I will make Qin Shi Huang immortal in the Great Qin Dynasty.

Harvest season has arrived.

In the specially designated experimental field outside Xianyang City, golden corn cobs hung heavily on the stalks, each kernel plump and round, gleaming with a warm luster in the sunlight.

Sweet potato and potato vines climbed all over the field ridges, their leaves lush and green, growing taller than a person's knees. The soil beneath the vines was cracked open, revealing the faint outlines of the bulging tubers.

The rice paddies were a sea of ​​gold, with heavy ears of rice bowing their heads and swaying gently in the breeze, like a layer of flowing gold dust spread across the earth.

The agricultural official in charge of looking after this experimental field stood on the edge of the field, holding a sweet potato that had just been dug out of the ground in his hands. His lips trembled slightly, and his old eyes were filled with cloudy tears.

He had spent most of his life as an agricultural official and cultivated crops, but he had never seen such thick tubers or such plump ears of corn.

He broke open the sweet potato, and the orange-yellow flesh glistened moistly in the sunlight, its aroma sweet and rich, making him involuntarily swallow.

He recalled the words of the Imperial Advisor: this was just the beginning.

Once the seeds are widely distributed throughout the Qin region, each mu (unit of land area) can yield a harvest of thirty shi (unit of dry measure).

Thirty shi (a unit of dry measure).

Holding the sweet potato in his hands, he felt that after serving as an agricultural official for most of his life, he had finally achieved the most pride-worthy thing in his life.

The harvesting work has begun in full swing.

The corn, sweet potatoes, potatoes, and rice from the experimental fields were transported back to the granary by truckload, where they were dried, threshed, sorted, and stored.

The golden corn kernels were packed into sacks and stacked neatly, like small hills filling every corner of the warehouse.

Sweet potatoes and potatoes were carefully stored in the cellar, kept well-ventilated and dry to prevent them from rotting and sprouting.

After the harvest was completed, the second round of seed distribution began.

The scope of this round is much larger than that of the first round.

Most of the first batch of harvested corn, sweet potatoes, and potatoes were kept as seeds and planted in different climate zones according to local climate and soil conditions.

Some varieties don't grow well in cold places, so they are relocated to warmer areas.

Some varieties did not yield well in arid areas, so they were sent to areas with abundant water.

The destination of each batch of seeds is recorded, and each experimental plot has a designated person responsible for observing and recording its growth.

From sowing to germination, from growth to harvest, every step must be meticulously recorded to accumulate experience for future comprehensive promotion.

Qin Tian tirelessly traveled between the various experimental fields to check on the growth of the crops and solve various problems encountered during the planting process.

Sometimes, when he noticed that the corn leaves in a certain field were turning yellow, he would squat on the edge of the field and examine them carefully for a long time. In the end, he would find that it was due to a lack of water and immediately order the agricultural officials to increase the frequency of irrigation.

Sometimes he would find that the sweet potato vines in a certain field were growing too vigorously, but the tubers were not very big. He would tell the agricultural officials to turn the vines over in time to control the excessive growth and allow more nutrients to be concentrated on the tubers.

At first, the old farmers had doubts about the various new methods proposed by the national advisor, but seeing that the crops in the experimental fields were growing better day by day, they gradually went from doubt to admiration and began to remember those new methods as treasures.

After several rounds of trials, data showed that each crop found a suitable climate and soil environment for growth, and the yield of each trial was steadily increasing.

Qin Tian estimates that after another year or two of promotion and accumulation, these high-yield grain varieties can be fully deployed in suitable areas.

At that time, the people of Qin will not only be able to eat their fill, but also eat well.

This news should naturally be told to the whole world.

The news of the founding of the Daqin Daily had already spread throughout Xianyang and the surrounding counties several months ago.

That was the first thing Qin Tian did after papermaking and movable type printing matured: to establish a newspaper for the whole world.

Ying Zheng approved the proposal at the court meeting, designating the Daqin Daily as the official newspaper of the court. The printing bureau under the Ministry of Industry was responsible for typesetting and printing, while the propaganda department was responsible for content compilation and review. It was to be distributed regularly throughout the country.

Qin Tian simplified the newspaper model of later generations and transplanted it to the Qin Dynasty. Each issue had four pages, covering all aspects of the country, including court policies, local news, agricultural technology, culture and education.

As it was an official newspaper, its content mainly focused on promoting Qin policies, reporting on local developments, and imparting agricultural techniques and general knowledge. The text was written in simplified Chinese characters, with Qin language pinyin annotations next to it so that even those with limited literacy could follow along and read it.

The distribution of the Daqin Daily was not done by transporting the printed newspapers from Xianyang to all parts of the country; that would have been too slow and too expensive.

Qin Tian had already considered this problem when he designed it. He had the printing bureau set up branch printing points in the capitals of counties and prefectures across the country, equipped with small printing equipment and paper materials. The branch printing points in various places would print and distribute the paper locally based on the unified typesetting samples received.

In this way, the quality and content of the newspaper remain consistent, but the transportation cost is reduced to almost zero, and the timeliness is greatly improved.

By the time the news reached a remote county, the newspaper had already been printed and transported to the market by the county government officials.

In the open space in front of the county government office, several bailiffs brought over a table and neatly stacked a stack of printed newspapers on it. Next to it, a wooden board was set up with an enlarged version of the newspaper printed on it. The words were written in large characters, so that even people standing in the back row could read the contents.

That was a special promotional edition printed by the Daqin Daily, specifically for those who were illiterate and unable to read newspapers on their own.

A long queue formed in front of the table.

Some people were holding a few copper coins in their hands, some were holding their own children in their arms, and some were pushing carts and stopping to look around.

An old man at the front of the line tremblingly stretched out a hand and exchanged a polished copper coin for a newspaper, holding it carefully in his palm as if it were a rare treasure.

He was illiterate, but he knew the paper was cheap, so he bought it and had a literate young man read it to his family.

This contains His Majesty's decree, a matter of great importance to the nation, and a method to increase crop yields several times over.

A young woman holding a two- or three-year-old child in her arms, who was behind her in line, also squeezed forward to buy one.

She was illiterate, but her husband worked in a nearby workshop and had heard people read the contents of a few newspapers aloud, which he then told her about several times when he got home.

It is said that His Majesty has found a new type of grain that can yield thirty bushels per mu. From now on, children in all places will be able to go to school. As long as they learn the Yuanli Guiding Technique, their bodies will become stronger and stronger.

She only half understood what they said, but those words suddenly gave her hope for the future.

Clutching the newspaper, she glanced down at the sleeping child in her arms, then silently folded it and tucked it into her bosom.

She thought that when her child was older, she would point out each word in the newspaper to him, so that he would know what kind of era his life was becoming.