Lamplight

Wei Yuan stood in midair, gazing down at the earth below as it faded into the twilight. Whenever night fell over the traditional cities of the Nine Kingdoms, only a scattering of lights remained. Only wealthy households could afford candles and oil lamps; ordinary mortals could only rise at the rooster's crow and rest at sunset. Thus, the Great Tang under the cover of night was far truer to reality, using those rare flickers of light and warmth to plainly reveal who was rich and who belonged to an immortal sect. Qingming, however, was different. Lights shone everywhere across the city. Families in countless high-rises more than a dozen stories tall kept their homes brightly illuminated, and from time to time, one could see workers returning late from their shifts, leaping up the building facades and jumping straight through their own front doors. In Qingming, living in a high-rise was a mark of status. Every floor had standardized bathrooms and latrines, far cleaner than any rural farmhouse courtyard. Moreover, coming and going offered an unmistakable opportunity to display one's cultivation to the neighbors. After all, a Jade Bone cultivator could jump two stories higher than someone in the Blood Merging stage. As for consummate Body Casting cultivators, not only did they insist on living on the top floor, but they also routinely carried hefty loads in their hands on their way to and from work. Watching the bustling city below, Wei Yuan could not help but chuckle. These simple folk really lived to show off in front of their neighbors day in and day out. In the month or so since Xiaoyu had assumed office, Yong'an City had changed noticeably. The most striking transformation was the addition of several hundred public latrines scattered across every corner of the city, with high-traffic areas having more than one—a touch that was quintessentially Xiaoyu. Xiaoyu had also established numerous waste collection points, mandating that all rubbish be deposited there, under penalty of fines and demerits. At the same time, he organized vast teams of laborers to sweep every corner clean. At this moment, even though normal dinnertime had passed and many ordinary households in Yong'an City would usually be preparing for sleep, crowds still lingered in the streets. More and more people poured out from their homes onto the thoroughfares. City Lord Xiaoyu had issued an announcement: a momentous declaration would be made tonight during the Hour of the Dog. Yong'an City was home to several million people, and right now at least a million had taken to the streets, creating a sea of humanity. People noticed that peculiar metal pillars had been erected along the roadsides, bearing glass boxes whose purpose remained a mystery. Soon, the appointed hour arrived. A beam of light suddenly descended from the night sky, illuminating the expanse above the City Lord's manor. Xiaoyu descended from the heavens within the pillar of light, his wide sleeves fluttering. He looked every bit like an immortal stepping out of a painting, an exquisite sight beyond words. Yet upon suddenly becoming the focal point of countless gazes, Xiaoyu felt an unimaginable pressure. This was no mere crowd; a million people were watching him. He had never imagined that the combined gaze of countless mortals alone could exert a weight as heavy as a mountain! Xiaoyu felt momentarily dazed. Had generations of Human Sovereigns in the past borne this kind of pressure all along? An instant later, however, another sensation welled up within him. In his consciousness, Xiaoyu said, "This is rather embarrassing!" "Shut up! If you're going to put on a show, see it through to the end! Do your job!" Star Lord Shaoyang's voice rang out, extraordinarily stern. Xiaoyu gritted his teeth, circulating his Dao power so his voice resonated across the entire city, before declaring clearly, "The hour has come!" As he pointed forward with one hand, countless starlights erupted from his body like magnificent fireworks. Sparks flew to every corner of the city, and wherever they landed, they illuminated that entire neighborhood! As if a switch had been flipped, district after district lit up in succession until the entire city blazed with light, as bright as day! Gazing at this miraculous sight, countless mortals were stunned into silence. Many were even moved to tears by the sudden brilliance that pricked their eyes. In the past, such light had belonged only to immortal houses and wealthy clans, but now it had fallen upon the mortal world, descending upon every single person. Suddenly, someone dropped to their knees toward the sky, bowing all the way to the ground, and cried aloud, "Gratitude to the Immortal Lord!" Immediately, swath after swath of people fell to their knees. Cries of "Gratitude to the Immortal Lord!" converged into one, roaring like a tempest, crashing like thunder, shaking like a landslide and an ocean swell! In Wei Yuan's eyes, flecks of azure light surfaced from countless mortals. Half drifted toward the vault of heaven, returning to Wei Yuan. The other half gathered toward Xiaoyu, making his entire body radiate brilliant light! Surrounded