Ma Su's words immediately won support from several younger officers.
"Lord Sun burned Cao's fleet at Red Cliffs—his military strength was once overwhelming. How could he possibly be routed by eight hundred?"
"General Zhang, war simulations must not carry personal grudges!"
"Or is General Zhang deliberately amusing himself at our expense?"
Zhang Fei's face flushed crimson. Yet he truly didn't know how to explain it.
His green-eyed brother-in-law's battlefield record was—quite simply—something that anyone who understood warfare would struggle to believe. →
In the end, Guan Yu suppressed the debate with a single sentence:
"Assume that Lord Sun has suffered a prior defeat and is currently incapable of offensive action."
Since General Guan had spoken, the others could only accept it. The officers noted the assumption and turned their attention back to the sand table.
Once again, Ma Su spoke first.
"If Lord Sun has troops stationed at Lukou, why not have the Jiangling garrison join forces with Lukou, march north, seize Xiangyang, and then besiege Fancheng?"
"The Lukou garrison cannot move," Guan Yu replied vaguely.
He himself didn't know how to explain why.
That won't work either.
Ma Su felt frustrated, but quickly rallied.
"Then what if the Hanzhong garrison feigns an advance through the Baoxie Road—creating the appearance of an attack on Chang'an to draw off Cao's forces?"
Guan Yu stroked his beard without speaking.
Huang Zhong had no choice but to speak up, forcing himself through it.
"The Hanzhong garrison has already returned to Chengdu. Hanzhong will not advance…"
At this point, even Xiahou Lan sighed.
Gao Xiang and Chen Shi studied the situation carefully before speaking.
"In that case, neither Hanzhong in the west nor Lord Sun in the east can coordinate with us. Even Lukou's allied forces are immobile."
"That leaves us effectively attacking the great stronghold of Xiangfan with only thirty thousand troops."
"Meanwhile, Cao's forces have no concerns on either flank. They can reinforce Xiangfan with full strength."
"Three tens of thousands attacking a city defended by a hundred thousand—how could victory be possible?"
Pfft.
At the words hundred thousand, Zhang Fei suddenly burst out laughing. →
Facing everyone's puzzled looks, he could only explain:
"I just suddenly thought of something funny… and this is only a simulation, right? Try pushing it a bit!"
But how were they supposed to push it?
No allied coordination.
No reinforcements.
Not even a way to restrict enemy reinforcements.
"Not only must we take Xiangfan," Zhang Fei shouted,
"we must also smash Cao's relief forces!"
Ma Su all but said it outright: General Zhang, please seek wiser company.
Yet Guan Yu suppressed all dissent mercilessly.
The group of officers could only frown and rack their brains, trying to imagine how Xiangfan could possibly fall.
The quicker minds began to wonder privately:
The lord has just married the sister of the Marquis of Wu—and already relations have soured?
Meanwhile, inside the blacksmith's workshop by Tiger Crossing River, Ma Liang stood barefoot among the coal piles, sorting stones alongside an elderly smith.
"I've got it!" the old smith exclaimed, eyes lighting up as he pulled a piece from the pile and waved Ma Liang over.
"Young sir—this here is good stone coal."
Ma Liang examined the coal curiously and gestured to the pile below.
"How can one tell it's good? How do you choose?"
The old smith chuckled and snapped off a piece with force. The two chunks rang sharply when struck together.
"This brighter kind—hard stuff. It catches fire easily, burns hot, and smelts better iron."
Ma Liang carefully recorded the explanation and tested it himself.
The coal in the old smith's hand was hard as rock. →
The duller coal on the ground didn't even need breaking—one stomp shattered it into fragments.
"This kind of coal isn't bad either," the old smith said, drifting into memory.
"I'm from Hedong. When I was young, you could still pick up stone coal nearby. There was also a kind like loose soil—dry it out, and it burned great for cooking."
"And there's a folk remedy too!"
The old smith's eyes gleamed slyly.
Ma Liang sighed.
"Master, we agreed—everything you know, you tell us plainly. We'll reward you according to usefulness. Trust Governor Liu."
