My cultivation disguise has been exposed by Xiao Sizi.

"Although this curved plow is exquisite, its structure is not complicated. As soon as the actual object appears, the craftsmen under the Shandong gentry can replicate it after just a glance."

"They control most of the country's fertile land and tenant farmers. If we let them develop it on a large scale, it would be like adding wings to a tiger. Wouldn't we be doing all the work for them for nothing?"

Faced with Lao Li's worries, Li Chen was not in a hurry. Instead, he reached out and picked up a grape from the plate and slowly peeled it.

"Counterfeit? Then let them counterfeit."

Li Chen popped the glistening fruit pulp into his mouth and chewed it a couple of times.

"Qingque, tell Father, what method did you use to forge the iron for this plowshare?"

Li Tai grinned, revealing a set of white teeth.

"Father, this plowshare was made using the blast furnace steelmaking method taught by my sixteenth brother, combined with high-temperature quenching of our honeycomb briquettes. It is three times harder than ordinary pig iron, yet half the weight."

"Their family used those old charcoal furnaces, and the pig iron they smelted was as brittle as a biscuit. It would crack as soon as you took it to the field and turned it over a couple of times in the hard soil."

Li Chen patted the juice off his hands and stood up.

"Did you hear that? Technological barriers."

Li Chen stretched out a finger and drew a circle in the air.

"We're not just going to sell, we're going to sell big! We'll have the Cui family's workshops in Qinghe work day and night to drive the price of these curved plows down to less than half the cost of pig iron for those aristocratic families!"

"Even the tenant farmers of powerful families are human; humans know how to do accounting. Would you rather spend half the money to buy a magic plow that will never break and can be pulled by one person, or pay a high price for one of those worthless pieces of scrap metal that the powerful families make and break after a couple of flips?"

Li Chen walked up to Li Shimin and patted the dust off his shoulder.

"Once spring plowing begins, curved plows are everywhere. Those old farm tool shops owned by aristocratic families have to close down immediately. They had tens of thousands of acres of fertile land, but in the end, they found that without the iron plows of our Qin King's Mansion, they couldn't even turn the soil. This is called a dimensional reduction monopoly."

Li Shimin looked at his son, who was half a head taller than him.

As I imagined the scene of curved plows covering the fields of the Tang Dynasty, a shiver of tingling shiver ran down my spine.

This kid is cutting the flesh of aristocratic families with a knife without drawing blood, and then expecting them to be grateful and offer the flesh to him with both hands.

"Great! What a brilliant example of a 'dimensional reduction monopoly'!"

Li Shimin slammed his hand on the stone table, making the teacups shake violently.

"Tomorrow morning, I will personally change into peasant clothes and go to the imperial estate outside the city to personally test your Zhenguan plow in the fields!"

"Holy crap! Old Deng, are you really that shameless? When did the curved plow become the Zhenguan plow?"

"You unfilial son! What's wrong with me naming it the Zhenguan Plow? It's an honor for me, the Emperor of the Great Tang, to name it. What do you know?"

"Bluebird, forget about this shameless old man, just call him Curved Plow."

"You unfilial son..." The following thousands of words of arguing are omitted.

……

As night fell, Chang'an was shrouded in a deep darkness.

Inside the Sifangguan in the south of the city, a solitary lamp flickers dimly.

The Tibetan delegation booked an entire courtyard. A cold wind blew into the room through the cracks in the windows, causing the candlelight to flicker.

Sangza, the legitimate son of a collateral branch of the Prime Minister, sat cross-legged on a thick woolen felt.

There was a plate of sizzling lamb chops on the low table in front of him, but he didn't touch a single one.

The scene from the Qin Prince's mansion backyard during the day kept replaying in his mind.

The Tang Dynasty girl, a head shorter than him and with pigtails, stood with her hands on her hips, looking at him with a contemptuous gaze.

"What good is it if you can fight?"

"Turns out he's just a nobody."

Sangza didn't understand the common language of the Tang Dynasty, but he could clearly feel the humiliation contained in those five words.

That was a trampling on him, the eagle of the snowy plateau and the first warrior of the future of Tibet.

"The Tang Dynasty's soft lamb..."

Sangza bit her lower lip hard, her sharp canine teeth leaving a deep row of bloody marks on her lips, a slightly metallic taste spreading in her mouth.

He stretched out his hands, calloused from years of practicing riding and archery, and grabbed the sharp silver cleaver on the table.

His fingertips gently caressed the cold blade.

For wolf cubs on the plateau, the only way to wash away the shame when provoked is to knock the opponent down with their fists and make them bow their heads in defeat.

He stood up and pulled a leather satchel from under the bed.

After rummaging around for a moment, he pulled out a sturdy leather rope used for harnessing horse foals, wrapped it around his wrist round and round, and finally tied a tight knot.

Sanza walked to the window and pushed it open a crack.

In the corridor outside the door, two Tibetan guards were dozing off, leaning against a pillar and holding long swords.

He took a deep breath, inserted the small silver knife into his boot, and slipped out through the crack in the window like a slippery eel.

His feet landed without making a sound.

Under the cover of night, Sangza evaded the patrolling guards of Sifangguan and, following his memories from the daytime, made his way through the streets and alleys towards the Qin Prince's Mansion.

A curfew had been imposed in Chang'an City at midnight.

The only sound on the empty streets was the mournful whistling of the wind.

Sangza jogged along the cold, damp walls of the workshop.

He looked at the enormous mansion in front of him, which appeared particularly majestic in the night and even emitted a faint glow.

"Which gang are you involved with?"

Sanza silently recited the slang that baffled him, a wild, cold smile creeping onto his lips.

"I don't care which path you follow. Tonight, I'll make sure you, this little ewe of the Tang Dynasty, know that I, Sangza, am the strongest among my peers!"

He walked to the high wall of the Qin Prince's Mansion.

He took two steps back, took a small running start, grabbed the protruding blue bricks in the crack of the wall with both hands, and like an agile snow leopard, used both hands and feet to climb up the wall little by little.

Moonlight pierced through the clouds and shone on the martial arts training ground in the backyard of the Qin Prince's mansion.

Sangza poked half his head out, perched on the wall, and scanned the movements in the courtyard.

He didn't know which room the little girl named Sizi lived in, but he had plenty of patience and was prepared to sneak in and search room by room.

Just as he was about to flip over and jump off the high wall.

In a corner of the training ground.

A figure wearing a large robe and carrying a water vat half the height of a person was slowly moving forward in the moonlight, with his back to the wall.