The world of film and television starts from the flow of money

Outside Luoyang city.

Under an old locust tree by the post road, an old man selling tea was bragging to a few young men.

"You children have no idea what happened back then!"

The old man spoke with spittle flying: "My great-great-grandfather actually saw the Emperor Emeritus with his own eyes! It was in the twentieth year of the reign, when the Emperor Emeritus toured Youzhou. The streets were deserted as everyone flocked to see him. My great-great-grandfather squeezed into the crowd and caught a glimpse of him from afar. Hey, the grandeur, the majesty, it was like a god descending to earth!"

A young man chuckled and said, "Come on, you've met your great-grandfather, but have you met him?"

The old man slapped his thigh: "Although I've never seen him, I see so many people coming and going every day in this tea-selling area. Last month, I even saw a young man in a moon-white robe standing on that slope for a long time. His demeanor and bearing were amazing. I'm guessing he's probably a nobleman from the capital!"

"A moon-white robe?"

Another young man laughed: "There are plenty of people wearing moon-white robes on the street, are you seeing things?"

The old man was about to retort when he suddenly stopped talking and stared straight at the end of the post road.

A train was approaching from afar, belching white smoke and whistling as it rumbled closer. It was the "express train" from Luoyang to Chang'an, running once a day. The carriages were painted a deep blue, and the windows were spotless; it was the most advanced passenger train in the empire.

The younger generation ignored the old man and stood up, craning their necks to look around.

"Look, look! Isn't that the new 'Flying Dragon'? I heard it can travel eighty li in an hour!"

"Not only that! My cousin works on the railway, and he says this train uses the latest steam engine, which consumes 30% less coal than the old model, and it's also much more powerful!"

"Have you heard? The imperial court is going to build a new railway, from Luoyang directly to Guangzhou, the whole journey will only take three days and three nights!"

"Three days and three nights? When I went to Guangzhou with my dad to buy goods, it took a month by water!"

The train roared past, stirring up a gust of wind that made the old locust tree rustle.

The old man watched the departing train and murmured, "It's changed, everything has changed. When I was a child, I had never seen such a thing. Back then, we relied on our own two legs to get around, or at most, riding a donkey. Now, in the blink of an eye, you're hundreds of miles away."

A young man turned around and said, "You're being sentimental again! Isn't this a good thing? We've caught up with a good time!"

The old man nodded, then shook his head: "Good times are good times, but the changes are happening too fast, so fast that it makes people uneasy."

Another young man said, "What's there to panic about? The Holy Ancestor Emperor reigned for sixty years and governed the country like an ironclad fortress. The current emperor has been on the throne for thirty years, and he's been very stable as well. This is a golden age! You should be secretly happy!"

The old man smiled and said nothing more.

He gazed at the towering sacrificial tower in the distance, then at the rows of high-rise buildings behind it, and finally at the straight railway stretching into the distance, his eyes filled with an indescribable complexity.

Prosperity.

It was indeed a golden age.

According to the latest statistics from the Ministry of Revenue, the total population of the empire has exceeded 4.5 billion. Among them, the Han Chinese population has surpassed 2 billion for the first time.

Two billion thirty-seven million.

What is this concept?
One hundred and fifty years ago, when Yi Huawei first came into this world, the entire land of China had only tens of millions of people. Years of war had left countless people starving. One hundred and fifty years later, the population of the Chinese people alone was dozens of times that of that time.

There were approximately 900 million naturalized citizens, 400 million people under the control of the government, and 180 million people in labor service.

Within the empire's territory, there are an average of nearly thirty people per square mile. In the core regions—the Central Plains, Jiangnan, and Sichuan—the population density is already several hundred people per square mile.

The population of Luoyang City has exceeded 20 million.

Chang'an, Jinling, Guangzhou, Chengdu, and Youzhou all had populations exceeding five million.

Even the remote city of Suyab has a population of over one million.

The city of Luoyang today is no longer what it was 150 years ago.

The empire's territory expanded tens of thousands of miles outward, and Luoyang was no longer a frontier, but a secure core. The city walls, which hindered transportation and development, were demolished section by section, and wide ring roads, orderly commercial streets, and towering buildings were built on their sites.

The city's streets were almost entirely paved with cement or asphalt. Rainy days were no longer muddy, and sunny days were no longer dusty. Every hundred paces along the streets stood a lamppost topped with a bright electric light—yes, an electric light. In the tenth year of the Chengping era, the Imperial Crafts Academy successfully developed practical "generators" and "electric lights," and over the next twenty years, the empire's major cities successively completed their power grid construction.

As night falls, Luoyang is as bright as day. The lights of thousands of homes reflect the stars in the sky, making it seem as if there is a Milky Way on earth.

The public transportation system became more developed. In addition to steam trams, "cable cars" appeared—powered by underground cables, quieter and cleaner than steam locomotives. A crisscrossing network of tracks connected every corner of Luoyang.

