The person outside the window knocked on his window again, and called out to him in a suppressed voice, "Junqi, open the window, it's me." ”

Lu Xu?

Yan Junqi pushed open the window, and sure enough, he saw Lu Xu's head smiling. Lu Xu stuffed the fried snail to him through the window, told Yan Junqi to open the door, and the person ran away.

Yan Junqi was stunned, and went to open the door with the lamp, and Lu Xu was already waiting outside his door.

"I see that the whole village is a little light here, can't you sleep?" Lu Xu lowered his voice and asked him energetically.

Yan Junqi: "......"

No, he's actually quite sleepy and wants to sleep.

Visitors in the middle of the night, although the time is not very suitable, but the visitor is a guest, so familiar, and he also brought a courtesy, he is not good at turning people away, Yan Junqi let Lu Xu into the study.

Lu Xu tiptoed in and went in softly, Yan Junqi unconsciously shrank his hands and feet, and inexplicably gave birth to a kind of thief's weakness in his own house.

Lu Xu saw that there was a book on his desk and asked, "Why are you still reading so late?" ”

Yan Junqi nodded, his voice revealing a little imperceptible bitterness, "The autumn test is going to be in the hospital." ”

"Oh......"

The imperial examination is a single-plank bridge.

Lu Xu had just been tormented by the college entrance examination, and he was very sympathetic, and he admired Yan Junqi very much for a student like Yan Junqi who wanted to break into a single-plank bridge, and after thinking about it, this admiration was beyond words, so he had to encourage him with action.

Lu Xu grabbed a handful of fried snails in Yan Junqi's hand: "Learning should also combine work and rest, come, eat some snails to replenish your brain, and then continue to memorize after resting." ”

Yan Junqi had a handful of sauce on his clean hands.

This time, Lu Xu came prepared, and just folded two bamboo branches outside as sticks.

They don't grow bamboo here, the climate is not suitable, and only the fastidious people only plant a few bamboos. There is a row of bamboos planted outside the courtyard wall of Yan Junqi's house, which his father exchanged with others when he went to sell mats - he heard that people who read love bamboo, and they are elegant and dignified, so he carried it back to his son.

After five or six years of growth, the pavilion and green bamboo have become patches.

Yan Junqi learned from Lu Xu to pick out the snail meat with a skewer.

The two ate snails for a while, and Lu Xu asked, "Is your shoulder broken?" ”

Yan Junqi nodded, "It's broken." ”

Lu Xu: "Hey, I guess so." ”

He shrugged his broken right shoulder and showed it to Yan Junqi, "I'm wearing out the skin, you must wear it out." Will you be in the market next time? ”

Yan Junqi thought about it and nodded.

Lu Xu: "Then I'll go to the third uncle's house next time to borrow a board car for you." ”

Yan Junqi asked, "Aren't you going?" ”

Lu Xu made a lot of money selling snails.

Lu Xu grinned, "I plan to go to the county to sell it, and I'll go tomorrow." ”

Yan Junqi was stunned, with some admiration.

Lu Xuwu said to himself, "Sell more expensive, make more money, and buy back the land sold by my family as soon as possible." After speaking, he was a little stunned, "I don't know if I can do it." ”

The two pillars of the new family glanced at each other, and ate the snails in silence.

The wick was about to run out, the lamp shook, Lu Xu clapped his hands and pinched the corduroy from the basket by the window, the lamp in the study was uncertain, Yan Junqi suddenly said, "I don't want to study anymore." ”

"Why?"

"I only took the children's exam twice, and I only took the exam last year, and I don't know how many times I have to take the college exam, and I have passed the college exam, even if I have passed the exam, there will be autumn and spring, and ......" Yan Junqi's eyes showed endless confusion. When he was young, he only felt that he was smart, reading interestingly, and he should study to enter the office, and serve the country and the family, but after reading for a long time, he knew that the sea of learning was endless, and the scientific examination was long.

What's more, books and paper are expensive, and it is not easy for a farmer to study, his father died, Wenzhen is still young, and the whole family will rely on his mother's embroidery to earn money to support the family, and he can't learn!

"I can make up the table, although the craftsmanship is not as good as my father, I can get by if I make it slower, and when I save some money, my family will have a better life, and then I will study for Wenzhen."

Lu Xu didn't say a word, he felt that it was nothing if he didn't like to read, he didn't like to read, he couldn't learn, and his family didn't expect him to study, but he didn't like to read because he couldn't learn, he didn't go to cram school, he stayed up all night, and there were teachers who came to his home for one-on-one tutoring, so he barely squeezed into the middle.

But Yan Junqi is different.

After years of conscription and conscription, the people are panicked, and their lives are still not safe, who still has the heart to study? They have six villages in Yinma Town, adding up to less than five scholars, and Yan Junqi is a lone seedling who is admitted to the Tongsheng Child. Don't think about the school, no! Enlightenment has to go to the county. Yan Junqi doesn't even have a teacher, he is completely self-taught, so he can be admitted to the Tongsheng student like this, isn't he a genius?!

