Bringing the Railway to Daming

Chapter 125: Planetary Research Institute, Bookstore Discussion on Imperial Examination [Third Update, Please Subscribe]

After hearing what Zhu Huilan said, Liu Kuan was not surprised - he was mentally prepared for Zhu and Empress Ma's request to celebrate the New Year together and watch a movie.

He paused for a moment and said, "There are only a few movies on my phone and laptop, and even fewer suitable for everyone to watch together. Let's just pick one this time."

"I'll find a few more suitable songs and add a few interesting videos, and that should be it."

"I'll download everything I find onto the tablet—the information in the notebook is too valuable. If I take it directly to play the movie, it might get damaged if I'm not careful."

Zhu Huilan smiled and nodded, "Well, as long as my husband has an idea."

So, after lunch, the couple stayed in the study and chose music, movies and videos together.

After weighing various options, Liu Kuan finally chose a movie, a video that collected six ancient style pure music, and three "Planetary Research Institute" videos.

"Planetary Research Institute" is an official self-media account that Liu Kuan followed before he traveled through time.

The video above mainly depicts the beautiful mountains and rivers of the motherland, as well as some great achievements at the national level from a geographical perspective.

The video was magnificent and the text was good, he liked it very much, so he downloaded and saved several of them intentionally or unintentionally...
The next day.

Liu Kuan and his entourage came to Sanwei Bookstore, a bookstore on the south side of Liren Street.

This is one of the shops given to him by Old Zhu. It was originally a bookstore. After Liu Kuan decided to publish "Natural Science", he came here to learn about it and changed its name to its current one.

This bookstore is not too big, but not too small either.

There is a store of about 50 to 60 square meters in the front and a small courtyard in the back, which has three main rooms and four side rooms, which can be used as warehouses and accommodation for store clerks.

The owner of the bookstore was named Gu Siqi, a middle-aged man in his forties, who was originally the owner of the bookstore.

After the bookstore was transferred to Liu Kuan, he passed Liu Lai Fu's "interview" and stayed.

Liu Kuan deliberately chose to come at noon, when most people were preparing to have lunch and there were basically no customers in the bookstore.

When Liu Kuan came in, Gu Siqi was using an abacus to calculate accounts in the account book.

There is no definitive conclusion as to when the abacus, a calculating tool, originated. The most reliable statement is that it originated during the Tang and Song dynasties.

At this time, the abacus was almost the same as the one Liu Kuan remembered - he didn't know whether there was any difference.

Before he traveled through time, he had only learned about the abacus in elementary school math textbooks and had never actually come into contact with it - after all, this tool had been eliminated in later China for decades.

Therefore, even if the abacus has not evolved into its complete form at this time, Liu Kuan can't help much.

"The boss is here." The shop assistant was the first to notice Liu Kuan. He called out and went forward to greet him, bowing, "Greetings, the boss!"

Gu Siqi quickly put down his brush and came over to greet him.

Liu Kuan nodded and said directly: "Let me see how the sales of Natural Science are doing."

Gu Siqi smiled bitterly and said, "Back at the boss, it's about the same as the previous few days. We sell five or six books a day at most. That's because we put it in the most conspicuous place in the bookstore."

"The books we sent to other bookstores weren't taken seriously. Some were even tucked away in corners, not selling a single copy a day."

"At this rate, it will probably take a year or two to sell all 500 copies."

In fact, based on Gu Siqi's experience as a bookstore owner over the years, it is considered a good result for a "miscellaneous book" whose author is not very famous in the literary world to sell 500 copies a year.

However, when Liu Kuan delivered these books to the bookstore more than half a month ago, he said that he hoped to sell at least 200 copies in the first month, and the remaining copies within two or three months.

The current sales progress of "Natural Science" is obviously far from Liu Kuan's expectations.

Although Gu Siqi knew that Liu Kuan was a kind person, he was still a little nervous, worried that Liu Kuan would blame him for not working hard enough.

Liu Kuan glanced at the Imperial College buildings across the street and said, "This place is only a couple of hundred steps away from the Imperial College. Logically, there should be quite a few visitors, right?"

Gu Siqi explained, "There are quite a few, but most of them come here for Confucian classics or contemporary writings by famous scholars. Very few read miscellaneous books."

Liu Kuan smiled slightly after hearing this, "As long as there is customer traffic - by tomorrow, there should be many more people coming to buy this book."

"I'll have the printing house send over the latest 1,000 copies. Take some time to talk to the other bookstore owners who are helping sell the publications and ask them to put them in a prominent place."

Gu Siqi was stunned after hearing this, and couldn't understand why Liu Kuan was so confident about this miscellaneous book.

He had been immersed in books for many years, and his mind was a little slow. Thinking of Liu Kuan's identity, he had a vague guess and subconsciously lowered his voice to ask, "Did the master of the boss get any news?"

"You'll know tomorrow."

After saying this, Liu Kuan left with his entourage.

"What on earth could possibly have made this miscellaneous book of the Dong family so popular? It doesn't make sense."

Gu Siqi muttered to himself, unable to figure it out for a moment. The more he thought about it, the more curious he became.

So I took out a book called "Natural Science" and read it carefully, hoping to find some clues from the book.

Since it was a book written by his boss, he took the time to read it as soon as it was put on the shelves of the bookstore.

Although the content of the book is very novel, it is written in plain language and has no literary talent at all. It has nothing to do with Confucian classics, which is why it is called "novel".

In addition, the boss now has some reputation in the capital, and he works hard to promote the products, so he could only sell a few books a day before.

In addition, although the content of the book is novel, the "truth" it describes is not so easy to understand. Therefore, he had read it several times before, but put it down halfway and was unable to finish it.

