Upon learning about the properties of the Gene Repair Fluid, Li Lianhua agreed without hesitation, though it was conditional upon the completion of the Lotus Tower.
Once she understood the physical requirements for using the Gene Repair Fluid, Yun Qingyue resolved to study medical arts diligently. Yueyue had to be well!
With so many good things here, Yueyue would surely recover, and the two of them could spend much more time together.
Lasting three months, Li Lianhua, alongside two skilled carpenters and four laborers, finally finished building the Lotus Tower. Midway through, due to Li Lianhua's high standards, he even went out to purchase several loads of top-grade timber!
As the construction neared completion, Li Lianhua went to the village chief to propose holding a completion ceremony to thank the villagers for their help.
Looking at the bustling beach once again, five or six village women tended to three large, steaming cauldrons. The rest of the villagers were busy with their respective tasks—picking vegetables, washing greens, chopping meat, kneading dough, and arranging tables and chairs. Shouting and laughing, the scene was filled with a vibrant energy that filled Li Lianhua and Yun Qingyue with deep admiration.
Installing the steps at the entrance of the tower was the final task, and the carpenters insisted that Li Lianhua complete this ritual himself.
"Clang, clang, clang," the final piece of wood locked into place. Li Lianhua stood up and happily announced, "Finished!"
"Yay, yay, yay! Congratulations, Brother Lianhua!" cheered the village children.
"Hahaha, congratulations, congratulations!" chorused the villagers.
"Congratulations, kid Li! Come on over, let's have a drink together!" called out the village chiefs from the surrounding settlements...
Surrounded by the enthusiastic crowd, Li Lianhua broke into a bright, hearty laugh in front of others for the very first time. Yun Qingyue could tell he was truly happy from the bottom of his heart.
Because he wanted to make amends, the two of them had done many things. The villagers finally had money to repair their damaged boats, the women and children had new clothes to wear, the sick elderly had money to buy medicine, and the children could occasionally enjoy a snack. This must be the divine life the common folk dreamed of living!
Starting the next day, Li Lianhua and Yun Qingyue slowly began organizing their new home. Starting with Yun Qingyue's boudoir on the second floor, it actually took them ten days just to get everything in order!
Because the Lotus Tower was quite heavy, the two of them bought four more horses, making a magnificent and swift team of six horses arranged in two rows. After moving in, they were in no hurry to leave. Li Lianhua trained the horses and then drove the Lotus Tower to an open spot near the village entrance to park.
Just as they had finally finished tidying up and were ready to leave, Li Lianhua discovered that Yun Qingyue was no longer satisfied with merely fishing in coastal waters. She actually wanted to go deep-sea fishing! She said the fish near the coast should be left for the villagers, and since she wanted to catch plenty of fish to take with her, they had to head out into the deep sea using a large boat!
Well, what could Li Lianhua say to that? Knowing that Yun Qingyue possessed a remarkably large boat, Li Lianhua had no choice but to humor her and risk his life alongside her. That afternoon, the two of them locked the front door of the Lotus Tower, and Yun Qingyue released a speedboat, dashing off toward the deep sea.
Rounding a reef island, Yun Qingyue stopped the speedboat and looked with a smile at Li Lianhua, whose eyes were shining with excitement. "I'll teach you how to drive it, shall we? Let you experience a speed and thrill quite different from Qinggong."
Watching the young man in his long, narrow-sleeved robes laughing and shouting with joy as he steered the speedboat back and forth across the ocean, Yun Qingyue smiled as well. You see, she had managed to keep both Li Xiangyi and Li Lianhua alive in this world!
With the reef island blocking the view from the coast, Yun Qingyue felt safe to bring out her large luxury yacht. She turned to look at the man, who merely raised an eyebrow slightly. "Do you want to play with this, or go up and take a look first?"
Li Lianhua acted quite sedate and mature at the moment. "Let's go up and take a look first. Are there any fishing rods? I'll come back and fish here later!"
"Of course there are, everything is here! Here you go, completely equipped." Yun Qingyue said, handing him a fishing gear bag. After watching him put down his fishing tackle, she led him up to tour the yacht!
"So the reason you came out so late was because of this boat? You can actually live inside it!" Li Lianhua remarked with a sudden understanding.
Without answering Li Lianhua's tease, she smiled and asked in return, "I'm about to cast my nets. Are you coming down or not?"
One had to admit that whether it was those special identity documents or the modification of vehicles and vessels, future technology was truly top-notch!
Li Lianhua returned to the speedboat with some food, drinks, and warm clothes, sailed some distance away to avoid the net-casting area, and leisurely began casting his line. While fishing, he snacked and let his mind wander.
Ah, fishing like this for the very first time—this boat was simply fantastic! Life was full of pleasant surprises everywhere, though it was a pity it wouldn't be easy to pull this out to play with once they left this place!
As for Yun Qingyue, an hour later she watched as the machinery slowly hauled the fishing net back up. Her jaw slowly dropped in astonishment. What was that reflecting a multicolored sheen?
