Zheng Quchi wasn't entirely sure whether he was from the Kingdom of Julu.
She planned to ask him carefully after Qiu's injuries healed what had happened between "Qing Ge'er" and the people of Julu Kingdom that made him believe "Qing Ge'er" was a traitor.
This matter cannot be rushed; what is more urgent at hand is, of course, repairing the house.
Staying at someone else's house comes at a price. She doesn't earn money easily, and she feels the pinch every penny she spends.
She had previously envisioned building a high-ceilinged duplex country villa, aiming to be the envy of her neighbors and exude grandeur. However, she later learned that in this era, there were restrictions on residences based on status and class.
Your social status determines the type of housing you can live in.
It's like a farmer who makes a windfall and builds a house that's even more extravagant and luxurious than that of an official. If he gets caught, he'll face imprisonment.
So even if she has ambitions, she can only work on materials and appearance, and cannot have the greedy idea of occupying the mountain and opening a manor.
She also made a special trip to Ye State to learn about the current level of housing construction.
Basically, poor people live in thatched huts, just like their family and Brother Yang's family did before.
Farmers with some means lived in rammed earth houses, while craftsmen with better means lived in fenced courtyards with wooden structures and yellow mud walls.
As for the houses in the county town, she had never seen them, so she didn't make any comparisons.
These houses are characterized by their simplicity and ease of construction, but they lack insulation, durability, and have a rough appearance. They are also not fireproof or explosion-proof.
As someone who works in civil engineering, she naturally doesn't intend to copy and paste what others do.
However, building a modern concrete and steel structure would be too time-consuming and mentally taxing for her current resources, given the limited conditions available.
Finally, as a compromise, she chose to build a simple yet sturdy mud-brick house.
Mud brick houses were very popular in the 1960s and 70s, mainly because they were cost-effective and were her first choice for low-cost housing.
The next day, before dawn, Zheng Quchi got up and went to the old house, which was still shrouded in smoke from the fire. She planned to replan the location and size of the house on the original site, which had been tamped down.
She picked up a piece of wood, her light brown eyes like those of a precision instrument, and quickly estimated the size of the land.
After thinking about it for a moment, she started drawing ground lines on the ground.
Brother Sang, who had followed, pulled Sister Sang along, noticing her hunched back.
"Qing-ge'er, what are you doing?"
"Brother, draw the ground lines first, then dig the trench."
Brother Sang looked blank. He had only seen others build houses, and he only had a vague understanding of how to do it.
But he didn't understand, and Qing Ge'er naturally didn't understand either; he just thought she was being silly.
He sighed, "Stop overthinking it. Let's go and hire a bricklayer and a carpenter."
People have specialized skills, and if you don't understand something, you can only ask someone who does. Even if you want to save money, you can't just do things haphazardly.
Zheng Quchi immediately objected: "We have to be careful with money. What they understand, I also understand, but what I understand, they may not understand."
"What do you know?" Brother Sang asked, looking exasperated.
Zheng Quchi said confidently, "I can build camps, so how could building a mere house be difficult for me? Brother, don't worry, leave it to me."
It's always like this.
Brother Sang sometimes really doesn't understand where her mysterious confidence comes from.
Before, she was quiet and taciturn, but now she is decisive and eloquent, spouting fallacies.
After he saw her draw lines on the ground, he went to get the ink line to judge the straightness and curvature. Once he found it was correct, he picked up the axe and ran to the ditch slope, cut down a few thick bamboo stalks, and carried them back.
When Brother Sang first saw Zheng Quchi lift a hundred pounds with his short stature, his eyes widened in astonishment.
"How...how do you have such strength?"
Zheng Quchi naturally didn't want to hide anything from those close to her, so she had already prepared an excuse: "I've always been strong, I just pretended to be strong because I didn't want to work."
Hearing this shameless and lazy remark, Brother Sang choked on his words, feeling both angry and helpless, and for a moment he didn't know what to say to her.
He asked impatiently, "What are you doing cutting bamboo now?"
“It has a clever use. The burned-down house still has embers and residual heat left. I plan to build a frame on it.”
"A rack? You want to bake something?"
"Used to bake clay bricks."
"What are mud bricks?" Brother Sang asked, looking puzzled.
"For building houses."
She chopped down more than a dozen bamboo stalks, split each one into four pieces with an axe, and then used the shavings of the flexible bamboo bark as rope to weave them together to form a wide mat.
Then they piled up stones and placed it on the ground where the sparks had not yet died down.
She considered that although the recent climate was dry and windy, this method of slow drying over a low flame was the most time-saving way to quickly remove the moisture from the adobe bricks.
By building a ring around the bricks and placing several rows on top, hundreds of mud bricks can be dried quickly at once. By repeating this process, she can gather the amount of mud bricks she needs in no time.
However, it should be noted that too high a heat can cause cracking, while too low a heat will not achieve the required quick drying.
Brother Sang was amazed to see Zheng Quchi's nimble and methodical bamboo mat making.
"Where...where did you learn that?"
“An old carpenter in the camp taught me,” she said without hesitation.
After the site for drying the clay bricks was prepared, she hurriedly ran to the forest to cut down trees.
She was strong, and with a few quick chops, she chopped the wood, then sawed out four long strips of wood and riveted them together to make a hollow rectangular wooden frame.
"What... is this all about?" This time, Brother Sang asked seriously.
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