Being an emperor is not something he can do, so he can only rely on his connections.

in the afternoon.

County government office.

Zhang Jingwei sat at the head of the table, his fingers tapping unconsciously on the rosewood table. His gaze, sharp as a hawk, fell on Fang Yue, who stood below him. He asked in a deep voice, "Fang Yue, tell me. What did you see in Gaoyang Tower during the day? What's so worthy of your outcry that you're so disregarding the occasion?"

Fang Yue took a deep breath, as if making up his mind. He untied the half-worn cloth bag he had been holding tightly in his arms, carefully placed it on the ground, and opened it. Inside was a thick stack of rice paper, densely covered with lines and annotations.

"Sir!" Fang Yue's voice was filled with excitement and urgency. "Please allow me to show the picture and explain in detail!"

Zhang Jingwei nodded, signaling him to continue. Fang Yue immediately squatted down and, with an almost reverent concentration, began to pull out the blueprints from his bag one by one, piecing them together on the ground with swift and precise movements. His movements were swift, clearly indicating he had already memorized the blueprints.

As the drawings unfolded, a breathtakingly complex and detailed diagram of the Gaoyang Tower's structure gradually emerged before everyone! The lines were smooth and precise, and the annotations were clear and detailed. From the layout of the foundation steps, the style and size of the column bases, the arrangement of the beams and rafters, the details of the bracket joints, to the arrangement of the wall brick joints, the angle of the eaves, and even the proposed location of the internal partitions... everything was included! This was far more than a simple sketch; it was comparable to the engineering drawings archived by a professional construction company!

When the last drawing—a drawing that clearly depicted the cross-sectional details of the branch duct at the key load-bearing node of Gaoyang Building—was spread out, Zhang Jingwei suddenly stood up from his chair! He walked around the desk, took a few steps to the drawing, squatted down, and stared intently at the complex and precise cross-sectional structure, his face filled with extreme shock!

"Wait!" Zhang Jingwei raised his head, looking at Fang Yue with burning eyes, his voice filled with disbelief, "Fang Yue, this... this was drawn by you at noon? In just one hour?"

Fang Yue was concentrating on adjusting the angle of the blueprint. He didn't even look up when he heard this, and replied matter-of-factly, "Your Excellency, that's right. I had an outline in mind when I was observing outside Gaoyang Tower, and I immediately drew it after returning to the yamen, not daring to waste a moment."

Huang Liang on the side couldn't help but gasp, pointing to the more than 20 pages of drawings on the ground that covered half of the floor of the government office, his voice trembling: "Sir! This is not the most astonishing! Fang Yue... the time he actually spent in Gaoyang Tower to observe the internal structure, added up... I'm afraid it's less than a quarter of an hour!" This means that Fang Yue almost relied on his fleeting memory and extraordinary spatial imagination and structural analysis ability to restore the skeleton of this huge building in a very short time!

Zhang Jingwei slowly stood up, his gaze returning to Fang Yue, filled with unprecedented scrutiny and wonder. He paced slowly, his voice tinged with realization, "Back in Yunzhou, I heard about you at the military camp. They all said you were proficient in engineering, a rare talent, even the military camp's master craftsmen were full of praise. I took it as flattery at the time... I never expected..." He paused, looking at the breathtaking blueprint on the floor, and spoke word by word, "I never thought you would be so proficient! Such talent is incredible!" This evaluation was already extremely high.

Fang Yue felt a little embarrassed by the praise and said quickly, "Your Excellency is too kind! I am just... just a little obsessed with this. Your Excellency, please allow me to continue reporting the doubts I saw in Gaoyang Tower today!"

Zhang Jingwei collected his thoughts and said sternly, "Okay! Go ahead!"

Fang Yue pointed to the densely packed foundation stone locations marked on the blueprints and said solemnly, "Please look, sir. Today, we have observed the interior of Gaoyang Tower, especially the positions, traces, and stress conditions of the foundation stones beneath the load-bearing column bases on the ground and second floors... Compared to the foundation stone distribution diagrams we saw with our own eyes and remembered when it was first built, we have... actually missing three or four out of ten! This is absolutely not something that can be explained by normal repairs or renovations!"

