Before strangers abroad could interpret this particular world, however, it first had to get out of one man's head.

　　Chen Aijun, 34, is an optometrist in Chengdu, capital of southwest China's Sichuan Province.

　　By day, Chen leads a quiet, down-to-earth life in a neighborhood optical shop. Inside, he worked among eyeglass frames and optometry equipment. On his computer was another landscape entirely: cloud seas, immense palaces, flying cranes and figures in ancient robes.

　　Chen's heaven did not come from any single ancient text.

　　Growing up in the 1990s, he watched "Journey to the West" and later encountered "The Investiture of the Gods," xianxia (immortal heroes) novels and fantasy games. Those stories mixed over time with images of Chinese architecture and landscapes he saw online.

　　He has never visited nearby Mount Emei, and most of what he knows of Mount Huangshan's famous sea of clouds comes from videos.

　　What appeared on his screen was therefore not a reconstruction of one fixed mythological scene, but a world shaped by traditional stories already filtered through television, novels, games, the internet and his own memory.

　　For years, Chen had no way to make that world visible.

　　He never studied painting, design, photography or 3D modeling. After high school, he joined his parents' optical business and eventually took over the shop.

　　Generative AI changed the gap between imagining an image and possessing the technical skills to show it to someone else.

　　More than a year ago, Chen began teaching himself through free online tutorials. In September 2025, he started regularly posting AI videos, and a month later began experimenting with palaces floating above clouds. He has since published more than 200 videos.