There was a man named Lang Yuzhu in Pengcheng, Jiangsu Province. His father served as an official and became a prefect. He was an honest official. Instead of buying land and property from his salary, he accumulated a house full of books. People of Lang Yuzhu's generation were particularly foolish: their family was suffering from poverty and had nothing they would not sell, except for their father's book collection, which they were reluctant to sell even a single volume. When his father was still alive, he copied the "Encouragement to Learning" and posted it next to Lang Yuzhu's seat, asking him to read it every day. He also covered it with white gauze to prevent the handwriting from being erased. He did not study to obtain an official position, but truly believed that there really was a "house of gold" and a "thousand bells of millet" in the book. He studied and studied day and night, and the severe cold and heat never stopped. When I am over 20 years old, I don't ask for a marriage proposal, but just hope that the beauty in the book will come automatically. When meeting relatives and friends, he doesn't know how to greet or socialize. After saying two or three sentences, he starts reading aloud, and the guests leave soon. Every time there was an examination for academic affairs, he was always selected as the first, but he suffered from the fact that he failed to pass the examination. One day, Lang Yuzhu was reading, and suddenly a strong wind blew away the book in his hand. He hurriedly chased after him, but without paying attention, he stepped on a hole and fell in. He touched it with his hands and found some rotten grass in the hole. When he dug it open, he found that it was grain stored by ancient people, which had become moldy and dirty. Although these grains were inedible, he believed even more that the saying "there are thousands of grains in books" was true, and he studied harder.
One day, Lang Yuzhu climbed up the ladder to the high bookshelf and dug out a gold chariot from the pile of books. It was about a foot long. He was very happy and thought this was the fulfillment of "the book has its own golden house". He took it out to show others, but it turned out that it was gold-plated, not real gold. He secretly complained that the ancients had deceived him. Not long after, a friend of Lang Yuzhu's father who passed the examination came to Pengcheng as an observer. This man liked to worship Buddha. Someone advised Lang Yuzhu to offer the golden chariot to the observer as a Buddhist shrine. The observer was very happy and gave him three hundred taels of silver and two horses. He was very happy, thinking that the words about golden houses, carriages and horses in the book were true, so he studied harder.
But Lang Yuzhu was already thirty years old at this time. Someone advised him to marry a wife, but he said: "'There are beautiful faces in the book,' so why should I worry about not having a beautiful wife?" He read the book for another two or three years, but it had no effect; people laughed at him. At that time, there were rumors among the people that the Weaver Girl in the sky had escaped privately. Someone joked with Lang Yuzhu: "Weaver Girl eloped just for you." Lang Yuzhu knew that he was teasing him, so he ignored it and did not argue.
One night, he was reading "Hanshu" to the eighth volume. In the middle of this volume, he saw a beauty cut from gauze hidden in the book. He said in surprise: "'There is a beauty like jade in the book', can this be used to fulfill it?" He felt melancholy, as if he had lost something. However, if you look closely at the beauty, your eyebrows and eyes are lifelike; on the back, there are small words vaguely written: "Weaver Girl." Lang Yuzhu was surprised. He put the beauty in his book every day and looked at it over and over again, even forgetting to eat and sleep. One day, while he was watching attentively, the beauty suddenly bent over, sat on the book and smiled at him. Lang Yuzhu was so frightened that he knelt under the table and kowtowed. After he got up, the beauty had become more than a foot tall. Lang Yuzhu became more and more frightened, and knelt down to kowtow again. The beauty got down from the table, standing tall and graceful, as if she were a peerless beauty. Lang Yuzhu bowed down and asked: "What kind of god are you?" The beauty said with a smile: "My surname is Yan, and my name is Ruyu. You have known me for a long time. I appreciate your favor and miss you every day. If I don't come, I'm afraid thousands of people will die." From now on, no one will devoutly believe in the ancients." Lang Yuzhu was overjoyed and lived with the beauty. However, between pillows and mats, Lang Yuzhu loved the beauty very much, but did not know how to have sex.
Whenever Lang Yuzhu was reading, he always asked beautiful women to sit next to him. The beauty advised him not to study, but he didn't listen. The beauty said: "The reason why you can't rise to the top is precisely because of studying. Look at the Jinshi and Juren lists. How many people like you are studying like you? If you don't listen, I will leave." Lang Yuzhu listened to her for the time being. . But after a while, she forgot her advice and started chanting again. After some time, he looked for the beauty, but the beauty was nowhere to be found. He was so distraught that he knelt down to pray, but there was no trace of him. Suddenly he remembered where the beauty was hiding, so he took the "Book of Han" and searched carefully until he found the place where the beauty was found. Sure enough, he found it. Lang Yuzhu called her, but she didn't move, so he knelt down and begged for a blessing. The beauty then came down and said: "If you don't listen to me anymore, I will never divorce you!" The beauty then asked Lang Yuzhu to buy chess pieces and gambling equipment, and played with him every day. But Lang Yuzhu's mind was not on this at all. When he saw that the beauty was not in front of him, he secretly picked up a book and read it. Afraid of being discovered by the beauty, he secretly mixed the eighth volume of "Han Shu" elsewhere, causing the beauty to lose her hiding place.
