The Heavens: A Qing, the Yue Girl at the beginning

In the Purple Palace, the agarwood incense from the bronze crane furnace was torn into wisps of residual smoke by the north wind. Yuan Wu's fingers, holding the urgent report from the border, pressed fine wrinkles on the silk book. When his eyes swept over "seven thousand four hundred feet", the copper clock in the corner of the palace just dripped the first drop of water at the hour of Chen.

"The Chu people's Sky Kites are so powerful!" He threw the urgent report on the dragon table: "Are we really going to have the sky of the Great Qin blocked by them? Find a solution for me within three days!"

More than twenty officials in black robes had sweat on their foreheads as they held yellowed ancient books and formed a fan shape in front of a long bronze table.

Emperor Yuanwu stood with his hands behind his back in front of the palace. The morning light stretched his shadow onto the wall covered with the map of the Kyushu territories, as if the mountains were plated with a layer of gold. The scorched earth samples sent from Hangu Pass in the distance glowed with a strange purple light in the glass cup.

In the ancient book spread out on the table, an illustration on a certain page with a faint blue fluorescence overlapped with the outline of the sky kite in the emergency report from Hangu Pass - that was the faded fragment of the "God King's Heavenly Palace" recorded in the "Record of the Netherworld's Sky Tour".

The ink-painted floating palace was being pulled by nine black dragons, and the twelve-layer golden and jade eaves were decorated with star-shaped runes.

The mottled ancient seal script below reads: "The clear one floats up to become a boat in the sky, while the turbid one condenses to become an anchor on the ground. As yin and yang rotate, the pavilion rises by itself... The rise and fall of these two energies is like a gourd floating on water."

"It's like a ship sailing on water!" Gong Sijiangzuoling suddenly slapped his knees. "When I was young, I was a transporter of military rations. A cargo ship of 1,000 tons could only draw water for a few feet. If we regard the clear and turbid air as the current air and 'water', then the floating vehicle is a ship sailing on the sea of ​​clear air!"

"Ancient books also say that 'hurricanes are born under the wings of Peng, not because of force, but because of momentum.'" He bent his skinny fingers, grabbed the bamboo paper on the desk and started drawing: "Assuming that every jin of black iron requires 15 hu of pure air to lift it, and based on the load-bearing capacity of the Chu army's kite..."

There was a sneer from the corner.

Chen Laojiu, who was studying ancient runes, opened a half-volume of "Yunxu Kao" and pointed his finger at a star map: "The floating warships of the You Dynasty rely on the Twenty-Eight Constellations Formation. What's the point of you calculating these mundane things?"

He suddenly started coughing violently, and the yellowed silk fell to the ground, revealing half of the sentence "The earth's veins pull people like magnets attract each other."

"Then have you successfully restored the Phantom Star Formation?" The head of the Armaments Academy sarcastically retorted, "Your Majesty requires a feasible plan, not just empty talk on paper!"

"So you can come up with practical skills?"

"Why not?"

Yuan Wu narrowed his eyes and scanned the arguing ministers. The sword in his sleeve quietly cut the carvings on the third pillar of the palace. Everyone fell silent instantly, leaving only the jingling of the bronze wind chimes on the eaves.

“Start with the simplest.”

The emperor flicked his finger and flicked away the moth that had landed on the memorial. "This morning I saw the steamer in the kitchen was opened and the cloth was swollen by the heat. If we sew a giant bag to store heat, can it carry people?"

The pupils of everyone in the Engineering Department suddenly shrank.

"Your Majesty's words are exactly what I think in my heart."

The Minister of Equipment grabbed a charcoal pencil and wrote wildly on the blue brick floor: "For example, when people set off 'floating lanterns', bamboo strips are covered with paper, soaked in oil and lit, and the heat will naturally lift them into the air. If this method is magnified a hundred times, take a hundred pieces of fire-washed cloth and sew them into a balloon, put a fine iron brazier underneath, and burn Qinggang charcoal. Calculate it based on the power of the rising heat..."

Amid the crackling sound of the beads, he suddenly looked up: "If the diameter reaches five feet, it may be able to carry three soldiers to a height of one thousand feet! But it can't stay in the air for less than half an hour, and it is afraid of strong winds."

