Xie Jianze was right.

In mid-October, the Xuchang paddock assassination case came to an end. Although the men in black who were assassinated were completely wiped out, leaving no survivors, the three justices found on the body of the man in black the waist of Zhao Song's banned army. card, so this assassination case was closed on the grounds that the previous rebellion was against the remnants.

The officials responsible for guarding the paddocks, such as the head of the palace, the commander of the commander, the commander of the deputy commander, and the marquis of the city of Yu, had more than 30 officials in their ranks due to dereliction of duty or dismissal, home raids, or exile.

Most of these officials are of honorable background. Even if they are not, they are inextricably linked with honors and honors. Among them, the commander Yu Qian is the son of Duke Shen, who is also one of the six founding fathers of the country. was stripped of the title.

For this reason, the First Prince's Party is in a hurry these days.

This is probably the only thing that can comfort Emperor Tianming and the third prince Qin Shi.

The next day, Li Zhe, the chief censor of the Zuoyao capital of the Duchayuan, said: "The origin of the prince's country is also the foundation of the prince's country.

Li Zhe belonged to the eldest prince Qin Yu. Xie Jianze could think of things that Qin Yu could not have imagined. It seemed that he was determined to be good at it. Meng Ze knew.

To this, Emperor Tianming only replied: "I understand what Aiqing means, but the prince's feet are used to save me from being lame, and I can show that every day with a firm heart. What's more, although the prince is lame, he is still the heir apparent. There is no reason to abandon the direct son and replace the concubine."

For this reason, that afternoon, the great eunuch He Mu arrived with the imperial decree of the Emperor of Heaven.

Hundred taels of gold, 10,000 taels of silver, one hot spring village, hundreds of brocades of various colors combined, and some miscellaneous things, the value is even more expensive.

The Emperor of Heaven has always been generous in acting.

After declaring the decree, the eunuch He Mu personally helped Meng Zezhi up: "The court, who does not know that Your Majesty loves you the most, so Your Highness does not need to take the gossip outside to heart."

Meng Zezhi was moved: "If you are lonely, why do you have to work with us?"

As he said that, he took a purse from the hand of the maid of the palace and put it into He Mu's hand: "This is a little bit of care, please have some tea with you."

He Mu didn't shirk: "Then I would like to thank His Royal Highness. Since the decree has been announced, our family wants to go back."

"Okay." Meng Zezhi tilted his head: "Huihui, send He Banban for Gu."

"Yes."

As soon as He Mu left, Meng Zezhi changed his face on the spot. He grabbed a jade Ruyi and sneered, "King Yan (the first prince Qin Yu), hehe."

Then he seemed to think of something, his face was gloomy, and he gritted his teeth: "Also, Prince Rui (the third prince Qin Shi)."

After he finished speaking, he threw Yu Ruyi back into the tray with a thud, and said coldly, "Mangui, go and ask the Ministry of Personnel to come over to Mr. Xu Minglang during the matter, and he said that he has an important matter to discuss with him. "

"Yes."

The maids and eunuchs on the side looked at their noses and noses and watched their hearts, silent, and pretended that they didn't hear anything, but they didn't know what they were thinking.

Two days later, Xu Minglang, a newly promoted candidate for the township examination in Zhili (prefectures around the capital) in the 20th year of the Mandate of Heaven, took part in the scientific examination, and he himself was the son of a prostitute.

He also brought out Mu Ping's fellow countryman Zong Youde to testify.

According to the Dagan Law, four types of people, including prostitutes (prostitutes), excellent (players), Li (executors), and Zao (military servants), and their descendants, were not allowed to take the imperial examinations.

As for counterfeiting, it refers to counterfeiting of the country of origin. In the imperial examination system, the number of students (scholars) who can take the exam and the number of admissions are limited, and the admission leniency and strictness are also different. To take the test, the old scholar must return to the place of his native place to take the test, and he is not allowed to take the test with a foreign nationality. However, in order to take advantage of opportunities, some scholars go to places with low competition pressure to take the exam, which is called fraudulent registration.

Mu Ping’s ancestral home is Henan’s chief minister, and his biological mother was a prostitute from a local Jiaofang Division (official brothel). He was not qualified to participate in the rural examination. In order to avoid people’s eyes and ears, he went to the capital to participate in the imperial examination, and finally won the Juren.

You must know that in the Qian Dynasty, Juren already has the qualifications to be an official.

Emperor Tianming was furious, and immediately ordered Mu Ping to be arrested and brought to justice, removed from his fame, and ordered a tribunal to hold a joint trial.

According to the law, famous scholars enjoy privileges such as being free from the cane.

The tortured Mu Ping soon confessed, but it turned out that his biological mother had a dewy relationship with Xie Qingyun, the left servant of the Ministry of War, and Mu Ping was also Xie Qingyun's son. The father and son met three years ago, but because Xie Qingyun's wife was a tigress, Xie Qingyun did not dare to bring Mu Ping home, but kept him outside.

It was Xie Qingyun who helped to change his household registration.

The case should have come to an end here, but Wen Sijing, the minister of Dali Temple, discovered a strange thing.

Before Mu Ping met Qingyun, he was just a gangster on the street. He didn't know a single big character. He did a lot of stealing things on weekdays. No matter how smart he was, he couldn't even pass the county in just three years. Exams, government exams, hospital exams, and township exams are all successful.

Otherwise, it would be a shame to call those scholars who have studied hard for more than 20 years and failed to pass the exam.

Under his investigation, he found that there were too many typos in the Zhu Mo scrolls that Mu Ping participated in the rural examination, and the sentences in the articles were not smooth at all.

