Section 24: The ideal is flying

The weasel came out of the tunnel naked and returned to the cell. He wrapped the cloth around his head, leaving only his eyes exposed. He first stood on the ground and listened for a moment with his ears, but did not hear any other sounds. He took off the cloth from his head and let out a long breath. He did not have time to rest for a moment, so he used his hands to scoop up the soil he had dug out of the corner of the wall and carefully sprinkled it on the ground of the dungeon. Then he used his feet to flatten the ground. He then lay on the ground again, checking the level of the ground with his eyes, making slight adjustments, before finally grabbing the kettle on the table and greedily taking a drink.

He was still thirsty, but he didn’t drink anymore. He took a sip of water and sprayed it on a piece of cloth, which he used to wipe his body until there was no more dirt on his body. He put on his clothes and lay down on the bed to rest with his eyes closed.

For a whole month, he dug the hole every night without stopping. In order not to arouse suspicion, he sprinkled the soil evenly on the ground, allowing the ground to gradually rise. If it weren’t for someone extremely perceptive, they wouldn’t have noticed the ground rising every day. The little spoon had completed its final mission, even though it had been sharpened by the loess and couldn’t withstand digging for a month straight. Tonight, it finally broke into two pieces.

The weasel was a bit nostalgic. He was going to go out and make a new one, to keep by his side. It would be a good choice for eating or digging in an emergency. He even wanted to introduce this convenient tool to the woman selling the mash. His own stall? It couldn’t be without a bit of character.

It is really indecent to drink the morass with your mouth, and it is completely unrefined to scoop it up with a spoon. It is the habit of the rich and powerful, so we should learn both hands, right? In the future, if my child grows up and pours morass into his mouth with a bowl, I will beat him severely. I dare not hit his face, but his butt is fine because he is still young.

It would be good to have three children. That woman has a big butt, so she’s obviously a good breeder. Two boys and a girl would be fine. It doesn’t matter if the boy looks like me, because he’s going to be a grave robber anyway. Who cares what you look like when you’re dead?

But a girl can’t be like that. She has to be like her mother. Who will marry her if she looks like me? But it doesn’t matter. I still have 300 strings of cash hidden under the willow tree. When the time comes, I’ll give her a generous dowry and she won’t have to worry about finding a good husband.

In his drowsy state, he seemed to see the woman selling fermented rice wine leading three plump children towards him, smiling sweetly, calling out “Husband” and the children calling out “Dad” as they rushed towards him.

“Tomorrow night, I’ll escape and never come back to this ghostly place again.” The weasel muttered to himself, rolled over, and fell into a deep sleep.

As soon as it was light, Li Tai returned to the dormitory with a small iron bucket full of hot water. The only privilege the prince could enjoy in the academy was having his own room. The room was not large, not even as large as the palace’s wood shed. Li Tai was very satisfied, as compared to the other four people in one room, it was much better.

He had accidentally been in one of the rooms, and the terrible sour smell in the room had almost made him pass out. These bastards, after kicking the ball, didn’t even wash their feet before going to bed. I don’t know how they can eat and sleep in such a room. Li Tai thought that the pigsty was cleaner than their room.

Li Tai has not visited the weasel in recent days. He has already mastered the progress of the weasel’s work. With the help of the guards, he added a kind of medicine to the weasel’s food. This medicine was asked from Sun Simiao during the medicine class. Under the condition of ensuring that nothing bad would happen, he gave a little bit.

However, the medicine worked very well. After eating, the mole slept like a dead pig. After carefully measuring the amount of earth the mole had dug, Li Tai felt that his arithmetic problem was almost finished. He did not measure the hole behind the bed, because under the known conditions, there was no need to. If the weasel could surprise him, he would not mind interceding for the weasel and asking the academy to let the creature off the hook. If the weasel did not surprise him, then the weasel’s life or death would have nothing to do with him. He only cared about whether his arithmetic problem was correct or not.

Looking back at the schedule of the work progress of the weasel on the wall, he took out a charcoal pencil and filled in the number one foot at the top of the table.

He picked up the books, all new, and smelled the strange ink. He liked the smell and put the books on his nose and took a deep breath. He couldn’t wait to find out what the books were about.

Last time Yun Ye said that two iron balls, one large and one small, would fall from a great height and land at the same time.

How could such a ridiculous thing happen? How could a ten-jin iron ball and a one-jin iron ball land at the same time? If so, what is the use of weight?

The bet of one hundred coins was proposed by Yun Ye, and Li Tai wanted to raise the stakes, but Yun Ye refused, which made him even more suspicious.

Since he wasn’t willing to bet money, Li Tai proposed a physical challenge.

A hundred loads of water, carrying a full hundred loads of water, not from the river in front of the academy, but from the waterfall at the foot of the mountain, then carrying it back, a round trip of a mile, I thought Yun Ye, the lazybones, would refuse, but I didn’t expect him to agree.

Li Tai picked the iron balls, one weighing one catty and the other five. Under the supervision of all the teachers and students in the academy, Liu Xian carried the iron balls and climbed up Eagle’s Beak Cliff. They stood on the grassland below the cliff, ready to see how it would turn out.

Liu Xian was a true master, standing on the eagle’s beak, which was more than 100 feet high, without the slightest hint of fear. He was holding the two iron balls, which had been painted red, firmly in his hands. Li Tai didn’t even consider the possibility that Liu Xian was cheating. He was the most trusted servant in the Li family, without a doubt. The reason my father sent him was because of his loyalty. No matter what happened, he would never betray the Li family. This is proven by history.

Liu Xian let go of his hands and the two iron balls fell from his hands at the same time.

When the two iron balls hit the ground, Li Tai heard only one sound, and the scene of the big iron ball hitting the ground first did not appear as he had imagined. Instead, the two iron balls really hit the ground at the same time. Li Tai checked the iron balls on the ground and found that they were correct, one weighing five jin and the other one jin. The audience was in an uproar.

He looked at Yun Ye in confusion. This had overturned his common sense of life, and he needed Yun Ye to explain it to him.

Yin Ye, who was biting a cucumber in his mouth, pulled Li Tai away from the cliff and waved the cucumber in his hand at the mountain. Liu Xian on the top of the mountain threw down two more iron balls. One fell to the ground in an instant, and the other slowly floated down from the top of the mountain with an umbrella on its back, blown by the wind to a distance.

Li Tai widened his eyes trying to figure out why such an incredible thing could happen. Even the teachers at the academy didn’t understand the reason.

“The speed of the falling iron ball is related to air resistance, not the weight of the iron ball.”

“What is air resistance? Why can’t I see it?”

“You saw it. The iron ball was carried away by air resistance, wasn’t it?”

“Does that mean that as long as the umbrella is big and strong enough, even if I jump off a mountain with it on my back, I won’t die?” Li Tai was a little fanatical.

“This is the truth. You won’t try it yourself, will you? Don’t do such a thing, or your father will throw me off the mountain like a ball.”

Yun Ye said that once you understand physics, you will enter a realm, a realm of gods, where you can fly, go to the sea, and destroy the world with a flick of your hand.

There is no mistake, this is the power of God. I want to seize this power, I want to master this power.

At this thought, Li Tai’s body involuntarily trembled…