Chapter 12: Lu Beigu

In short, County Magistrate Li’s move has given me a fair chance to compete. Over the next two months, I must devote all my effort to preparing for the county examination—poetry, prose, and classical texts all need catching up on.

You focus on your studies; I’ll handle things at home.

Pei Yan’s voice was soft, yet like a fine thread, it settled firmly on Lu Beigu’s heart.

By the way.

She suddenly remembered something: “Is that wound on your forehead really just from a bump?”

Earlier, Aunt Wang had been nearby, so she hadn’t dared to ask in detail, fearing Lu Beigu had been bullied by classmates at the county school.

Of course—it’s just that I got lost reading while walking and stumbled.

After dinner, Lu Beigu sat by the courtyard gate and thought quietly for a moment.

He came here because the room was far too dark, and at least here there was moonlight, allowing him to see clearly enough to draw with pebbles on the ground.

Lu Beigu picked up a pebble and, based on urgency, wrote down the three tasks he needed to tackle on the sandy ground.

One: In one week, accompany Li Pan to meet that “very important person.”

Two: Earn enough money within a month to buy books and rent a house in Hejiang County.

Three: Within two months, make up for his severely weak subjects, pass the county examination, and successfully advance to the prefectural school.

In terms of time, preparing for the county exam seemed least urgent—but in reality, Lu Beigu was most anxious about it.

Because the county exam determined whether he could advance from the county school to the prefectural school!

In the Song Dynasty, scholar-officials indeed held high status.

But the problem was, most people “only saw others eat meat without seeing them get beaten,” and no one mentioned how staggeringly low the pass rates were—from county to prefectural to provincial exams.

Take the county exam, which wasn’t even part of the formal imperial examination system.

Over the past few years, Hejiang County School averaged only five students per year who passed the county exam.

—That’s roughly a 2% pass rate!

In the last monthly test, which didn’t include poetry or policy essays but tested classical texts and prose, his scores were Classical Texts: Bing-Middle, Prose: Bing-Low, ranking 198th out of the county school.

He was essentially at the bottom among 220 students; how easy was it to make up for lost ground in poetry, classical texts, and prose within a short time and reach the top 2%?

Moreover, though he seemed to have over two months to prepare, there was an information gap: never judge ancient travel speed by modern standards.

Traveling from Chengdu to Hejiang via water down the Yangtze was slightly faster, but the return trip still took six or seven days; if pressed for time, one could not travel upstream by water from Hejiang to Chengdu—only the land route along the river’s official road was viable.

Although the Song Dynasty’s official roads were fairly well-developed, with relay stations every twenty li and inns every forty li, traveling by horse between the two places—even without reckless sprinting—took about ten days.

And one couldn’t possibly stay in Chengdu for just one day and return, could one?

Thus, though it seemed he had over two months until the county exam, Lu Beigu actually had only a little over one month to prepare.

Improving his scores was not only time-critical but also immensely demanding.

Because apart from policy essays, he had to catch up on everything else.

Of the exam components—poetry, prose, and classical texts—the easiest to improve was classical texts, requiring only rote memorization.

Ordinary scholars who diligently memorized the Analects could typically answer six or seven out of ten questions.

I say this because, besides forgetting answers, examiners could be utterly perverse.

How perverse?

They didn’t just cut out surrounding context—they’d leave only one or two characters, often ones repeated frequently in the Analects.

The most extreme example: the question contained only two characters—“Zi Yue.”

Of course, real cases weren’t this extreme; some hints were usually given.

To determine the original passage, one had to rely on punctuation.

Fortunately, the Song Dynasty already had punctuation.

Had he been transported to before the Song, he’d have had to decipher sentence breaks himself.

Still, the Analects totaled only about ten thousand characters; though this body’s memory was weak, Lu Beigu had his own memorization method.

Thus, he believed he could raise his classical texts score to eight or nine correct answers within a short time—even all ten, if lucky.

As for poetry and prose, he needed to become familiar with rhyme schemes, formats, and themes, then train extensively to prepare fixed templates.

So improving poetry and prose wasn’t especially hard—just time-consuming.

For Lu Beigu, the hardest was prose.

Though prose questions came from the Spring and Autumn Annals and the Book of Rites, these texts were no simple matter—especially the Spring and Autumn Annals, famed for its “subtle words, great meaning.”

Since the Han and Tang dynasties, Confucian classics had been the foundation of aristocratic family legacies, and thus, over centuries of transmission, many schools of interpretation arose for the same text.

Different schools gave entirely different interpretations of the same phrase, even the same character; even the Song court couldn’t produce a standardized answer key.

Moreover, after the Qingli Reforms, the court encouraged prose exam questions to emphasize the candidate’s personal understanding.

So while some questions had accepted standard answers, many had none at all.

Yet heaven never closes a path: Song Confucians favored direct pursuit of the classics’ meaning over transmitted commentaries, focusing more on the historical nature of the Spring and Autumn Annals—many prose questions tested understanding of its historical events.

Even for questions based on commentaries, patterns existed: one could study the Three Commentaries on the Spring and Autumn Annals or the Five Classics Justice, or directly examine the writings of the “Three Masters of Early Song”—Hu Yuan, Sun Fu, and Shi Jie—on the Spring and Autumn Annals and the Book of Rites.

Sun Fu was the most important Spring and Autumn scholar of early Northern Song; he centered his interpretation on “honoring the king,” differing significantly from the Three Commentaries, and authored Twelve Scrolls of The Spring and Autumn Annals: Honoring the King and Three Scrolls of General Discussion on the Spring and Autumn Annals.

The Spring and Autumn Annals: Honoring the King had an especially profound influence on Song Confucianism and was one of the reference texts for prose exams.

Thus, Lu Beigu needed to study prose strategically, spending minimal time to maximize score gains.

“By the post-Qingming monthly test, I must raise my classical texts and prose scores to the top 20 in the county school!”

“Within two months, while keeping my policy essays at Jia-Middle or higher, I must raise classical texts to Jia-Low or above, poetry and prose to Yi-Upper or above, and prose to Yi-Middle or above—to enter the top five in the county school!”

“Only then will I have a chance to enter the prefectural school!”

Lu Beigu rubbed out the charcoal marks with his shoe sole and stamped his foot.

Beyond this, he carried another concern: after the Cold Food Festival, he must accompany Li Pan to meet that “important person,” and he needed to prepare his words carefully.

After all, his plan sounded shockingly radical.

As for money, Lu Beigu was merely troubled.

Though buying large quantities of books and renting a house for household registration transfer both required funds,

Lu Beigu believed his talent would solve this problem—he wouldn’t let his sister-in-law worry further.

Even so, when he rose and saw the stone table in the courtyard, now without its ledger, he sighed sincerely.

“A single coin can defeat a hero!”

(End of chapter)