Chapter 530: Once Explained, It Ceases to Be Divine

"This is bad — the Governor of Jiaodong Commandery comes with ill intent!"

Heifu had barely spoken when Lu Sheng, ever on high alert, felt a jolt of alarm and glanced at Han Zhong beside him.

Lu Sheng and Han Zhong were both fangshi. The origins of fangshi can be traced back to the shamans and invocators of high antiquity, but their thought largely derived from Zou Yan of the Yin-Yang School a century ago. The famous fangshi — Song Wuji, Zheng Boqiao, Chong Shang, Xianmen Gao, and others — were precisely the disciples Zou Yan took when he lectured at Jieshi Palace!

Yet because they emphasized different aspects of Zou Yan's doctrines, they split into two major schools. The Overseas Immortal-Seeking school believed in the theory of the "Greater Nine Continents," holding that beyond the Nine Continents lay three great immortal isles, upon which grew spirit herbs and divine medicines, awaiting men to explore them.

The other school, however, adhered to "Yin-Yang and the Five Phases," believing that metal, wood, water, fire, and earth were the fundamental forms composing all things, the five phases generating and overcoming one another. Thus in theory, even stone could be refined into gold, and cinnabar along with various rare medicinal ingredients could be refined into an elixir of immortality…

Having apparently absorbed the lesson of the Confucians, whose fractious factions were utterly routed in court and country struggles, the two schools' three leaders, under Lu Sheng's planning, began to cooperate, letting their theories complement each other and often covering for one another.

But in his heart, Lu Sheng held Han Zhong, Hou Sheng, and the other elixir-refiners in contempt, deeming their arts the inferior sort of fangshu.

Because he felt that these things were far too easy to verify as true or false…

"The arts of longevity we use to persuade kings are invariably arcane records and strange texts, jade tablets and golden cords, locked away in the treasury of luminous spirits, sealed upon altars of jasper — things the common man can never glimpse."

Take the overseas immortal mountains he touted — Penglai, Fangzhang, Yingzhou. He merely said they drifted upon the vast, boundless sea, shrouded in mist and wave, their whereabouts hard to seek. Lu Sheng boasted that he had landed on them in his youth, only that those immortal isles were encountered by chance, not sought; and because he had eaten immortal fruit there, he still looked young at seventy. Who could prove he was lying?

In short, a fangshi must make himself appear unfathomably profound, make longevity seem attainable yet beyond reach — best of all, forever impossible to falsify!

So long as the painted skin was not stripped away, they were immortals and Dao masters walking the mortal world, with glory, splendor, and riches theirs for the taking.

By contrast, Han Zhong, Hou Sheng, and their ilk claimed to have fathomed the subtle mysteries of Yin-Yang and Five-Phase transformations, and thus could summon things by sacrificing to the stove and obtain the elixir of immortality.

It sounded alluring, but this also meant their theories became subject to discernible patterns! They still had to produce tangible, solid results and present them to the emperor for verification — unlike Lu Sheng, who relied entirely on imagination and spun whatever came to mind.

What astonished Lu Sheng was that Heifu had actually spotted this flaw too. He had rounded up all the normally secretive Jiaodong fangshi and detained them by the seashore, treating them as convict laborers, forcing them to draw on their years of experience in sacrificing to the stove and summoning things to devise the brine-filtering and leaching method — only then were they released.

And now, right before the First Emperor's face, Heifu was turning the question back on Han Zhong, demanding to know the principle behind it!

A nameless dread rose in Lu Sheng's heart: "This Heifu — could it be that from months ago, he has been advancing step by step, intending to dig this very pit for us fangshi?"

What was Han Zhong supposed to say? If he claimed not to know, then his so-called "knowledge of Yin-Yang and Five-Phase transformations, and thus ability to summon things by sacrificing to the stove" would become a joke. He couldn't even grasp this simple principle, yet he wanted to refine an immortality elixir for the emperor to consume?

And if he steeled himself and explained it clearly, that would be no better.

"The divinity of the fangshi lies in the Way's hidden remoteness, its mystery profound and its origin unfathomable. Once explained plainly, it ceases to be divine!" This was Lu Sheng's honest self-assessment!

