Bai Yujun sat quietly, spacing out.
She stayed in an impoverished, utterly rudimentary Small Temple, watching the slanting sunset and counting the cattle, sheep, fat ducks, and geese returning to the lanes.
Whenever an old ox passed the mountain spring well before the temple, it would lower its head to drink. Mischievous newborn calves ran before the Small Temple, sniffing about wildly. Village women called their children home for supper in dialects she could not understand. Mosquitoes and insects danced at dusk; whenever she watched the sunset clouds burn like fire, she could never avoid the swarming gnats.
Smoke rose from chimneys. Perhaps firewood smoke was the very scent of the mortal world.
After night fell, the little town grew ever quieter. The starry sky was deep blue, and only insect cries and the occasional dog bark kept her company.
The flowering trees glowed in the darkness, beautiful and resplendent.
At night, the lawn released tiny Luminous Seeds, transforming into a dreamlike sea of stars. The tranquil ditch reflected that beauty upside down, until a frog breaking the water shattered the mirror.
It was very quiet.
After too much quiet, boredom slowly crept in. There was nothing to do.
With a faint sigh, her consciousness returned to her true body.
Such peaceful years would last a long, long time—long enough for seas to turn to mulberry fields. Bai Yujun wanted to find something to do.
What Bai Yujun did not know was that she was not alone. A figure often appeared in the Ice Cave to keep her company. Solid Ice could not block that care, even across distant time and space.
To find something to do, Bai repeatedly tried to accelerate her consumption of Fire Pearls.
Calculating, correcting, simulating, experimenting.
When she discovered there was no way to optimize