"Oh—old habits, hehe."
The old smith wiped his hands on his robe, embarrassed.
"In my hometown, there's a family remedy. If someone accidentally swallows gold or silver coins—grind stone coal the size of half a thumb with sulfur the size of a thumb, mix it with wine, drink it, and it'll come right out!"
Ma Liang shuddered.
How would one even verify this?
And wasn't this medicine? Weren't they discussing iron-smelting?
He recorded it without changing expression, already deciding to pass the burden of verification to someone else. He absolutely would not try it himself.
"Oh, and one more remedy," the old man continued smoothly.
Ma Liang didn't want to write anymore—but the man was already talking.
"I heard this from my mother. If a woman's monthly blood doesn't come—boil a little stone coal into a broth and eat it with three crushed ba-dou seeds. Guaranteed effective!"
Ma Liang wrote it down.
After some thought, he decided both "remedies" would be best handed to Physician Zhang.
As for testing them—he truly had no way.
After bidding farewell to Master Xie, Ma Liang returned to the county office and handed his notes to Jiang Wan.
At present, the Inspection Division had only one true operative: Ma Liang himself.
Reliable to a fault.
For example, the records he submitted were neatly divided into three parts:
One: Master Xie's knowledge of stone coal.
Two: its advantages and drawbacks in iron smelting.
Three: Master Xie's so-called secret remedies.
Jiang Wan skimmed the pages.
As expected…
He sighed inwardly and separated the folk remedies.
"Copy this and send it to Physician Zhang."
He then placed the two coal-related reports on Zhuge Liang's desk, where several similar transcripts already lay.
Finally, Jiang Wan appended his own assessment:
Summarizing craftsmen's opinions: charcoal and stone coal each have strengths and weaknesses. Stone coal is difficult to mine, and iron quality is unstable—likely related to coal variety. If these differences can be identified and addressed, stone coal may surpass charcoal.
But—
Jiang Wan shook his head.
Addressing the root causes—how difficult that would be.
"Gongyan works efficiently indeed."
Jiang Wan turned to see Zhuge Liang, looking exhausted.
Mud flecked the hem of his robe—he had clearly just returned from the fields.
"Was Tiangong Kaiwu useful?" Jiang Wan asked.
At the mention, Zhuge Liang's fatigue vanished.
"Useful?" His brows flew up.
"It's nothing less than a complete canon!"
"Just two chapters gave me deeper insight into rice cultivation than seasoned farmers possess!"
"I can scarcely imagine what secrets the remaining chapters contain!"
"Such a treasure—sold so cheaply in later ages! What kind of flourishing age must that be?"
The later age…
Whenever this came up, Jiang Wan thought of the light screen's ability to turn speech into text—and felt envy himself.
"I truly wish to see that 'aircraft carrier.' Perhaps it's like a floating territory—self-sustaining, carrying elite troops, appearing and vanishing at will."
Zhuge Liang shook his head.
"Gongyan—you're thinking too small."
To him, the implications ran deeper.
The three items displayed together on the light screen were similarly priced—Han swords, Eight-Ox Crossbows, Tiangong Kaiwu.
Which meant: in later ages, these were of roughly equal value.
What was Tiangong Kaiwu?
Just the rice chapters alone could raise Jing Province's grain output by thirty percent.
How many lives could that surplus sustain?
And that was only one section of the book.
Calling it a pillar of the state wouldn't be excessive—yet in later ages it cost merely forty-nine yuan. Roughly five qian.
A national treasure capable of saving countless lives—worth five qian.
A military forbidden device that could enable glorious western conquests—thirty qian.
And a Han sword—unable to feed the hungry, unable to quench thirst, inferior to a long spear on the battlefield—twenty qian.
Then there were the free items glimpsed earlier on the light screen—those Zhao Yun had praised highly.
In that age, such things were discarded like worn shoes—while aircraft carriers were exalted.
The power of later generations—
Unfathomable.
The morning fungus knows nothing of dusk and dawn.
The cicada knows nothing of spring and autumn.
Who is the fungus?
Who is the cicada?