Chapter 66: Warm Beds and Vermicelli, a Warm Revolution from the Inside Out...
Looking at the mountains of stone-skin potatoes and starlight wheat piled up in the cellar, and smelling the rich, mouthwatering aroma emanating from the smokehouse, everyone breathed a long sigh of relief, feeling that this winter was finally over.
However, this sense of security was ruthlessly shattered when the biting north wind howled through the town night after night.
Lin Yue sat in the room wrapped in a thick stone and wild boar skin, feeling like a frozen dumpling put in a refrigerator.
That evening, Li Ge and several of his construction team brothers returned home exhausted. Instead of going straight back to the cold work shed, they habitually gathered near the blacksmith's shop, where the furnace fire was still burning, making it the warmest place in town besides the bonfire.
"Damn it, this weather is awful, my hands are practically frozen stiff. How am I supposed to build the wall tomorrow?" Li Ge said, rubbing his red, frozen hands and breathing on the stove fire.
A young man named Tie Niu, a key member of the construction team, stood beside him, his hands trembling as he warmed them with warm air. He said with a whimsical expression, "Brother Li, what if... our house could heat up on its own like Uncle Shi Quan's stove? Wouldn't it be so comfortable for us to sleep at night?"
These words drew good-natured laughter from those around him.
"You're just daydreaming. How could a house possibly heat up on its own?"
Uncle Stone Fist, wearing his beloved rabbit earmuffs and clanging as he hammered a new axe, snorted irritably upon hearing this: "A bunch of useless bastards, can't even stand this little bit of cold? Back in the day, when we were mining in the ice caves up north, it was a hundred times colder than this."
Even so, he still added a few pieces of wood to the stove to make the fire burn even brighter.
Just then, Mia came over carrying a large earthenware basin and some earthenware bowls. The basin contained steaming hot wild vegetable and meat soup with ginger slices. "Brother Li, Uncle Shiquan, everyone has worked hard. The mayor asked the kitchen to make some hot soup for everyone. Drink some while it's hot to warm yourselves up."
Everyone thanked them, took the earthenware bowls, and drank the hot soup in large gulps. They felt a warm current spreading from their stomachs, and their cold bodies were slightly relieved.
Lin Yue, who had just walked over, happened to hear Tie Niu's whimsical words and saw the scene of everyone warming themselves around the stove. It was as if a lightning bolt struck his mind.
Make the house heat up on its own?
“Uncle Stone Fist,” Lin Yue suddenly spoke, his eyes sparkling with surprise, “Tie Niu was right! Why can’t the house heat up on its own? Do you think we could make the fire flow in the walls, under the bed?”
Shi Quan was drinking his soup when he was taken aback by this abrupt question: "Huh? What nonsense are you talking about? Letting fire run through the walls? Do you want to burn the house down?"
“No, no, no,” Lin Yue said excitedly, squatting down and picking up a charred wooden stick. He started drawing on the dusty ground. “What I mean is, let’s connect the kitchen and the bedroom! In the kitchen, right against the wall, we’ll build a stove. This stove will not only cook, but the smoke it produces won’t be allowed to escape directly from the kitchen chimney. Instead, we’ll guide it through a ceramic pipe we made, or a brick flue, first to the bed in the next bedroom, then around it, then up the wall through a passage, and finally out through the main chimney on the roof.”
He became more and more excited as he spoke, waving the wooden stick in his hand rapidly: "In this way, when you cook a meal, not only is the meal cooked, but the bed is also warm, the walls are warm, and the whole room is cozy, without any smoke. You can call this 'earth dragon' or 'fire kang'."
This imaginative idea instantly silenced everyone around. They stared blankly at the sketch on the ground, a single image simultaneously flashing through their minds: outside, snow was falling heavily and the wind was howling, while they lay comfortably on a warm kang (heated brick bed), covered with thick animal-hide quilts, fast asleep…
"My God... this... can this really work?" Li Ge's eyes widened like saucers. He was already imagining himself lying on the heated kang, sleeping soundly.
“Theoretically… it’s feasible.” Uncle Stone Fist scratched his head, thinking. “The key lies in the direction of the flue and the design of the smoke extraction. Smoke rises, so how do you make it bend around the walls and under the bed and still escape smoothly, instead of flowing back into the room?”
He pinpointed the core difficulty of the design.
“Good question,” Lin Yue gave Shi Quan an approving look, then, as if he had flipped a strange switch, began to utter a series of words that made everyone’s heads buzz. “This is the technical challenge we are going to overcome today… I call it the preliminary application of thermal aerodynamics and fluid mechanics in the field of construction.”
