Compared with other articles that are written with flowers and brilliant rhetoric, Cai Qi's seemingly simple article is actually too difficult to write, just the column of data requires him to spend a lot of effort to recall, coupled with various calculations based on this, it makes him pinch his fingers red, and the writing speed is naturally extremely slow.

In the end, the other candidates in the palace had left one after another, and he was the only one left who was still there burying his head in the calculations and writing, even if he had experience in doing things in the yamen, it also made Cai Qi nervous and anxious, causing him to sweat on his forehead, and he was slower to write.

At the same time, the candle lit on the case had also burned to the end, swaying for a while, making Cai Qi more and more uneasy, and subconsciously reached out to protect the candle flame. But at this moment, someone on the side suddenly put down the long candle that had just been lit, and said such a word of comfort, which made Cai Qi's heart move, raised his eyes, and almost stood up: "Sun ...... Sun Taiwei ......"

Sun Tu put down the candle with one hand, and pressed back Cai Qi, who was about to get up, with the other: "Now what you have to do is to finish the article." I look like I'm almost at the end, so I can't be distracted. ”

Cai Qi only felt moved, responded in a nasal voice, and then completely focused on the pen and paper in front of him, even Sun Tu then took the article he put aside and didn't seem to pay attention.

When he finally finished writing this article, thinking about whether he should check it carefully again to see if there were any omissions or taboos, he suddenly found that the written papers were pinched in his hands by Sun Tu, who had not left beside him, and looked at it carefully.

After half a cup of tea, Sun Tu finally finished reading all the Chinese chapters in his hand, and then looked at Cai Qi, who was a little apprehensive: "You are Cai Qi?" The Jiangnan candidate who mentioned in his essay during the examination that he wanted to increase the commercial tax to replenish the national treasury? ”

"It's the students." Cai Qi had already gotten up at this time, and hurriedly bent down to reply, and as he spoke, his heart moved again: "How can the Taiwei know the name of the mere one?" ”

"Haha, do you know that among those test articles, the one I like the most is yours. Although your article doesn't look as smooth and beautiful as other candidates, every sentence hits the nail on the head of today's middle school shortcomings, especially for commercial taxes, which has always been a problem. It is precisely because of this that when the other examiners deposed you, I tried my best to dismiss the public opinion and ordered you to enter the palace examination. And you really didn't disappoint me, this article about military grain transportation to comment on the similarities and differences between the Northern Expedition at the time of the founding of the country and today's Northern Expedition is indeed unique and refreshing. ”

Cai Qi looked at Sun Tu with some disbelief, he could become a member of the palace examination and still have such twists and turns? This made him forget to thank Sun Tu for a while, and only agitation was left in his heart.

Sun Tu looked at each other with a smile, and said, "By the way, looking at the data details in this article, you shouldn't be an ordinary candidate, right?" And you really have a set of calculations for these data, and you want to have a strong dabbling in arithmetic? ”

It wasn't until he heard the word arithmetic that Cai Qi suddenly came back to his senses, and hurriedly bowed down and replied: "What Taiwei said is that in fact, the student was just a small official in Zhuji County, Shaoxing, Jiangnan before the reference, and these relevant data were also seen and collected by the student in the official documents of the Dibao for more than ten years. In addition, the students were indeed interested in arithmetic when they were young, so they were later hired by the county government to walk in the house. ”

"I see, it seems that you are really talented. Well, that's good! Sun Tu nodded again and again in approval: "Is there any empirical evidence that you wrote above that Taizong sent troops to the Northern Expedition at the beginning of the country and finally failed because of the lack of food supply in the rear?" ”

This question made the other party's face blush, and he said with a wry smile: "This student is only inferred from the facts. First, the road between the Great Song Dynasty and the Liao State was already rugged and difficult to travel, and the main army had already killed near Youzhou, resulting in the supply route being too long - the Taiwei was well versed in the art of war and should know that in this way, not to mention the dangers along the road, the consumption of grain alone was much greater than the short-range transportation of grain, after all, the people who transported the grain also had to eat, and what they escorted was the grain, so it was naturally impossible to save, so no matter how much grain was transported to the front, it would be consumed, which would lead to a shortage of food at the front.

"The second is that it can be extrapolated backwards based on the results. The defeat of the Gaoliang River was of course because of the collapse of the whole army due to the injury of Emperor Taizong, but in fact, in the eyes of the students, this is only the appearance, and the root of this defeat is that the Northern Expedition army is short of food and grass, and the officers and men in the army have long been struggling, which is the cause of Taizong's injury, which caused the final rout. ”

These arguments are all conclusions that Cai Qi has reached through collecting some data over the years, and when asked today, he was very excited to say them one by one, almost forgetting that he was facing Sun Taiwei, the most powerful person in the Great Song Dynasty today. It wasn't until he finished saying that he came to his senses, and his face was restrained and apprehensive again.

