A Complete Explanation of the Negative Examples in Imperial Examinations

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[He was the villain in family drama stories, the obstacle in pampering romance novels, and the example of what not to do in imperial examination tales]

Your father joined the army and became a marquis, but the hostess wasn’t your mother. What to do?

Your stepmother seemed to be a transmigrator, gentle and virtuous but actually wanted to spoil you rotten. What to do?

Your grandmother was biased and opportunistic, wanting you to give up your position as the eldest legitimate son. What to do?

While preparing for the imperial exams, relatives caused all sorts of trouble, hoping you would fail. What to do?

— All these answers could be found in “A Complete Explanation of the Negative Textbooks for the Imperial Examinations.” This book covered modules on family disputes, imperial exam difficulties, official career troubles, and rules for powerful officials. It was suitable for exam candidates aspiring to become villainous high-ranking officials. With this book in hand, you would conquer the exams. If it didn’t teach you, we offered a full refund!

Later, when noble families educated their children, they always used Xiao Jingduo as an example: “Study hard and don’t go astray. Don’t be like him; don’t disgrace the words of the sages.”

People’s opinions of Xiao Jingduo were mixed. His most criticized trait was his apparent lack of scholarly integrity, willingly serving as the Regent Princess’s blade and dedicating his life to her.

Later, Xiao Jingduo married the Regent Princess.

Court officials: “… no wonder!”

Associated Names
One entry per line
A Complete Explanation of the Negative Textbooks for the Imperial Examination
朝公主
科举反面教材全解
Related Series
N/A
Recommendations
Greetings, Ninth Uncle (1)
I Became The Stepmother of My Ex-husband (1)
It’s Better to be the Empress Dowager (1)
Spring Banquet (1)
The Crown Prince in the Jade Pendant (1)
When Spring Comes (1)
Recommendation Lists
  1. Romance - Drama - Slice of life - Adult (On-Going)
  2. God of Transmigration/Reincarnation 2
  3. 2023 New Favorite Novels
  4. I Have Read A Gem #4
  5. my recommendation

Latest Release

Date Group Release
07/18/24 KnoxT c15
07/17/24 KnoxT c14
07/16/24 KnoxT c13
07/14/24 KnoxT c12
07/11/24 KnoxT c11
07/07/24 KnoxT c10
07/07/24 KnoxT c9
07/05/24 KnoxT c8 part2
08/02/22 KnoxT c8 part1
07/17/22 KnoxT c7
07/16/22 KnoxT c6
07/07/22 KnoxT c5
06/28/22 KnoxT c4
06/26/22 KnoxT c3
06/23/22 KnoxT c2
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Review
7 Reviews


SweetShireen
SweetShireen
Jun 18, 2022
Status: --
I knew the summary sounded familiar....I read this over a year ago using only MTL. It was good enough to keep me hooked through machine translation, so that's a plus. The ML is pretty awesome and he has a hard life. He really has to work for everything he has, his father is a POS. But who really stood out to me was the FL. She's amazing and I love how they worked as a team. She helped him early in life when he was vulnerable and he helped her... more>> later in life when she appeared strong but was more vulnerable than ever. He was willing to become the knife in her hand without her ever asking him to. Now that's love. <<less
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Humming-lady
Humming-lady
Jun 18, 2022
Status: Completed
Hi!This is the translator. And a very noob one. This is my first one. So if there were mistakes, don't mind and keep going on. Cuz the novel is a good one.

This one I found after 'It's better to be the Empress Dowager.' I just like searching for the same author's novels. And all of them are good.

This one starts from young child to a prime minister. So romance is a sub plot. But they interact since a child.

This is more like a slice of life. The angst is just... more>> enough. It's about his study and career.

I can't spoil you all too much. But if you are too impatient to wait for release, you can mtl it. It's not difficult to read. I also did it. So don't mind.

And it has a sequel. Like many years after their genereations. That one is good too.

Sorry, guys. This 's my first review. I can't explain it. Hope you guys enjoy it.

