11,000 nutrient solutions bonus chapter: "Choose a few of the least reliable ones..."
These are things that neither bystanders nor insiders have ever heard of. As it turns out, even after unification, he had no chance to recuperate and implement benevolent governance.
The remnants of the six former states were restless, all wanting to restore their kingdoms. Popular uprisings continued. Although they were unified on the surface, no one really considered themselves to be a Qin citizen.
The nomadic tribes of the grasslands outside are as swift as the wind, attacking and fleeing without fixed strongholds. Although the Qin state is not incapable of defeating them, the cost of doing so is too high, and they are constantly harassed by them...
At that time, the country was beset by internal and external troubles, so the only option was to build the Great Wall. This would both exhaust the subjects of the six states, keeping them from thinking about restoring their kingdoms, and also serve to defend against nomadic enemies.
However, the more they were suppressed, the more they wanted to resist, and in the end, with his death, the Qin Dynasty was almost finished.
Thinking of this, Banban hesitated for a moment, then remembered the bamboo that Xuanxi and Xuanjiao usually ate. Last year during the New Year, she and her cousin had burned some bamboo together. When the bamboo caught fire, some of it would crackle and pop, like firecrackers filled with gunpowder.
She hugged her cousin and gently patted his shoulder in a comforting gesture, saying, "I understand, cousin. You're right."
He embraced her slender waist and pulled her into his arms.
They had lunch together. In the afternoon, instead of taking a nap, Banban went to Taxuexuan to visit Xuanxi and Xuanjiao, who had eaten bamboo and nibbled on bamboo shoots and were now curled up for a rest.
The palace servants were instructed to find some tender bamboo shoots and chop them open along the intact bamboo nodes.
He lit the stove and waited for the fire to burn brightly before picking up two bamboo sections and throwing them in.
Cong Yun and Qian Yin waited quietly by her side, asking, "What is the Queen doing?"
Surrounded by a group of palace servants, the queen had no idea what she was going to do.
"Let's give it a try. I don't know if it'll work, but if it explodes, everything will be fine." Banban muttered to himself, squatting not far away and staring intently at the stove.
She had been waiting for who knows how long, and Qian Yin's legs were getting sore. She was about to speak.
"Bang--"
With a loud bang, the stove was startled by a small explosion. The sound wasn't loud, but since the surroundings were quiet, it still frightened many people.
"Ah!" Qian Yin was startled and stepped aside, only to find that nothing had happened.
The boiler operator explained, "Don't be afraid, everyone. This is what happens when bamboo is thoroughly burned. In the past, when we cooked at home, some damp wood would make this sound."
Banban's eyes lit up, and he asked, "Do you know why wet wood makes a crackling sound?"
The boiler operator scratched the back of his head, unable to explain, "This... I don't know either."
No one knew, so she had to investigate on her own and have someone remove the burst bamboo. The bamboo had cracked explosively from the inside.
Could this be considered a problem caused by the gas pressure after the fire is lit?
After this thought popped into her head, she thought of modern pressure cookers. Is the principle behind pressure cooker explosions the same as that of bamboo explosions?
If these two are similar, it means that the bamboo is cut along the nodes and is hollow inside, containing air and moisture. As the flames burn brighter, the water vapor inside the bamboo tube is sealed, and the increased air pressure will cause an explosion.
If you want to use it as a weapon, you still need a tool that can quickly ignite it... and you can't avoid gunpowder.
How exactly is gunpowder made?
Qian Yin stared at the stove for a while, then suddenly said, "Bamboo can explode when it burns. This reminds me of an interesting story my father told me when I was young."
"What interesting tidbit?" Before Banban could even process what was happening, her mouth had already started talking. She was the kind of person who never let anyone else's words fall flat.
Qian Yin once told an interesting story: a boy in her neighborhood had a fever for several days and did not get better. They invited a shaman to perform a ritual, and she said that he was missing one of his three souls and seven spirits and could not be found. He was beyond saving, and in the end, the boy did indeed die.
When Banban was little, she was terrified when she heard this. For several nights in a row, she didn't dare to turn off the light when she went to sleep, for fear that someone would come and steal her soul.
When she grew up, it dawned on her... wasn't it just that he died from a high fever that lasted too long?! He should have taken his medicine earlier!
“My father said that when he went hunting, he met a strange man. The man was an alchemist who could make many kinds of pills, such as those that prolong life, beautify the skin, calm the mind, and even turn a female fetus into a male fetus.”
Banban immediately became alert. Oh dear, her cousin mustn't hear this.
"However, alchemy also depends on timing, luck, and formula. If it succeeds, every batch will be of superior quality; if it fails, the furnace will explode."
Banban paused, catching the key word, and asked suspiciously, "Explosion?"
Qian Yin nodded. "Yes, sometimes it can even burn hands and faces and burn houses to ashes. This is something my father learned from that alchemist. I found it strange and it remains vivid in my memory. Your Majesty, how could burning a furnace possibly turn a house to ashes?"
Heavy-hearted, she returned to Zhaoyang Palace. The next day, Banban used her status as queen to widely recruit alchemists from all over the world. She stated that she would select four alchemists to refine specific pills for her, and anyone with such talent was welcome to apply. They were to wait outside Xianyang Palace for the queen to inspect and select them.
If selected, one will be rewarded with five hundred gold coins annually.
Ying Zheng didn't care what his wife wanted to do and let her make a fuss. However, he wanted to make sure to say something clear beforehand so that his wife wouldn't be deceived and angry with him for not stopping her. This kind of thing happened many times.
