Chapter 488

On the final day of the journey, Harry stayed on the top floor of a hotel on the city’s outskirts, gazing at the moat nearby—the broad river, as calm as it had been a hundred years ago.

Finally, as the midnight bell struck, the bridge began to slowly rise, its entire concrete surface standing upright as a new city gate; most residents and administrative bodies of the inner city had already evacuated in advance, and from this moment on, those who had not left could no longer depart—among them, their emperor.

“When Emperor Yongle moved the capital to Shuntian, he proclaimed to the world that he would personally guard the nation’s borders, even dying on a campaign against the northern steppes,” Zhang Qiu said with a touch of emotion. “But after the Tumu Crisis, civil and military officials feared the emperor would be endangered, and refused to let him leave the palace even a step.”

Harry calmly watched the brilliantly lit Shuntian Prefecture, where people with flashlights walked along the city walls; after the bridge rose, the city fell back into stillness. He listened to Zhang Qiu’s words, though he didn’t understand them, he felt the pride within— an emotion both familiar and strange. Once, even the poorest worker in London’s East End could speak like Zhang Qiu now; yet today, even Harry, nearly at the pinnacle of his own nation, found himself envying even a driver in the Celestial Empire.

“I deeply admire my Master for conceiving this idea—nothing better than Shuntian City standing on the front line to embody the ancestral maxim: ‘The Son of Heaven guards the nation’s gate,’” she said, then let out a soft laugh. “Though our enemies are but clay chickens and broken dogs, this is the war that opens the new era—I believe they will spare no effort.”

The moat began to glow blue, then one after another, beams of light shot skyward; citizens on the city’s outskirts spontaneously flooded the streets, loudly discussing and marveling at the rare spectacle.

A loud voice echoed from within the city, likely explaining the city’s ascent. Harry felt a pang of regret—he couldn’t understand it, but he could sense the passion in the tone. Yet when he turned to ask Zhang Qiu to translate, he saw only boredom in her eyes.

“It’s just a leader’s speech—it happens all the time,” she patted Harry’s shoulder. “Basically, they announce war, then the emperor changes the era name and declares a new age.”

Harry asked, “What does ‘era name’ mean?”

“It’s the government’s summary of its governing goals. Previously, they chose ‘Tong Chen,’ meaning to coexist peacefully with other nations. Now the emperor wants to change it to ‘Fuxing’—honestly, that era name’s kind of lame, makes it sound like we’ve declined.”

“So ‘Fuxing’ means to rise again? I don’t know when the Celestial Empire was at its peak, but I doubt even then it reached today’s level.”

“We once ruled all of Asia, just as Rome ruled all of Europe,” Zhang Qiu said proudly. “While you nostalgic fools romanticize Rome, South Asian nations were still resisting it.”

Harry didn’t argue—he simply raised another topic rationally. “If that era is the aspiration for Fuxing, does that mean your goal is merely to reclaim all of Asia?”

“From the most radical view, even the Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors who once ruled the entire world could be chosen as the ultimate goal of Fuxing. But realistically, we see no need to occupy that cesspool you abandoned—we’d be satisfied with the Ganges as our border,” Zhang Qiu recalled the radical debates she’d heard in the embassy. “More importantly, we must seize some islands to form a two-chain defense system in the western Pacific and prepare for a prolonged war across the strait.”

“In your Chancellor’s plan, he seems to favor Bai Gong as the winner of the Cold War. Why?” Harry asked. “He said Yanayev abandoned his ideals, trying to save a nation that had already abandoned them—I think his view of Soviet Russia is too narrow.”

“Because they built their state on that ideal—so when the ideal was discarded, the outcome was already sealed. No matter how Yanayev delays it, even if he truly wins the Cold War,” Zhang Qiu paused, “he can only dissolve it and rebuild the original nation on ethnicity and culture.”

This topic deeply confused Harry. Since childhood, he’d been drawn to that red ideal, but the more he grew and understood the world, the more he doubted its feasibility. During fifth year, he realized human desire has no limit—no ideology can construct a self-consistent utopia. Now, Yanayev’s future appeared to him as nothing but fog.

