Mythical Three Kingdoms

Chapter 2395: Chapter 2113: It’s a Sphere

Gan Ning and his party spent nearly ten days detouring to Australia, but Lyu Bu had already sent Red Hare back to report safety to Diao Chan before that.

Thus, when Gan Ning’s party brought Lyu Bu back, Diao Chan was quietly waiting on the coast for Lyu Bu’s return.

“Wow, how beautiful!” Sun Ce glanced and decisively turned his head; he knew why Ma Chao was chased by Lyu Bu for thousands of kilometers. Red Hare and Diao Chan were definitely not to be flirted with.

“Fengxian, are you alright?” Lyu Bu embraced Diao Chan without speaking much, while Diao Chan buried her head and meekly inquired.

Though she had countless questions, wanted to know why it took so long to return, wanted to know how severe Lyu Bu’s injuries were at the time, wanted to know if Lyu Bu’s hidden dangers had been eliminated, upon seeing Lyu Bu, Diao Chan only asked this one question.

“I’m fine, don’t worry, no one can defeat me. In some time, we will return to the Central Plains.” Lyu Bu said calmly, not mentioning anything distressing about Zhao Yun or Lyu Qiling, only his hand embracing Diao Chan trembled slightly.

“Mm, let’s return to the Central Plains.” Diao Chan raised her head and looked at Lyu Bu, nodding with a smile that warmed Lyu Bu’s heart, showing no resistance as he feared.

Yet in that instant, Diao Chan’s arms embracing Lyu Bu clenched together on his back involuntarily, thinking about the Central Plains, the place that buried her foster father and her past would eventually need to be returned to.

Even her strongest, invincible husband cannot be absolutely stable in the Central Plains, returning there means her husband is likely to embark on the path of conquering the Central Plains again, but she cannot eternally bind him to her side, he is an eagle. Though he briefly returned to earth, his true home never changed, it was always in the high sky!

“Mm, let’s return to the Central Plains.” Diao Chan raised her head and gently looked at Lyu Bu, like an eagle who may have fallen to earth because of something he loved, someday needs to return to the sky, where his true homeland lies.

“Marquis Wenn, let’s wait for a day or two, when we’ve replenished our drinking water, we’ll set off again.” Zhou Yu respectfully said to Lyu Bu, acknowledging him as a truly formidable man.

“As you wish, head slightly southwest, there are rivers there.” Lyu Bu casually pointed southwest and said, as he had found this lush place with water sources and proximity to the sea after moving to the west coast not long ago.

Zhou Yu nodded, commanding a large number of soldiers to disembark from the ships, some land appraisal diviners followed along and soon returned within half a day, looking shocked; they discovered iron ore.

“Are you saying you’ve found iron ore?” Zhou Yu asked the diviners with a hint of confusion.

When Zhou Yu went south, he brought along many diviners skilled in Feng Shui, astrology, and geomancy, though primarily to determine directions by star chart during the voyage, not to find iron ore.

Although astrology from the Central Plains was dead after arriving in the Southern Hemisphere, Zhou Yu’s voyage was not very fast, so these people were constantly observing and verifying, though the stars kept changing, their extensive astrology studies and sleepless nights of reference had allowed them to chart part of the Southern Hemisphere’s constellations.

The biggest issue now isn’t the star chart but the conflicting thoughts among the astrologers, where the majority now suspect the ground beneath them isn’t flat anymore. Okay, it isn’t just a flat or not flat issue; it’s a sphere!

As early as sixty or seventy years ago, someone in the Central Plains had predicted “the cosmos like an egg, celestial bodies round like a bullet, the earth like the egg yolk,” but few believed it back then.

Yet the current problem is, based on these astrologers’ conclusions, either the stars in the sky are very close to us, or the thing beneath us is a sphere.

Because only when objects are very close do you feel them moving to another place when you move, and when something is far away, essentially your movement doesn’t affect the perceived position of objects.

Ancient China once used this method to estimate the distance between the earth and the moon, though due to inaccurate measurements of displacement and angles, resulting in significant errors, the method wasn’t wrong.

In this context, all astrologers know the moon is hundreds of thousands of li away, and based on their voyage perceptions, stars must be closer than the moon to cause this displacement effect, but that’s impossible!

