Seeing that the three of them were about to argue, Zhao Rui hurriedly came out to smooth things over. "In my opinion, we don't have enough numbers now anyway. It doesn't matter if we have one more brother Xu and one less brother Xu. Why don't we have a showdown with Tang Che tomorrow?"

If he agrees to the three of us participating, we will give it a try. If he doesn’t agree, then the responsibility for canceling the game will not be on us. What do you think?"

Everyone stopped talking, so the plan for the competition was temporarily decided.

Next, everyone discussed the order of appearances tomorrow. It was decided that Yang Ju would be ranked first, followed closely by Yu Ren, and Lu Xiangsheng would be ranked last.

After everything is ready, everyone goes back to sleep.

The next day, just after midnight, the open space at the foot of Wushan Mountain was filled with people. These people were divided into two floors in an orderly manner. Most of the people on the inner floor were scholars wearing scholar uniforms. There were more people than at Yunjian Tea House seven days ago.

Several times, there were also a few squires wearing silk and satin.

As for the outer layer, the number of people was twice as large as the inner layer. However, most of these people seemed to be ordinary citizens with little status.

Yu Ren did not expect that a bet between scholars would attract so much attention. Little did he know that this was all because the Donglin Party had such a high reputation among the people, and he was almost the representative of ordinary citizens and gentry.

.Because of this, the supporters of the Donglin Party are mainly squires and ordinary citizens from various places, and the vast majority of them are in several southeastern provinces.

The main reason is that in recent years, the southeastern provinces have experienced rapid commercial development and overseas trade development. It can be said that in the southeastern provinces, agriculture has gradually been reduced to a secondary position, while industry and commerce have gradually developed in recent years.

became the main body of society.

However, in the officialdom of the Ming Dynasty, everyone still used to regard craftsmen and businessmen as the lowest level of society. In the eyes of most of the important officials in the court, these people were dispensable social classes.

However, the Donglin Party is an outlier among them. They have always paid more attention to and paid more attention to this group of emerging craftsmen and businessmen than any party in the DPRK.

Gu Xiancheng, the founder of the Donglin Party, and five of the other seven gentlemen were all from the southern Zhili area. They had been exposed to the prosperity of southeastern industry and commerce since they were young, so they naturally paid more attention to it.

Because of this, when I heard that the representatives of the Donglin Party were going to compete with Wansong Academy, the squires, small businessmen, and craftsmen in Hangzhou all spontaneously told each other that they would go to the foot of Wushan Mountain to give Donglin a speech on this day.

Some support.

Yu Ren took a quick glance and found that there were probably no fewer than five thousand people in the audience.

This group of people surrounded an open space the size of a football field. On the slightly higher hillside in the southeast corner, Yu Ren also saw a few scholars picking up several banners with bamboo poles. Some of them said: "Donglin must win";

The most representative couplet of the Donglin Party, "The sound of wind and rain, the sound of reading...".

In the northeast corner, the higher ground is occupied by a group of "fans" of Wansong Academy. They also hold a lot of slogans in their hands such as "Wansong is the best, Wansong is invincible".

.

Yu Ren and others arrived at the place early. However, Tang Zhe and their group of contestants were not seen for a long time. Seeing that the hour had arrived, everyone became impatient with the wait. Some people began to whisper: "Is Wansong Academy afraid of losing?"

, don’t dare to come?”

Just as he was talking, he heard the sound of gongs clearing the way outside, and then saw a large sedan walking towards the venue. Following the sedan were none other than Tang Zhe and other students from Wansong Academy and Li Xianzhong.

His servants.

The sedan landed in the middle of the field, and a middle-aged man in his forties with a pale face and no beard walked out of it. As soon as the man got off the sedan, Tang Zhe quickly introduced him to everyone.

"Dear friends, thank you very much for coming to our game today, and thank you for supporting our Wansong Academy." Tang Zhe made such a shameless opening statement, which immediately divided the audience into their own.

Supporter of Wansong Academy.

"Actually, this is just a small competition between Wansong and Donglin. Fortunately, Mr. Wen, our professor at Hangzhou Fuxue, is also very concerned about this matter, so he took time out of his busy schedule to come and give us a

Witness. Next, let’s ask our Mr. Wen to say a few words to you.”

This move really exceeded everyone's surprise. It was originally just a verbally agreed competition between the scholars. No one expected that an official from the DPRK and China would be brought to the scene to testify. Although the professor of Fu Xue seemed to

His rank is not high, he is only one level higher than the county magistrate. However, due to his special status, he has always been very influential in the hearts of scholars. And this Master Wen of Hangzhou Prefecture is the most popular among the professors of Fu Xue in the country.