Speak like a human being!
"Ahem," Lin Yue coughed lightly, immediately switching to plain language, "Simply put, a chimney is like an exhaust fan. The higher the roof, the stronger the wind and the stronger the suction. And the bends in the flue are like speed bumps for the smoke; they can't be too sharp, they have to be gentle curves so the smoke doesn't get clogged..."
The test site was chosen at the original model house.
Li Ge rubbed his hands excitedly and led his group of brothers, who were eagerly anticipating the new house, inside with shouts of excitement, to be in charge of building the walls and assembling the kang (heated brick bed).
The flue project was taken on by Uncle Stonefist without hesitation. Having experienced so many infrastructure projects, this dwarf master's obsession with supervision seemed to be growing stronger, and his demands becoming increasingly inhumane. He would meticulously inspect every brick's placement angle, the thickness of the cement mortar at every joint, and the curvature of every corner with his sharp eyes. The slightest mistake would be met with his thunderous roar and a merciless order to redo the work.
Under Shi Quan's devilish supervision, a complex but ingeniously designed flue system was carefully laid inside the fire wall and the heated brick bed.
Finally, amidst everyone's eager anticipation, the heated kang system in the experimental room was officially completed.
The lighting ceremony was scheduled for a cold, windy evening. Almost everyone in the town put down what they were doing and gathered outside the small model house, eager to witness the birth of a miracle.
Lin Yue personally placed a bundle of tinder and charcoal into the newly built stove, and then lit the flames with a flint.
Flames rose, licking the bottom of the pot. Everyone held their breath, staring intently at the wall connecting to the chimney and the heated kang bed covered with straw mats.
At first, nothing changed.
Quiet discussions and doubts began to emerge among the crowd.
"I told you it was unreliable! How could smoke possibly go downhill?"
"Yeah, we don't want the house to catch fire..."
Just then, Uncle Stone Fist suddenly shouted, "Pump the bellows and get the fire burning brighter!"
Amu immediately started pulling the bellows hard at the makeshift bellows opening next to the stove.
call--!
The flames in the stove suddenly shot up, and plumes of scalding hot smoke were forced into the flue by the strong airflow.
A miracle happened.
Wisps of visible white steam began to rise slowly from the cold brick wall. Then, a warm aura began to emanate from the wall.
"It's hot! It's hot! The wall is really hot!" A man who was closest to the wall couldn't help but reach out and touch it, then pulled his hand back as if he had been electrocuted, and shouted in surprise!
Everyone gasped in disbelief.
And the heated kang bed covered with straw mats began to emit the same warm feeling.
Several teenagers, encouraged by their parents, took off their heavy winter boots and carefully climbed onto the kang (a heated brick bed).
Wow! It's so warm!
"My feet feel warm and comfortable."
In an instant, the room was filled with the children's excited shouts. They rolled around excitedly on the warm kang (heated brick bed), their little faces beaming with happiness, as if this were not a cursed land of ice and snow, but the warmest paradise in the world.
[Ding! Detected that the host has successfully developed and promoted the major public heating technology, "Firewall and Heated Bed," which has greatly improved the quality of life and well-being of community residents in harsh environments, making an outstanding contribution to community stability and civilized development!]
[Special Quest Triggered: Housewarming Celebration!]
[Mission Objective: Within one month, complete the construction of at least fifty red brick houses equipped with heated kang (traditional heated brick beds) systems, and organize a grand housewarming ceremony so that all eligible families can move into their warm new homes during the harsh winter.]
[Task Rewards: 5000 System Points, unlock the [Intermediate Architecture Blueprint Pack] (containing more complex house structures and public facility blueprints), maximize community cohesion, and unlock the achievement [Warmth of Home]!]
Lin Yue looked at the task issued by the system, a slight smile playing on his lips. This task was exactly what he needed.
That evening, the curious crowd lingered, reluctant to leave. They took turns going inside, carefully touching the warm walls, or taking off their shoes and sitting on the edge of the kang (a heated brick bed) for a while, feeling the comforting warmth emanating from below.
Lin Yue specially arranged for several elderly people and children from the town who had been coughing and feeling unwell due to the cold to stay in this experimental room. That night, they slept the most restful and comfortable night since the beginning of autumn on the warm kang (heated brick bed).
