After receiving Zheng He's affirmative answer, Gao Jian stood dazed at the street entrance. A chilly wind funneled in and brought him back to his senses. He asked:
"How could the Ming Dynasty reach the moon with its level of productivity?"
Zheng He did not argue. He raised a hand and pointed toward the circular plaza drawing ever closer at the end of the street, his voice matter-of-fact. "Mr. Gao, why not go and see for yourself?"
Gao Jian looked in the direction he indicated.
There were noticeably more people around the circular plaza than at the street entrance: workers, farmers, merchants, and officials. There were also women with children, soldiers maintaining order... and even a few wandering monks in tattered robes. Everyone crowded around the edges of the plaza, gazing at the Wood-and-Iron Giant at its center.
It was an enormous Flying Chair.
Whispers echoed across the plaza. Everyone had instinctively lowered their voices, yet this only made the strange solemnity enveloping the plaza more pronounced beneath the dense murmur.
The Wood-and-Iron Giant, angled toward the heavens, seemed to have become the city's sole hope beneath the grayish-yellow sky.
"We all have great faith in Lord Wan Hu."
"Faith in what?" Gao Jian pointed at the giant chair in disbelief. "Faith that this thing can fly to the moon?"
"Of course." Zheng He nodded.
Gao Jian lowered his voice. "That's impossible. Black-Powder Rockets, a wooden frame, and a hemp-cloth skin. Fluid mechanics, materials science, structural mechanics, propulsion systems-it has none of what it needs. If this thing can take off, I'll eat the chair. Forget reaching the moon. Getting higher than the city walls would be a miracle."
As a professional aerospace engineer, Gao Jian thought this thing was less technologically sophisticated than the simple water rockets students made.