The Waning Song Troupe was thoroughly bewildered. One moment it was Dao Xuan Tianzun, the next it was the Saintess. What kind of celestial comedy had they stumbled into?
But when the hand that holds the purse strings commands perform under the stars, you don't argue about the lack of a sun. They assumed their enigmatic patron would at least drape the stage in a hundred lanterns. It wouldn't be perfect, but it would have to do.
No time to lose. All ten of them ducked into the cramped backstage rooms—spaces that held the lingering ghosts of greasepaint and forgotten applause. They barred the door and began the frantic alchemy of their trade: conjuring heroes and ghosts from pots of paste and bolts of threadbare silk.
From above, Li Daoxuan watched their haste. They're expecting lanterns. How... quaint. He rummaged in a drawer and pulled out a string of fairy lights—the cheap, colorful kind meant for festive trees. Perfect for a festival. He reached down, looped the wire around the plastic stage proscenium in a garish halo, found the plug, and flicked the switch.
Click.
The stage awoke in a silent explosion.
This was not the warm, breathing light of oil or flame. It was a cold, electric seizure of color. Crimson, emerald, sapphire, and amber points of light blinked and chased each other in a frantic, silent circuit, painting the smooth plastic in pulsating, chaotic rainbows. The effect was less 'hallowed theatrical tradition' and more 'ramshackle disco summoned from a forgotten box'.
This electric aurora was impossible to ignore. Across the village, figures paused, pointed.
"What sorcery is on the slope? That light… it's unnatural."
"So many colors!That's the Tianzun's signature for sure."
"Ha!Who else? Only he has a taste for such… divine garishness."
"If Dao Xuan Tianzun is lighting the hill,something worth seeing is about to happen!"
A crowd began to coalesce just as Gao Yiye came bounding down from the commercial district, her face alight with a messenger's joy. "By the decree of Dao Xuan Tianzun!" she announced, her voice slicing cleanly through the growing murmur. "A troupe will perform the Northern Ballads tonight!"
"A show?"
"A real play!"
"So the mad lights are for a stage!"
"Wonderful!"
"Something todo!"
A wave of exhilaration swept the villagers. In Gaojia, where entertainment was so scarce that the protracted, awkward romance between the fierce Xing Honglang and the obliviously kind Gao Chuwu passed for gripping serial drama, the promise of professional theater was a social earthquake. Their bellies were full, their evenings long, and their hunger for spectacle was a palpable, pent-up force.
That force now broke its banks. They scattered like startled birds.
"Wife!Children! Now! A performance at the square! We must seize ground or be left viewing from the next province!"
Men who moved with tectonic slowness in the fields became paragons of agility and ruthless spatial negotiation.A human tide surged up the hillside.
The few benches vanished in an instant. Undeterred, the crowd flowed upward, spilling onto the second-floor balconies of the neighboring plastic structures—the tavern, the inn, the optimistically titled 'Pavilion of Artful Conversation'. When even those overflowed, they scaled the roofs.
It became a living amphitheater: three layers deep on the earth, three layers in the mid-air galleries, and a final, daring layer perched upon the eaves.
San-shi'er arrived, his daughter in tow, and met an unyielding wall of backs. He hopped, his stewardly decorum evaporating. "Ahem! Does no one yield a seat for the Third Steward? Your faithful administrator?!"
His plea was swallowed by the din.
The strategically gifted—Tan Liwen, Saintess Yiye, the ever-vigilant Captain Cheng Xu—had entrenched themselves in the prized front-row center long ago. They were not in a charitable mood.
Madam Bai and her son arrived a moment later, their dignified progress their downfall. She surveyed the seething monument of humanity and sighed. "It appears we have been too leisurely, child. We shall retire."
Young Master Bai's face crumpled. "It's Mother's fault. You walk as if measuring the earth for a survey."
THWACK! Madam Bai's palm connected with the back of his head with the crisp, definitive sound of a judge's gavel. "A filial son races ahead to secure his mother's comfort! He does not critique her stately pace! Is this piety? Does this merit correction?"
