APSIL -Chapter 68 Teaching and Making Trouble

Seeing Grand Madam caught between joy and sorrow as she reminisced about the past, Nanny Li quickly tried to comfort her.

“Everything turned out for the best because of your heartfelt desire to protect the children, Grand Madam, and because of the master’s kindness.”

“For all these years, I’ve always regarded Yingying as my own granddaughter, and Consort Yu has treated Princess Yongping as if she were her own daughter.”

“Thankfully, Zhang Shou has grown up healthy and handsome. His mother did not give her life bringing him into this world for nothing.”

She sighed softly.

“Consort Yu has always felt guilty for leaving him to grow up in the countryside. Ninth Daughter-in-law blamed Jing’er, me, and herself even more. She quarreled fiercely with us, insisting the boy should have been raised in the Duke’s residence. She accused us of being heartless, then shaved neither her hair nor her emotions, choosing instead to live in Zhaoming Temple as a lay devotee. She refuses to see even Yingying.”

“The Emperor and Jing’er thoroughly investigated Widow Zhang’s husband’s family and several generations of her ancestors. They questioned the midwife, Madam Wu, and everyone living on that street. There had been no other pregnant woman or newborn child there that day. She truly was only a scholar’s wife.”

“If not for the rebellion, she would probably have lived a modest but peaceful life with her son…”

She sighed again before anger suddenly flashed across her face.

“So what if Zhang Shou’s student ranked only seventh in the prefectural examination? Even if he had taken first place, he would have deserved it!”

“A disciple of Grand Secretary Ge’s own disciple—should he not even be capable of winning first place in a mere prefectural examination?”

“Those pedantic scholars keep clamoring to close the borders, forbidding foreign books and scholars from entering, calling everyone beyond our borders uncivilized barbarians.”

“Heaven knows what they’re really afraid of.”

“Perhaps they’re afraid that the Founding Emperor, who abdicated and sailed overseas, didn’t actually die in that shipwreck—but instead established another branch of his descendants somewhere beyond the seas!”

This time, Nanny Li fell completely silent.

She dared not utter another word.

Meanwhile, in the east wing…

After listening to Qi Liang recite his examination essays from memory, Zhang Shou stroked his chin thoughtfully while pacing back and forth across the room.

The thing that surprised him most, however, was the mathematics problem set by Prefect Wang.

The depth of a well is unknown. If a rope folded into three equal sections reaches the bottom, four feet remain outside the well. If the same rope folded into four equal sections reaches the bottom, one foot remains outside. How deep is the well?

A classic rope-and-well problem…

For scholars who spent their lives buried in the Confucian classics, the question would be fiendishly difficult.

For anyone with a bit of mathematical talent, it was straightforward.

For someone from the modern world like Zhang Shou…

It was almost laughably easy.

You could solve it with a single-variable equation.

Or a system of two equations.

Or simply draw a diagram.

When Prefect Wang had added several mathematics questions during the examination for government clerks, it could still be explained as a privilege of his office as Prefect of Shuntian.

But to insert such a question into the official prefectural examination…

Was that really appropriate?

Had Prefect Wang intended it himself?

Or had someone else secretly slipped the question into the examination?

Had Qi Liang’s seventh-place ranking come because of this problem?

Thinking it over, Zhang Shou questioned Deng Xiaodai about the tax records he had been handling since joining the Accounts Office.

After pondering for quite some time, he suddenly smiled at the two nervous youths.

“Qi Liang, there’s a very good chance rumors about your ranking will spread for a while.”

“I’m going to dictate several essays. Write them down carefully.”

“Xiaodai, come over here as well. Show me those statistics you’ve been organizing. I’ll teach you a better way to present them.”

As he spoke, Zhang Shou immediately began dictating an essay.

Qi Liang froze for an instant before hurriedly picking up his brush to write.

Meanwhile, Zhang Shou moved to the other side of the desk, spread out a fresh sheet of paper, placed a bronze paperweight neatly across it, dipped his brush in ink, and began drawing diagrams.

Watching him dictate flawlessly while simultaneously drawing with complete concentration, Deng Xiaodai was utterly stunned.

Then he noticed something else.

These figures looked nothing like the plane geometry Zhang Shou had taught before.

