Chapter 805: Horsepower

The birth of the inline three-cylinder spiritual energy engine deserved the luck it brought. Little Wei Yuan thought of over a hundred uses in almost an instant, and Yu Zhizhuo had already completed a preparation document, listing dozens of industries that could be applied immediately.

The spiritual energy engine had great power. According to the new standard established by Azure Void, the maximum power of this prototype engine could reach fifty horsepower.

In Azure Void, horsepower did not refer to the power of an ordinary horse, but the maximum power that an average ordinary human-rank early-stage Dao Foundation cultivator could output.

Yu Zhizhuo organized hundreds of natural cultivators and five thousand template cultivators to conduct multiple tests, then filtered and optimized the data, and finally obtained the basic power unit: horsepower.

An ordinary early-stage Dharma Form cultivator typically exerts a force between forty and fifty horsepower. Three mid-stage Heaven Foundation and Dao Foundation disciples, according to the merit standards of the Azure Heaven Palace, should normally be at twenty-four horsepower.

But sitting in this engine, they could output fifty horsepower and could output it continuously for one hour. If it were the economic power of twenty horsepower, they could output it for a whole day.

From this engine, Little Wei Yuan immediately saw the future development direction: the improvement of unit spiritual energy utilization efficiency.

Most cultivators' concepts of spiritual energy quantity were vague and inconsistent. Dao Foundation ancestors everywhere often called it one mouthful of spiritual energy, two mouthfuls of spiritual energy.

The Grand Tai Tai Chu Gong's application of spiritual energy was naturally much more brilliant. Not to mention that the array design was the first in the immortal cultivation world, it was also firmly in the top three, and no one dared to say it was significantly stronger than the Grand Tai Tai Chu Gong.

Even so, compared to the spiritual energy engine, the wind-driving array that had been passed down for many years was a complete defeat in terms of efficiency. The combination of array and mechanical structure was unexpectedly efficient.

Yu Zhizhuo stopped the engine and let Little Wei Yuan look at it carefully inside and out. Subsequently, the two walked into the workshop, and Yu Zhizhuo showed Little Wei Yuan the design drawings and explained the core design philosophy. This explanation took half a day.

The core mechanism of the engine was extremely complex, far beyond Little Wei Yuan's expectations. To stably convert spiritual energy into mechanical energy, the array nesting used was as many as dozens of layers, and there were nearly a thousand mechanical parts.

Individual components were extremely fine and complex. In a palm-sized control machine box that was assembled, there were unexpectedly four layers of three-dimensional arrays and over a hundred parts. If it weren't for Yu Zhizhuo's explanation, even if Little Wei Yuan took it apart with his own hands, he was afraid he wouldn't be able to put it back together.

Next, where to use the spiritual energy engine was the core.

Little Wei Yuan weighed the needs of various fields. The most urgent task at the moment was the textile factory.

The so-called clothing, food, housing, and transportation; the food problem had been basically solved by Little Wei Yuan, and he had already begun to move toward eating well. Housing could be considered to have solved more than half of the most basic needs; several million people had already moved into buildings, although most lived in Yuan's Buildings that leaked wind on all four sides.

But clothing was far from being solved. Now Azure Void's machine brocade was popular in Jin and Zhao, and the brocade industry in the eight commanderies of Ningxi had been beaten to pieces, with only some old craftsmen lingering on. Zhao brocade was not large in scale to begin with, and it was uprooted by Little Wei Yuan.

The two countries combined had over a dozen commanderies that were successively changing rice to mulberry, and there were already over a million *mu* of mulberry fields. Among them, ice mulberry accounted for nearly a million *mu*.

These raw materials were almost all taken away by Azure Void, then turned into machine brocade, and continuously transported back.

Brocade was the exclusive property of wealthy families. What Little Wei Yuan prepared for large-scale mass production this time was cotton cloth. Azure Void had been developing cotton weaving for several years, but it had never grown large, only solving the cloth demand within the realm.

The textile factory was also within Yu Zhizhuo's plan and had been studied. Using the spiritual energy engine as power, one engine could drive two hundred looms, and the processing cost of cotton cloth would be unimaginably low. With the increase in production, the cost of factory looms would be amortized, and could almost be ignored.

