Chapter 147: New House I.
Takeshi was very intelligent; he had the ability to use the earth element. He did not dig to create paths, but he compressed the earth to create paths. His control was almost absolute regarding earth; the only things hindering him were creativity and incremental development. In the future, if he became stronger, it would not be a block of stone as big as four large houses combined anymore, but controlling a mountain would be simple; however, that was a matter of the future.
Currently, Takeshi was panting from exhaustion; working these past few days with only very short rest periods, it could be said he was still weak.
After four days of designing, they had their first residence. And it was great because this place was exactly a real furnace, not to mention it was already summer; if the group stayed in here for long, they would probably be heated until cooked through.
Put that matter aside and come to the house of the group.
Aoto had relied on memory, from the time he went to the city of merchants and investigated after the disappearance of Kazuka and Ayaka. He had found the path going down to the secret place at the city's sewer. Aoto designed the door to be identical to the door at that place.
Originally, the large stone block in the center of this forest had existed for a long time, so there were many vines growing around it, and green moss too.
Aoto created a few holes on the top of the door, then brought a bit of soil over. Then he went to pull up vines and tried to plant them in the small soil patches he created; vines lived quite well and were hard to kill, so there was no worry. After finishing planting the vines, he pulled them down and covered the group's downward door. There was no need to cover everything; everyone knew that vines grew everywhere and could grow very strangely, so he only needed to cover the three straight lines of the door. Those were the three marks left behind: two vertical lines and one horizontal line at the top. And the large part of the vines would cover the door handle.
The way to open the door was very simple: just remember and go there, use strong force, and push forward. That way, the vine strands still covered the marks of the door.
Beneath this thin stone block—this door—were small dry firewood sticks, specifically of equal shape and size. They would be placed on a small slope.
Thus, when the stone door was pushed inward, this thin stone block would slide on these wooden sticks and be pushed back. After that, the edge of the door would be revealed; one only needed to shove the door to the left with strong force. When shoved over, this thin stone door, only as thick as a finger joint, would slide in the groove of the two wooden pieces more easily.
When going inside, they would push the stone door up; it would successfully stand on the flat ground and return to its camouflage.
If going outside and then wanting to close the door, it was also very simple. On the surface of the door, many vines had clung and even covered the entire top part of the stone door. And at that covered part was a stone crevice formed by Takeshi's earth element ability, looking like a horizontal handle. Thus, when going out and wanting to close the door, one only needed to lift the vines, grab the horizontal stone handle, and use force to pull it back up. If it is hard to imagine, it was like the handles of some large pots; the lids of large pots usually do not protrude but are concave and create a handle right there.
Generally, this design was not for ordinary people; although the stone block was thin, it was still stone, not to mention the width was 0.6 tharn and the length was 1 tharn. Thus, it was also very heavy.
Currently, Takeshi wanted to find an underground water vein to lead it straight in here to make things easier.
Returning to the new house, after stepping through the door, there would be a small space to stand. Looking down below was a long row of stairs with no visible end. Intelligent Aoto had also calculated for the case if someone could sense it; he calculated here in case there was an Elemental who could sense them. Therefore, these stair steps went down 200 tharn. So the stairs were quite long; walking them made the legs tired.
Along the stairs were glowing stones; glowing stones were not precious, but they were also difficult to dig. These things usually gathered in a certain place, so telling Takeshi to use the earth element and take a few glowing stones was impossible. These glowing stones were bought in large quantities by Airi; in her mind, she already had the intent to create a residence. Along the stairs going down, the glowing stones were quite sparse, partly because there were not many.
After going to the end of those long stairs, one would reach a quite large space. This space was lit by yellow glowing stones set into the walls. They did not even have shelves to place the stones; instead, Takeshi created holes just enough to set the glowing stones in.
This box-shaped space was just enough to serve as a living room. Naturally, since the group was dirt poor, how could they have many precious decorations? The table was a stone table; the chairs were wooden chairs made by everyone. They only tried to make the tables and chairs larger so as not to make the room lose symmetry.
At the four corners of the walls were wooden shelves as high as their lower bodies, considered for beauty. For the time being, they could not decorate yet.