Now I open it again, read it from all angles, but I still can't see why this book would make readers like it.

"Could it be because the boss is going to be promoted to a higher position? If he is promoted to the Ministry of Personnel, becoming a minister or something, then there may be many people who want to curry favor with him and buy this book."

Gu Siqi couldn't help but think so.

The Ming Dynasty now operates under a recommendation system. Previously, the power to select officials lay with the Secretariat and the prime minister. Last year, both the Secretariat and the prime minister were abolished, leaving the Ministry of Personnel with this power. Two weeks ago, the Guo Huan case broke out, and several ministers and vice ministers from the six ministries were dismissed.

Then the court reformed the system, changing the six ministries into nine, which resulted in a lot more positions for Shangshu and Shilang.

As a Deputy Minister of Works and a son-in-law of the emperor, Liu Kuan had a high possibility of being promoted to Vice Minister.

Thinking that Liu Kuan's confidence in "Natural Science" might come from his promotion, Gu Siqi put the book down again.

He was a bookshop owner in his late forties, and he had no desire to become an official. Why should he force himself to read books he didn't like?
Seeing that someone was busy on the other side, Gu Siqi took out a book called "The Private Story of Red Lotus by Zen Master Wujie" from under the counter.

This book tells the story of a romantic affair that took place in a temple during the reign of Emperor Yingzong of Song. It is very interesting.

He flipped through the pages to the exciting parts he had read several times and savored them again.

"'Separate the eight yang bones and pour out half a bucket of ice and snow', wonderful, this description is really wonderful..."

The next day.

morning.

Gu Siqi sat behind the counter, looking a little listless. There was a faint scratch on his slightly exposed neck, as if he had been scratched by a big cat.

He was just about to take a nap when he saw seven or eight students from the Imperial Academy coming in together.

The leader went straight to the most conspicuous bookshelf by the store entrance, picked up a copy of "Natural Science," and said excitedly, "Look, I said there are books about "Natural Science" here, right?"

Several other students immediately stepped forward and took one each.

Watch and talk.

"It's called 'Natural Science,' but I'm not sure if that's the 'natural science' that's used in the imperial examination."

"It should be—did you see the signature on this compilation? Liu Kuan. It should be the Deputy Director of the Science and Technology Department, Princess Chongning's consort, Liu Kuan!"

"So what if it's him?"

"Brother Cai is so absorbed in his studies that he's been somewhat out of touch with the news. I heard this guy is now teaching at the main hall, and what he teaches is none other than 'nature'!"

"The princes study natural science, and one of the subjects in the imperial examination is now 'natural science'. Who would believe me if I said the two were unrelated?"

At this time, a student who had been flipping through the journal for a while suddenly said, "This 'Natural Science' is filled with vulgar, uncultured language. It seems to be some incomprehensible miscellany. Could it really be the content of the imperial examination?"

The student who led the person into the shop said, "Why is it impossible? The test also includes 'Hundred Craftsmanship'. What is Hundred Craftsmanship? Isn't it just the work of a craftsman?"

Another student frowned and said, "It's a good thing that the court reinstated the imperial examination system. It would have been fine if mathematics were mandatory, but they also listed these things like 'natural sciences' and 'crafts' as optional subjects. That's outrageous!"

"Hush, keep your voice down," the oldest of the group warned. "It's a good thing the court has reopened the imperial examinations. If we're not satisfied, and that person hears some criticism and gets angry and stops the exams again, we'll all have to suffer in the Imperial Academy again, waiting for the selection."

"Brother Pingzhi is right. Let's stop discussing state affairs and find some books on mathematics and various crafts. Buy them and bring them back to the academy."

At this point, several students took a copy of "Natural Science" and then went in to pick out other books.

Gu Siqi was stunned by what he heard.

Restart the imperial examination?

Mathematics is a compulsory exam, and natural sciences and trades are optional?
real or fake?

Before he could figure it out, he saw another group of students entering the bookstore.

"Boss, do you have any books related to mathematics? Bring them all to me!" This man was wearing fox fur and it was obvious that he was not short of money.

Several other students followed suit and said, "Give us more so we can pick out a few books too."

"If you have any books on natural sciences or trades, bring them along."

Gu Siqi didn't bother to think too much and quickly responded, "Yes, yes, all."

Then he started working with his friends.

When Liu Kuan came to the bookstore for the first time, he asked him to buy hundreds of books on mathematics and various crafts from Sancai Printing House.

Although some math books have been sold over the past few days, there are still two or three hundred left.

Even fewer books on tradesmanship were sold.

He originally thought that these would have to be stored until next year or the year after before they could be sold out.

Who would have thought that in less than one morning, all the math books were sold out!
A small half of the books on various trades and skills were sold, and more than half of the thousands of "Natural Science" journals were sold!

Sitting behind the counter, Gu Siqi was tired and excited.

"With so many students from the Imperial College coming to buy books, the court's reopening of the imperial examinations must be true!"

"Bookstores have a good stock of books on Confucianism, but they may not have many books on mathematics, natural sciences, and various crafts."

"This is a great opportunity for our Sanwei Bookstore to make a fortune!"

Thinking of this, Gu Siqi hurriedly wrote an order and copied it several times.

Then he called over a clerk and said, "Go quickly to Sancai Printing House and ask Manager Lin to select one of these orders and ship it to us as soon as possible."

"Then take the order to other printing shops and place them one by one. Remember, you must do it as quickly as possible—if you get it done, you'll get a reward!"

The guy was also very tired, but when he heard there was a reward, he immediately became motivated, took the order and rushed out...
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(End of this chapter)