Chapter Twenty: Grandfather Emperor, your grandson is willing to confess his guilt!

Does this thing really have any great use?

Watching Zhu Yunsong’s confident expression, Zhu Yunwen could not help but feel a sense of suspicion. He shook his head inwardly. That was impossible. Although he was unsure of the device’s function, at best, it was merely a toy. To call it a great treasure capable of benefiting the nation and its people was nothing short of a ridiculous joke.

“Third brother, how can you speak to Imperial Grandfather in such a manner?” Zhu Yunwen chided. “Filial piety, humility, and propriety are the foundations of being a person. Imperial Grandfather has treated you well; at such a young age, you have already been enfeoffed as a Prince. You should be focused on showing your filial devotion, not demanding rewards from him. It is simply inappropriate!”

Having said this, Zhu Yunwen immediately put on an air of maturity and filial respect, turning to Zhu Yuanzhang to say, “Imperial Grandfather, please do not blame my third brother; he is young and ignorant.”

Zhu Yunsong smiled. “Of course, being filial to Imperial Grandfather is only natural. However, as the Son of Heaven, Imperial Grandfather should also be clear in rewards and punishments; only then can one win the hearts of the people. I am not asking for a reward for my own sake, but for the sake of the people of the world, and to establish the credibility of our Great Ming court—that those who contribute shall be rewarded.”

Old Zhu snorted. “You had better explain what this thing is and what it is used for. If it is truly as you say—of great use and beneficial to the nation and the people—I will certainly not be stingy with rewards. But if you are deceiving me with lies, then it will not be a reward, but a heavy punishment.”

Zhu Yunwen immediately interjected, “Imperial Grandfather, even if my third brother has committed a thousand faults, he is still your own grandson and my own brother. No matter how you punish him, you cannot truly keep him under house arrest for the rest of his life! At most—at most—you could strip him of his princely title, and I shall look after him for the rest of his days so he may live a carefree life.”

On the surface, he was pleading for mercy, but in reality, he was subtly reminding Old Zhu to strip Yunsong of his title.

Zhu Yunsong, however, was completely unfazed. He patted his chest and said, “No matter. If this is truly not a treasure that benefits the nation and the people, I shall have no complaints if Imperial Grandfather keeps me under house arrest for the rest of my life.”

He placed the object on the table, unfolded it, and began his introduction without haste.

“This device is called a rotary mimeograph. It is a supreme tool for printing books and text. You simply write the characters on a wax stencil, place it flat on the mesh screen, put the screen frame onto a piece of paper, and run the ink roller over the stencil; you can then copy the text onto a page. Printing is simple, convenient, and fast. Compared to standard movable type or woodblock printing, it is roughly ten thousand times more efficient! With this, our Great Ming Dynasty could even allow everyone to read and write, making every person in the world a scholar.”

“What?” Old Zhu was struck with astonishment, rising abruptly from the dragon throne.

Zhu Yunwen’s expression also changed, and he immediately said, “Third brother, this is no joking matter. You must not deceive Imperial Grandfather in this.”

Zhu Yunsong shook his head. “How would I dare to deceive Imperial Grandfather!”

He took out a prepared wax stencil and, in front of Zhu Yuanzhang, used a quill pen he had crafted to write a few lines. He then placed the stencil on the mesh screen, followed the method he had just described, inserted a blank sheet of paper, pressed down firmly with the ink roller, and removed the page. Sure enough, the characters he had just written appeared on the paper. He then printed a second sheet, then a third.

“Imperial Grandfather, look! With this treasure, printing books and text will be as easy as this from now on!”

This was the simplest form of a mimeograph. In his previous life, while in primary school, he had seen his teachers use such crude machines to print exam papers for students. It was only later, with the advancement of technology and the spread of printers, that they were phased out. Because the working principle and operation were so simple—the machine itself was so rudimentary—anyone could understand how it functioned with a single glance.

