After the three decrees arrived at his fief on the same day—promoting him to Viscount, granting him Blue Sky City, and appointing him commander of the Northern Border Medical Camp—Lan Tian took just three days to finalize a preliminary plan for building the city.
For the first two days, he shut himself in the studio at Blue Silver Castle, spreading the fief's original terrain maps, the newly incorporated sixteen thousand mu of city territory, and the routes of several major roads nearby across his desk. He compared them over and over.
Old Ke crouched beside him, helping copy information about water sources and terrain from the old maps onto the new city plans. They worked late into the night before settling on the general layout of the districts.
On the third day, he called Louise, Xiao Li, and Ah Yin into the sitting room and spread the new city plan, covered in lines and annotations, across the long table, asking the three women to see what else needed adding.
Louise stood beside the table and studied it carefully, then pointed to the eastern section of the plan. "The ground here is flat and gets plenty of sun. It's suitable for growing medicinal herbs on a large scale. Blue Medicine Hall's headquarters can be near the City Lord's Mansion in the city center, making it convenient both to sell to outside customers and to send materials into the fief. Also, the Pill Workshop should be built beside the Medicinal Herb Processing Workshop, with enough space for passage between them so we don't waste time transporting raw materials and finished products."
Xiao Li crouched on the other side of the plan and examined it for a while, then gestured toward the western section near the ridge. "The ground here is high, with