The next morning, an elderly woman who had been bedridden due to a cold miraculously walked out of her room on her own, leaning on her cane. With a radiant face, she told everyone she met, "It's amazing! This kang (heated brick bed) is truly miraculous. I slept here all night, and I feel all the coldness in my body has been warmed out. My back doesn't ache anymore, my legs don't hurt, and my cough is much better."
Upon hearing this, Lin Yue waved his hands repeatedly, both amused and exasperated, saying, "Auntie, it's not that bad, it's not that bad! This is just physical therapy, a placebo effect, a placebo effect."
However, the rumor that heated kang beds could cure diseases spread like wildfire, and everyone was even more eager to move into their new homes.
During the long, cold indoor hours, when most outdoor work was impossible due to the cold, Lin Yue shifted his creativity to another area that brought him immense happiness—food research and development.
He turned his gaze to the mountain of stone potatoes piled up in the cellar.
Lin Yue led Mia and Norm, who was full of curiosity about all new technologies, to first crush the hard stone-skinned potatoes with a large iron hammer, then put them into a stone mill, add water, and grind them repeatedly to make a cloudy potato paste.
Next comes the crucial filtration and sedimentation process. Multiple layers of fine linen cloth are used to filter out the coarse fibers and impurities from the potato pulp, leaving only a fine, milky-white starch slurry. This slurry is then placed in a large earthenware jar to allow the starch to slowly settle.
This process requires immense patience. A few days later, when a thick layer of snow-white, fine wet starch settles at the bottom of the vat, the most crucial ingredient is ready.
At this point, take out the wet starch, add an appropriate amount of boiling water to scald it, and knead it into a smooth and elastic starch dough.
Finally, came the shaping process. Lin Yue had a blacksmith specially craft a metal strainer with numerous small holes drilled in the bottom. He placed the starch dough into the strainer and squeezed it forcefully. Thin, translucent strips, like vermicelli, flowed out of the strainer's holes and fell directly into a pot of boiling water below!
The vermicelli is quickly scalded and shaped in boiling water, then taken out and cooled in cold water. Finally, it is hung on a wooden pole inside the house to dry slowly under the heat of the stove.
This process is filled with scientific rigor and the romance of food lovers.
When the first batch of crystal-clear, chewy, and smooth potato noodles was successfully made, Mia and Nom were stunned. They had never imagined that those hard lumps of stone could be transformed into something so beautiful and magical.
To celebrate the birth of the vermicelli and to reward the construction team members who had worked hard all day, Lin Yue decided to have a hot and sour vermicelli feast that night.
The smoked bacon is chopped into minced meat, stir-fried with animal fat until fragrant, and then a large amount of fire crystal pepper powder and chopped exotic ginger are added and stir-fried until fragrant, making a spicy and tempting minced meat sauce.
Then, blanch the soaked potato noodles in boiling water until cooked, remove them and place them in a large earthenware bowl, and then blanch a few tender snowball cabbage hearts. Next, pour a large spoonful of hot minced meat sauce over it, drizzle with a little sour arugula for added acidity, sprinkle with some roasted nuts and chopped wild coriander, and finally pour a spoonful of simmered broth over it.
A brand new bowl of hot and sour potato noodles, specially made for Hope Town, was born. The crystal-clear noodles, like crystals soaked in ruby broth, are covered with a layer of savory minced meat sauce and garnished with a few emerald green pieces. The red, green and white colors are so appealing that they make your mouth water just by looking at them.
The complex aroma, a blend of smoky meat, slightly pungent spiciness, and a subtle sourness, forcefully penetrates everyone's nasal cavity.
"Hiss—Ahhh—that feels so good!"
The moment the glass noodles touch your tongue, their chewy and smooth texture dances on your palate. Then, the savory aroma of the minced meat and the spiciness of the chili oil explode in your mouth, instantly igniting your taste buds. Before you can even savor it, a tangy aftertaste rises up, perfectly balancing the spiciness and greasiness, leaving only a mouthful of freshness and a thoroughly enjoyable, refreshing sensation.
Everyone felt a surge of heat rush from their heads to their feet, and a fine layer of sweat instantly appeared on their foreheads. The fatigue and chill of the past few days seemed to be washed away by this mouthful of rice noodles, and they exclaimed how satisfying it was.
"Once our sauerkraut has fermented properly, we'll use it to stew glass noodles. The taste... tsk tsk, that's the real winter delicacy!"
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Author's Note: Everyone (lying down): "This kang (heated brick bed) cures all ailments!"
Lin Yue (slurping noodles): "Huh?! No way, no way!"
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