serious man in the red chamber

Chapter 487 Imperial Royal Academy
  Three years ago, Jia Hu drew a circle outside Beijing, and a mythical academy, the Imperial Academy, emerged.

The Imperial Academy is located in the west of Beijing, covering an area of ​​about one thousand acres, which is about the same size as the Forbidden City. The construction area is less than two hundred acres, and the rest is a testing ground.

A row of simple wing rooms is located on the central axis of the Imperial Academy. At the front door hangs a wooden board with the three characters "Vice President" written on it.

In the room, there is a row of earthen beds next to the wall, a table at the east end, and a row of wooden chairs next to the window.

Xu Deming, vice president of the Imperial Academy, sat in front of the desk and remained silent.

Several college officials sat on chairs near the window with solemn faces.

They were obviously all waiting for something.

Finally, an official rushed in excitedly, said hello to Xu Deming, and then handed a letter to Xu Deming with both hands: "Urgent letter from Tongzhou!"

Xu Deming took the letter and read it, his eyes flashed, and then he said loudly: "The steamship driven by Wang Hongcheng and the others arrived at Tongzhou Pier safely and successfully! We succeeded!"

Before he could finish a word, another official rushed in, panting: "It's done, it's done."

Xu Deming stood up suddenly.

The officials also stood up.

The official breathed a sigh of relief and said excitedly: "The test of the new locomotive was successful."

"Oh?"

Xu Deming cheered up and said, "Let's go and have a look!" He said and walked out quickly.

All the officials swarmed out
  The square outside the Imperial Academy is four acres square. In the middle of the square stands a three-foot-long flagpole with a bucket, facing the two huge stone lions on both sides of the gate and stone steps.

On both sides of the stone lion at the gate stood a row of imperial soldiers carrying swords.

The officer on duty stood quietly in front of the gate. Only the southeast wind blew the yellow dragon flag on the pole.

There was a sound of horse hoofbeats, and a group of more than [-] horses galloped towards the gate.

The officer on duty quickly cast his gaze away.

The cavalry team galloped to the Yellow Dragon Flag and reined in their horses, then rolled their saddles and dismounted.

The leader was none other than Jia Lian. His eyes first set his sights on the gate of the Imperial Royal Academy. A plaque with several vigorous and round regular script characters "Imperial Royal Academy" hung high on the lintel in the middle.

The officer naturally knew Jia Lian, so he hurriedly stepped forward to greet him and raised his hand towards Jia Lian: "Old Xiaoge."

Jia Lian raised his hand: "Get ready, the Holy Driver will be here soon."

After hearing this, the officer did not dare to delay and quickly directed the imperial troops to open the middle door.

Soon, the sound of horse hooves and rustling footsteps came along with the vibration of the ground.

The mighty yellow umbrella canopy, flags, spears and honor guard gradually approached.

The officer led the imperial troops to kneel down to greet him.

There were no stone steps at the gate, and the chariot drove directly into the Imperial Academy.

In the carriage, Jia Hu sat cross-legged on the tiger skin mattress in front of the desk. After reading William's letter, a sneer appeared at the corner of his mouth, and he threw the letter on the desk with a "hum".

Tanchun and Xichun, who were playing black and white, were slightly startled, and both looked at Lin Daiyu.

Jia Song, Jia Jinxuan, and Rong Shou also looked at Lin Daiyu.

Lin Daiyu put down the book in her hand, stood up and poured a bowl of tea for Jia Hu: "Drink the hot tea."

Jia Hu picked up the tea bowl. The more he thought about it, the angrier he became. He put the tea bowl on the low table and said, "How dare a bunch of bastards threaten me!"

Lin Daiyu sat down next to him, picked up the letter and read it. Her expression changed drastically as she looked at it, and asked after a while: "Is this true?"

Jia Hu: "It should be true."

Lin Daiyu read the letter carefully again: "So, the Xiyi people are determined to go against us."

A glimmer of cold light quickly flashed in Jia Hu's eyes. Ever since the Southern Xinjiang Legion destroyed Annan, the empire had signed trade treaties with the Western countries, and the two sides had entered a honeymoon period.

In the twelfth month of last year, at the invitation of Rakshasa Queen Yeka and the newly crowned King George of Great Britain, Western countries held a closed-door meeting in France to condemn the empire.

Under Yeka's instigation, the Western countries jointly signed a letter of credence, requiring the empire to withdraw its troops from Central Asia, release the imprisoned Central Asian royal families, and compensate the Central Asian countries for their losses. At the end of the agreement, Jia Hu was also required to Promise not to invade Central Asia again.

At the meeting, the Yeka girls also threatened that if the empire did not withdraw its troops from Central Asia, they would cut off trade with the empire, impose economic sanctions on the empire, and even directly send troops to help the Central Asian countries recover.

Lin Daiyu thought for a while: "The Xiyi delegation should enter Beijing at the end of the month."

Jia Hu nodded with a smile.

Suddenly, there was an earth-shattering sound of cannons, nine shots in a row, which made the chariot shake slightly.

Tan Chun, Xichun, Jia Song, Jia Jinxuan, and Rong Shou were so frightened that their faces turned pale.

