Chapter 29: Building the Factory

This two-hundred-acre plot of land was valued at one hundred gold leaves. It was a fair market price. Including this land, the entire village and the fields they had reclaimed were sold by Carlotus for nearly nothing—one gold leaf. Of course, strictly speaking, this was not a sale but an acknowledgment by the academy of their ownership rights to the land. The very next day after the transaction concluded, a construction crew of barely a dozen men marched onto the site in grand style.

Why did a handful of people warrant such a grand entrance? Because they had come from Ye Ye Academy, carrying heavy equipment. The academy possessed no machinery on the scale of excavators or dump trucks, yet it did have substantial tools. There were massive hammers weighing several tons, used to level and compact earth. And there were enormous scythes capable of felling trees in batches. These were large spirit artifacts, some dating back to the academy’s founding a thousand years ago and still in use today.

In Ye Ye Academy one could study virtually any discipline, of course including civil engineering and architecture. The building elder brothers had waited a long time for suitable work; the academy’s own structures had stood for so long that the old city of Ye Ye was difficult to renovate. Now these veterans had returned to their favorite sites. Yet for them this project felt almost too simple.

“Just this?” The foreman, a woman with a blade of grass between her teeth, scanned the construction drawings with open disdain.

“Only these for now,” Su Ziye confirmed seriously.

The main factory building intended for instant-noodle production would comprise four halls: cafeteria, warehouse, workshop, and dormitory. The design followed a strict principle of simplicity and efficiency, which left the grand-scale craftsmen feeling quietly contemptuous.

“Wooden framing? We’re supposed to cut and assemble on site?” the foreman continued, still studying the plans. “Su Ziye, can you be any more excessive?”

“Time is short, the deadline is tight, and the budget is limited. We must make do.” Su Ziye smiled.

“No way!” the foreman declared firmly. “Even a dog could handle this. Why did Carlotus drag us here for such work?”

“If we finish in seven days, dogs truly could not,” Su Ziye replied.

“What? Seven days?” The foreman was stunned.

“Can it not be done?” Su Ziye asked.

The foreman re-examined the drawings with fresh care. Though the sketches were drawn with genuine skill, they carried an unmistakable air of haste. At first she had glanced over them quickly and dismissed them with contempt. Now, however, she began to study them more closely. She could estimate both volume and timeline from the plans. After initial disbelief she realized that, working at her own pace, she could complete the job in ten days. Seven days, though, was almost impossible.

“Impossible,” she stated. “Unless a saint is lending a hand.”

Construction followed its own objective laws. Su Ziye’s drawings were excellent, yet even a master would need nearly ten days to work through them step by step. Of course, if a saint were present, the entire structure might rise in a single hour or even less. “There is no saint,” Su Ziye said with a faint smile. “Would you care to place a wager with me, foreman?”

“What kind of wager?”

“As long as you follow my lead, we can finish the factory in seven days.”

“Agreed.” The foreman answered without hesitation. She was eager to witness the young man’s next miracle.

“Then let us begin,” Su Ziye said, jumping down from the platform.

“Right now?” the foreman asked.

“The crew is assembled. We start immediately.”

The first task was leveling the ground. Ye Ye Academy’s construction team had ample experience. The land had once been farmland, so its contours were level, though the soil was loose and the crops had not yet been harvested. Su Ziye saw no reason to wait. He simply ignited a fire.

Golden flames swept across the two-hundred-acre field in under an hour, reducing every crop to black ash. Water-system mages followed, dousing the embers and rinsing the hardened soil.

Su Ziye’s flames were searing. In that single hour the entire plot had been turned into a solid slab of brick. This step surpassed the foreman’s expectations. She then directed the crew to rough-grade the surface before construction could begin.

“Foundation?” she interrupted sharply.

The plans did show a foundation.

“It is already in place,” Su Ziye said calmly. “The entire site rests on foundation.”

“How thick?” the foreman asked instinctively.

“Fifteen meters.”

The foreman produced a probe and shovel, confirmed the measurement, and stared in disbelief. Su Ziye had burned the two-hundred-mu plot into a single fifteen-meter-thick slab of brick with nothing but fire and time.

It was a display of raw power, subtle yet unmistakable. Once recognized, it inspired awe.

“May we proceed to erect the buildings?” Su Ziye asked with a smile. “Additionally, cutting the current earth will yield high-quality bricks.”

“Bricks are made by fire,” he added. “I know how to burn them. Even poor soil turns hard under such heat.”

“As for timber, any unclaimed forest nearby can be used. I will oversee the drying process as well.”

Watching the youth before her, the foreman suddenly understood. With a saint’s help the factory could rise in an hour. Without one, Su Ziye’s arrival alone could still compress the schedule to seven days—solely because he was Su Ziye.

She could not help smiling. “I never imagined a true powerhouse would take on such tedious labor.”

“Now you may,” Su Ziye replied.