As the governor of the capital, Wang Ziteng had the power to be rich.

Moreover, in the protective amulet, the words "There is a shortage of white jade beds in the East China Sea, so the Dragon King came to invite the King of Jinling", which all shows that the Wang family was already very rich when they were still in Jinling.

Therefore, there is no reason for the Wang family to force their close nephew to sell their property. Not only will this matter be ridiculed by others, it will also not be beneficial to the prince's official reputation.

After all, because Wang Zitengguan has done a lot, he must care more about official reputation than money.

After thinking about it, it suddenly occurred to me that according to time, Yuanchun should be made a concubine.

Perhaps the Supreme Emperor sensed a crisis because too many things had happened in Longshou Palace recently, so he hinted to Wang Ziteng, and then forced him to perform an operation on Xue Pan first, just to show off.

Shi Zhongkui suddenly frowned when he thought of this.

The Supreme Emperor and Wang Ziteng were both in trouble, but he couldn't be happy about Yuanchun being granted the title of concubine.

It is clear from various signs that the emperor did not like Yuanchun at all.

Of course, there is no love at all when an emperor gets married. In addition to profit, it is also profit.

However, the title of concubine in Yuanchun was very sudden. Even before the eunuch came to announce the decree, not only was there no news at all, but everyone in the Jia family thought that the emperor was punishing the Jia family.

The question now is whether the emperor made Yuanchun a concubine in order to win over the Jia and Wang families, or the emperor ordered the emperor to make Yuanchun a concubine in order to stabilize his base among the nobles.

If it is the former, it can only be said that the emperor has lost his mind.

After all, he was a man of orthodoxy. By doing this, he clearly wanted to compete with the Supreme Emperor and set off a fight between father and son, as well as a dispute between the court.

if the latter one.

Shi Zhongkui sighed, "Oh, it's been such a troubled time."

Xue Pan couldn't help but panic after hearing this.

Shi Zhongkui waved his hand and said, "In the recent period, I have been going home and preparing Baochai's dowry."

After being kicked out of home by Shi Zhongkui, Xue Pan returned home puzzled.

After talking to Aunt Xue and Baochai, even though Baochai couldn't guess what kind of medicine Shi Zhongkui was selling in the gourd.

But the words about preparing a dowry made her realize that perhaps this meant asking Xue Pan to move immediately.

And Xue Pan had already planned to move because of the gossips made by the servants of the Jia family.

This time, no matter what Aunt Xue thought, she was determined to leave.

"Before my sister got married, she could no longer live in the Lixiang Garden in Rongguo Mansion, let alone get into a sedan chair in the Lixiang Garden. Besides, my house has been sorted out a long time ago, so I might as well move out tomorrow."

Aunt Xue said hurriedly, "This is too urgent. Your uncle will look bad."

Aunt Xue's idea is very simple. Her son-in-law has not yet been named on the gold medal list, and Xue Pan has faked his death again, so she can have shelter by living in Jia's house.

Of course, before, she was also worried that Shi Zhongkui would not be able to pass the examination and pass the examination.

But now his tone is not as firm as before.

"Mother," Baochai reminded her hurriedly, "you can't stay until the wedding day is approaching. When the time comes, will your daughter marry first, or your second sister?"

Aunt Xue was shocked. Her family's family status was not as good as that of the Jia family. If the sedan chair entered the Shi Mansion later than the Jia family, no one would believe that Baochai was the principal bride.

-----

This matter reached the ears of Jia Mu, Jia Zheng, and Mrs. Wang. It turned out that the Jia family was just like before and did not want the Xue family to move out now.

But Xue Pan got into trouble, took Baochai and got into the carriage and left.

The angry Jia Zheng couldn't help but cursed, "This bastard has no respect for the young or the young in his eyes."

After saying that, he wanted to call Xue Pan to teach him a lesson, but he couldn't say anything and shook his head helplessly.

Although the uncle is an elder, he is not a close relative. Xue Pan has to leave, and the Xue family has a house in the capital.

No matter how many reasons Jia Zheng had, they didn't stop him from letting others live in his home.

And Jia Mu soon realized that there might be something else going on.

After all, Xue Pan had insisted on moving before, but he failed to move after being persuaded a few times.

But this time it seemed a little unusual. The old lady thought about it carefully, but she couldn't figure out the reason.

We can only conclude that Xue Pan was thinking about Baochai, and even the matter itself was Baochai's idea.

Alas, every step is too late, every step is too late.

It seems that Er Yatou will never think about getting big in the future.

A few days later, the Xue family finished moving things, held a moving banquet, and the imperial examination arrived.

I won’t go into detail about the process, and Xia Shouzhong was as reliable as ever this time.