Jia Hu looked at Lin Daiyu. Lin Daiyu turned around and took out a piece of paper from the case file, looked at it, and said with a smile: "Today we will test-fire the new artillery." She handed the piece of paper to Jia Hu.

Jia Hu took it and saw that this was the schedule of the Imperial Academy. Important experiments had to be reported to Jia Hu, who was the dean. However, Jia Hu didn't take care of much, and almost all of them were approved by Lin Daiyu.

Jia Hu is not only the dean of the Imperial Royal Academy, but also the dean of the Imperial Royal Army Academy and the Imperial Royal Naval Academy.

When the school was founded, Jia Hu said that the deans of these three colleges could only be the emperor of the empire, and it was written into the law.

After watching the steamship trial, Jia Hu took everyone to the Army Academy and Naval Academy to let Jia Song get to know the future generals.

Suddenly everyone heard a passionate whistle, and then the chariot stopped.

Xichun opened the car curtains, and in the distance, a locomotive was spewing smoke on the rails.

Jia Hu's eyes lit up and he smiled at Lin Daiyu and said, "Let's go and have a look."

"elder brother!"

Xichun looked at Jia Hu expectantly.

Jia Hu ignored her, opened the door and walked out, and shouts of "Long live" immediately came from outside the carriage.

"Humph", Xichun looked at Lin Daiyu: "Sister-in-law~"

Lin Daiyu thought for a while and said to Tanchun and Xichun: "Put on your curtain hat."

"I know my sister-in-law is the best!"

With that said, Xichun opened the cabinet behind the chariot and took out three curtain hats.

Vice president Xu Deming reported to Jia Hu about the new locomotive: "The horizontal boiler is eight feet long and equipped with two cylinders, which provides powerful power to the locomotive. After demonstration, the locomotive's power wheels were also changed from two pairs to Five pairs, more stable, safe and reliable.”

Looking at the locomotive speeding on the railway track, Jia Hu smiled with satisfaction and nodded.

At first, Jia Hu just drew a simple sketch from memory, and a year later he built the first locomotive.

The first locomotive had only one cylinder, a large fuselage, and little power. It relied on gears to rotate. It made a deafening sound when it drove. It swung and swayed. It was difficult to operate the power wheel and change speed. It often derailed.

Half a year later, a second locomotive was built. Xu Deming and others summarized the lessons of their failure. They first improved the boiler for steam production, changed the vertical boiler to a horizontal boiler, and adopted a horizontal multi-smoke tube boiler with a large heat transfer area. It produces steam quickly and can provide greater power.

In order to prevent the locomotive from derailing, rims were added to the sides of the wheels. Finally, a huge flywheel was installed on the front of the locomotive. This flywheel could use inertia to help the locomotive move. Unfortunately, it failed in the end. The vibration was too great, and it even overturned the locomotive.

For more than a year, Xu Deming and others continued to improve the locomotive and finally designed this qualified locomotive.

Jia Hu asked Jia Lian and Liu Kun beside him: "How is it?"

Liu Kun did not answer, but made a gesture of humility to Jia Lian.

Jia Lian, however, was not humble. He looked at the locomotive coming with its puffs of mist and praised loudly: "Good! This thing eats coal and water, unlike horses and mules that need to rest. It can greatly facilitate the transportation of goods and shorten long distances." Time for transportation, especially of Siberian coal and ore.”

Jia Hu looked at Liu Kun again.

Liu Kun smiled and said: "I remembered the 'railway network' that Your Majesty mentioned. If it really covers the whole country, the empire can quickly gather troops anywhere, especially heavy artillery. In addition, soldiers no longer have to travel long distances to reach the battlefield. You can go into battle immediately!"

At this point, Liu Kun's eyes obviously saw something from the direction of the chariot, so he stopped talking and lowered his head.

Jia Lian and Xu Deming also saw it and lowered their heads.

The three of them shouted almost at the same time, "Empress!"

Lin Daiyu came over wearing a curtain hat.

Jia Hu looked back and saw Tanchun, Xichun, Jia Song, Jia Jinxuan, and Rong Shou standing in front of the chariot, looking at the speeding locomotive.

Lin Daiyu nodded with a smile and said to Jia Hu: "The sound was too deafening. I didn't let the prince come over."

Jia Hu nodded.

The locomotive was approaching, and the earth was shaking slightly.

Jia Hu protected Lin Daiyu behind him, and Lin San took a step forward to block Jia Hu.

The locomotive came to a slow stop. A college official led two students down and knelt down to Jia Hu and Lin Daiyu: "See you, the emperor, see the queen!"

Jia Hu raised his hand: "Everyone, get up." Then he said to Xu Deming: "Draw up a list and I will reward you heavily."

Xu Deming said excitedly: "Yes."

Jia Hu said to Lin Daiyu again: "When the railway tracks are laid in Suzhou, I will take you home to have a look."

Lin Daiyu said "hmm".

Jia Hu looked at the locomotive again, and then said to Xu Deming: "Hook up the carriage, let's get on it and give it a try."

Xu Deming hesitated for a moment, then asked the craftsman to hook the carriage onto the locomotive.
  With a passionate whistle, the train slowly left the platform.
  (End of this chapter)