In the fan group, someone asked, "Brother Xiang, why did you stop the ’Yu Gong Project’? Isn’t that just starting with a bang and ending with a whimper? Don’t you want the views?"

Li Xiang explained, "I had no choice. Some despicable people reported me. The call went from the province to the city, the city to the county, the county to the town, and finally from the town to the village. Our village party secretary had a talk with me, so I had to stop. I’ll share any good new projects suitable for streaming with you all in the future."

Many people sighed and cursed the ones who reported him, furious that some people just can’t stand to see others succeed.

Someone else yelled in the group, "Was it someone from this group who reported him? If it was you, get the hell out! Right now!"

Everyone chimed in to defend themselves. "It definitely wasn’t me! I’m one of Brother Xiang’s most loyal fans."

"Not me, either! I’m always donating, sending gifts, and leaving likes and comments for Brother Xiang."

Li Xiang calmed everyone down. "It was probably some of my competitors," he said. "After all, people in the same trade are rivals."

"Brother Xiang, is there really a mine?" a fan asked.

Li Xiang replied, "What mine? You’re all overthinking it. I want to find a mine more than anyone, but the chances of that are tiny."

Everyone thought about it and agreed. It was normal not to find a mine, so they dropped the subject.

In reality, Li Xiang had quite a few high-end Chicken Blood Stones in his system inventory. ’I need to find a way to sell these off sometime,’ he mused. ’Getting rich on the quiet is the way to go.’

’These aren’t Spirit Stones. You can’t eat or drink them. The best thing to do is turn them into cash to hoard supplies for the future.’

Of course, he would also keep a few of the highest-quality pieces to carve into personal seals.

Chicken Blood Stone seals were valuable items.

He had spent the last few days researching the market. A few years ago at an auction, a small Chicken Blood Stone seal from Baling Youqi, measuring just 3.1 x 3 x 11.9 cm, had sold for 4.83 million yuan.

He had also seen a photo of that seal, and it was indeed gorgeous. Its color was magnificent, with patches of "white fat" showing through. The base color and the blood-red color blended seamlessly, resembling a dancing flame. Yet in his system inventory, he had five large blocks of Chicken Blood Stone of the same, or even better, quality, totaling 3.6 kilograms. He also had seven or eight pieces of a slightly lower grade, weighing around ten kilograms.

If he sold them all, even if he couldn’t get such a high price per piece, he could definitely make seven or eight million yuan.

After all, that was sold at a competitive auction, but he had a much larger quantity.

Selling in bulk would mean a slightly lower price, plus his were raw, unprocessed materials.

’I hear the provincial capital has a large Chicken Blood Stone trading market and appraisal center, with lots of companies looking to buy. Looks like a trip to the provincial capital is a must.’

So, Li Xiang called He Zhixiang, the coffee merchant from Yunnan Province, and arranged to go to Rongcheng with him. He had promised to introduce him to that wealthy young master, and he couldn’t go back on his word. This way, he could take care of it at the same time.

Then, Li Xiang called the rich scion who was also a skilled archer. The guy had shown up to support his stream and even joined his fan group, so Li Xiang had his phone number and WeChat.

The man’s name was Xu Xuan. According to He Zhixiang, his paternal and maternal grandparents, parents, uncle, and aunt were all either high-ranking military or political figures, or top-tier businesspeople. They were extremely influential throughout the entire Southwest region.

’His surname is Xu?’ Li Xiang fell into deep thought, his memories drifting back to his past life.

Back then, there had been eighteen large underground bases in the country, and the leader of the one in the Southwest region seemed to have the surname Xu.

’Could it be his family? Looks like I have even more reason to go now.’

In his past life, Li Xiang had always stayed in the Jiangsu, Zhejiang, and Shanghai region for work, so he was still there when the Apocalypse descended. He ended up joining the local underground base and didn’t have much contact with the one in the Southwest. Back then, transportation and communication had been extremely difficult.

The Demon Beasts came from outer space, swarming across the sky. Their arrival destroyed all the satellites, including the Space Station. Many satellite-guided missiles became unusable, and artificial intelligence systems were severely restricted.

For example, the Beautiful Country’s C4ISR and the Eastern Great Power’s "War Skull," "Thousand-armed Guanyin," and "9G Network" were all crippled. All of this high-end technology relied on satellites.

