Quick Transmigration: The Love Rescue Plan

Prefect Ma was essentially a local tyrant in Wu Commandery, while Ma Wencai was the crown prince. Ma Wencai's life had always been smooth sailing under Prefect Ma's protection, with flattery being a common occurrence. This explains why Ma Wencai was interested in Zhu Yingtai's extraordinary qualities.

After all, among the noble ladies Ma Wencai had come into contact with, they were all dignified, virtuous, and reserved, as if they were all cut from the same mold. After seeing them so many times, he naturally got tired of them and couldn't muster any other thoughts.

If one doesn't encounter a unique and vibrant woman like Zhu Yingtai, marrying any noblewoman would be the same.

In the midst of a mundane life, who would give up a touch of brightness?

Even if scions of prominent families don't become Ma Wencai's supporters, but instead become his friends, how many of them can truly treat Ma Wencai as equals?

Even though Dong Zhixin is disguised as a man, she is still a well-bred young lady from the Dong family of Jiankang, who has been raised for more than ten years. Naturally, she cannot attract Ma Wencai's attention with her "wild" nature like Zhu Yingtai did.

Yes, Dong Zhixin is now certain that Ma Wencai is the one.

Therefore, Dong Zhixin chose to return the favor without holding back.

“I am Ma Wencai. It is certainly wrong of my classmate to speak ill of you, but Brother Dong’s words have insulted the entire gentry of Wu County. Don’t you think this is inappropriate?” Ma Wencai stood up and bowed.

What a clever tactic of retreating to advance! Dong Zhixin didn't back down either. He stood up, cupped his hands, and bowed, saying, "Although I have only recently come to Wu County from Jiankang, I have heard of Prefect Ma's name. Since you are a prefect, you must be a leading figure among the scions of prominent families in Wu County."

“Everything requires evidence, but unfortunately I am not a illegitimate son of the Dong family. However…” Dong Zhixin changed the subject, “My Dong family is nothing among the aristocratic families of Jiankang, just an ordinary small family. If I can defeat Brother Ma, wouldn’t that prove that the sons of aristocratic families in Jiankang are indeed stronger than those of aristocratic families in Wu County?”

Before Ma Wencai could say anything, his lackey immediately retorted, "With your small frame, you think you can beat Brother Ma? You're just dreaming."

Dong Zhixin didn't identify the person who had taken the lead, but looked directly at Ma Wencai and said, "The six arts of a gentleman are rites, music, archery, charioteering, calligraphy, and mathematics. It's not good for us to resort to violence on the first day of school, is it? How about we have a math contest instead?"

The Six Arts required students to master six basic skills: rites, music, archery, charioteering, calligraphy, and mathematics.

Etiquette is a form of etiquette.

The music refers to the Six Musics: the ancient music of Men, Da Xian, Da Shao, Da Xia, Da Huo, and Da Wu.

The archery test assesses five archery skills: * **White Arrow:** The arrow pierces the target while the arrowhead remains white, indicating an accurate and powerful shot. * **Continuous Shots:** One arrow is fired, followed by three more in quick succession, each shot connected like a string of pearls. * **Swift Throw:** The arrow is fired with lightning speed, requiring only a short aiming time and immediate release to hit the target. * **Proximity to the Ruler:** When shooting with the ruler, the subject stands beside the ruler, yielding one foot to the ruler. * **Well-Shaped Archery:** Four arrows are fired in quick succession, all hitting the target precisely.

The imperial chariot test involved several driving skills: "Ming He Luan" (鸣和鸾), meaning the chariot moved in harmony with the sound of phoenixes; "Zhu Shui Che" (逐水车), meaning to ride swiftly along a winding bank without falling into the water; "Guo Jun Biao" (过君表), meaning to pass the emperor's memorial arch with proper etiquette; "Wu Jiao Qu" (舞交衢), meaning to drive swiftly and skillfully across a passageway; and "Zhu Qin Zuo" (逐禽左), meaning to hunt and shoot animals from the left during a hunt.

The six categories of calligraphy are: pictographs, ideographs, compound ideographs, phonetic compounds, derivative characters, and phonetic loan characters.

