Transmigrating to the Ming Dynasty’s Imperial Examination Ch. 145

Chapter 145

The Jinyiwei sat in the street tea stalls, drinking tea.

As they drank tea and ate snacks, they discussed the cases they had solved and the criminals they had caught, embodying a spirit of serving the country and the people, a clear and pure appearance. When eating, they were polite even to the old man serving tea and water, and did not drive away the people sitting in the stall.

Where was the feared image of the Jinyiwei that caused unease wherever they went? Where were the terrible and ferocious people capable of extortion and intimidation? Were these men in red and yellow robes really the infamous Jinyiwei, or were they impersonators? The guests drinking tea in the stall were all very confused.

Those who could not bear the atmosphere of sitting with the Jinyiwei threw down money and quietly slipped out—as they looked at the bright sky outside, they felt a strange joy of having escaped death’s clutches. In addition to feeling overjoyed, they found that the Jinyiwei were preoccupied and only concerned with eating, drinking and talking. The Jinyiwei had not even glanced their way, making them feel a little disappointed.

Braver scholars, driven by a sense of righteousness in their hearts, remained seated, wanting to see what the Jinyiwei would do. Even if they had to go home, attend academy, or meet friends later…no matter! When they returned and told people they had fought against the Jinyiwei to protect civilians and had been imprisoned, it would be a lifetime honor to say they had faced the Jinyiwei!

As they slowly ate the remaining food, onlookers quietly waiting outside peeked into the stall. The Jinyiwei, however, remained unfazed. After work, they usually liked to change into new waist-hugging robes. They were accustomed to being watched wherever they went due to their handsome appearances and fashionable clothes.

In order to have a flat waist and abdomen so that they could fit into their nice robes, they usually did not dare to eat too much. After drinking enough tea, they left with Xie Ying and merged into the crowd.

As they passed by the scholars with their wide sleeves and robes, who were wasting time picking at sesame seeds and staring righteously, they picked a quarrel and laughed: “How long does it take to drink one bowl of tea? You are hogging the table and preventing others from coming in.”

“Eating so little, yet your waists are so thick—pitiful.”

“Your clothes are so unfashionable. Must be from some rural area. Which scholar in the capital still wears such loose robes except when meeting an Instructor?”

The scholars, embarrassed and angry by how hard the Jinyiwei were laughing, wished they could start a fight—even better if they could get arrested and achieve a lifetime of glory. One indignant scholar turned red and angrily cursed, “Ignorant brutes…”

Xie Ying glanced back and waved to his men, “There are still many good citizens waiting for us to clear out the ruffians. The Emperor, the Battalion Commanders and Commanders-in-Chief are waiting for our report. Do not lower yourselves by speaking to these rural scholars.”

The Jinyiwei, dressed in bright clothes and galloping horses, walked away without looking back, leaving behind a few lonely, righteous scholars in the shed and a group of speechless onlookers outside the shed, looking at each other in bewilderment.

The old man in charge of the stall, following Steward Liu’s instructions, gathered the leftover soup into bamboo tubes and stored the cakes in bamboo baskets to be distributed to the beggars. Soon, even the beggars left, and the old man cleaned the Jinyiwei’s tables, observed the empty tea bowls on the tables of the scholars, then asked if they wanted more tea.

The scholars, disoriented, finally came back to their senses after the old man asked them. They noticed the empty and clean tabletops, “Those Jinyiwei drank tea and did not pay for their food! Old man, you have been wronged. Though we are weak scholars and cannot fight those hawks and hounds¹, we have some compassion and cannot let the old, weak, women and children lose money  like this. These few silverpieces are not much, just take them to supplement your livelihood.”

Onlookers shook their heads and sighed. “Just when we thought these patrolling Jinyiwei would not disturb the people and pay for the amenities after eating and drinking at the store, it turns out they still are like that.”

The old man, surrounded and flustered, hummed a few times in his throat, but no one could hear him clearly. The crowd squeezed closer and closer, asking questions in buzzing voices. His throat was squeezed more and more narrow, his voice suffocating in his lungs. When he got to his limit, he finally burst out, “The boss said not to take money from them! This stall is prepaid; the Jinyiwei eat and drink here for free!”

His shouting was heard several feet away, and the crows of neighbors and guests who were watching could hear it clearly.

Not daring to ask for money and being unable to ask for money are two different things. Those who were originally indignant felt as if a bucket of cold water had been poured over them, leaving them speechless with embarrassment. The murmurs of discussion from the crowd outside changed tone—

The Jinyiwei booked a tea stall to drink tea, did not disturb the public, did not cause trouble, and at most mocked others for their big waists and rustic clothes…Nowadays, it is fashionable in the capital to wear fitted clothes. It was not like wearing straight robes meant that one was fat and it was not like the scholars could not wear slimmer robes, so why be upset?

