Poet Immortal, Poet Sage, Duke of the State!

Three days passed in the blink of an eye.

Just past noon, with several deep drumbeats, the two heavy, lacquered main gates of the examination hall slowly opened to the sides.

The attendants, servants, coachmen, and family members of the examinees who had been waiting in the square all rushed over, their eyes fixed on the blue stone passage inside the gate.

A moment later, the first figure finally emerged from the examination hall.

To be precise, it was the second figure.

Because three days earlier, Chen Chang'an was the first person to leave the examination hall.

Following Chen Chang'an, no one submitted their papers early.

This is normal; in fact, in all previous imperial examinations, it was rare for candidates to submit their papers early.

After all, this exam concerns their future and destiny. Many candidates will carefully consider their papers after submitting them, looking for any revisions to their essays, any adjustments to the wording of their poems, and any better strategies for their policy proposals...

They didn't finalize the draft until the morning of the third day.

One after another, candidates emerged from the examination hall. Few of them had a rosy complexion; most were pale or sallow, and they walked unsteadily, as if a gust of wind might knock them over…

The three days at the examination hall were extremely difficult to endure.

Not to mention how mentally taxing the exams were, the food at the examination hall was barely enough to fill one's stomach, and the wooden plank beds were pitifully small, making it difficult to eat or sleep properly. Most of the candidates came from relatively well-off families, and this was the first time they had ever experienced such hardship...

Almost everyone who came out of the examination hall was exhausted, hungry, and had aches and pains...

Zhang Huaiyu walked at the front of the crowd. Although he was also feeling unwell, he still pretended to be calm and collected, with even a faint smile on his lips, which was in stark contrast to the other candidates.

One of Zhang's attendants immediately stepped forward, took the examination certificate and household registration document from his hands, and asked with a smile, "Congratulations, young master! You're sure to be admitted directly to the Hanlin Academy this time!"

Zhang Huaiyu dusted off non-existent dust from his sleeves. At this moment, the attendant spoke again, "By the way, young master, that Chen Chang'an, he gave up on the exam on the very first day!"

"What?"

Upon hearing this, Zhang Huaiyu's face showed an extremely surprised expression. That kid made such a big fuss to send the examinee off, inviting all ten of the most beautiful courtesans in the capital, but he gave up on the exam on the first day?

The attendant continued, "He entered the examination hall and came out three hours later; many people saw him..."

Zhang Huaiyu shook his head, no longer wanting to think about it.

Whether Chen Chang'an gave up the exam or not was not his concern; he only cared about whether he could get into the top tier.

Qian Baiwan leaned against the wall of the examination hall, gnawing on a pork knuckle while listening to the steward talk about Chen Chang'an's decision to abandon the exam.

He had been eating steamed buns and pickled vegetables for three days, and he was really craving them.

The Qian family steward asked, "Young Master, how did you do on the exam?"

Qian Baiwan, gnawing on a pork knuckle, mumbled, "It's so-so..."

Before the imperial examination, his father spent no less than 100,000 taels of silver to hire a famous teacher to help him with the exam questions.

In his father Qian Wanguan's words, the Qian family is not short of money, but they lack someone who can study and become an official, so as to improve the feng shui of their home.

He didn't guess anything from the imperial examination essay; he just wrote whatever came to mind.

Poetry was alright. The Qian family spent a full ten thousand taels of silver to buy him a hundred poems, and he spent two years memorizing them all.

In this imperial examination, he accurately predicted six images in his poems and wrote them all down.

As for policy proposals, his father spent the most money on that.

They hired ten tutors to teach him policy essays every day, and spent a lot of money on exam predictions before the exams. Surprisingly, they actually predicted the salt administration and the imperial examination reforms correctly.

As for the final commercial tax reform, although he didn't predict it correctly, he had many ideas of his own and wrote a long and detailed article about it...

He felt good about himself; as for whether he would pass the exam, he said it was up to luck.

