Volume 1: Farming Chapter 13 Opening up a new dungeon
There were enough mud bricks made in advance. After building a square straight chimney against the wall at the smoke outlet, Xiao Yun thought about building a bathroom on the left wall of the house where the big stove was burned. He subtly let the tribesmen develop the habit of washing hands before meals and feet before putting on shoes. Therefore, he must force the tribesmen to wash the old mud on their bodies before entering the house and getting on the kang... Otherwise, he would have to keep warm in a closed room with a group of smelly snow wolves. Just thinking about that scene is extremely enchanting.
"Oh, by the way, let's fix the toilet." While squatting on the ground drawing the blueprint, Xiao Yun thought of another important thing, "Well...just build it outside the tribe. It won't be used often anyway, so it doesn't matter if it's far away from the living area."
The digestive organs of the snow werewolves are very strong, extremely strong. How strong are they? More than 80% of the food they eat can be digested and absorbed... Adult snow werewolves only need to excrete once every four to five days, while teenagers only need to excrete once every seven to eight days.
Compared to humans who need to defecate every day, the Snow Wolf people naturally have no concept of toilets at all... When they need to defecate, they just dig a hole in the wild and bury it after defecation. Xiao Yun has only defecated twice in all these days, so he has no sense of urgency about building a toilet.
The bathroom, to put it simply, is just a larger family bathroom. There is definitely no bathtub or shower facilities. Everything has to be made with what is available: the bathroom is built directly against the wall on the left side of the mud brick house, and a water storage pool is built across the wall from the stove. When the stove is burning, the heat from the wall heats the water for use. As for the shower facilities... well, Xiao Yun simply dug a crude scoop out of wood... The technical content lies in the sewage discharge part. Xiao Yun had to dig a ditch to discharge the sewage outside the tribe. This job was done by Xiao Yun himself.
The mud brick houses have been built, and the heated kangs have been used by the tribesmen. When Xiao Yun proposed to build a bathroom, no one objected, including Yangmao and several other young men. No one thought that Ayun was just too playful and always couldn't get along with the mud.
The bathroom with an internal water tank took half a day to build. After the swamp silt cement was dried, the beams and roof could be put up.
A total of nine logs, about six meters long and as thick as Xiao Yun's waist, were placed vertically on the wall with spaces reserved for mud bricks. Thinner, less straight wood chips and branches were horizontally placed in the specially cut slits on the vertical beams of the logs and then covered with reeds that had been cut in advance, dried in the air and tied into sheets. This was the prototype of the roof. The reed poles used for the roof were all more than one person tall. If it rained, reed poles of this length could draw water droplets along the pole to the eaves behind the house. If snow accumulated on the roof, it would also be easy to push the snow down from high to low.
Well, the monsoon on the grassland is quite strong. In order to prevent the reed roof from being blown away, we have to put some wood chips and stones on it...
Xiao Yun did not have the technology to make windows, so the ventilation holes of the house directly utilized the gaps between the mud bricks on the top of the wall. Just make sure that the house can breathe. The snow werewolves can have night vision, so it doesn't matter if it's dark inside the house. As for the door, just two animal skins will be enough. Anyway, Xiao Yun didn't think that the snow werewolf tribe needed doors... At least there was no creature on the grassland that could break through the snow werewolf's empty door.
Such an ugly mud brick house was, as expected, extremely popular among the Snow Werewolves. On the night when the roof was completed, Xiao Yun asked Yangmao and others to help light the stove and heat up the kang, so that all the tribe members could go in and feel the airtight environment and the warm kang. The tribe leader immediately proposed that all the cubs who stayed overnight in the tribe should sleep in this house...
"It hasn't snowed yet. We can build another mud brick house before it snows, so that all the tribesmen can spend the night on the warm kang when it snows. But I have a request... Everyone must go to the bathroom and wash their bodies before entering the house and getting on the kang."
Xiao Yun seriously dragged the clan leader to see the bathroom he had built, which no one in the clan cared much about its function. He explained to the clan leader the principle of how the water tank borrowed temperature from the big stove next door.
The tribe leader did not agree to Xiao Yun's request immediately this time. He hesitated for a while and said, "If our bodies are exposed to water too much in cold weather, our tribe members will get sick... Besides, our bodies need a layer of mud."
Many wild animals have the habit of rolling in the mud, using a layer of mud shell to protect their skin and maintain body temperature. The Snow Wolf Man probably learned this habit from wild animals during his long life on the grassland. Xiao Yun didn't know whether to laugh or cry. He would never give in on this: "To maintain body temperature, wearing cold-proof fur is definitely more useful than being covered in mud. Besides, our skin is not the fur of real wild animals. Mud is harmful to us."
The tribe leader still firmly disagreed. The tribe members didn't take a bath in the winter, let alone in the summer. What Ayun said this time was contrary to his experience, and he didn't dare to risk the lives of his tribe members.
Xiao Yun had no choice but to hold his nose and let a few dirty young men from Yangmao make trouble on the kang in the house all night. The next day, with his nose almost rotten, he got up and rushed towards Sal's tent.
