During the Hongwu period of the Ming Dynasty, in a village on the upper reaches of the Yellow River, there was a kind-hearted scholar named Wang Qing. Wang Qing's family was poor, and in order to study, he often went up the mountain to collect firewood and carry it to a market town more than ten miles away to sell, earning some broken silver for tuition fees.
One day, when Wang Qing came back from school, he went to the mountain to collect firewood and met a sika deer in the forest who had been injured by a hunter and could not stand on his hind legs. When the sika deer saw that he was holding a machete in his hand, he trembled all over with fear, and his eyes were pitiful for survival. The kind-hearted Wang Qing walked to the side of the sika deer amicably, looked at the injury, and immediately tore a piece of cloth from his clothes and bandaged the wound. The sika deer nodded with tears in his eyes, as if to express his gratitude.
Another day, Wang Qing was reading a book under a big tree in front of his house when a flower pigeon with injured wings fell in front of him. Wang Qing hurriedly put down the book, picked up the injured flower pigeon and walked into the house, applied medicine to the flower pigeon, and fed it every day. After seven or eight days, the wings of the flower pigeon grew well, and Wang Qing released the flower pigeon in front of the door. The flower pigeon circled a few times over Wang Qing's house before slowly flying away.
A year later, Wang Qing packed up and went to the capital to take the exam. He carried the burden and walked in the direction of the capital. On the fifth day from home, when he walked into a dense mountain forest, he got lost and didn't know where to go. The forest was eerie and terrifying, and there was no one in sight. Wang Qing was anxious and at a loss. At this moment, suddenly a sika deer came out from the depths of the forest, lying meekly in front of Wang Qing, and motioned with his mouth for Wang Qing to ride on its back. At this time, Wang Qing didn't care much, so he had to ride on its back according to the meaning of the sika deer. The sika deer let go of its four hooves and ran, and soon carried Wang Qing out of the mountain forest and sent him to the road to the capital. When Wang Qing got off it, it jumped back to the mountain forest.
One day, in order to hurry up, Wang Qing got up early, ate a few bites at the inn, and then hurried on the road. But this way, Wang Qing walked hundreds of miles, and the water was not sticky to his teeth. He was already hungry and tired, and his eyes were dark, and he fainted from hunger on the side of the road. Just as he was passing out, a puff of flower flew from somewhere, holding a piece of cake in his mouth and putting it next to his mouth. When Wang Qing woke up, he smelled the fragrant cake, ate it, and felt full of energy. The flower puff pigeon on the side watched Wang Qing finish the cake, flapped his wings and flew away. Wang Qing looked at the flying flower puff pigeon, and suddenly realized that this cake was sent by the flower puff pigeon!
After nearly two months of wind and rain, at noon one day Wang Qing crossed the Yangtze River, and the capital was clearly visible. He slowed down, walked leisurely to the bank of a small stream, and washed his face with both hands. Occasionally, there was a dead poplar leaf floating in the stream, and a large number of ants were crawling on it. The ants on the edge of the dead leaves were crawling desperately towards the middle of the leaf surface, and there was a danger of the leaf turning ants dying at any moment. At this time, the kind-hearted and kind Wang Qing hurriedly picked up the dead leaf with both hands and put it on the shore, so that the ants were spared drowning.
Wang Qing answered the questions fluently in the exam, and was the first to hand in the paper. When he returned to the inn to ponder the answer carefully, he suddenly remembered that he had written a little less of the word "Tai" in the test question due to a moment of carelessness, and mistakenly wrote it as the Great Ancestor Emperor. Although the article felt good, it was a typo, and it was not the right time. Taizu was the emperor of the current dynasty, Zhu Yuanzhang. Not to mention that it must be hopeless. If the court is guilty, it will be the crime of beheading. At that moment, Wang Qing was stunned, burst into cold sweat, and was at a loss.
Strangely enough, he found an ant running around his desk while the chief marking officer was reading the examiners' papers. He gently dusted it with his sleeve, but the ant was dusted on a stack of paper. The marking officer did not care and continued to grade the papers.
When he flipped through Wang Qing's exam paper, the ant was unbiased and happened to crawl under the "big" word of the Great Ancestor Emperor, and the word "big" became the word "too". The principal did not notice either. However, when he saw that Wang Qing's essay was written smoothly and fluently, with astonishing simplicity and extraordinary ethics. It was a rare and good essay, and he was suddenly interested and ranked Wang Qing first in the gold list. He immediately sent someone to meet Wang Qingsu.
At this time, Wang Qing was packing up at the inn and preparing to flee for his life. Suddenly he heard the guard outside the door say that the chief reading officer wanted to pass him into the mansion, and he was so frightened that he went to see the chief marking officer with the officers and soldiers in fear.
When he came to the marking official, he also appreciated his appearance, which made Wang Qing inexplicable, and the monk who was two feet tall could not touch his head.
The honest Wang Qing was puzzled, so he told him that he had mistakenly written the word "too" in the word "big" due to carelessness in the examination room. The chief marking officer was also very surprised and said, "The old man has read more than thousands of test papers in the past 30 years, but there has never been an error.
As he spoke, he casually took Wang Qing's paper from the desk and took a look. Sure enough, there was no mistake, and even Wang Qing was puzzled. Suddenly, the dot in the word moved too much, and the chief reader took a closer look and found that it was an ant.
The chief marking officer also felt strange, so he asked Wang Qing, "Do you know what's going on?Wang Qing thought of saving ants from leaves in the water by the stream, and told the chief marking officer truthfully. When the chief marking officer, who knew justice, heard that Wang Qing was not only outstanding in literature, but also had a kind heart. Not only did he not hold Wang Qing accountable for writing the wrong word "too," but he also listed Wang Qing as the first on the gold list.
Soon after, Wang Qing was entrusted with an important task by the imperial court and became a county magistrate in a certain county. He was very grateful to the chief marking officer for his love, and he was also grateful to the ant who had helped him.
During the next 30 years as an official, Wang Qing always treated the people and living beings with kindness and became a very honest official.