Kays Translations

Just another Isekai Lover~

Chapter 291: Ten-Thousand-Ton Class Ship

It wasn’t until 8 p.m. that Dong Guanwu submitted the ten items he had compiled. However, he was not the only top-tier journalist—there were others as well. The top ten news stories still needed further selection and would ultimately be reviewed personally by Lord Song Xing.

Time was tight. The newspaper office worked through the night typesetting, printed in the early morning, and even tripled the usual number of copies. By the time the eastern sky turned pale, more than 150,000 newspapers had finally been printed.

Only then did Dong Guanwu have a chance to pick up a copy and read it to see the final version of the published news.

He read through the stories one by one.

Article One: The sale of Spiritual Spring Water.

Reason for listing: The sale of the spiritual spring represents the discovery of a new resource, bringing new hope to the resource-scarce Immortal Realm. Many people are already preparing to “mine” in deep mountains and marshes. It’s said that recently in Anyang, earth-element talismans and magical tools have been selling like hotcakes.

Article Two: Public sale of Foundation Establishment Liquid and related elixirs.

Reason for listing: Foundation Establishment Pills are crucial basic pills in the cultivation process, essential for late-stage Qi Refining cultivators preparing to break through to the Foundation Establishment stage. In the past, due to a lack of spiritual herbs, the number of Foundation Establishment cultivators was severely limited, weakening the human race. The emergence of Foundation Establishment Liquid may help bridge this gap.

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Article Three: Supersonic aircraft and future visions—There is real hope of flying to the Immortal Realm in a flying machine.

Reason for listing: This is a brand-new path of development; as the saying goes, all paths lead to the same goal. Perhaps industry can also create miracles.

Article Four: Jin Kingdom’s defeat and treaty signing, with all negotiations held at the “Purple Bamboo Conference Building.”

Reason for listing: Represents the rise of Anyang and the “correctness” of industry and commerce.

Article Five: Anyang’s expansion and strengthening.

Reason for listing: The power of merchants can no longer be ignored.

Article Six: Alliance with the Dragon Palace, and Li Xian retaining the title of “Virtuous King” within the Dragon Palace.

Reason for listing: A new development model, an open mindset—cooperation is the way forward. (Commented personally by the Virtuous King.)

Article Seven: Cooperation among nations, establishment of embassies, mutual trade, and industrial exchange.

Reason for listing: The operational models and political structures of various countries are beginning to change.

Article Eight: Dongyuan County and Nanyang County imitate Jin Kingdom in yielding.

Reason 1: Industry and commerce have demonstrated powerful potential.
Reason 2: The pattern of feudal conflict within Great Xia is shifting.

Article Nine: Remarkable results of Anyang’s legal system.

Reason for listing: Rule of law governs the nation—cutting-edge thinking in national governance.

Article Ten: Banks.

Reason for listing: A new platform for wealth, quickly emulated by other nations.

These top ten news items were all within expectations; however, after the top ten, there were several other important pieces of news:

First, in three days, a 10,000-ton ironclad warship will undergo a water test, and public viewing will be allowed. According to official sources, this ironclad warship belongs to the second-tier “Yellow Level” technology—based on the rainbow-tier system originally set by Xia Qingqing.

Second, Also in three days, ten civilian iron-hull ships (not ironclads), each 80 meters long, will go on sale. Starting price: 200,000 taels of gold—only one-thirtieth the price of military ironclads with similar displacement, classified as civilian vessels.

Third, Civil war within Great Xia. Guangling County and Songzhou County jointly invaded the weakened Nanyang County, which was retreating steadily. As a last resort, Nanyang ceded 100 li (approx. 50 km) of land to Anyang in exchange for:

100 twin-engine aircraft
40 four-engine aircraft
400 cannons
500 locomotives
100 machine guns
Plus a variety of artillery shells, bombs, bullets, and fuel

Fourth, (Li Yulong) Tang Kingdom sends troops to occupy 200 li of land northeast of Wuyang County, nearly one-fifth of its territory, and is now competing with the First Prince for control of Xin’an County. Both sides have already deployed troops at the border. The war is fierce: Tang Kingdom, supported by Anyang, has powerful firepower; however, the First Prince’s forces were also well prepared—retaliating with gunpowder and low-grade artillery.

Moreover, thanks to Li Xian’s public release of basic industrial knowledge, the First Prince’s faction has independently developed firearms. Although still primitive and using black powder, they are already quite powerful.

