Chapter 56: The World Is Too Vast, the Great Qin Is Too Small

Two questions struck straight at the First Emperor's soul, leaving him silent because he knew he could not guarantee it.

And that was precisely the crux of the matter.

According to what Li Nian had described of later history regarding the things Huhai had done, he should have executed Huhai immediately to eliminate future trouble. Yet, he genuinely loved this youngest son, and Huhai was still young; he felt there might still be a chance for change.

Thus, the First Emperor fell into a contradictory state of mind: on the one hand, as the master of Qin and for the sake of the empire, he ought to kill Huhai. Even if future events proved Li Nian was lying and he killed the boy unjustly, for the sake of Qin's stability and longevity, executing one misplaced Huhai was of no great consequence.

On the other hand, however, he was a father. He doted deeply upon this youngest son and was reluctant to kill him outright, wishing to see if there were any other way to bring about a change.

This explained why he had gone to visit Huhai, given him a beating, and then, because of the bamboo slips Huhai presented, punished him by making him copy the *Book of Songs*.

These actions were the very embodiment of the First Emperor's indecision on how to handle Huhai!

Because the *Book of Songs* contains the saying, "The Book of Songs contains three hundred pieces, but in a word they may be summed up: Think no evil," punishing Huhai by copying it was done in the hope that he would comprehend the imperial intent and reform himself.

Yet today, Li Nian had directly torn apart this illusion of the First Emperor, laying a cruel reality before him: you have no way to guarantee that Huhai can truly change for the better!

Ying Zheng closed his eyes briefly, then opened them again and asked, "Is there no other method?"

Li Nian replied, "There is, but none of these methods can permanently eradicate future troubles. The reason Prince Huhai is able to wreak havoc and cause the Qin dynasty to perish in the second generation is because he is the son of Your Majesty, possessing the status of a 'prince.' If Your Majesty were to strip him of his status and surname, and then exile him to a distant, unfamiliar land, it might prove effective."

"According to this method, Your Majesty must stage the death of Prince Huhai!"

Simply put, let the person Huhai remain alive, but let the position and status represented by the name Huhai be put to death. Huhai himself would no longer be able to rely on his identity as the First Emperor's son to cause chaos.

Yet, just as Li Nian had stated, while this method might be effective, it could not eradicate future troubles permanently in the way a direct execution would.

"Your servant offers merely a suggestion; how to decide rests entirely upon Your Majesty's judgment!"

Ying Zheng said, "I understand. You are good; you have not deceived me!"

"Not deceived" referred to the fact that Li Nian had dared to speak plainly to him about executing Huhai to permanently eliminate future trouble.

The First Emperor did not reveal how he would choose to deal with Huhai, though Li Nian secretly hoped the First Emperor would opt for the second method he had proposed.

Although that would allow Huhai to live, it would also show that the First Emperor possessed a humane side, proving he was not a completely cold-blooded and ruthless monarch. There would be a chance he wouldn't drag Li Nian down with him to the grave when he passed away.

Human nature was inherently complex and contradictory, and Li Nian was no exception. He both wanted Huhai to die and wanted the First Emperor to handle Huhai using the second method.

Setting aside the problem of Huhai, the First Emperor continued, "According to your method, if all my sons were to become outstanding talents, what should be done then?"

This was a question of what to do when all his sons became exceptionally capable, yet there was only one throne in Qin.

Li Nian answered, "This is easily resolved. If all the princes are exceptional, we need only enfeoff them across the various regions of the world. Like Your Majesty, I do not advocate reviving the enfeoffment system within Huaxia, but for the entire world, it is entirely feasible. Coming here today, I brought a globe; Your Majesty will understand just how vast the world is at a single glance."

"Why haven't you presented the globe yet?"

Immediately, two eunuchs carefully carried in a tilted, multi-colored wooden sphere.

Ying Zheng instructed, "Put it by his desk!"

The eunuchs placed the wooden globe on the table before Li Nian.

Pointing to a region painted black on the wooden sphere, Li Nian said, "This sphere represents the world we inhabit, and this black area is Qin."

Qin favored the color black, so Li Nian had intentionally painted Qin's territory black on the globe.

Despite the distance, the First Emperor could clearly see that his Great Qin occupied only such a tiny patch upon that sphere.

Was this the entirety of Qin compared to the entire world?

He had originally thought his Great Qin possessed the world's most vast territories and boundless lands; looking at it now from this sphere, it scarcely amounted to a hundredth or thousandth of it.

"Upon this sphere, the blue parts are the oceans, and the rest are all lands, divided by different colors into different countries."

Meng Yi said in shock, "Does this not mean the world we inhabit is mostly ocean, as if the land floats upon the sea? How strange! If the world is a sphere, why have we never felt it?"

Noticing other parts of the globe, Meng Yi pointed to a location near the bottom of the sphere and asked, "May I ask, are there countries here as well, and human habitation?"

"There are!"

Upon receiving Li Nian's confirmation, Meng Yi asked in bewilderment, "Living down here, do they not fall off?"

Li Nian explained, "They do not live 'beneath' the sphere, nor do we live 'on top' of it; in the universe, there is no distinction of up, down, left, or right. The reason we and they do not fall off the sphere is because the sphere that forms our world possesses a force that holds us to it."

"The General has experienced this force in daily life as well. For example, when the General tosses a pebble upward, it invariably falls back to the ground—this is precisely the reason. As for why we cannot feel that the world is a sphere, it is because this sphere is simply too vast for us."

"The most direct and brutal way to verify that the world is a sphere is to undertake a global circumnavigation. The *Strategies of the Warring States* speaks of 'driving south while your destination is north,' but in reality, since the world is a sphere, even if you drive south, you may still reach your destination."

Li Nian spun the wooden sphere, drawing a circle across the blue expanse to let Ying Zheng and Meng Yi understand what he meant by global circumnavigation.

No, wait, how had he let Meng Yi lead him off track again? Today was not the day to give the First Emperor a popular science lesson on geography; he was explaining to the First Emperor that the world was vast and Qin was too small. With Qin's current technology, effectively ruling the entire world was impossible, making overseas enfeoffment an absolute necessity.

Li Nian stated, "Your Majesty, please look: the world is too immense. To rule the entire world with Qin's current strength is utterly unachievable. Therefore, the only solution is to enfeoff the princes and send them abroad."

Ying Zheng disliked enfeoffment; he preferred centralized power vested entirely in himself, controlling the entire realm personally. Yet upon seeing that Qin occupied merely such a small patch on the globe, he knew that enfeoffment was the only viable path. Otherwise, how could he govern such a vast domain?

Leaving aside whether Qin possessed a sufficient number of officials, communication alone presented an unsolvable dilemma.

If a rebellion broke out in a certain region and required his personal intervention, because it was too far from Xianyang, even riding the fastest horses day and night would take half a year. By the time his decree was issued and relayed back to the locality, another half-year would have passed.

A year would have gone by, and by then the region would long since have become the domain of the rebels. Of what use would his decree be then?

Looking at so many lands that he was powerless to govern himself, the First Emperor felt a deep sense of unwillingness and asked Li Nian, "If we could manufacture that miraculous device called a mobile phone, would we then be able to rule the entire world?"

Before Li Nian could reply, the First Emperor answered himself, "It is merely my wishful thinking. Great Qin is separated from the later generations from which you hail by a millennium of time; how could such a gap be bridged overnight?"

Though confident, the First Emperor knew such a gap could not be leveled in an instant—he was not a fool!