Yu Zhizhuo estimated that in the initial stage, the cost of one bolt of cotton cloth would be half of the market price, and when the scale expanded to over a thousand looms, the cost would be one-tenth of the current market price, and the texture would far exceed that of earth cloth, the wear resistance would be twice as high, and the smoothness and luster would not be on the same level either.

Although Azure Void's machine-woven cloth had good quality, the problem was that outside of Azure Void, the cotton cloth market did not exist. Cotton cloth was cheap, and almost every household of farmers everywhere could weave earth cloth, and the people in the surrounding countries were all too poor, so poor that they couldn't even afford cotton cloth that cost a few taels of ordinary silver per bolt, and it was not uncommon for a quilt or a pair of cotton pants to be passed down for generations.

The people of various countries didn't care about the quality of cotton cloth; earth cloth could be used just the same, and what they wove themselves didn't cost money.

Fortunately, in the past two years, Little Wei Yuan had borrowed the name of the Southern Military Minister to loot the five commanderies of the Southwest, almost scraping the ground, alive and taking away seventeen million people, and three or four out of ten people in each commandery were taken away by Little Wei Yuan. Once these people arrived in Azure Void, they would have money sooner or later, and they would also need clothes.

To tell the truth, Yu Zhizhuo didn't oppose Little Wei Yuan's decision, but he was somewhat puzzled. He didn't quite understand why Little Wei Yuan focused all his attention on how to improve the quality of life of mortals in Azure Void. In his view, the people in Azure Void now lived well enough; looking at the world, where else was there a place like Azure Void?

There were many places that needed the spiritual energy engine, and the engine's production was quite limited. Using it in the textile factory meant that other industries had to be put on the back burner.

Little Wei Yuan couldn't explain that this move was actually also for human luck. Only with human luck could one have room to struggle and resist when facing an immortal.

In addition to internal demand, Little Wei Yuan was also preparing to open up a large market: military uniforms.

Azure Void's army scale was becoming larger and larger, and just military uniforms and clothing were a huge demand for high-quality cloth. In addition, Little Wei Yuan also set his sights on King Ying's Northern Army, which was 1.5 million people, and the families of nine million military colonists.

The Zhao army also needed military uniforms, but how much could be sold depended on Li Chengfeng.

There was also an almost infinite market: the Shaman tribe.

Once the textile factory was built, Little Wei Yuan prepared to submit a memorial to the King of Jin, changing a portion of military pay to be issued in military cotton cloth produced by Azure Void, and sending it directly to King Ying's Northern Army. In this way, the Minister of War would surely be so angry that he would curse, but Little Wei Yuan wasn't afraid of him; if they couldn't argue in the palace, they could just fight.

Little Wei Yuan was no longer the young boy who had just entered the court; now, even if the ministers of the six ministries were tied together, they wouldn't be enough for Little Wei Yuan to fight.

It was just that fighting in the palace was really a bit ugly, and it was inevitable that he would be left with the reputation of a barbarian and a reckless man in the history books. It would be best if he could subdue the enemy without fighting.

Thus, a phrase couldn't help but pop up in Little Wei Yuan's mind: "Sword and boots to court"?

In addition to the cotton textile industry, another key application area Little Wei Yuan determined was cargo flying boats and large heavy-duty trucks. This was mainly considering military needs.

Azure Void's current warfare required astronomical logistics supplies. The transport volume required for various types of ammunition and artillery had far exceeded traditional food and grass. Basically, for every soldier going on an expedition, the monthly consumption of various materials could be as high as several hundred *jin*. Only with sufficient material supply could there be combat effectiveness.

The spiritual energy engine also had massive demand in metallurgy and mines. Little Wei Yuan and Yu Zhizhuo discussed in detail, and after a few days, they finally had a rough plan.

Among them, the top priority was still large cargo flying boats. As long as the problem of long-distance transport of materials could be solved, Little Wei Yuan could use troops externally.

Subsequently, Little Wei Yuan wrote another letter to Li Chengfeng.

After receiving the letter, the next day when Li Chengfeng went to court, he bit the bullet and stepped out, playing: "Currently, the Bishui realm has a population of 500,000 and is far from the Zhao homeland, making travel quite inconvenient. Your son requests to build a highway between Bishui and the Zhao border to facilitate the use of troops!"

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 806 =====