And how old is Yan Junqi, he will only be fifteen years old in a few months! The first time I took the exam, I was only 12 years old, and I was only 14 years old last year! At such a young age, he dared to carry his burden to the county and the government to take the exam, he was quite nervous to participate in a competition outside of high school, Yan Junqi was much better than him no matter how he looked at it.

He was still worried that he couldn't get into a second university, Yan Junqi had such a good talent, how sorry was it to give up like this?

Lu Xu said: "I remember hearing your father say that you were only three years old when you fled the famine, and the scholars in the same car read poems, and you can memorize them after reading them once, and you can write your name only once if you are taught them once, they were amazed, and praised you again and again for being a genius, and taught you to read Mongolian books on the road, and you memorized them in half a month. Wenzhen is also three years old, you teach him to read poems, can he listen to it once and memorize it? ”

Yan Junqi was silent.

"Ugh." Lu Xu sighed, no! Yan Junqi taught Wenzhen and Lu Zhou to memorize poems, and their Lu Zhou memorized faster than Wenzhen.

"Junqi, your father is gone, my father is gone, I know you are in a hurry, and I am also in a hurry. Lu Zhoulayue They are still young, my stepmother's personality is soft, she cries at every turn, your family depends on you, my family depends on me, what do you think I can do? If you hadn't given me ideas, I wouldn't have thought I would be able to sell snails. ”

"Let's go to the market, don't look at me, I seem to be quite confident, in fact, I don't have a bottom. If I hadn't taken you with me, I'd have found a place to sit and I wouldn't shout, and I'd sell it if anyone asked. I won't take the initiative to sell snails to the pharmacy shopkeeper and bargain with those aunts, and I don't like to talk to strangers. But if I don't go, my snails won't sell, and your table will have to be sold at a low price, so what's the matter? I was the one who proposed to rush to the market, I am still older than you, I can't let you lose, so I can't be afraid, I have to be an example for you. ”

Lu Xu stared at Yan Junqi seriously, he had never talked to anyone so much when he was so old, "Junqi, you can't be afraid, if you are afraid, what will your mother do, what should Wenzhen do?" Don't think about it, the money is too slow, you can't farm, you can't do anything else, study hard, don't waste it after studying for so many years, the goal doesn't have to be set too far, you can be exempted from forced labor in the exam, and you can also be exempted from field tax. How many acres of land can we exempt from Daqixiu? ”

Yan Junqi: "The densely populated prefectures and counties in the south can be exempted from 50 acres, and our Jinyuan is vast and has few people, so we can be exempted from 80 acres." ”

"Eighty acres!" Lu Xu's eyes widened, what a big piece of land! "Even if Wen Zhen grows twenty acres, he can still rent sixty acres, but these fields can always earn rent for you, how much grain does your family eat in a year, isn't this more cost-effective than making a mat?"

Lu Xu settled accounts with him.

Daqi fought for more than 10 years, and the land tax rose from 1/10 to 203, that is, from 10 percent to 15 percent, and then deducted the excesses and miscellaneous taxes, and almost 5 percent had to be paid, and the tax exemption could save 20 percent of the grain, one-fifth! What a bargain! Five acres of land is equivalent to one acre for white, and eighty acres is equivalent to sixteen acres for white.

"With these fields, your family will not have to worry about eating and drinking, when the time comes, you will only have to study, it is better to be able to be admitted to the lifting of people and jinshi, and if you can't pass the exam, you don't have to worry about food and clothing, if you want to study, you don't want to study, you can plant flowers and drink tea, just play!"

Yan Junqi was stunned when he heard this, as if the eighty acres of land were already in his pocket. This show hasn't been seen yet, why have you even figured out how to use it?

"You don't have to worry about the money now, I see that there are still a lot of mats in your house that have not been sold, and I will help you find a way to find other money, the way will definitely be more than the difficulty, I promise that before your mat is sold out, you will definitely come up with another way for you." After imagining the future, you have to be down-to-earth, after eating snails, Lu Xu washed his hands and patted Yan Junqi on the shoulder, and walked home by himself without disturbing him to study.

Yan Junqi is his first friend in addition to his brothers and sisters, and he is also a scholar.

In the past, there were many top students in his class, and his parents were willing to spend money to stuff him into the key classes of key schools, but the teachers and students in the class actually didn't like him, and they thought he was poor in his studies. Later, he studied hard, and his grades were rolled to the middle stream, but they still looked down on him. They don't play with him, and he doesn't play with them, and he is his indifferent scumbag every day with a cold face.

He knew that they gave him a nickname behind his back, calling him a brainless and cold-faced young master, and whoever dared to do so in front of him, he would fight with them.

Anyway, if you learn well, you generally don't have any fighting skills, and you don't like to form gangs to beat him, and he is not afraid of calling parents as parents.

Yan Junqi is willing to talk to him, that is, to treat him as a friend, although he is a scumbag, he has also learned "The king treats me as a countryman, and I will repay him as a countryman", to his friends, he is righteous!

Lu Xu went home satisfied, feeling that it was really worth staying up this night, having more friends, more burdens to help friends find a way out, and life was heavy, but it seemed to be a little more real than yesterday.

He has to earn more money, and after the worst of all, he hires Wenzhen to catch snails for him, and he pays Wenzhen's wages!

