Palace.

Throne room.

The early pilgrimage is underway.

However, the emperor and the ministers chatted with each other, and they didn't have much of the heart to discuss other court affairs.

The top priority of the Great Chu Dynasty is the third round of the "national examination", which will select 200 people who have passed the national examination.

This is the most important joint of the new imperial examination policy. As long as you pass the "national test", the guarantee is also a court official, and you will eat the job of the official family.

Two hundred officials selected through the imperial examination are about to appear in the court.

Emperor Xiang Yanran and the ministers of the Three Princes and Nine Emperors are all waiting for the mysterious examination papers of this national examination.

How the elected officials are, of course, depends on the examination papers.

The secrecy of this national examination paper is so good that no one knows about it except for Xiao Duhou.

"Your Majesty, the national examination papers have arrived!"

Several eunuchs hurried to the palace with more than 100 examination papers.

The examination of Jinling Gongyuan has officially begun.

The eunuchs finally got the national examination papers in the Jinling Gongyuan and hurriedly sent them to the emperor and the ministers for inspection.

Emperor Xiang Yanran took an exam paper casually.

This is the first time since he ascended the throne that he has adopted the method of imperial examination to select talents from the entire Great Chu.

Of course he was very curious, the national examination papers that Xiao Duhou came out.

There are only nine questions in this national examination paper, which is much less than the previous county and county exams.

"The first question of the national examination - astronomical arithmetic.

Please listen to the question:

One paper is one millimeter thick, and the height is doubled at a time when folded in half. If folded forty-one times, the thickness can reach from the earth to the moon. So, how far is it from the earth to the moon? Please write out the calculation process for each fold! ”

Xiang Yanran was stunned, and her face twitched.

How far from the ground to the moon?

He found.

The first question stumped him.

As an emperor, he can be regarded as well-versed in the past and the present, and has read countless books... But how to calculate this problem, he didn't know how to start.

Leave that question aside.

Let's look at the next question.

"The second question of the national examination - physics and arithmetic. Why does water become ice, why does it turn into gas, and disappear? Explain how it works. ”

Emperor Xiang Yanran held the teacup in his hand and was stunned for a long time.

This question can be understood in every word.

But composing a sentence, he can't understand it.

Why does water turn into ice and why does water turn into gas?

You ask me?

Who goes, I ask?

How does he know?!

"The third question of the national examination - historical evolution and agricultural examination questions: stone tools, bronze tools, iron tools, steel tools, how much effect does the change of agricultural tools from ancient times to the present have on increasing cultivated land and increasing grain production, how much population has been increased, and how much national strength has been increased?"

"Forget it, next one!"

"The fourth question of the national examination - medical exam question: How many plagues have occurred in Dachu. The types of plagues, and how much harm did they cause to the dynasty and society? Under what circumstances will there be an outbreak, and how will it be treated, prevented, and isolated? ”

"Forget it, I'd better go back to the first question and try origami!"

After all, origami is a little easier.

Emperor Xiang Yanran took out a blank piece of faint paper.

Isn't it just folded in half, how easy!

Xiang Yanran said secretly.

Fold it, two millimeters.

Fold it twice, four millimeters.

Fold three times, eight milli .... Sixteen milli... Thirty-two milli... Sixty-four millimeters.

Fold eight...!

Uh, it's over, I can't fold anymore.

How many times does this piece of paper have to be folded before it can be folded onto the moon?

Emperor Xiang Yanran tried his best, but he didn't break to the ninth stroke. As for the calculations, after more than ten calculations, he didn't know how to do them.

Xiang Yanran gave up in despair.

He is the emperor of the Great Chu State, and he can't answer a single question correctly.

From what ancient books did Xiao Duhou scavenge for these strange exam questions?!

...

In the court, the ministers were also desperately solving problems, whispering from time to time.

"Xiao Duhou's exam questions are too nonsense, too unstandard.

A piece of tissue paper folded forty-one times, I'm afraid it is not as high as the eaves of my house, how did it reach the moon? ”

Some officials were extremely dismissive.

When Yang Chu heard this, he shook his head and said: "This is not necessarily, if the eaves of your house are more than one zhang high, you only need to fold them twelve times." ... If you don't believe me, you can fold it and try it. ”

"How is that possible!"

Unconvinced, the official took a blank piece of paper and folded it.

It was only eight times that he had been folded eight times, and he had exerted enough strength that his face was flushed, and he still couldn't fold.

I can't fold it, I can only use a pen to calculate it.

But when you count it, you can't count it anymore.

He didn't know how to calculate it, the more he counted it, the more terrifying it became!

...

"Which Aiqing will answer this exam paper?"

Xiang Yanran couldn't help but ask the ministers in the hall.

In the court.

Taiwei Li Rong, Taichang Lu Zi and other courtiers kept looking at the nine questions of the national examination, their eyelids jumped, they looked at each other, and no one dared to say anything.

This exam question, at first glance, seems to be a very small question.

But when I thought about it carefully, my mind was so confused that I couldn't answer anything.

"Minister, please convene all the doctors in charge of books and dictionaries, who are familiar with historical affairs, and who specialize in planning and calculation, to solve the national examination questions together!"

The big farmer ordered Yang Chu to say: "And find all the relevant books!" ”

"Accurate!"

Emperor Xiang Yanran immediately summoned all the doctors of the Great Chu Dynasty to go to the palace together to crack the first subject of the national examination.

The courtiers and the wise men worked together to dig through the ancient books and seek answers.

A stick of incense past... An hour has passed... Most of the day passed.

The ministers of the palace were sweating profusely.

The first question is actually the easiest, because it only requires repeated superposition calculations.

But it's still extremely difficult.

Because the method used by the Great Chu Dynasty did not have the formula commonly used by later generations, it was not an "abacus", but a more ancient "calculation" - a bag of "bamboo chips" as a counter.

Put one to five sticks horizontally, representing one to five numbers.

Put one vertically, representing five. The vertical two are ten.

One vertical and four horizontal, representing nine.

Decimal system, single digits, tens digits, hundreds of digits, thousands of digits, 10,000 digits....

The ministers put up "calculations" on the ground, and they kept doubling their calculations, doubling them forty-one times.

After a few hours, they finally figured it out.

It's about 760,000 miles, the distance from the ground to the moon.

This figure made Emperor Xiang Yanran and his ministers feel shocked and discolored, unbelievable, but ecstatic.

From Jinling City, the imperial capital of Great Chu, to the distant Chengdu County, this is only a few thousand miles. Between east and west, between north and south, there are no more than thousands of miles.

From the ground to the moon, it was actually more than 700,000 miles away, exceeding the territory of hundreds of Great Chu Dynasty.

They didn't use a ruler, but they measured the height of the sky.

What an ecstatic thing this is?!

Of course, why is Xiao Duhou so sure that the thickness of the paper folded forty-one times can reach the moon?

This is a question worth pondering.

They don't want to ask this question.... This is a brain-burning question. There must be a lot of extremely complex calculations involved.

However, this is only the first question of the national exam, and every question in the subsequent exam is a headache for the ministers.

After rummaging through all kinds of books and painstakingly solving a small half of the exam questions, all the courtiers and doctors were out of the void.

This national exam question is too terrifying.

Completely beyond what they could master, in Confucianism, Taoism... In the books, there is no answer at all.

It's no wonder that Xiao Duhou allowed the talents to bring books into the examination room and take the open-book exam.

The talents in Jinling Gongyuan may have encountered the most difficult moment in their lives.