The Overlord of Puluo

Li Banfeng gently pushed open the door to the fifth room. He did not want to embarrass the Film Projector too much, but he made sure the Film Projector knew he had come in.

The Film Projector remained composed and greeted him. ”Director Qi, still awake?”

Li Banfeng smiled and dropped onto the sofa beside the Film Projector. The two of them sat there quietly, watching the little show flickering across the screen.

The words appeared on the left, while on the right the story came to life in moving pictures.

Li Banfeng knew the story. He had read it in the newspaper before, though it was nothing like the usual tales from Blackstone Slope. This one crept around its meaning instead, telling everything in a quiet, delicate sort of way.

Every now and then, the picture gave a little jump and skipped a frame. Whatever he was watching, it had not actually been filmed.

Li Banfeng asked, ”Who is this young lady? Aren’t you going to introduce me?”

”You mean her?”

The image froze on the heroine. The Film Projector answered calmly, ”I imagined her.”

Li Banfeng said nothing. He watched the entire story before finally giving his verdict. ”It was filmed very well. You just need to put a little more thought into the editing.”

With that, Li Banfeng headed back to his room to sleep. Just as he reached the door, the Film Projector called out from behind him. ”Director Qi, I have always been utterly loyal to you, and that has never changed. When we go into battle, I will always fight for you until the very last moment.”

Li Banfeng nodded. ”I have never once doubted that.”

As an expert in this sort of thing, Li Banfeng could say with certainty that the woman had not come from the Film Projector’s imagination. She was far too real. Yet she had not been captured by an actual camera either. If she had neither been filmed nor imagined, then what exactly was she?

Li Banfeng sat in the sixth room and pondered the question for a long time. Before long, the Film Projector’s voice reached his ears again. ”Don’t be shy. This is the honesty that comes from art!”

”But this is... a little too honest...”

”My heart contains nothing but the purity of art!”

”For real?”

”Don’t listen to his nonsense. He’s up to no good.”

There’s someone else! More than one person has gotten into the Pocket Dwelling.

There was another person in there. The voice was so faint that Li Banfeng could not even tell whether it belonged to a man or a woman. The voice had not come from the fifth room. Li Banfeng looked around in the sixth room for a while, listening carefully. The voice he had just heard seemed to have come from a different direction.

He got up and went into the seventh room. After listening for some time without hearing anything, he moved on to the eighth room.

When he pushed the door to the eighth room, he saw that it was completely empty inside. There wasn’t even a single piece of furniture. Yet somewhere in the empty room, he thought he could hear the faintest trace of sounds.

He could barely make out the sound. He was close to hearing it. If his Perceiving the Spirit’s Melody improved just a bit more, he would be able to hear it clearly.

Li Banfeng focused all his attention on his ears. He strained until his temples began to throb, but he still could not pick up another sound in the eighth room.

Recently, because he had leveled up, his Perceiving the Spirit’s Melody had improved quite a lot. Unfortunately, whoever had slipped inside had suddenly gone silent.

Li Banfeng rubbed his temples and headed toward the ninth room. Just then, a woman’s voice suddenly reached his ears. ”Why isn’t this madman asleep? What is he up to now?”

Why is this voice so clear? Li Banfeng suddenly turned around and shouted, ”WHO DID YOU CALL A MADMAN!”

Crimson Lotus flinched. ”You heard me?”

Among everyone in this household, Crimson Lotus had been around even longer than the Pocket Dwelling itself, but this was Li Banfeng’s first time hearing her voice.

Crimson Lotus’s voice was not nearly as sweet as Wifey’s. It had something else instead, something cool and clever and terribly sensible. The sort of voice that made Li Banfeng picture a woman with neat hair cut just below the ears, rimless glasses perched on her nose, and a smart little office suit.

Li Banfeng struck a match, lit the candle, and plopped himself down beside Crimson Lotus. ”Well, well. I never knew you had such a nice voice.”

”As if it could compare with your precious Wifey,” Crimson Lotus said and gave a chilly little snort. She didn’t want to give Li Banfeng any attention.

A faint glow still shimmered across the lotus leaves. Crimson Lotus was making another batch of pills.

Li Banfeng eyed the glow. ”You are not making another Profound Essence Pill, are you?”

”What’s wrong with a Profound Essence Pill? Is it not good enough for you now? Do you have any idea how many Cloudborne Layer cultivators would happily risk their necks for a single one?”

Li Banfeng answered quite simply, ”But I am not at the Cloudborne Layer.”

”You should think a little further ahead. I really am looking out for you. I won’t let you suffer.”

Li Banfeng paused, then broke into a smile. ”Well, in that case, it seems I have misunderstood you. It’s wrong of me to keep you here. You must have felt some grievances. I will carry you back to the second room.”

”No need. I like it here. The farther I am from that wicked woman, the more peace and quiet I get.”