It seems the behavior of the Jinyiwei was indeed changing.

The crowd began to discuss recent events: the Jinyiwei rescuing two women from a brothel, capturing flower thieves, and arresting a notorious thief who stole a Minister furen’s undergarments in Liu Alley.

A group of people entered the tea house, sat in the seats just vacated by the Jinyiwei, and began recounting these tales. Their vivid storytelling quickly dispelled any lingering resentment towards the Jinyiwei for bullying people, turning them into heroes from legendary novels and stories.

Only the scholar who had been mocked for his size sat down with a gloomy face and ordered the old man, “Bring me another bowl of plain tea, no sesame, walnuts, salt, or tangerine flat cakes… just plain tea!”

Tea, if consumed regularly, can help one lose weight. When he loses weight—let’s see how things go!

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As the ‘Clear Tea’ chain of tea stalls opened, more and more people witnessed the Jinyiwei drinking tea, observing their ordinary behavior while on duty. The reputation of the Jinyiwei gradually began to change.

The first to notice the shift in public perception were Xie Ying and his patrolling officers. Initially, people avoided them, and neighbors were terrified of the Jinyiwei during interrogations. Gradually, people stopped fearing them. Some even used the tea stalls to pass on information about criminals’ hideouts. Using these tips, the Jinyiwei blocked a gang of thieves that scaled walls to rob homes, property and women and resolved several old cases.

Xie Ying wrote to Cui Xie, expressing his deep thoughts: “These days, I have been strict with my subordinates. They are bitter and tired, harboring resentment. Thanks to your tea stalls, they have a place to take shelter from the harsh wind and rain, rest their feet, drink some tea and have some refreshments, and feel better, with the strength to do things. Now, the common people treat us differently…”

Previously, Xie Ying had tried to restrain his men from harming the public while on duty, but not as strictly as now. This time, following the Emperor’s decree to eliminate criminals and interact more with the people, while maintaining a policy of not disturbing the populace, the perception of the Jinyiwei began to improve.

This change was partly due to Cui Xie’s help—

The tea stalls provided by Cui Xie were crucial and not only provided tea and food. Wasn’t the initial purpose of his petition to gain a good reputation among the scholars and to openly associate with Cui Xie?

Without this motive, Xie Ying might have continued to go with the flow and follow old practices of the Jinyiwei.

Of course, these deeper thoughts were not written in the letter; it contained only everyday observations visible to all, even unclosed cases could not be mentioned. Yet, Cui Xie could read the gratitude and self-reflection of the Jinyiwei’s usual behavior behind the plain words.

Cui Xie thought, Xie Ying was truly a good person. From the first meeting, he blocked a fatal blow from the White Lotus Sect Patriarch and gave him top-quality wound medicine. He must be equally kind to others.

If this continues, the day when the military and civilians live in harmony as close as brothers and sisters was not far off for the Ming Dynasty.

He carefully stored Xie Ying’s letter with the invitation from Li Dongyang in the same book box and called Cui Liangdong over, asking him about recent rumors regarding the Jinyiwei—He instructed to only report the good ones, ignoring any about house raids or arrests by the Jinyiwei unrelated to Xie Ying and did not want to hear it.

Cui Liangdong slapped his thigh and said, “How could there be none! At our tea stall, people have been talking about how the Jinyiwei cleverly captured the Black-clad Thief! Young Master does not know, but this thief, named Li Hu’er, was a notorious bandit in the Cangzhou area, later moving to the capital where he committed countless crimes, even daring to rob the residences of Dukes and Marquises. He set his sights on a pipa player named Wang San at Wang mama’s place outside the East Gate, showering her with gold and silver, and even gifting her sets of jewelry belonging to noblewomen. Wang San, adorned with these jewels, looked like the reincarnation of Xi Shi or Mao Qiang…”

Cui Liangdong was addicted to talking, but, Cui Xie, however, did not want to hear this and waved his hand, telling him to skip the unnecessary parts and focus on how the Jinyiwei solved the case.

His enthusiasm dampened, Cui Liangdong could not muster up any emotion for a while and dryly recounted, “It was those headpieces that the investigating Jin Yi Wei noticed. They had seen such items before and knew they were not imitations but items used by high-ranking figures and did not seem to be counterfeit used by merchants outside. So, they set a trap in Wang San’s house and captured the Black-clad Thief when he came to visit her.”