Next, going to the end, were two crude wooden doors made temporarily, but they were also quite large, about more than 1.5 tharn.
Behind the doors was another large space; this space was an octagonal box shape. Each corner was a path leading to the residence of each person.
In general, Takeshi had compressed the earth. This made the ground very flat and smooth, and also harder; the stones were also made flat by his ability.
The door entering this octagonal space was located at one corner of the octagon. To the right side were three corners, which were the three rooms of the three people: Kazuka, Aoto, and Takeshi. To the left side were the three corners of the three girls: Elyssia, Ayaka, and Airi. Their room doors were also quite crude and simple.
At the center of the room, there would be small water crevices running in and connecting to the edge of each room's door, then running in the crevices at the edge of the room. Naturally, it could not run on earth crevices; otherwise, in the long run, the octagonal room would become a valley. So these water crevices, only as small as three fingertips, ran in a crevice of stone; this would make the water unable to soak through the earth. This stone crevice was also thin, only about one finger wide, but generally, it ensured the water did not soak out into the earth. And of course, Takeshi's earth element helped do this.
Straight ahead was the final corner of this octagonal room. Here there was a door; this door led to the place where they lived their daily lives. Takeshi, after searching for a long time, finally found underground water below, quite far at about 50 tharn, but having the earth element, he could create a path and lead the water here.
But if the water was just left to flow like that, flooding was a certainty, so they found a way to solve it. Previously at Tharros city, during the war, Tharros city had produced many weapons. Cunning Takeshi had snatched five swords to bring back, thinking that later if Kazuka lost his sword he would use them, but today they had a different use.
One more thing about the water pipe: Takeshi used stone blocks joined together to create a stone conduit; making it with earth would break early. If the water conduit was left large, it would be hard to control, so this water conduit was only as small as two fingertips, quite small. Then they let it flow to a large stone block made hollow by Takeshi to hold water. This hollowed-out stone block was 1 tharn high and 1 tharn wide. But the inside was deep down about 2 tharn.
Returning to the problem of solving the flowing water. No one in the group used the fire element, so smelting iron was very difficult. But softening it through the heat of a fire was possible; then by ingenuity and strength, they were able to bend it. The sword hilts were snapped off and thrown away, while the sword blades were utilized.
At the two sides of the water conduit flowing into the tank, they created two large holes, then at the end point of the large holes, they dug deep down for a distance. At this time, the sword blade was bent more than a bow. Then at the two ends of the sword blade, they twisted them a bit and bent them deeply downward; these two deeply bent ends would be set into the holes behind those other holes, so that weak water force could not push them out.
As for the water conduit, at the sword blade, they used wild boar skin, then wrapped it like a cork to plug into the water conduit; that way, having the boar skin, there would be no dripping.
Aoto, who had the ability to control his energy, carefully bored three holes on the sword blade, and for that wooden cork wrapped in wild boar skin, he tied metal wire into the hole at the bottom of the cork he created and connected it to the three holes very tightly. Thus, the water flow processing was finished. As for where that metal wire came from, on the previous owner's carriage, there were probably tasks that left quite a lot behind, so they saw and used it.
Thus, when wanting to lock the water, they would use that boar-skin-wrapped cork and plug it into the water conduit. Because this cork was tied to the middle part of the sword blade, and the two ends of the sword blade were bent and set into the holes in the stone, the water would not flow out.
Next came the place for bathing and the place for using the toilet. The bathing place was simple. Lead water from the water conduit over; the way to block it was also that water conduit locking cork. The three boys' bathroom was on the right, still a crude door; inside was a rock-hard stone tub, above which was the water conduit that would flow down. At the corner of the bathroom were two wooden buckets made from tree stumps by themselves—naturally, they were ugly and could not equal handmade ones—and there was also a wooden water scoop. Naturally, the bathroom floor was made of stone; water would flow to a small crevice, leading down to an extremely deep hole that Takeshi created to contain water.
Most things were made by everyone themselves, so it was quite time-consuming and labor-intensive, not to mention Takeshi had to use the earth element continuously, making him extremely tired; everything used it, but naturally, if there was more to do, he would still do it. He did it for everyone.