Seeing Qi Liang pause briefly while catching up with a particularly long sentence, Zhang Shou quietly explained, “I taught you how to make tables before.”

“This one is called a line graph.”

“And this is a bar chart.”

“They let you visualize changes in tax revenue from different counties over three years much more intuitively.”

“This is called data visualization.”

“Of course, these aren’t the only kinds of visual charts. They’re just examples.”

In the modern world, charts of every imaginable kind had become indispensable.

But Zhang Shou remembered clearly that in Western history, people first relied on simple numerical tables.

Only in the eighteenth century, after William Playfair pioneered data visualization and invented line graphs, bar charts, pie charts, and similar graphics, did such methods become widespread.

Even though Arabic numerals themselves were wonderfully convenient, endless columns of numbers still made people’s heads spin.

Compared with that, a graph that instantly showed rises and falls in values was far more practical.

For imperial officials who constantly dealt with taxes, farmland, and population statistics, such tools would be invaluable.

Britain in the eighteenth century had managed without computers.

There was no reason this era couldn’t do the same.

Just as Zhang Shou continued dictating essays to Qi Liang while explaining chart-making techniques to Deng Xiaodai—

A furious shout suddenly exploded from outside.

“Where’s that swindler calling himself my brother-in-law, Zhang Shou? Tell him to get the hell out here!”

The second young master of the Zhu family.

The “Second Brother” Zhu Ying often complained about.

Since Zhang Shou had never learned the man’s given name, he usually referred to him simply as Zhu Er.

Hearing the furious roar outside, Zhang Shou casually dug his little finger into one ear before sighing inwardly.

This Zhu Er really lives up to his name… What an idiot.

He certainly didn’t believe Grand Madam had deliberately summoned Zhu Er.

If she had, she would never have arranged for Zhang Shou to stay in Qing’an Hall.

Within the residence she personally ruled, who would dare stir up trouble?

Yet here was Zhu Er barging straight into his grandmother’s residence, shouting for Zhang Shou to come out.

The man was astonishingly foolish.

No wonder a dignified young master of a ducal household had become so impoverished that he was constantly borrowing money from Zhu Ying.

Seeing Qi Liang and Deng Xiaodai exchange uneasy glances, Zhang Shou merely shrugged.

“Qi Liang, keep writing.”

“Xiaodai, continue thinking about these charts. Consider where else they might be useful.”

Leaving his two students behind, he calmly walked toward the door.

But he stopped just before reaching it.

Although the man outside was Zhu Ying’s rather idiotic second brother…

He had demanded that Zhang Shou come out.

If Zhang Shou obediently showed himself now, wouldn’t that be dancing to the fellow’s tune?

Knowing A-Liu was standing guard outside—and that no matter how arrogant Zhu Er might be, he wouldn’t get through him—Zhang Shou waited calmly.

The next moment, a cold laugh sounded from outside.

“So this is who thinks he can swagger around my Qing’an Hall.”

“It turns out to be Second Young Master.”

Coming from Grand Madam—the unquestioned authority of the household—those words were already a severe rebuke.

Yet Zhang Shou couldn’t tell whether Zhu Er was drunk, had simply given up caring, or had some hidden confidence backing him.

Instead of withdrawing or immediately kneeling to beg forgiveness, Zhu Er only raised his voice even louder.

“Old Ancestor!”

“I know you’ve never liked this useless grandson of yours, but there are things I have to say!”

“Yes, I’m jealous that Yingying is the apple of your eye and Father’s favorite—that she gets everything she wants while I get nothing.”

“Yes, I envy Elder Brother for taking command of troops while still so young.”

“But I know my own limitations.”

“I’m useless, so I’ve resigned myself to muddling through life.”

“But now Father is under impeachment, and Elder Brother disappeared after leading troops into battle.”

“At a time like this, what’s wrong with me trying to find Yingying a reliable husband?”

“That pig from the Lu family may not be handsome.”

“He may not be especially capable.”

“But he promised that after marrying, he’d move out and establish his own household.”

“Yingying wouldn’t have to serve her mother-in-law like a servant or live under someone else’s thumb.”

“Tell me—how many men in the capital would agree to that?”