"A thousand feet? The cruising altitude of the Chu army's kites is seven thousand feet! I'm afraid your 'Fire Cloud Lamp' will be used as a target as soon as it leaves the ground!" Old Master Chen sneered, "The fire bag will collapse when it encounters rain. How is it different from a kite released by an ordinary child with a string?"

"The difference is that it can take off stably without relying on wind power! It is also cheap and can be quickly deployed!"

The director of the Armaments Academy retorted, "On the other hand, your useless Star Array is hard to find in terms of materials and the number of missing runes is huge. Even if I really put them all together for you, can you guarantee success? I, the Great Qin, still have time for you to test it over and over again!"

"you!"

"The Honghuang Chronicles mentions that 'the qi channels are as connected as the spine of a dragon', and there is also a saying that 'the black dragon has a wind and thunder bag in its belly, breathing in and out clouds three thousand feet high'." The youngest recorder in the Engineering Department suddenly spoke up. He leaned over and drew on the blue bricks with tea:

"If the airbag is changed to a spindle shape with sixteen iron support frames inside, it can be made into a 'Cloud Cha Flying Ship' with thirty-six air chambers inside. Even if half of them are damaged, it can still float! If the surface of the airbag is coated with thunder beast glue, it can resist arrow penetration! This is exactly the principle of the watertight compartments of our ships..."

The debate began to arise.

Yuan Wu stared at the water marks on the brick surface, which were the prototypes of the airships of later generations. He flicked his finger and the tea marks suddenly became three-dimensional and suspended, reflecting a colorful halo in the morning light: "After the cloud raft is formed, how to defend against the enemy?"

"It can carry a Cloud Chasing Crossbow!"

The old historian of ingenuity was so excited that his jade crown tilted. "It is said that when the You Dynasty was at its peak, the 'Eye of the Sky' was deployed in the floating city. Although the specific structure has been lost, if forty-nine Long Wind Chasing Cloud Crossbows were used to form a projectile array, it may not be impossible to hit enemy kites that are seven thousand feet high!"

The craftsman took a deep breath and stepped forward quickly: "I have seen that the Chu army's flying kites are powerful, but every deployment requires a huge amount of money. If we use the 'Fire Cloud Lamp' and the 'Cloud Cha Flying Ship' as a basis, we can deal with it in three steps——"

He unfolded a scroll of silk and began to sketch: "First, quickly make a thousand five-foot-long fire cloud lamps, and carry elite scouts and falcons into the sky. With a vision limit of three thousand feet, it will be enough to monitor the movements of the Chu army. Each lamp will require eighty pieces of fire-washing cloth and one thousand five hundred kilograms of Qinggang charcoal, a total of ninety thousand strings of cash."

"Second, improve buoyancy." The director of the Armaments Institute suddenly interrupted, "The 'Essential Techniques of the Celestial Beings' records that the giant warships of the Divine King of the Nether Dynasty all used the 'Clear and Turbid Rotation Method'. If a hole is opened on the top of the 'Cloud Chariot' and a mechanism is installed to alternately release turbid air and inject fresh air, the airborne time can be extended to three hours!"

The weapon supervisor shook his head and said, "There are fifteen kinds of gas that are lighter than ordinary gas. The lightest one is the 'Mysterious Magnetic Aurora Gas', but the method of preparing it has long been lost. The lightest one that exists now is the 'Yanghe Qingqi'. Refining it requires half of the true essence of a hundred fourth-level cultivators every day. The cost of a single vessel has skyrocketed seven times, and they all have to practice the 'Kanzhen Dissociation Technique'. It's better..."

He suddenly grabbed the bamboo paper on the desk and folded it into a boat shape. "Imitating the sails of a building ship and the wings of a flying bird, I added 'wind-lifting sails' on all sides of the 'cloud raft' to use the wind power to propel it and save the fresh air inside..."

Everyone's eyes lit up, but Chen Laojiu snorted coldly: "The sails of the building ship are understandable, but what is the mystery of this 'sail feather'?"

"Birds fly by flapping their wings to generate lift. If we add many pairs of foldable giant wings to the 'Cloud Chariot', and use the Xunfeng Symbol Array to control the flapping of wings, we can turn freely like a flying bird, and even achieve short climbs and dives, greatly improving its maneuverability!"

