Chapter 92: Another Great Merit, Wealth Should Not Be Exposed

Leaving the martial arts hall, Liang Qu didn't even have time to put down the medicine bag and rushed to the academy.

Tomorrow is New Year's Eve, and today is the last day of class at the academy. After this, it will be a seven-day Spring Festival holiday. He should naturally come here once to show his face and explain.

Otherwise, if he didn't see anyone for half a month, he was afraid that he would be misunderstood as being lazy and tired of learning because of his status as a personal disciple, leaving a bad impression.

The sunlight spread flatly along the clouds, the walnut wood table reflected the shadow of the window, and the entire room was dyed with a faint crimson color.

The children were dressed in uniform clothes, sitting straight, with focused expressions.

Si Hengyi, who was teaching, glanced through the window and caught a glimpse of Liang Qu's figure. He didn't even care about lecturing on the classics and hurried out, bumping into Liang Qu.

"Mr. Si?"

"You finally came. Hurry and go with me to see the Mountain Chief!"

"See the Mountain Chief?"

The Mountain Chief, that is, the host of the academy, is responsible for the organization and management of the academy, and also shoulders the responsibility of teaching and educating people, so there are also titles such as "Master" and "Main Lecturer," similar to the later principal.

Liang Qu didn't know why Si Hengyi wanted to take him to see the Mountain Chief.

"The 'Pinyin Method' you showed me last time is truly a wonderful idea. I gave it to the Mountain Chief the next day. The Mountain Chief praised your idea, studied it with the Hall Chief and the Lecturer for several days, improved your method, and started trying to teach it yesterday.

Just started contact, it's hard to see the effect for the time being, but I believe that in a few more days, it will definitely be much faster than the current method of teaching! The number of characters that can be learned every day will definitely increase several times!"

Liang Qu was surprised. He didn't expect Si Hengyi's movements to be so fast, but it was exactly what he wanted.

He brought this thing out to get an invention reward.

He didn't dare to think about a low-level title, but earning some silver or getting a tax exemption privilege was good.

Naturally, the faster the better. If he could get it done before May, it would be even better, and he could save a sum of summer tax money.

Under the guidance of Si Hengyi, Liang Qu met the Mountain Chief, an old man with white hair in a blue robe, sitting in a small pavilion, named Zhao Ji.

"Student Liang Qu, see the Mountain Chief."

"No need for courtesy."

Zhao Ji raised his hand to support him, and without much nonsense, placed several stacks of paper on the table. "Take a look. What is the difference between the improvements made by me and several lecturers and your original idea? Are there any better suggestions?"

Liang Qu reached out to take the papers and read them page by page.

The number of sounds on this version was less than the seventy-six he summarized, only sixty-three, including twenty-three initials, twenty-four finals, and sixteen whole-syllable recognition syllables.

The characters chosen were also simpler. Some couldn't even see what the initial radical was, and the difference from the character system itself became greater. One stroke could draw it, and the difference between them was also greater, so they wouldn't be confused.

Some pronunciations were changed so that Liang Qu himself didn't recognize them, but after reading the characters marked with Pinyin behind them several times, he could recognize them.

The Mountain Chief was really amazing. This could almost be called a version iteration.

Major repairs and changes, the framework remained unchanged, and the content changed a lot!

"Qu is convinced! It's much better than the student's version!"

Zhao Ji shook his head: "It should be me who is convinced by you. If it weren't for your whimsical ideas, I'm afraid I would never think of using symbols to annotate sounds in my life, and would only fall into the trap of using characters to annotate characters, separating the pronunciation, which not only is not easy to deform, but also greatly simplifies the bloated reverse-cut system."

The bloatedness of the reverse-cut method was obvious to all.

Just the initials for the upper cut had more than four hundred characters, and the finals for the lower cut had more than one thousand characters. Just learning this set of systems was enough to make that group of children have a headache.

The original world was about the same. It wasn't until the Song Dynasty that a monk had a sudden whim to create the Shouwen Thirty-Six Alphabet Table, greatly simplifying the system.

It wasn't until the Yuan Dynasty that they thought of using an independent Tibetan script system to create phonetic symbols.

Liang Qu's appearance was equivalent to a god descending to earth, finishing all the summary of rules and the independence of the system. It could be said to be a master of children's enlightenment!

If the invention award wasn't given to him, who would it be given to?

"It's really that each generation has its own talents." Zhao Ji sighed, "Perhaps only a beginner like you who is not bound by the characters themselves would think of such a whimsical good method.

In my opinion, using another set of symbols to replace character annotation is the most exquisite part. Yang Dongxiong really took in a good disciple. You have high comprehension and good creativity. Even if you don't study hard, you can become a master of martial arts in the future."

Daring to call Yang Shi by his name directly, it seemed that the Mountain Chief's identity was not simple, Liang Qu thought, and on the surface, he hurriedly humbled himself a few words.

"Take another look, is there anything else that can be improved?"

Liang Qu shook his head: "The student is dull. The previous one was already the best method I could think of. This version is better than many, and I think it is very suitable."

"Good, since that's the case, I will report your merit. I don't know if the title can be achieved, but the tax exemption in the future is certain. I can guarantee it here."

"Many thanks, Mountain Chief."

Liang Qu bowed, retreated behind Si Hengyi, studied for another hour at the academy, showed his face, and then went to the pier, rowing toward Yixing City.

He went to see the three beasts.

