YAY!

Also Yan Shang: Hop in Princess, we're going to the red light district

Still Yan Shang: You are getting out of the carriage in the red light district?!!?

HILARY DUFF A fan made a crochet animated Lizzie McGuire doll and gave it to Hilary at her show in Austin, Texas!

The two other scholars, Feng Xianyu and Liu Wenyi, offer two other extremes. Feng Xianyu gives up his honour so the Imperial Princess (Cougar Princess) can get him a job. While this works in the short term, it binds his progress to her power and he fades from the story, probably never advancing very far. Liu Wenyi tries to advance without any help at all, believing that he's smart enough to beat the system. He ends up disillusioned and bitter, eventually also resorting to power (almost) entirely based on favour.

Even though Yan Shang is the only one who does it "right," I think the novel illustrates just how hard it is to navigate in these systems without losing sight of morality. How much playing the system is okay and how quickly that can topple into a complete loss of morality. It also makes me think of the Chinese idiom I've heard in a lot of dramas "water that is too clear has no fish" No one can be completely pure and still be effective.