"By mixing coal with water vapor and burning it, you can also get 'coal gas'... Although this gas is not as good as 'yang and clear air', it can win in terms of quantity."

The young clerk added: "If we fill the Yuncha auxiliary airbag with gas, the cost can be greatly reduced. If we modify it with the military's 'fierce oil tank', it can spray flames to help propel the flying ship."

"In this way, we have two types of flying ships: long-term soaring and short-distance sprinting." Yuan Wu nodded slightly: "Continue."

The craftsman wrote with charcoal pencil: "The third is the art of ground support... Our Yin Yunyue, Panlong Feimao, and Jinwu Zhuo can all shoot up to more than ten thousand feet, far better than heavy crossbows. The only problem we need to solve is accurate locking, and we need to develop a special anti-air guidance array..."

He stopped writing and took a deep breath: "If these three steps are accomplished, our Great Qin can compete with the Chu army's Tianyuan, and even counterattack the enemy!"

"… Exotic birds and dragons can all fly to heights of four to five thousand feet, controlling the air and moving through the air without any hindrance. If you want to borrow the nature of birds from other things, why don't you just domesticate the birds?"

The beast garden supervisor, who had been silent all this time, suddenly spoke. His scaly fingers stroked the mottled beast patterns on the bronze plate at his waist, and his hoarse voice echoed in the hall: "Seven years ago, the queen ordered me to breed a hybrid of the black-scaled eagle and the dark-blooded crow. Now I have more than 9,000 of them, each weighing 300 kilograms, with a wingspan of up to 42 feet..."

"After testing by this humble servant, I found that this bird can carry a thousand pounds and fly to a height of five thousand feet. Its vision can penetrate the clouds and mist and can see more than ten miles away. If equipped with a special saddle and chain, it can probably be controlled by a knight and become a true 'Sky Rider' army! When it is released from the 'Cloud Chariot' mothership, it will surely be even more..."

"Most likely? That means it has not been actually tested." Yuan Wu frowned and interrupted him: "Do you know that on the battlefield, a 'most likely' may cost the lives of thousands of soldiers?"

"Exotic birds and beasts are violent by nature and difficult to tame. If they suddenly go crazy in the sky, the knight's death is a small matter, but if the Chu people take the opportunity to attack with sky kites, wouldn't that be a weapon for the enemy? Zheng Wujiu, do you have a solution to ensure that they will obey orders in battle?"

"This..." The zoo supervisor was speechless, with cold sweat on his forehead.

“But this road is also worth exploring.”

Yuan Wu pondered for a moment and waved his hand: "Well, when you go back, select the 100 most docile and domesticated exotic birds, bring 3,000 prisoners from Longxi, and conduct manned flight tests there. When you succeed, come back and report and apply for funds."

"promise!"

"By the way, when the birds you raised were flying at an altitude of 5,000 feet, how did you control them and ensure that they did not take the opportunity to escape? Did you just take secret medicine as bait regularly?"

The director of the Armory suddenly noticed this and quickly grabbed the sleeve of the Beast Garden Supervisor who was about to turn around: "Could it be that they are using a whistle-like musical instrument to guide them? The sound follows the air and can reach far... Yes, the musical note arrows that our dynasty has recently developed may be the nemesis of Chu Yuan and others!"

Everyone present knew that the musical note arrow was originally invented by the Great Chu Dynasty. It was designed to interfere with the flow of the enemy's true essence and blood in the body with sound waves of a special frequency, gradually tearing the meridians and blood vessels, causing large-scale casualties. Later, the Qin spy stole the secrets, copied and improved it to create his own version. "Although the Chu Yuan is flying at a high altitude, it must be within the range that sound waves can transmit. As long as its approximate frequency band is determined, we can try to interfere with it or even kill it with the musical note arrow!" The head of the Armory became more and more excited, "Your Majesty, if this plan succeeds, the Chu Army's Tian Yuan will be defeated without a fight!"

"But according to existing observation data, the enemy kite's flying speed can easily break the sound barrier. Before the sound waves of your note arrow spread out, the enemy has already flown out of the attack range."

