NABC Chapter 29: The Blue Brick City Wall
Chapter 29: The Blue Brick City Wall
After assigning all the tasks, Ron went to play his building game, the first thing being to build the adobe walls of the territory.
Now, his magic power has increased to 70. He meditates for 24 hours a week, and his meditation technique is about to break through to the middle stage of the apprentice level.
This efficiency is many times greater than that of other architectural mage apprentices.
After all, most architectural mage apprentices only cultivate for a few hours a day at most, while he cultivates for five or six times that amount.
"In a few more days, I should be able to enter the middle stage of the apprenticeship. I wonder how much my magic power and mental strength will increase." Ron muttered to himself as he started working. After building the last two sections of the adobe city wall, he headed to the other side.
By the time they returned for dinner in the evening, half of the city wall to the west of Ron had been completed.
This gave the former Wenger residents, who had just joined the territory, an unprecedented sense of security.
"Our lord seems to be a very powerful architectural mage," a middle-aged man said, looking at the city wall before him. "If we had a city wall like this back then, so many people wouldn't have died."
"Yes! At the speed at which the lord builds, we'll be considered city dwellers in ten days to half a month."
While his subjects were enthusiastically discussing the city walls, Ron returned to the pit courtyard, just in time for dinner.
A large round table was placed in the courtyard, where almost all the important figures of the territory were present and eating.
This is a new rule set by Ron: to eat together at dinner time and report on work at the same time.
Ron can be said to have squeezed every last drop of resources from all the high-ranking personnel in the territory.
Old Hall asked eagerly, "Young Master, about the iron ore?"
After all, the importance of iron in the territory is self-evident.
After thinking for a moment, Ron said, "Once the territory recovers its fighting strength, Leonardo da Vinci will be in charge. He will lead a mining team to mine every day. There won't be many; they'll go in the morning and return in the evening."
"Why don't we rebuild Wenger's territory, lest it fall into the hands of others?" Tangen suggested.
Ron said confidently, "Just plant the flag. We are the closest to Wenger's territory. The nearest other territory is seventy or eighty miles away. As long as we don't agree, no one can build a new territory."
Fanta, as the military commander, nodded in agreement.
Old Hall added at the opportune moment: "While Mad goes out hunting, intensify reconnaissance and exploration around Wenger Territory."
"Yes, Lord Hall!" Mad replied quickly.
"My lord, it's done, it's done!" A strong woman ran over happily, holding two dark, murky objects in her hands.
Ron's eyes lit up when he saw the objects, and he immediately put down his cutlery to grab two dark bricks.
The two bricks collided together, producing a crisp sound.
The sound drew everyone's attention, and Ron tossed one of the pieces to Fanta: "Try it, see if you can break it."
Without saying a word, Fanta started trying to break the brick.
The brick broke with a crack as his face turned bright red.
Fanta, panting, said, "Young master, this brick is quite good!"
With Fanta's Earth Rider arm strength, which can easily reach three or four hundred pounds, it still takes a lot of effort to break it, which shows its strength.
Old Hall then began analyzing the data on the blue bricks, and then nodded: "Indeed, although it is not as hard as granite, it is highly malleable and breathable, making it the best material for building houses."
"Young Master, you have truly succeeded." Old Hall knew very well how much profit this could bring.
Ron nodded and looked at the two strong women, saying, "Fire another batch according to the standards I taught you. This time, don't use water vapor to seal the kiln. Once it's fired, just open the kiln to let it cool down."
The water mist sealing process during the firing of blue bricks, also known as "sinking water" or "returning water," is a crucial step in determining whether the bricks can turn from red to blue.
It is not just about cooling; it is an artificially created reduction reaction that directly determines the strength, durability, and color of the bricks.
The chemical principle is that the iron in the brick blank will oxidize into red ferric oxide at high temperatures.
The water mist instantly vaporizes upon entering the kiln, consuming the oxygen inside and forcing the iron to be reduced to bluish-gray ferrous oxide.
"Yes, my lord!"
Ron looked at Old Hall and said, "Tomorrow you will help build the solar kiln. This time, the kiln should be large, ideally one that is equivalent to ten, or even a hundred."
After all, the original solar kiln was mainly for experimentation.
Old Hall naturally understood the purpose of these blue bricks; they might even become the pillar industry of the territory in the future.
Now that we have the bricks, the next step is the building adhesive.
Some people's first reaction is cement, but Ron doesn't plan to use cement. Instead, he will use lime mortar, for a simple reason.
Lime mortar has low compressive strength, but relatively good tensile and shear strength.
It can tolerate slight settlement and deformation of the foundation, and can play a role in overcoming rigidity with softness. Microcracks may re-heal during later carbonization.
Cement has extremely high compressive strength, but it is also brittle. If the foundation settles unevenly, it is prone to irreversible through cracks.
The main function of the city wall was defense. Its main body was made of rammed earth using adobe bricks. When dealing with attacks such as catapults, the rammed earth had the ability to buffer and disperse the impact of the stone projectiles due to its properties.
If the outer layer is combined with blue bricks and cement, it is more likely to crack under the impact of stone bullets. It is better to use lime mortar and blue bricks.
Of course, the advantages of cement are also very obvious: it has high hardness and fast setting speed, which allows it to be quickly used in urban construction.
Ron quickly used the sand on the ground to solidify lime, clay and sand, and then mixed them into lime mortar in a ratio of 2:1:3.
Old Hall immediately understood what Ron was doing and hurriedly came over to help.
"Young Master, let me help!" As soon as Old Hall moved, the others hurriedly followed to help.
Mrs. Moriel immediately had all the fired bricks brought over; there weren't many, only about a hundred.
A group of people quickly built a wall, but because they weren't professional craftsmen, it looked crooked and uneven.
"We'll know how it goes tomorrow." Ron clapped his hands, then went back to prepare his dinner.
Looking at the wall in front of him, Doron secretly complained to himself that having dinner with the lord was not a good job. He had to work while eating and also had to cooperate with the lord's wild imagination from time to time.
"Eating a meal is exhausting!"
"Doron, what did you say?" Leonardo da Vinci seemed to hear Doron's murmur and asked subconsciously.
"No, hurry up and eat!" Doron said irritably. "Take care of your injury as soon as possible, don't just focus on enjoying yourself."
As promised, Ron gave Leonardo da Vinci two women. In addition, with the addition of his knighthood, Leonardo da Vinci has been partying every night for the past few days. The noise has been so loud that his neighbor, Doron's wife, has been getting up in the middle of the night to bother him, leaving Doron speechless.
Leonardo da Vinci scratched his head awkwardly. He had struggled for most of his life and successfully crossed social classes. Now that he had some free time, he naturally thought about the future, and having offspring became his top priority, after all, he was almost forty years old.
"Haha, I'll be gentler tonight."
Doron waved his hand dismissively: "Get lost! You'd better watch out, you might die in bed."
Early the next morning, Ron came out of the cave, stretched, and saw everyone looking around at the wall that had been built the night before.
Old Hall would occasionally dig at the lime mortar that wasn't completely dry, but the smile that occasionally appeared on his face showed that he was very satisfied with the effect of the lime mortar.
Ron smiled and accepted the breakfast Mrs. Moriel brought him. The main dish was still black bread. As for the dough seized from the goblin camp, Mrs. Moriel dared not give it to Ron.
Does anyone know what was added to it?
"Old Hall, I'll be focusing all my efforts on building the city walls for the next while. The work of firing the bricks and preparing the lime mortar will be yours," Ron said, clapping his hands after a quick breakfast.
Old Hall smiled and nodded: "Young Master, don't worry about leaving it to me."