If you are okay., please support the author on jjwxc. <<less
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frostcrystal
frostcrystal
Jul 02, 2023
Status: Completed
A decent try from an author I'm pretty fond of. The base concept (life story of the Princess Regent's right hand man/consort) is pretty good, but the first half of the book is not executed as well as I could have hoped.

I'll start with the good stuff. I really enjoyed the gender-flipped variant of the usual setting. ML is the underdog in the scheming inner court, and FL is the mysterious, powerful, high-born one who occasionally helps him because he piques her interest. As it happens, this actually works really... more>> well because the ML has more agency than normal historical romance leads due to his gender, and FL has more limits on her power, also due to her gender. This results in the two of them having a much more equal power dynamic than a usual CN in which ML is some untouchably strong fellow secretly working for the emperor while FL is stuck in the back house.

I'm also happy to report that FL Rong Ke is cool and competent throughout the book and never had a sudden change of character. ML seems to love her partly due to the fact that she's so strong, which one can understand if you look at his mom.

About halfway through, the story picks up into a rather fun little kingdom builder, if you like kingdom building (and I do!). Then it branches into political intrigue, if you like political intrigue (and I do, too!!). These were the stronger portions of the story for me. I found the early part of the book a bit hard to swallow for the reasons below.

Downsides:

    • ML is somewhat... unbelievably OP. He has a very broad view of the situation and great forethought starting early on in the story that is not quite right for a 9-year-old child raised on a rural farm. Being emotionally mature would be one thing, but ML seems to just instinctively know things (like how interactions between the aristocracy, royalty, and officials work) which he has no background reason to know and no one has explained to him.
    • If you're still able to accept ML's rather prodigious maturity, just know that FL starts the novel out at five.
    • Some of the side characters have supernatural powers (transmigrated, reincarnated, etc), and although this does have a minor impact on the plot, I don't feel like it was really needed. It didn't seem to quite jive with the novel as a whole.
In short, I feel like it was a fun and promising premise that could have been done better in the beginning. Frankly, all the main characters just needed to be about five years older than they are. <<less
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DojaDoge
DojaDoge
Jul 15, 2022
Status: Completed
This is a true underdog story featuring a young male protagonist. The story features a wily, ruthless regent princess. The MC is one of her loyalists/aides, for lack of a better word.

Unlike, other books written by this author, there really isn't a lot of romance in this novel. This has a lot of scheming, plotting, mystery -solving, action, and battles. There are plenty of humorous moments.

The author wrote that the battles for the throne (a highlight of the novel) and the huge social upheavals that take place are based on... more>> the early Tang dynasty.

The translation is good. I found the story so engrossing that I had to MTL the rest. Most of it was understandable and easy to decipher.

I deducted one star because the romance was underdeveloped; the characters were two dimensional. Some parts seemed to drag on and on. Like many CN authors, she writes her protagonists as near-geniuses from a very young age. Sure, they matured quickly back then... but maybe not so fast. Anyways, if you dislike this gimmick, you will hate 90% of CN novels. The plus side is that some of their enemies are also very smart, so it's mostly a fair fight.
Spoiler

Towards the end, the MC makes a huge mistake. In addition to almost losing her life, she endangers her brother's throne.

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At any rate I liked this better than I'll be the Male Protagonist's Sister-in-law. Her other books, It's Better to be Empress Dowager and I Became the Stepmother to my Ex is much better. Greetings, Ninth Uncle is also a winner.

In response to Bookworm:

The other books that I read by this author are romances, so I mistakenly thought it would be the same. Bookworm is right to say that the romance is a subplot. Nevertheless, it is still underdeveloped. The romance begins with the MC's adoration towards the Princess. Nothing happens until the end-- when it's wrapped up in a hurry.