Skyscrapers stand side by side. The tallest, the "Chengping Building," is located at the most bustling intersection in Luoyang. It has 23 floors above ground and 3 floors below ground, and is entirely constructed of reinforced concrete, equipped with multiple steam elevators. There is an observation deck on the roof, from which one can overlook the entire city of Luoyang and even see the spire of the Sacrifice to Heaven Pagoda in the distance.

The empire's total railway mileage has reached 250,000 li (approximately 165,000 kilometers). All major trunk lines are double-tracked, with some busy sections even having four tracks running parallel. Thousands of trains travel throughout the empire daily, transporting millions of passengers and millions of tons of cargo.

Passenger trains are divided into three classes: first class carriages have soft seats, sleeper berths, and a dining car, comparable to a mobile luxury hotel; second class carriages have hard seats, but are clean and tidy, and reasonably priced; third class carriages are the cheapest, crowded with peddlers and laborers, but they can still get on the train and travel hundreds of miles in a day.

Coal from Shanxi, silk from Jiangnan, grain from Huguang, timber from Lingnan, and minerals from the Western Regions were continuously transported to all parts of the country via a dense network of railways.

Steamships replaced sailing ships, and on major rivers such as the Yangtze, Yellow, Pearl, and Han Rivers, thousands of sails raced day and night. Coastal routes were even busier, with giant ships shuttling back and forth, closely linking goods between the north and south.

Ocean routes continued to expand. The empire's merchant ships had reached as far as the west coast of Africa, the Atlantic coast of Europe, and even the more distant west coast of the Americas.

Wireless telegraph technology has become increasingly sophisticated. Even the most remote frontier outposts and the most desolate mining camps are now connected by telegraph. Orders issued from Luoyang can reach anywhere within fifteen minutes. The main warships of the Imperial Navy are all equipped with radios, enabling communication between each other over a range of hundreds of miles. Civilian wireless telegraph services are also becoming more widespread, with telegraph offices in major cities offering "wireless services." Although expensive, time is money for merchants.

In the twenty-fifth year of the Chengping era, a young PhD from the Gewu Tiangong Institute invented the "telephone"—a device that could convert sound into electrical signals and transmit them through wires. After five years of improvements, the telephone began to be piloted in major cities such as Luoyang and Chang'an. The mansions of the wealthy, the shops of large businesses, and government offices were all equipped with this amazing machine, allowing people to communicate with others without leaving their homes.

The oil fields of the Western Regions Protectorate produce more than five million shi (a unit of dry measure) of crude oil annually. The refineries operate day and night, producing various products such as kerosene, gasoline, lubricating oil, and asphalt.

In the fifteenth year of the Chengping era, a doctor from the Gewu Tiangong Institute invented the "internal combustion engine"—a new type of engine that uses gasoline as fuel. It is smaller, lighter, and more efficient than the steam engine, and although it is not yet mature, it has already shown great potential. Some predict that future cars and airplanes will be powered by internal combustion engines.

Large dams have been built at the Three Gorges of the Yangtze River, the Hukou Waterfall on the Yellow River, and the upper reaches of the Pearl River, using water power to drive turbines to generate electricity. The electricity from these hydroelectric power stations supplies factories and residences within hundreds of miles around.

In the thirty years of peace, the empire's annual steel production had reached 80 million tons, four times that of the sixty years since its establishment. This steel was transformed into rails, ships, bridges, skyscrapers, machinery, weapons, and countless pots and pans used by ordinary people in their daily lives.

Fertilizers, pesticides, dyes, medicines, plastics, synthetic fibers... all sorts of previously unheard-of products are being produced continuously from chemical plants, changing people's lives.

The promotion of high-yield crops such as corn, potatoes, sweet potatoes, and hybrid rice, coupled with the extensive use of chemical fertilizers and the widespread adoption of agricultural machinery, led to an astonishing increase in the empire's grain production. In the thirtieth year of peace, the total national grain output was three times that of the sixtieth year of the establishment of the empire and two hundred times that of the first year of the establishment of the empire.

Farmers' lives are much better than before.

Railways transported industrial goods from cities to the countryside and agricultural products from the countryside to cities. Many farmers bought steam tractors and harvesters, and farming no longer required them to toil in the fields from dawn till dusk. Many of the younger generation of farmers are literate, can do arithmetic, and even subscribe to agricultural science journals to learn new technologies.

Sinong Temple established thousands of "agricultural technology extension stations" across the country, sending technicians to rural areas to teach farmers how to cultivate crops scientifically, how to prevent and control pests and diseases, and how to improve the soil. Farmers were highly motivated—more grain production meant more money.

The lives of ordinary people are indeed much better than they were 150 years ago.

Not having enough to eat? That's an ancient legend. There was an abundance of grain, and the price was low. Ordinary people could eat white rice and white flour buns every meal, and even have meat every few days.

Not having enough warm clothes? The empire's textile industry is highly developed, with a wide variety of cotton, silk, wool, and synthetic fibers available at low prices. It's not difficult for an ordinary person to make several new outfits a year.