The boy clutched his skull, enlightenment arriving via stinging osmosis. "This son is wretchedly unfilial and deserved that. Next time, I will fight my way to the very front to secure you the premier vantage!"
Madam Bai nodded, her expression one of profound satisfaction. "Now you comprehend."
"Noodles! Get your hot rice noodles here!" Sensing destiny, Gao Laba began to roar from his stall. "A full stomach for a full show! Don't watch hungry!"
Many had come straight from forge, field, and workshop, supper forgotten. The notion of trudging home to cook was universally dismissed. Gao Laba's stall became the beating heart of a pre-show fair, the merry clatter of his abacus a rhythm beneath the crowd's roar.
Backstage, the ten players froze, half-transformed. The noise beating against the thin wall was a physical thing.
"That…is not the sound of a village."
"A thousand.At the very least."
"Impossible.We are in a famine."
"It looked like a bustling town…but even so..."
"In the third year of drought,no one has the heart for song. Why here? Why now?"
The unspoken truth dawned on them, bright and terrifying as the alien lights: An audience this vast, this eager, does not starve. The realization stole their breath.
"Stop gawking and finish your faces!" roared Master Zhang, his own hand trembling as he tried to paint a steady line. "That is a crowd! Move!"
One of the vocalists raised a hand, his visage now a perfect mask of porcelain tragedy. "Master, I am ready. I can go out and prepare the ground."
"Go! Herald us!"
The singer nodded. With the four musicians following, he led the way down the long, silent, synthetic-feeling passage that led to the stage.
They stepped from shadow into a cathedral of light.
The stage was a jewel box, bound by a scintillating band of captive constellations. Tiny suns of ruby, gold, viridian, and azure winked and danced in a silent, mesmerizing reel. It was nothing of their world—not the honest glow of a lamp, nor the wild dance of a flame. It was pure magic.
The lights pulsed. They chased.
What celestial court have we blundered into? The singer's heart hammered against his ribs. For a troupe that plays on dirt? This is a dream. Or a divine joke.
Then he looked past the blinding radiance, down.
The sea of darkness before him was not dark. It was a vast, rippling landscape of faces—hundreds upon hundreds—illuminated by the reflected carnival glow. Every eye was fixed upon him. Expectant. Alive.
Three years. Three long, silent, dusty years since he had stood before anything but a scattering of ghosts and hollow echoes.
The tears came then, hot and unbidden, carving gleaming tracks through the white powder on his cheeks.
A roar erupted from the darkness, warm, impatient, and wonderfully alive:
"Sing!"
"Save the tears for the tragedy!"
"We've been waiting!"
[Internal Monologue – Li Daoxuan]: Okay, the dramatic pause is great, but my popcorn's getting cold. We've set the mood lighting. Let's get this folk-opera rave started!
The singer dragged a shuddering breath into his lungs—air that tasted of dust, old dreams, and something terrifyingly new: hope. He walked to the dead center of the luminous ring. The musicians found their places in the corners—the three-stringed sanxian, the four-stringed sihu, the bamboo flute, the plaintive guan. They lifted their instruments, ancient shapes etched in electric fire.
The singer tilted his head back, addressing the void above the lights where a god might be listening. His voice cut the night, not with force, but with the pure, piercing, heartbreaking first note of the Pingdiao—the "Level Tone." It flowed, seamless, into the complex melancholy of the Liangqiang, the "Cool Melody," then soared into the fragile, beautiful sorrow of A Lone Plum Branch.
The crowd detonated. "YES!" "AGAIN!" "MORE!"
The high, silent, watchful night was irrevocably shattered. In a world defined by dust and thirst, a perfect, shared vessel of joy had been summoned, whole and complete, into being.
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Footnote - Social Geography: The frantic seat-scrambling highlights a key social shift. In a traditional starving village, hierarchy (like the Steward's status) would be rigidly observed. In Gaojia, where prosperity is widespread and stems from a shared, divine source, community enthusiasm often overrides old formalities, creating a vibrant, chaotic, and uniquely egalitarian social space.