Allure of a Country Maiden
Chapter 1108 - 1105_1

Chapter 1108: Chapter 1105_1

By the time Shangguan Xuanyi returned to his room, Xiao’er had already heard about their conversation from Yang Liu.

In fact, cheating in the Imperial Examinations happens every time. What matters is whether the cheater is cunning enough to avoid detection.

This sort of thing cannot be completely eradicated. If you have a clever scheme, others may have ladders to scale the walls. There is always a wall that can be climbed.

However, over the years, the majority of the examiners chosen are known for their integrity and high reputation, so the chance of manipulation has been greatly reduced in the examinations.

"Is Jinghao all right?" Xiao’er asked.

"He’s fine. Someone probably tampered with his food with a drug that affects his sleep pattern. I’ve ordered someone to look into it." The drug wasn’t poisonous, and it wouldn’t be detected by a silver needle. It just made a person sleepy at improper times and very alert during times when sleep is expected.

Once the effects of the drug passed, the person would be unaffected.

"The cheating methods have certainly become sophisticated! They’re not leaking the questions or smuggling in cheat sheets; instead, they’re manipulating the mental state of the academically inclined. By causing them to underperform, the cheaters can then climb up the ranks.

Many people tend to think that if you go to the examination hall and your routine is thrown off due to unfamiliar surroundings, that’s normal. After all, adapting to a new environment isn’t easy. Some examinees from other regions even have problems with acclimatizing to the Imperial Capital’s environment, suffering from diarrhea or vomiting. Many people encounter such issues and when it happens, you can only blame it on bad luck!

This method of cheating is much more sophisticated than smuggling in cheat sheets, and it might not even raise suspicions among the students," Xiao’er sighed.

"Could it be that those who bribed the examiners were actually quite scholarly, but were worried that they wouldn’t rank high enough, so they took the risk?" Yang Mei suggested after hearing this.

"That’s possible, it depends on who benefits the most," Xiao’er replied.

Luckily, Jinghao was truly gold that fears no fire. He could stand up to any test. Even if he couldn’t, she had prepared invigorating brain pills for him. He simply couldn’t escape his fate of being top scorer!

...

The matter was soon clarified. Jinghao’s intuition was right - it was indeed Master Lin’s doing.

But he was not bribed by anyone; he just couldn’t resist the huge temptation of overnight wealth.

Therefore, he tampered with Jinghao’s food, only intending to affect his performance and prevent him from taking first place.

The reason was simple, his wife was a notorious gambler, and the odds for Jinghao not achieving the top scorer in this Imperial Examination were one thousand to one.

But no one was willing to buy such high odds.

When Master Lin’s wife saw this, she used all their family savings to bet on Jinghao not taking the first place.

She then returned home and told Master Lin about it, asking him to spike Jinghao’s food with the sedative she occasionally gave to her mother-in-law during the examination. This would disrupt his routine and make him underperform.

When Master Lin first heard of this, he was almost furious to death!

He had an elderly mother at home who needed medicine daily. Those savings were meant to be his mother’s life-saving money!

His wife then said: "I knew those silver taels were my mother-in-law’s life-saving money, that’s why I took them to gamble. With odds of one thousand to one, if the second son of the Marquis Shengping Mansion doesn’t achieve the top scorer, we’ll have over 200,000 taels! Does mother-in-law still need to worry about not having money to save her life?!

"Over 200,000 taels, you can’t earn this much money in your lifetime as an official!."

"With over 200,000 taels, you might as well not be an official! We can use this money to open a shop somewhere else and start a business! Many people have opened workshops and made a lot of money! There’s a sister of mine who opened a tofu workshop. They sell their tofu products to other counties and cities. Now they’re rich and they eat delicacies from the mountains and the sea every day. They live a much better life than us!

"As an official, your monthly salary barely covers our expenses. My mother-in-law needs medicine and we live a very tight life. If it weren’t for our shop, providing us with some income, we would be eating the northwest wind long ago!"

"Besides, haven’t you said before that students often faint or suffer from diarrhea or vomiting due to acclimatization problems at the examination site? All you did was giving him some sedative to mess up his routine. Anyone would see this as a common occurrence. Nobody would notice!"

Master Lin was influenced by his wife’s words, after much contemplation he decided to go ahead with the plan.

A return of one to one thousand! His wife had bet all of their over two hundred taels of silver on Jinghao not achieving the top scorer. If Jinghao did not, they would have 250,000 taels - a sudden fortune overnight!

With this over 200,000 taels, why would they fear their mother’s illness being a bottomless pit that they could never cure?

Indeed, the temptation was too great!

Furthermore, his wife had a point - even as an official, he wouldn’t make over 200,000 taels in his lifetime. And with over 200,000 taels, it didn’t really matter whether he kept his official position or not.

That day at the examination site, he saw the test papers - the difficulty was immense. Many were furrowing their brows over it. Not many would have studied the obscure history that was being tested. But he saw the second son of the Marquis Shengping confidently answering questions. He must have read all about it! He was sure to come first in this examination!

With that, their over two hundred taels of savings would be lost all at once! His mother was currently ill and with the huge expenses at home, it would take years to save it back!

He thought that even if he gave Jinghao some sedatives, with Jinghao’s confidence, he would certainly still achieve the rank of tribute student, only not the first. As long as he got that rank, he could still take the imperial examination and it wouldn’t affect him becoming top scorer.

Jinghao would still be a top scorer in the future, his life wouldn’t change. But if he didn’t achieve the top scorer this time, Master Lin’s life would undergo a huge transformation. Thinking about this, Master Lin couldn’t help but poison Jingrui with the sedative the doctor prescribed for his mother.

What he didn’t expect was that he ended up biting off more than he could chew. The drug did affect Jinghao’s sleep pattern, but it clearly didn’t impact his ability to answer the questions well. He was still able to complete the paper perfectly well in the limited half day!

What he knew even less was that Jinghao was suspicious about it! And he had noticed that it could possibly be his doing!

The moment Shangguan Xuanyi summoned him, he had a bad feeling. But he comforted himself, the test papers were not yet all marked, the results hadn’t come back, Prince Rui couldn’t possibly figure out so quickly that it was him.

He was so guilty that when Shangguan Xuanyi asked him to confess truthfully with a stern face, he was so intimidated that he confessed everything immediately.

And so, in this way, Master Lin lost his silver and his official position!

Of all people to provoke, he chose such a savvy person. It was just like shooting himself in the foot with a rock!

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