A person who is famous.

Just when everyone was still stunned, Mr. Wen had already stood in the field and spoke loudly to the surrounding scholars: "It is an honor to be able to contribute to this event agreed by Tang Caizi and Yang Caizi today."

Testify to the competition.

I know that many of you must be thinking in your heart: Why do we all compete in martial arts instead of poems and essays when we are all literati? This is probably the first time I have heard of this kind of martial arts contest between literati.

The first thing I want to say is: I am very happy to see that in our scholarly community, there are scholars like Tang Caizi and Yang Caizi who are both civil and military, proficient in all six arts, and do not forget the ancient teachings of the saints. This is the most rare thing. Nowadays

There are too few scholars who can take care of the six arts. Too few! The prosperity of the Ming Dynasty requires not only the literary governance of scholars, but also military preparation.

Since ancient times, almost all the truly famous generals have been skilled in both civil and military skills. If the literati of Ming Dynasty did not practice martial arts, it would be very dangerous. Especially now. I think you must have heard about it. Women from Liaodong

The real person has become more and more violent, and this time, he has almost wiped out all four famous generals of the Ming Dynasty.

Our Ming Dynasty will no longer have famous generals to send, who will defend the border for us against the enemy? When we read the books of sages, we should remember the teachings of the sages. At this time, the court needs us to practice martial arts and know how to fight, so we should do our part.

Mr. Yang Ming once said: A clear mind shows one's nature. What is our nature? I think it should be for the prosperity of the family business and the prosperity of the country.

Mr. Qian Qianyi said: Managing the world and applying it. So, what do we need most now? I think it should be practicing martial arts and knowing soldiers.

Therefore, whether from the point of view of Mr. Yangming or Mr. Qian, I believe that it should be a good thing for scholars to learn martial arts at present.

Having said so many unnecessary words, let me first introduce to you the specifics of this competition.

This competition is divided into two games. The first game is an archery competition. Five people from each side draw lots for a one-on-one competition. The side that wins three rounds wins.

The second battle was originally a horse battle, but due to the different strengths and weaknesses of the horses on both sides, and in order to best reflect fairness, after negotiation between the two sides, it was changed to an infantry battle. Each side still had five men. However, this time it was

Use the ring style. That is to say, as long as one party is not knocked down by the other party, they can stay on the stage until they are knocked down by the other party, or until all opponents are defeated.

The final outcome is determined by the winning or losing of two games. If both sides win one game each, it will be a tie.

Since the stakes of this bet are somewhat special, I would like to reiterate them here!

If Donglin wins this time, then Tang Zhe from Wansong Academy and his thirty-two classmates will worship Donglin in public. If Wansong wins, then Yang Ju and the other four participating Donglin students

Mr. Lin will swear in public that he will never set foot in the examination room again in this life."

Having said this, Professor Wen Tirenwen paused for a moment. He turned to look at Tang Che, who was standing aside, and asked, "Tang Che, am I right?"

Tang Zhe nodded.

Wen Tiren turned to look at Yang Ju again, "Yang Ju, is the bet I told you correct?"

Yang Ju quickly took two steps forward, bowed and replied, "Mr. Wen is right!"

Wen Tiren then faced everyone again and said loudly, "Then, I now announce that the first game has officially begun. Please invite the five contestants from both sides to come on."

After hearing Wen Tiren's announcement, Tang Zhe immediately waved behind him. He was already impatient with the waiting.

I saw the other four contestants from Wansong Academy coming out one after another. They were Wang Shiji, Li Xianzhong, Li Liu, and Li Qi. These four people were wearing the same white Confucian shirts as Tang Zhe today, which made them look extra special.

The clothes are uniform, and the four characters "Wansong Academy" are embroidered on the chest of the clothes, which looks very advertising.

When Yang Ju saw that everyone on the other side had already left the field, he had no choice but to bite the bullet and said to Wen Tiren, "Mr. Wen, please forgive me. There are only three people on our side who can compete for the time being, but I don't know if Brother Tang can agree?" Yang Ju said.

Then, he turned his gaze to Tang Zhe who was standing aside.

Tang Zhe was obviously a little surprised. He didn't expect that the five people Yang Ju had originally said would be a good person would turn into three when it came to the competition. He glanced over and saw that there were only two people behind Yang Ju, Yu Ren and Lu Xiangsheng. "Why?
Chapter completed!