Back in her room resting, Jiang Xian tallied up her earnings for the day.
[Studied the proper etiquette for being punished. Palace Fighting Points +1]
[Practiced how to attend the sick Emperor. Palace Fighting Points +1]
[Read the Palace Rules thoroughly. Palace Fighting Points +10]
A mechanical voice sounded in her mind.
When the system first bonded with her, Jiang Xian had been prepared for a do-or-die situation—fail the palace selection, be obliterated; fail to serve the Emperor in bed, be obliterated; fail to get promoted within a year, be obliterated. To her surprise, the system didn't react at all to the word "obliterated." And after she got a general understanding of its requirements for the host, she was utterly stunned.
The system's goal was set high: to become the winner left standing at the end.
A deadline to sleep with the Emperor? None.
A promotion requirement? None.
An expectation for heirs? None.
System: [The current Emperor will live to be 90 years old. To be the winner left standing at the end, you can't rush things. Therefore, the deadline for sleeping with him is when he's 78, because in that year, he will be too old for sexual activities.]
'What a vigorous Emperor!'
They say that being unable to perform in bed is a blessing for middle-aged men, yet the Emperor was still going strong into his old age. He was truly a dragon among men, not to be underestimated.
As a veteran corporate drone, Jiang Xian's first instinct was to ask about all of the client's demands.
After she had thoroughly understood the system's requirements and standards, Jiang Xian couldn't help but tear up. 'What a conscientious boss! No performance quotas, and it doesn't even rush my progress!'
But corresponding with the low requirements were low rewards.
The system mainly encouraged the host to engage in palace fighting but didn't force it. As long as the host performed any action related to "palace fighting," she would receive points. These points could be exchanged in the System Mall for various Golden Fingers to help her rise through the ranks.
She opened the System Mall. It was divided into three categories.
[Halos]
[Courses]
[Single-Use Consumables]
The Halo Type items were permanent Golden Fingers, so they were all very expensive. A quick glance showed prices in the four-digit range. The cheapest was the Little Pitiful Halo for 300 points. Equipping it would make others feel pity for her, but it only worked on people who already had a favorable or neutral impression of the host.
The Courses category was quite eclectic.
There were the usual ones: medicine, pharmacology, dance, and music.
Jiang Xian scrolled down and saw "108 Styles of Intimacy." She was caught completely off guard, feeling like a truck had just run over her face.
Note: [If the host wishes to learn additional content, as long as a reasonable justification is provided and it is verified to be helpful for palace fighting, the system can request it for the host.]
Because the Course Type items required Jiang Xian to put in the effort to study them herself, their exchange prices were correspondingly cheaper.
Among the single-use consumables, the one Jiang Xian wanted most was Peeping Emperor's Footprint, which cost 40 points per use.
[Name]: Peeping Emperor's Footprint
[Type]: Single-Use Consumable
[Function]: The host can choose to learn the Emperor's real-time location or when he will appear at a certain place.
[Note]: Even if you have eight hundred different skills, they're all useless if you can't even see him.
The latter option was practically designed for engineering "chance" encounters.
'If you want a promotion, you have to get some face time with the big boss.'
With this, she'd never have to worry about missing an opportunity to make her presence known.
Therefore, once Jiang Xian discovered that actively studying the rules also awarded Palace Fighting Points, she began her point-farming plan.
※
Since she had already briefly studied the Palace Rules as a new concubine, the nanny sent by the Empress to each of the newcomers was more for reinforcement. After three days of instruction, they could, like the other concubines, go to Jianzhang Palace daily for morning and evening greetings and wait for the Emperor to flip their name-tablets.
This year, the Empress Dowager, displeased with the Emperor's lack of heirs and infrequent visits to the harem, had specifically insisted on accepting more newcomers.
She even disregarded family background, focusing on admitting those with beautiful faces.
In the end, a full seventeen newcomers entered the palace. The one with the highest rank was Noble Lady Guo, whose position was even higher than some of the older concubines who had been in the palace for a long time.
After all, she had a father who was a Second-rank Official.
Her neighbor, Chen Daying, was extremely envious of this. It just went to show: when your dad doesn't work hard enough, his daughter suffers for it.
Jiang Xian never envied those with connections.
