Chapter 71 The Little Princess's Super Waterwheel
Let the water flow up the mountain on its own?
The thought swirled in Mu Yu's little head, like a glass marble rolling around in her purse.
She found Grandpa Su's idea quite interesting.
She'd seen water flow downhill, but she'd never seen water climb a hillside on its own.
Back at the county office, Mu Yu was still pondering the matter.
She sat on the doorstep, her chubby little legs swinging back and forth, holding the lark that Su Wan'er had given her in her arms, occasionally winding it up to listen to it sing.
Yan Ziche passed by her with a book in his hand. Seeing her serious expression, he couldn't help but smile.
"What important national affairs are you thinking about, young princess?"
Mu Yu looked up and asked earnestly, "Brother Ziche, how can we get Shui Shui to climb the mountain by herself?"
Yan Ziche was stunned for a moment, then burst out laughing.
"Water flows downhill, that's the law of nature; it can't climb mountains on its own."
“But,” Mu Yu tilted her head, “Grandpa Su’s Tian Tian lives up high and has no water to drink. She’s so pitiful.”
She saw those fields, in the vision of her astral eye, were a scorched yellow, with wisps of black smoke rising from them—a sign that the crops were about to wither and die.
Yan Ziche's smile faded.
He knew this was a big problem; after the disaster in Jiayu County, every inch of arable land was incredibly precious.
“We can build a reservoir at the foot of the mountain and then carry the water up bucket by bucket by manpower,” he explained. “But that would be time-consuming and labor-intensive, and it would be a drop in the ocean for hundreds or thousands of acres of land.”
Mu Yu wrinkled her little nose.
"Wouldn't that exhaust people?"
She remembered the disaster victims she had seen at the dock; they were all covered in dust and looked weak.
"No, no." She shook her little head like a rattle.
She suddenly remembered something she had seen on the canal.
It happened when we were passing through a big town. There was a huge, constantly turning wooden wheel by the river, as if it was pounding rice.
“I’ve seen a huge wheel!” she gestured. “It was such a huge wheel that when it turned, things were lifted high into the air!”
Yan Ziche's eyes flickered.
"Is the princess referring to a water mill?"
"Yes, yes, yes!" Mu Yu nodded vigorously, although she didn't know what it was called. "It moves when the water is rinsed!"
A brilliant idea flashed in her little mind, and she connected the two things together.
She recalled that when she was a child in the koi pond, the Turtle Prime Minister had made a small bamboo toy to feed her the spiritual fruit that grew on the vines on the shore.
“We could also make a big wheel and let the water spin around it.”
She stood up and drew a circle on the ground with her foot.
"There are so many little spoons hanging on the wheel." She drew many crooked little circles around the edge of the circle.
"As soon as the wheel turns, the little spoon scoops a spoonful of water from the river."
"Turn it to the highest point, tilt the spoon, and the water will pour out!"
Pointing to the top, she said excitedly, "Let's build another slide and let the water flow down to the fields on the mountain!"
She spoke and gestured, her logic was incoherent, but the core meaning was crystal clear.
Yan Ziche, standing to the side, was completely stunned.
The book in his hand fell to the ground with a "thud".
Watermill...bamboo tube...tipping bucket...aqueduct...
These scattered concepts were combined by Mu Yu into a complete and efficient water diversion and irrigation system using the most childlike language!
Dragon-bone waterwheel! Waterwheel!
These things are occasionally recorded in ancient books, but their complex structures have long been lost. Unexpectedly, a little princess "invented" them in a "playful" way!
"Genius! Absolutely a genius!"
Yan Ziche blushed with excitement and grabbed Mu Yu's hand.
"Princess! Say it again! How did that little spoon get crooked? How long is the slide?"
He picked up the book from the ground, turned to a blank page, and began to record and draw with the charcoal pencil he carried with him.
Chu Chongjin and Mu Fang were also drawn over by the commotion.
After hearing Yan Ziche's excited explanation, the two men, who were used to seeing big scenes, looked at Mu Yu with very strange eyes.
What exactly is going on in that little head of his?
Xiao Beichen happened to be returning from his patrol when he saw the things on the blueprints and waved his hand dismissively.
"What's so difficult about that! It's just a big toy, right? Leave it to me!"
General Xiao, who was extremely efficient, immediately pulled Yan Ziche along and selected more than a dozen of the best carpenters from the Xuanjia Army, heading straight to the river outside the city.
Objective: To build the first "super waterwheel" in the Great Chu!
Their first challenge came from an old carpenter named Lu.
Old Lu was the most skilled craftsman in Jiayu County, and Xiao Beichen invited him to be his technical advisor.
