Lin Qingyuan did not confirm or deny it. Fifty or so junior scholars, is the imperial examination really that easy to pass?

  Shang Mingjie naturally knew this, but he just wanted to try his best. He glanced at Lin Qingyu and couldn't help asking: "Aunt Lin, when my cousin comes of age next year, will you arrange a marriage for her?"

  Lin Qingwan smiled warmly: "But it's just a get-to-know-each-other meeting, she's still young, no need to rush into anything."

  Shang Ming Jie let out a sigh of relief and nodded in great agreement, "Yes, I also think that we can wait two more years before making any decisions about the engagement."

  If by then he still can't convince Lin's family and get their agreement, nor bring happiness to his cousin, he will give up.

  Lin Qingwan glanced at him and looked out the window at the sky outside. She thought of Lin Jiang's praise for Shang Mingjie back then, and she couldn't help but curve her fingers to tap on the table, implying: "Our family only has one daughter, Yubi, so we naturally want to keep her a bit longer. This marriage proposal isn't anything else, it can't be settled in just a year or two."

  So the Lin family can give him at most two years, and then it's up to him whether he can satisfy Lin Qingwen or not.

  Shang Mingjie let out a deep breath, stood up and bowed to Lin Qingyuan before retreating.

  Lin Qingwan nodded at the desk and didn't speak, only letting the book bureau speed up the engraving of Shang Mingjie's "Four Seasons Agricultural Book".

  It takes a lot of time to carve a block of wood, and at this rate, it will take two or three months to complete the carving.

  But after engraving, printing and mounting are easier.

  Lin Qingwan personally went to the bookstore to see them engraving and printing. In the end, she nodded at those carved plates without saying a word.

  Liu Guan Shi stood beside her, always paying attention to her expression. Seeing this, he couldn't help but ask, "Miss, do you have any opinions?"

  "Have you ever thought of not carving a whole block of wood, but cutting out these words and putting them together when needed for printing?" Lin Qingwen said: "In this way, in the future, when new books need to be printed, there is no need to carve new characters. Just pick out the required characters and arrange them according to the content."

  Liu Guanshi sank into thought for a moment, then his eyes lit up and he said, "That's indeed a good idea."

  He frowned again, "Unfortunately, the new books that come into our bookstore are very few, mostly old books, and the old book engravings are mostly collected by our bookstore."

  The collection of Lin's Bookstore is not only the first in Jiangnan, but also one of the best in the entire Daliang.

  With these printing blocks available, Lin's Bookstore can have countless books.

  In this way, movable type printing is no longer of great use to Lin's Bookstore. After all, there are many commonly used characters, and if they were all engraved, it would be a huge project.

  Moreover, engraving is not difficult for the craftsmen in their bookstore, just copy and engrave, but it's hard to arrange according to the content of the book.

  He can recognize characters and has a considerable vocabulary.

  Do you think craftsmen can recognize characters just by carving them?

  You're thinking too much, they just copy and paste, and can recognize a few characters at most.

  If they can recognize so many characters, why don't they become artisans instead?

  Lin Qingyuan apparently also knew this, so she didn't rush to get the movable type printing technique out. Instead, she mentioned it in passing to Liu Guanzhi.

  Anyway, the Lin family is not doing anything with movable type printing now.

  "Get this agricultural book printed as soon as possible, I want it before spring." Since Shang Mingjie had this intention, she didn't mind helping him out.

  "How much does it cost?"

  Lin Qingwan thought for a moment and smiled: "Print some more, after all the book is ours, profit or loss is our responsibility. If it sells well, we might even make a fortune."

  This book is considered to be the agricultural book written by Lin Qingwen and Shang Mingjie for Old Man Chen and others. The author listed on the book is Shang Mingjie, but there are many narrators, with Old Man Chen being the first one.

  No matter how many people's names are on the book, the copyright of this book is actually in Lin Qingwen's hands.

  Well, now that the book is written, she can settle the account with Shang Mingjie.

  Shang Mingjie's life: For the first time, he got his hard-earned money, and curiously counted it for a while. However, he generously used all of it to buy gifts.

  Not only grandmother and mother have it, but also brothers and sisters in the family, Lin Qingyuan and Lin Yuhong both received a copy.

  Even his father in Beijing received a copy. Of course, Shangping also received a letter of advice apart from the "gift bought with manuscript fee" from his son.

  Not bad, that's the straightforward boy Shang Mingjie writing to his father, hoping that his father can petition the emperor to restrain all officials in the world, so that the people won't be disturbed because of the emperor's longevity.

  His father received this letter and was so angry that his face twitched. He didn't even look at the gift he had brought, but threw it aside directly.

  What kind of son did Zhao raise, to actually raise a bookworm like this? At this time, both inside and outside the imperial court are rejoicing over the expansion of the territory, and Your Majesty is also happily preparing for his grand birthday next year. Isn't it seeking trouble to bring up such a matter at this time?

  Shang Ping put aside his son's letter and picked up Zhao Sheng's letter to read.

  They were one step slower, and Lin's family, even without Lin Jiang, still stood firm in Jiangnan.

  What a pity! Shang Ping disappointedly burned Zhao Sheng's letter, his facial expression flickering uncertainly in the firelight.

  The two families of Shang and Lin have a close relationship. When Lin Jiang just died, he didn't dare to take action, lest he be accused of kicking someone when they're down. But he didn't expect Lin Qingyuan and Lin Run to be so ruthless.

