Bringing the Railway to Daming

Li Wenzhong was stunned for a moment after hearing this.

He never imagined that Japan had not only attempted to invade China during the late Ming Dynasty in the original history, but also occupied half of China's territory five or six hundred years later.

This is enough to show that the Japanese have indeed always harbored great ambitions toward China, like a venomous snake lying beside their bed, ready to bite at any opportunity, or even devour it whole.

Just as Li Wenzhong's thoughts were changing because of Zhu Xiong Ying and Liu Kuan's words, Zhu Biao also said: "Duke Cao, we are now destroying the Japanese nation and destroying its culture and language. Although our actions are a bit cruel, we may leave behind some infamy."

"But if we can ensure that the country is free from Japanese pirates for hundreds of years, and that the Japanese islands remain under the rule of the Ming Dynasty forever, and that the East China Sea is peaceful for a thousand years, what does it matter if we bear some infamy?"

Li Wenzhong regained his senses, immediately stood up, bowed to Zhu Yuanzhang and Zhu Biao, and said, "Your Majesty, I understand your good intentions—I will not have any objection to the court's policy on the Japanese islands and will fully cooperate!"

Zhu Yuanzhang said, "It's good that you understand. From now on, don't imitate those literati and make pointless complaints. You are the Duke of Cao, the Left Commander of the Navy, and a Grand Councilor of our Great Ming Dynasty. You are not some literati."

Li Wenzhong nodded.

Although this is just his personality, now that he knows his shortcomings, he can just pay more attention to them in his daily life.

Xu Da and Tang He exchanged a few glances during this time—the two had previously found the imperial court's policy toward Japan somewhat strange, but now their doubts were finally cleared up.

Of course, neither Xu Da nor Tang He were heavily influenced by Confucianism. If they were young, they might have suggested exterminating all the Japanese to eliminate any future threat.

However, they now understand that doing so not only goes against the will of Heaven, but is also not the best way to solve the problem.

As the imperial court planned, relocating the majority of Japanese people to make the best use of their talents was the most appropriate strategy.

Zhu Yuanzhang felt that it was inappropriate to discuss the history of the Ming Dynasty too much, as it would inevitably involve the Jingnan Rebellion. Moreover, he did not want to tell Xu Da and Tang He about the scandals of the Ming emperors in the original history.

So he said, "Liu Kuan, play the video."

"Yes."

Liu Kuan responded, picked up the tablet, and played the first video he had prepared.

"This first video tells the story of something from our ancient times, which can be considered as broadening our horizons."

After a brief introduction, Liu Kuan put the tablet down and started playing the touchscreen.

The video begins with the title displayed against a black background: Why did Homo sapiens defeat Neanderthals?
Although the characters were simple, Xu Da and Tang He could recognize them, but they were puzzled and wondered: Which ethnic groups are Homo sapiens and Neanderthals? Why have they never heard of them? Could they be nomadic tribes of the steppes that have disappeared like the Xiongnu, Xianbei, and Turks?
Soon, the rest of the video answered their questions.

"There is a phenomenon that seems natural, but is quite abnormal upon closer inspection: the only remaining human species on Earth is Homo sapiens."

"According to evolutionary theory, many different species of the genus Homo existed before Homo sapiens, all of which evolved from Australopithecus, such as Homo habilis, Homo erectus, Neanderthals, Denisovans... and Homo sapiens!"

The video features a relationship map, with "Australopithecus" at the top, followed by species from the genus Homo habilis, Homo erectus, and others, accompanied by images.

Xu Da, Tang He, and even Li Wenzhong were dumbfounded when they saw some of the "people" who looked somewhat like them but were clearly distinguishable, and some of them even looked almost indistinguishable from apes.

He wondered to himself: What does this mean?
Does this mean that we humans are related to apes? We all evolved from Australopithecus?
They had heard their children say before that humans were not created by Nuwa from clay and breath, but evolved from apes, but they hadn't taken it seriously, thinking it was just children's jokes. They never expected it to be true.

Of course, some people have seen similar claims in journals such as Natural Science, and are still quite surprised to learn that humans had many "relatives" in ancient times.

Then these people raised the question posed in the video: Where did Homo sapiens' "relatives" go?

"According to current archaeological research, after the earliest Homo sapiens appeared on the African continent and migrated to Eurasia and other continents, the Homo species other than Homo sapiens, such as Homo erectus and Neanderthals, that originally lived in these places all disappeared."

"Let's leave aside Homo habilis and Homo erectus for now and talk about Neanderthals today."

"Those who have followed my videos may already know something about Neanderthals, but I'll talk about them again today."

"Based on the research on some Neanderthal skeletons that have been excavated, Neanderthals were not only more physically robust than Homo sapiens, but also had larger brains."

"We know that brain size is related to intelligence. Generally speaking, people with larger brains are also smarter."

"Therefore, Neanderthals must have been a more robust and intelligent species of the genus Homo sapiens than us. So why are we Homo sapiens, and not Neanderthals, now the dominant species on Earth?"

"Some say it's because we Homo sapiens are able to invent and use tools—this may be a reason, but it's not a subjective one."

"Because according to archaeologists' investigation of Neanderthal remains, they also knew how to use fire and how to make tools, and some of them were even quite skilled, no less than Homo sapiens."

