After saving the Empress, I became the top scholar in the imperial examination.

……

sunset.

The sky was dyed a deep orange-red.

The interior of the elmwood carriage was not decorated with much refinement.

The renowned Master Ning leaned back in the carriage, holding a book in his hands, earnestly licking his fingers as he turned the pages.

The book cover is written in elegant small regular script: "Collection of Examination Records of Yingtian Prefecture in the Eleventh Year of Longchang".

It contains a collection of county examination questions from eight counties, including Jiangning, Shangyuan, and Liyang. The questions are detailed and complex, the handwriting is neat, and it is a unique copy, making it extremely rare.

When Han Laoguai copied this book from a great Confucian scholar at Bailu Academy and handed it to him, he specifically instructed him not to circulate it outside the academy, saying that this book was the great Confucian scholar's family heirloom, and if it were circulated outside the academy, the great Confucian scholar would probably be furious. Ning Nan then read it very carefully.

The prostitute stole a glance at the talented scholar who was silently reading, her eyes filled with resentment, and her heart sank.

She wasn't famous at Yanchun Pavilion, but she was still considered very beautiful. She was only wearing two thin gauze garments, one red and one green, but the other person only looked at the fake Yan Ruyu in the book, leaving the real Yan Ruyu aside, wasting the silver note that was given to her.

The car interior smelled strongly of cosmetics.

The prostitute silently inhaled, yet could only follow the other party's instructions, her eyes darting around, telling herself a joke, and then letting out a clear, bell-like laugh, as if she were having a pleasant conversation with a great scholar—it was all very strange.

The carriage curtains were lifted from the outside, letting in a cool autumn breeze.

A tall young man whispered, "Young Master Ning, we've caught him."

Ning Nan nodded and smiled at the courtesan in the main seat, saying, "Thank you for your help today, young lady."

talking.

He pointed to the tall young man outside the carriage curtain and said, "This is a strong man from the Embroidered Uniform Guard, surnamed Qian, named Sijin. Young lady, could you please keep today's events a secret and not tell anyone else?"

Qian Sijin's fierce eyes swept across the prostitute.

The prostitute's heart skipped a beat. Who would dare provoke such menacing figures as the Embroidered Uniform Guard? Her face turned deathly pale, and she stammered, unable to speak, but nodded hastily.

"Thank you, young lady."

Ning Nan pinched the page he had just been reading between his fingers, closed the book, got off the carriage, and instructed Uncle Ping, who was running over, to take the prostitute back.

Unperturbed, he sat down against the alley wall, enjoying the cool autumn breeze and the cleanliness, and continued reading in the afterglow of the setting sun.

Take a look at the county examination question, try to solve it in your mind, and then look at the solution proposed by the top scorer at the time. By comparing the two, the brilliance of others becomes apparent, and your own shortcomings also become apparent.

His level of writing in the eight-legged essay style has improved significantly compared to last month. In the private school, he is only slightly behind Tang Lianbin and Zuo Yong. He seems to be doing well, but he is still a little uneasy because he doesn't know how the overall level of the private school is in Yingtian Prefecture.

Not long after.

Several heart-wrenching screams came from a nearby house.

Ningnan turned a deaf ear.

Gradually, the orange-red on the horizon faded, turning into blue, and then from blue to black, and the sky darkened.

"Snapped!"

Ning Nan closed the book.

He stood up and patted the dust off his clothes.

Qian Sijin strode over, his face grave, and explained the situation to him.

These three thieves who were secretly following him were quite stubborn; they only said that the three of them wanted to rob him, and they couldn't get any other information out of them.

Ning Nan nodded, not too surprised. He rolled up the book, tapped it in his palm, and walked towards the house.

This alley, adjacent to the Qinhuai River, is called Qiaotou Alley, and the house there was one of the strongholds of the Embroidered Uniform Guard.

When Qian Sijin said that someone was following him, Ning Nan thought for a moment and asked the other party if there was a place close to the brothel that was suitable for ambushing them from the front and back. The other party suggested this place, so he stopped the carriage to buy wine and ordered Xu Cheng to pretend to take a servant to Ning Mansion to deliver the wine, but in reality, he rode back quickly and brought Er Lai and the others here, where they were ambushed from all sides.

After lingering at the brothel for a while, he leisurely arrived with the people who had been following him at the appointed time.

Erlai captured the wiry leader, and ten servants also emerged in perfect coordination, blocking the other two sneaky spies. The group achieved a great victory, and Qian Sijin said to him in admiration, "Young Master Ning's servants are very well trained."