  More than two years of time not only blocked the momentum of the Zhao family but also allowed the Lin family to regain their footing in Jiangnan.

  Shang Ping sighed and thought to himself that if only he had been a bit slower, the Shang family would still have had time to intervene.

  Lin Qingwan may not know that Shang Ping still has the idea of replacing Lin's status in Jiangnan, otherwise she would not be so polite to him.

  She received another letter from Zhou Cishi, with a letter of advice on the post of Luzhou Cishi. Lin Qingwen couldn't help but smile and nodded at the letter, saying: "This uncle of our Lin family is too clever."

  Isn't this just being clever for its own sake?

  Bai Mei and Bai Feng exchanged a glance, and after racking their brains for half a day, they finally remembered that the uncle Lin Qingyuan had mentioned was none other than the second master of the Shang family.

  The two of them tiptoed up to peek at the newspaper in her hand and didn't see Second Uncle's name on it.

  Lin Qingwan folded the letter and handed it to Bai Feng, smiling: "Give it to Jiang Nan, take it with you when you go to the academy tomorrow morning, if you run into Ming Jie, give it to him."

  Bai Feng handed over the things with a head full of misty water to Jiang Nan.

  Jiang Nan couldn't understand it either, so he handed it over to Lin Yuhong first.

  Lin Yuhong also saw the letter of advice from Luzhou Governor, and when he looked at the date, he couldn't help but sigh: "Second Uncle is too worried."

  She frowned and said: "But why did Auntie let you give the letter to Second Brother? Isn't that going to make him sad?"

  Lin Qingwan was just going to make Shang Mingjie heartbroken, she wanted him to know that in the Shang family, he had to take charge, and the resistance was not just his mother, but also his father.

  What is Mrs. Shang Er compared to Shang Ping?

  For Lin Qingwan, whether the two families would become in-laws was not about Mrs. Shang's attitude, but about Shang Ping's attitude.

  Lin Yuhuan left the academy earlier than the students on the other side of the male school, so she went in for a while before Shang Mingjie and several classmates came up from the mountain.

  Jiang Nan directly walked over to this side of the gate and handed the letter to him, "Second Master, this is a letter from my aunt that I was asked to deliver to you."

  Shang Mingjie was bewildered, "Why did Auntie suddenly think of sending me a newspaper?"

  Jiang Nanlu smiled, "I'm just in charge of delivering things, but I saw that the young lady's mood wasn't bad yesterday, maybe it's a good thing, or maybe not."

  Shang Mingjie unfolded the newspaper and the first thing he saw was the "Letter of Advice to the Governor of Lu State" which took up a large section.

  Zhou Tong and several others happened to hear it and rushed over to ask: "What did the official newspaper say? Isn't your father being promoted?"

  "It must be so, otherwise why would Lady Lin specially send you a letter of invitation instead of sending it to Lin You?"

  Lin You smiled and said, "I'll go back and take another look, it's still the same."

  But he still went up because he was also curious about what his aunt had brought in the newspaper.

  Shang Mingjie quickly scanned the letter of admonition from the Governor of Luozhou, and was taken aback for a moment.

  The wording and sentence structure of that letter of admonition were entirely different from his, but the meaning was the same, all advising the emperor to restrain officials and not disturb the people just because of your longevity.

  Judging from the date of the letter, it was still two days after his letter arrived in Beijing.

  What does Aunt Lin mean by this?

  Shang Mingjie's dejected figure slipped into Lin You's arms and listlessly entered the study.

  "What's going on?" Lin You hugged the newspaper and hastily unfolded it to take a look.

  Other onlookers also crowded around and asked, "Has something happened to Master Shang?"

  "It can't be that serious, right? Didn't the Lin family's coachman just say that Young Mistress Lin was in a good mood this morning? If something happened to Master Shang, how could she still be happy?"

  It's just happiness, but it has to be held in one's heart. Since they are relatives by marriage, isn't expressing it so obviously not good?

  Lin You quickly scanned the newspaper and flipped through it again, saying: "There's no mention of the Shang family in here."

  Zhou Tong pointed at the lengthy letter of advice and said: "Just now Ming Jie was staring at this article."

  "It's an admonishment to Your Majesty," Lu said, stroking his chin. "This admonishment is quite pertinent, Governor Zhou cares for the people, so we don't have those messy things in Suzhou, but I heard that some local officials are forcing the people to contribute money for a birthday gift for Your Majesty."

  "It seems that the governor of Lu state should be begging for mercy on behalf of the people, but why does Shang brother look so listless and unenthusiastic?"

  Lin Yu immediately folded his arms and reported: "Let's not make wild guesses, I think the Shang brothers may not be unhappy about this."

  "Why not ask him and find out?" Zhou Tong rushed into the academy first.

  Others followed suit and rushed in, grabbing Shang Mingjie, who was hanging his head, and interrogating him.

  Lin You shook his head and followed them in. Everyone wasn't worried that Shang Mingjie would get angry, because he had always been good-tempered.

  Even when in a bad mood, I rarely take it out on others.

  Shang Mingjie was not really angry, just a little disappointed. He sat on the steps and said: "The letter of advice to the governor of Lu state I also sent to my father before, but he didn't take it seriously."

  "I thought it was something big, but perhaps Uncle Shang is just afraid that you're too young and hot-headed to get into trouble," Lu Li patted his shoulder and advised: "Don't take it to heart, you're still young, and after entering officialdom, there will be plenty of opportunities for you to present a memorial to the Emperor."