Chapter 426 Talent Selection
Gu Changqing shook his head. “No, the King of Jin wants to establish his authority. It would be more shocking to kill Wei Yue in person than to assassinate him. Since Wei Yue has already left, assassinating him is meaningless and will also damage his credibility. The King of Jin will not do such a stupid thing.”

Lu Heming sneered and said, “That’s not necessarily true. If Wei Yue took the governor’s seal away, the King of Jin would definitely kill him.”

“Brother Gu, have you got the governor’s seal?” Zhu Lie asked.

Gu Changqing shook his head. “The governor’s seal was taken away by the King of Jin. I am only the acting governor. The King of Jin gave me a letter of appointment.”

Zhu Lie smiled and said, “Actually, what we care about is whether Brother Gu can get the position of governor.”

Gu Changqing hesitated for a moment and said, “I don’t know either. This should not be up to him. It is decided by the court. The court’s rule has always been that officials from the north are chief officials and officials from the south are deputy officials. I don’t think the court will break this rule.”

“That’s not necessarily the case!”

Zhang Zhaoguang smiled and said, “It depends on whether Prince Jin is willing to protect you. I think if Prince Jin wants to completely control Jiangnan Road, cooperating with the Southern Aristocratic Family is a good way. If he protects the interests of the Southern Aristocratic Family, then the Southern Aristocratic Family will also support him.”

Zhu Lie agreed, “That’s right. The key is still benefits. If we can give benefits to the King of Jin, but the Guanlong nobles can’t, he will know his choice.”

Lu Heming snorted coldly: “Do you know what his interests are?”

The day after Xiao Xia returned to Jiangdu County, the Jiangnan Road civil servant recruitment examination began. About three hundred scholars from various counties in Jiangnan competed for sixty places.

After all, this was not an imperial examination, but only a recruitment of civil servants, so outstanding scholars looked down on this kind of recruitment, and those scholars who were determined to change their destiny through the imperial examination would not come. Just for these two reasons, 90% of the scholars abandoned the recruitment examination.

Most of the scholars who actually came to take the exam were second-rate sons of major families, basically children of concubines. The legitimate sons and first-rate sons were reserved for the imperial court.

The clerks in the Jiangnan Dao General Administration Office were like chicken ribs. These aristocratic families found them tasteless and it was a pity to throw them away, so naturally they let their less important children come to take the exam.

Although Xiao Xia was very anxious, Gao Jiong did not adopt Xiao Xia’s suggestion to take the exam in advance. Instead, he adopted Xiao Xia’s other suggestion and asked students from the provincial school to help. These students worked very hard. With their help, all preparations for widening Shanyang Du were completed, and 150,000 laborers were basically in place. They were just waiting for an auspicious day for the project to officially begin.

In the morning, Xiao Xia, accompanied by Liu Wenjing, arrived at the examination site, Jiangdu County School. The county school had specially closed for a day to vacate the school building.

Gao Jiong was devoting all his efforts to preparing for the start of the canal construction and was too busy, so Liu Wenjing was appointed as the chief examiner.

“We have done our best this time. We paid for their round-trip fare, food and lodging in Jiangdu. They won’t lose anything if they fail the exam. Maybe they can even get a nice souvenir.”

“What souvenir?” Xiao Xia asked with a smile.

Liu Wenjing smiled and said, “Mr. Gao and I discussed that these students were basically sent by the Jiangnan families. In order to feel the support of the Jiangnan families, we decided to give each scholar who came to take the exam a sheepskin.”

Xiao Xia happily said: “Sure!”

They have hundreds of thousands of high-quality sheepskins, and giving out three hundred of them as a favor is no big deal.

The three of them walked into the county school. The examination had already begun. The scholars were all writing. The examination content was very simple. It tested “Mencius” and “The Analects of Confucius”. There was a designated passage for dictation, and there were five questions in total.

Testing on Mencius and the Analects is just the beginning. First, the unlearned and unskilled playboys are eliminated. Then the calligraphy is examined, which is the selection of the best.

It is a consensus among everyone that as long as a scholar is willing to practice calligraphy diligently, he will definitely be good in other aspects as well.

Xiao Xia saw from the window that the scholars taking the exam were all very young, mostly in their early twenties, and all of them had decent looks. The aristocratic families also wanted to save face and would not send ugly children to take the exam.

Xiao Xia nodded repeatedly and asked Liu Wenjing, “Are they all illegitimate sons of various families?”

