Yunlong Lake in Xuzhou, originally named Stone Dog Lake, is surrounded by mountains on its east, west, and south sides, with the city proper to its north. Every rainy season, floodwaters from a 60-square-kilometer upstream catchment area pour into it, posing a serious threat to the city. It isn't just the flood threat; as a swamp, it overflows with sewage during heavy rains. Big rains mean big floods, small rains mean small floods—filthy, stinking, and nauseating. Bacteria breed rampantly in the swamp, making it a serious health hazard as well.

The base area intended to build Xuzhou into a heavy industry center. Building on such a foundation would be a bit too miserable. When the People's Republic was founded, the country lacked comprehensive urban design and planning, so "adapting to local conditions" left many problems for later urban redevelopment. While Chen Ke disliked forced demolitions, he also disliked "nail households" (stubborn holdouts). In this era, land was cheap. With better planning now, the future government could save countless demolition costs and avoid endless trouble.

The temporary circular railway had over a dozen cars divided into four groups, each equipped with a steam locomotive head—barely qualifying as a small train. Regrettably, even with steam power, these contraptions couldn't run entirely on their own. Every time they started, a bunch of people had to help push the "train." Only with auxiliary power could the "train" be effectively set in motion.

This situation, which Chen Ke found "too tragic to look at," actually ignited great enthusiasm among the participating soldiers and civilians. whenever the "train" was about to start, without anyone calling for help, a crowd would immediately rush over to push. According to Chen Ke's observation, some laborers even waited specifically for this, scrambling to participate in this "activity."

The comrades inspecting the site with Chen Ke were all seasoned workers. The "joining in the fun" mentality of these train-pushers made the comrades look a bit embarrassed. Everyone knew Chen Ke wasn't some high-and-mighty leader; he could see exactly what was happening at a glance. Everyone's eyes fell on Gu Lu, the Engineering Liaison Staff Officer following Chen Ke.

Gu Lu spoke as if nothing was amiss. "Chairman Chen, we aren't too keen on managing this right now. Everyone has never seen a train and wants to join in the fun. I've pushed it several times myself."

"Haha." Chen Ke laughed. "Comrade Gu Lu, your understanding is very correct. Do you pay them for pushing the train?"

"Under these circumstances, we can't pay. The troops get their allowance, and the earth-movers are paid by workload. Our troop comrades definitely don't get paid for pushing. As long as there are no accidents, let those who want to join in the fun do so," Gu Lu replied calmly.

"As the liaison staff officer, how do you view this project?" Chen Ke clearly didn't intend to let Gu Lu off easily.

"This project is different from previous ones," Gu Lu answered seriously, walking side by side with Chen Ke without any evasion. "The project design document states clearly: maximize transport capacity using mechanical equipment. The key now is for the transport machinery to operate normally, while ensuring the speed of excavation, unloading, and dam construction."

This was content from a junior high political science textbook: with stable transmission, strengthening input and output management can effectively improve efficiency. Observing the Yunlong Lake construction site, one could clearly see this. The makeshift circular track and the small "trains" running back and forth formed a loop from digging to drying the earth to building the dam. All labor revolved around this transport line.

"Minimizing the round-trip distance for each laborer can most effectively improve efficiency," Engineering Liaison Staff Officer Gu Lu answered earnestly.

Chen Ke liked Gu Lu's attitude, but this wasn't the reason for Gu Lu's promotion. Long before Gu Lu came to the construction site as this liaison officer, his path to "rapid advancement" had already shown a general trend.

Chen Ke had carefully reviewed Gu Lu's file. He was born in a mountain village in Henan, the third of ten siblings. Apart from one who died young, the rest were healthy and lively enough to reach adulthood. As tenant farmers who were among the few in the area to own a small plot of self-tilled land, their family circumstances weren't too terrible. Thus, there was spare money for him to attend private school for two years. Besides recognizing a few hundred Chinese characters, he also learned a bit of abacus, which played a decisive role in his future life path.

With his elderly mother's serious illness, the family's fortunes began to decline. The high-interest "string money" borrowed from the landlord slowly rolled into a massive figure. The self-tilled land gradually transferred into the landlord's hands. The family rapidly fell to the bottom of society. Reading was no longer an option; he had to work as a long-term laborer for the landlord to repay the debt. Soon after, Gu Lu's second brother was beaten black and blue for secretly bringing the landlord's horse feed home for his younger siblings to eat, adding another patient to the family.

Coming from a hard background but having some education was certainly one reason Gu Lu was valued. However, changing one's destiny required relying on social changes. When Chen Ke opened up the Dabie Mountain base area, the local local tyrants and evil gentry naturally refused to sit and wait for death. As an existence from the downstream of history, Chen Ke had his own views. He believed that the Party had been too merciful in physically eliminating local tyrants and evil gentry back then, especially those old literati—even though Chen Ke tried his best to follow the Chairman's instruction that "human heads are not chives; they don't grow back after being cut." But in his heart, he felt it wouldn't be a pity at all to kill them all.

In the Dabie Mountain area, spontaneous land struggle movements existed even before the People's Party intervened. After the 1906 Anhui floods, the People's Party had already sent people to contact locals. Once the main force charged into the Dabie Mountains, the local land reform revolution immediately spread like dry wood on fire. Since there was a mass foundation, the People's Party struck extremely hard against those tyrants and gentry who dared to arm themselves against the people's revolution.