As for Chen Chang'an, the courtesan poet, Qian Baiwan wasn't particularly interested in his poetry, but he was quite keen to do business with him...

After the imperial examination ended and the candidates left the examination hall, they immediately learned from those around them that Chen Chang'an, who had been the most prominent candidate before the examination, had already given up on the first day.

Upon hearing this news, many people were secretly delighted.

After all, the imperial examination was a true battle of thousands against a single-plank bridge, with nearly 10,000 people participating in the provincial examinations, but ultimately no more than 100 were admitted.

Having one less strong competitor is certainly a good thing for them.

Soon, the discussion about Chen Chang'an ceased.

As the gates of the examination hall slowly closed, this year's imperial examination officially came to an end.

For them, there was only one thing left to do: wait for the results to be released.

Before the papers were graded, the examination hall had a strict procedure to ensure the anonymity and fairness of the exam papers.

After the exam papers are handed in, the candidates' names will be covered up first.

Then, a special transcriber would use a vermilion pen to copy the candidate's exam paper exactly as it was written. This way, the examiners would only see the content of the exam paper and would not be able to identify the handwriting, thus preventing the examiners from recognizing the candidate's identity through the handwriting and thus making a biased score.

The exam papers copied by the scribes will be compared with the originals by a separate person to ensure that the content is accurate.

The transcription and comparison process will last for three days.

Three days after the provincial examination ended, at dawn, the examiners, dressed in official robes of various colors, lined up and entered the examination hall.

They walked through the bluestone passage, passed through the examination cells, and headed straight for a two-story pavilion at the deepest part of the examination hall.

That is the Wenhua Pavilion, built specifically for reviewing examination papers.

In the center of the first floor of Wenhua Pavilion, there are three huge long tables.

On each long table, nearly ten thousand exam papers were neatly arranged, separated into three categories: essays, poems, and policy discussions.

These exam papers have been transcribed. The papers are clean and neat, and the handwriting is in regular script. In the upper right corner of the exam paper, there is only the candidate number, not the name.

The examiners took their seats in several halls of the Wenheng Pavilion according to the subjects they were responsible for.

Articles in this category have always been reviewed by the Hanlin Academy.

Apart from the newly appointed Jinshi (successful candidates in the highest imperial examinations), most of the scholars in the Hanlin Academy were senior scholars who had devoted their lives to scholarship. It was most appropriate for them to review the articles.

The poetry and prose section was overseen by ten renowned literary figures specially appointed by the imperial court.

Of these ten examiners, Li Yannian, a former Grand Secretary of the Hanlin Academy, was the chief examiner, and Gu Huaiyuan, the former Chancellor of the Imperial Academy, and Shen Bo'an, a renowned Confucian scholar from the capital, were the deputy examiners.

The outstanding works selected by the other seven examiners will be reviewed by the three examiners for the final evaluation, and they will give the final score.

The final policy essay was reviewed by officials from the six ministries.

Among them, the policy proposals on salt administration and commercial taxes were reviewed by the officials in the Ministry of Revenue who were in charge of salt, iron and commercial taxes.

The reform of the imperial examination system was jointly undertaken by the Ministry of Rites and the Ministry of Personnel.

As the marking officially began, the only sound inside the Wenhua Pavilion was the rustling of pages turning...

A residence in the south of the city.

Qing Shuang looked at Chen Chang'an, who was lying in a rocking chair in the courtyard basking in the sun, and couldn't help but ask, "The grading starts today, why aren't you in a hurry at all?"

Chen Chang'an closed his eyes, basking in the warm winter sun, and said calmly, "The exam papers are all handed in, there's no use in rushing, just wait patiently..."

Qing Shuang paced back and forth in the courtyard, angrily saying, "You're not worried, but I am! You have no idea what those people outside are saying about you. They say you can only write brothel poems, and you're exposed as soon as you get to the exam hall. It's infuriating..."