She recently started dieting, insisting that she wouldn't eat fancy food or drink milk tea, and asked him to help her control herself.
He refused, and she tearfully accused him: "Cousin, don't you want her to become a better person? How can you let her fall into depravity?"
He promised that nothing would happen.
However, the day before yesterday, he only mentioned it briefly when she asked for a nighttime supplement, and she immediately turned on him, crying and making a scene, saying that he disliked her for being fat and not pretty anymore.
Thinking of all this, Ying Zheng was speechless. "What's the point of refining pills? Those are just tricks by charlatans to swindle money from people."
With a forced smile, he said, “The elixir of immortality, the elixir of longevity, the elixir of rejuvenation, and all sorts of other elixirs that can make people live a long and healthy life.”
Ying Zheng paused in his book-flipping motion, "?"
"Look at you, look at you, you're getting carried away!" Banban threw down the embroidery in her hand, grabbed his face angrily, "Jiang Taigong fished, and you are that fish. Even if you're just being tricked with empty hooks, you'll still bite, won't you!"
"..." he said, "I haven't said anything yet."
"Those are all lies." Ying Zheng put on a calm and rational appearance, and even comforted his wife, "How could I be fooled? What a joke."
joke?
You must be itching to do something, otherwise you wouldn't be behaving like this.
Anyone can say nice things. He knew that Dan Shi was mostly a fraud, but even the smartest person could fall into a trap when faced with a scam tailored specifically for them.
Banban said these things on purpose, waiting for Danshi to explode a few times to scare him and see if he would still dare to swallow those explosive things.
As the two argued about whether Ying Zheng was truly moved, Qin Ju suddenly knocked on the door, requesting an audience. "Your Majesty," he said, "Mr. Lü Buwei has committed suicide by poison."
Banban's movement to choke him froze. "What?!"
Qin Ju's forehead was covered in sweat; his robes were almost completely soaked from running.
There was a commotion inside the room, and soon the door opened. He saw Ying Zheng come out hastily dressed, wearing shoes and a robe. "When did this happen?"
“It was this morning.” Qin Ju wiped away his sweat, trying to calm his tone, but a slight tremor of helplessness still escaped his throat uncontrollably. “According to Gu, he read the letter sent by the King, sat in silence all day, then dined with her, practiced martial arts with the children, and drank poisoned tea at night. Everyone thought he was asleep, but they couldn’t wake him the next day…”
Banban sat there blankly. The letter she sent to Lü Buwei was written by her cousin with her own eyes. In fact, the content of the discussion was exactly what she and he had discussed before: the importance of agriculture and warfare to the Qin state, the advantages and disadvantages of the "Lüshi Chunqiu" to the Qin state, and finally left a sentence: "Conquering the country and governing the country require two different national policies. I have already made up my mind. Uncle Zhongfu does not need to worry."
As ruler and subject, he had resolved Lü Buwei's inner conflict, but also told him not to wait for him anymore. His past mistakes were unforgivable, and he would not give Lü Buwei a chance to return to the Qin court.
As Qin Ju spoke, his voice was filled with undisguised grief and indignation. "Madam Gu said that he was forced to his death by envoys from various countries. Those people surrounded the mansion for a long time and refused to leave, which also delayed their normal business. In addition, rumors were flying around, and he was repeatedly slandered for inviting envoys from various countries to come in for a chat. He did not want to put the king in a difficult position, so he committed suicide."
Banban came out wearing her clothes, only to see Ying Zheng standing by the door with his back to her. He didn't speak, and she couldn't see his expression.
Qin Ju knelt on the ground, unable to hold back his tears. His trembling anger almost overwhelmed him, making it impossible for him to follow reason and remain impartial.
Strangely, the two of them had clearly been wary of each other over power, plotted against each other, and parted ways on several occasions due to differing political views.
Ying Zheng disliked Lü Buwei's attitude of acting like an uncle, and wanted to pressure him to show his submission to the young King of Qin. He also looked down on the eclectic scholarship that Lü Buwei advocated.
As for Lü Buwei, he may well have hated the young King of Qin for his unyielding stubbornness, his intense suspicion, and his ruthless cunning in watching him set traps.
In the end, it all vanished like smoke.
Under intense pressure and suspicion, Ying Zheng never readily ordered his execution; Lü Buwei, unwilling to let Ying Zheng bear the stigma of being cold-blooded and ruthless, silently committed suicide.
After standing by the door for a long time, Ying Zheng waved his hand slightly and said, "Issue my order to give him a proper burial, according to the standards for a prime minister."
That night, Banban took out her treasured wine and poured him a cup, saying, "Drink some to help you sleep."
Ying Zheng cast a surprised glance at him. “No need to worry, I’m not sad,” he paused, then added, “I’m just a little melancholy.”
In the letter, he criticized Lü Buwei's political views, but then praised them at the end, which shows traces of his personal instruction to Ying Zheng.
Lü Buwei himself spoke in this way, never saying anything definitive, always leaving room for maneuver.
Ying Zheng himself was unaware of it, but Lü Buwei must have noticed it when he read the letter.
Seeing that her cousin's expression didn't seem fake, Banban quietly breathed a sigh of relief. The two talked for a while and then went to sleep together.
A few days later, the summoned alchemists submitted their lists. Banban didn't bother with filtering, good or bad; she wanted everyone, to personally select the most! Unreliable!
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Author's Note: Here it is! This chapter is a bonus chapter for 11,000 nutrient solutions!
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