One day, Lang Yuzhu was engrossed in reading when the beauty came, but he didn't notice it. Suddenly he saw it and hurriedly closed the book, but the beauty had disappeared. Lang Yuzhu was very frightened and searched hard in the pile of books, but there was no trace and it was difficult to find. Later, he found it in the eighth volume of "Hanshu", and the page number was correct. So he knelt down to pray again and vowed never to study again. The beauty then came down, played chess with him, and said, "If you can't learn how to play chess in three days, I have to leave." On the third day, Lang Yuzhu suddenly won the beauty by two pieces in a game of chess. The beauty became happy and taught him to play the piano, giving him five days to master a piece of music. Lang Yuzhu fiddled with it in his hands and stared with his eyes, having no time to think about other things. After practicing for a long time, he played it casually and in tune with the rhythm, and he was inspired unconsciously. The beauty drank and played chess with him every day, and he was so happy that he forgot to study. The beauty encouraged him to go out and make friends. From then on, Lang Yuzhu's reputation for being charming and suave quickly spread. The beauty said: "You can go out and take the exam."
One night, Lang Yuzhu said to the beauty: "Generally, people will have children when men and women live together. Now I have lived with you for so long, why haven't I given birth to a child yet?" The beauty said with a smile: "You study every day. I originally said that you don't have children when you study. Good thing. You haven't even understood the chapter on the way of husband and wife yet. The word pillow mat requires effort." Lang Yuzhu asked in surprise: "What effort?" The beauty smiled and said nothing. After a while, the beauty took the initiative to get close to him. Lang Yuzhu was extremely happy and said: "I didn't expect that the fun between husband and wife is more difficult to express in words." So he told everyone he met, and everyone who heard it covered their mouths and laughed. The beauty found out and blamed him. He said: "You can't tell others about drilling holes and climbing up walls; family happiness is something everyone has, so why be taboo about it."
Eight or nine months later, the beauty gave birth to a boy and hired a wet nurse to take care of him. One day, the beauty said to Lang Yuzhu: "I have been with you for two years and have given birth to a child for you. It's time to say goodbye. I'm afraid it will bring disaster to you if we stay for a long time. It will be too late to regret by then." After hearing this, Lang Yuzhu said, She shed tears, knelt on the ground and could not get up, and said, "Don't you miss the crying child?" The beauty was also very sad. After a long time, she said: "If you want me to stay, you must scatter all the books on the bookshelf." Lang Yuzhu said: "This is your hometown and it is my life. Why did you say such a thing?" !" The beauty did not force him, but said, "I also know that all this is God's will, but I have to tell you in advance."
Earlier, some of Lang Yuzhu's relatives had seen the beauty, and they were all surprised. However, they had not heard about which girl he was married to, so they all went to ask him. Lang Yuzhu couldn't tell lies, so he had to remain silent. People became more suspicious, and the news spread almost everywhere, including the county magistrate Shi Gong. Shi Gong was from Fujian and won the Jinshi Scholarship when he was young. When he heard the legend, he was very admired and moved, and secretly wanted to see the beauty's face, so he arrested Lang Yuzhu and the beauty. When the beauty heard the news, she ran away and disappeared without a trace. The county magistrate was angry and arrested Lang Yuzhu, deprived him of his status as a scholar, and used all kinds of torture to make sure to find out the whereabouts of the beauty. Lang Yuzhu was dying and did not say a word. The county magistrate tortured Lang Yuzhu's maid, but the maid could only tell the general situation. The county magistrate thought that the beauty was a goblin, so he prepared a car and came to Lang's house in person. I saw books piled up all over the house, too many to search, so they were set on fire; thick smoke gathered in the yard and lingered for a long time, making it dark like dark clouds.
After Lang Yuzhu was released, he went to a distant place to get a letter from one of his father's disciples, and he was able to regain his qualifications as a scholar. In the autumn of this year, he passed the imperial examination, and the next year he passed the imperial examination. And he hated the county magistrate Shi Gong with all his heart. He set up a memorial tablet for the beautiful Yan Ruyu, and prayed morning and night: "If you have a spirit, please help me to be an official in Fujian." Later, he went to Fujian as a censor to inspect. During his three months in Fujian, he found out many of Shi Gong's evil deeds and confiscated his family. At that time, Lang Yuzhu had a cousin who was a manager, who forced Lang Yuzhu to take in Shi's concubine, falsely claiming that she was a purchased maid and living in the government office. After the case was concluded, Lang Yuzhu went to court that day to report his fault, requested to be dismissed, and took the concubine home.