If they stripped off their own painted skin and set this precedent, who knew whether Heifu would later pursue every root and branch, demanding that fangshi explain clearly the principles by which stone could be refined into gold and cinnabar and quicksilver into an immortality elixir? What would they do then?

Push everything back onto the mysterious and unknowable will of Heaven? Chance? Lu Sheng shook his head. This move of Heifu's was not easy to parry!

The attack was too sudden. Even Lu Sheng was at a loss, and Han Zhong was clearly unprepared as well, hesitating, wanting to speak but stopping.

But before Han Zhong could fully weigh the pros and cons, Heifu smiled again. "Your Majesty, it seems Master Han still needs to ponder a while. In that case, let the local fangshi who devised this method explain it themselves."

The First Emperor was in fact rather curious to know the reason, so he had Zhao Cheng bring over the three fangshi who had come to lodge a complaint against Heifu.

These three fangshi had also been thoroughly duped by Heifu. He had tricked them with talk of "devising wondrous formulas and marvelous arts to present to His Majesty," only for them to end up here by the sea, skin peeling from sunburn, with officials sent daily to bark orders and press them, refusing to release anyone until they came up with a method. In the end, the three had no choice but to offer up their own method of purifying saltpeter from brine — which was precisely the brine-leaching method before them…

After being released, they were ultimately unable to swallow their anger. A minor clerk deliberately sent by Heifu egged them on with a few words, saying that His Majesty the Emperor was fond of fangshi and would surely believe any accusation without doubt. So, with malice emboldening them, they filed a complaint against Heifu.

But seeing the current situation, with this Governor of Jiaodong Commandery so clearly in the sovereign's favor, the three regretted it and mumbled that it was all a misunderstanding. One of them even presented the brine-leaching method as if offering a treasure, lavishly boasting of it as his own "wondrous formula and marvelous art," saying this was the excellent method they were presenting to His Majesty the Emperor, hoping to claim credit for it.

At that moment, Zhang Cang, who had long since arranged things with Heifu, spoke up.

"Your Majesty, in truth this is no profound and mysterious art at all — it is merely an ordinary matter! It is not because a fangshi performed this act and received divine aid that it proves efficacious. Even if a small child or an old man performed it, the result would be exactly the same!"

…

Everyone was astonished. The three fangshi hurriedly argued, but the First Emperor looked at Zhang Cang. "You understand it? Then explain."

Zhang Cang bowed, fetched a basin of fresh water, took out the salt pouch he carried, and shook a little white salt into it. The salt dissolved completely in an instant.

He then grabbed a handful of sand-laden salt from the ground and scattered it into another basin. After adding water, those sparkling white salt crystals likewise vanished, while the sand and mud sank to the bottom of the basin, clearly visible.

Zhang Cang showed both basins to the emperor and said, "The Governor of Jiaodong told me that, from what he has observed, common things in this world can be simply divided into two categories: those soluble in water, and those insoluble in water. I deeply concur! What is soluble is salt; what is insoluble is sand and mud. Thus when sand and mud enter water, they gather and sink; when salt enters water, it dissolves. Yet the water already tastes salty — therefore the salt is in the water!"

The concepts of soluble and insoluble were what Heifu had just explained to Zhang Cang. Zhang Cang was a clever man and grasped it at once — ah, a top student is a top student indeed.

Zhang Cang continued, "By the same principle, seawater contains salt. When exposed to the blazing sun, the water dries and the salt emerges, mixing with the mud — therefore the mud contains salt."

"Then when seawater is poured over the salty mud at the filter-bed's outlet, the salt in the mud dissolves upon meeting water, while the mud, as before, does not dissolve. Thus when the water exits the filter bed, the salt in the water is already more concentrated than before — and so it becomes brine!"

After saying all this in one breath, Zhang Cang felt that that mouthful of brine that had nearly choked him had been worth swallowing after all!

In short, as seawater flowed through the filter layers, the sand and mud were left behind, but the salt in the mud traveled with the water — this was the principle of the brine-leaching method. Through repeated filtration, the concentration of the outflowing brine kept increasing.

