Chapter 575 [First Update] 575

When Liu Tan thought of the word "blower", his head started to hurt even more.

To be honest, he could have put in some effort on other things, but as for the blower... it's not something he can make just by working hard. It's not something that can be made now.

Liu Tan stood there thinking for a long time, but his thoughts were like a knot and he couldn't think of an alternative solution. Finally, he simply gave up thinking about it and asked someone to make a few Kongming lanterns to take back for Liu Che to play with - with the experience of making hot air balloons, Kongming lanterns would be much easier to make, at least Kongming lanterns only needed paper and candles.

Even if the paper needs to be processed in order to make the Kongming lantern fly more smoothly, it is still much easier than a hot air balloon.

Liu Tan had fifty of them made at once. He said, "One is just for fun; it only looks good when there are more."

However, the only thing you need to pay attention to with a Kongming lantern is that you must control the size of the candle underneath and don't let the candle burn for too long. Otherwise, if you encounter some force majeure along the way, what if the lantern body breaks and the candle falls and ignites other things?

Even if this possibility is very small, there are all kinds of coincidences in this world. If a fire occurs, it would be fine if no one died. But if someone died, Liu Tan would really feel bad.

After experiments, we finally determined the most suitable size of the candle, and ensured that if the candle fell, it would go out in mid-air and would not ignite.

After Liu Tan had the things prepared, he took his people back to the palace.

When he returned to the palace, the first person he saw was Crown Prince Liu Ju. At that time, Liu Ju's sedan chair was coming from the direction of the harem. Liu Tan knew at a glance that he must have gone to see Wei Zifu.

Although Liu Ju was in the sedan chair, the young eunuch beside him had already informed him smartly.

Liu Ju immediately stopped the sedan chair and came out, saying with a smile, "You are finally willing to come back."

Liu Tan immediately said, "Don't come out, don't come out. It's too sunny outside. Your Highness, go back to the Crown Prince's Palace first. I'll tell the Queen Mother and come find you later."

Liu Ju also said: "You also know that the sun is strong, so why are you running around? Go report to the Queen and rest. I think the Emperor will summon you this afternoon, so be careful then."

Liu Tan immediately became alert and asked, "What's wrong? Is Father unhappy again?"

Liu Ju sneered: "It has nothing to do with you if he's unhappy. It's just that the witch from Baiyue is a little dishonest."

Liu Tan frowned: "Not honest?"

Liu Ju waved his hand and said, "My wife should also know about this matter. You will know it when you see her. Go quickly and don't stay out in the sun."

Liu Tan was confused, and after saying goodbye to him, he quickly went to the Pepper Room.

After seeing Liu Tan, Chen Ajiao said with some complaints: "You ran so fast, leaving such a little thing behind for me."

Liu Tan glanced at the Seventh Prince, who was being taken care of even better by Chen Ajiao, and said with a smile, "I'm sorry, Mother. I really don't know how to take care of a child. Even if I were here, I'd still have to trouble you, Mother."

Chen Ajiao wiped his sweat with a handkerchief and said, "The autumn heat is really strong. You might as well wait until it's cooler before coming back."

Liu Tan immediately said, "I miss my father, the emperor, and my mother, the empress."

Chen Ajiao didn't buy his tricks: "You've been away in the Northern Territory for so many years, and I haven't seen you miss me."

Liu Tan smiled and watched Chen Ajiao order someone to bring him an iced drink, thinking about how to ask about the great witch.

But before he could say anything, Chen Ajiao said, "Did you come back in a hurry because you knew that barbarian was dishonest?"

Liu Tan shook his head. "I didn't know about it until I came back. After I got back to the palace, I happened to run into His Royal Highness the Crown Prince. He mentioned it to me, but because it was too hot outside, we didn't say much before we parted ways. I still don't know what happened."

Chen Ajiao asked, "Did you get a lot of sheep as a snack for the servants?"

Liu Tan explained, "It's not to give the servants extra food, but because we need sheepskins, so we had a lot of sheep brought over. The weather is so hot, it would be difficult to keep so many sheep after slaughtering them, so I simply gave them as rewards to those who have made contributions."

Chen Ajiao said nonchalantly, "It's just a few sheep. That barbarian is narrow-minded. But you don't have to worry. Your father has already punished him."

Liu Tan: ???

Chen Ajiao said, "I don't know where that barbarian got the news from, but he ran to your father and said that the Han Dynasty is indeed the Celestial Empire. In their country, even a high-ranking wizard like him can only eat mutton once a month, while the slaves of the Han Dynasty can eat plenty of mutton."

Liu Tan raised an eyebrow after hearing this: "Then he should learn from the Han Dynasty and see how poor the Baiyue people are that they dare to become enemies of the Han Dynasty."

As soon as Liu Tan heard this, he knew that this was a roundabout way of saying that he was extravagant.

