Ming Dynasty: I am truly not the Emperor of Longevity

"After I established my fiefdom in Yunyang Prefecture, I also asked around about the geography and scenery of Yunyang Prefecture."

Lu Chen looked at Feng Yue.

"I have heard that there is a place called Shiyan, forty li south of Yunyang Prefecture. When Physician Feng was choosing the site, did he go there to check it out?"

"Your Highness has put in a lot of effort."

Feng Yue bowed to Lu Chen and said,

"As the chief supervisor of the construction project of the Prince of Ying's Palace, how could I dare not be conscientious in the matter of site selection?"

When I last came to Yunyang Prefecture, I found that the city was not big enough to accommodate a prince's mansion, so I led my men to visit all the villages and towns within a hundred miles of the city.

I have naturally visited Shiyan before; it is located upstream of the Jiang River.

There is a small town with only a little over a hundred households. The local mountain people built ten weirs on the Jiang River to irrigate their fields, hence the name Shiyan (Ten Weirs).

The terrain around Shiyan is fragmented, and the inhabited areas are mostly mountain gullies, numbering more than twenty in total.

There simply isn't enough flat land to house a prince's mansion.

"There are as many as ten weirs across this stubborn river, so it's probably impossible to navigate now."

Hearing Feng Yue's words, Lu Chen felt somewhat disappointed.

How do the people of Shiyan Town interact with the outside world?

"Your Highness, although the Jiang River is not navigable, there is a relatively flat road built along it that can be used by carriages."

Feng Yue nodded and said,

"The mountain people who come out of the more than twenty mountain valleys in Shiyan basically all take this road, which leads directly to Huanglongdian, and then they take a boat from the dock to the outside world."

Elsewhere, the mountains are high and the forests dense, making passage extremely difficult.

"Does Doctor Feng mean that Shiyan at that time was an area composed of more than twenty mountain gullies, almost completely isolated, with only this small path along the Jiang River connecting it to the outside world?"

Lu Chen's eyes lit up.

"Does that area have an abundant water supply, thanks to the ten weirs built on the Jiang River?"

"Your Highness, that is indeed the case."

Feng Yue replied,

"Although there are other paths to enter and exit Shiyan Town, they are all difficult to walk on. People and livestock can pass through, but in the narrowest places, two people cannot even walk side by side, and vehicles cannot pass at all."

The only road mainly used by the mountain people is this one that connects to Huanglongtan.

That's it!

Lu Chen finally understood why the future of another dimension wanted to build a new urban area in Shiyan.

Shiyan New City was built in the 1960s, initially just to house the Second Automobile Manufacturing Plant.

The reason for choosing this location was not because the terrain was suitable for building a factory, but because it was secluded.

The Shiyan area is crisscrossed by ravines, and the Second Automobile Works could disperse its different factories in more than twenty ravines, using the terrain to block aerial reconnaissance and prevent important military industrial bases from being discovered and destroyed by the enemy.

Located near the Han River and the Du River, it has convenient access to industrial water, and is not far from the Danjiangkou Hydropower Station, ensuring a reliable power supply.

This city was born during a special period, specifically for the construction of the Third Front.

After conducting an on-site investigation near Yunyang Prefecture, Lu Chen agreed with Feng Yue's opinion that, indeed, only the Huanglongtan area near the prefectural city had enough flat land to build a prince's mansion.

If the Prince's Mansion were built on Jiuqingping, the easternmost part of this flat land, it would effectively block the main passageway out of Shiyan.

He then ordered people to carefully survey the terrain around Shiyan and block all the paths leading to the outside world.

These twenty-odd mountain gullies became a closed area adjacent to the Prince of Ying's mansion, which made it easy to monitor. Each gully could be used to build a relatively independent secret production base!

The fact that the Second Automobile Works in another dimension chose to be located here makes perfect sense.

"Yang Ban, send someone to Shiyan to investigate."

Lu Chen turned to Yang Bingzhong and instructed him.

"I need a detailed topographic map of the area surrounding Shiyan."