He looked at Yan Ziche's exquisite drawing, then glanced at Mu Yu beside him, who was looking on expectantly, his white beard sticking up high.
"This is just something little kids play house with!"
"I've been a carpenter for fifty years, and I've never heard of wheels being able to send water into the sky!"
He tossed the blueprints aside, his face full of disbelief.
"This is utter nonsense! What a waste of wood!"
The other young carpenters looked at each other, wondering what was going on.
Will this thing really work?
Xiao Beichen's face darkened, and he was about to lash out.
Yan Ziche stopped him, picked up the blueprints, and said politely to Master Lu, "Sir, this matter concerns thousands of acres of fertile land and the livelihoods of tens of thousands of people. Please give it a try."
"Test? How do we test it? How do we fix the bearing? How do we connect the cylinder? What if the water flow impact is too great and the structure falls apart?" Old Lu threw out a series of questions, each one a technical challenge.
Yan Ziche was speechless for a moment when asked the question.
Theory is just theory; putting it into practice is fraught with difficulties.
Seeing that the atmosphere was about to freeze again, Mu Yu walked over with her short legs.
She looked up at the old man Lu, who was blowing his beard and glaring at her.
She saw in him a grayish-white, foul and hard light, an aura of "stubbornness".
But deep within this grayish-white light, there is a bright, silvery-white light that represents "craftsmanship".
This shows that the person is not a bad person at heart, but is too attached to their own experience.
Mu Yu thought for a moment, then took out a shiny candy from her small purse.
It's a spleen-strengthening candy made by Xie Zhiwei using herbs; it's yellow and looks like a small sun.
She handed the candy to Old Lu and said in a childish voice, "Grandpa, don't be angry."
"Here, have this. It'll make you less stubborn."
She used a little trick that she had just mastered and was becoming more proficient at.
Fortune Allocation - First Stage - Bestowing Blessings!
A barely perceptible wisp of golden good fortune, carried by the candy, quietly seeped into Old Man Lu's body.
Old Lu originally intended to open the candy, but looking into the little girl's clear, bright eyes, he inexplicably took it, unwrapped it, and put it in his mouth.
A sweet taste with a faint medicinal aroma melts in your mouth.
Old Lu's stubborn and agitated heart inexplicably calmed down.
When he looked at the blueprint again, his mind suddenly went blank, and several solutions to the technical problems came to mind.
"Huh?" He was stunned.
"This bearing... could be constructed using mortise and tenon joints, with an embedded iron core, and then soaked in tung oil..."
"This tube body... can be made of bamboo strips as the frame, covered with oilcloth to reduce weight..."
He muttered to himself, picked up the blueprints, and went off to study them on his own.
Xiao Beichen and Yan Ziche were both dumbfounded.
Is... such a single candy really that powerful?
With Old Man Lu's technical expertise, the construction of the waterwheel progressed rapidly.
Three days later, a huge waterwheel, three zhang tall and made of dozens of bamboo tubes, stood proudly on the side of a tributary of Mirror Lake.
Amidst everyone's anticipation, Xiao Beichen gave the order, and the soldiers opened the diversion port.
The rushing river water crashed against the blades of the waterwheel.
"Creak...creak..."
The huge waterwheel began to turn slowly, then faster and faster.
One by one, the bamboo tubes were filled with river water after being submerged in the water, and then slowly carried into the air as the waterwheel turned.
When the bamboo tube is rotated to its highest point, the opening of the tube will naturally tilt.
"Splash—"
A stream of clear water descended from the sky and landed precisely in the aqueduct that had already been built!
Then came the second, the third...
The clear river water converges into a stream, meandering up the long bamboo aqueduct and flowing towards the parched fields on the distant hillside!
It was a success!
The farmers who had cultivated this land for generations were moved to tears as they watched the spring "fall from the sky." They knelt down and kowtowed repeatedly in the direction of Mu Yu.
"The little water god has appeared!"
"It was the little water god who saved our land!"
Old Lu stood outside the crowd, looking at the "miracle" he had created with his own hands, his old eyes filled with shock and excitement.
He walked up to Mu Yu and bowed deeply.
"Your Highness...it was my ignorance that I failed to recognize your greatness!"
In Mu Yu's sea of consciousness, the golden pond of blessings stirred up towering waves.
The golden power of faith, born from the gratitude of tens of thousands of farmers, surged into the pond like the Yangtze River.
The water level in the pond rose rapidly at a visible speed, even overflowing the edge and turning the entire sea of consciousness into a brilliant gold.
Mu Yu felt warm all over and yawned comfortably.
A familiar drowsiness washed over me.
She softly fell into Mu Fang's arms, and before closing her eyes, she made a request.
"Daddy...I...I want to eat...strawberry-flavored...fish scale jelly..."
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