Madmen don't keep diaries

Chapter 5 005 Sail City
After crossing another narrow platform paved with wooden boards, Feng Xiuhu finally stepped onto the cobblestone road.

The view suddenly broadened.

Look to the right first.

People are hurrying on the street, rickshaw drivers pulling people and donkey carts pulling goods are competing on the same stage, the shouts of people selling clothes and leather bags are heard one after another, and wild dogs running around happily and old men begging on the ground complement each other.

Not so lively!

Looking to the left again, it was empty.

Feng Xiuhu was stunned.

There is really nothing here, no shops, no streets, only the blue sea and blue sky.

It looked like a dam on the river bank, or a cliff surrounded by guardrails, but the cliff was too long, and the guardrails extended straight forward, extending to a place where Feng Xiuhu could not see.

He took a few quick steps, came to the edge of the guardrail and looked out, finally seeing the whole picture clearly and why there was a lower city under the lower city.

It turns out that there is a city under this "dam".

The low houses are densely packed and piled up in no order. A large part of them cannot even be called "houses". They are just sheds made of a few wooden boards.

The limited space cannot accommodate a large population, which is the direct cause of the dense and disorderly housing. This environment also makes it impossible to plan decent roads.

As far as the eye could see, barefoot children ran through the maze of muddy alleys, men carrying filthy fishing nets jumped from rooftop to rooftop, and women preparing dinner threw skinned rats into the pot.

Feng Xiuhu saw a rotten city, like a pool of silt piled up on the riverbed, smelly and lifeless.

This is what Shunzi calls the bottom city.

The bottom city extends into the distance and reaches the mudflats on the coast. You can vaguely see many people busy on the mudflats, probably catching some shrimps, crabs and shellfish.

Strangely, there were no fishing boats on the sea, not even a sampan.

The bottom city extends further and reaches the feet of Feng Xiuhu.

What separated them was the "dam" under Feng Xiuhu's feet - or it would be more appropriate to call it a high wall.

The high wall has a drop of dozens of meters, and Feng Xiuhu couldn't tell the exact horizontal distance because he couldn't see the end.

The wall is almost vertical and is built with irregular white boulders. Standing on it, you can have a panoramic view of the entire city below.

Feng Xiuhu looked around and saw no ramps or stairs. He asked Shunzi, "How do the people down there get up?"

Shunzi pointed to the left - that was where he and Feng Xiuhu had just come up.

Feng Xiuhu turned his head to look over, but his attention was attracted by another huge object, and his pupils gradually dilated.

A building more majestic than the high wall at his feet was reflected in his eyes.

It was a towering city wall running from north to south.

Feng Xiuhu originally thought that the white stone wall several dozen meters under his feet was high enough, but the wall in front of him was even higher. Feng Xiuhu had to raise his head as high as possible to see the top.

"What is that?" Feng Xiuhu couldn't help but ask.

Shunzi replied, "Broken Wave Bridge. Legend has it that the Goddess of Wind and Rain summoned a strong wind from there to drive back the evil spirit that stirred up the waves."

There was no time to absorb the new knowledge. Feng Xiuhu raised his head and extended his gaze along the direction of the city wall to the sea. The Broken Wave Bridge went straight into the sea and then cut off in mid-air. The top of the city wall at the end was more than 100 meters above the sea below.

Feng Xiuhu turned around to look at the city again, but his view was blocked by another white stone wall.

The white stone wall was not much different from the one beneath my feet, except that the wall beneath me was built from the bottom city upwards, while the one behind me started from the lower city. Both were built of white boulders. The majestic Broken Wave Bridge extended all the way behind the white stone wall, and the outlines of many buildings could be vaguely seen behind the wall.

"And where is that up there?"

Feng Xiuhu asked.

"Upper city." Shunzi looked up with longing. "All the nobles live up there."

At this time, Feng Xiuhu finally had a rough outline of the city in his mind.

This is a city built on the hillside. On the side of the mountain facing the sea, the city is built into three layers, the upper city, the lower city, and the bottom city, going down in sequence. Each layer is separated by a high wall, like a huge staircase.

Only the Broken Waves Bridge seems abrupt. It is at a vertical angle to the two high walls, like a sideways Chinese character "丌".

They had just come up from below and were standing not far from the base of the wall of Duanlang Bridge. Feng Xiuhu noticed that there was a doorway under the wall, and the street continued to extend along the doorway to the other side of the wall.

"Where's the other side of the wall?"

Feng Xiuhu realized that the outline in his mind was not the entire picture of the city.

Shunzi was still looking at the upper city: "It's similar to this side. Behind the wall of the upper city is the other half of the upper city."

Feng Xiuhu put his knowledge into practice and pointed at the doorway, saying, "So that's the other half of the downtown area?"

"No."

Shunzi shook his head repeatedly: "That's the factory area."

Although the name of Broken Wave Bridge contains the word "bridge", it is tightly connected from top to bottom and is built entirely with stone bricks, so Feng Xiuhu mistook it for a city wall at first.

At least there is a doorway in the lower city area that can be used for passing through, but what about the lower city area?

Feng Xiuhu blinked, turned around and looked down again.

I was busy looking at the whole picture of the city before, and I took a quick glance at it. I subconsciously mistook the high wall of Broken Wave Bridge for a mountain. Now I looked at it again - the wall was built so solid that there was not even a crack.

It seems that the other side of the wall is not the other half of the city.

Shunzi saw what Feng Xiuhu was thinking and said, "That's the port area. Large ships go out to sea and back out to sea from there."

Feng Xiuhu pointed to the mudflats in the distance and said, "What if I have to go this way?"

Shunzi quickly shook his head and waved his hands: "That won't work. If we go out to sea without permission, we'll be blown to pieces by the Shenwei cannon."

"Why?" Feng Xiuhu's face fell.

"Because this is Sails City."

Sail City is a city built on a hillside. It is like a huge three-story step facing the vast sea. The Broken Wave Bridge is inserted in the middle, dividing the entire city into left and right sides.

Shunzi patted Feng Xiuhu on the back and soothed him, "The noble master has the final say on matters concerning Fancheng."

He changed the subject: "Do you know why it's called this?"

"If you ever have the chance to go out to sea by boat, when you reach the middle of the sea and look back, you'll see this city looks just like the sail of a huge ship. The Broken Wave Bridge in the middle is the mast, and the two high walls on either side of the bridge are like sails blown by the wind. It's so beautiful."

Feng Xiuhu stared at the bottom of the city wall as if he was looking at a piece of moldy mud.

“It’s so beautiful.”

(End of this chapter)