Luoyang.

In the north of the city, the upper east gate is in the Jide Fang.

Hebei Road Jinjuan Yuan is set up in this square, this square lives in the north of the city, just in the east of the door, adjacent to the Cao Canal in the south, the location is critical, and the traffic is convenient.

Morning.

Liu Cong, the director of the Hebei Provincial Concert Academy, asked people to invite the people who participated in the imperial examination in Hebei Province this year to the Concert Academy.

As the Beijing office of Hebei Province, the Hebei Jinju Yuan also belongs to the official yamen, they are funded by the local government, and their task in Beijing is to take charge of the transfer of edicts and official documents of various departments of the imperial court to Zhulu, and forward them to the chapters and documents, and distribute the documents to the relevant departments of the imperial court.

In addition, when local officials from various provinces entered the Kyoto Dynasty, they also stayed at the Jinjuin Temple. In normal times, they also undertake the task of liaising with various departments of the central court of the imperial court and inquiring about some of the movements of the imperial court.

This year is the first imperial examination, and all provinces attach great importance to this imperial examination. As the representative of Hebei Province in Beijing, of course, the Hebei Provincial Jinju Institute had already received a greeting from the local officials of Hebei, asking them to entertain the children of their hometown on their behalf.

"Director Liu, Ma Jieyuan has arrived."

As soon as Liu Cong heard that Ma Zhou had arrived, he hurriedly greeted him in person, although he was an eight-grade master, Ma Zhou was just a lifter, but Ma Zhou is now a big hit, how many prime ministers and ministers want to recruit him as a son-in-law, after all, this has long been appreciated and valued by the emperor, and he was supposed to be awarded the official of the imperial history, but this one has to participate in the imperial examination in person, and it is rumored that Ma Zhou is the champion of the internal designation.

Such a hometown scholar, Liu Cong naturally has to take it seriously.

Outside the gate of the concert hall.

Led by Ma Zhou, 90 people from Hebei Province who participated in the examination have come to the door.

"Hey, the Qilin talents in my hometown, please hurry up, let this official bless you on behalf of our fathers and villagers in Hebei Province."

The total number of people who will be given a total of 2,300 people will be able to do so, which is more than the original amount. However, not the amount of each solution is the same, Luoyang and Chang'an, Fanyang and other six capitals, that is, separate from the provinces, Luoyang solution 12, the remaining five capitals each Beijing solution 100. For example, Hebei, Henan, Hedong, Guanzhong, these four roads, each of which has a solution of 90, while Shandong, Huainan, Bahan, and Jiannan have each solved 80, and such as Liaoxi, Liaodong, Andong, Longyou, etc., are also decreasing, and Longyou has a 70th solution, while Yunnan Dao, there are only 20 solutions.

This kind of quota restriction is actually related to the number of people at this time, the Central Plains has a large population, and there are many scholars, only one Luoyang Prefecture has more than 20 counties with millions of people, of which the proportion of scholars is also the largest. And like the distant frontier land, the population is small, and the number of people who read is small.

In the concert hall, Director Liu sent a dish to the lifters first.

"This is the flying locust Tengda, this is the champion red."

Liu Cong smiled and pointed to the plate of roasted grasshoppers, and then picked up a glass of wine, "I wish everyone will try high school and soar all the way from now on!" ”

He also specially toasted Ma Zhou, "Everyone says that Brother Corbin will be the champion of high school today, please!" ”

The fried golden grasshoppers are placed on the plate in strings, and the lifters are smiling when they look at it, this is indeed a good luck, in fact, now Luoyang Street is full of all kinds of grasshoppers and locusts for sale, what is fried and fried, and the scholars like to eat the most is this flying locust Tengda.

Good sign.

Especially when strung together like this, no matter how you look at it, it's all rising.

For the candidates of Hebei Province, they are very advantageous in this imperial examination, a total of 2,800 candidates, Hebei Province has 90 quotas, and Fanyang Mansion because it is Beijing, so there are only 100 quotas, so the original Hebei Province actually has 190 quotas.

Compared with Yunnan, which has a total of 20 qualifications, candidates from Hebei Province have a higher chance of being a Jinshi. However, in comparison, every move that can be solved is only killed in the sea of blood in this corpse mountain, and it is indeed a leader.

After eating the flying locust Tengda and drinking the champion red, Director Liu personally took the gong and drum team that had been prepared long ago, and beat the gongs and drums all the way to send the ninety lifters of the Dao to the examination room of the Gongyuan Academy.

He prepared a large horse for each of them, and each of them wore a large red flower on his chest, and there were people from the concert hall in front of him to help clear the way.

This team walked on the long street, which attracted attention, and allowed the Hebei lifters to pass the street treatment after a high school jinshi in advance.

This year's examination is held on the 9th, 12th and 15th days of the first month of February, so it is also called the Spring Festival.

The examination was presided over by the Ministry of Rites, which was originally to be presided over by the Ministry of Officials at first, but later the emperor gave this task to the Ministry of Rites.

After receiving the qualification to preside over the examination, it is said that the whole Ministry of Rites was overjoyed, and even mobilized the small treasury of the Ministry of Rites to give everyone a bonus as a sign of celebration.

The emperor appointed the chief and deputy examiners of the examination, of which there were four chief examiners and nine deputy chief examiners, and the four chief examiners were Fang Xuanling, the right attendant of Zhongshu, Du Ruhui, the left servant of Shangshu, Wei Zheng, and Wen Yanbo, a scholar of Hanyuandian University.