Although I couldn't directly guess the emperor's question, relying on what book the emperor read or even which page he turned to was a huge advantage in itself.

Moreover, except for Shi Zhongkui, what all the scholars and officials present did not expect was that the emperor actually proposed a policy issue on salt tax.

What is even more unexpected is that this time the palace examination did not test poetry and other items, but only policy theory.

Do you want to see the true talents of this scholar?

Or was the emperor worried that if he was selected as the number one scholar, he would be gossiped about because of his poems?

Shi Zhongkui secretly glanced at the emperor sitting on the throne of the Golden Palace.

She saw that his eyes were always on her.

I was busy concentrating and couldn't help but think about the articles I had written in the past few days.

Although the Great Zhou Dynasty is different from the Braided Dynasty, it has experienced the Song and Yuan Dynasties, and then the Chen Dynasty that competed with Lao Zhu for the world and won the Battle of Poyang Lake, and then the current Great Zhou Dynasty.

In terms of time, the Zhou Dynasty, which has been a country for a hundred years, is actually no different from the Kangxi and Yong Dynasties.

In addition to affecting the court's income, the corruption of the salt administration had the most direct negative impact on the food and salary supply for the border troops.

In the past, if Jiangnan salt merchants wanted to obtain salt, they had to transport grain and grass to border towns first.

But now it is directly replaced by using silver to buy salt. On the surface, the court's income is indeed more.

But the extra money was actually stolen from the food and fodder of the border army.

Moreover, if civilian officials are responsible for the supply and transportation of grain and grass, they will inevitably get their hands on them and make another fortune.

If you think about it this way, you can write a lot more.

Moreover, as a civil servant, he was destined to choose a side and stand on the opposite side of Wu Xun and the general.

Therefore, Shi Zhongkui did not write about the dirty things of civil servants. He was not afraid of offending Wu Xun at all. When he wrote down everything about the generals, even he felt a sense of relief.

The cabinet bachelors and Hanlin bachelors who had been watching around him suddenly smiled with satisfaction when they saw that he was writing with divine help.

In the eyes of these ministers, if you have to think about something as simple as salt policy, you must be a nerd who is obsessed with reading and doesn't know anything about the world.

At the end of the day, except for lunch and convenience, the emperor actually never left.

Based on this alone, this person can be called a diligent official.

When handing in the paper, Shi Zhongkui glanced at Xia Shouzhong. The eunuch's eyes moved left and right a few times, and Shi Zhongkui immediately understood that he had something to tell him.

After thinking about it, it may be related to Yuanchun's incident.

Lowering his head, not nodding, and not making any other small movements, Xia Shouzhong felt relieved.

After walking out of the Golden Palace, Yu Tongfu hurriedly looked over and asked, "Are you sure?"

Shi Zhongkui rolled his eyes at him. No matter how well he thought the article was written, whether he could win the top prize depends not only on the emperor's thoughts, but also on the cabinet and other important ministers.

Moreover, despite the talkative talk of the people nearby, there must be eunuchs who specialize in observing the performance of the prospective Jinshi.

Acting too eagerly will definitely give the emperor the impression that this person is not stable enough.

"Be careful. There are more than a dozen eunuchs, Han generals and embroidered guards around us. They must be watching us."

Yu Tongfu was shocked and quickly put away his smile.

Putting his hands in his sleeves and pretending to be serious, he followed Shi Zhongkui slowly out of the golden palace, and then he breathed a sigh of relief.

Then he looked at Shi Zhongkui and exclaimed, "My dear brother, you are indeed a mature and prudent person. In that kind of environment, you can still think of so many things, which is much better than my brother."

Shi Zhongkui smiled and said, "Senior brother, you are already the father of two children, but you still have the nerve to say that I am older than you."

Yu Tongfu's face froze, knowing that Shi Zhongkui was joking, but he felt a little unhappy.

"My dear brother, don't forget to teach my family Taiji enlightenment, and also study for my brother-in-law and uncle's family Huaiji."

"Shi Huaiji is very easy to handle. He will assign homework every three to five days. If he can get into it, he will not see him more than once every ten days."

As for Taiji, let’s wait until the little guy can learn to read, but by then, I might have already left Beijing to work in other places.”

"Haha, dear brother, you don't understand."

Yu Tongfu said with some pride, "Even if the wise brother fails to win the first prize, the two scholars have to stay in Beijing for three years to observe politics before they have the opportunity to be released.

If my dear brother really wins the first prize, you will probably never have the chance to leave the capital in this life.

You must take the path of Imperial Academy, James Mansion, Six Ministries, and Cabinet, so you should prepare to be the master of my nephew and son."

Shi Zhongkui was stunned for a moment, then smiled and shook his head and walked towards the palace gate.
To be continued...