Pan Little Black: "You've practically led the Ministry of Works into building a steam engine, and you're still talking to me about inevitability and chance?"
"So what if we made one? It's only a steam engine. Historically, the steam engine widely acknowledged by later generations was built around the late Ming and early Qing, and at that time, the various technologies of our China could still be called the best under Heaven. The theoretical foundations of the steam engine had already taken shape as early as the Yuan dynasty. Wang Zhen's Book of Agriculture contained diagrams of linked water-powered bellows and wind bellows. Therefore, with the Ming Dynasty's current technologies, making a steam engine was possible. That was inevitability, not chance."
Pan Little Black: "You could clearly achieve this with a single array. Why go through all the trouble of fussing with those craftsmen from the Ministry of Works?"
"The Celestial Master's Mansion's cultivation methods have already been promoted among the Imperial Guards and the Imperial Guards, but so far, not one person has cultivated primordial energy. In other words, arrays still lack the foundation for widespread use," Pan Yun said. "You're the Spirit Realm. Haven't you calculated how much merit it would take to unseal the entire Spirit Realm?"
"To gain such an enormous amount of merit, the people of the entire Ming Dynasty—and even more people beyond them—must benefit. Only by letting something this good work among ordinary people can I gain more merit points."
Pan Yun said, "Let the people make it, let the people use it. Primordial power and arrays can replace motive power, but without a foundation for widespread use, it is all castles in the air."
Pan Little Black immediately fell silent. When all was said and done, this was all for merit.
No,