"So how exactly did Neanderthals lose to Homo sapiens in this competition?"

Upon hearing this, Tang He and others who were watching this type of science video for the first time felt an itch to get to know it.

'The person speaking in this video is probably a storyteller, always trying to keep people in suspense—couldn't they just tell us how that person disappeared?'

Just as Tang was secretly grumbling to himself, the video entered its core content. The uploader first used some videos and animations about human history to tell the story of how humans migrated from Africa to continents such as Eurasia in ancient times.

The earliest hominids migrated out of Africa and evolved into Homo erectus, Neanderthals, and other species in Europe and West Asia.

Later, Homo sapiens appeared. Around 100,000 years ago, Homo sapiens migrated northwards and beyond Africa, where they encountered Neanderthals from Europe and West Asia. Because the tools and social development levels of Homo sapiens and Neanderthals were similar at the time, and Homo sapiens were not as strong individually as Neanderthals, they were driven back to Africa.

However, around 70,000 years ago, Homo sapiens experienced a qualitative leap in cognitive and communication abilities, and were not much different from modern Homo sapiens.

Thus, Homo sapiens used their cognitive and communication abilities to develop larger social organizations.

Before this, Homo sapiens and Neanderthals generally lived in settlements of a few dozen people, at most growing to a little over a hundred. Any more than that would be too much for the leaders to manage, inevitably leading to internal strife and eventual division.

Before their cognitive and communication abilities reached a certain level, Homo sapiens and Neanderthals could manage at most a hundred people, and no more than that.

However, when Homo sapiens' cognitive and communication abilities made a leap forward, they were able to organize hundreds, thousands, or even thousands of people to carry out large-scale hunting activities and even wage war.

Therefore, even though Neanderthals were stronger and even smarter than Homo sapiens, they were ultimately wiped out by Homo sapiens due to their inferior social organization.

The video is now nearing its end.

Xu Da and Tang He both thought their previous doubts had been answered—Neanderthals were exterminated by Homo sapiens.

In fact, this aligns with their years of battlefield experience—war is inherently about the many defeating the few and the strong defeating the weak.

However, the man narrating the video then changed the subject, saying, "However, according to the research of modern anthropologists, most contemporary Homo sapiens genes contain 1% to 4% Neanderthal genes."

"For example, diabetes, which plagues some people, is said to have originated from Neanderthals. And social anxiety disorder may also have originated from Neanderthals."

"Therefore, there is another theory: in the tens of thousands of years of struggle, although most Neanderthals were wiped out by Homo sapiens, some Neanderthals interbred with Homo sapiens, reproduced, and their bloodline was integrated into Homo sapiens."

Xu Da, Tang He, and the others suddenly realized what was going on, and then felt that this conclusion made a lot of sense.

Just like when they destroyed the Mongol Yuan Dynasty and drove the Tartars out of the Central Plains, some Tartars were incorporated into the Ming Dynasty, and many Mongol women became wives of Han men and bore them children. Isn't this equivalent to the integration of Han and Mongol people?
The offspring born were naturally Han Chinese, but also contained some Mongol blood.

At this point, the video narrates: "In fact, with the development of science and technology and the continuous exploration and research of anthropologists, the theory of human origins in Africa has begun to be questioned."

"For example, the 'dragon man' skull discovered in Harbin, my country, is strong evidence refuting the theory of human origins in Africa—but that's the topic of our next video, see you next time!"

The video showed a strange human skull placed in a glass case in a museum, and then the video ended.

Seeing this, Xu Da and Tang He felt that there was still more to say.

Although Zhu Yuanzhang felt that the video content was of little use to the development of the Ming Dynasty, he still savored it and felt that he had gained new knowledge.

After regaining her composure, Zhu Xiong Ying asked first, "Teacher, shouldn't our theory of the African origin of mankind be wrong? If it is right, why are most people in Africa black, while we have yellow skin, and Europe and West Asia have more white skin?"

Liu Kuan did not expect Zhu Xiong Ying to ask such a complicated question right away.

Seeing that Lao Zhu, Xu Da, Tang He, and others all seemed quite interested, he couldn't very well not speak up.

I figured I might as well just treat it as casual conversation.

He said, "According to the research of later anthropologists, most of the human genes do indeed originate from Homo sapiens who originated in East Africa."

"As for His Highness's question—human beings will continue to evolve due to changes in the environment."

"According to later scientific research, white skin is more suitable for living in high-latitude, cold regions, yellow skin is more suitable for living in mid-latitude temperate regions, and black skin is more suitable for living in low-latitude tropical regions."

"Therefore, central and southern Africa are mostly inhabited by black people, but North Africa has some white and yellow-skinned people. Similarly, the natives of the islands in Southeast Asia are mostly black-skinned."

"Of course, natural conditions are one factor in shaping human skin color, competition between human groups is another, and there may be other factors as well."

Zhu Xiong Ying nodded in agreement, then seemed to be deep in thought.

At this moment, Tang He asked curiously, "Marquis of Jiangning, are we humans really evolved from some kind of Australopithecus? Or were we created by Nuwa?"

Liu Kuan laughed and said, "They should have evolved from ancient apes—but a small number of people in later generations still insist that humans, that is, modern Homo sapiens, were actually enlightened by aliens."

Initiated by aliens?

How did Nuwa become an alien? (End of Chapter)