Chapter 973: Establishing the Framework

While Yu Qian and Chen Xun busied themselves with increasing the state treasury's revenue, Pan Yun was immersed in a sea of data books.

The time had come; she was pulling up blueprints of various machines and methods of material smelting from the Spirit Realm, copying them down one by one with a brush.

For example, if railways were built, trains would be needed—should they use the most basic steam system, or advance further to internal combustion engines?

Electricity…

Pan Yun temporarily set that aside.

Her hand paused mid-writing on the plan sheet; she fell into thought. Actually, using electricity directly wasn't impossible—through arrays and talismans, some necessary technologies and materials could be replaced, converting petroleum into electricity.

The gray cast iron used for internal combustion engine cylinders could be smelted with current technology; crankshafts and connecting rods posed no problem, but pistons required forged aluminum alloy, and piston rings needed special alloy cast iron, which current technology could not yet produce.

If the distilled diesel could be converted into power by another method…

Pan Yun dropped the half-written plan, pulled out a blank sheet of paper, and began sketching array diagrams.

She drew until midnight, gaining only a faint insight—linking arrays to replace internal combustion engines was still impossible.

Seeing Miao Zhen entered with a bowl of noodles, picked up the discarded array diagram, and asked: "Little Master, even if you can draw an array diagram to convert energy, how many talismanists in this world could actually engrave this array?"

Pan Yun snapped back to awareness: "You're right. We can't abandon the other set of technologies."

She silently retrieved the plan sheet hidden beneath the drawings and resumed writing.

Seeing Miao Zhen placed the noodle bowl on the other side: "Little Master, you should eat something first—you haven't eaten all day."

Though Pan Yun's cultivation level meant going three or five days without food posed no issue, she was still at an age of growth.

Pan Yun put down her brush, sat over, and took the chopsticks: "Where are Miao He and Tao Yanbai?"

Seeing Miao Zhen: "The Minister of Rites, Hu Minister, came seeking Little Master, just as Zhou Wang arrived with the Crown Prince to bid farewell. Third Master and Little Sister were also there. The five of them unexpectedly clicked, and they're still talking outside—it's been three hours, and they're already on their second meal."

Pan Yun tilted her head, thinking: What could these five possibly be discussing?

Pan Yun raised an eyebrow: "Medicine?"

"Yes. When I went to the kitchen to make your noodles, they were already discussing co-authoring a medical compendium, ideally modeled after the 'Book of Wild Edible Plants.'"

Pan Yun immediately ate faster. Modeling it after the 'Book of Wild Edible Plants' wasn't enough.

If they were going to do it, they had to make it better than the 'Book of Wild Edible Plants'—ideally, it should become as ubiquitous as the 'Great Edict,' with one copy in every village.

If possible, she hoped to create a book like the 'Barefoot Doctor's Manual,' ensuring every bao had a copy—this would raise both literacy and medical awareness.

This was a public health issue; besides the Ministry of Rites, the Imperial Medical Bureau should also participate.

Mentioning the Imperial Medical Bureau, Pan Yun frowned.

In the early Great Ming, the Imperial Medical Bureau oversaw the People's Welfare Pharmacies and the Herbal Storage, and controlled medical education and examinations.

But in recent years, medical academies opened across the provinces had gradually closed or shrunk, and even the People's Welfare Pharmacies were retreating.

The People's Welfare Pharmacies provided free medicine to the poor, managed by medical officers dispatched by the Imperial Medical Bureau—but now… Pan Yun rubbed her forehead, then smiled faintly: "At least Emperor Taizu set a good precedent—the rules already exist; a few adjustments will make them usable."

"Huh?"

Pan Yun waved her hand, sweeping all items on the desk into the Spirit Realm, then stood: "Let's go see."

By the time the two arrived, the five had already laid out their positions, gathered around a table, drafting the book's table of contents to determine what to include.

After the Emperor's birthday, Pan Yun met Zhou Wang and his father in the Imperial Study with the Emperor, strongly encouraging them to continue their ancestor's legacy.

After the former Zhou Wang wrote the 'Book of Wild Edible Plants,' Zhu Yuanzhang had ordered its printing, but the two subsequent Zhou Wangs became embroiled in imperial power struggles; though the book still circulated among the people, the court ceased reprinting it.

Pan Yun not only wished to continue reprinting the 'Book of Wild Edible Plants,' but also hoped the Zhou Wangfu would compile a separate collection of simple, practical remedies for common folk, while simultaneously reprinting the former Zhou Wang's 'Universal Relief Formula,' distributing it to medical academies and People's Welfare Pharmacies in every prefecture, state, and county, and selling it at low prices in bookstores.

Seeing the Emperor's approval, Zhou Wang felt no hesitation about his Wangfu's association with the State Tutor, shed his psychological burden, and naturally grew closer to Pan Yun.

Today he came because the feudal lords were gradually leaving the capital—he too would return to Kaifeng with his Crown Prince.

Pan Yun glanced at their list and shook her head: "Insufficient."

Hu Yuanjie tugged his beard: "How is it insufficient? It covers internal diseases, external injuries, even toxicology. A book meant to popularize medicine among common folk—how much more could they possibly absorb?"

"Precisely because it's for common folk, your list is inappropriate," Pan Yun said. "Teach ordinary people how to handle minor illnesses and emergencies, but don't burden them with complex pathology and pharmacology. For example: what to do if someone chokes, how to relieve hiccups, how to revive someone pulled from water, how to stop bleeding from a knife wound when medical help is unavailable—none of this is written. Instead, you write about toxicology and heart vessels? That's for physicians, not ordinary people."

Hu Yuanjie tugged his beard in silence, lost in thought.

Zhou Wang was indecisive, but he agreed with Pan Yun—he had lived among the common folk, and during his fall from grace, his circumstances had been far worse than Hu Yuanjie's.

He whispered: "Following the State Tutor's logic, we could also write about fever reduction, heatstroke, safe drinking water, disease prevention—especially plague and chickenpox."

"Excellent," Pan Yun gave Zhou Wang an encouraging look and continued: "When discussing medicine, we can extract illustrations of herbs from the 'Book of Wild Edible Plants' and teach the people to gather, process, and consume local plants."

The 'Book of Wild Edible Plants' recorded 414 usable plants, many of which were both food and medicine.

These plants grew all around them, yet the people didn't recognize them; some knew a few edible plants from ancestral oral tradition, but their knowledge was extremely limited.

The former Zhou Wang had lived through war and famine; after the founding of the Great Ming, natural disasters continued relentlessly—he wrote this book to teach the people to recognize these plants and survive famine.

This book predates the 'Compendium of Materia Medica' by two centuries; of its entries, only 138 herbs were recorded in earlier texts—the remaining 276 were painstakingly discovered, tasted, and added by Zhu Su himself.

In later generations, the West called it the "Eastern Classic of Botany."

Most importantly, Zhu Su was already a prince—he had money, so he specifically hired artists to draw illustrations. To ensure accuracy, he established a medicinal herb garden within his Wangfu, planting rare herbs, observing their growth, then having the artists draw them—so lifelike they were nearly perfect.

With the illustrations as a guide, one could always find them.