106: Chapter 106 Zhao Fusu's Main Quest in Qin

Governing a country and ensuring its orderly development involves many different aspects.

To avoid a haphazard approach, Zhao Fusu used a tree diagram to organize the projects that needed development.

He used a tree diagram to organize the projects needing development.

In the Great Qin Empire under his rule, heavy industry was the material foundation that allowed the Great Qin Empire to be powerful and served as the backbone of the national economy.

Heavy industry was the focus of his development.

Only with a developed heavy industry in Great Qin could the military manufacturing industry flourish.

However, the development of light industry could not be neglected either.

Light industry provides consumer goods and hand tools, affecting people's basic needs—clothing, food, housing, and transportation—and is closely related to daily life.

Developing both heavy and light industry, walking on two legs, is the only way to go far.

Education is of great significance to both heavy and light industry.

In heavy industry, education provides necessary technical support and a talent pool, promoting technological progress and industrial upgrading.

In light industry, education provides innovative design and management capabilities, helping light industry enterprises improve product quality and market competitiveness. The diversification and high quality of light industrial products depend on professional talents trained through education.

Prioritizing education and opening up a large number of positions also provides a channel for upward mobility for the common people at the bottom of society.

The reason many rebel leaders chose to revolt was that rebellion was their only path for upward mobility.

For example, in the late Tang Dynasty, Huang Chao, who wiped out the aristocratic clans, found it easier to lead troops into Chang'an than to pass the imperial examinations.

When Zhao Fusu seized power, the reason he resolutely abandoned imperial autocracy was precisely because he had considered this point.

Imperial power shackled the upward mobility of the common people across social classes.

For an emperor, the most important aspect of the Imperial Examination System was not stimulating social vitality, but rather using this system to directly control the scholar-official class.

As the scholar-official class became increasingly dependent on imperial power, the monarch's authority grew even greater.

The Imperial Examination System did not promote social mobility; instead, it deepened class solidification.

From a social structure perspective, hierarchy was deeply rooted in an imperial society.

Even if some individuals achieved class mobility through various means, the mobility of society as a whole remained constrained by many institutional factors.

What Zhao Fusu was bound to was the great qin heavy industry system, not an imperial power system.

He knew very well that his role in Great Qin was not to promote imperial power.

His main quest was to drive the development of Great Qin's heavy industry, initiate an industrial revolution, develop industrial civilization nationwide, and enter the industrial age.

In short, the cake must be shared; when everyone benefits, everyone will want to make the cake bigger.

If you eat the whole cake yourself, who would be willing to help you make it bigger? They will only condemn and criticize you.

The more you try to make the cake bigger for yourself, the more the people of the world will hate you.

People's hearts would not be united.

In that case, he would be unable to drive Great Qin's heavy industry development or start the industrial revolution, let alone lead Great Qin into the industrial age.

In Zhao Fusu's view, the branches of the Great Qin Empire's development path could be divided into: the first branch, heavy industry; the second branch, light industry; the third branch, education; and the fourth branch, agriculture.

Heavy industry would develop steel, Steam Engines, steam tractors, and so on.

Light industry would develop papermaking, including office paper, napkins, and toilet paper.

In agriculture, they would increase grain yields and research and produce agricultural machinery to improve production efficiency.

With such a division, Zhao Fusu clearly understood how he should lead the Great Qin Empire's development.

While both heavy and light industry were beginning to develop, the field of education could not remain a blank slate.

Initials, finals, the pinyin alphabet, and dictionaries—these had to be created when he had the time.

The New Oriental School also needed to be established as soon as possible, and he would be its first principal.

All the students graduating from the New Oriental School would call him Principal!

The talents trained by him personally would also become his core team.

And all of this had to be built on the premise that he possessed absolute military force.

Zhao Fusu went to the Forging Workshop again—no, it should be called the Great Qin Empire Academy of Sciences.

Zhao Fusu inspected the progress of the soldiers sent to learn the lost-wax method.

Old Yang had not held anything back, and these soldiers had already learned the lost-wax method.

Zhao Fusu's face brightened with joy.

The production of the Iron Pagoda was officially put on the agenda!

Through his check-ins, Zhao Fusu had obtained the book "Detailed Explanation of Iron Pagoda Forging."

Previously, he had only seen photos of the Iron Pagoda and hadn't looked into the specifics of how it was forged.

After carefully studying the forging method for the Iron Pagoda, Zhao Fusu frowned.

The method of making the Iron Pagoda was somewhat different from what Zhao Fusu had imagined.

He had originally thought the Iron Pagoda was made entirely of steel.

In reality, that wasn't the case.

The Iron Pagoda was made using steel, leather, and cords.

Producing a complete set of Iron Pagoda armor was extremely tedious.

The armor worn by an Iron Pagoda warrior consisted of 1,800 steel plates.

These steel plates had holes for threading.

By using cords, the steel plates were bound to leather and assembled to make arm guards, inner armor, outer plating, and skirt armor.

The weight could reach sixty catties!

The Iron Pagoda was cavalry armor, which had certain differences from buren armor.

The difference mainly lay in the overlapping technique of the steel plates.

For cavalry armor, the steel plates were overlapped from bottom to top, providing defense against upward thrusts from below the mount.

The bottom-to-top overlapping technique of the Iron Pagoda plates could effectively prevent enemy weapons from piercing into the gaps between the plates.

The most handsome and coolest part of the Iron Pagoda human armor was the helmet.

The helmet was integrated with the face mask and neck guard.

Once the helmet was worn, only a pair of soul-stirring eyes were visible.

Horse armor was also known as barding.

Therefore, the full name of the Iron Pagoda was the Iron Pagoda Barded Cavalry.

Zhao Fusu then looked at the "Detailed Explanation of Mingguang Armor Forging."

The mingguang armor's protective performance couldn't match the Iron Pagoda, but it looked very good.

Zhao Fusu decided not to forge mingguang armor.

By slightly changing the overlapping method of the steel plates, he could create buren armor for the infantry.

However, whether it was the Iron Pagoda or buren armor, the difficulty of forging was very high, making large-scale distribution impossible.

Zhao Fusu's plan was to create three thousand Iron Pagoda Barded Cavalry.

The buren armor would be supplied to the vanguard units.

For example, the troops on the front lines when two armies faced off.

To produce the three thousand sets of Iron Pagoda barding more quickly, Zhao Fusu decided that after the soldiers used the lost-wax method to produce the steel plates, he would outsource the work of making the breastplates, leather components, and skirt armor.

Zhao Fusu pondered how to obtain three thousand sets of Iron Pagoda barding as quickly as possible.

If one person were to make a single set of Iron Pagoda barding, it would take a month.

Therefore, producing three thousand sets of Iron Pagoda barding required a massive amount of manpower.