Walking the Path of a Workaholic in Cliché Novels (QT) Chapter 82

“Sir, I like you so much.” A drunk An Yinong was even clingier than usual, like a piece of candy that would turn into honey when held in the mouth.

Gu Zhengzhong used a hot towel to wipe his face, hands, and then feet. His ankle still had the red string that Gu Zhengzhong had tied with his own hands, and it had not faded after so many years. The red rope dangling around the snow-white ankles contained an indescribable temptation.

“Hmm.” The drunken man lay in the arms of someone he knew well, curled up his feet, and hummed, “Itchy.”

An Yinong was already a young man, and he looked very dignified when he wore his official robes, but when he took them off, he had a kind of youthfulness. This youthfulness was not in his face, but in his courage to move forward and his innocence of believing in his ideals.

“Will Yinong always like me?” Gu Zhengzhong gently took his hand and covered his face. His sweetheart was the bright sun in winter, while he was an immortal evil creature in the darkness, boring and hypocritical. He was not a gentleman, but an evil ghost who thought about plundering every day.

Gu Zhengzhong occasionally worried about what would happen if An Yinong got tired of him or saw through him one day.

He didn’t know if he felt something, but An Yinong opened his eyes, still drunk, but he spoke clearly: “Sir, Happy New Year. I have lucky money, put it on your pillow. As he said this he started laughing foolishly.

As a result, Gu Zhengzhong really sealed the marriage certificate from the pillow. It was an informal marriage certificate between two men, no, one man and one ghost. He was stunned, and his mind went blank for a moment.

An Yinong, who was still drunk, didn’t know that he had revealed the surprise. He still said with a smile: “Sir, at this time every year, I want to welcome the same New Year with you, for the rest of my life…”

Gu Zhengzhong tasted the faint flavor of wine from his soft and warm lips, which was sweeter than any alcohol he had ever drunk. The red gauze curtain silently slid down, and the cold fingers started from the red rope at the ankle, probing little by little.

An Yinong hummed lightly, lazy as if his bones were about to be pulled out. The cool and smooth feeling made his cheeks warm. He leaned over, took a closer look, and carefully identified: “Sir.”

“Yeah.” Gu Zhengzhong’s voice was slightly hoarse.

“I’m so tired. I want to sleep.”

Gu Zhengzhong looked at An Yinong who had fallen asleep in his arms, and for a long time he didn’t know what to do. He laughed and shook his head: “Forget it, the time is not right yet. Anyway… we still have a lifetime.”

Happy days always passed quickly. After the Lantern Festival, the busy days started again. The prisoners who had rested were taken away to build roads. The runners wore thick cotton clothes and went out to check every household to see if they had survived the winter. If they unfortunately did not, they had to register.

The shops on the road also opened their doors and started doing business. However, what most intrigued the people of Dingsha County was probably the job recruitment notice posted in the county government office.

“Who does our magistrate want to recruit?” An illiterate man asked the clerk above him.

“Our master has just built a brick and tile kiln, and is looking for craftsmen who can make the bricks and tiles. In addition to them, we are also looking for carpenters and masons who can repair houses, as well as diggers who can dig wells. However, the most popular ones are those who can build roads. They don’t need to know anything, just need a bit of strength.”

“Will you pay me?” Someone was tempted. Their food was almost consumed this winter, and they would starve if they didn’t have any more income.

It was because the new magistrate had just distributed land to people that they had the courage to come and ask. If it had been the previous magistrate, they would not have had time to run.

“Of course, five hundred wen a month, including one meal.” As soon as the clerk said this, many people were tempted. However, some people also asked whether there were so many other jobs that required skills.

“If it’s just a laborer, it’s eight hundred a month. If it’s a master chef, it’s incredible, one or two taels of silver per month.”

The high salaries attracted many craftsmen and laborers. The roads began to be built, and the newly built kilns began to burn bricks and tiles day and night.

The magistrate got a blueprint from somewhere, which allowed him to make an extremely useful “bellows”. Just push and pull the bellows and the fire would burn vigorously. The bricks and tiles that came out were of extremely good quality. In addition, the magistrate ordered people to build a new kiln, but he didn’t know what to burn in it.

When the people in Dingsha County didn’t know what to make, An Yinong sent a letter to Empress Qi in the capital, introducing a wonderful thing called cement, which could be made with only lime, clay and slag from cast iron. It was an excellent brick and stone adhesive.

An Yinong dedicated the recipe to Empress Qi and volunteered, saying that the people in Dingsha County were willing to be a test to try out whether the cement was useful, as long as the ruler sent some slag from iron smelting.

Seeing how he talked so much, how could Empress Qi not be tempted? Soon, several carts of slag from iron smelting were delivered, and the kiln that had been inactive since it was repaired also began to burn things. The gray powder was carefully collected, but no one knew what it was used for.

A notice was posted outside the county government office, recruiting workers who were strong and conscientious. The main job was to break mud bricks and dry them in the sun.

The people of Dingsha County speculated that the county was going to build a county government office. Later, merchants also came with logs from afar, which made them more convinced of their suspicions.

Then came the news that the garrison troops were suppressing bandits. This time, they were suppressing the bandits who were robbing people on both sides of the main road. The merchants in Dingsha County all cheered loudly. The bandits along the way were eliminated, and it became easier for them to do business.

“It is said that it was our county magistrate who persuaded the general.” Someone knew the inside story, so the group of people thanked the county magistrate again.

At this time, An Yinong was taking a group of well-drilling craftsmen who had been hired with great difficulty to the designated welfare housing address.

“Here.” An Yinong drew a dot. This place was where the water ghost had found an underground spring. If they dig from here, they will find water within a few meters.