As for IBTMPSIL, IMHO it just wasn't written as well as her other books. Nevertheless, it's still a lot better than many books you come across online. I'm not going to go into detail since I already wrote a review. Please see that for more info. Also, I don't rate a book higher just because it happens to be my preferred genre. The plot is much better conceived in this book. The MCs in both books could be better developed, but I like the Princess. There aren't very many characters like her. <<less
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Syncletica
Syncletica
Apr 02, 2024
Status: Completed
This is one of the author's book that I like to read although to be honest, the reason I don't give it 5 stars is that 1) The story focuses too much on the MCs and 2) There's too many illogical plot holes here and there. Still, I give this a plus for the premise. Rarely you'll find this kind of story where the FL's the overlord and the ML who voluntarily becomes her loyal sword.

I also kinda expected them to end together in the end, since there's some kind... more>> of chemistry between them. It isn't romantic, yes. Their relationship is more like the kind of trust that you can entrust your everything to each other. I personally prefer this kind of natural relationship rather than romantic tropes filled with sugary words.

One thing to note, I feel pity for the FL. When she tries to survive in the chaotic court in the middle of people trying to get rid or take advantage of her for the sake of protecting her brother, the one person who should support her — her mother — is wary of her and afraid that she'll take the throne from her brother's.

I hate this kind of parent who can't accept their children the way they are. Heck, even the brother says that the FL's more suited for the throne than him, and if she asks him for it, he'll give it to her willingly. But because she doesn't want to, then he'll protect everything she has struggled for. I'm really, really glad that her brother is not the kind of ungrateful bastard who throws away his own sister after using her.

On that note, I think this novel has more interesting premises than the author's other work. Feel free if you want to read it. <<less
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bookwurm247
bookwurm247
Nov 19, 2022
Status: Completed
As with the others, I also MTLd this after reading the translated chapters. First to address a few thing another review brought up based on my impressions of the story.

MsEliteNeet: They make two points that I want to address. There's nothing wrong with their review, I just disagree with a couple of points.

1. There was a lack of romance in the book. I believe this was because this was the author's intent. There wasn't author's notes for me to read in MTL but I got the sense that the author's... more>> intent in this series was more focused on the palace drama over succession. The romance was a subplot. I'm not gonna lie, I am a little confused by their rating since they said they deducted a star for the lack of romance, which said to me that they wanted more romance. But they liked this book better than IBTMLSIL, which has a lot more romance in it compared to the succession drama in that series. That story is essentially about how two people "saved" each other when they were at their lowest.

2. Spoiler
Spoiler

Theres two scenarios I'm thinking this might refer too. 1) they're referring to when the FL got attacked and had to leave the city then fight a civil war with her uncle because he was rebelling. Idk why they think this is a mistake on FL's part since she had no idea it was coming at all. First, the initial attack came from her Uncle-in-law, who she was close with since this was her full blooded aunt's husband. Second, the third uncle was the one who plotted to overthrow her and her brother. This third uncle was also close to her and literally watched her grow up. He used to take care of her too. Because she never expected the attack to come from two of her closest relatives, idk how you can call this a mistake. She would've died if she didn't leave. They had the palace and city surrounded and her maid had to disguise as her so that FL could escape. 2) They're referring to when FL was traveling to a monastery to pray for the people since there had been a lot of snow lately and there was some disasters because of it. She gets attacked and falls off a cliff. Again idk how this was FL's fault since again, the attack came from a trusted person, her personal maid who had been with her for a decade +. Plus, she knew the attack was coming. She just didn't know who was going to be the one pulling the trigger, her great-grandma or her step-grandma. The trip was only to lure them out and get them to attack her since she needed a chance to finally do something. After the attack, she uses the chance to get rid of alot of their cronies in the administration so that it was easier for her brother to rule. Another indication that she had planned this was when she was found by her personal guard about 1 day after she fell off the cliff. She was only injured because she wasn't expecting the attack from her personal maid.

