The Three Kingdoms: I asked you to save Guan Yu, not to destroy Sun Quan.

Chapter 498 Zhuge Liang, a man of almost supernatural wisdom

Zhuge Liang stared at Guan Xing, scrutinizing him from head to toe with sharp eyes, as if he wanted to see right through Guan Xing inside and out.

Guan Xing felt a chill run down his spine and a sense of unease under his gaze. He couldn't help but ask weakly, "Strategist, are you alright?"

Zhuge Liang snapped back to reality, forcibly suppressing his chaotic thoughts with willpower and changing the subject: "Then tell me why this can't be done?"

Guan Xing said with a wry smile, "It's not that we can't do it, it's that we can't do it now."

"First of all, the exam is a screening process. Since it is a screening process, it must have a large base of people as a foundation. The effect of screening from 10,000 people is definitely different from that of screening from 100 people. However, education in the Han Dynasty is far from widespread. More than 80% of those who have studied are from aristocratic families. If the aristocratic families change their thinking and actively participate in the imperial examinations with the principle of 'if you can't beat them, join them,' the people selected will still be the same aristocratic families. It still has nothing to do with people from poor families."

Zhuge Liang's pupils contracted again. Imperial examination, the imperial examination system, the recommendation system, you even came up with the names of the examinations. You really came prepared.

Guan Xing, with his head down, did not notice Zhuge Liang's unusual behavior and continued to speak to himself: "Therefore, if we want to promote the imperial examination, we must first popularize education and enable most people to read and write before we can promote it. Otherwise, we will not be able to achieve the effect of selecting talents for the court in all aspects."

Guan Xing's words were not unfounded, but based on experience and lessons learned. In the early Ming Dynasty, after Zhu Yuanzhang opened the special imperial examination in the fourth year of Hongwu, why did he suspend the imperial examination for fifteen years, and not open the second special imperial examination until the eighteenth year of Hongwu?

Isn't it because there were too few scholars at the time, and they were all mediocre people from aristocratic families, so the quantity was small and the quality was low?

Therefore, if you want to promote the imperial examination system, you must first popularize education. What's the point of promoting the imperial examination system if you don't popularize education?

Zhuge Liang pondered and said, "That makes sense. Then what's next?"

Guan Xing replied, "Secondly, while bandits can prevent roads from being blocked, county and prefectural examinations are manageable, but the final imperial examination requires going to the capital. People near the capital can easily walk there, but what about those from Jiaozhou, Nanzhong, Liangzhou, and even the Western Regions? Students from these remote areas probably have to set off two years in advance, and they still might not arrive safely. If they encounter bandits or fall ill on the way, wouldn't that harm them?"

"The imperial examination system was a product of a certain stage of social development. The Han Dynasty had not yet developed to the point where it could promote the imperial examination system."

"Therefore, I believe we should first improve productivity, and to improve productivity we need to develop technology, such as steelmaking and papermaking. Steelmaking can be used to make farm tools. If every household doesn't have to worry about farm tools and ironware, then farming efficiency will naturally increase. With increased farming efficiency, people will have the energy to do other things like building bridges and paving roads."

"Papermaking can be used for writing and copying books. If books are scattered like flowers by a fairy, there will naturally be more people who read books."

Books were a rarity in those days. Many people in remote mountainous areas had never even seen what a book looked like, let alone read and write.

Guan Xing had presided over the land reform and had come into contact with ordinary people in remote mountainous areas, so he knew how backward their living conditions were.

Zhuge Liang frowned and said, "Continue."

Guan Xing said, "We won't continue. What we'll continue is to distribute agricultural tools widely, build bridges and roads to connect the city with remote areas, so that candidates from remote areas can travel to the capital to take the exam without any obstacles."

Zhuge Liang mentally rehearsed everything Guan Xing had said before smiling and saying, "What you say makes sense. In that case, let's promote education and prepare for the preliminary work of the imperial examination. Go back and write a memorial about the imperial examination plan I just mentioned, and I'll take a look."

Guan Xing stood up, bowed, and picked up the notebook to take his leave, but Zhuge Liang snatched the notebook first, flipping through it and asking, "Did you write all the words on this?"

Guan Xing nodded instinctively.

Zhuge Liang turned the notebook to a blank page, then grabbed the half with writing in his left hand and the blank half with his right, tearing it in half. He then handed the blank half to Guan Xing and said, "I'll keep this draft and take another look."

