Imperial Master of the Ming Dynasty

These prisoners who signed up have never had enough to eat.

Because, in prison, they have very few opportunities to eat.

Jiang Xinghuo himself had experienced this. He knew very well that two meals of gruel a day in official prisons was probably a very good treatment compared with civilian prisons.

In this case, if you ask the prisoners what they want.

The answer is often touching.

They just want a full meal!

However, this kind of thing is simply impossible to achieve.

If the imperial edict does this, the jailers will be waiting for a greater workload, more troubles, and even greatly increase their probability of injury or death.

Therefore, for these ordinary prisoners, being able to eat a mouthful of steamed buns is already a luxury and very satisfying.

Jiang Xinghuo looked at the prisoner in front of him.

There are men and women, old and young.

But at this moment, they all have something in common. Everyone is unkempt and in a state of embarrassment. The skin exposed under the tattered prison uniforms is generally covered with purple bruises and bloodstains, as if they had just been beaten in the torture chamber. Afterwards, it was as if it was dragged back here, looking particularly ferocious and terrifying.

There was also a suffocating stench surrounding their bodies, and the entire space was filled with a strong rancid smell.

Jiang Xinghuo watched the prisoners eating quietly without saying a word.

Finally, all the prisoners and students finished eating the buns.

Next——

Jiang Xinghuo picked up the charcoal pen, wrote the word "ginger" on the upper left corner of the board, and then stopped.

Except for the sound of charcoal rubbing against wood,

No response.

After a while, there was a sound of nauseating retching in the duty room.

One man ate in a hurry, and the regurgitated steamed buns mixed with saliva got stuck in his esophagus. He retched uncomfortably, and pinched his own throat with both hands.

The prisoners around him consciously stayed away from him.

Jiang Xinghuo walked quickly to his side and pressed his shoulder.

"Spit it out."

The man resisted the instinctive feeling of vomiting extremely resolutely and wanted to swallow the precious steamed buns back.

Jiang Xinghuo patted his back, and the man shook his body, trying to resist, but he couldn't hold it in, and a piece of undigested hard dough bun was spat out.

Almost in a flash of lightning, everyone's eyes were greedily staring at the vomited bun, ready to move.

The man also stretched out his hands to pick it up from the ground and stuff it back into his mouth.

A shoe stepped on the steamed bun.

The man looked up and glared at the owner of the shoes.

Jiang Xinghuo squinted his eyes and looked at him. He was a tall and thin young man with sunken cheeks and chapped lips with blood stains.

The lines on his face were very soft, and his eyebrows were slender. However, the pale complexion on his face made the originally delicate man look a little gloomy.

Jiang Xinghuo looked at the tall, thin young man.

"Answer my question and I'll give you another steamed bun."

The young man looked at the small piece of steamed buns that had been trampled dirty on the ground, with an anxious look on his face, and said: "You are also a prisoner, but you are just a teacher. There is no steamed buns to share with me. Don't think that I am easy to trick." .”

Jiang Xinghuo just said to the two jailers at the door.

"Go to the kitchen and get some more buns."

Xie Jin and Zheng He looked at each other with big eyes and small eyes. You looked at me and I looked at you.

These two fake jailers just changed their clothes and waist knives. Who knows which way does the prison kitchen door open?

Xie Jin motioned for Zheng He to go, but Zheng He didn't tolerate him.

In terms of official position, Zheng He was one of the most eminent eunuchs in the imperial court. In terms of merit, Zheng He followed Zhu Di throughout the entire Jingnan period. He was not a young eunuch or eunuch who could be ordered around at will by Xie Jin.

What's more, Zheng He was forced to dig out bird droppings in a stone pond not long ago due to Jiang Xinghuo's words.

After coming back after so much hardship, many people in the palace even laughed at him, saying that his contribution was so great that His Majesty would definitely call him a "bird shit lord".

Now Zheng He returned to Nanjing with a fleet of guano. Before the smell of guano could be washed away, the emperor assigned him to Jiang Xinghuo again.

I just came back from digging bird droppings for you, and you ordered me to serve you steamed buns. Who am I, Zheng He?

Sanbao eunuch!

The powerful commander of the Ming Navy!

Don't I want to lose face?

Seeing that he could not be pushed to the indignant Zheng He, Xie Jin had no choice but to grit his teeth and turn around to look for the steamed buns.

Ever since, Xie Jin felt a little more resentful towards Jiang Xinghuo.

After Jiang Xinghuo saw the two lazy jailers exchanging glances, one of them was white and thin, so he stopped delving into it.

The prisoners' attitudes changed somewhat when they saw that Jiang Xinghuo, the prisoner responsible for teaching, actually instigated the jailers.

The most intuitive thing is that they are willing to talk.

Jiang Xinghuo asked the young man.

"what's your name?"

"Xiao...Xiao Wu."

It was the tall, thin young man who had blood oozing from the corner of his mouth just now.

To say he is a young person may not be accurate.

To describe him accurately, he should be a big boy.

Jiang Xinghuo nodded to him, and then said to everyone: "Before you come, someone should have told you that you should come to my place to learn literacy and arithmetic for an hour every day. If you learn well, you will have steamed buns to eat."