Sun Tu nodded with satisfaction: "Well said, it seems that although you are only a small official in the county government, you have always been concerned about the affairs of the court, which is rare." What's even more rare is your ability to learn arithmetic, and you can make use of it, which is exactly the talent that the imperial court needs. ”

After a pause, seeing that the other party was happy, Sun Tu smiled again and said, "Okay, today's palace test time is also up, you go out of the palace first and wait for the news." Talents like you will definitely be reused by the imperial court. ”

"Yes...... Yes, student, student thank you for the ......" Cai Qi was so excited that he almost knelt down and kowtowed, and after a while, he left the hall in a daze.

And when Sun Tu saw him leave, a happy smile appeared on his face, it seems that even God is helping him this time. Just mentioned to Tong Mu that they were looking for professional talents to enter the important yamen, and here they found a person who is proficient in arithmetic, isn't this just the right time to put him in the household department for some training?

In Sun Tu's view, as long as there is such a precedent as Cai Qi, more relevant talents will inevitably emerge in the imperial examination hall in the future, so as to change the bad habit of inheriting for hundreds of years, only using poetry and songs or shenghua articles to get jinshi, so that more talents can be used for their own use.

The facts after that showed that Sun Tu still underestimated the hundreds of famous palace examination candidates in this department. These people may be full of many candidates who can only write flattering articles, but Cai Qi is by no means the only one with real skills.

There are three of them, not only can write the article exquisitely, but also have their own reasoning, so that people can nod their heads again and again when they look at it.

For example, this candidate named Shen Tu from Huainan explained the difference between today's Great Song Dynasty and the past from the distinction between civil and military, and used this as an extension to pull the Han and Tang dynasties together and make a strong comparison. Although there is also a certain suspicion of touting, everything in his article is reasonable, and he has many opinions of his own, just from the perspective of the article itself, it is obviously stronger than Cai Qi.

Zhang Nan, another candidate from Gyeonggi, analyzed the previous Northern Expeditions from the way of using soldiers, which can be said to be simple to understand, even those who do not understand military affairs can understand many subjective factors of the repeated defeats of the Great Song Dynasty from his articles. He even boldly pointed out the shortcomings of the Great Song Dynasty, which had many emperors since Taizong, who liked to remotely command the battle in front of the battle in Tokyo......

The only flaw in this article is that it is half-white and not ancient, and it should be that Zhang Nan made some changes in the choice of words and sentences in order to cater to Sun Tu's statement that the main examination abolished ancient texts. It's a pity that many habits of writing can't be easily changed, so at a glance, it always makes people feel a little awkward.

But even so, Sun Tu is quite appreciative of this article, as for how he is, it is not just a matter of reading an article to make a judgment.

Anyway, in the process of reviewing the candidates' articles in the next few days, Sun Tu still gained a lot, and only from these 100 people, he found out more than a dozen candidates with insight and potential. In this regard, he was naturally satisfied, and at the same time made corresponding arrangements.

Three days later, the imperial court finally announced the final results of the palace examination, Shen Tu was a well-deserved champion, a candidate named Yang Changnian became a role model, and Zhang Nan was Tanhua.

As for Cai Qi, under them, he became the top of the second class and passed on. However, it is said that Sun Tu originally planned to list him as the third Tanhua, but after a secret discussion with Tong Mu, he moved his ranking back by one place, so that this Cai Qi was not so conspicuous in this imperial examination. After all, what people pay the most attention to is the three candidates who are ranked first.

But even so, when he learned that he was actually the top two in high school, Cai Qi still couldn't believe his ears and eyes. Even when he entered the palace again and thanked the court and the Son of Heaven with a group of people of the same year, he had a sense of unreality that his soul was out of his body. Because he never thought that he would actually become a jinshi and really become an official of the imperial court one day.

And what surprised him even more was still to come, just above the Golden Palace, the Son of Heaven issued a special decree to promote him, a new science and technology scholar, to the post of a member of the household department, and to be responsible for the food supply to the Northern Expeditionary Army, which was obviously a great trust and honor, as well as a heavy burden......

As for the other jinshi, Zhang Nan was also put into the military department exceptionally, and Shen Tu directly entered the political hall as a minor official, which really entered the center.

Only this trick has made this imperial examination ripple in the Great Song Dynasty, so that all scholars once again have a different view of this new imperial examination, the original resistance is a 180-degree change, after all, compared with the previous step-by-step, today's imperial examination can make talented students come out quickly.