The nine deputy examiners are all purple-robed ministers above the third grade.

The four examiners, all of whom are Zaifu, show that the emperor attaches great importance to this exam.

2,300 people who had been relieved of their quotas were to take the examination of the Ministry of Rites in Beijing, and more than 20 students from the six capitals plus the Guozijian were to compete for 230 jinshi here.

1 out of 10.

Although compared to Xiucai's 30 out of 1 and 20 out of 20 people, this is undoubtedly a higher admission rate, and it may be that of the 2,300 people who go to Luoyang Gongyuan, which one is not a great candidate. Even the eighty lifters who got the relief from the Guozi Prison were fought out of more than 10,000 classmates.

There are more than 12,000 students in Guozijian, and because most of them are children of aristocratic officials, the competition for the eighty quota is also very fierce.

The exam is divided into three sessions, one on three days, and all candidates are in the same examination room of the Gongyuan.

Before entering, you must search your body, you are not allowed to bring anything into it, and you are not allowed to bring in even the clothes on your body, and you will be issued by the Ministry of Rites with clothes, quilts, paper, pen, inkstone, and even candles.

Each candidate has a single room in the Gongyuan, and during the examination, they eat and live in this semi-enclosed small room, and they are not allowed to leave, and they eat, drink, and sleep in it.

The outside of the Gongyuan was blocked by the forbidden army early on, and no one was allowed to approach.

Even the meals delivered to the candidates were taken care of by the forbidden army enclosed in the Gongyuan.

After the examination paper is handed in, it is handed over to a special copyist who is responsible for copying the paper, and then the name is pasted. In the end, the papers sent to the marking officials will not reveal the slightest information about the candidates.

The examiners didn't know whose papers they were reading, the names were all sealed, and even all the fonts were the same.

Moreover, all the exam papers are cross-reviewed, and finally they are handed over to the four examiner presidents to review each paper together.

This is the greatest possible possibility to avoid cheating, and there will never be another such as the imperial examination in the Sui Dynasty, where the examiner admits scholars based on the candidate's life experience and reputation, so there is no need for the scholars of this year's imperial examination to visit those noble officials or celebrities everywhere as before, and submit their own poems to seek fame.

After the entrance examination, there is no fixed ranking of jinshi, but only 230 jinshi are admitted.

As for the ranking, it has to be hand-picked by the emperor in the final palace test.

After several days of intense exams, the candidates came out, but the Gongyuan was still closed.

The thirty examiners, nine deputy chief examiners, four chief examiners, and many officials who were responsible for transcribing and obscuring their names were still locked up in the Gongyuan.

After three consecutive days of deliberation, the thirteen chief and deputy examiners finally judged the final 230 Jinshi papers.

"In this order, remove the names and present them to the Son of Heaven."

Although there is no definite ranking of Jinshi after the examination, it is the official ranking, and before the palace examination comes out, in fact, after the examination is marked, there will also be a first place, called Huiyuan, and the rest are called tributes.

"Please invite the secretary and supervisor, the inner chamberlain, the palace supervisor, the secretary of the Ministry of Rites, and the imperial historian to come and open the seal together!"

The five purple-robed ministers entered the Tribute Academy, and they were responsible for supervising the witnesses, witnessing the opening of the examination papers and checking the original papers.

"Let's see who Huiyuan is!"

"It's definitely Ma Zhou!"

The five ministers did not participate in the reading of the file, but they all estimated that this time the meeting was very likely to be Ma Zhou.

When the name of the test paper that was judged to be Huiyuan was revealed, the name on it was revealed.

"Wow!"

"Sure enough!"

"It's really King Ma Zhou Ma Bin!"

"This guy, it's great, this is already five yuan in the company, above the Golden Palace, I'm afraid that I will win another champion, this is six yuan in the middle!"

"Liuyuan High School, this son will be the prime minister in the future, and the future is immeasurable."

Even Fang Xuanling couldn't help but sigh to Du Ruhui, as Jinshi in the Sui Dynasty, Fang and Du were also selected by the imperial examination, but the original imperial examination was completely different from this imperial examination.

If it is according to the current process rules, they don't know if they can still enter high school after removing their family's reputation.

A guy like Ma Zhou, who can go all the way for five yuan, is really rebellious.

"No wonder His Majesty gave him eight grades, but he refused, he really has the ability."

The secretary and supervisor Wang Qi and others compared Ma Zhou's original volume again, and found that Ma Zhou's characters were actually better, and there were no mistakes in the whole volume, and it was also very clean and tidy.

"Present these two hundred and thirty original scrolls to the saints!" Imperial Doctor Zhang Yichen said.

The examination papers were sealed again, stamped with the seals of thirteen examiners and five overseers, and then personally escorted into the palace by the general of the forbidden army and presented to the saints.

After Luo Cheng saw this box of test papers, he didn't wait to see the performance, but asked directly, "Who is Huiyuan?" ”

"Hebei Shizi Ma Zhou Ma Bin Wang, the thirteen examiners unanimously judged his test paper to be the first place in the examination, and no one objected!"

Hearing that Ma Zhou really won Huiyuan, Luo Cheng laughed.

"This Ma Zhou, I really didn't disappoint me, it's good, open the box, I want to see what is written in his volume!"