Qian Sijin originally wanted Xu Cheng to go to the Embroidered Uniform Guard to call for reinforcements, but Ning Nan thought that he should take advantage of the opportunity to train the troops. If they couldn't even handle a few petty thieves, then it would be better to send them home to farm, so as not to embarrass themselves in the capital.

Ning Nan entered the house.

Er Lai was staring at the three pale-faced servants with a livid face. After a moment's glance, it seemed that Er Lai had kicked the three of them countless times.

I only found out after asking.

When the Imperial Guards were interrogating those thieves, those three good-for-nothings actually vomited. Erlai was furious and ordered the ten of them to take over the work of the two Imperial Guards and remove the three thieves' fingernails and nail bamboo skewers to their fingertips.

Although the servants were pale, they gritted their teeth and did as Erlai said.

Ning Nan didn't say much, just left the matter to Er Lai.

The three thieves were locked in three separate rooms.

Ning Nan went in and took a look. The three of them were no longer human. Their hands and feet were handcuffed and tied to chairs, and their fingers were still dripping blood.

The leader, named Bamboo, was in his early twenties. His eyes were swollen and bruised, half of his teeth were missing, the nails on four of his fingers had been ripped off and bamboo skewers were stuck in them, and it seemed that several of his ribs were broken. He was sucking in air with a "hoarse" sound, and blood and saliva were slowly dripping from the corners of his mouth.

Ning Nan slung the book behind his back, glanced at the man, and couldn't help but frown.

Bamboo's one eye was so swollen that she couldn't open it. She only opened her red and swollen left eye to glance at Ning Nan and uttered a "heh".

"The Northern Tartars, the Northern Tartars have ten cruel tortures... You cowards from the South... all you know is this... I..." Blood dripped from his mouth as he laughed in a trembling voice, "I... I despise you..."

Xu Cheng and the others' expressions darkened, and they were about to use some more methods on this person when Ning Nan waved his hand, indicating that it was unnecessary.

Ning Nan asked, "Are you from Hejian Prefecture?"

Bamboo was taken aback for a moment, realizing that his accent was familiar. This wasn't surprising. After a moment of silence, he sneered and said, "Grandpa is..."

Ning Nan asked in the Hejian accent, "How have the harvests been in Hejian Prefecture in recent years? How many shi of grain can you get per mu?"

Bamboo was taken aback.

Qian Sijin, Xu Cheng, and the other four Imperial Guards were all taken aback. Young Master Ning actually knew the words of Hejian Prefecture.

Bamboo, panting, stared at the young scholar before her, her lungs choked with emotion, and for a moment she didn't know what to say. "You are..."

Ning Nan let out a breath and sighed, "My mother was from Hejian Prefecture. She fled to the south back then. She survived floods, droughts, and locust plagues. Then the Tartars started killing people again, and half the villagers died. Her parents couldn't take it anymore, so they took her and ran south... My mother has spoken our hometown dialect to me since I was little..."

Bamboo hadn't heard his native accent in a long time, and when the other person said this, he was stunned. He felt a lump in his throat. This Ning Baixuan was actually from Hejian Prefecture? If he wasn't from Hejian Prefecture, how could he speak such a familiar accent? This was something you couldn't learn on the spot!

Ning Nan looked dazed, as if lost in some kind of memory. He didn't ask any more questions and instructed that they should stop using torture, as these were all people with hard lives and had not had it easy.

He instructed Xu Cheng and the others to change the binding of the other man's hands from behind to in front, and then called out to Er Lai to go to a certain shop outside and buy a portion of braised donkey meat, asking that it be cut into small pieces.

Ning Nan sighed and said to Zhu Zi, "Fellow villager, you stay here for now. I'm leaving first. My mother only has one son, me. I wonder how many your mothers have?"

Ning Nan stood up, gave a bitter smile, and sighed softly in his Hejian accent, "Everyone says that our Yan and Zhao regions are full of generous and tragic heroes... Brother, you could have done anything, so why did you become a dog of the Tartars..."

"Bullshit!" Upon hearing this, Zhu Zi glared and, completely ignoring the excruciating pain in his eyes, shouted in the Hejian dialect, "I, Zhang Zhu Zi, am a renowned and valiant man from Hejian Prefecture! A hero who has fought his way into the Forbidden City! A true hero!"

Ning Nan's eyes reddened, and she asked in shock, speaking with a Hejian accent, "You even managed to break into the Forbidden City?"