Opening the net, Yun Qingyue immediately reached in and picked it up... Ah, it was a sword, pulled out from among the fish trapped inside. What kind of sword was this? It had no markings, and it wasn't even sharpened yet! Oh well, she'd put it away for now.
She looked more closely at the harvest. Wait a minute—did the martial arts here defy logic, and did the fish and other creatures here grow just as unreasonably?
How was there every kind of fish imaginable? There were even pearl oysters here too! What were they waiting for? Hurry up and cast the nets again...
The sun was about to set. Li Lianhua, who had already returned twice, walked up to her with a helpless shake of his head as he looked at the girl, who was still grinning from ear to ear.
He pulled her closer and said, "Aren't you hungry yet? It's so late, let's have dinner. And pack up the small boat!"
"Ah, oh oh oh, I'll pack it up right now. Dinner, dinner! Today let's have a fish hotpot. We'll use Sichuan pepper, mushroom broth, and lemon-flavored soup bases. With so many fish, shrimp, crabs, shellfish, and sea vegetables, we can eat our fill to our heart's content! Hahaha, hurry up, hurry up, let's get things ready, I'm starving!" Yun Qingyue wore a thoroughly greedy expression.
At the hotpot table on the deck sat two people eating so intently they couldn't even raise their heads. Li Lianhua didn't even have time to drink the yellow wine paired with the meal; the sashimi and cold tossed sea vegetables, paired with the steaming hotpot, were simply an earthly delicacy.
Ever since meeting Yun Qingyue, Li Lianhua felt his life had continually reached new peaks. His determination to follow her grew stronger with each passing day, unwavering!
Yun Qingyue finally ate her fill and lifted her head, which had felt so heavy just moments before. Slowly, she said, "Let's stay here for two days—no, three days, how about that? Let's catch more seafood to eat; my spatial dimension can store fresh produce without it going bad. Oh, right, we also salvaged a lot of shells—pearl oysters, too!"
Li Lianhua muttered inwardly: How could someone who lacked neither things nor money be so hopelessly gluttonous? "Alright, as long as it doesn't storm and we stay safe!"
Yun Qingyue cheered happily, "Yay, thank you! You should drink some yellow wine to ward off the chill! Seafood is very cooling, and while I can't drink alcohol, I do have spicy soup—would you like to try some?"
During the meal, the two of them bantered back and forth as they ate for nearly two hours. The more she ate, the less Yun Qingyue wanted to leave. It was too delicious—ahhh, so satisfying!
The three days finally passed. The Number One Under Heaven, whose only rests came during mealtime, spent every day continuously quick-freezing various kinds of seafood hauled up from the sea. The delicious food could barely cure his misery.
Having learned his lesson the hard way, the Number One Under Heaven worked while secretly resolving: From now on, he absolutely must not let this girl have her way all the time; it was simply too torturous!
Finally returning to the Lotus Tower, the first thing the two of them did was take a good, long soak in a hot bath. Both of them felt that after dealing with fish every day at sea for the past few days, they were about to turn into seafood themselves!
Yun Qingyue had been full of enthusiasm when she made the decision, but by sunset the next day, she had already begun to regret it. However, since the other person didn't complain, and it had been her own proposal, she had no choice but to pinch her nose and see it through to the end!
After finishing dinner, the two of them sat at the table to tally up their harvest. Yun Qingyue took out a basket almost completely filled with pearls of various colors, along with several smaller empty baskets and several cloth pouches. They divided the labor to work together.
First, they sorted out pearls of the same color and distributed them into the empty baskets. Looking at the pearls of various colors emitting a faint, serene glow under the candlelight, Yun Qingyue became mesmerized.
"They're so pretty! I've seen a lot of pearl jewelry, but looking at them like this is still the most beautiful!"
Li Lianhua looked with amusement at Yun Qingyue's dazed expression and thought to herself: As expected, no girl could resist the temptation of jewelry! He would have to pay more attention to such things in the future!
The final tally was as follows: White pearls were the most numerous, with 20 tribute-grade pearls, including four matching pairs. There were 14 pink pearls, including three pairs; 13 golden pearls, including two pairs; 11 purple pearls, including two pairs; seven blue pearls, including one pair; and five black pearls, including one pair.
The rest were sorted by grade and stored away, while the misshapen ones were kept separately. All the defective pieces sorted out were placed into a large box, intended to be ground into powder or given to people of appropriate status!
At this moment, Yun Qingyue no longer felt tired, nor did she find the sea boring. With bright, shining eyes, she looked ingratiatingly at Li Lianhua and said, "Big Brother, Brother Lianhua, let's go again tomorrow! This time we'll dive straight down to harvest pearl oysters! The ocean here is so strange—fish and shells from all different regions can be found right here!"
Li Lianhua looked at her current expression and found it simply unbearable to watch. He spread his hands in a helpless gesture and said, "Too bad. Although I know how to swim, I can't dive down to the seabed. How are we supposed to harvest them?"