The reason why no one discovered it before was because there was a huge rock in the soil, so water couldn’t well up and grass couldn’t grow, so it looked like there was no water. But now, the huge rock had just been moved away by someone (a ghost) using magic.

Nearby was a newly reclaimed wasteland, and experienced farmers were smiling as they touched the moistened soil. An Yinong wanted to build a small village here, with welfare housing inside. In the future, those who were poor because of lack of resources could cultivate the land and return to their own houses. Each village would also be equipped with a large well to meet their daily needs.

The water-drawing team looked at the dot with some doubt, but they did not dare to refute the new magistrate’s words and resigned themselves to picking up their tools. Unexpectedly, after they had been busy for a short while, water actually started to come out of the cracks in the ground.

“Water is coming out! Water is coming out!” The members of the water-fetching team were ecstatic; even their dirty faces could not hide their joy. Water was a more precious survival material than food here.

An Yinong was standing outside, also smiling happily. The news spread quickly, and residents of came to see it, not because of the well, but because the county magistrate promised to build good houses here and sell them to the poor at half the price.

“Really? Was there such a good thing?” They were skeptical.

But those who had been allocated land before were unwavering in their belief: “Our magistrate is a man of integrity. What he says is what he will do. He will not lie to us.”

“I won’t lie, but…” An Yinong thought for a moment, “The people who can apply for welfare housing must be a family of five or more, and they don’t have a house in the countryside or the county town. If someone who already has a house applies and gets the quota, the house under their name will be automatically confiscated.

“So, can you accept it?”

If you want a new house, you have to give up your old house. Many people shook their heads and said, “It sounds good now, but who knows what the house will look like after it is built? What if it is not as good as the old house? I won’t do it.”

But some people hesitated: “Let’s take a look first. What if the magistrate is not lying to us and this is really a good house?”

The county magistrate did not lie, and people came every day to dig the foundation. Because hundreds of people came at a time, within a month, the foundations of three rows of welfare houses were dug, and every household dug a cellar.

The well had been dug and the foundation had been excavated, and now the logs brought back by the merchant could be put to use.

These were all good wood that had been dried in the shade. Carpenters trimmed them into shape, inserted them into the polished stone bases, and fixed them with mortise and tenon structures. These wooden foundations were sufficient to support two floors.

An Yinong wanted to build was a single-story, flat-roofed mud-brick building suitable for the northwest region. It included an open courtyard in the middle, the total construction area was 160 square meters.

“The temperature difference between day and night is large here. The winter is dry and cold, and the summer is dry and hot, so the walls are made thicker. There are strong winds in early summer here, and there is little rain all year round, so the house is suitable for a flat roof.”

“Also, there are few small windows, mainly to keep out the cold. But since we are going to build a kang in the house, the windows can actually be made a little bigger and open to the south for ventilation and light.”

An Yinong directly took the 100:1 scale model he had made, and the effect could be seen very intuitively.

“Everything else doesn’t matter, except here. The kitchen and the kang bed are separated by a wall. The kang bed should be made bigger, so that seven or eight people in the family can lie down. In winter, we can use centralized heating.”

Separate heating was too expensive, both the cost of building a house and the cost of burning firewood were high. However, hanging kangs and central heating could alleviate this problem.

He had been thinking about cement before, also in order to have cement boards to make suspended kangs, which would save more firewood than traditional earthen kangs. One has to know that the people who moved in were most likely to be poor households, so the design had to be based on their situation.

Therefore, An Yinong chose to build the house with mud bricks, and only had to use bricks and cement boards for the suspended kang, which were relatively expensive materials.

He had already asked experienced craftsmen for their opinions on the building structure. If the walls were made thicker, it will be able to last for 70 to 80 years.

“These houses need to be inspected every 30 years, and the fallen walls need to be repaired in time. If the foundation is eaten by insects and ants, it needs to be reinforced. This way they can be used for one to two hundred years.” In the era before mass production of cement and steel bars, such single-story buildings with wooden structures and mud bricks were the sturdy and durable houses that poor households most desired.

Welfare housing had become one of the hottest topics in Dingsha County today. Every day, people went to take a look out of curiosity, just like following modern internet celebrities.

An Yinong had originally wanted to check the progress every day, but after seeing this situation, he felt that it didn’t matter whether he went or not. With so many people watching, the carpenters and masons who were repairing the house didn’t dare to be lazy.

So he spent more time visiting his cows, as well as the rubber grass and succulents he had started to plant.

The old farmer who grew plants had never grown this strange grass in his life, so he was still trying to figure out how to plant it. However, many people knew how to grow succulents, which the locals called a slightly different name, so it seemed that An Yinong didn’t need to worry about it.

“We have the land. As long as the weather is good this year, we can always harvest enough food for our family. We have started to repair the houses. This year, a group of people will move in, and more people will move in later. Then the next step is to develop local cash crops and promote them.”

An Yinong was in the study was thinking about his plan. He had already thought about raising local specialty animals, one of which was the black cattle and the other was the local hounds. An Yinong had already asked people to purchase hounds and build kennels to raise and train them.

As for economic plants, the first was definitely the very practical rubber grass, followed by succulents that pursued the strategy of small profits but quick turnover, and finally local herbs and spices.

“If we want to sell these goods, it will not work just by promoting ourselves. Even if I write a storybook, it is not safe to sell the goods in the name of the county magistrate.” After thinking it over, An Yinong decided to turn his attention to Empress Qi.

Empress Qi seemed to be a very thoughtful monarch. He wondered if she was interested in developing the beef cattle breeding industry in the Northwest?