The people of Ning'an County lined up in a loose queue on the street in front of the government office, moving slowly forward like a slow river. But after the woman shouted, the people in the front stepped back and the people behind pushed forward, risking their lives to see Fang Yun.
Some parents even pressed their sons’ heads to the ground, and whispered, “Hurry up and kowtow to Master Xu Sheng!”
In Shengyuan Continent, common people do not bow to officials, but kneeling before the saint is a matter of course. The title of virtual saint is an honorary saint, so those scholars, no matter how great or small their fortunes are, are willing to kneel before the saint.
There was a locust tree on each side of the county government office. Some people couldn't squeeze into the door, so they quickly climbed up the tree and looked down. Soon, even the tree was full of people.
Fang Yun knew that overcrowding would lead to trampling and even casualties, so he immediately held the official seal, coughed lightly, and said, "Please don't crowd to avoid hurting the candidates."
Fang Yun's words combined with the official seal formed a strange force, which made everyone realize the danger of squeezing towards the door and stopped involuntarily.
Some children instinctively felt grateful because they were too thin and small, and already felt uncomfortable in the crowd. The sudden rush of everyone towards the door made them even more uncomfortable.
Fang Yun said: "The love of the examinees' parents for their children and the enterprising spirit of the examinees are all seen by this county, but this place is not a temple after all, so it is not convenient to pray for blessings. However, as the head of a county, I cannot let the people down. How about this, I will name the two stone lions in front of the county government office as 'Mr. Lion' today, and let the two Mr. Lion convey your wishes to me. I will have the servants string up your small items and hang them around the county government office as a pearl curtain for all the people. As for the silver and money, I will send them to the county academy for use in the academy. I wonder if you are willing to comply?"
"Master Xusheng is right!"
Everyone realized that their previous behavior was inappropriate. How could they throw things at the gate? So some people in front took the initiative to pick up the things on the ground and threw them at the lions on both sides.
The guards and soldiers at the door also hurried to clean up. Soon, the two lions were hung with all kinds of purses, ornaments, herbs and other items, piled up into two small hills, and the poor lion heads were covered.
It was inconvenient for Fang Yun to stay at the door for long, so he said goodbye to the people and returned to the county government office.
Those who prayed for blessings were just following the crowd and had no opinions of their own, but now that Fang Yun came out in person and named the two lions Mr. Lion, they suddenly felt that since praying for blessings could attract virtual saints, it might really help their children get good grades in the imperial examinations.
As a result, tens of thousands of people continued to line up to pay homage to Mr. Lion.
Those who left spread the story of Mr. Lion, and others couldn't sit still. Some people would take the exam next year even if they didn't take it this year, so it was definitely better to visit the shrine early than not to do so.
Therefore, in Ning'an County, any family with students who were going to take the imperial examinations would take the students to the gate of the county government to worship Mr. Lion.
Seeing this scene, the officials of Ning'an County Zuo Xiang's party were furious. This kind of behavior is too easy to rally the people. From today on, anyone who wants to incite the people to oppose Fang Yun must be prepared to have their house burned down in the middle of the night.
Therefore, some officials began to fabricate charges against Fang Yun and impeach him. However, they knew that as long as Fang Yun had Xu Sheng as his protection, it was unlikely that they could bring him down with this excuse.
Fang Yun left the county government office from the back door, handed the farm implement drawings to the engineer, pointed out a few points of attention, and then went to the fields as usual.
After several days of study and observation, Fang Yun finally discovered the viciousness of Zuo Xiang.
The agriculture in Ning'an County is in decline. Apart from growing some grains and vegetables in the suburbs and raising some pigs, cattle and sheep, there is no breeding base. Everything has to be purchased from other places. Even if the children of farmers work together, they can only get B at best in farming, not A.
These days, Fang Yun summarized the characteristics of crops in Shengyuan Continent. Due to the abundant vitality, the per-acre yield of grain and vegetables in Shengyuan Continent is relatively high, but the problem is that people here eat a lot, especially soldiers, armored cattle or dragon horses, who eat even more.
A great scholar in agriculture had pointed out long ago that the fertility of the land in Shengyuan Continent was sufficient, but the growth of crops was poor, so Shengyuan Continent attached great importance to breeding. Unfortunately, there was a lack of experience and technical reserves, and the technologies such as hybridization and grafting were available but not perfect.
Fang Yun has found two development directions for farmers.
One is the intensive farming advocated by later generations, which aims to increase grain production by improving the growing environment of crops. This can be fully implemented in Ning'an County. It only requires a small amount of land to verify it, and it will produce results by the time of autumn harvest, and will receive extremely high marks in the palace examination.
Therefore, Fang Yun decided to use the knowledge and experience of later generations to write a "Book of Intensive Farming", which can be applied from sowing to harvesting, from grains to vegetables to fruit trees. Fang Yun actually wanted to write a "Complete Book of Agricultural Administration", but the workload was too large, so he would finish it slowly in the future.
The second direction is to cooperate with the Xu Xing family and personally guide the Xu Xing family's breeding, and the first step is to improve the hybridization technology.
Near noon, Fang Yun and the agricultural staff stood by the field, looking at the farmers working, and said: "Wenxiong, please contact the head of the Xu family for me and tell him that I want to plant some peas. There are only a few agricultural scholars, so I won't mention them. Can you ask a agricultural scholar who can make the plants mature quickly for help? I know that some agricultural scholars have the ability to ripen plants quickly."
"Growing peas? I know you want to study hybridization, but can't you just study rice?" Xu Wenxiong was puzzled.
Fang Yun smiled and said, "Just help me contact them."
"Okay, wait a moment!"
Fang Yun naturally couldn't explain the reason. Peas are self-pollinating and closed-pollinating. In nature, they are basically purebred, and their relative traits are easy to distinguish and can be stably inherited. But rice is different, so it is best to use peas to find the laws of plant inheritance in the early stage to lay the foundation for hybridization technology.
Not long after, Fang Yun contacted the head of the Xu family. After several hours of communication, he finally decided to ask a senior agricultural scholar for help in selecting early-maturing peas.
The growth period of early-maturing peas is only a little more than two months. With the help of the agricultural scholar, the growth period can be reduced to twenty days. Combined with Fang Yun's experiments, it will be enough to summarize the basic laws of plant inheritance, that is, genetic laws, before the end of the palace examination.
Once the laws of plant inheritance are mastered, farming technology will surely advance by leaps and bounds. If someone were to give birth to a similar text book, or condense a related agricultural book, the breeding capacity would reach its peak, and grain production might double or even triple in a few years!
If a super seed is cultivated using holy power or the power of the demon world, the impact it will have on the human race is unimaginable.
By then, the food problem of the human race will be completely solved, and then childbirth will be encouraged, allowing the population to double continuously within a few decades, and the strength will grow wildly.
Fang Yun calculated carefully that if he could double the grain production of the human race, his contribution would be no less than the lifetime achievement of an ordinary semi-saint. If he could quadruple it, his contribution would be close to that of a sub-saint!
As food increases, the total population will increase, the number of scholars will increase, and the total amount of talent will increase accordingly. At that time, there will be more and more scholars with high literary status.
Fang Yun looked at the blue sky ahead and clenched his fists. The peas he planted would become the key to supporting the great development of the human race. (To be continued...)