“But…”

“No matter what, everything Yanayev is doing now is futile—he’s merely expanding and sustaining a red empire, not truly moving toward a red future,” Zhang Qiu stepped forward, watching the crowd on the street. “And perhaps everything my Master is doing won’t be enough either.”

“I think this isn’t necessarily a good path,” Harry said, bewildered. “What does the road to an ideal society even look like?”

“I don’t know. But I know the upper and middle classes of this country have been restrained too long—they’re now caught in a strange frenzy to expand and develop. Perhaps after this brief madness, they’ll find a new answer,” Zhang Qiu, who understood the speech, felt it more deeply. “Before this, Xuan Jun proved that in a stable environment, no true answer can be found—the Dao isn’t the answer, just another useful tool.”

“What will the future of this world become?”

“Once Great Ming re-enters the game, the situation will grow more complex—but I still have confidence. I believe humanity can find a new path through cooperation and competition,” Zhang Qiu turned to him with a smile. “And we can work together to guide Great Britain down that road.”

Harry smiled back. “Don’t you care about this Ming Empire?”

“No need. It’s already walked far along its path.”

Soon after Zhang Qiu finished speaking, the speech on the horizon ended. A tremendous roar began. Harry could imagine the city rising—but in truth, it didn’t rise; it remained in place, yet the roar continued, and time stretched again.

“They’re making Muggles believe we’re using some scientific method,” Zhang Qiu commented. “This roar sounds like an engine? Or do they call it a reactor or generator? Maybe we do use some tech to assist—but you saw the documents: the real effect comes from a linked ritual forming a massive levitation charm. Wizards don’t need such noise to cast spells.”

“There’s another layer,” she continued. “Such a loud noise ensures no one nearby can sleep. How could they miss the city’s ascent while sleeping?”

Harry smiled and shook his head—he couldn’t understand why anyone would rather sleep than step outside to witness such a miracle.

The noise grew louder; windowpanes trembled faintly. They could no longer speak easily—the roar drowned all words, leaving the world in a roaring silence.

Then, thirty-two searchlights positioned outside the city fired thick yellow beams, illuminating the bronze dragon heads carved into the city walls. These beams intersected precisely with the vertical blue columns— to confused Muggles, it might look like precision-guided technology. Zhang Qiu still interpreted it as “a way to wake up the people.”

The glowing light painted the midnight sky like dawn’s first light. The city began to rise slowly, like a sleeper deciding to awaken. Inside, carved beams and painted rafters lit up with red and yellow indicator lights. These classical-style buildings, once surrounded by towering modern structures on the outskirts, had seemed like stubborn old men in wheelchairs. But now, as the city ascended and they rose level with the modern towers, the skyscrapers became humble servants.

On the other side of the land, a specially designed steel structure, embedded with light strips, formed an alternative wall. As this wall fully detached from the ground, the hidden structures beneath were revealed to the world.

They were skyscrapers—but inverted. Their rooftops were fused tightly to the original earth, while their bases ended in sharp spires. Within these upside-down towers, lights still glowed on every floor, just as they did on the outskirts. From this distance, Harry couldn’t see who, if anyone, was inside. Together, these meticulously designed towers formed an inverted cone, growing ever more forceful in their downward thrust toward the earth’s depths as they neared the city center.

Finally, when the central inverted tower revealed its spire, Harry, standing atop the outskirts’ tallest building, had to tilt his head upward to see the original ground of Shuntian. Powerful spotlights illuminated the city’s edge, their light reflecting off metal, casting a strange orange-yellow haze across the horizon, while mist clung to the city’s underside. Clearly, it wasn’t mist—it was falling dust.

When a play demands a scene change, stagehands move the sets. The insurmountable mountains in the drama can be shifted at will—between acts lies a moment beyond the play, a power the characters cannot imagine or explain.

The crowd watched this magnificent interlude with boundless excitement and joy.