She recalled the mess she ran into right after she transmigrated. She felt for her father and her stepmother who wanted to stand up for her. It only made her want to fight harder in this deep palace, so that her father, mocked for being a poor County Magistrate, could also experience what it was like to be one of those well-connected people who could win without lifting a finger.
For now, learning the rules from Nanny Zeng was the safest way to farm points.
So for the next three days, Jiang Xian latched onto Nanny Zeng like a sheep to be fleeced and sheared her for all she was worth, leaving Chen Daying dumbfounded.
At first, she thought Jiang Daying was just being sycophantic, fawning over even a nanny...
But maybe she had been wrong.
'Perhaps Jiang Daying isn't trying to please people, but to offend them?'
With Jiang Xian pestering the nanny, Chen Daying was happy to have the free time.
Sometimes, she even wished she could grab a handful of melon seeds and watch the show from the sidelines.
Over these three days, Nanny Zeng's expression went from pleased, to weary, to bewildered, then to suspicious, and finally, to numb.
This numbness persisted all the way until she went to Jianzhang Palace to report back to the Empress.
The matter of assigning a nanny to each newcomer was handled by the Empress, and after the task was completed, they had to report back to her.
The content of the report was, naturally, the newcomers' temperaments.
The palace nannies all had sharp, discerning eyes, honed by years of observation. The naive newcomers, with their shallow thoughts, could hardly hide anything from them.
If the Empress had a strong desire for control, the nannies would say more.
But today, when the Empress summoned them, she gave only a three-word command: "Keep it brief."
After finishing the main selection, there was the minor selection. The Empress's face showed unconcealable exhaustion. Teaching the newcomers rules was supposed to be a light task, so when she saw that Nanny Zeng looked a hundred times more tired than she did, appearing ten years older than she had three days prior, the Empress couldn't help but show a flicker of astonishment. "Are Chen Daying and Jiang Daying particularly disobedient?"
"To answer Your Majesty,"
Nanny Zeng paused. She had been so thoroughly pestered by Jiang Xian that the other Daying had become a blur in her mind. "Both young mistresses are fine, it's just that Jiang Daying is particularly... spirited."
When she mentioned Jiang Xian, a look of what could almost be described as awe appeared on Nanny Zeng's face.
She quickly recounted her ordeal of the past three days.
After listening, the Empress couldn't help but say, "This Empress feels exhausted just hearing you describe it."
Thus, when Nanny Zeng left Jianzhang Palace, she received an extra handful of silver melon seeds, which served as overtime pay.
The Chief Palace Maid in charge of bestowing rewards, Qiu Xing, asked with a smile, "Is Your Majesty perhaps interested in that particularly 'spirited' Jiang Daying?"
But the Empress just shook her head, her gaze sweeping over a stack of palace affairs on the table. "This Empress was just thinking..."
She wished she could retire on the spot, but her family still sent people to urge her to whisper sweet nothings into the Emperor's ear.
Her family depended on her so much that she feared if she were to die one day, her father would, while making offerings to her spirit, urge her to quickly visit the Emperor in his dreams to promote the men of the family.
"If only Jiang Daying could spare some of her vigor and spirit for this Empress."
※
When the three days of learning the rules came to an end, Jiang Xian clung to Nanny Zeng, reluctant to let her go.
Nanny Zeng tried to pull away discreetly twice but couldn't break free. She was held back to "quiz" Jiang Xian on four more questions. Only after receiving 4 Palace Fighting Points did Jiang Xian finally, though still unsated, release her grip on the nanny's hand. "Nanny Zeng, you must visit Yizhu Pavilion often in the future!"
Nanny Zeng didn't dare to look back, only pretending not to have heard.
Jiang Xian called out, "One day, when I have the authority to request a nanny, I'll definitely ask the Imperial Household to send Nanny Zeng back!"
Nanny Zeng walked even faster, disappearing in the blink of an eye.
Jiang Xian was genuinely fond of the nanny.
Putting everything else aside, in just these three days, she had farmed 2,046 points from her. She had asked at least 600 questions a day—how could she not love her?
Finally, before even gaining the qualification to serve the Emperor in bed, she had farmed enough capital to go on a shopping spree in the System Mall!