After using the Prince of Fu's Residence as a very expensive test subject, Li Daoxuan gradually got the hang of controlling the vacuum cleaner's hovering height.
Once the altitude was adjusted precisely, the suction no longer affected buildings. It was only strong enough to pull in locusts, nothing more.
A sweep across East Street.
Whoosh.
The entire street was instantly spotless.
Then West Street.
Then he shifted the nozzle toward the Governor's Yamen.
"Oh right, the militia barracks too."
Li Daoxuan was normally extremely lazy. The kind of person who could let his kitchen go uncleaned for days without feeling a shred of guilt. Yet now, cleaning Luoyang City inside the diorama box, he was painstakingly careful and thorough.
A textbook case of being lazy with real life responsibilities, but turning into a perfectionist the moment it involved something like a game.
After a flurry of these so called divine operations, Luoyang City was left absurdly clean. So clean that it practically gleamed. If he had gone one step further and polished it, the whole place would probably have sparkled.
Li Daoxuan looked down at the city.
"Perfect. Job done."
He pulled back the air conditioner nozzle.
"Oh right."
"And I still have to retract those glass cups, glass bowls, and acrylic boxes."
The people of Luoyang City had truly had their horizons expanded today.
Celestial artifacts had descended right before their eyes and swept away the locust plague completely. Fast, clean, decisive. It was just like the legendary Great Immortal Zhenyuan casually sweeping Sun Wukong into his sleeve.
Along with the locusts, all the dust and debris in Luoyang City had been cleared away as well.
The air was terrifyingly clean.
Some of the braver residents slowly pushed open their doors and crept outside. They stared blankly at the sky.
Then they saw giant transparent cups and bowls rise one after another and fly away into the heavens.
The refugees who had been trapped beneath them were freed, yet none of them stood up right away. Instead, they dropped to their knees with loud thuds, bowing deeply toward the sky.
"Thank you, Immortal Lord, for saving our lives!"
Someone hesitated.
"Wait, doesn't adding 'Lord' after 'Immortal' sound a bit strange?"
"Then how should we address him?"
"Great Heavenly Deity?"
"Great Immortal Deity?"
"Dao Xuan Tianzun?"
The people of the city poured into the streets, performing all sorts of elaborate bows and prostrations toward the sky, completely sincere and utterly chaotic.
Li Daoxuan picked up his silicone avatar and examined it carefully with a magnifying glass.
"Good."
"Not a single bite."
After all, it was a chemical product. By instinct alone, the locusts probably knew that eating it would cause explosive diarrhea, so they did not dare to touch it.
He gave it a quick blow to clean it off.
Then he placed it back into the diorama box, positioning it right outside the Prince of Fu's Residence.
Inside the box, the Prince of Fu and his entourage were still stuck in the roofless gatehouse. They clung tightly to the pillars, none of them daring to let go, all afraid that the celestial artifact would suddenly return and vacuum them straight into the heavens.
Then they saw it.
Immortal Xiao descended from the sky once more, landing steadily on the ground in the exact same posture he had held when he flew upward.
He stood there, hands behind his back, gazing up at the sky with a distant, inscrutable expression.
After a moment, his eyes shifted. He lowered his head and turned around.
He walked up to the gate and knocked.
"Alright. The locust plague is over. Prince of Fu, come out. Let's continue discussing the dine and dash incident."
The Prince of Fu fell silent.
Eunuch Zheng fell silent.
The guards and jianghu toughs fell silent.
An eerie, suffocating silence filled the gatehouse.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
The knocking continued.
The Prince of Fu was terrified out of his mind.
"What should I do? This Prince was so disrespectful just now. I do not dare go out and speak to him."
Eunuch Zheng swallowed hard.
"Your Highness, this… you must go, whether you want to or not. If you do not, and Immortal Xiao becomes angry that we are making him wait, and he summons that celestial artifact again…"
He shuddered.
"The entire princely residence will be swept straight into the heavens."
The Prince of Fu trembled from head to toe.
"What do I do? What do I do?"
Suddenly, he turned and glared at the group of troublesome jianghu toughs.
"This is all your fault!"
"What free meal was that?"
"Could you not even spare ten coins?"
"For the sake of ten coins, you dared provoke a Heavenly Immortal on my behalf?"
The toughs were shaking just as badly. The problem had long since stopped being about ten coins. It was now about how to survive after offending a deity.
Eunuch Zheng, as a eunuch, was highly skilled at reading intent and finding a way out.
A flash of inspiration struck him.
"Immortal Xiao clearly could have swept all of us into the sky earlier with that celestial artifact."
"But he did not."
"That means our offense is not unforgivable."
"It can still be remedied."
The Prince of Fu's eyes lit up.
"How do we remedy it?"
Eunuch Zheng lowered his voice.
"The story of begging for forgiveness with humility…"
The Prince of Fu instantly understood.
"Yes. Yes. Begging for forgiveness with humility."
He turned to the guards.
"Beat them."
The guards immediately understood. They rushed forward and began beating the troublemaking toughs mercilessly.
The toughs knew they had caused a catastrophe and did not dare resist. They accepted the blows obediently. In the blink of an eye, they were beaten into pitiful, battered shapes.
Eunuch Zheng spoke quietly.
"These men were recruited by me. I must also bear responsibility."
He extended his left arm toward a nearby guard.
"Do me a favor. Break it."
The guard's face went pale.
"Really break it?"
Eunuch Zheng gritted his teeth.
"Break it. Offering an arm in atonement is far better than being swept into the heavens like locusts."
The guard clenched his teeth and swung his club.
Crack.
Eunuch Zheng's left arm snapped.
He groaned, clutching his broken arm, his face twisted in pain.
"Good. Now I can atone."
He turned to look at the Prince of Fu.
The Prince of Fu sucked in a sharp breath.
He was the Prince of Fu, the third son of Emperor Shenzong of Ming, the most favored among his children. Though he had not ascended the throne, he had always been treated with the highest ceremonial respect, even exceeding that of other princes.
To suffer such humiliation was unthinkable.
But angering a deity was worse.
Even Emperor Shenzong himself could not protect him from that.
After a long struggle, the Prince of Fu made his decision.
He chose a particularly solid looking pillar.
Then, thwack.
He slammed his head into it.
He controlled the force carefully. Not enough to kill himself. Just enough to draw blood.
Blood immediately streamed down his face, staining half of it red.
The Prince of Fu asked shakily.
"This… this should be enough to atone, right?"
Eunuch Zheng, his arm broken, lips twitching in pain, nodded.
"It should… be… enough…"
Thus, a bizarre procession formed.
A group of people in various states of injury, groaning and limping, slowly made their way out.
Creak.
The palace gates opened.
The Prince of Fu, his head bleeding, accompanied by a group of severely battered men, appeared before Li Daoxuan.
Li Daoxuan had already seen everything through observation, but he pretended ignorance.
He raised an eyebrow.
"Oh? Your Highness, what happened to you?"
The Prince of Fu forced a mournful expression.
"Grand Immortal… Grand Immortal Xiao…"
Li Daoxuan frowned.
"Immortal? What Immortal? I know no Immortal."
The Prince of Fu panicked.
"Ah. Hero Xiao!"
He quickly corrected himself.
"Earlier, when the locust plague struck, this Prince… cough… this humble one thought carefully inside the residence."
"The solutions you proposed earlier were all extremely reasonable."
"There must be compensation. Absolutely compensation."
"I will personally interrogate these jianghu toughs."
"Anyone who extorted money or caused losses to the common people will compensate them twice over."
He paused, then hurriedly added.
"No. A hundredfold compensation!"