Even so, it had taken him quite a bit of effort to complete. The industrial level of this era was truly too low. Things that were mundane and easily produced in the future were difficult to manufacture here. If he were not the Emperor’s grandson, a Prince with the authority to command any craftsman he pleased, and could simply stand by and give instructions, he would never have succeeded on his own.

“Is it really this miraculous?” Old Zhu snatched the ink roller from his hand, laid down a sheet of paper, applied the ink, pressed it, and when he lifted it to look, he threw his head back and laughed loudly. “A divine object! A divine object!”

Old Zhu danced with joy, unable to contain his excitement. If he had any life goals after becoming Emperor, there were two. The first was to ensure everyone in the world had enough to eat and no one went hungry—having lived through starvation himself, he knew the suffering of the common people. He worked diligently to govern for this very reason.

The second was for everyone in the world to be able to attend school and read. To this end, he had defied the collective opposition of the civil and military officials to force the establishment of public schools across the country and promote compulsory education. Yes, the Great Ming of this era possessed the world's earliest and most complete system of compulsory education! For the first time in history, Old Zhu had opened state-run schools in the vast rural areas.

In the second year of the Hongwu reign, even before the Ming had unified the nation and while wars were still raging, Old Zhu had impatiently begun spreading these public schools. He wanted everyone in the world to be literate. He wanted the subjects of the Ming to know propriety and follow the law.

In the imperial court, not a single minister supported this. Whether it was Liu Bowen, Li Shanchang, Hu Weiyong, or those scholars who claimed to be dedicated to spreading the moral teachings of the sages, all of them opposed this policy. For the Great Ming of this era, extending public schools to every rural village was somewhat impractical. Yet, Old Zhu ignored all opposition and pushed forward with unyielding determination. Historically, this policy was abandoned shortly after his death, but for now, Old Zhu was still alive, and the large-scale national public school system continued.

This was his dream—the dream of an Emperor.

However, Old Zhu was well aware of the difficulty of promoting it. He knew that the policy often remained superficial and was poorly executed. But there was no other way. The court’s treasury could not afford to provide books to all the students, and neither could the common people. The reason was simple: books were too expensive.

Although movable type printing had been invented long ago, woodblock printing remained the mainstream in practice because Chinese characters were logographic, not alphabetical, making typesetting an arduous task. Woodblock carvers did not need to be literate; they simply copied the characters. Workers using movable type, however, had to be able to read in order to arrange the characters. But unlike the nine-year compulsory education of the future, reading and writing in this era remained a highly exclusive skill.

“Of all pursuits, only the scholarly path is noble.” If someone could recognize thousands of characters, they could easily make a living elsewhere—why would they choose to be a lowly typesetter? Because printing was so difficult, many books in this era still relied on hand-copying. In fact, even centuries later during the Qing Dynasty, when Cao Xueqin wrote *Dream of the Red Chamber*, it was so widely circulated that people still hand-copied it. Each copy could sell for dozens of gold pieces, and many made a living this way, which also left behind various hand-copied versions for later generations.

This showed that the inconvenience and backwardness of printing technology created a market for hand-copying. In comparison, a mimeograph that allowed one to hand-write a stencil once and then print thousands of copies with an ink roller was incredibly convenient. With this machine, the possibility of printing countless books quickly and cheaply became reality, making universal literacy truly attainable. It would allow Old Zhu to realize the dream that had been out of his reach his entire life. How could he not be thrilled?

“Imperial Grandfather!” Zhu Yunsong struck while the iron was hot. “Your grandson believes that as a ruler, one should not just study for oneself, but ensure everyone in the world can study, so that the wisdom of the sages and the laws of the nation may take root in every heart. That is why I developed this rotary mimeograph. With it, we can print countless books and allow more people in the world to read and write.”

“To make this, I have neglected my studies for a few days and did not read the works of the sages properly. But I believe this, too, is a form of study—studying for the sake of the millions of people in the world! Making sure everyone has books to read and that the people of the Great Ming are literate and cultured is far more important than my own individual study. If this action is wrong, please punish me, Imperial Grandfather! I am willing to accept the blame!”