Though the storytelling was lackluster, the plot was intriguing. The Ming Dynasty’s Jinyiwei, carefully investigating brothels in the red-light district, following clues, dug deep into the truth, capturing the infamous Black-clad Thief, made for a tortuous, inspiring and intense tale, worthy of a crime show!

Although the Ming Dynasty did not have television, it did have musical plays and comedies! Last time, when the theater troupe performed at the Three Kingdoms TOP Five event, did the troupe managers not invite experts to revise the scripts?

This story, if turned into a musical drama, would probably be just as good as the Amazing Detective Di Renjie!²

Cui Xie’s blood was boiling with excitement. He clutched his chest and said, “You still have connections with those drama troupes, right? Can you find someone who can write scripts? Such a good story would be wasted if it is only passed around by word of mouth. It would be better to turn it into a play.”

Cui Liangdong, having been told to shorten his story earlier, thought that Cui Xie did not like to hear stories about the Jinyiwei. In the blink of an eye, the Young Master seemed disinterested in the Jinyiwei tales, and the next, he wanted to turn the story into a play. It was really a bit hard to understand what he wanted to do.

Cui Xie glanced at him and said plainly, “Your storytelling is not good enough. Wait for me to write a draft, and then you can find someone to adapt it into a play.” He planned to study how films paced their narratives and climaxes and expand the story into a four-act play, have someone rehearse it well, so as to showcase Xie Ying’s heroism and make him famous.

The pipa player’s character also needed reworking—she should be like Diaochan, a chivalrous woman who sacrifices herself to eliminate evil, while also developing a tragic romance with a Jinyiwei investigating the case during the undercover operation…

Of course, the protagonist could be a fictional character, while Xie Ying would be a high-profile character with few appearances as the fashionable supporting hero.

Thinking this through for a long time, Cui Xie saw that Cui Liangdong was still standing there and asked, puzzled, “Why are you still here? There is nothing else to do here.”

Cui Liangdong, after a long pause with his mouth open, said hesitantly “Young Master can write plays now? No wonder you apprenticed under a Hanlin Academyscholar. If you keep excelling, you will become one of the greats like Guan, Bai, Zheng, and Ma of the previous dynasty!”

Cui Xie was far from those literary giants; at most, he was a struggling writer selling outlines to a novel website. Wouldn’t the full text still require professionals to expand?

Cui Xie shook his head and said calmly, “It is too early to say that. Just buy some scripts for now, and I will study them first.”

Finally understanding his task, Cui Liangdong headed to the Peace of Mind Study to get a complete set of the refined scripts by Prince Xian of Ning and Chancellor Qiu. Chancellor Qiu’s plays were generally unpopular, but Prince Xian of Ning’s were lively and interesting. Cui Xie analyzed the structure of these scripts and then focused his efforts on those films in his hard drive that had been validated by the public.

While Cui Xie was studying art at home, Teacher Lu, who was on vacation in his hometown in Henan, was also studying the art of promotion.

As a juren from a small county, he held a high status there, and receiving gifts at the county yamen was practically a given.

This was part of the officialdom’s unspoken rules. Juren who had passed the second class exam, needed to build networks and connections. Each juren was seen as an achievement and a future colleague by the county magistrates. County magistrates, were often jurens themselves, who had entered officialdom one step earlier, and did not consider themselves superior.

Moreover, Teacher Lu returned back with funds and knowledge to promote education, making him a benefactor of sorts.

Cui Xie never intended to profit from making pencils. When Teacher Lu went back to his hometown, he took all the experience of making graphite pencil cores that he and Little Cui Qi had gathered, investing his own money to donate the produced graphite pencil cores to local schools for free.

Henan, much like Northern Zhili, was poor and lacked a strong academic atmosphere. It was far from being a province that excelled in the imperial examinations; the annual quota of three xiucai was enough to give the County Magistrate and the school officials headaches. With the technology for graphite pencil cores, literacy could be spread more widely. While it might not necessarily produce xiucai, it could at least enable more underprivileged children to read and write, giving them a glimmer of hope.

The local County Magistrate Lu, Teacher Lu’s newly recognized elder brother, upon hearing him mention ‘studying’, immediately selected the best kiln and experienced kiln workers to help him produce graphite pencils of varying hardness and thickness.

When the finished pencils were distributed at the local school, they proved to be quite useful: students could use them to draft essays and write notes, saving a considerable amount of ink and preserving the tips of their brushes. Over time, this could significantly reduce the financial burden on the students.

Seeing the success and feasibility,  Lu da-ren wrote to several County Magistrates he knew to promote the pencils, and Teacher Lu also traveled to different counties, bringing along the 《Collection of Graphite Poems》 and technical notes printed by Cui Xie, to provide technical guidance to local craftsmen.

