Fortunately, the weather is neither cold nor hot now, and most candidates wear lined robes, making the search relatively easy.
Each item in the examination basket must be checked, including breaking open the buns candidates bring in to check for hidden notes.
The Autumn Examination consists of three sessions, on the ninth, twelfth, and fifteenth, each lasting three days, totaling nine days.
During this period, candidates eat, drink, and sleep in their tiny examination rooms.
Jiang Youzhi’s room is the second one in the front of a long row. Upon entering, he glanced around disdainfully; it was too dirty.
With thousands of examination rooms, one can’t expect the governnt officials to clean them properly for you.
The room had stone slabs, with weeds growing tall in the crevices, and there were cobwebs and dust everywhere.
Jiang Youzhi didn’t enter at first; he lit a dicinal herb ball given by Yun Jiao and threw it into a corner, then stepped back a bit.
Soon, all kinds of bugs crawled out from the wall crevices, centipedes and cockroaches were among them.
The herbal smoke was particularly thick, and soon the whole room was filled with rolling smoke, which also spread to the corridor outside.
When the smoke cleared, the floor was littered with the corpses of various insects.
Jiang Youzhi found a broom. Just as he was about to start cleaning, a clerk ca over, "Does the young master need help?"
Jiang Youzhi had heard that these clerks in the examination hall earned so silver by serving tea and water or doing so tasks for the candidates, taking advantage of the opportunities their surroundings provided.
Jiang Youzhi tossed a piece of silver over, "Clean it up."
The clerk took the silver and worked diligently; he cleared away the cobwebs and dust from the top of the room, pulled the grass from the stone crevices, and cleaned up all the insect bodies on the floor.
After cleaning, the clerk also helped Jiang Youzhi hang an oilcloth.
The examination hall had no doors, so the oilcloth served as a curtain, used to shield from rain just in case.
After hanging the oilcloth, he pinned cloth drapes around the walls so that when sleeping at night, it’d be clean.
Then Jiang Youzhi took out the realgar powder Yun Jiao prepared for him and sprinkled it along the edges of the room.
Realgar is used to ward off snakes. Since the examination rooms are only opened once every three years, you can find all kinds of creatures inside.
A "snap" sound ca from the right side of the room, followed by a man’s voice, "It’s already August, why are there still so many mosquitoes!"
Jiang Youzhi calmly took out the specially formulated mosquito repellent flower dew given by Yun Jiao and applied it all over his arms and neck.
The man in the room to the left of Jiang Youzhi was wearing a purple silk robe, indicating a well-off family. He stood outside, watching a clerk clean his room, observing Jiang Youzhi’s every move.
Seeing Jiang Youzhi sprinkling realgar and applying flower dew, the man discreetly sneered.
Just then, they suddenly saw a man leading two clerks running from the roadside to the front row of rooms.
In no ti, the clerks were carrying a man out.
Several other people were also following.
The man in the purple silk robe walked over to inquire, "What happened to him?"
Soone replied, "He was bitten by a poisonous snake that darted out from under the eaves."
The man gasped and stepped back two paces, suddenly turning his head to look at Jiang Youzhi.
Jiang Youzhi was casually fanning himself, exuding an undeniable aura of nobility.
The man in the purple silk robe approached Jiang Youzhi with a humble smile and cupped his hands, "Young master, I noticed you had so extra realgar. Could I borrow so?"
Jiang Youzhi didn’t say anything; he reached into his examination basket and handed over the unused realgar to him.
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