Here Lu Xu fell asleep soundly, and over there Yan Junqi lit up the oil lamp. Lu Xu said whimsically, which made his heart more steady.

College exam, show talent.

After being admitted, their family will no longer be worried about food and clothing, his mother will not have to embroider every day and night, and Wenzhen will not have to stare at other people's homes if she wants to eat sugar and meat.

Unable to hear the movement, Yan's mother came out of the bedroom by the moonlight, stood in the courtyard and leaned on Yan Junqi's window to look, and saw that Yan Junqi was reciting the book seriously, with a calm and firm expression, so she smiled softly.

Chapter 10: It's all about acting

As soon as the sky dawned, before the sun crossed the shade of the mountain, Yuan Manniang knocked on the door and called Lu Xu up.

Go to the county to get the town to take a boat, go a little early, arrive a little earlier, maybe you can sell out early and come back early.

Lu Xu divided the money he earned last time, one article for Layue, one article for Lu Zhou, he left fifty yuan, thirty yuan to take a boat, and the remaining twenty yuan for backup, and the rest was given to Yuan Manniang.

After breakfast, Yuan Manniang sent Lu Xu out, Lu Xu passed by Yan's house, stood by the window, and Yan Junqi really got up to study. He shouted by the window, "Junqi, I'm leaving, help me take care of my younger siblings." ”

Yan Junqi pushed open the window, Lu Xu waved at him, grabbed the basket rope and strode towards the dock.

Facing the daylight, the more you walk, the brighter the sky becomes.

From the town of drinking horses to and from the county seat, a trip of fifteen wen, Guanyang County in the upper reaches of the town of drinking horses, when going against the water, a basket of goods to pay more than five cents, back to the water, with goods without money.

Yuan Manniang used to go to the county to buy New Year's goods, but when she went, she didn't pay it before, and she forgot to add money. After Lu Xu handed over the twenty papers, he was a little distressed.

He still has to leave fifteen wen back, so that there is only fifteen wen left.

Most of the people who went to the county in the morning were selling goods, and Lu Xu saw an old man carrying a basket of mulberries on his back, a little greedy. When I asked, the mulberries were not cheap, a pound cost forty wen, and he couldn't afford to eat the meat when he was about to catch up.

Under the mulberries are neatly pressed wild vegetables, all bundled, neat and neat, and they look more tender than the ones picked by Yuan Manniang.

It takes a day to pick such a basket of wild vegetables.

There were also those who sold eggs, live chickens, live ducks, and rabbits, and they were all bound with their feet and wings, and they were crowded in the bilge.

There was enough boatload of people, and the sky was completely bright. The boat swayed and went against the current, the speed was not fast, and it took more than an hour to walk from Yuma Town to Guanyang County.

The boat traveled west through Lujia Village, and Lu Xu saw Yuan Manniang taking Layue to wash clothes by the river. Layue saw Lu Xu with sharp eyes and shouted loudly to her brother.

Lu Xu beckoned to them, "Brother is back to buy you candy to eat!" ”

The boat turned around on the west side of Lujia Village and gradually moved away.

Lu Xu sat down with his back to the sun, hugged his arms and took a nap, and then there were mountains on both sides of the riverbank, far from the county seat.

When he arrived at the county seat, Lu Xu first smelled a fishy smell.

There is only one wharf in Guanyang County, where the transporting of goods, transporting people, and selling fish are all here, and the government has divided the area, and the fish sellers are in one place, the unloading is in one place, and the passenger ships are in the middle.

Lu Xu got off the boat, looked left and right, the price of fish is about the same as in the town, but the big fish is much more than in the town, most of them are alive, packed in wooden basins and barrels, if they die, they can be cheaper for three or five cents, some people who are not rich want to eat cheap fish, just wait by the fish stall, and wait for a while to always meet the one who has just died, and the big ones are not fresh and don't want them, they must be alive and full of scales, and they are picked up and let the guys push the cart and fill the barrel to send home.

Lu Xu looked at it strangely.

On the other hand, most of the goods are still transported.

In the war in the north, half of the grain collected from their county to the east and south had to pass through Guanyang, because there was a wharf, people came and went, and the people of Guanyang were also rich in the entire state capital.

Lu Xu lined up to enter the city with the crowd of people who went into the city to sell vegetables, and if he didn't encounter the imperial court to arrest important criminals, he could enter the city after a simple inspection by the city guards. Generally, they only look at whether they are carrying murder weapons and knives, ask about the purpose of entering the city, and ask where they are coming from if the accent is not local.

When it came to Lu Xu, the city guards casually slapped him a few times and searched him, and asked him customarily: "What are you doing in the city?" As he spoke, he lifted the cover from the basket.

Lu Xu unloaded the basket, took two pockets of fried snails and handed them to the two city guards, "The snacks made at home come to the city to buy and sell, Master Jun, you can taste them." ”

The young city guard looked at the older one, the big one nodded, he took it and pinched one and put it in his mouth, "The taste is okay, it's delicious." ”

The old man said, "You are a farmer, pay a penny, go in." ”

Lu Xu thanked him, handed over the money and carried the basket into the city.