Thrall's tent was piled with the tribe's property and various furs. He was indeed quite capable. The finished animal skins were relatively soft and had a certain degree of elasticity. Although they still had defects such as being smelly, not waterproof and not heat-resistant, they were still usable . They were much more finished than the hard and smelly furs that were the original owners' private property.
Relying on the fact that Thrall was afraid of him, Xiao Yun took out a piece of furry skin from the pile of animal skins that was almost as long as his height, bent the furry part inward, gestured with his hands, and then... he used the bone needles and thread made of animal tendons that Thrall had, and used his disastrous needlework skills to sew the fur into clothes - the animal head could be processed into a ready-made hat, the skin of the forelimbs could be sewn together to make sleeves, the tail could be turned into a belt, the cut made when the animal was skinned and peeled could be used as a lapel, and the animal tendons could be used as a zipper after perforation, and the longer part of the hind limbs could be cut off and the rest could be turned into trouser legs. The crotch was located lower and difficult to change, but it didn't matter anyway, it didn't require it to be beautiful.
Holding the fur coat and returning to the mud-brick house, Xiao Yun found the horn knife that he had not returned after cutting from the horn, and laboriously cut his hair...
Xiao Yun, the unkempt hair, had been annoyed for more than a day or two. He had been holding back on having his hair cut in order to prevent the tribe members from thinking that he had a problem. Now, in order to convince the tribe leader, he could no longer care...
It's true that the white fur of the Snow Wolf Man was so thick that it hurt his balls. The horn knife that was carefully sharpened by the horn made Xiao Yun's scalp hurt. After finally cutting the messy hair into short hair that fell to the shoulders like a dog's bite (compared to the original length), Xiao Yun felt that his head was at least several pounds lighter.
After throwing the cut hair aside, Xiao Yun went into the bathroom and took a refreshing bath... The water that had been heated up all night by the stove was steaming hot, and it felt indescribably refreshing when it was poured over his body. He softened the old mud on his body with the hot water and rubbed it with his hands. Well... it perfectly demonstrated what rubbing mud meant, without any exaggeration.
After rubbing off a layer of mud and ironing the hair on his head with hot water, Xiao Yun once again felt several pounds lighter. After washing, he ran into the house naked and squatted in front of the big stove to use the embers to dry his body and hair. Then he put on a fur coat and straw sandals, tied up his short white hair with animal tendons, and immediately ran to show Yangmao and the others the results of his work.
She was diligently weaving wool from rattan grass, staring at Xiao Yun with her mouth open for a long time, and then she uttered, "Ayun, you are so white!"
"..." Xiao Yun looked down at his washed arms. Indeed, after removing the layer of old mud that had accumulated for who knows how many years, his skin inherited from the original owner was snow-white... However, to be honest, his skin, which had been damaged by the old mud that brought who knows how many bacteria for so many years, was white but not delicate at all. Instead, it had many features of pathological keratosis and a lot of bumps.
"After taking a bath and putting on the fur, I feel much more comfortable than before." Xiao Yun sincerely coaxed the young men, "Really, I feel very relaxed now."
"Hey..." Wool and other friends stopped weaving and gathered around him to look at his strange-shaped fur coat.
"Look at the bumps and old skin lesions on my hands. These are skin diseases caused by being covered with dirt for a long time. If your resistance decreases over time, your skin may rot." Xiao Yun exaggerated. "Have you seen dead tribesmen? The dead tribesmen's bodies are rotten all over. It's very scary. This is caused by too much mud on their bodies and not taking a bath for years."
Yangmao and the others looked at him in horror, they were so scared... What nonsense, it would be strange if the dead did not decay. Xiao Yun was just bullying them because they did not understand the common sense of Earthlings.
That night, when the tribe leader and half of the herders came back for a rest, they saw that the four cubs who stayed behind in the tribe were all washed clean and white, wearing strange fur clothes that looked like human clothes, and their hair was cut so short that they could only be tied up...
"We've been showering all day and no one's sick!"
Xiao Yun, who acted first and reported later, patted his chest confidently towards the clan leader.
The chieftain glared at him, then turned to Yangmao and asked nervously, "Are any of you feeling unwell?"
The wool was several kilograms lighter (for sure). The few people could not understand the tribe leader's nervousness at all and shook their heads blankly.
"Chief, I've told you it's okay. Getting sick has nothing to do with whether there's mud protecting the body. On the contrary, mud will make the cubs in the tribe unhealthy. If you don't believe me, wait a few days to see if Yang Mao and the others look better than the cubs who didn't take a bath. Then you'll believe me." Xiao Yun tried to persuade him again.
Well... the clan leader still didn't listen. He had to observe for a few more days before he could rest assured. This was because the clan leader trusted Xiao Yun enough for the sake of the wild vegetable bean sprout mud brick house kang, otherwise he would immediately let Xiao Yun and the others roll in the mud and get back the old mud that protected the snow wolf's skin.
The enclosed stove that can make full use of heat greatly reduced the fuel consumption when cooking food. The saved fuel was more than enough to burn the kang for a whole night, so that night the older clan leader also squeezed together with the cubs on the kang to spend the night - if Xiao Yun had not explained to him that the fuel consumed by the kang has nothing to do with how many people sleep on it, the clan leader probably would not be willing to "compete" with the cubs for heating resources.