”Peace and quiet? Do you really feel peace and quiet?” Li Banfeng glanced around the room. ”Have you ever heard any strange voices around here?”

Crimson Lotus’s leaves trembled for a moment. Then she said, ”I have heard voices. I have heard them in every single room.”

Li Banfeng stared at her. ”Every room?”

Crimson Lotus sounded thoroughly annoyed. ”Every time a new room gets created, you would move me there. I have lived in every one of them, so of course I have heard what goes on inside.”

Li Banfeng decided to ask the important question first. ”How many people are living in the Pocket Dwelling? I mean people I don’t know.”

Crimson Lotus thought for a moment. ”As far as I know, there is at least one in every room.”

Li Banfeng’s expression changed. ”Who are these people?”

”I haven’t the faintest idea. Their voices are so muffled I can’t even tell whether they are men or women.”

Li Banfeng frowned. ”I was in the fifth room just now, and I heard a woman’s voice.”

”I lived in the fifth room once too, and I heard voices there. But I really couldn’t tell whether they belonged to men or women.” Crimson Lotus considered it. ”Perhaps that wicked woman’s Perceiving the Spirit’s Melody works differently from mine, so you can hear them more clearly.”

Li Banfeng asked again, ”Do you know what any of them have said?”

Crimson Lotus answered, ”That’s even harder to figure out. In this whole house, your Wifey is probably the only one who can hear them clearly.”

Li Banfeng frowned. ”What about the Pocket Dwelling? Can’t he hear them himself?”

”Who knows? Maybe he simply can’t be bothered.”

As the two of them spoke, a peculiar chuckle suddenly drifted into Li Banfeng’s ears.

”Heheheh...”

It was a muffled laugh that sounded so unclear that Li Banfeng could not tell whether it came from a man or a woman.

Crimson Lotus’s leaves trembled. She was trying to find where the sound came from too, but she could not trace it.

Li Banfeng asked, ”You really want to stay in the ninth room?”

”As long as you don’t move me again.”

”Sure. Then you will be called Ninth Flower from now on.”

Crimson Lotus froze. ”I already have a name. I don’t need a new one. I am fine being called Crimson Lotus...”

Having settled that to his own satisfaction, Li Banfeng went back to the sixth room to sleep.

By noon the next day, Li Banfeng went to the main room. After spending some time being affectionate with the Gramophone, he asked, ”Darling Wifey, did you hear anything unusual last night?”

”Huff~”

Wifey gave a soft laugh. ”Darling Husband, I did hear a few things, but nothing important. You don’t need to worry. Just leave it to me.”

With Wifey saying that, Li Banfeng felt relieved.

Wifey clearly knew about the other residents in the Pocket Dwelling, including where those voices came from and how to deal with them. For the moment, however, it was inconvenient for her to explain” everything to Li Banfeng.

When Li Banfeng went out of the Pocket Dwelling, the workers just happened to be taking their lunch break.

Night-Blooming Jasmine was an evening paper, so the afternoon workload was heavy and the lunch break was short. The workers usually did not bother taking a nap. After eating, they smoked a cigarette, read the paper for a while, then went back to whatever they were doing.

The supervisor brought over the attendance sheet. They were printing extra copies today, which meant that the work was more tiring this time. Everyone who had shown up was asked to sign their name as there would be a bonus at the end of the month.

Li Banfeng glanced at the sheet and frowned. Quite a few people in Blackstone Slope could read, but not many could write well. It was not that they could not write at all. Their handwriting was simply terrible, full of crooked characters, missing strokes, and little mistakes everywhere.

One of the new workers was a young man named Xiaofu. He really could not write. He could not even recognize his own name, so all he could do were simple jobs like folding newspapers and delivering them.

After lunch, he copied the older workers and picked up a newspaper to read.

Of course, he could not read the words, so he could only look at the pictures. There were only a few of them, and he finished looking through them in no time. Everyone else was still reading the front-page news.

”Mister Song, what is the part you are reading?”

With the newspaper in hand, Mister Song lowered his voice and explained the passage to Xiaofu.

After hearing it, Xiaofu’s veins bulged. ”Something like this actually happened? That young miss can do that? Is this story true or made up?”

Mister Song waved a hand. ”Who knows? You will have to decide for yourself.”

”Decide? How am I supposed to tell?” Xiaofu got so worked up that he stood up. He wanted to go ask someone else, but after taking two steps, he quickly sat back down.

His trousers were too thin.

”Mister Song, tell me, which three characters make up that young miss’s name?”

Mister Song laughed. ”You little brat. You still haven’t even learned your own name, so why do you care what hers is?”

”I just want to know where she shows up again later...”

Li Banfeng watched Xiaofu for a long moment. Then Little Chuan, who was beside him, said, ”When I first came to Blackstone Slope, I could only look at the pictures too. I thought the pictures here were really good. Later, people told me that the stories told in words were even better. I didn’t believe them at first, but after they read a passage to me, I realized they were right. You could really find anything and everything in the writing.