Zhang Cang could not help recalling what Heifu had said to him atop Mount Tai.

"People do not understand the process by which things change and see only the result. Because they do not know the how or why, they call it 'divine.' But if you uncover this process of change and let people see that so that's how it is — strip away that veil of mystery! — that is what I call proof: demonstrating truth or falsehood by the facts!"

Yet those things that seem to contradict common sense, when traced to their roots, turn out to be merely another kind of common sense.

"Exactly — I have proven this matter, demonstrated truth and falsehood by the facts. This is not the divine power of one or a few fangshi, but the great Dao of heaven and earth, the laws of nature!"

Though the words had reached his lips, Zhang Cang, having learned from his last setback, stopped at just the right point and did not trespass on the First Emperor's sore spot.

"So that's how it is!" The Fifth-rank Grand Master Ziying listened, eyes staring blankly. The thing he had racked his brains over was actually this simple?

"That's it?"

The First Emperor's expression remained unchanged, though he seemed somewhat disappointed that the "marvelous art" was so dull. With a wave of his sleeve, he ordered the three fangshi who had made the "false accusation" detained and handed over to the Commandant of Justice to determine their punishment.

It was Heifu who interceded for the three, hypocritically saying that although their mouths were full of nonsense, they had nonetheless spurred the implementation of the new salt-production method. He hoped their deaths could be spared and that they might continue to serve the state and have a chance to redeem themselves.

Seen through the eyes of later ages, the two schools of the Yin-Yang fangshi were, in fact, simply chemists and explorers — wild-grown ones, admittedly.

But this group studied the arts of Yin-Yang not to explore the composition of matter, the vastness of the world, or the principles of historical cycles, as Zou Yan and his nephew had done. Rather, seeing that Zou Yan had "made the theory of Yin-Yang's ruling cycles manifest to the feudal lords," they were filled with envy and sought to use this theory as their painted skin, as decoration for "attaining longevity" — their ultimate goal being to amass wealth and seek riches and rank.

Swindlers are not frightening; what is frightening is a swindler with learning. The fangshi, having changed their skin, could spin boastful tales in elaborate sets, flourishing greatly in Yan and Qi, making fools of King Zhao of Yan and others. In history, the First Emperor was likewise duped by them.

So long as the fangshi's aim remained swindling and deception, Heifu would keep digging pits for them. He was unwilling to see the hard-won development of Jiaodong squandered on useless pursuits, with manpower and wealth diverted by the troublemaking fangshi!

This interlude soon concluded, and Heifu resumed his role as guide, introducing the First Emperor to the steps of the new salt-production method.

Heifu explained that after preparing the brine, the salt workers would pluck a sprig of a seaside shrub called "yellow-fish thorn" to judge the brine's concentration. If the yellow-fish thorn sprig floated on the brine's surface, it indicated the brine had reached sufficient concentration and was ready for salt-drying. If the yellow-fish thorn sank to the bottom or hung suspended in the middle of the water, it indicated the brine concentration was insufficient…

The First Emperor nodded casually, paying it no mind. Zhang Cang, however, stopped in his tracks, watching the bobbing yellow-fish thorn with a thoughtful expression.

Heifu felt that, given the right moment, if he fed the chubby fellow concepts like density and buoyancy, Zhang Cang would be able to accept them and even expand upon them.

But for today's matter, simple soluble and insoluble had sufficed — why use a butcher's knife to kill a chicken? Heifu would keep his middle- and high-school knowledge in reserve for now, bringing it out piece by piece once Zhang Cang had digested the earlier material. These things were fine weapons for dealing with the fangshi.

"This is merely a reminder, a warning…"

As the party left the filter beds, Heifu glanced sidelong at the fangshi Lu Sheng and Han Zhong, who, after being cold-shouldered, had been awkwardly dismissed by the First Emperor back to the traveling palace. After this setback, their retreating figures no longer seemed quite so ethereal and Dao-sage-like.

"If those people still refuse to learn their lesson and insist on jumping up and down, playing tricks and putting on ghostly acts in my Jiaodong…"

Heifu thought to himself: "Then I'll show them what 'Approaching Science' really means!"

(End of chapter)