After sleeping on the kang for a night, although the tribe leader still disagreed with Xiao Yun's proposal to let the tribe members take a bath, he supported the idea of building another mud brick house so that all the tribe members could spend the winter in the house. He also asked the two female snow wolves and Niu Jiao who had assisted Xiao Yun to continue to help him and try to complete the house construction project before the heavy snow came.
Unlike the clan leader who was counting the manpower on his fingers and worrying about the lack of manpower, Xiao Yun did not think it would be difficult to refresh the house-building dungeon that he had successfully "opened up". After getting the adult labor force again, Xiao Yun only let Niu Jiao make mud bricks, first coaxed the two female snow werewolves to cut their hair and take a bath, and then sew fur clothes with him...
In just one day, two clean-looking people (although they also had serious skin diseases) appeared in the tribe. The tribe leader looked at Xiao Yun with a fierce look in his eyes...
The Snow Wolf people are tall and energetic. After Xiao Yun made the clothes he wore, he made styles for others that were mainly wide in the torso and had half-sleeves on the limbs. First, he was worried that the Snow Wolf people, who moved like mad dogs, would damage the clothes during exercise. Second, if these people wore long sleeves, the cuffs would probably rot in three days, no matter how sturdy they were.
After successfully coaxing his uncle Ashan into taking a bath and putting on clothes (he refused to cut his hair), the clan leader, who had been observing for a few days, reluctantly agreed to let all the clan members who wanted to sleep on the kang take a bath. At this time, the second mud brick house built side by side had been completed and only needed to be dried before the roof was added. Xiao Yun could also start his second new copy of land reclamation - that is, making pottery.
Not surprisingly, when Xiao Yun found the tribe leader, who seemed a little uncomfortable in his fur clothes, and proposed that he planned to build a kiln to make pottery, the tribe leader looked at him with the same look as when he heard that he knew how to build a house.
"Do you know how to make the pottery we exchanged with the caravan?!" The patriarch almost stuck his nose to Xiao Yun's, and grabbed Xiao Yun's shoulders with his two big hands.
"I know the theory, but how to burn it still requires practice. Also, if you keep grabbing me so hard, I might not know it." Xiao Yun grinned.
The clan leader quickly let go and asked excitedly: "How many people do you need?"
"It's better to let Niujiao, Qingcao and Dahe help me." Xiao Yun seized the opportunity to ask for people. Qingcao and Dahe were the two female snow wolves who helped him build a house. Last time he proposed to let the tribe members take a bath, the tribe leader disagreed, so he took the two of them to graze. Xiao Yun, who thought they were under his control, was confused the whole day... Even if Niujiao was always following him, this big fool was not as useful as Qingcao and Dahe, who were relatively dexterous.
Even though he was very old, the tribe leader was still simple-minded and didn't realize that the cub Ayun had some signs of "a real man cannot be without power for a day", and he readily gave the three tribesmen to him again.
When they heard that Ayun was going to lead them to make pottery, Niu Jiao looked innocent and confused, which made people feel particularly helpless; Qingcao and Dahe were much more reassuring, they immediately showed excited expressions that "Ayun was going to lead them to do great things", and they also grabbed Ayun's shoulders like a clan leader.
"Just ask whatever you want to ask, don't do anything!" The alert Xiao Yun immediately hid behind the bull's horns and pointed at the two people who were about to pounce on him.
"Hehe..." Qingcao and Dahe looked at each other sheepishly. After washing themselves, these two really looked like handsome guys, and their behaviors were also very similar. This somewhat shy look made Xiao Yun feel the discordant gender confusion again. "Then Ah Yun, what should we do?"
"First, make the right clay." Xiao Yun walked out from behind the ox horns. "We use the yellow mud we use to make mud bricks and the silt from the swamp. Mix these two kinds of mud and see what ratio is easy to shape and fire. If it is fine enough, not too sticky, and air-dried without cracking, then it can be fired. You two should take care of this first."
Qingcao and Dahe were stunned and whispered , "Still playing in the mud?"
Xiao Yun ignored what they were muttering and turned to look at Niu Jiao: "Niu Jiao, first try to build a kiln with me using the extra mud bricks from building the house, and then find suitable stones to build another one, and see which kiln is more useful."
Niu Jiao didn't understand what he said at all, and still looked innocent and confused...
Xiao Yun sighed: "Anyway, the process is almost like this, let's get busy."
The technical content of pottery making is not high. Primitive people even made pottery by kneading mud into shapes, laying them on the ground, covering them with firewood and hay, and burning them directly... The pottery made in this way can be used, but the quality is poor, it is fragile, and it cannot withstand firing. Xiao Yun would definitely not consider it. However, the pottery clay mixed in the early stage can be tested in the big stove for heating the kang first - Xiao Yun knows too little about kiln burning, and he has no confidence that he can build a usable kiln.
By the way, in the forum Xiao Yun used to hang out on, there was a guy who was so bored that he used a gas stove to make pottery. No one was so bored...