”Then, I kept pestering people to read the newspaper to me. Because of you and Master Wu, they would read me a few lines at first, but if I asked too often, they would get annoyed. Some things just weren’t exactly convenient to read out loud either.

”So I got myself a dictionary and started learning on my own. Whenever I couldn’t figure something out, I asked other people. If they didn’t want to explain it, I would offer them a cigarette. After doing that for long enough, I eventually learned to read an entire newspaper by myself.”

Li Banfeng stared at him. ”You taught yourself to read just so you could read the newspaper?”

Chuan scratched his head. ”I can read, but writing is another matter. I keep getting the strokes wrong, and my handwriting looks awful.”

Yu Wenqi laughed. ”My handwriting was terrible when I was young too. I taught myself, so there were always little things I did wrong. Later, I met Old Bai. He was from Ink Fragrance Shop, and every stroke he wrote looked beautiful.

”I wasn’t willing to admit defeat, so I went out and bought copybooks. I practiced writing while studying articles, and after spending enough time with Old Bai, I eventually became a real scholar too.”

So Yu Wenqi and Bai Qiusheng had come from very different backgrounds. Yu Wenqi had started out as a laborer.

Li Banfeng looked over the attendance sheet again and saw that almost every worker who had shown up was the same. They had learned to read just so they could read the newspaper?

Li Banfeng walked around among the workers during their lunch break. What he saw was almost exactly as the Peddler had described. About half of the workers could read.

During lunch, it was easy to tell who could and who could not. The ones who could read held newspapers and discussed the stories with each other. Those who could not read could only stand nearby and listen. They did not dare join the conversation, and some barely dared make a sound.

When work resumed in the afternoon, the workers who could read got first pick of the jobs. Whatever was left went to those who could not.

There was no point complaining. Workers who could not read could not even understand the work orders.

Among these workers, some would slowly separate themselves from the rest and force themselves to learn how to read.

Is this why literacy is so high in Blackstone Slope? Li Banfeng muttered inwardly. No, that doesn’t seem right. Factories elsewhere work the same way. Workers who can read have an advantage, but that doesn’t mean the others go out of their way to learn. So why is Blackstone Slope different?

Li Banfeng was still thinking when Xiaofu came running back, covered in sweat. He was holding a dictionary he had bought from one of the other workers. It was old and worn, with many pages patched and repaired.

Even so, Xiaofu treasured it. He carefully tucked it into his shirt, and while folding newspapers, he would secretly take it out from time to time and compare the words inside with the ones printed on the page.

As long as he could learn to read, every story in that newspaper would become a reward waiting for him.

The reward itself was cheap. Once the story was finished and the excitement passed, there was not much left to it. But that did not matter. There would be a new reward tomorrow, and every day brought something different.

The more newspapers they read, the more rewards they found. Their social circles changed, and as they talked with others, they learned more and more words. Their status improved along with it.

If they pushed themselves a little further and learned how to write and learn to write articles, they might get the chance to work in the building out back.

This was a virtuous cycle!

The newspapers were the key to this whole cycle, but not just any newspapers. It had to be the special kind that only Blackstone Slope seemed to produce.

Did Greenwater City not have books and papers like that? Of course it did. You could find them tucked away in the corners of bookstores. But first you had to know where to look. Then you needed enough experience to guess what sort of thing you were getting from the title and the little description beneath it.

A person who could not read had no way of judging any of it. They might not even dare step inside a bookstore in the first place.

What was different about Blackstone Slope?

Li Banfeng stepped out of the newspaper office and looked down the street. There were more than a dozen newspaper stands along a single road.

Getting your hands on a newspaper here was ridiculously easy.

The roar of the printing presses broke into his thoughts and reminded him of something else.

It was not only easy to buy newspapers in Blackstone Slope. It was even easier to print them.

Blackstone Slope was full of paper mills and printing houses, and both paper and ink were cheap.

That kept the cost of producing newspapers low, so they could be sold cheaply too. More money could then be spent on the content itself.

It was another virtuous cycle.

That was how Blackstone Slope’s whole literary culture had taken shape. Two virtuous cycles were working together, encouraging people to learn on their own.

Li Banfeng had always thought he knew Blackstone Slope well. Only now did he realize that someone had arranged all of this with remarkable foresight, and he had never noticed it before.

Who was behind it?

***

Inside an abandoned factory, Tang Shijiang reached under a lathe and pulled out a battered metal lunchbox. ”Hungry? Come on, have something to eat first.”

The rickshaw driver dropped the rickshaw at once. ”Senior Brother, how could I possibly eat right now? I came here to beg you for a favor!”

Tang Shijiang smacked his lips and gave him a look. ”Could you stop calling me Senior Brother? Having you for a junior brother is downright embarrassing.”

Author’s Note:

PS: Tang Shijiang is the land deity of Blackstone Slope, and he has always liked people with guts.