The craftsman immediately raised an objection: "Moreover, at high altitudes, the effect of sound transmission will be greatly reduced. This plan may not work... In other words, it can only be used to build a ground defense system, and we must not expect it to work in air combat."

"Can the Sky Kite always maintain the speed of a flying sword? Even if it does, we can use the Note Arrows to block them from all directions and lay a net of heaven and earth!" The head of the Armaments Academy retorted unwillingly: "As long as we calculate the lead time, the Note Arrows may still be able to hit the high-speed enemy Kite!"

"Besides, in a specific Qi environment and with the attachment of True Qi, the speed of sound can be greatly increased, and it can completely surpass the mobility of the Sky Kite! In short, I think it's worth a try!"

"Want to engrave the 'Great Thunder' array pattern? Do you know how many times the cost will be increased? How difficult is it to integrate it into an arrow?"

"Since the Chu army's flying kites are driven by mysterious mechanisms, perhaps we can try to use the talisman array to interfere with their control system. For example, the 'inverted five-element array' can make all metal objects within a certain range malfunction... This method is not limited to the speed of sound, but..."

"Birds are born with wings, but humans and animals do not. However, if we follow the rise and fall of the air currents, we can develop a talisman called 'acquired wings'..."

Amid the arguing, Yuan Wu's eyes suddenly turned to the copper bell on the eaves. When the north wind blew past, the hanging silk ribbons actually stopped at a certain angle. "Wind." The cyclone condensed at his fingertips shattered three snowflakes. "Since the Chu army relies on air currents to soar, let the Seventh Realm Grandmaster disrupt the celestial phenomena."

"Your Majesty is wise!" The old doctor of the observatory trembled and held out the star plate and bamboo slips: "Please look, the astronomical records show that when the Chu army attacked last night, the wind in the Xun position was disordered. This old minister remembered the storm in the East China Sea forty years ago, and the fishermen saw a dragon sucking water to the sky and the sea..."

"speak English!"

"Vortex!" The old doctor knelt on the ground. "I have seen half of an ancient ship's mast in the ancient battlefield of Youshan. There is a spiral groove at its core! Maybe we can use the collision of clear and turbid air to form an artificial tornado, and use the power of heaven and earth to tear apart the Chu army's formation! It's like a kite encountering turbulence--"

Elder Chen stroked his beard and sighed, "It is also recorded in the Youwenlu that in the last years of the You Dynasty, there was a 'Wind Lord' who caused a hurricane with the force of nine stars in a row. In one day, he blew away tens of millions of rebels and overturned mountains. If the seven masters were ordered to guard the Tianshu, Yaoguang and other stars separately..."

"The Seven Realms' ability to move mountains is more than just creating whirlwinds?"

Yuan Wu said solemnly: "The cold air alone can condense into billions of hailstones and cover an area of ​​100 miles, which is enough to make the Chu army's Tianyuan nowhere to hide. If we supervise the construction of the 'Li Yang Zao Gang Array' on the border, we can even attract star rays and nine-day thunderstorms to destroy the airspace..."

"But this method can only be used once, not twice. It can only be used when we are in danger. The Chu army also has masters of the seventh realm. If we consume them first, the high-level combat power will be temporarily empty, and I am afraid we will fall into a very passive situation."

"What I want you to do is to find the most cost-effective solution, rather than piling up your skills regardless of cost!"

The Zichen Palace fell into silence again.

All officials understood that Emperor Yuanwu was looking for a tactic that could be applied on a large scale and at a relatively low cost, rather than relying solely on the personal strength of a master-level warrior.

……

The ticking sound of the copper clock in the corner of the palace was suddenly cut off by the sound of the sword bursting out from Yuan Wu's sleeve. The emperor's fingertips condensed a half-inch green light, starting from the Eagle Beak Cliff of the simulated sand table in Hangu Pass, and cut a sword mark extending a hundred miles straight into Yangshan County in Chu territory: "Within three days, I want to see the prototype of Tianjiwei."