The water surged, and the three water beasts were overjoyed to see the god again, swimming back and forth on the water surface, scraping out whirlpools, and the covered boat swayed uncontrollably.

The three beasts had grown significantly in size. Needless to say, the two beasts were completely able to compete with the covered boat he was on in terms of length.

"Fist" had grown to more than a foot high, and its raised double pincers reached Liang Qu's knees. Ordinary fish couldn't escape its double pincers at all.

The Heavenly Water Centipede, A-Wei, felt the rich water vapor, slowly peeled off Liang Qu's wrist, crawled into the water, and floated quietly on the water surface, looking very comfortable.

After all, it was a "Water Centipede."

Gadagada gadagada.

A pair of dark red small horns were clamped by "Fist." It jumped onto the bow of the boat, its six feet moved quickly, holding the double pincers flat, and placed them in Liang Qu's hand.

Liang Qu took the red horn. It was the horn of that ox-horn pomfret, vermilion, glowing with oily luster, looking like jade at first glance.

He rubbed it in his hand and was surprised to find that it was a large pair, two inches long. Was that fish not a small ten jin?

He had eaten an ox-horn pomfret weighing over a jin before and obtained 1.8 water marsh essence.

The actual meat yield of ox-horn pomfret was not high. There was no exaggerated proportion of more than fifty percent for specially edible fish, only about forty percent. That is to say, when he ate five taels of meat, he had nearly two points of water marsh essence, and the content was very high.

It was the highest variety among the three kinds of treasure fish.

A ten-jin ox-horn pomfret could provide nearly forty points of water marsh essence.

Fist only ate a small point, and the rest of the bulk was for the fat catfish and the pig-mother dragon.

Yesterday Liang Qu went to kill mountain ghosts, and the two beasts found a red-blood perch again. He thought that the two beasts were about to evolve, and he was busy, so he didn't come over.

The red-blood perch went into the stomachs of the two beasts, also having five or six points.

【Can consume 6.2 points of swamp essence to evolve Taihua Crocodile into Horned Wood Crocodile】

【Can consume 8.4 points of water marsh essence to evolve Six-Whisker Catfish into Tiger-Head Catfish】

Just a fraction short.

Liang Qu felt uncomfortable. A total of fourteen points were missing. If he was lucky, one treasure fish would be enough; if he was unlucky, it would take two or three.

He didn't know where the opportunity for evolution was.

Liang Qu encouraged: "Explore more nearby. If you see red-blood perch or tiger-head spot, eat them yourself. Whether you can evolve and when you evolve depends on yourselves. I'll come back later to find them with you."

The fat catfish shook its whiskers, and the pig-mother dragon flicked its tail, both indicating that they would work twice as hard.

Liang Qu nodded and greeted A-Wei to come back.

After A-Wei came to his wrist and turned into a blue bracelet, he rowed to Shangrao.

The two-entry courtyard was about to start installing the ridge beam, so he had to go and place a copper coin to get a good omen.

After finishing, he would come back and explore the water area with the three beasts to make up the last fraction as soon as possible.

"One, two, three, hey yo!"

"One, two, three, hey yo!"

"Put in some effort, you ate solid food this afternoon, why don't you have any strength?"

It was late, and the workers didn't mean to stop working. They carried the large pillar by the dim moonlight.

Carpenter Liu Quanfu stood on the house and roared at the strong men carrying the piles below.

Several big men carried a large pillar and walked in unison, panting. The feeling of sweating in winter was uncomfortable.

Suddenly,

A large pillar that would normally require three or four people to lift was actually hoisted up by a young man, who looked exceptionally relaxed doing so.

Several burly men turned back to look and exclaimed, "Master Liang! Master Liang is back! How could we let you do this? Put it down quickly, we'll handle it!"

Liang Qu carried the pillar and stepped back, avoiding everyone's hands and feet. "What 'Master Liang'? We're all fellow villagers; don't be so formal. Just call me Ashui."

"Liang..." Liu Quanfu opened his mouth, but seeing Liang Qu looking over, he forced himself to change his tone. "Ashui, they've eaten the rice and taken the copper coins, so they should be working. There's no need for you to help them!"

"It's fine, I have plenty of strength and work fast." Liang Qu carried the large pillar alone toward the courtyard, calling back, "Uncle Fu, where should I put it?"

"Just put it right here, just put it right here!"

Liu Quanfu hurriedly ran down from the scaffolding to help Liang Qu lower the pillar.

"Ashui, you're here to check the progress, right? Don't worry, no one is slacking off. We'll install the main beam immediately. Once that's done, I'll hurry to lay the roof boards. We'll leave the side rooms for now, but the main house will definitely be finished before the start of spring. You'll definitely be able to move in."

"It's alright, Uncle. If it's a bit slower, it's a bit slower. I'm not in a rush; I was just passing by to take a look." Liang Qu looked around. "Uncle Liu, which one is the crossbeam for the central hall? Since we're installing the beam, I'll place a copper coin first."

"Look at my memory, I almost forgot about that." Liu Quanfu pointed to the longest and thickest one among the many stacked pillars. "It's this one."

Liu Quanfu took out a small chisel and quickly dug a small hole.

Seeing this, Liang Qu took out a copper coin and placed it inside.

Liu Quanfu found some clay to smear over it, filling the surrounding gaps, pressing the coin flat and firm as he filled it.

This is called "wealth not exposed," and it has a certain effect of attracting prosperity.

Besides this, there are also methods of hanging red-stringed coins or placing money underneath, but there was no need to go through that trouble.