Can't afford a house? Housing prices in big cities are indeed high, but ordinary people can live in workers' new villages on the outskirts of the city or return to their rural hometowns. The empire has implemented the "Affordable Housing Project," providing cheap rental housing for low-income earners.

Can't afford medical care? The empire has a comprehensive healthcare system, with government-run hospitals in every state and county, charging low fees. The poor can apply for "medical assistance" for free medical care. Although medical conditions in remote areas are still poor, they are gradually improving.

Fifty-three years into the reign of Emperor Ding, an imperial medical doctor discovered penicillin, a miraculous drug capable of killing a wide variety of bacteria. In the following twenty years, various antibiotics were successively discovered or synthesized. Pneumonia, sepsis, and puerperal fever, which had once claimed countless lives, could now be cured with just a few injections.

Life expectancy has increased from 55 years in the 60th year of the establishment of the dynasty to 75 years in the 30th year of peace.

Can't afford school? The empire implements compulsory education, with elementary school free. Although subsequent education is not free, there are scholarships and grants, so children from poor families can still attend higher education institutions if they are outstanding enough.

Most importantly—a sense of security.

The empire was extremely safe. Police patrolled the cities, and the countryside had its own militia system. Petty theft existed, but murder and arson were rare. One didn't have to worry about being robbed when going out, or about being murdered while walking at night. This sense of security was something their ancestors could only dream of.

The empire's army is no longer what it was a hundred years ago.

The soldiers carried breech-loading rifles, capable of firing fifteen rounds per minute with an effective range of eight hundred paces. The officers carried revolvers on their hips, a new type of weapon capable of firing six rounds in succession.

The artillery used breech-loading rifled cannons, and the shells were "high-explosive shells." Even more terrifying were the "machine guns," a type of weapon that could fire shells continuously, with a rate of sixty rounds per minute, enough to tear an army to shreds in an instant.

The mainstay of the navy was the 10,000-ton-class "dreadnoughts"—built entirely of steel, equipped with more than ten large-caliber guns, and covered with armor up to a foot thick. These warships could easily sink any ship from a century ago.

In the thirty-eighth year of the Yonghui era, the Gewu Tiangong Academy successfully manufactured its first "airplane"—a controllable flying machine heavier than air. Today, the Imperial Air Force possesses three hundred aircraft, used for reconnaissance, bombing, and air combat. Formations of aircraft frequently roar overhead over Luoyang, attracting countless citizens to look up and watch.

Elementary education has reached every village. County and prefectural schools are scattered throughout the country. The number of institutions of higher learning has increased from seven to twenty-three, spread across major cities. The knowledge taught in universities is countless times more profound than it was a century ago: calculus, physics, chemistry, biology, geology... each discipline has countless branches, and each branch has countless experts researching it.

Newspapers, magazines, and books abound. The literacy rate is close to 100%—at least among the Chinese population. Tens of thousands of new books are published every year. The Luoyang Library's collection exceeds ten million volumes, making it the world's largest library.

And all of this can be attributed to one person.

Emperor Shengzu.

The founder of the empire.

The people don't know where he is now, what he looks like, or even if he's still alive. But they do know that this is the man who descended upon this land two hundred years ago, ending the war and ushering in a golden age.

Two hundred years have passed, and he remains a legend.

In the streets and alleys, in teahouses and taverns, people talk about him with eyes full of reverence. Some say he once personally killed the Turkic Khan, some say he once single-handedly defeated thousands of troops, and some say he is now cultivating somewhere, preparing for immortality to forever protect this land.

In the present empire, shrines dedicated to the retired Emperor Yi Huawei are scattered throughout the land.

Some were built by the government, majestic and solemn, with local officials personally presiding over the spring and autumn sacrifices; others were built spontaneously by the people, simple and plain, with people coming to burn incense and kowtow during festivals.

The ancestral hall mostly houses a white jade statue—a figure in a moon-white robe, standing with hands behind his back, possessing a handsome face and profound eyes. The craftsmen sculpted the statue according to the legends, and although it was far from a true likeness, it was enough to make the people worship it.

The incense in the ancestral hall burns continuously throughout the year.

The elders told their children and grandchildren stories: how the retired emperor single-handedly pacified the world, how he ensured the people were well-fed and clothed, and how he expanded the territory, making the Chinese people the masters of the world. When they got emotional, tears streamed down their faces, and their children and grandchildren listened intently.

Young people may not believe these legends, but they believe in the facts before their eyes: railways, telegraphs, electric lights, trains, ships, hospitals, schools... all these things began to appear during the reign of the retired emperor. Everything they enjoy is based on the foundation laid by the retired emperor.

Scholars and writers composed poems and essays to praise the great achievements of the retired emperor. Some have calculated that during the thirty years of peace, the most frequently appearing word in various collections of poems and essays published by the empire was "retired emperor".

Even street performers could sing a few lines of "Ode to Peace": "The Supreme Emperor, who stabilized the world, has benefited all people for sixty years; with the opening of railways and the transmission of telegrams, the prosperous age has come without hunger or cold..." (End of Chapter)