Guan Xing trusted Zhuge Liang completely and had no doubts whatsoever. He took half of the book and turned to leave.

Zhuge Liang watched him walk out of the tent, then immediately opened his notebook and examined it carefully. He noticed the problem at a glance.

Guan Xing was his student, and he taught Guan Xing personally, just like he taught Liu Shan. Therefore, he was very familiar with Guan Xing's handwriting and could not only recognize it but also easily imitate it.

But the handwriting in the notebook was completely different from the handwriting of Guan Xing, whom he was familiar with. There was no similarity between the two. Why?

Guan Xing's right hand doesn't seem to have been injured. If it wasn't injured, why would the handwriting of the same person show such a big difference?

Zhuge Liang first suspected that he had misread the words, so he picked up a pen and imitated Guan Xing's handwriting in the blank space, writing the words in the notebook again. When he compared the two, there was indeed no similarity at all.

what's the situation?

Could it be that the Guan Xing of the past and the Guan Xing of today are not the same person at all?

That's ridiculous!

But how do we explain the handwriting issue?

Zhuge Liang went through everything that had happened to Guan Xing from birth to the present in his mind, and the more he thought about it, the more gloomy his face became.

Sun Quan, Zhang Zhao, and others might not be able to see the difference between Guan Xing before and after, but those who had lived with Guan Xing for many years and knew all of his habits were very likely to notice something was wrong. The reason they didn't notice it was simply because they hadn't thought about it that way yet.

However, if one thinks about that aspect and falls into doubt, not to mention Liu Bei and Guan Yu, even slow-witted and roughnecks like Zhang Fei and Zhang Bao could easily notice the anomaly.

Zhuge Liang stared at Guan Xing's handwriting and fell into deep self-doubt.

What's going on? Is Anguo already dead, and someone has possessed his body and returned to life? That's too far-fetched!

Confucius said, "I do not speak of strange phenomena, physical prowess, disorder, or spirits." May the patriarchs above forgive my insolence.

Wait, when did Anguo start acting strangely? It seems that before he left Chengdu and ran away to Jiangling, he told me and the King that he wanted the King to send troops to support Zigui and Yiling to prevent Guan Yu's retreat route from being blocked and unable to return to Shu. At the time, the King and I didn't pay any attention, and this kid just left a letter and ran away.

It now seems that he knew long before the defeat at Xiangfan that the Wu army would cross the river in disguise, that Mi Fang and Fu Shiren would surrender the city, and that Guan Yu would be defeated at Maicheng and besieged at Linju. He even had a plan to break the deadlock, and he instigated Guan Yu to recruit bandits from the Dabie Mountains to launch a surprise attack on Jianye.

Furthermore, his actions in the land redistribution campaign in Wushang did not seem like something he came up with hastily; rather, it seemed as if he had received relevant education, accumulated relevant experience, and then followed proper procedures.

Having managed logistics for many years, Zhuge Liang was very clear about the difference between following the rules and being unconventional. Following the rules would prevent mistakes, or at least prevent major ones, while being unconventional would lead to various errors and variables during execution. Only through continuous trial and error and improvement could today's innovations be transformed into perfect procedures for the future.

Any perfect system is the result of rigorous testing and the test of time; it is impossible for it to be nearly perfect as soon as it is introduced.

Guan Xing's actions in Jiangdong were absolutely unconventional in the eyes of the world at that time. There were many things that Zhuge Liang had never even heard of, let alone done. Yet Guan Xing did them as if they were second nature, and he did not make any mistakes in the process. How could this be something that was thought up on the spot in a moment of impulse?

In other words, what others consider unconventional has long been a habit for Guan Xing, an instinctive reaction that he can blurt out without even thinking.

Just like the difference between the people of the pre-Qin period and the people of the Han Dynasty when it comes to the concept of unification, if you talk about unification with the people of the pre-Qin period, they will think you are crazy.

But if you talk to the people of Han about unification, they will definitely say, isn't that a matter of course?

This is the difference of the times, and also the difference between Zhuge Liang and Guan Xing.

And that perfect imperial examination system, as well as skilled steelmaking and papermaking techniques—could it all have been achieved in one go? Didn't it require thousands upon thousands of trials and experiments?

In conclusion, the Guan Xing before them is definitely not the same person as the Guan Xing before. The Guan Xing before them has many things that they do not know and are much more advanced.

So the question is, how should we deal with this imposter Guan Xing?