The miniature kingdom's daily life had gone viral!
The video of the tiny people fighting their little war had swept across Douyin overnight, attracting hundreds of thousands of likes and well over ten thousand comments.
Leaning against the box, Li Daoxuan happily scrolled through his phone, thoroughly enjoying the flood of comments from netizens.
"Holy crap! This tilt-shift photography is incredible! It really does look like an entire kingdom of tiny people!"
"The props are amazing! Just look at that city wall made of LEGO bricks! Watching those little figures fight on top of it is absolutely hilarious!"
"Jokes aside, building a set like that must have cost a fortune. They'd have to construct the entire wall first, then paint it to look like LEGO bricks. Wouldn't that easily run into several hundred thousand yuan?"
"It's probably CGI. Actually building a giant LEGO-style city wall just to shoot a short video would be ridiculously expensive. Creating it digitally would be much cheaper."
"Definitely CGI. But the effects are so good that I can't spot a single flaw! This is on a completely different level from those cheap, fifty-cent special effects!"
"Even if the wall is CGI, what about the actors? Their costumes and all those bows, rusty swords, hoes, pitchforks, and pot lids look like real props. How much did the creator spend on all that?"
"Exactly! Look at the bandits charging toward the city. There must be a thousand of them! Just dressing that many extras in period costumes would cost a fortune!"
"You don't need a thousand actors. Hire thirty or forty people, then use CGI to fill out the rest of the army."
"CGI, my foot! Have you actually looked at the footage? Every single person has a different face and wears different clothes. How could all of that possibly be computer-generated?"
"That's how advanced CGI has become! Do you think Marvel actually hires thousands of extras for those massive battle scenes? Of course not! Most of the soldiers are digitally generated. Only the actors in the foreground are real."
"That plastic catapult had me rolling! How on earth did they make that thing? Surely they didn't actually manufacture an entire collection of miniature plastic catapults?"
"Wait a second. Were those actors really crushed by the catapult projectiles? The footage looked so realistic that I almost thought I was watching an actual battle!"
"Don't be ridiculous! What production crew would actually kill its extras by dropping rocks on them? Obviously, that's CGI!"
"There's no question about it. The whole thing must be digitally enhanced. But the effects are so convincing that you genuinely can't tell the difference!"
"The effects are absurdly good! They're even more realistic than what you see in some movies. Spending that much money on special effects for a one-minute video is insane. How much could that single minute have cost?"
"With this level of production, I bet the blogger is preparing something big."
"Going viral once doesn't mean much. Douyin is full of accounts that become overnight sensations because of one lucky video. Unless this creator can keep producing content at the same level, the traffic will dry up before long."
Thousands upon thousands of comments like these flooded the screen. Li Daoxuan was so engrossed that he completely forgot about his meal.
He might not have any professional experience in short-video production, but he understood one basic principle. As long as he could keep releasing videos that performed this well, the account's traffic would eventually stabilize. And once he had a steady audience, the next logical step would be livestream shopping.
"Tsk. With a face like mine, which is reasonably handsome, I should do just fine on camera, shouldn't I?"
Of course, he would need to practice his sales pitch first. Otherwise, the moment the livestream started, he'd be sitting in front of the camera with his tongue tied, unable to squeeze out a coherent sentence.
That would be a spectacular way to ruin the whole operation.
Alright, time for some mirror practice!
"Fam, I've personally negotiated a lower price on these building blocks! Get the exact same Lego-style blocks used to build the miniature kingdom's city wall! Not 999 yuan, not 99 yuan. Just 9.9 yuan, with free shipping straight to your door..."
---
Meanwhile, Shan Shi'er and the others had reached a point just a few li outside Chengcheng County, with Wang Er escorting them along the way.
The county town was already visible in the distance.
Wang Er could go no further. He was, after all, a rebel. The imperial court might have temporarily decided to leave him alone under its rather peculiar policy of letting the bandits loot until next spring and sort themselves out afterward. But that didn't mean he could stroll around the county gates in broad daylight without inviting trouble.
"Master Shan, brothers of Gaojia Village, this is where I'll leave you." Wang Er cupped his fists. "Come back to this spot tomorrow morning and call for me. I'll return to escort you home."