"Jiang keeps his word. Seeing that you are very hungry, I will allow you to eat steamed buns first."

"If you plan to give up after eating one steamed bun today, Jiang has nothing to say, so please come back now."

The prisoners looked at each other in confusion. The guards had all gone to serve the steamed buns. If they went back now, wouldn't they be losing money?

"No one goes back?"

Jiang Xinghuo walked to the middle of the guard room, then raised his eyes and looked around, finding that most of the other prisoners had very calm expressions.

Although the scars on their bodies were still shocking, they did not feel panic. In fact, they seemed to be used to it.

Only when their eyes passed over another prisoner in the corner——

The man lowered his head and huddled on the innermost side of the wall. He blocked the only light in the room with his hair, completely covering his appearance. Even if you look closely at him, it is difficult to distinguish his true appearance. Not to mention getting to know each other.

Jiang Xinghuo frowned slightly.

Among such a group of dirty prisoners, there was an unexpectedly fair person.

"Keep your head up."

The man shrank his neck, and the prisoner next to him whispered: "You've changed your face, you don't want to eat steamed buns anymore? This teacher is talking to you!"

In this way, this man just raised his head, but his face was painted like a ghost with the white dust he didn't know he had blown away.

Then, the man turned his head.

With a "swish" sound, he turned into a simple red-faced mask. I don't know how he did it.

As soon as the red face appeared, his whole person changed from the state of cowering in the corner to a weird one, and his whole person became angry.

"Red-faced Guan Gong, fuck your mother-in-law!"

Seeing this man change his face, the prisoner next to him immediately changed his face as well, as if he was very familiar with him, and worked together to pin him to the ground.

"Don't go crazy! Change back!"

Looking at this farce, Jiang Xinghuo's expression remained calm, but he couldn't help but think about it.

"Yes, the co-author is still a schizophrenic. There are really all kinds of characters in the prison now."

Only when the boy named 'Bian Lian'er' returned to his white-faced state and retreated into the corner with his face in his arms, was Jiang Xinghuo able to continue.

After questioning, Jiang Xinghuo roughly knew the names and circumstances of each of the prisoners who came to eliminate illiteracy.

The one who was retching at the beginning was called Xiao Wu, and he was a mirror polisher who walked around the streets. Well, he used mercury to polish bronze mirrors to make the blurry bronze mirrors clear again.

The person called "Lianlianer" is not a real theater practitioner. He is a little beggar on the roadside who learned his skills from a master who picked him up with half a bucket of water.

I really only learned two things.

Practicing every day, year after year, dreaming of one day being on stage and becoming a star, in the end it will be like this.

The result was these two. Because there was no one to guide me, I took on the role myself. I was stunned.

The old man who was missing a leg was a scale waiter. He had no name, so he was called "Lao Deng Weighing Scale".

The scale maker, as the name suggests, is the person in the market who is responsible for calibrating scales for everyone. To do this job, you need two things. One is a steady hand, so you can know whether the scale is fishy as soon as you make a move; the other is credibility, as long as someone sees it. I tampered with my hands and feet, and I will no longer be able to do this business from now on.

It is the so-called "the importance is in the eyes, the balance is in the hands, and there must be no difference".

The smooth-tongued one is called Zhang Ling. He is a street detective who specializes in gossiping with people, saying wisecracks and auspicious words to flatter people. He is more common in Qinhuai River and prosperous commercial neighborhoods. He has also been engaged in "selling war" (selling fake medicines) in the past. A very promising industry.

In the other corner, silently holding a piece of wood and stunned, he was a craftsman who carved and molded wood. He changed it to "Mu Leng". He didn't know whether it was a pseudonym, a nickname, or his real name that confused Jiang Xinghuo. His fingers had been corroded by gold powder over the years, and under the candlelight they looked like a pair of golden hands and fleshy Buddhas.

There was also a kiln burner who was also taciturn.

After roughly understanding the origins and names of these people, Jiang Xinghuo felt confident.

Including the time they spent eating steamed buns and introducing themselves, it was now half an hour later, and Jiang Xinghuo still had no intention of starting a lecture.

This could not help but make Zheng He, who was standing at the door holding a knife and watching, secretly frowning.

Jiang Xinghuo, what are you planning to do?

At this time, Xie Jin also came back with a stern face carrying a basket of hard buns.

Seeing that the teaching progress here was still zero, Xie Jin couldn't help but sneered and put the buns on the table.

"Bang!"

The steamed bun on top was so shaken that it turned over.

Jiang Xinghuo looked at this strange jailer strangely.

The strange thing is not because he has never seen this jailer before. After the rebellion of King Gu, the jailers in the imperial prison changed a lot, and there were many jailers he had never seen before.

What's strange to Jiang Xinghuo is how this skinny jailer with so little eyesight survived to this day. He doesn't look like someone with great abilities and background.

With no time to think about it, Jiang Xinghuo asked the first formal question to the students in the prison literacy class.

Jiang Xinghuo held the charcoal pen with three fingers and wrote on the wooden board.

He turned around and asked, "Do you know what this character means?"