84 The Time Has Come

After Mu Tianlan had rolled about, climbed trees twice, and crouched in the undergrowth several times, Wu Qingchen and the others finally left the coverage of Section No. 35.

Seeing Mu Tianlan, now caked head to toe in mud, water, seeds, and leaves, finally stop and lag far behind, Wu Qingchen felt that the whole team seemed to let out a quiet breath of relief.

Ahead of them, the person in charge of the next section was already waiting by the roadside after undergoing the same round of inspection and body search.

And so, along the increasingly familiar path of Aikeli Village, Wu Qingchen walked on while answering the various questions posed by the officials from each section, making that narrow trail come closer and closer to the true shape of a medieval world.

In the real Aikeli Village of the medieval world, Old William’s family could support several children, so their standard of living was naturally rather good. In terms of housing, that standard was reflected in their home’s location, which was relatively close to the center of the village.

The cowherd’s mansion, of course, was even closer to the village center.

On Earth’s simulated base, it took Wu Qingchen and the others only a little over ten minutes to walk from Old William’s former home to the cowherd’s newly acquired mansion, even while they were stopping to answer questions along the way.

With a crude bridge made of logs as the boundary, once they neared the former cowherd’s mansion, the new residence that Wu Qingchen, or rather Luo Si, and in fact all the people of Earth would have to live in for a long time to come, the acceptance work immediately became several times more time-consuming.

First came the scope of inspection. On the earlier sections they had passed, Wu Qingchen generally only needed to pay attention to the road itself, and at most a few places along its sides that obviously carried some degree of danger.

But around here, the area he had to confirm for acceptance suddenly expanded to one or two meters beyond either side of the road. In some open stretches without bushes or trees to block the view, it expanded directly to five or six meters away.

The scrutiny also became far more exacting. Bridges, thickets, ponds, and landslides—places obviously dangerous or prone to accidents—were naturally checked again and again. Puddles, grass, and side slopes, places where hidden threats might lurk, were not spared either.

The acceptance procedure itself became far more cautious as well. It was no longer like the earlier sections, where places that differed from Wu Qingchen’s memory only needed to be marked for later correction.

Here, wherever an inspection point needed confirmation, if Wu Qingchen raised an objection, most places were immediately corrected on site. For some locations expected to take longer, or where the required work was likely to be substantial, several high-definition cameras were set up at once, and through an emergency-deployed high-bandwidth local wireless network, the live feed was transmitted in real time to the acceptance assistant who remained at Wu Qingchen’s side. Then, through the high-definition display held by the assistant, Wu Qingchen was consulted repeatedly as the work progressed, so that his latest views could be incorporated without delay.

Under such meticulous and demanding requirements, it took Wu Qingchen a full half hour to cover that mere few hundred meters before he finally stepped into the cowherd’s mansion simulated by the base.

The conditions outside were already so strict; the standards inside were naturally even harsher.

With an even more careful and cautious attitude, Wu Qingchen went through the simulated cowherd’s mansion seven or eight times from top to bottom and from inside to out, examining everything in painstaking detail, repeatedly confirming countless details concerning this new home.

Then came a large contingent of carpenters, stonemasons, blacksmiths, plasterers, bamboo craftsmen, and senior consultants from numerous renowned home design firms and interior decoration companies, who took the stage in a cloud of dust and paper, and devised for this new dwelling a living-environment improvement plan tailored to its limited conditions: the simplest in steps, the easiest to modify, the most discreet in its changes, and the most effective in its results.

Limited conditions—so limited that even iron tools had to be borrowed temporarily from the priest;

Simple steps—simple enough that Wu Qingchen could memorize and master them effectively within an hour;

Easy modification—easy enough for the body of Wu Qingchen, or Luo Si, a fourteen-year-old boy from the medieval world, to carry out;

Discreet changes—so discreet that even the original cowherd’s family would hardly notice if they came back;

Remarkable results—so remarkable that after working in this new dwelling for nearly three hours, he still did not feel stuffy or stifled.

As everything was nearing completion, Wu Qingchen, who had gotten up at seven, looked up at the sky. The sun was bright, the heavens cloudless, the blazing sun hung high overhead, and before he knew it, five hours had passed. It was already noon.

“Mr. Wu, please place your order.”

As it was almost time for Wu Qingchen’s usual lunch, and while he had a brief pause after mastering yet another skill point for improving the environment, a staff member who had long been waiting nearby hurried over and handed him a thick book.

“Place my order?” Wu Qingchen took the book in confusion. When he opened it, it turned out to be a menu after all. It was more than ten pages long, printed on thick coated paper, and organized by regional cuisine, with pictures and text side by side. Altogether, it listed nearly a hundred kinds of dishes.

They all looked pretty tasty...

After only a few glances, Wu Qingchen could not help licking his lips, though what he felt more than anything else was confusion. “Do I really have to order? Isn’t it usually just a matter of going over there and eating?”

“Oh, it’s like this...” Huang Xing, who was standing beside Wu Qingchen, answered at once. “A few days ago things were too rushed, and the conditions were limited, so a lot of arrangements were not very well put in place... But everyone has been working hard, and things have improved somewhat now... We must give priority to logistical support and respect Mr. Wu’s tastes. That’s a very important job... Mm, Mr. Wu can order with confidence. We guarantee everything is fresh.”

As he spoke, Huang Xing pushed open a certain “wall opening” in the wooden hut, and the scene outside was suddenly revealed.

On an open patch of ground about a dozen meters from the cowherd’s mansion, a huge sun umbrella had been erected. Beneath it stood a long dining table covered with a spotless white tablecloth, and in front of the single chair, a complete set of utensils had already been laid out neatly.

At a spot several dozen meters away from that umbrella, in another open and level stretch of the villagers’ allotment land, more than ten mobile cooking stations had been built in the air using supports and steel plates. Beside each cooking station stood several chefs in tall hats, leading even more assistants as they busily prepared all kinds of food.

Was all this really necessary?

This... this was far too much formalism!

In an instant, Wu Qingchen understood a great deal. He sniffed lightly, and sure enough, he caught a faint scent of printing ink from the menu in his hands.

Lowering his head in silence to look at the menu, the bloodshot eyes from Jiang Fengming’s training sessions, the subtle feeling from Huang Xing’s handshake that morning, all flickered rapidly back and forth in Wu Qingchen’s mind, in a head that had already been trained for several days.

“This...” After a few seconds, Wu Qingchen lifted his head, smiled at Huang Xing, and closed the menu. “There’s just so much here, I honestly don’t know what to choose... Ahem, I mean, it’s too hard on you to be cooking in this heat...”

“...Anyway, I think the original dishes were already very good. They suit my taste perfectly.”

“Haha, since Mr. Wu is being so considerate of our work... that’s great, that’s really great...” Huang Xing said with hearty laughter.