Liu Wenjing nodded. “Basically, all of them. There are only five from poor families in Jiangdu County. The rest are illegitimate children. They all submitted their resumes when they signed up.”

Xiao Xia was a little puzzled. “We offer a high salary, so why are the poor students unwilling to take the exam?” Liu Wenjing smiled slightly and said, “We have discussed this question and have basically come up with an answer!”

“Tell me, what’s the reason?”

“There are three reasons. First, studying is too expensive. Children from poor families cannot afford it. They can only learn a few words at most. First of all, in terms of quantity, there are very few children from poor families who study. Second, children from poor families who can study well are basically excellent. They look down on our clerks and only want to take the imperial examination to become officials. Children from poor families are more concerned about fame and fortune.”

“It seems that these candidates are not very good!”

“That’s true. The truly outstanding scholars will not take the civil service examination.”

“What about the third reason?” Xiao Xia asked again.

“The third reason is that we have a misunderstanding of children from poor families. We think that only those who are born in a low-class family and have a poor family background are called children from poor families. In fact, this is not the case. Most of the illegitimate children of aristocratic families come from relatively poor families. They can only study with the financial support of their families.”

Xiao Xia understood a little bit, pointed at the examination room and said with a smile: “Most of them are from poor families?”

Liu Wenjing smiled and nodded, “Just look at their clothes and you’ll know. Less than 10% of the candidates are wearing silk.”

Xiao Xia looked at it for a moment, then said to Liu Wenjing, “There are no mediocre people in the world, it’s just that most people don’t have a chance. There’s no need to limit it to 60 people, almost anyone can be admitted. I will expand the army and government offices next year and recruit more reserve clerks.”

“I’ll remember this!”

Xiao Xia thought about it and said, “Let’s tell them something up front. If we find out that they are engaging in prostitution or gambling, their employment will be cancelled.”

“Don’t worry, Your Highness. I have already told you.”

The exam is over, and the scholars are walking out of the county school in groups of three or four. The results will be out the day after tomorrow, and they can stay in Jiangdu comfortably for two days.

The government provided food and lodging for this exam. The General Administration’s Office booked three large inns and housed 300 scholars together, with three people living in each room. Basically, everyone in the same dormitory became good friends.

The exam was over and everyone was going to have a drink because they had done well and everyone was in high spirits.

One of the scholars from the Xiao family in Jiangdu was called Xiao Ning. Of course, he was a bastard. There were more than twenty bastards in the Xiao family. Most of them practiced martial arts, and some studied. Xiao Ning practiced martial arts for two years, but found that he did not have the aptitude for it, so he switched to studying. In the future, he would be a steward like the sixth brother.

There are several illegitimate sons of the Xiao family like him, for example, Xiao Gui and Xiao Ju, who solved the case with Xiao Xia and Xiao Zhurong. They also turned to studying because they were not good at martial arts, but both of them were not as good as Xiao Ning, so the deputy head of the family, Xiao Gui, asked Xiao Ning to take the exam.

There were two other people with Xiao Ning, one was called Xie Jun, from Xuancheng County, and the other was called Lu Miao, from Wu County. Both were illegitimate sons of aristocratic families, but their family conditions were poor and they could only wear cloth clothes.

However, their families gave them travel expenses for taking the exam this time, more than ten strings of cash each, but they basically did not use it. Now they can go out for a drink and celebrate, and have a good meal. Previously, it was announced that they were not allowed to visit prostitutes or gamble, but going to the tavern should not be a problem.

The three of them came to a small restaurant. There were not many people eating at noon, so they found a seat by the window on the second floor and ordered a pot of wine and some delicious dishes.

Xie Jun smiled and said, “I heard that the King of Jin came to inspect the examination room today. Brother Xiao should have seen him!”

Xiao Ning nodded. “When he came to the Xiao Mansion in Jiangdu, we all thought he was a descendant of the Xiao family in Luoyang. It was not until he returned to the capital that we found out that he was actually the grandson of the emperor. I have seen him before, but we have not interacted much. He practices martial arts, and I study literature.”

In fact, Xiao Xia also studied in the Xiao family school for two years, but the Xiao family members looked down on him and ignored him, so Xiao Xia always kept to himself.

Xiao Ning didn’t dare to tell this matter, for fear of being ridiculed by his two friends. He had a clear opportunity to become successful in the future, but he didn’t seize it.

(End of this chapter)