The so-called vermilion scrolls, because each person's fonts have obvious differences, in order to prevent the same examiners participating in the scoring from recognizing the candidates' fonts through handwriting and giving them special care, the imperial court specially formulated the cinnabar ink scroll system.

This system stipulates that candidates will use ink pen to answer the papers. After the exam is over, they will be handed over to a special examiner who will check the examination papers including the scratch paper one by one, and then hand over all the examination papers to the transcription officer. The transcript officer will re-transcribe all the test papers with a cinnabar pen, and the examiner can only see the red papers of the candidates.

Moreover, according to the regulations of the subject field, the test papers of the test candidates must be clean and tidy, and there should be no typos and alterations. Once found, the admission qualification will be directly lost. If there are too many typos, they will not be allowed to participate in the imperial examinations for ten years, or they will be directly revoked.

How could such a test paper be selected?

In the 20th year of the Zhili Township Examination, a total of 100 students were recruited from high school, and Wen Sijing, the minister of Dali Temple, immediately organized manpower to review all the test papers of these people. After investigation, a total of nine test papers have the same problems as Mu Ping.

A case of fraud in the imperial examination turned into a fraud case in an instant.

All of a sudden, one chief examiner, two deputy chief examiners, and seventeen fellow examiners who presided over the Zhili Township Exam that year were all imprisoned.

Half a month later, the case came to light.

This involves another method of cheating in the imperial examination, that is, the scholars taking the examination can write some words that can be used as marks in the examination room as a piece of paper in advance, and give it to the same examiner participating in the marking.

Because the style of the imperial examinations in the Qian Dynasty adopts the eight-part prose, and the beginning and end of each paragraph of the eight-part prose will use some function words, such as 'qiefu', 'just', 'yi', etc., what is written on the note is Such meaningless but essential words. In this way, the same examiner can take this note, find the test paper, and secretly manipulate it, which is absolutely safe.

And the identities of these nine cheating candidates are not ordinary, and most of them are from honorable backgrounds or children of official families.

To this end, they each paid at least 5,000 taels of silver to the examiner.

The Emperor of Heaven was furious.

The chief examiner was immediately rectified, and his wife’s property was confiscated from office; the two deputy examiners were immediately hanged, and his wife’s property was confiscated from office; the examinee who bribed the examinee was punished with a cane, and his family property was confiscated.

Wen Sijing, the minister of Dali Temple, belonged to Meng Zezhi.

Xie Qingyun, the left servant of the Ministry of War, was born in the mansion of Duke Xinguo. Duke Xinguo was also one of the six founding fathers and a die-hard supporter of the eldest prince Qin Yu.

One of the deputy examiners, Ji Shandao, the left servant of the Ministry of Rites, is the father-in-law of the third prince Qin Shi.

The six founding fathers folded in two at once, and that night, all the porcelain in the residence of the eldest prince Qin Yu was replaced.

Ji Shandao was born in a poor family, and has served as a sacrificial wine in the Imperial College for several years. Although his official position is not high, he is better than noble.

Emperor Tianming has always protected the third prince Qin Shi very well. In order not to attract attention, even the family background of the prince and concubine he pointed to is much lower than that of other princes.

The predecessor did not want to disclose this case, not only because these same examiners and the parents and brothers of the cheating candidates had his people or people who supported him, but the most important thing was that the chief examiner and the minister of households, Gao Dengbing's wife and brother are Qiu Mingyuan, the current commander of the Ma Junsi of the bodyguard.

The front division of the hall, together with the guard Ma Jun division and the guard infantry division, are also called Sanya, and they govern the front divisions, straight divisions and the national forbidden army.

The predecessor did not want to offend Qiu Mingyuan because of this, and even used it as a bargaining chip to recruit Gao Denbing and Qiu Mingyuan.

Meng Zezhi didn't have so many worries.

He is also not afraid that the Emperor of Heaven will not be fooled. After all, he trades in an irrelevant left servant of the Ministry of Rites (the father-in-law of the third prince Qin Shi) in exchange for a chance to attack Xungui (the six founders of the country, the first prince's party), why not do it? .

It's just that in the eyes of outsiders, killing 1000 enemies will damage 800, Meng Zezhi's move is really a bit self-indulgent.

They all thought that Meng Zezhi did this to avenge the third prince Qin Shi who had caused his lameness and the eldest prince Qin Yu who made a fuss about his lameness.

"Qin Hao." Qin Shi slammed his fist on the bed and said bitterly, "I am at odds with you."

Because of this incident, the good reputation he finally accumulated was completely ruined. Who made Ji Shandao his father-in-law?

At this moment, Emperor Tianming couldn't care about comforting Qin Shi, he frowned: "Prince seems to be a little reckless and irritable these days."

Just because he had a lame leg and was stimulated by Qin Yu, his heart changed greatly?

It is unlikely that the prince is not so vulnerable.

Just thinking about it, the great eunuch He Mu hurried in and whispered a few words in his ear.

Emperor Tianming frowned immediately: "What?"

Qin Shi reacted: "Father, what's wrong?"

Emperor Tianming sighed: "There is news from Longwei that the Xie family is secretly investigating your affairs."

This is probably the handwriting of the prince.

Yes, when he was assassinated that day, he was in a hurry and helped Qin Shi first. The prince has always been thoughtful, he must have seen something.

This can also explain why the prince has been emotionally disturbed recently.

Emperor Tianming's fingers that tapped on the table suddenly stopped, and he was calm, thinking that he knew what to do next.

The author has something to say:

The fraud case in this chapter refers to the Wuwu Branch case during the Xianfeng period of the Qing Dynasty