Large Excavator

This revenge and annexation campaign went smoothly. Aside from the population, however, Luo Chong had gained little else.

Before Luo Chong became Chieftain, the Han Tribe had been dirt-poor—poor enough to piss blood. Baldy's tribe was hardly any better. Apart from its people, all it had left were some dried meat and fruit. It had no hides in storage, not a single bag of salt, and even its pottery had been traded from the Han Tribe. It was poor as hell.

After returning to the Han Tribe, the newcomers integrated smoothly as well. After all, the Han Tribe had previously traded for some of Baldy's people, and they were all relatives.

Although the Han Tribe did not have enough Pottery Pots to give one to every person as Luo Chong had claimed, it had plenty of Pottery Bowls. They did not need that many pots anyway—several people could share one. Their food reserves were indeed abundant, and with what they had seized this time, two hundred people would have no problem making it through the winter.

The cave's population capacity had already reached its limit, however, and it was extremely cramped. Still, being packed together made things warmer. With winter fast approaching, no one complained.

What surprised these people even more was that the Han Tribe actually raised beasts—especially giants like Rou Rou and Hui Shan. This gave them a new understanding of the Han Tribe's strength. They were proud now, too, because they had become members of the Han Tribe.

The women had been twisting rope these past few days. They had also sent out a team to continue gathering nuts and fruit. Things like that would probably be consumed in large quantities later on. After all, eating meat every day would get tiresome. Of course, that was only what Luo Chong thought. The other tribespeople wished they could eat meat every day.

The men continued felling trees. The trunks were kept as building materials, while the branches were used as firewood. They had stopped burning charcoal—their current charcoal reserves were enough to smelt all the ore Luo Chong had brought back. Now they were saving firewood for firing the kilns.

They had brought back less than five hundred kilograms of ore in total. Getting five or six hundred kilograms of copper and tin combined would already be a good result. With all four small earthen furnaces running at once, they could produce only thirty or forty kilograms a day. At that rate, it would take more than half a month to consume all the ore. All the refined copper and tin were cast into gold and Silver Plates for storage.

Luo Chong had not been idle either. He made the necessary woodworking tools one by one, then cast fifty Iron Shovels. No—that was not right. They were Bronze Shovels, only shaped like Iron Shovels. Forty had rounded heads for digging soil, while ten had flat heads, which were convenient for mixing mud. Each shovelhead used less than one kilogram of material, so two days' worth of bronze production was enough.

Now that they had tools for digging, Luo Chong's first-stage Artificial River project had to begin. Remodeling the Paddy Field could not be delayed. Time waited for no one, and missing next year's spring planting would be disastrous.

Since this was a construction project, they naturally had to survey the site first.

Using an extra-long hemp rope woven by the women as a measuring line, Luo Chong first measured out the location of the future city directly north of the cave. He then buried a round log at each of the city site's four corners as markers, using them to determine the best location for the river channel.

They marked the river channel's position with sticks as well. Then it was time to build the Brick Kiln. Once the river excavation began, it would produce a tremendous amount of earth, so Luo Chong planned to dig the river and make brick blanks at the same time. The Brick Kiln would be built beside the Small River.

There was a reason for building the Brick Kiln beside the river: it was meant to fire Blue Bricks.

In modern society, construction mostly used things like cement bricks and hollow bricks. Blue Bricks had already been banned from firing, and later even ordinary Red Bricks were prohibited. That was because firing either kind required clay, especially the soil from Paddy Fields that had been covered by water for long periods. This had led some private kilns to destroy large stretches of farmland in order to extract soil for brickmaking, which was why the clay-ban order eventually appeared.

Although Blue Bricks and Red Bricks were made from the same material, their performance was worlds apart. Modern Red Bricks had terrible resistance to aging. In houses that were decades old, the bricks had already turned crumbly, and a piece could be scraped off with a finger.

