With his field of vision significantly expanded, Li Daoxuan naturally wanted to quickly survey his new domain.
There was one place he desperately wanted to see, so he prioritized frantically clicking the "West" and "North" buttons.
Soon, his view incorporated a new village, "Shiqu Village." But it was already empty of people. This seemed to be Shi Laosi's village. Continuing northwest, he added another, "Hejiagou," which was also deserted.
He kept clicking...
Click after click, a massive family fort entered Li Daoxuan's view.
The fort was square-shaped, clearly renovated not long ago, with a layout suspiciously similar to a Hakka walled village. It had four tall corner towers and a newly erected watchtower.
On the third-floor balcony of the watchtower sat a man in flowing white robes. He held a book titled First-Year Middle School Mathematics, Volume Two, studying desperately, with a pile of crumpled draft papers on the table.
Bai Yuan! It was Bai Yuan!
Li Daoxuan was overjoyed. Bai Family Fort was finally within sight.
He felt like reaching down to poke Bai Yuan, just to say hello.
But seeing Bai Yuan so engrossed in his math problems, he decided not to disturb him for now.
Li Daoxuan continued adjusting his view, observing the area around Bai Family Fort.
After moving past the fort, he could only shift about one li further north before it stopped, just reaching the foothills of the Huanglong Mountains. He couldn't see the mountain's interior yet.
He pulled the view back, surveying in all directions.
Vast farmlands surrounded Bai Family Fort, but they were all as dry and cracked as the patterns on a turtle's shell. A bit farther out, several small villages guarded the fort in a semi-circle.
This layout was somewhat similar to Gao Village's current situation—Gao Fort at the center, with Refugee Valley, Day Laborer Village, and others encircling it.
Only, Bai Family Fort was much smaller in scale. Moreover, while the fields around Gao Fort were all operational, the land around Bai Fort remained barren yellow earth.
Li Daoxuan casually dragged his view, scanning the several villages around Bai Family Fort. These villages varied in size, some with over a hundred people, others with just a few dozen.
The villagers inside looked much better in spirit than those in the deserted villages he had found before.
Though the natural disasters were merciless, that goofball Bai Yuan was quite compassionate. For the first two years of the drought, Bai Yuan had used his own wealth to aid the surrounding villagers. Later, Li Daoxuan often sent large trucks to deliver food, continuously helping Bai Yuan provide relief.
This allowed the villagers around Bai Family Fort to scrape by, preventing them from fleeing as refugees and essentially stabilizing the population here.
Li Daoxuan felt quite happy seeing Bai Family Fort's condition. It confirmed he hadn't misjudged Bai Yuan all along...
But how should he give Bai Family Fort and the surrounding villages a welcoming gift?
Rain would certainly be a great idea. However, Bai Family Fort plus the large cluster of villages covered an extremely vast area. Li Daoxuan would be overwhelmed trying to make it rain here and there. How long would that take? It didn't seem like a gift that would bring instant joy, more suited for a subtle, nurturing effect.
The gift needed to be big, something to startle the villagers to be fun.
Li Daoxuan continued panning his view. Soon, he discovered something unusual.
Right in the center between Bai Family Fort and that large cluster of villages was a massive depression.
It was truly huge. If Li Daoxuan centered the box on that depression, the giant pit would fill the entire screen. It couldn't be called a depression; it was more like a sinkhole.
Upon closer inspection, he realized Bai Family Fort and the surrounding small villages were all built around this sinkhole.
Li Daoxuan didn't understand at first, but after a few seconds, a lightbulb went off in his head. This wasn't some giant sinkhole at all—it was a lake!
A small lake that had completely dried up!
(Ming Context: Settling around lakes or rivers was a fundamental principle of traditional Chinese village选址 (site selection). A reliable water source was not just for drinking and irrigation; it was the literal lifeline of a community. A dried-up lake at the center of these villages symbolized the core of their current crisis.)
Ancient people loved building villages around lakes. How could he not have thought of that earlier? He was too slow.
Now that he understood, Li Daoxuan knew exactly what gift to give the villagers.
He first prepared several large buckets. Then, he slipped downstairs to the central pond in his residential complex, filling the buckets to the brim, startling the koi fish into scattering, almost scooping one into a bucket.
The full buckets were incredibly heavy. With great effort, he dragged them one by one into the elevator, finally managing to get them upstairs and over to the box.
The mighty Tianzun, sweating profusely from moving a few buckets of water.
Now he could say hello to Bai Yuan.
Li Daoxuan clicked on the words "Bai Family Fort" outside the box, and the view snapped to directly above the fort. Bai Yuan was still buried in his math homework.
Li Daoxuan lifted the box lid and, deliberately not using the Thanos Gauntlet, used his hand to fan some wind toward Bai Yuan...
A strange, powerful gust of wind whooshed toward Bai Yuan.
The draft papers on his table rustled and flew up, scattering everywhere.
Bai Yuan let out a startled "Ah!" and jumped up. "My math problems!"
He lunged forward in a flash, grabbing one just-floating paper, then spun and caught another. In a series of leaps and bounds, swish swish swish, he managed to retrieve several sheets. Then, he laughed heartily at the sky, "Hahahaha! Even a sudden demon wind cannot stop my Bai Yuan's mathematical prowess from advancing by leaps and..."
He stopped mid-laugh, sensing something was off. Above his head, about sixty or seventy zhang high, floated a patch of low-hanging clouds. Wasn't that the exact same kind of cloud that appeared every time the Daoist Mystic Tianzun manifested?
Bai Yuan broke out in a cold sweat, exclaiming urgently, "The Tianzun is here? Ah, ah, ah! I have been most discourteous, actually calling that a 'demon wind' just now. The 'art of propriety'... strike that, strike that! Tianzun, forgive this offense. I truly did not expect the Tianzun to grace Bai Family Fort with your presence."
Li Daoxuan chuckled inwardly. It was him, the Tianzun, being an impish old man and teasing his little people. How could he blame Bai Yuan for a word that slipped out? He took out an A4 paper, printed a few characters, and unfurled it below.
Bai Yuan was just waiting for the Tianzun's judgment when he saw the clouds part. A giant sheet of paper appeared in the sky, bearing the words: "Gather the villagers."
Bai Yuan's spirits soared. He understood—the Tianzun had finally flown to Bai Family Fort and was going to care for his people! Hahaha, excellent! His Bai Family Fort had finally gained the Tianzun's favor.
Overjoyed, he ran to the balcony railing and bellowed to the servants below, "Sound the watchman's clappers! Gather all the villagers! Quick, quick, quick, quick!"
The servants struck the bamboo tubes hanging at the four corners of Bai Family Fort. The sound—kong kong kong kong—spread for miles. Then, the surrounding villages echoed with the same kong kong kong kong sounds as a great number of villagers came running out of their homes.