Nine numbers; *Fangtian*: land surveying. *Sumi*: grain conversion ratio; *Differential*: tax distribution. *Shaoguang*: area and width of farmland. *Shanggong*: estimation of earthwork in engineering projects. *Junshu*: allocation of transportation costs. *Fangcheng*: equation; *Yingbuzu*: calculation of profit and loss. *Pangyao*: Pythagorean theorem.

In simple terms, numbers are mathematical addition and subtraction calculations.

Since the test only involves addition and subtraction, Dong Zhixin naturally wants to use clever tricks.

Of course, this doesn't mean that Dong Zhixin is worse at math than Ma Wencai. You have to know that Dong Zhixin's body is actually Dong Qianyue, who has received modern education. Wouldn't it be ridiculous if he couldn't even do basic addition and subtraction better than Ma Wencai?

Moreover, although this era emphasized that a woman's virtue lay in her lack of talent, daughters of noble families were expected to become the matriarchs and managers of the household after marriage. If they couldn't even understand the accounts, how could they manage the household?

However, she was, after all, a young lady from a respectable family. It was indeed a bit unreasonable for her to be better at mathematics than scholars.

To attract Ma Wencai's attention, Dong Zhixin naturally couldn't afford to lose this match.

Since it would be illogical for Ming to win, Dong Zhixin had no choice but to resort to trickery.

Ma Wencai naturally didn't think he was inferior to Dong Zhixin, so he nodded without hesitation and said, "Okay."

"Here's the rule: you and I will each ask a question, read it only once, and whoever answers correctly wins," Dong Zhixin said with a smile.

“Okay.” Ma Wencai didn’t seem to think there was anything wrong with it.

"Will you go first or should I?" Dong Zhixin put away his folding fan and gently tapped his palm.

"Guests from afar are naturally given priority," Ma Wencai said nonchalantly.

Dong Zhixin smiled indifferently and said, "Brother Ma, did you hear that clearly?"

The trick Dong Zhixin was thinking of was not cheating, but rather...

"In the courtyard of the Master's family, there are ten rows of stone lions. Each row has fourteen large stone lions, each large stone lion has a small stone lion on its back, and each large stone lion has four small stone lions at its feet. Master Shi led forty-four students to count the stone lions. How many large stone lions and how many small stone lions did they count in total?"

Ma Wencai: ...

Everyone:...

If this were a text-based arithmetic problem, it wouldn't be difficult. But this is a tongue-twister arithmetic problem; how can one learn arithmetic if they haven't even understood the question?

Ma Wencai was silent for a moment before saying, "I can't answer this question, so it's my turn to ask one. If you answer it, you win. If you can't, it's a draw."

Dong Zhixin could naturally guess that Ma Wencai was not someone who would give up so easily, so she smiled and nodded in response, "That's right, Brother Ma, please give me a question."

Since Dong Zhixin had used a trick when setting the question, Ma Wencai naturally wouldn't just set a question that Dong Zhixin could easily win with. His inability to answer the question wasn't due to a lack of mathematical ability, but simply because the question used a shortcut. However, since Dong Zhixin had already used this method, he couldn't very well imitate it.

If this contest is lost, at best it means Ma Wencai is inferior to Dong Zhixin; at worst it means the son of a prominent family in Wu County is inferior to the son of a prominent family in Jiankang. Both are disgraceful for the Ma family. Even if Ma Wencai has to resort to trickery, he must ensure that this contest ends in a draw.

"There is a wall five feet thick, and two mice are going to burrow through it. The larger mouse burrows one foot a day, and the smaller mouse burrows one foot a day. The larger mouse doubles its daily burrow, and the smaller mouse halves its daily burrow. When will they meet? And how much burrow has each mouse burrowed through?"

The problem can be translated as follows: There is a 5-foot-thick wall. Two mice are digging holes in opposite directions. The larger mouse digs one foot on the first day, and the smaller mouse does the same. Each day thereafter, the larger mouse's speed doubles, while the smaller mouse's speed is half. How many days will it take to break through the wall, and how much each mouse has dug?

To put it simply, it's a problem of encounters between people moving at different speeds, but the ancients had limited mathematical methods and didn't have tools like algebraic functions like we have today.

This problem wasn't conceived by Ma Wencai; it's a long-standing mathematical puzzle.