked "Three Three Five." Three thousand Haining scholars were taking the examination, and there were likewise three thousand separate cubicles. From outside, each cubicle looked like nothing more than a signboard, but inside, it was about the size of a restroom: a table, a chair, a stack of draft paper, a lamp, a basin, and a chamber pot.

Lin Su sat on the chair and waited for the Golden Bell to ring four times.

In the rear mountains of Qiankun Academy stood an elegant little courtyard, with bamboo cottages and bamboo railings, its ground paved with bamboo and a bamboo grove outside.

The courtyard was steeped in the fragrance of books, bamboo shadows swaying in the wind.

The instant Qiu Mochi appeared at the edge of the bamboo grove, a tiny peacock suddenly flew from the bamboo forest above. The peacock called out, "Mochi is here, Mochi is here..."

Qiu Mochi raised his head. "Is Auntie here?"

"Auntie is here, Auntie is here!"

The peacock flicked its tail feathers lightly, and the bamboo shadows before him suddenly parted, revealing a road paved with bamboo leading straight to the small lake ahead.

By the lake, a white-clad woman stood with her back to the bamboo grove, painting. The peacock flew up and plunged into the drawing board before her, where it actually imprinted itself upon the board and became part of the painting.

"Auntie, your paintings are becoming more and more impossible to distinguish between illusion and reality!" Qiu Mochi cried delightedly.