Chapter 153: The Bottomless Fish Tanks
Li Daoxuan strolled through the flower and bird market and soon found a shop selling fish tanks.
Fish tanks of all sizes, quite beautifully crafted.
Li Daoxuan reached out and ran a hand over one of the tanks. Tsk, not bad at all. Several millimeters of thick glass, sturdy and stable.
To allow buyers to comfortably view the fish inside, despite its thickness, the glass was crystal clear, almost invisible. If used as a glass door in a shopping mall, a "Caution: Glass" sign would definitely be needed, otherwise someone would surely walk straight into it.
Seeing Li Daoxuan meticulously examining the glass, the shop owner understood immediately. This wasn't a casual browser; the man clearly had an intent to buy. He darted out, a smile spreading across his face. "Handsome, looking for a fish tank? You've come to the right place. My tanks are the highest quality in this market."
Li Daoxuan smiled. "Indeed, I'm quite satisfied."
The owner's face lit up. "Then which one would you like?"
Li Daoxuan said, "I'd like... a fish tank without a bottom."
"Pfft!" The owner almost spat out a mouthful of old blood. "What did you say? A bottomless fish tank? Isn't that just four pieces of glass in a circle? How would it hold water? How would you keep fish without water? Are you messing with me? No bottomless fish tanks, absolutely none. I can't do business like that."
The owner's commercial smile snapped back into place instantly. "Oh, that's simple! I'll just melt the silicone sealant, and the bottom of the tank will come right off. I can modify them for you on the spot, guarantee every single one is bottomless, ha ha ha! Fish tanks don't need bottoms at all; you're clearly an expert in fish keeping, only an insider like you truly knows how to do it right."
The boss got to work immediately, melting the silicone sealant from the fish tank bottoms and removing them. A beautiful aquarium was transformed into nothing more than four glass panels forming a circle.
He was probably cursing this 'idiot' in his mind, but outwardly, his expression remained perfectly serene. It didn't take long before twenty bottomless fish tanks, in various sizes, were delivered.
The larger ones were tens of centimeters long, the smaller ones about ten, and they came in both round and square shapes.
Li Daoxuan added a delivery fee on top of that.
The owner personally drove, transforming into a delivery driver, helping him carry all twenty fish tanks upstairs. As he left, he shook Li Daoxuan's hand, then leaned in and whispered, "Handsome, if all your fish die in a few days, and you need to buy new fish and tanks, please come back to my shop."
Having said his piece, he bolted.
Li Daoxuan returned to his box. First, he glanced at Gao Family Village. Xing Honglang had already followed Gao Yiye to the watchtower, and the two girls had closed the doors and windows, applying the "divine medicine" to Xing Honglang's wound.
Gao Chuwu, meanwhile, had disappeared, likely off somewhere to wallow in self-pity.
The other villagers were busy trading goods with the salt smugglers.
Li Daoxuan tapped "Zheng Family Village" on the outside of the box, and the scene instantly shifted, taking him above Zheng Family Village.
He mentally outlined the layout of the fields outside Zheng Family Village, dividing them into several sections. Then, he selected a perfectly sized bottomless fish tank and gently placed it over one section, pressing it down slightly so the glass embedded a short distance into the ground. This would prevent bandit forces from digging tunnels underneath.
He selected another section and placed another fish tank over it.
In mere moments, six or seven fish tanks were in place.
Zheng Family Village's numerous fields, large and small, were now all covered by the massive, bottomless fish tanks. "Excellent," Li Daoxuan clapped his hands. "That's that!" Now, there was no need to worry about random bandits from Heyang County suddenly appearing to ruin the crops.
He tapped "Gao Family Village" again, and his view instantly snapped back to the village. Gao Yiye and Xing Honglang had finished applying the medicine; Xing Honglang's right arm was now wrapped in white cloth, simply bandaged. Judging by the extent of the bandage, the injury was clearly quite severe.
Yet, there wasn't a trace of pain on her face; she remained as bold and unyielding as ever. No wonder no one had noticed her injury earlier; only Cheng Xu had spotted a hint of it in her boxing movements.
Gao Yiye said, "Sister Xing, since you're injured, please don't run around. It would be best to let your arm heal a bit before you leave."
Xing Honglang nodded. Losing to Gao Chuwu earlier had made her realize her combat effectiveness had significantly dropped. If she ran around without letting her injury heal, she might well die at the hands of some idiotic bandit. So, she no longer tried to appear strong. "Thank you for your kindness, Saintess. I will impose upon Gao Family Village for a few days then."
Gao Yiye smiled faintly. "The Heavenly Lord promised Sister Xing last time that if you were willing to return, we would prepare a residence for you. Look, on that hillside..."
Gao Family Village's northern slope, once barren with trees stripped of their bark and withered, had been completely cleared of trees by the diligent labor of the reformed prisoners.
A few days prior, Li Daoxuan had taken a small shovel and reached into the box. In a few quick scoops, he cleared an open area on the northern slope and arranged a large cluster of hard plastic buildings, naming it the "Gao Family Commercial District."
Inside, there was a large mansion provided for Xing Honglang and her salt smuggler subordinates to rest, along with a wet market, and a circle of other buildings: a brothel, an inn, a restaurant, and a teahouse.
Unfortunately, as soon as Li Daoxuan placed them, he remembered: fires couldn't be lit inside plastic houses. So, the restaurants and teahouses were impractical. Later, he'd have to let the little people build stone ones themselves. For now, the plastic restaurants and teahouses could only serve as pretty decorations.
As for the brothel... *cough cough*... scratch that, scratch that!
Xing Honglang looked at the colorful buildings spread across the hillside, and couldn't help but murmur to herself: "This Heavenly Lord, who has never shown his face, is certainly generous and open-handed, incredibly lavish with his gifts."
"But his aesthetic sense leaves much to be desired. Why make the houses so brightly colored? Too gaudy, it clearly doesn't look like a reputable place."
Complaints aside, if someone's offering a grand mansion, why not take it?
She quickly moved into the mansion with her subordinates.
The mansion was opulent, grand, and high-class, with pavilions, towers, gardens, and rockeries – it had everything imaginable.
In the back garden, there was a beautiful flowering tree. Though Xing Honglang appeared rough and unrefined, deep down she was still a woman who appreciated flowers. She reached out, intending to pluck one to admire, but after tugging for a long time, she couldn't break off a single branch. She simply couldn't get a flower down.
Only then did she realize that this flowering tree was utterly bizarre, made of some strange material that was neither gold, iron, nor wood – truly inexplicable.
That evening, Gao Chuwu arrived. He stood at the entrance of the plastic mansion, hands hanging by his sides, not even daring to knock. He spent a full half-hour muttering apologies at the twin plastic doors.
He thought no one was listening, unaware that the salt smugglers were always vigilant. Sentries were positioned behind the plastic doors and had long since informed Xing Honglang.
Xing Honglang stood behind the door, listened for a short while, then hummed "How tedious" under her breath, and went back to sleep.
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