Jia Zheng snorted coldly, waved his hand and said, "You go back and tell him that I will test his essay later, just let him wait with peace of mind!"

The boy went away with a sad face.

Jia Zheng hesitated for a moment and suddenly asked: "I heard that General Manager Lai wants to use your connections to find an official position for his son. What do you think of this?"

He mentioned this not to stand up for Lai, but because he saw that Jiao Shun was absent-minded, he wanted to use this opportunity to test Jiao Shun's current attitude towards Rongguo Mansion and himself.

"Is this..."

Because Jiao Shun was busy making trouble for Mei Hanlin recently, he didn't pay attention to this matter for a while. Now that Jia Zheng took the initiative to mention it, he immediately jumped up and said: "I should have asked Uncle Shi to give me instructions, so my nephew will do it as ordered -

—It’s just a coincidence that during the past two days, I was discussing with the emperor in the palace the preparations for the establishment of an engineering school, and I just had a rare opportunity to advance into it.”

"oh?"

Jia Zheng listened to the words in front of him, and unconsciously stroked his beard and nodded. He also heard that there was a rare step to enter the body, and subconsciously asked: "But I don't know what the step to enter the body is?"

"Uncle Shi must have heard that the Ministry of Accounts has always refused to allocate the funds needed to build the engineering school. The emperor's repeated orders have not been effective, so he thought of simply abandoning the Ministry of Accounts and raising funds on his own."

"Self-funded?"

Jia Zheng frowned when he heard this: "You mean donating money?"

"good."

Jiao Shun said: "When the yamen next door want to raise funds from the public, they either force them to allocate money, or they make loud noises and make little rain. But engineering and science are different. They are inseparable from industry and commerce. What's more, the imperial businessmen are now asking for donations."

Send the children in, now all we need is someone to pierce the window paper."

"Do you want the Lai family to take the lead?"

Jia Zheng's brows furrowed even more tightly: "His family is afraid that they may not dare to be in such limelight."

Jiao Shun cupped his hands slightly: "So I need Uncle Shi to nod."

After a pause, he added: "But since I have done this, Manager Lai's family will probably be better off than mine in the future. Otherwise, I don't know what kind of rumors will come out outside."

"Let the Lai family deregister?"

After hearing this, Jia Zheng's frown suddenly relaxed a lot.

In fact, he was dissatisfied with the Lai family's control of the family, especially the matter of secretly investigating the master a while ago. Unless the old lady had spoken, he might not be willing to turn the matter into a minor matter.

Now it is the Lai family who has taken the initiative to seek an official position. For this reason, resigning from the family can be regarded as a favor to seek benevolence, and the old lady should not be able to find fault.

The more he thought about it, the more he felt that he had done it right.

only……

"Even if the Lai family is willing to come forward, the expenses for engineering studies are definitely not a small amount. How much are you prepared to ask him to donate?"

"not much."

Hearing this, Jiao Shun slowly stretched out three fingers.

"Three thousand taels?"

Jia Zheng was confused: "What can you do with such a small amount of money?"

Jiao Shun shook his head and corrected: "It's thirty thousand taels."

"Thirty thousand taels?"

Jia Zheng was taken aback, and immediately waved his hands: "His family has just built a garden. Although it is far inferior to this provincial residence, I am afraid that it has already added all the money he has saved over several lifetimes. You let him go out for three years?"

Even if I sell the house at a discount, I may not even be able to get it together."

"Ha ha!"

Jiao Shun laughed and said disapprovingly: "Uncle Shi is probably looking down on his family. How about you leave this matter to your nephew and see if he can take it out?"

After hearing this, Jia Zheng's face became increasingly suspicious. The Rongguo Mansion had already incurred a huge debt for building this Provincial Courtyard. How could this mean that the Lai family still had enough money to spare?
Chapter completed!