More than ten miles outside the city of Xunzhou, Huangkeng Village.

This village, with only a few dozen households, is like most villages in this era, and the village is inhabited by people surnamed Huang, and even they all have a common ancestor.

At this time, in an ordinary low house at the head of the village, a young man wearing only a single coat in the cold of spring, wrapped in a quilt to avoid the cold, was holding a book that had been almost turned over and shaking his head loudly.

At this time, there was a shout outside the house: "Brother Yongxiang, Brother Yongxiang!" ”

When the young man in the house heard this, he opened his tattered life and stood up, and then put on a cloth robe with many patches and pushed the door out, and saw a young man in a cloth robe standing in the courtyard.

Immediately, he said: "It turns out that Brother Zisong is coming from afar, please come in quickly!" ”

Although the young man in the cloth clothes was plainly dressed, this cloth robe was brand new, and the texture was quite good, which was in obvious contrast to the patched cloth robe on the young man who was called Yongxiang.

After the two entered the house, Yongxiang began to make tea, although the tea is just ordinary tea, and the spout of the teapot is also missing, but he is meticulous when making tea, and his demeanor is extremely cautious, as if what he has in his hand is the best hair tip and purple clay pot.

When Yongxiang was making tea, the young man on the opposite side did not speak, but sat upright, waiting until Yongxiang poured the tea on the teacup, and spread his hands: "A cup of coarse tea, please don't dislike Brother Zisong!" ”

Zisong nodded slightly, then took a sip of the teacup, then put down the teacup and said: "Bitter but not astringent, clear but not light, good tea, Brother Yongxiang's tea art is becoming more and more exquisite!" ”

Yongxiang said: "Reputation, the tea ceremony is just a small road, and the first thing for me and other scholars is the scriptures and articles, the imperial examination avenue!" ”

After Zisong heard this, he immediately straightened up again, and then said, "Junior brother came to visit Brother Yongxiang this time, just for this imperial examination!" ”

"Imperial examinations? Now that the official army has been defeated, the huge Guangxi generals are all in the hands of the pseudo-Tang Dynasty, how can we take the exam, I have to go to Guangdong to take the exam! Yongxiang sighed after saying that.

Zisong said: "Yes, it is the imperial examination, but this time we are going to Zhaoqing to take the exam!" ”

"Zhaoqing?" After Yongxiang heard this, he was slightly puzzled: "Isn't Zhaoqing in the hands of the pseudo-Tang?" How do we go about taking the exam? ”

Zisong said: "Don't Brother Yongxiang know? The Son of Heaven of the Tang Dynasty has announced to the world that it will be held in April, Xu has already applied for the exam, and he is about to leave for Zhaoqing in the near future. ”

Hearing this, Huang Zhiyuan didn't answer immediately, but looked at the best friend in front of him, and then said: "I also heard a few days ago that the pseudo-Tang Dynasty seems to be going to hold the imperial examination, but I didn't think of taking the exam, this pseudo-Tang Dynasty is a pseudo-dynasty after all, and I am waiting for ...... as a scholar."

Before he finished speaking, Xu Hanshi on the side waved his hand slightly, and directly interrupted his words: "The emperor of the Tang Dynasty has already been called the emperor, and now he is the capital of Zhaoqing, and he has more than 100,000 soldiers. ”

Speaking of this, he paused for a while and said: "The day before yesterday, I received a letter from my second grandfather, in which he instructed me to take the exam and get a good ranking, and said that there is only one such opportunity, and when it comes to this year's autumn exam, it will not be so easy!" ”

"If I remember correctly, your second master is an official in Guizhou, right? Could it be that he ......," Huang Zhiyuan said with a puzzled expression.

Xu Hanshi said: "Yes, now my second master is already an official of the Tang Dynasty, and the official worships the six grades of Liping Mansion!" ”

Hearing Xu Hanshi say this, Huang Zhiyuan finally understood why his best friend suddenly said that he was going to participate in the imperial examination of the pseudo-Tang Dynasty, why?

His second uncle has all surrendered to thieves, and he has also surrendered to thieves with official bodies, this kind of thing is absolutely intolerable to the imperial court, and his second uncle is tantamount to pulling the Xu family into the water, if the pseudo-Tang Dynasty is finished, the huge Xu family may be raided and wiped out!

The Xu family, who has no way out, can naturally only go to the dark one by one!

In fact, as Huang Zhiyuan thought, the scholars who planned to participate in the imperial examination this time were basically scholars who had a close relationship with the Tang Dynasty, their family members, elders or teachers, classmates, etc. have all surrendered to the thieves, and in the case of no way out, they can only go to the dark in one way, hoping that the Tang Dynasty will last longer, or even directly unify the land of China, then they will be able to become a new powerful family of a new dynasty.

But this is the choice of the Xu family, and it is the choice of Xu Hanshi.