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Overall tho, I enjoyed the book. It definitely is a little different compared to her other books that I've read (I'll Be the Male Lead's Sister-in-Law, It's Better to Be the Empress Dowager, I Became the Stepmother of my Ex-Husband, and Greetings Ninth Uncle.) Like I mentioned above, since the romance is a subplot, it might seem like it came out of nowhere when they get married. But there are clues along the way that show how and when they fell for each other. The only thing is
Spoiler

ML has a BF/rival from school who he competes with. Granted the competition is more from Bai Jiayi's side to beat the ML in something. There's a line at the end that the ML says, "Finally, Bai Jiayi, the political and love rival, was completely resolved." This kinda came out of nowhere for me. Probably because this was MTL but I couldn't pin point where Bai Jiayi "fell in love" with FL. Honestly, he kinda disappears from the plot for periods of time until he was needed and then he shows up

[collapse]
.

Tbh, the side characters are kinda 2D and are only inserted where needed. We only know the bare minimum to know who they are and why they're relevant to the plot. Tbf even the main couple of kinda 2D. Their plot armor is so thick that I can't see through it to know them better. The ML is only a little better because it's his pov, kinda. Maybe because it was MTL, I might've missed some nuances about the characters but overall characters are not that well developed imo. A major theme in this series is betrayal from those closest to you. There's a lot of examples, and not just about FL, and I won't list them all but from the FL's perspective,
Spoiler

there's a couple of notable examples. There's the two I mentioned in my response to MsEliteNeet's spoiler and another notable one is from her own mother. Her mother gets suspicious toward the end that FL wanted the throne for herself and wasn't going to return it to her brother. It's not mentioned but it's implied that there's been people who have been whispering things to her about this. Her mother had always dismissed it because FL was fighting to get rid of rivals to her brother's rule. This was further exacerbated by the fact that FL mentioned to her mother that she wanted to marry ML (because her mother was also pushing her to get married now that things had settled down), who is a pretty prominent person at court at this point. FL asks why and her mother's response was that they were both to headstrong to workout with each other. They both needed someone "gentle and understanding" to balance it out. IMO this was a lie that the mom was telling herself. I think the real reason why is because if they get married, they would be too powerful as a couple for the mom to do anything about. She didn't reject her daughter becoming regent because she knew she was too weak to handle the job

[collapse]
. This review is getting too long so I will wrap up. Overall, another good book from September Flowing Fire. I wouldn't rate it as high on my list as her other ones, but definitely one I'll come back to when it's fully translated. <<less
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7starkiller99
7starkiller9
Jul 23, 2022
Status: Completed
Novel 100% not recommended to read.

The story lacks logic and is full of plot holes, honestly to the point where you wonder how the author thought any of this was logical.

Basically, MC (the guy) has a sickly weak mother who dies from lack of love (moronic), with an evil stepmother (a scumbag crosser from time and space) and a scumbag father (who tried to kill Mc's mother).

Author makes MC OP in knowledge, being able to read fast and learn pharmacology due to seeing books as a kid. Yet before he... more>> even turns 10 he's foiling plots to poison his mother, stirring controversy within his father's mansion, and beguiling his family to read and study.

The story is pointless, lacking any real interesting hooks to keep reading.

Basically the plot structure is: Mc's life is pitiful - Scum does scum stuff - MC easily foils it despite author writing how horrible and tragic and hard Mc's life is. You never feel anything since the MC is an OP perfect individual who can stop poisonings, solve evil bees, or even navigate complicated court structures. To make it even more laughable, the little princess also below age 10 is doing her own schemes. There is never a sense of danger, nor is there any emotional investment in the sociopathic MC. He's also a prideful idiot, except everything goes his way. Guy has thick plot armor. Perhaps if this moronic OP MC took the easy path and lurked with his scum father he could've saved his mother even. He's really quite s*upid.

Really, the novel is ludicrous event after ludicrous event with a side entry of lame, disgusting tragedy. -900Quintillion/10 A garbage novel of Chinese court intrigue.

P.S. Forgetting the insanely gifted child MC and FL, what's with the reactions of the other individuals. All you have is scum or cardboard people who exist to react. Really makes the novel an empty waste. <<less
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