Yun Qingyue instantly understood his meaning. Was this fellow trying to get out of going? Absolutely not! So she stood up, gave a little wave of her hand, and flashed a flattering smile. "Hehe, I have a professional set of diving equipment! Look, my body can't dive right now, but I can teach you! Hehehe, hehehe, well... look at this..."
With a splitting headache, Li Lianhua thought that if his body hadn't been healed so thoroughly, he would have wanted to spit blood right then and there! He took a deep breath, even turned around in a circle on the spot, and said through clenched teeth, "Tomorrow, wake up early!" With that, he bent down, picked up his things, and walked straight back to his small room without looking back!
Watching his retreating figure, Yun Qingyue couldn't help thinking that if the folding doors weren't fragile, the force of his departure probably would have made the entire Lotus Tower shake!
Clearing the items off the table and heading upstairs, Yun Qingyue thought: When they returned to Yunyin Mountain, she would pack up a selection of pearls of various colors for Mother Cen, along with some seafood.
Tomorrow she would also ask Li Lianhua what local specialties he wanted to bring back. Still, she had to coax him; judging by his reaction just now, tomorrow probably wouldn't be easy!
When they reached the spot where they had found the most shells a few days earlier, the sky was just beginning to break as they deployed the large boat. Yun Qingyue brought out the hotpot equipment and said ingratiatingly to Li Lianhua, "It's still early, let's have congee-base hotpot today! It's warming to the stomach, light, and very nourishing, hehe!"
This behavior from Yun Qingyue actually left Li Lianhua baffled. What was going on with her? Could there be something else she was plotting, bringing it up only now so he couldn't refuse?
Still, he could only reply with a calm expression, "It's fine, anything is fine. I've never tried this kind before anyway!"
Once again, Li Lianhua's speed at learning things astonished her. By midday, he had actually learned how to dive, and after two trial descents, he had no problems at all.
Once again beaten by a genius learner, Yun Qingyue resolved this time to take good care of her health once they returned and use the Gene Repair Fluid as soon as possible!
If you asked why Yun Qingyue was so persistent about coming out to fish on the sea, it was all because of Shaoshi! She had already redeemed the token; all that was left was Shaoshi. This belonged to Li Lianhua. If he didn't want it, it could be shelved, but no one else was allowed to touch it!
Yesterday upon returning, she had gone into her spatial dimension to look for instructional videos and discovered that the sword from yesterday was indeed Shaoshi, which made her practically burst with excitement. Once she found a chance to have someone repair it, she could return it to Li Lianhua along with the token!
With the heavy stone lifted from her heart, Yun Qingyue could simply focus on having fun today. Since she couldn't dive, she would go sea fishing instead! Li Lianhua had caught so many fish yesterday!
At first, he had been so disgusted by those fish—either they were too ugly, or they didn't look like anything edible at all. Ah, how hilarious!
Later, when they cooked and ate them, his expression—which looked as though he were eating poison, followed by that look of pleasant surprise after finishing—still made her want to laugh when she thought about it. Though Yun Qingyue also had to admit that many seafood items truly were quite ugly in appearance!
Before dark on the second day, the two of them weighed anchor and returned to the Lotus Tower. After organizing their harvest once more, the two decided to go bid farewell to the village chief the next day and then set off back to Yunyin Mountain!
Returning to her room, Yun Qingyue took out all the pearls she had collected over the past few days, mixed them together, and recounted them: 120 white tribute-grade pearls, making 12 pairs; 85 pink pearls, 10 pairs; 70 golden pearls, 10 pairs; 66 purple pearls, nine pairs; 57 black pearls, nine pairs; and 40 blue pearls, seven pairs. The rest were put back in their proper places as before!
As the morning light dawned, Li Lianhua prepared to drive the carriage off when, in a blur, he noticed figures moving near the village entrance. It turned out that when Li Lianhua had gone to see the village chief yesterday, he had run into some villagers at the chief's house. Learning that they were leaving, the villagers had spontaneously come to see the two of them off.
Li Lianhua's eyes welled up with tears of emotion. While exchanging pleasantries and farewells with the villagers, he had managed to hold it together and keep from crying. But when the villagers began placing gifts inside their Lotus Tower one after another, he finally lost it, retreated to the platform, and stood with his back to the crowd, clutching the reins!
Yun Qingyue had no choice but to step forward herself, acting cute and coquettish, buttering them up until the villagers finally agreed to head back. Li Lianhua drove the Lotus Tower as it slowly rolled down the road, while Yun Qingyue sat beside him, telling him what items the villagers had brought!
In truth, although the villagers had earned some money recently, they still had many expenses, yet they had stayed up all night making food and clothes, hurriedly stitching shoes, and gathering wild fruits and greens for them.
As Li Lianhua listened to all this, he couldn't wipe away his tears no matter how hard he tried. This was the most enthusiastic and sincere response he had received ever since he fell from grace and began a cycle of constant self-doubt and self-denial.
The rather fragile foundation of the belief Yun Qingyue had built for him now grew firm and clear. From this moment on, he would always hold his head high and ignore those petty ants who looked down on him or tried to use him! Having shaken off his shackles, the Number One Under Heaven would travel light, living solely by his own will!