However, do you want to participate in the imperial examination of the pseudo-Tang Dynasty?

After Xu Hanshi left, Huang Zhiyuan fell into deep contemplation!

He Huang Zhiyuan is a typical farmer's child, there are three brothers and sisters, the eldest sister is married, he is second, and there is a younger brother below, his parents are typical farmers, and he can't read big words.

When he was young, his parents originally just wanted him to go to the school in the next village to learn a few words, so that he could be a decent person like an account office in the future, but they never thought that their old Huang family would be able to produce scholars who could participate in the imperial examination.

There I thought that Huang Zhiyuan had a great talent for reading, and he was also praised by the teacher in the next village as the most talented teenager in many nearby villages.

Encouraged by this, his parents, who didn't recognize the two big characters, almost worked hard for him to study, and the people of the same village, who were also surnamed Huang, also helped him a lot.

The last time he got off the exam, he passed the county exam and the government exam, although he lost the college exam in the end, but many people thought that he was not very lucky, and the articles he wrote were not appetizing, but his talent was unanimously appreciated by many students around him.

Like every scholar who aspires to the imperial examination, the meaning of his survival is to obtain fame and become a great official for the imperial examination.

However, after the puppet Tang Dynasty went south to Guangxi last year, he occupied the whole of Guangxi, which made him depressed for a while, because it meant that the imperial court would not hold the imperial examination in Guangxi in a short time.

Now that he heard that the pseudo-Tang Dynasty had also opened the imperial examination, to be honest, he felt ridiculous when he first heard it, thinking that a gang of thieves dared to open the imperial examination, which was simply ridiculous.

But after listening to the words of his best friend Xu Hanshi today, he had some other thoughts, and he didn't have the heart to continue reading, after explaining to his family, he went to Xunzhou Mansion early the next morning, anyway, their home was only ten miles away from the city, and it would be an hour to go.

This is the first time he came to Fucheng after the capture of Xunzhou Mansion by the puppet Tang thief army, and when he first arrived in Fucheng, he had not yet entered the city, he just felt that Xunzhou Mansion was different from usual.

First of all, although there are many people waiting to enter the city in the direction of the city gate, there is not much noise, everyone is quietly queuing up to enter the city, and there is no rich boy who is extremely domineering and directly crosses the crowd and then enters the city.

Occasionally, I saw Ma Cheng from a few rich and noble families come to the city gate, although he is cutting the queue into the city, but he can also see that the house slaves of those rich and noble families are very polite to the pseudo-Tang officials wearing black uniforms at the city gate.

He is not a stupid person, so naturally he will not put himself in a special situation at this time, so he is at the back of the line, and the person in front of him is obviously the same reader as himself, but these two readers seem to be the same as him, a shy person.

Because they are saying that those pseudo-Tang officials are too black-hearted, and if they want to enter the city in advance, they will have to spend one or two silver to cut the queue, otherwise they can only honestly queue up to enter the city for free.

These two pieces of silver are nothing for a wealthy family, but if it is for ordinary people, it is extremely expensive, so although occasionally you can see someone directly cutting into the city, but at first glance, it is a large family that is either rich or expensive, as for ordinary people, even many brightly dressed people are honestly queuing.

The Tang Dynasty is naturally the same as many dynasties, there is no entry fee for ordinary people, but for caravans, there will be relevant tariffs, and the queues of these caravans are different from ordinary pedestrians, ordinary people will not be taxed if they do not carry a large number of obvious goods.

Huang Zhiyuan is just an ordinary scholar, when he enters the city, he will naturally not be hindered in any way, after he entered the city, he did not spin around like a headless fly, but first went to another friend's house, of course, in the name of visiting and exchanging knowledge, and also took a few of his recent essays.

Well, there is another reason that cannot be said, it is good to have a meal at noon!

This friend of his is also an ordinary family, after the two sat down and talked, Huang Zhiyuan learned from a friend that this time the pseudo-Tang Dynasty opened the imperial examination, but there was an uproar in Xunzhou Mansion, and many Shilin seniors were strongly opposed to the scholars to participate in the imperial examination of the pseudo-Tang Dynasty, and even those who were more radical would cut off relations with those who planned to participate in the imperial examination.

But he got an extremely important information from this news, that is, although the overall proportion of scholars participating in the pseudo-Tang imperial examination is not high, there must be one, and the number should not be small.

When he knew this, he left his friend's house in the afternoon, and then went to the pseudo-Tang Dynasty Yamen to watch the imperial examination announcement this time, this notice has been posted for some days, there are not many onlookers, but there are still several scholars like him who are watching, and after reading the notice, some people directly ran to the yamen inside to sign up for the examination.

Why do so many people take the exam?

Huang Zhiyuan didn't understand it at first, but when he saw the details of the notice, his heart was shaken, and then he couldn't help but walk towards the yamen of the puppet Tang official mansion in front of him!

He's going to take the exam!