nashuaworldcup Chapter 433 The Flower of Barrenness (8)
Chapter 433 The Flower of Barrenness (8)
The answer was as expected, but Wangyou was still inevitably disappointed, as her path of self-study for healing was completely blocked.
Since this path is blocked, let's not waste our time.
"I'll take a look myself, you go and do other things!" Wangyou said, then went into the bookshelf, picked out some books to look at, and picked out the books she wanted to buy.
I read everything, from agriculture and people's livelihood to the imperial examinations, and I don't care about anything else.
No wonder it's so hard for children from poor families to achieve great things. If they were from wealthy families, their families would probably have prepared past years' imperial examination questions for their children to study. For poor families, taking the exam really depends entirely on luck. Even Wang You can only cast a wide net.
The current emperor has only been on the throne for seven or eight years, and he is a pragmatic emperor. It is always right to follow his policies to collect resources. However, Wangyou searched for a long time but could not find any books about mountains, rivers and water conservancy.
Therefore, one can only turn to travelogues. Although the content recorded in travelogues may not be accurate, it still has some reference value.
Seeing her daughter come out carrying several books, Madam Song felt helpless. Her daughter's tastes were always different from those of other young ladies.
After buying the books, Madam Song took Wangyou to buy some clothes and jewelry for her daughter. Her daughter was growing up and it was time to dress her up.
Wangyou had no interest in dressing up, but since her mother was willing, she simply let her do as she pleased.
After returning home, the mother and daughter went about their own business.
Today at the bookstore, I saw many paintings and calligraphy works. I originally wanted to see if her paintings could sell for money, but after thinking about it, I decided to write storybooks instead, so that more naive girls wouldn't be deceived by poor scholars.
After a moment's thought, Wangyou began to write.
She wrote a story about a fox spirit who was saved by a mortal man and eventually repaid his kindness.
Fox Nine was originally a little fox spirit who had cultivated into a demon. However, one day she accidentally stepped into a hunter's trap. Just then, a child happened to pass by and rescued the little fox.
The little fox, Fox Nine, remembered the life-saving grace and, after the child grew up, disguised herself as an orphan girl who had lost both her parents to repay the kindness.
Fox Nine did not despise the scholar for his poverty. Instead, she supported him by washing clothes and weaving and embroidering day and night, enabling him to pass the imperial examinations with flying colors and finally achieve success.
Before leaving, the scholar told Hu Jiu that he would marry her in a grand wedding procession after she passed the imperial examination. However, he added that while the righteous are often the lowly butchers, the unfaithful are often the scholars.
The scholar was favored by the prime minister's daughter, and the scholar also fell for the prime minister's daughter. He knew that marrying the prime minister's daughter would save him twenty years of detours. So the scholar naturally forgot about Hu Jiu, who was still waiting for him at home.
However, no one expected that the prime minister's daughter had suffered from a heart ailment since childhood. The Taoist priest of Nanshan Temple said that if they could obtain the inner core of the fox demon and give it to the prime minister's daughter, then her illness would be cured.
The scholar immediately thought of Hu Jiu, who had always taken care of him and supported his studies. How could someone who spends every day with another person not notice?
The scholar assured the prime minister's daughter that he would obtain the fox demon's inner core and that he would ensure her safety.
Thus, through the prime minister's efforts, the scholar was able to return to his hometown to pay respects to his ancestors.
Fox Nine finally got her beloved back, but unexpectedly, the scholar gave her a bowl of medicine at night and forcibly dug out her inner core. Fox Nine could no longer maintain her human form and turned back into a fox. The scholar was so cruel that he didn't even spare her corpse. He skinned her and made her into a fox fur coat, and gave it along with her inner core to the prime minister's daughter.
Later, the scholar also met a bad end; on the eve of his wedding to the prime minister's daughter, he accidentally fell into the river and died.
As for the prime minister's daughter, her purpose in approaching the scholar from the beginning was to obtain the fox demon's inner core. How could a mere scholar compare to the prime minister's daughter?
After the fox clan discovered that a member of their clan had been brutally murdered by having his inner core removed, they located the prime minister's daughter through her aura and directly retrieved her inner core. As for the Taoist priest who had devised the plan, he was also killed by the fox clan.
At the end of the story, Wangyou concludes: Love yourself before loving others; marriage between people of equal social standing has existed since ancient times, but crossing social classes is a high-stakes gamble; repaying kindness with enmity will ultimately backfire.
Wangyou divided the book into two volumes. She gave part of the first volume to Song to ask the bookstore if they would accept it.
Not long after, Song brought good news to Wangyou: the other party would buy the book and could share the profits according to Wangyou's requirements; the contract had also been drafted.
Wangyou checked the contract and found no problems, so she signed her name.
The next day, Wangyou asked her mother to bring the rest of the first volume to the bookstore owner, who immediately sent people to print it and then began to build hype.
Once the book was published, it was loved by many young ladies. However, the first volume happened to be released on the scholar's way to take the imperial examination, so the bookstore received people every day urging for the second volume.
Seeing that the first volume had sold out, Wangyou gave the second volume to her mother to run a errand to the bookstore.
The bookstore owner was stunned after reading it. The ending was neither the scholar keeping his promise nor a happy one, but rather everyone died.
The shopkeeper thought to himself, "I can't be the only one heartbroken by this ending; everyone has to be heartbroken too."
The release of the second volume was still a huge success, but it also sparked reflection among young women in their boudoirs, prompting them to question whether the ideal of a talented scholar and a beautiful woman was truly worthy of such admiration.
Of course, Wangyou also made a lot of money, but she didn't expect to shatter people's deep-rooted ideas with just one book. Wouldn't it be better to take things step by step?
That way, she can make money steadily and sustainably.
Upon receiving her 500 taels of royalties, Wangyou was excited but didn't forget her main task. After finishing her main task, she began to conceive her new book.
This time, Wangyou wrote a story about a woman who achieved great success despite being a woman.
Forget-Me-Not tells the story of the eldest daughter of a large family. She was well-versed in poetry and literature from a young age, but because of her gender, she was confined to the inner quarters of the house. She did not want to waste her life in the inner quarters, but she had no way to escape this predicament.
Left with no other choice, she had to obey her parents' wishes and marry another man through a matchmaker. Although her husband was a playboy, he was not a bad person and treated her with great respect, which stirred up new emotions in the woman's heart.
Her parents-in-law also praised her highly, entrusting her with the power to manage the household and the responsibility of disciplining her husband. Her husband was only a bit sharp-tongued, but he never laid a hand on her.
In this way, the woman gradually reformed the spoiled young master, and in the end, her husband passed the imperial examination with top honors and applied for a posting to a distant place.
The woman followed her husband to a small county town on the frontier. She helped him govern the town and made it prosperous. She accompanied her husband as he rose through the ranks, eventually becoming a prime minister.
Her husband was not the kind of person who was afraid of his wife surpassing him. Whenever he talked with the emperor, he would never forget to mention that his achievements today were inseparable from his wife's help.
In the end, the two lived happily ever after, and their children were all successful. Their daughter, like her mother, was a woman with great vision and perspective.
In the end, Wangyou still remembered to summarize.