Lord of the Myriad Worlds

Chapter 5: Construction Experience

That night, Li Wei slept in the shack that reeked of strong mildew. Despite two days of intense sun exposure, it remained damp.

A sheepskin blanket was his only possession.

The previous night when he first arrived, he had been too exhausted to feel the mosquito bites.

Tonight, with worries keeping him awake, he truly experienced the torment of being bombarded by insects.

He finally managed to fall into deep sleep around midnight.

When he woke up the next morning, as expected, his body was covered with large welts.

It was hard to imagine how Fila and Penny had endured this.

But the good news was that Penny's expensive herbs were truly effective - the inflamed, festering areas on his hands were already healing, and calluses would likely form soon.

He could finally become a working man.

After his morning routine downstream by the creek and washing up with the stream water, despite being ravenously hungry, he felt extremely grateful for this vivid sense of being alive.Yes, health was wonderful, being alive was wonderful.

When he returned, Fila had already cooked wheat porridge. This time Li Wei felt no guilt about usurping someone else's place, and he deliberately observed her more carefully. She appeared to be in her forties or fifties, with graying hair. Though her clothes were tattered, one could still discern traces of former respectability.

Anyway, even considering the world's background, she definitely didn't come from a farming family.

However, an aura of decay lingered around her, like seeing someone gravely ill.

If one word could describe it, it would be "approaching death's door."

In contrast, Penny, though thin and small in every aspect, possessed truly vigorous vitality that even her ragged clothes and messy hair couldn't conceal.

"George, don't waste time, we have important work today."

As if sensing Li Wei's observation, Penny urged him with displeasure in her eyes.

"Okay!"

Li Wei didn't ask further. In fact, he still couldn't figure out how they would build this house.

He had chopped ten logs, each with usable lengths of seven to eight meters, but without a saw, how would they cut them?

He chewed the wheat porridge with great effort and care, spending over ten minutes finishing one bowl.

This was all experience.

This stuff was too coarse - eating too quickly could cause indigestion and produce a lot of gas.

Over there, Penny was already busy working. It was unclear how construction experience was determined.

By the time Li Wei finished his bowl of porridge and walked over, Penny had already used an axe to chop off the thinner ends of the ten logs, cutting them into different lengths.

Undoubtedly this should be a step that yielded substantial construction experience, but he had missed his chance.

However, Penny's axe-swinging power was completely different - fierce and powerful. The axe in her hands seemed like a divine weapon, cutting through sections with three or five swift strikes.

Li Wei roughly estimated that Penny's strength attribute must be at least around 10 points. Additionally, her one-star artisan card should provide decent bonus benefits.

Just like his Apprentice Farmer status.

"George, dig holes where I've marked, deep enough to bury the logs. Dig four total, each chest-deep for you."

Penny directed, and Li Wei didn't argue, taking the clumsy shovel-like tool and digging with grunting effort. Once he started, he surprisingly found this seemingly clumsy tool quite effective, especially since digging felt much more comfortable and natural than chopping wood.

Perhaps because the wounds on his hands had scabbed over and improved, or maybe this body had adapted to such heavy physical labor, he actually dug with considerable vigor.

Before he knew it, even before noon, the four holes were basically dug.

He even had some energy to spare.

Strange!

Could it be related to his Apprentice Farmer identity?

"Well done!"

Whether Penny was genuinely praising or just going through the motions, she crooked her finger, beckoning Li Wei over. The two of them lifted a thicker log section into the hole.

Li Wei was responsible for holding it straight while Penny backfilled with soil.

When the hole was completely backfilled and firmly tamped down with feet, Li Wei unexpectedly received a message: Construction Experience +1.

He didn't know how much construction experience Penny gained, but when they brought over the second log section, she directly shoved the shovel into Li Wei's hands.

"You do it!"

Li Wei didn't mind. His stamina still had surplus, no longer resembling his disheveled state of the first two days.

Like this, the two cooperated, burying the four thickest log sections in the holes and compacting them, forming a square framework with sides about five meters long.

The ground within the framework consisted of a stone layer serving as foundation.

Behind it was a roughly two-meter-high earthen slope that had been leveled, with Penny stacking a three-meter-high stone wall on top.

By now, Li Wei finally understood Penny's house-building approach.

The four logs served as four support points, while the stone wall on the rear slope could act as additional support.

This way, the house effectively had six support points.

Using two six-meter-long log sections fixed atop them would serve as the main beams.

Then between the two main beams, they could longitudinally lay some thinner logs, followed by even thinner wood laid horizontally. Assuming they didn't build trusses, this would be relatively easy to accomplish.

However, this wooden house's lifespan probably wouldn't last long.

It could only serve as a transitional solution.

After lunch, just as Li Wei had guessed, Penny took out eight roughly thirty-centimeter-long, rust-stained crude iron nails from the carefully wrapped small box in the oxcart.

But when she produced these eight nails, he also received the bill that needed to be paid to Fila - shockingly demanding four experience points.

So expensive!

Li Wei looked at Penny, only to see her stern and fierce gaze that strongly suggested she'd drive those iron nails into his skull if he refused to pay.

Fine, better not provoke her.

Thus, the four construction experience points earned from a morning's hard work instantly vanished.

But these eight iron nails truly possessed the power to determine the outcome.

After Li Wei and Penny worked for a while, nailing the two six-meter-long main beams with the iron nails, the wooden house's structure began taking shape.

Subsequently, they adjusted the final two support points by adding or removing stones to ensure even weight distribution and enhance the house structure's stability.

By this point, Li Wei successfully gained two construction experience points - one point per main beam.

"We don't have any more nails, right?"

Li Wei asked at this point. More nails would undoubtedly be excellent.

Penny rolled her eyes at him, too lazy to speak, just gesturing for him to work, very much resembling an experienced gamer bullying a newbie.

Li Wei had no choice but to be ordered around, jumping and scrambling.

However, the subsequent work wasn't too complicated - just lifting log sections about ten centimeters thick and securing them with ropes.

Fortunately, the ropes didn't need purchasing because Penny simply dismantled and cut up Li Wei's shack for them.

After using up Li Wei's shack materials, she used her own shack.

Barely managing, they finally covered the area above the main beams. They just needed one more layer before the roof could be directly plastered with wild grass mixed with mud.

But by the time the two of them worked until this point, the sun was setting in the west. No matter what, they couldn't complete the house today.

Fortunately, there was still good news.

[House construction progress has reached the two-thirds milestone. Calculating rewards. Current total rewards available for distribution: 60 Construction Experience points]

[You participated in the main structural construction of the house. You gained 20 Construction Experience points]

[You currently possess 5 Logging Experience points, 28 Construction Experience points.]

—

Wait, why only 20 points? Didn't that mean Penny got 40 points all by herself?

Li Wei was astonished and confused. He had even sacrificed his shack for this.

But ultimately, he chose not to ask. The distribution of experience rewards definitely wasn't determined by Penny - there must be some mechanism he didn't understand.

Penny, this experienced player, had undoubtedly leveraged her advantages as a veteran.

No matter, take it slow.

Hadn't everything already gotten on the right track?