by such an immense volume of mortal luck azure qi for the first time, Xiaoyu felt as if he were soaking in a warm spring, an indescribable sense of comfort washing over him. His dharma idol, which had already bordered on flawless, purged yet another trace of impurities under the scouring of karmic luck. Though it was only a negligible sliver, it was exceptionally rare. At Xiaoyu's level, advancing the grade of one's dharma idol even a fraction was monumentally difficult. It was like refining metal: 99.9% purity and 99.99% purity were two entirely different realms. By now, the azure qi swirling around Xiaoyu had become an ocean numbering tens of thousands of wisps, rapidly approaching a hundred thousand. He felt as if he were dreaming, having never imagined that one day he would possess so much karmic luck. Star Lord Shaoyang materialized beside him and smiled. "How does it feel? You understand now, don't you? Earning karmic luck is nothing to be ashamed of!" "Isn't this... a bit too much? All I did was install a few streetlamps..." Star Lord Shaoyang replied, "It's not just that you installed streetlamps. It's that you placed them in your heart. These mortals understand that." "Still..." Xiaoyu felt deeply moved, yet also felt he hardly deserved such praise. Star Lord Shaoyang sighed. "Among mortals, there are lazy and deceitful sorts, and all manner of mediocre people. But if you truly keep them in your heart and examine governance from their perspective, the return they can offer will far exceed your imagination. I too only gained this insight after watching everything Wei Yuan did when Qingming was first founded. But we did this deliberately, whereas I truly have no idea what was going through Wei Yuan's head back then to make him do all those things." The beam of light vanished from the sky, and Xiaoyu faded from view, but the populace began to celebrate. From this night forward, their daily lives would be extended by an entire two-hour watch. The streetlamps Xiaoyu built ran primarily on lamp oil treated with Dao power, where a single jug could burn through the night. Turning the lamps on and off could be controlled by the Zhou Tian Celestial Stars Array, allowing the whole city to brighten or darken in unison, while immediately pinpointing whichever lamp happened to break. In truth, when Xiaoyu first decided to build streetlamps, many people could not fathom the idea. After all, these fixtures yielded no tangible output; they merely made the city cleaner and brighter. Brightness in particular seemed superfluous. Why did the night need to be so bright? Cultivators saw the dark as clearly as day; Dao Foundation cultivators had no need for lamps, and even if they did, they could hardly admit it. Not only was it incomprehensible to many, even Xiaoyu himself had failed to see the point at first. But ultimately, unable to overcome Star Lord Shaoyang's insistence, he had invested the very last of his budget into the endeavor. Wei Yuan had observed the entire transformation. It was not just the streetlamps; the public latrines, the waste stations, and the drainage ditches had all been shifting the hearts of the people bit by bit. The greatest difference between Xiaoyu and his predecessors lay in the fact that he had started with the poorest, most chaotic districts, spending nearly all the funds there to bring them up to the standard of wealthy neighborhoods and bustling commercial avenues. Perhaps it was simply that Xiaoyu could not stomach dirt, disorder, and darkness. But the poorest, most ordinary, and most numerous mortals had reaped genuine, tangible benefits. After tonight, Xiaoyu's measures in Ding'an City would surely be emulated by other cities. The whole of Qingming would diverge ever further from the earthly landscape seen since the Li Dynasty, steadily drawing closer to an otherworldly realm. High in the sky, Wei Yuan looked down at the brightly illuminated city below, and at the stream of people still bustling about during the Hour of the Dog. Not only were they well-fed and warmly clothed, but they also bore responsibilities, duties to attend to, and futures awaiting them. Flames of war still raged on the front lines, yet the mortals' fighting spirit was unprecedentedly high. Now, even without Wei Yuan activating Ephemeral Multitude, they would gladly lay down their lives without hesitation. In the past, what they defended was their homeland, their families, and their children behind them. Now, there was one more thing: the beautiful life they had just attained. Was this not the very definition of a flourishing age? Wei Yuan suddenly recalled when he had first founded Qingming, when he had spoken words that seemed somewhat embarrassing in retrospect. To think that over a decade had passed in the blink of an eye, and Qingming was already showing the beginnings of a golden age in the mortal world. Step by step, the ideals he had harbored back then had drawn considerably closer. Wei Yuan stood with his hands behind his back. With such a Qingming beneath his feet and the hearts of millions resting upon his shoulders, whatever schemes the Shamans might employ, let them come.