C26 (1/2)

Su Zhi jumped in fright. Instinctively, she retreated until she bumped into the corner of the table behind her. The pain made her grimace, but it was difficult for her to flare up.

After all, stealing a peek at someone being caught was not something to be proud of.

”Are you alright?”

Seeing that she didn't look well, Xiao Qian stood up to check on her injuries.

”Don't worry about it, General.”

Su Zhi sucked in a breath of cold air and repeatedly refused.

Xiao Qian didn't force it and the tent wasn't big. He could faintly smell a familiar sweet fragrance lingering at the tip of his nose.

Su Zhi's chest rose up and down from the pain, as she panted incessantly.

Xiao Qian felt a bit unnatural. When he thought back to last night, his ears turned red.

Su Zhi rubbed her sore spot. Su Zhi didn't notice Xiao Qian's strangeness and continued, ”There's nothing important in Japan today. I heard that the general has been handling military matters all night. I want to see if there's anything I can do to help.”

Xiao Qian glanced through the account books for the entire night before reading a few pages. He couldn't help but rub his nose.

”It's best if you can help.”

Without being rejected, Su Zhi brought over a small stool from the side, sat herself down in front of the desk, and used her slender fingers to quickly move the abacus up and down.

”Why don't I give you a list of ninety-nine times multiplication method?”

Su Zhi said.

Xiao Qian looked over in confusion.

What the hell was that?

”Or simple operations and laws? It's all very simple, even children know how to do it. ”

Xiao Qian was silent. He was shocked by Su Zhi's expression, which was clearly full of common sense.

Although he was a martial general, he had studied proper books before, and even though he had not studied the Four Books and Five Classics very well, he still understood the general principles. As for Su Zhi's simple calculation, he truly did not know a thing.

Xiao Qian looked thoughtfully at the innocent looking woman in front of him. He had the nagging feeling that she wasn't an ordinary mountain village woman.

The general did not speak, and Su Zhi did not know why. She bit her pen and, before he could signal her, continued with the accounting.

When within a hundred times add, subtract, multiply, and divide, the result can be easily calculated without the need of a click-clack abacus.

”Wait a minute, if you were to calculate in this place, how did you end up flipping a page?” The man suddenly spoke up.

Su Zhi blinked her eyes, but then turned to the previous page and puzzledly said, ”This page has already been calculated. ”The garrison city has given out grain a total of 11 times, and each time, there would be 4,611 stones, right? Then, we can just multiply it by 11 and get a total of 5,0611 stones, right?”

Xiao Qian was stunned, but he quickly took the abacus and calculated it. The result was indeed correct.

He looked at Su Zhi in shock and opened his mouth to speak.

Su Zhi shrugged her shoulders indifferently. 11 was a miraculous number. No matter how complex the multiplier was, it could be calculated verbally.

The simple truth was that any misplaced numbers were the result.

”You … You worked in an accounting office before? ”