Several County Magistrates jointly recommended him to Gui De Prefecture, praising the benefits of the new pencils.

The newly appointed County Magistrate Yan, was a second-class jinshi, and unlike the officials in the smaller counties, he was not as particularly friendly towards juren. When he saw Teacher Lu, thin and stern-looking with a dark complexion and a rigid demeanor, his interest waned. Their conversation was dry, stiff, lacked warmth, neither cordial nor funny. County Magistrate Yan’s reception of him was somewhat indifferent.

However, Lu juren was a true scholar with a rich inner life. When he spoke of the benefits of graphite pencil cores, he presented a collection of poems co-authored with his peers and students, handing it over with both hands and smiled, “This is a collection of poems I co-authored with some colleagues and my students while I was tutoring. Hoping da-ren can offer some guidance.”

Mr. Yan had previously seen the《Collection of Graphite Poems》sent by the other County Magistrates, but he had not finished it. The colorful cover looked decent, but the poems he read were all about graphite, accompanied by mediocre illustrations of middle-aged scholars. He quickly lost interest and was too lazy to read anymore.

Now, in Lu juren’s presence, he had to give him some face, no matter how boring they were. Smiling, he said, “Lu juren, this collection is well-printed. This official has heard that Northern Zhili has been producing excellent color-printed books recently and have seen a few, but none are as finely detailed as this one.”

Lu juren laughed, “The young boss of the best color-printing shop in Northern Zhili is the sworn brother of the Young Master of the family I served. He also studies the classics and painting under me, so he took extra care in printing my book.”

Sworn brother of the Young Master? Wasn’t the best printed colored books done by the Cui Beauty? How could this old scholar, with his severe demeanor and pedantic face, be connected to the Cui Beauty!

Magistrate Yan holding back a smile, casually flipped through the pages until he reached a five-character ancient poem. Before he could turn the page, Lu juren lightly coughed, leaned over, and pointed to the page, saying, “This poem was written by the student who helped produce the graphite pencils. He only started writing poetry last year, so his style was still quite immature…”

Oh…it is by one of Lu juren’s students. It is  natural that the work isn’t very good.

Mr. Yan was about to rack his brain for some polite comments when Lu juren quickly added, “Although he has only been writing poetry for a short time, his progress has been rapid. During the two months since the student returned, his natural talent and spirit caught the eye of Academician Li, a scholar at the Hanlin Academy—Recently, I received a letter from home saying that Academician Li has accepted him as a disciple.”

Academician Li… Could it be Li Dongyang, the master of the Chaling poet group? If a student of Lu juren could write poetry that impresses Academician Li, maybe his own appreciation of poetry was outdated?!

County Magistrate Yan was utterly shocked. He rubbed his eyes and read the ancient-style poem from beginning to end several times. The more he read, the more he seemed to find a certain elegance within it. Unable to contain his admiration, he exclaimed, “Indeed, this is a work of great antiquity and simplicity, free from excessive embellishment. Worthy brother Lu, to have taught such an excellent student, you are truly enviable. I must take this collection back and study it carefully. As for the graphite pencils my worthy junior mentioned… there’s no need to discuss it here in the hall. I’ll have a banquet set up in the back hall, and we can discuss it over a meal.”

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Footnotes:

1. Hawks and hounds: running dogs/hired thugs ↩︎
2. Amazing Detective Di Renjie: is a Chinese television series based on gong’an detective stories related to Di Renjie, a Tang dynasty magistrate and statesman. Written and directed by Qian Yanqiu, the series starred Liang Guanhua as the titular protagonist, and was first broadcast on CCTV-8 on 6 August 2004. The series was followed by three sequels, due to its immense popularity. ↩︎

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TN: Have a good rest of your week everyone and enjoy the chapter! I think the Jinyiwei are absolutely adorable, just very misunderstood my the general populace! CX is so cute for always trying to think of ways to help XY ~

Update 12/23/24: I just updated it so that all my advance chapters for TMD are up on patreon (and will be continually updated)! Sorry for being so lazy with it and apologies for taking so long to do so. I had to organize a lot of my random documents after a long hiatus last year.

Announcement: We have set up a kofi and patreon account! If you would like to support us or get early access to advance chapters for Blood-Sucking Empress OR TMD, those options are available for you (in support us page)! I have just added a patreon tier for Transmigrating to the Ming Dynasty’s Imperial Examinations in which patreons can have access to a google document with ALL of my advanced translated chapters for the novel. Since I am a grad student, there should usually be at least 10 advance chapters in the document at a time, but depending on my schedules, there may be fewer or more. I’m currently extremely busy, but I have translated out some new chapters for you all! But, I will still post each week with the same schedule. Thanks!

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