Fifth, Xu Ren, Li Yuanming, and Yan Ze’an predict that a full-scale civil war in Great Xia will break out within three months at the latest. A storm is brewing!

In the City Lord’s Mansion of Anyang, three “guns” lay before Li Xian—if they could indeed be called guns.

These three guns were captured from the First Prince’s side. Li Xian looked at them and sighed once again, “We really must not underestimate others’ intelligence!”

He had sighed similarly before—this Immortal Realm had already accumulated enough; it simply lacked some guidance. The technologies Li Xian gradually made public served as that guidance. At last year’s industrial expo, some firms had already displayed primitive machine tools.

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Now, after a year of accumulation and recent technological diffusion, the First Prince’s faction appeared to have finally opened the door to industry. These guns were evidence.

These three guns clearly bore industrial marks—with standardized components and rifling. However, the muzzle was wide enough to fit a fist—a caliber of two inches, approximately 6.7 cm—essentially miniature cannons.

The shell casing used is—paper. There was no flash or explosion; instead, paper cartridges were used, and then a small fire-type spell was cast to ignite the gunpowder. This gun was still rather primitive. But the bullet (iron ball) was already powerful enough to injure a Foundation Establishment stage expert within 100 meters.

“It’s probably due to insufficient industrial precision; producing shell casings is difficult. But such firearms already show potential for warfare!” Li Xian gave this evaluation as he looked at the “gun” before him.

When it came to industrial matters, Xu Ren became a bit anxious. “Young master, should we take countermeasures?”

Li Xian smiled confidently. “No need. After our aviation department successfully developed jet engines, they already began researching rocket technology. In the future, we’ll be using missiles, not guns.

We must set our sights on the future, not remain in the past. When a product’s design is finalized, it’s already on the path to obsolescence.”

Xu Ren nodded and said no more.

Beside them, Tang Rong proudly handed Li Xian a document. “Young master, as expected, we have completed the periodic table of elements. To achieve this, we mobilized almost all resources in the Qingyun Valley—from chemistry to physics, from the aviation department to the locomotive division, even the smelting department, petroleum division, and electric power and energy department.

But this chart also lays the foundation for our future technological development.”

Li Xian was overjoyed. He snatched the chart eagerly and burst out laughing as he looked at the familiar yet slightly different table. The reason it differed from his memory was due to the slight variations in this world and some differences in research approaches. But at its core, it remained the same.

Tang Rong continued by his side: “Young master, based on this periodic table, we have already identified 36 common elements. According to our analysis, the pure metals copper, iron, gold, and silver can be refined into red copper, black iron, mithril, and refined gold. So we hypothesize that other elements, under stringent conditions, can also be refined into unique materials.

Perhaps we may even be able to restore many rare and wondrous materials from ancient times—or go even further.”

Li Xian laughed heartily. “Excellent. Keep up the good work.”

Later, Li Xian and his team focused on discussing the future dynamics of wars between political regimes. As for domestic conflicts within the Great Xia Kingdom, Li Xian had only one strategy—the glorious isolation principle: he would only sell arms and let the others fight as they wished. Meanwhile, Anyang could indirectly control the wars through arms sales.

In secret, Li Xian naturally supported Li Yulong; but he had his own principles and reasoning—support was one thing, but the commercial development of Anyang could not be halted. Moreover, only by experiencing the trials of war could Li Yulong establish a truly powerful dynasty. Li Yulong also agreed with this perspective.

Time flew by, and three days passed. During those three days, Anyang became even livelier—Anyang was about to sell ironclad ships! Though they were only iron-hulled ships, the concept of “ocean transport” had unknowingly taken root in people’s minds.

Relying on the sea, Anyang had its five ironclad warships bombard the eastern coast of the Jin Kingdom, an event already immortalized in countless retellings. Over the past month, countless people had traveled to the Jin Kingdom to witness the remnants of the bombardment for themselves.

Now, Anyang had opened maritime routes: “Anyang–Jin Kingdom” and “Anyang–Liu Kingdom.” Two ports in the Jin Kingdom were even leased territories under Anyang’s control, while the Liu Kingdom’s port was independently developed.

Not to mention, today marked the maiden trial voyage of a 10,000-ton class ironclad warship—just imagining it was thrilling. Previously, Anyang’s largest ironclad was only 3,500 tons. And now people could even catch a glimpse of Anyang’s long-mysterious seaport, prompting cheers from countless attentive onlookers.