Landlords who ate people without spitting out the bones were executed by the People's Government, and the seized land was returned. Without a word, to defend his land and home, Gu Lu joined the Red Guards. Carrying a spear seemed quite majestic; singing "August Osmanthus Flowers Bloom Everywhere," he fought a few battles with the militia corps before immediately joining the Workers' and Peasants' Revolutionary Army and being incorporated into the Anhui troops. Eighteen fellow villagers joined with him, including three of Gu Lu's brothers and five cousins.

At the time, it was common for clan members to serve together. These eighteen men were split in two, and the army appointed a squad leader. Gu Lu soon became the vice squad leader. When the Restoration Society attacked Nanjing, Gu Lu's unit, serving as the guard for the medical team, fought a fierce battle in the Nanjing mountains against nearly ten thousand of Wang Youhong's men. Although the unit voluntarily withdrew in the end, that battle wasn't regarded as a defeat.

"Where is the commander-in-chief of the project?" Chen Ke asked.

"At the headquarters."

"Take me to see him."

The engineering headquarters was located on Yunlong Mountain. Chai Qingguo, the general person in charge of the project, wasn't surprised to see Chen Ke arrive. He pulled out a blueprint and asked, "Chairman Chen, are you really planning to create a dozen or so urban parks, big and small?"

The organization had already informed Chai Qingguo that in the coming years, if there was no war, the army's main task would be large-scale infrastructure construction throughout Huaihai Province. In response to this change, the Workers' and Peasants' Revolutionary Army was even preparing to establish two new branches—the Engineering Corps and the Railway Corps—forming a military system structure of field army, engineering corps, railway corps, reserves, and militia.

Chai Qingguo naturally had no objection to expanding the military establishment. It was just that the army's main task not being fighting made him feel very unaccustomed. Building factories, opening mines, and constructing housing in Xuzhou—Chai Qingguo found these understandable. But building urban parks on a large scale in Xuzhou was something that left him scratching his head.

When Chen Ke visited Yunlong Lake in the 21st century, it was already a beautiful large park. In the 21st century, people had many complaints about poor urban design, and cities invariably began municipal construction. The whole of China turned into a giant construction site. Lacking a comprehensive plan, cities demolished to build and built to demolish—not only delaying matters but also providing a heap of opportunities for "vanity projects."

Having witnessed such a situation, Chen Ke naturally refused to repeat the same mistakes. He attached great importance to the urban planning of the base area. Laozi said in the *Tao Te Ching*: "Thirty spokes share one hub. Adapt the nothingness to the purpose of the carriage. Knead clay in order to make a vessel. Adapt the nothingness to the purpose of the vessel. Cut out doors and windows in order to make a room. Adapt the nothingness to the purpose of the room. Thus, what we have is the benefit; what we have not is the use." As for urban construction, one might as well leave some "nothingness"—empty space—for future development.

Clearly, Chai Qingguo did not agree with Chen Ke's proposition; he cared about the "being" that could exist right now. It couldn't be said that Chai Qingguo was wrong. Laozi also said, "Non-being is named the beginning of heaven and earth; being is named the mother of ten thousand things. Therefore, constantly without desire, there is the wonderful mystery; constantly with desire, there is the limit. These two spring from the same source but differ in name; this appears as darkness. Darkness within darkness. The gate to all mystery."

The "non-being" advocated by Chen Ke indeed needed to be supplemented by comrades like Chai Qingguo who pursued "being" to show its completeness. However, some comrades just couldn't figure out what was going on. In very organizational terms, they "couldn't position themselves correctly." For example, Director Zhang of the Engineering Planning Division began to "support Chairman Chen Ke's view," thinking that leaving empty space unused was correct. As for *how* it was correct, he actually didn't know; in the end, the central idea was simply that Chairman Chen Ke was right.

Both Chen Ke and Chai Qingguo's expressions changed slightly. However, neither had an outburst. Chen Ke glanced at Gu Lu, only to see that Gu Lu seemed to have absolutely no interest in these matters, focusing entirely on waiting for orders from Chen Ke and Chai Qingguo.

"Old Chai, how about letting Comrade Gu Lu show me around?" Chen Ke said.

"Can't let him go. He's in charge of engineering liaison. If communication gets cut off, he'll be the first one to answer for it," Chai Qingguo said somewhat grumpily.

A liaison staff officer was equivalent to a chief of staff in civil administration. The position seemed low in rank and ostensibly lacked real power, yet it was a very subtle position. First was the tediousness of the work; thousands of issues converged on the liaison staff officer. One slip-up could lead to misreporting or late reporting, which immediately became a responsibility issue. Wanting to avoid mistakes in this position was impossible.

However, this position allowed a cadre to fully understand the structure of the entire organization. Chai Qingguo seemed grumpy, but in reality, he both looked after and valued Gu Lu. He sent Gu Lu to welcome Chen Ke because Gu Lu was the liaison staff officer. Now, not letting Gu Lu take Chen Ke around for inspection was also because Gu Lu was the liaison staff officer.

"Then you have to assign someone to me," Chen Ke asked.

"How about letting Director Zhang take you around," Chai Qingguo gave Chen Ke the person he considered dispensable.