That was because Red Bricks were light and low-density, with poor resistance to oxidation and atmospheric erosion. To protect a house and extend its service life, families with the means would apply a layer of cement over the brick walls as protection, or even stick a layer of tiles over them, preventing the Red Bricks from being directly exposed to the wind and rain.

Blue Bricks were different. Most ancient buildings that had survived into the modern era had been built with Blue Bricks. Even without a protective layer, Blue Bricks could remain exposed to the air and still last for thousands of years without rotting. Their resistance to aging was plain to see.

The greatest difference between Blue Bricks and Red Bricks was not the material, but the manufacturing process.

Clay contained a great deal of iron. After clay was made into brick blanks and fired at high temperature, the iron in the blanks naturally turned into Iron Oxide as they cooled, causing the bricks to turn red and become Red Bricks.

When brick blanks made from the same clay had been fired at high temperature, they could not be allowed to cool naturally. Instead, when the kiln reached its highest temperature, water had to be poured inside. With fire and water meeting in the kiln, the glowing brick blanks produced huge amounts of steam, forcing out all the air.

At that point, the kiln was sealed, maintaining an airtight, oxygen-free environment with standing water and steam inside. As the bricks cooled, the iron in the blanks turned into ferrous oxide, causing them to become Blue Bricks.

Generally speaking, the process for Blue and Red Bricks was the same except for the final cooling stage: one was air-cooled, while the other was water-cooled.

Blue Bricks, however, were far denser than Red Bricks. For the same volume, a Blue Brick was much heavier and correspondingly sturdier. Although it was not as hard as granite, it was not much weaker than flint. That was why Luo Chong had chosen to make Blue Bricks—and why he was building the Brick Kiln beside the river. It made pouring in water convenient.

Lame had fired many Red Bricks some time ago, and they were perfect for building the kiln. The Brick Kiln stood beside the Small River. It was cylindrical, narrowing gradually toward the top and ending in an arched roof, with a smoke outlet left above. It was not very large, making it easy to seal later.

The Brick Kiln was a semi-underground structure, with most of it underground and only a small portion above the surface. The entire settlement's labor had been mobilized, yet it still took five days to complete. Digging the pit alone had taken more than half the time.

They spent some more time sawing the round logs into planks and making brick molds. Only then was the preparatory work complete.

The Giant Plow that Luo Chong had spent many days building finally made its appearance. It consisted of a two-meter-wide wooden frame fitted with four Bronze Giant Plows beneath it. Once the thing was pulled, it could turn over a strip of land two meters wide in a single pass, digging as deep as forty centimeters.

Naturally, this contraption was not meant for farming. It was specifically for digging the river. As for what would power it, that was of course Rou Rou and Hui Shan. Those two had been eating for free for so long that they had to be given some work.

The two Giant Plows were placed side by side, with Rou Rou and Hui Shan in front pulling them together. They turned over the entire four-meter-wide river channel behind them. In less than an hour, the two beasts had loosened the whole seven-hundred-meter-long channel to a depth of forty centimeters.

Luo Chong was overjoyed. At this speed, perhaps his plan to build the city would not take three years after all. If these two plowed the land once a day, ten days would give him four meters of depth. This was practically an excavator—and it only ate grass, without needing fuel.

~

~

~

~

~

On New Year's Eve, as the old year departed and the new one arrived, Qing Shu felt extremely fortunate to spend the occasion together with all the readers. He was also deeply grateful to those who had always supported this book. Thank you for your support. He wished everyone a new year in which they would grow stronger and stronger, just like the Han Tribe, and see their lives improve day by day. May everyone be as unstoppable in their respective fields as Luo Chong.

The New Year had arrived, but Qing Shu had no gifts to give everyone. All he could offer was a ten-thousand-word update, along with a request for everyone's good wishes. Today, Qing Shu was not asking for tips, only red packets. If anyone wanted to support the book, please send their Qidian Coins directly as recommendation-ticket red packets and help the book's results rise. Thank you, everyone.