At this time, the general populace wasn’t aware how many stars the Big Dipper had, just viewing its shape as constant; however, the descendants of the long-standing celestial observer families knew the Big Dipper had nine stars, and star charts continued to undergo subtle changes over hundreds or thousands of years that only professionals could discern.

Of course, those found by Zhou Yu would certainly be professionals, naturally aware of star chart changes, and when crossing from the Northern Hemisphere to the Southern Hemisphere, the Big Dipper’s star chart didn’t change, nor did the constellations deviate, proving that the stars are further away than the moon.

This was the most perplexing aspect for all astrologers; the star chart positions didn’t shift, yet they were hidden. At that time, some astrologers suspected the ground beneath was not flat.

Eventually, while traveling across the sea, witnessing the top of a distant ship’s mast first, most astrologers confirmed a fact; whether it was a sphere we couldn’t be certain, but it definitely wasn’t flat.

All astrologers reached this consensus, though it was of little use, radical astrologers using the sphere theory had solved the issue of lunar eclipses, explaining why the shadow covering the moon during an eclipse was just right as an arc.

Ultimately, debates nearly broke out over why, if it’s a sphere, we don’t fall off; because it’s huge, appearing flat.

Later, someone calculated the distance to the top mast of visible ships on the ocean to estimate the size of this assumed perfect sphere, causing nearly another clash among the group.

Overall, the ground beneath is definitely not a square piece, but now most astrologers struggle with the implications for those on the sphere’s opposite side?

After all, those who continue to argue under these circumstances aren’t amateurs; their ancestors likely excelled in both astrology and mathematics. Especially within this group, there were descendants of Gan De, who supported the sphere notion but posed a question to the others.

“My ancestor said six hundred years ago in Gan Shi’s Astronomical Text that we orbit the sun, and now based on our calculations, the ground beneath is a sphere; should we not be flung out when we reach the opposite side?” Gan Fen once posed this question.

The crowd knelt, unable to answer the question; though the crowd contained parents of big names like Wang Fann and grandfathers of monsters like Chen Zhuo, yet even they couldn’t solve this problem.

Though they could derive the approximate size of Earth using mathematics, based on π estimate among them at the time, using perfect circles, arcs, tangents, trigonometric functions, no one could solve Gan Fen’s query.

However, although the issue couldn’t be resolved, preventing any fights among them, because the ground beneath is a sphere, it’s already caused internal division.

Thus, they resolved to each study separately, pledging that their descendants would continue the investigation if they couldn’t resolve it within their lifetime; if the sons failed, the grandsons would. This task spans endless generations.

After all, those capable of engaging in mathematics and astrology weren’t usually impoverished in ancient times. They likely had already explored all worldly pleasures, finding none left but to dive into the ocean of knowledge for satisfaction; thus, difficulty and livelihood weren’t issues for these people.

Even in death, successors would take over, ensuring generations continued researching if not resolved, writing down the unknowns to await future solutions by descendants. This legacy is their capital; enduring multiple generations to solve any scientific issue is challenging.

Especially within the family, where generations adopt similar immersion, newborns receiving above-average familial support right from the start.

Those who clashed secretly resolved to begin research immediately upon returning home, meanwhile performing their duties for Zhou Yu while on the ship.

Despite discovering a significant issue distracting them, they were skilled enough to perform adequately without forgetting technical expertise.

Then they discovered a massive, high-quality iron ore, which by their estimates surpassed any recorded iron ore in quality!

This was astonishing, prompting them to hastily report the discovery to Zhou Yu.

“An iron ore of excellent quality?” Zhou Yu said puzzled, not taking it seriously.

The Central Plains were too far from here, making transport hardly worthwhile. Factoring in ship capacity and escort ships against possible Kushan Navy encounters through Malacca, Zhou Yu felt overwhelmed; a round trip could be nearly twenty thousand kilometers!

Transporting iron ore from such a distance would result in exorbitant costs, far exceeding the value, better to mine and refine locally in the Central Plains; Australia is too far anyway.

However, Gan Ning seemed interested in the iron mine, seeing it as an opportunity to secure or mark it for future generations, not to leave it undeveloped if current sentiments deem it unusable, so descendants may have a pathway.