"Everything you have proposed has its own merits, so we need to move forward simultaneously." The ministers held their breath suddenly, and saw Yuan Wu wave his sleeves across the tea model suspended on the blue bricks. The illusory spindle-shaped cloud raft first expanded to three feet, and then split into seven streams of light:

"From now on, the Sky Strike Guard will be divided into seven divisions - the Fire Cloud Division will focus on hot air floating devices, the Cloud Cha Division will specialize in composite warships, the Sky Bird Division will train alien flying cavalry, the Thunder Sound Division will develop sonic and magnetic killing devices, the Ground Anchor Division will be responsible for anti-aircraft talismans, the Hurricane Station will specialize in meteorological warfare, and finally, the Gold Calculation Office will be set up to coordinate money and food."

He tapped the table with his fingers. "The Fire Cloud Division will first allocate 100,000 pieces of fire-washing cloth and 3 million kilograms of Qinggang charcoal. The Engineering Department needs to complete 1,000 five-foot-class floating lamps within ten days. The Cloud Chasing Division will receive 100 jars of Thunder Beast Glue, and 100 monks from the Military Department will be recruited to take turns to refine Yang and Qing Qi. The air chambers of ten test ships need to be filled every three days."

"Your Majesty!" The beast garden supervisor suddenly knelt and took two steps. "If you want the Tianqin tribe to be established in a hundred days, you need to add 50,000 elixirs, 3,000 kilograms of dragon bone powder, and transfer 800 beast slaves from Jiaodong County..."

"Approved. Each exotic bird will be given three pounds of cold marrow pills to suppress its ferocity. Each time a prisoner tries to fly, it can be used to replace half a year of service." Yuan Wu pointed and wrote quickly on the bronze table: "But you must submit a list of casualties every ten days. If more than 70% of the prisoners die in three months, you will fill the eagle's nest yourself."

The director of the Armaments Institute could not wait to unfold the scroll: "The Leiyin Department requests to use 3,000 square meters of Xuanyin Jade from the Shaofu's inventory. In addition, we need to recruit the twelve lawyers of the Yuefu and all the practitioners who can perform the 'sound transmission technique' within 300 miles of the southern border to build a nine-sound resonance tower on the top of the cloud chariot..."

"How much does it cost?" The weapon supervisor, who had been drawing countless blueprints with his head down, suddenly raised his head and interrupted, "Based on the calculation that each cloud raft is nine feet in diameter, about fifty feet long, and equipped with three sound towers, the cost of a single ship will exceed 120,000 strings of cash!"

"Then cut off the Yuncha tribe's Zhenfeng sail feathers!" The dean shouted with his neck stiffened. "Anyway, those iron-bone wings will consume thousands of forged steels, so we might as well concentrate our resources on..."

"How dare you!" Yuan Wu's pressure was like a collapse of Mount Tai, and the blue bricks under everyone's feet cracked at the same time. "The Yuncha and Leiyin tribes will each receive an initial funding of 1.4 million coins, and submit a detailed list of expenses before the morning three days later. The Jinshangfang will send 12 red-robed supervisors to the treasuries of each department. Anyone who dares to embezzle a single copper coin -"

He pointed his finger like a sword across the air, and the bronze Bi'an statue guarding the palace gate ten feet outside the hall was decapitated, and sparks flew from the cut like blood: "This is the end."

Elder Chen, the chief priest, suddenly raised a half-rolled and torn star map and said, "May I ask your Majesty, my old minister's formation of the twenty-eight constellations..."

"You, the Textual Research Faction, have established a separate Ancient Law Division, specializing in the restoration of the You Dynasty's star array, and are not affiliated with the 'Heavenly Strike Guard'."

Yuan Wu grabbed the Chu Jun Tianyuan's mapping paper on the desk, and the true fire ignited on his fingertips burned the silk book to ashes. "I will allocate you 300 talisman masters, 5,000 kilograms of meteorite iron, and temporarily transfer the authority of the officials in the Imperial Classics and History Library..."

The seven-colored streams of light converged and transformed into a palm-sized floating city, with the twenty-eight constellations shining brightly on the base. Old Master Chen held the model with tears in his eyes, "I will definitely live up to your trust, but restoring the star array requires a large number of relics from the You Dynasty..."

"You are allowed to cooperate with Prime Minister Li's 'Digging Army' to secretly excavate all the royal tombs and ancient tombs of previous dynasties in the territory, and search for and verify the lost skills of the ancients, but do not leak the news to the outside world..."