As for the Moon Base, contact had been lost long before that. The common speculation was that they were doomed. Even if they had survived, they wouldn’t last long without supplies from Earth.

In the backyard, Li Xiang sat cross-legged on a large block of Chicken Blood Stone, basking in the Sun. In his hands, he held a smaller, top-quality piece, which he was carving.

The texture of this piece was fine and smooth, dense and almost translucent. Its bright, blood-red color was vivid and rich, forming a majestic pattern. It was the most beautiful of all his Chicken Blood Stones.

Of course, he had to keep this one for himself.

This Chicken Blood Stone was very hard, with a Mohs hardness of 7 to 8. Chicken Blood Stone is mainly classified into four types: "jelly," "soft," "rigid," and "hard." His piece was definitely of the "hard" variety.

However, no matter how hard it was, the stone was like a piece of fruit before the White Fang Dagger. Combined with Li Xiang’s immense hand strength, carving it was exceptionally easy.

HUFF...

He blew away the fine stone dust as he carved, and soon, a beautiful personal seal took shape.

This type of Chicken Blood Stone was fine for making seals, but since the cinnabar within was toxic, it wasn’t suitable for Accessories. Therefore, he planned to sell all the other pieces.

That mountain was actually the collective property of Li Family Village. Li Jinyu had already spoken with Li Xiang about it; they would hold an election around the New Year, and the outcome was basically a foregone conclusion.

Since Li Xiang was about to become the village chief, he would have the authority to manage its development.

Of course, he would still have to go through the necessary procedures in the name of the village committee.

But he hadn’t taken office yet. So, to avoid unnecessary trouble, Li Xiang sealed both entrances to the cave. He used some of the stones he had previously excavated to build a wall about a meter thick, which he then covered with weeds.

One of the large stones served as his door.

This "door" was about 1.5 meters tall and 70 to 80 centimeters wide, weighing between seven and eight hundred pounds. An ordinary person couldn’t budge it, but Li Xiang could move it with ease. This meant he could get in without a problem, but it would be extremely difficult for anyone else.

He also left a few small, well-hidden holes to serve as air vents.

For now, this place was his secret base. In the future, whenever he had time, he would come here to expand it. When the great flood arrived in a few years, it would be large enough to shelter everyone in the village.

Since the flood would be caused by continuous, heavy rainfall, pitching tents on the mountain would be a miserable experience—everything would be damp, and there’d be a high risk of lightning strikes. How could that possibly be as safe or comfortable as living in a dry cave?

As for moving stones during the expansion, that was even easier. His system inventory had now expanded to 512 cubic meters, so he could easily haul out an entire day’s worth of excavated rock at once and scatter it across the mountainside.

He could also save some of the better quality stone to use as building materials later.

Plus, he had the Night Vision Technique, so the darkness inside the cave was no obstacle whatsoever.

Li Xiang returned to the cave. Using his White Fang Dagger in tandem with an Iron Pickaxe, he cut out a massive block of stone—about 2.5 meters long, 1.8 meters wide, and 80 centimeters tall. He carved it into a flat stone bed and placed it in one of the "bedrooms" of his "three-bedroom, one-living-room" layout.

He even used the sharp White Fang Dagger to engrave patterns onto the bed frame, such as auspicious clouds, a five-clawed golden dragon, and a lucky four-leaf clover.

To ensure proper air circulation, he carved two more small tunnels into the walls of his three-bedroom, one-living-room layout. They led in opposite directions, north and south, all the way to the surface.

The tunnels were angled slightly downward, with a particularly steep slope near the exits, so he didn’t have to worry about rainwater flowing in.

These exits were also concealed with stones, shrubs, and weeds.

To keep small creatures like snakes, insects, rats, and ants from crawling in, he got some quicklime, slaked it with water, and then brushed several thick layers of it along the inside of the tunnels.

If he had any spare cats at home in the future, he could bring a few over to live here.

Li Xiang looked at his "simply furnished"—no, "unfurnished"—secret base and felt quite satisfied. It was warm in the winter and cool in the summer. If he ever needed to enter seclusion to break through to a new Realm, he could hide away here.