He walked over to another drawing depicting the exterior of Gaoyang Tower and continued, "What's even stranger is that the students walked a few feet outside the building and, combining the subtle variations in the wall brickwork and the tilt of the eaves, deduced that Gaoyang Tower... it... it seems like every side is missing a crucial support!"

Yang Zhao frowned and offered a possible explanation: "Could it be that the internal compartments were modified? The partition wall blocked the original location of the foundation, causing you to misread it?"

Zhang Jingwei immediately shook his head to deny Yang Zhao's guess: "There should be no partition blocking the key foundation. I have been to the top floor of Gaoyang Tower. The view from there is excellent, the windows are wide open, and the street scene is in full view." He recalled the scene at that time.

Fang Yue keenly grasped this detail and immediately asked, "Your Excellency, what did you see from the top floor? Was it the view from South Street or North Street?"

Zhang Jingwei was confused and replied, "You can see both north and south. The windows are open on both sides, and you can see the south and north streets. What's wrong? What's the problem?"

Fang Yue's brows knitted together, his eyes filled with confusion. "That's strange, sir! Gaoyang Tower is a long building running north-south. Since the top floor is transparent from north to south, it means there are no complicated partitions or mezzanines on the top floor, and its structure should be relatively transparent and coherent. But if that's the case, how could the foundations on the bottom floor, which support the weight of the entire building, be missing so much for no reason? This completely violates the basic principles of building load-bearing! Unless..."

Zhang Jingwei followed Fang Yue's train of thought, his eyes flickering as he said in a deep voice, "Unless... the structure of this building isn't as simple as it appears on the surface. Fang Yue, you don't know that Gaoyang Tower originally had fourteen floors!"

"Fourteenth floor?!" Fang Yue exclaimed

Zhang Jingwei nodded and said, "That's right. It has seven floors on the outside and fourteen on the inside. I was also extremely shocked when I saw it."

"Building within a building!" Fang Yue blurted out, his eyes flashing with brilliance! "Sir! 'Fourteen floors built in'! This is most likely a 'building within a building' structure! Within the framework of a larger building, one or more independent floors are cleverly nested! From the outside, it looks like seven floors, but the interior is divided into two, adding up to fourteen floors! This is a solution to spatial division and structural stability in high-rise buildings... Although extremely risky, it's not completely impossible!"

Zhang Jingwei immediately shook his head and retorted, "No! If I were in the mezzanine of a building within a building, how could I see the north-south street view? There must be a partition blocking my view!"

Fang Yue's thoughts were remarkably clear. He pointed to the top floor on the blueprint and said, "Sir! You were on the top floor! The top floor! The 'building within a building' structure is very likely to have undergone special treatment near the top for the sake of light and visibility! The structure of the top floor is likely completely different from the one below! It may have eliminated the internal mezzanine partitions, restoring it to a complete large space, or it may have adopted a special light-transmitting design to achieve the north-south transparency you mentioned! This precisely explains why the foundation of the ground floor is reduced - because part of the load-bearing is shared or transferred by the internal nested building structure!"

Zhang Jingwei listened to Fang Yue's analysis, his eyes brightening, but his brow furrowing ever tighter. He paced back and forth in front of the blueprint, his hands behind his back, muttering to himself, "I think... I've just thought of something... It's a very detailed thing... It's crucial..." His memory raced back, trying to grasp a fleeting scene from the top floor of Gaoyang Tower that he hadn't noticed at the time.

Suddenly, he stopped dead in his tracks! His eyes were as sharp as lightning.

"That's right!" Zhang Jingwei slammed the table, his voice filled with urgency and excitement. "Hurry to the prison! Bring that Deng family slave to me! Immediately!"

Although Huang Liang was still a little dazed by the information about "building within a building" and "missing foundation", seeing Zhang Jingwei's anxious expression, he knew that the matter was of great importance and did not dare to be negligent. He immediately bowed and responded: "Yes! Sir! I will go and get the person!" After that, he turned around and rushed out of the government office.