Yuan Wu finished writing the last stroke of the "Tianjiwei Planning and Establishment Order" and inserted the entire table diagonally into the floor tile: "Remember, the six departments of Tianjiwei need to cooperate with each other in competition. Those who rank last in the monthly actual combat drills will be demoted to deputy officers and their funding will be cut by 30%."

When the last drop of the copper clock fell into the halo of the morning hour, Yuan Wu had already walked out of the Purple Palace, stepping on the fragments of the star map all over the ground.

He looked at the rolling clouds outside the palace. The coiled dragon pattern on the bright yellow dragon robe seemed to be about to break through the air. The snowfall of last night had stopped. The morning sun reflected the dark Kui pattern into a flowing river of blood. The twelve-tassel jade crown collided in the north wind to create a golden war:

"The people of Chu think that seven thousand feet is the sky? I want to tell them that the territory of the Great Qin stretches from the sky to the underworld!"

……

Half an hour later, thousands of miles away in Zhang Huatai, Zhao Qing, the developer of the Chu Army's Tianyuan, was in no hurry. She didn't take Qin Fang's response to heart at all, but just focused on her own research project.

At midnight last night, a comet hit the moon, and the brightness of the back of the moon suddenly increased a hundred times, setting off a vital energy tide of tens of thousands of feet. This was undoubtedly a strange and sudden astronomical accident. Unfortunately, except for her, the observatories of various dynasties did not pay much attention to it and almost turned a blind eye to it.

"Just a few aircraft formations have tied up all the energy of the Qin, Yan, and Qi dynasties, making them rack their brains to balance the recent changes in the situation. It seems that I will have to deal with this potential extraterritorial threat alone... I don't know how long it will take to develop a space vehicle that can land on the moon."

Zhao Qing was thinking: "Speaking of which, the juice squeezed out of the spiritual plants that coexist with the 'Taixu Spirit Seed' could be used as high-energy liquid fuel for aerospace? This seems to be much more versatile than the steam engine that is completely driven by practitioners and the magic array engine with rune crystal as the core?"

"...Theoretically speaking, when the quality and related parameters of the refining materials exceed those of a cultivator's body, the engines made from them can completely reach the power density of a cultivator at that level, becoming like an external auxiliary organ, plug-and-play, and truly changing the entire cultivation world..."

"However, considering the profoundness of the law of vital energy, conventional skills that have not yet reached their essence and have not been optimized are probably not as good as the magic array composed of pure vital energy that practitioners at the eighth level and above directly solidify with their divine thoughts. The latter does not even need to specially process any materials... The importance of realm cannot be ignored."

"So, relying on the Sky Kite fleet to directly or indirectly exert military pressure on the Qin and Qi dynasties, forcing Yuan Wu to secretly open the 'Gushan Sword Collection' and use the information related to the coordinated operations between heaven and earth. Zheng Xiu began to try to trade the 'Twelve Witch Gods' with the Qi people, so that the skills of the Witch Ancestor can be reappeared in the world——"

"In this way, I can try to obtain these two crucial ancient inheritances and let them become the nourishment that propels me to further progress."

She pondered to herself, "By the way, Yuanwu found an excuse to have Li Si send people to rob the ancient tomb. Maybe he wanted to use the burial objects left over from the Zhou Dynasty to ease the pressure on the resources needed for reform? The action was so blatant that even Old Wu from the coffin shop in the south of the city noticed it."

"'Qin Zhongyan moved east to Zhou territory to guard Zhou's old tombs, and Qin began to grow.' In the Sword Dynasty world, the Zhou Dynasty's influence and ruling time were much worse than normal history, but it was still a powerful dynasty with Guanzhong as its core. The Yan Dynasty of the Ji clan was still its branch..."

"The Qin Dynasty established its capital in Changling for only a hundred years. The previous dynasty recorded in its history books was actually the Eastern Zhou Dynasty. It is said that the Gongsun family, the head of the old powerful and aristocratic families, is actually the descendant of the Duke of Zhou in this world... and there are countless tombs of emperors and dukes in the Qin Dynasty."

...(End of chapter)