novelnext Chapter 64: Emptiness
Chapter 64: Emptiness
The 15-meter-high city wall was an enormous behemoth to the country bumpkins of the Blackthorn Wasteland.
Even Fanta, a knight commander who had once accompanied the clan chief to the capital, was awestruck by the city walls before him.
Even the royal capital Camp Nou is only twelve meters tall. Isn't the lord too powerful?
In all his years with the Ashwood family, he had seen buildings far more magnificent than this city wall, but he had never seen one built so quickly and with such minimal material usage.
This massive section of the city wall was built entirely by the lord alone, without any other architectural mages assisting him.
Ron asked, "How is it?"
Fanta looked at it for a long time before saying, "It's so tall and big. There's nothing on top of it. It must be very spacious."
Hearing this, Ron thought for a moment, looked at the sky, and realized there was still some time before it got completely dark.
"Good suggestion, I'll go up and take a look."
Upon reaching the top of the city wall, Fanta gazed at the vast ramparts that stretched nearly twenty meters wide.
"We can train up there from now on," Fanta muttered unconsciously.
Ron walked to the far right end of the city wall and, without thinking, built a rampart, directly extending a platform onto the wall.
When the two ramparts were completed, Fanta looked at the nearly forty-meter-long open space where the ramparts and the horse path met.
Is the lord going to use this place as a training ground?
"That's enough for now." After the two sections of the rampart were completed, it was completely dark. Ron patted his men on the rampart.
Fanta looked at the city wall in front of him for a long time before saying, "Have four squads of militia bring up tents and take turns patrolling and guarding the area tonight."
A group of militiamen rushed off to make arrangements, including Bartos, the brother of Sanlier and Nina.
Bartos, leaning against the parapet, looked into the distance and asked, "With walls this high, can goblins shoot up them with their shortbows?"
Sanlir, being a member of the crossbow unit, was quite familiar with the power and range of crossbows.
"I've tried using the goblin's shortbow, and its effective range is no more than 25 meters. To shoot it onto the city wall, you'd probably have to stand at the foot of the wall. This kind of wall is beyond the reach of goblins."
Bartos exclaimed excitedly, "Won't the militia left behind in Harvest Town be living the dream?"
Sanlier shrugged and went back to set up his tent.
The nights in the wilderness are very cold, and when not on patrol, it's much more comfortable to stay in the tent than outside.
After finishing his simple dinner, Ron began to check the system panel.
[Create a new building template: Ming Dynasty City Wall. The creator's construction costs are reduced by one-third, and construction speed is doubled.]
"Not bad, this way, a section of the Ming Dynasty city wall only requires 100 magic power."
This is also why Ron was able to build it so quickly in the later part.
"The city walls are too empty." Ron couldn't help but laugh as he thought of Fanta's flowers.
The next morning, Ron arrived at the city wall early.
I happened to see Shanlier and his militia running laps on the city wall.
This is one of the military training programs designed by Ron. In addition to practicing formations, there is also 20 kilometers of physical training every day, which even the Knights Guard cannot skip.
"My lord! Good morning."
The militia stopped and saluted Ron, patting his chest in greeting.
"Good morning!" Ron nodded and said, "Go train at the foot of the city wall! I need to build some things here, no, you need to work with the laborers to bring up a large amount of supplies."
After all, building the city gate tower required a lot of wood and metal, and since the city wall had already been built, a large amount of sand and gravel was still needed.
Bartos immediately led his men down the city wall, leaving only a few men standing guard on the wall.
Because it was the lord's order, the knights and laborers left behind in Harvest Town quickly mobilized after finishing their breakfast.
To speed things up, Ron also assembled a huge pulley system out of wood on the city wall to make it easier to hoist materials up the wall.
The delivery of supplies alone took more than three hours, mainly because Ron requested far too many materials.
With nearly three hundred people transporting the materials simultaneously, including strongmen like knights, it still took this long, which shows how much material there was.
Ron didn't rest during those three hours either.
The original two-meter-wide pass was continuously widened using earthwork, and in three hours it was widened to thirty meters.
He originally wanted to expand it to fifty meters, but the base of the rock walls on both sides was not stable enough, and thirty meters was the current safe limit.
Only those who live in Fengshou Town can truly understand how much it has changed.
The city wall is 15 meters high, and the original 2-meter-wide pass has been expanded to 20 meters. There is also a moat more than 5 meters wide and 4 meters deep outside the city wall. This was formed by excavating building materials during the construction of the city wall.
The moat was nearly ten meters away from the city wall. When Shanlier saw the moat that morning, he said, "With goblins' shortbows, they pose almost no threat outside the moat."
"My lord, the materials are ready." Fanta trotted over and reported to Ron.
"Yes, pile up these stones. This is the location of the second city wall."
The second city wall is more than 100 meters away from the first city wall, providing ample space for movement. It could also be used as a military camp in the future.
"Yes, my lord."
Back on the city wall, looking at the building materials scattered all over the ground, Ron began to imagine what the city gate tower would look like.
The template he used was the Deshengmen Arrow Tower in Beijing.
The arrow tower stands majestically atop a 15-meter-high city platform, with a double-eaved hip roof covered in gray cylindrical tiles and green trim. It has seven bays in width and a five-bay annex at the rear, with the tower and platform reaching a total height of 35 meters.
The three exterior walls have four rows of arrow slits, totaling 82 holes.
Ron closed his eyes, and the model of the arrow tower was built in his mind layer by layer: the city platform, the walls, the arrow slits, the wooden beams, and the hip roof.
Civil engineering work begins; blue bricks rise from the ground and are stacked layer by layer, with mortar seeping from the brick joints and then being smoothed out.
A wooden frame was left for the arrow slit, to be embedded after the wall has dried completely.
The gray cylindrical tiles on the roof were laid one by one, gleaming with a dark bluish light in the setting sun.
Because the arrow tower was so intricate, Ron only managed to build this one arrow tower in a whole day.
Looking at the 35-meter-tall building, Fanta was so shocked that he was speechless.
"My lord, who could possibly breach such walls?"
Ron dusted off his hands and glanced at the distant wasteland.
"The best walls are those that no one can breach."
He turned and walked down the city wall, with the militiamen finishing their work and the sky gradually darkening behind him.
Outside the canyon, a small squad of goblin wolf riders shuddered as they looked at the towering city walls and arrow towers in the distance.
They were badly beaten down by the six-meter-high walls of Ashwood Territory back then; how many goblins would it take to breach this wall, which is over thirty meters high?
"We must go back and report to the chief immediately; the Earth Dragon Tribe has been taken over by the humans."