However, Liu Tan is now almost immune to this kind of talk.

You know, ever since he came here and started to tinker with all kinds of things, because his parents gave him enough money, people would stare at him every day and think he was extravagant, oh, in the words of those people, he was living a life of extravagance.

At that time, Liu Tan was still a little worried. After all, the emperor could be extravagant, but he certainly would not like his son to be overly extravagant.

However, perhaps because what he did made Emperor Wu of Han sufficiently satisfied, no matter who said that to him, Emperor Wu of Han never punished him for it, not even verbally.

There were even several times when someone told Liu Che that he was too extravagant, Liu Che would immediately start giving him money, showing with practical actions that he supported Liu Tan's extravagance. From then on, very few people dared to say these words to Liu Che.

It was not known whether the great wizard had been reminded by someone or was born that way, but he was very careful in what he said so as not to leave any room for error.

But how old was he? How could he possibly hide his thoughts from Liu Che?

Even though he had a high status in his own tribe, the Baiyue were originally small tribes with at most a thousand people in their tribe. His vision and experience limited him.

Therefore, Liu Che knew without any effort that this guy was secretly reporting Liu Tan, so Liu Che cut his salary for one month without saying a word, and made him reflect in his palace for three days. After three days, he did not see him for five consecutive days. It was only in the past few days that he allowed him to serve by his side again.

Chen Ajiao said in a mocking tone, "He is much more honest this time. His words and actions are much more measured than before."

Liu Tan frowned slightly: "I don't have much in common with him, why would he want to make things difficult for me?"

Chen Ajiao covered her mouth and laughed, "It's not just this southern barbarian, but many alchemists hate you."

After hearing this, Liu Tan immediately became alert. Wasn't it because he wanted to become the first emperor that he killed the alchemist and ended up burning books and burying scholars, a crime that has been passed down for thousands of years?

If these alchemists now also hold a grudge against him, I wonder what they will come up with.

However, vigilance was only for a moment. He thought that after he died, he would not hear what others said about him, so why bother?

Anyway, now he understands that his existence makes the witch from Baiyue feel a little restricted.

Liu Tan talked with Chen Ajiao for a while, then turned around and went back to his Sui Yu Palace. He sent someone to ask Liu Che if he had time tonight, so that he could release the prayer lanterns for Liu Che to see.

Liu Tan was helpless in using this name. At that time, no one knew where Kong Ming was. If he was called Kong Ming Lantern, when Emperor Wu of Han asked him later, he would have to wonder where he had made up such a person.

Originally, Liu Tan was thinking of going to see Liu Che at night, and then he could ask the palace gate to keep him there. However, after hearing the news, Liu Che directly called him over and let him have dinner and a midnight snack.

Liu Tan had no choice but to pack up his things and have someone take the box containing the Kongming lanterns directly to the Weiyang Palace.

When he got there, he found Liu Che was dealing with documents, while the witch from Nanyue was sitting below with a black veil covering her face, looking quite bored and afraid to move.

Liu Tan couldn't help but feel a little strange. According to Liu Che's character, it was already an exception for him to let Nan Wu stay here while he was dealing with paperwork. Why did Nan Wu look like he was in prison?

Liu Che looked up and waved to Liu Tan, saying, "You've come at the right time. I just happened to see the memorial from the King of Wusun."

Liu Tan immediately threw the Southern Witch aside, quickly went over and sat next to Liu Che and asked, "What did he say?"

Liu Che squinted at him and said, "You don't know? Doesn't he often write to you?"

Liu Tan shook his body and said, "When we write to each other, we always talk about personal matters and never discuss political affairs."

After all, the Northern Border Kingdom and the Wusun Kingdom are two vassal states. What the central government fears most is that the vassal kings will collude secretly.

Even if Liu Tan and Lu Xuan said they would not discuss political affairs and no one would believe them, at least he would not admit it on the surface.

Liu Che also understood this truth and gave him a half-smile, "You've made progress."

At least I'm not as stupid as before and I say whatever I want.

Liu Tan narrowed his eyes when he heard Liu Che say, "He has sent another victory message to Chang'an."

The smile on Liu Tan's face suddenly disappeared. He became quite impatient and said, "Victory news? He's fighting again? Didn't he say he wouldn't mobilize troops anytime soon? Who is he fighting? The Western Regions or the Xiongnu?"

Seeing that the expression on his face didn't seem fake, Liu Che couldn't help but feel a little strange: "Did he really not tell you anything?"

Liu Tan felt helpless. Although others might not believe what he said, the problem was that Lu Xuan really didn't say anything this time. He was very tight-lipped. Everything was peaceful from beginning to end. He even told him about the construction progress of the royal city and the royal palace in his letters from time to time.

According to that progress, the Wusun Kingdom is indeed making every effort to build. Does that mean they are lying to him?

Liu Che simply threw Lu Xuan's memorial to him and said, "Read it yourself."