Shan Shi'er returned the salute.
"Many thanks, Hero Wang. Here, take this silver and share it among your brothers."
He pulled out a handful of small silver pieces and offered them to Wang Er.
Wang Er smiled and shook his head.
"Everyone's hunting for our heads at the moment. Even if we had silver, there'd be nowhere we could safely spend it. Hahaha! I appreciate the kindness, Master Shan, but you should keep it."
Well, that was certainly true.
"Very well. Then we'll meet here tomorrow morning."
The two sides exchanged one final salute before parting ways.
Shan Shi'er and his companions hurried onward. It didn't take them long to reach the county town.
Under normal circumstances during the Ming Dynasty, a county was administered by a seventh-rank magistrate assisted by a little over thirty bailiffs. There usually wasn't any permanent military garrison inside the county town. The soldiers, under the command of a ninth-rank Patrol Inspector, were stationed at a military post roughly ten li away.
Civil officials handled civil affairs, military officers handled the troops. Everyone had their own jurisdiction, and nobody was supposed to interfere with the other's business.
Chengcheng County, however, was currently an exception. There were soldiers stationed right inside the town.
The gatekeepers were no longer a pair of elderly men. Instead, two sturdy young soldiers stood guard at the entrance, wearing cloth armor despite the scorching summer heat. Sweat streamed down their faces, but their expressions were fierce and their eyes constantly swept over everyone approaching the city.
Shan Shi'er's party consisted of more than ten men. They carried large bundles on their backs and had blades hanging from their waists. In short, they looked about as inconspicuous as a pack of armed troublemakers could possibly look.
Before they even reached the gate, the two soldiers had already half-closed it.
"Who's there? State your business!"
Shan Shi'er raised his head.
"I am Shan Shi'er, former strategist to Magistrate Zhang Yaocai. The men behind me are my attendants."
The moment the guards heard his name, their expressions changed as though someone had just announced that a corpse had walked back into town.
"S-S-Shan... Master Shan?! W-Weren't you... weren't you turned into a ghost over at Gaojia Village?!"
Shan Shi'er stared at them in bewilderment.
"What? When did I ever become a ghost?"
He was genuinely confused for a moment. Then, suddenly, he remembered.
During their previous encounter, he had cooperated with Tianzun to frighten Patrol Inspector Cheng Xu away from Gaojia Village. The entire affair had involved a rather convincing display of supernatural phenomena.
And judging by their reaction, these two soldiers were probably Cheng Xu's men.
His guess was spot on.
Not only did the two guards serve under Cheng Xu, but they had also been among the soldiers who had accompanied him to Gaojia Village. They had witnessed Li Daoxuan's little performance with the terrifying female ghost's laughter.
Back then, both men had been scared half to death. They had fled alongside Cheng Xu in utter panic, running as though the King of Hell himself were chasing them. For days afterward, they had been plagued by nightmares, and it had taken them quite some time to recover.
Now, seeing Shan Shi'er standing right in front of them again, they felt as though they'd encountered the same ghost all over again. Their entire bodies began trembling.
Shan Shi'er was secretly amused, but he maintained a solemn expression.
"It's broad daylight, with the sun blazing overhead. And you still claim I'm a ghost? I think you're the ones with something to hide. After all, the guilty are always the first to suspect ghosts!"
The two soldiers instinctively looked up.
Sure enough, the sun was shining brightly overhead.
Well... ghosts probably wouldn't be wandering around in the middle of the day under such a scorching sun, would they?
They lowered their heads again, still looking thoroughly bewildered.
"Master Shan... what exactly is going on?"
Shan Shi'er put on an expression of complete innocence.
"When Wang Er of Baishui started his rebellion, I took my wife and fled the county town to escape the trouble. Recently, I heard things had settled down around here, so we decided to return. What's the matter? Have we met somewhere before? You two look as though you've seen me."
The soldiers exchanged uncertain glances.
"The one we saw last time must have been a ghost impersonating him."
"But the man standing in front of us now..."
"...really does look like the actual Master Shan."