Over the next few days, Lu Changsheng devoted himself entirely to his studies.
His talent for reading and recognizing characters had already reached a genius level, and he learned at a rapid pace.
Almost every day, he mastered a fresh batch of characters.
Along the way, he even picked up a few he had never seen before.
"Knowing more characters will give me a better chance of surviving in the prefecture city!"
He secretly exhorted the other three to study diligently.
A sense of urgency was also growing in his heart.
After all, he was running out of money!
"Heihou, lend me ten copper coins first!"
That day, Lu Changsheng sought out Wang Heihou.
"Here!" Wang Heihou handed them over without any hesitation.
This made Lu Changsheng feel a twinge of gratitude.
He bought two steamed buns, tucked one away on his person for emergencies while eating the other as he walked.
Just as he finished eating, he saw the middle-aged man walk into the study room with a solemn expression.
"Master asked about you today, and I answered honestly. Master's reaction wasn't very good!"
The middle-aged man shook his head at the group gathered before him.
"So be it. Then the day after tomorrow, we shall begin. Whether you succeed or not will depend entirely on your own talent!"
***
"Changsheng! Why is it so soon? We feel like we haven't learned anything yet!"
"That's right!"
During the afternoon meal, the four of them sat together in the courtyard.
Wang Heihou, Niu Dazhuang, and Li Nangua all wore anxious expressions.
"Master must have some purpose in mind!"
Lu Changsheng did not tell them the truth.
The three of them were too young, especially Wang Heihou, whose temperament was rather flighty. If he shared his suspicions, he was afraid the word would get out.
Lu Changsheng had seen plenty of trouble come from loose lips.
The problem either lay with Master himself, or it originated with Zhao Deshui.
Regardless of which possibility was true, there was currently no way to resolve it.
He picked up a stick and practiced writing characters on the ground as he usually did.
"Study hard. Who knows, come that day, you might win Master's favor!"
The three of them could only lower their heads and desperately try to memorize.
Lu Changsheng recalled the characters taught by the Master's student that day, picked out more than a dozen that repeated, and then earnestly copied and memorized them.
Practice makes perfect!
"This light screen panel doesn't show the specific time spent on reading and studying. That's probably because studying and learning characters is too broad a category!"
However—
"That doesn't seem quite right either. Loafing around should also count as a specific skill, yet that didn't generate a specific time either!"
"Is there something about this that I don't know?"
Lu Changsheng pondered for a moment, then shifted his focus back to practicing his handwriting with intense concentration.
In the blink of an eye, two days passed.
The group had only been in Heishan Prefecture for a few days, and toward this unfamiliar place, they naturally held a measure of awe and fear.
Take Zhao Liang, for instance—a veritable little tyrant back in his village, but here, he had to suppress his true nature.
When night fell and everyone should have been asleep, many of the children stole away to secluded spots, using a stick for a brush and the earth for paper, practicing their difficult strokes.
"For the impoverished, trying to climb up is far too difficult!"
Under the pale moonlight, shifting figures drifted like ghosts from the underworld toward the light.
Lu Changsheng sat on the ground, looking at the group of exhausted boys and girls suffering from sleep deprivation, a faint sense of emotion stirring in his heart.
A burst of footsteps approached.
The Master's student and Liang Hu, who was often nowhere to be found, entered the room one after the other.
"Reading is about understanding the 'principle' behind things. Therefore, if you fail the assessment, there is no need to fly into a rage!"
The Master's student gave a dry cough, produced a yellowed book and a ruler, and began testing them one by one.
"What character is this?"
"Year!"
"Wrong! What about this one?"
"Scram!"
"And the meaning?"
"The meaning... the meaning..."
The boy racked his brains, but the characters he had so firmly memorized seemed to have vanished into thin air. The next moment, his face turned ashen, and cold sweat poured down.
"You lack the talent for study! You may leave now."
"Thud!" The boy's knees went weak, and he dropped to the floor, kneeling. "Sir—"
"Son of a bitch! What are you playing at?"
A hand reached down, grabbed the boy by the shoulder, hauled him to his feet, and dragged him outside. A moment later, wailing echoes drifted in from the courtyard.
Liang Hu walked in and sneered, "Studying is the business of the upper classes. If you could beg your way through with a pair of bending knees, it would be far too easy!"
"If anyone else tries these little tricks, don't blame me for being unpolished!"
He grinned, revealing a ferocious expression that left the crowd trembling with fear.
Even the Master's student standing nearby looked shaken.
"Continue!"
***
"Fail!"
"Fail!"
"Fail!"
***
The Master's student rallied his spirits and wove through the crowd.
Abruptly, he stopped in front of Lu Changsheng.
"What character is this?"
"Ghost!"
"Meaning?"
"That to which a person returns is a ghost; that which is crooked is a ghost; that which is quick-witted is a ghost!"
"Pas—"
The word "pass" got stuck in the Master's student's throat.
After all, this answer was not wrong.
He felt a slight ripple of surprise, but didn't dwell on it, assuming it was just a coincidence.
Learning characters relied heavily on memory, and given three to five days, some people could indeed memorize a few.
However, over the past few days, he had written down no fewer than two hundred different characters—that was far beyond what an ordinary person could commit to memory.
So, he pointed to another character.
Yet, a moment later, everyone fell silent.
A trace of shock and hesitation flickered across the Master's student's face.
Clearly, he had not expected anyone here to reach such a level of proficiency.
After a moment of thought, he picked up the brush and wrote a brand-new character on the wooden board.
And this time, Lu Changsheng did not know it.
"Fail!"
Despair washed over the faces of all the children.
"Your talent was actually just a hair's breadth away. What a pity!"
The Master's student said with a sympathetic expression.
Now, everyone knew that Lu Changsheng was practically the benchmark for passing.
If even he couldn't make the cut, they certainly stood no chance.
Sure enough, right down to the very last person, not a single soul passed the test.
"Pack your things and get lost tomorrow!"
Liang Hu commanded impatiently.
***
The chill of early winter began to bite.
Lu Changsheng pulled his cotton-padded jacket—woven for him by his mother—tighter around himself, and his body felt a fraction warmer.
"Changsheng, why don't we just go back? I feel like this year is exceptionally cold!" Wang Heihou said, rubbing his nose.
"If we go back now and run into bandits, we're goners!"
"Those bandits don't go around killing people, you know!" Wang Heihou recalled the imposing, square-faced big man, a hint of admiration and awe coloring his thoughts.
Lu Changsheng said helplessly, "Don't let that bunch of outlaws fool you into thinking all bandits are like that!"
"That's right, Heihou. I often heard my mother say that bandits drink human blood and eat human flesh!"
Niu Dazhuang chimed in.
Wang Heihou suddenly felt a wave of fright wash over him, and then he asked with a vexed expression, "Then what can we do by staying here?"
"Don't rush! Wait a little longer!"
Lu Changsheng said.
"At this hour, he's probably tying up loose ends!"
"What loose ends?" Wang Heihou and the other two stared at Lu Changsheng in bewilderment.
Lu Changsheng simply smiled.
*You three better grow up fast,* he thought to himself. *If you do, I won't have to leave seven parts of suspense in everything I do.*