A Poor Scholar: Ten Thousand Volumes for Ten Thousand in Gold

Transmigrated into the body of an impoverished scholar on the brink of death and buried in debt, Shen Yan unexpectedly unlocks a golden finger that turns reading into cash.

Read agricultural manuals, and vegetable seeds and grain seedlings that yield three times the usual harvest appear out of nowhere. Study medical texts, and minor ailments are cured with a dose of medicine while serious illnesses come with a prescription. Bone up on policy essays, and good fortune follows him into the exam hall, where examiners pick him as the top candidate of their own accord.

Incomplete texts yield only half the returns, while forbidden books of the occult drain his lifespan and blessings. Only the classics of the righteous sages double his gains.

While others toil for years to earn distinction, he reads as he builds his fortune: paying off debts, constructing houses, buying farmland, and taking on students. He breaks the aristocratic clans’ monopoly on books, making it possible for impoverished scholars everywhere to study and prosper. With a stroke of his brush, he determines who thrives; with ten thousand volumes, he commands the realm.