Chapter 173 - 74: The New Shelter
Chen Zhou only went to sleep in the early morning of March 28, staying up too late, so he couldn't get up on time.
Back when he first landed on the island, even if he had only slept for four hours, he wouldn't dare be this lazy.
Now that the cement load-bearing pillars inside the cave dwelling were completed and the wooden load-bearing beams were installed, he felt more relaxed and lacked the urgency of previous days, allowing him to sleep soundly until noon.
He originally wanted to linger in bed for a while, but Lai Fu, who hadn't had breakfast, wouldn't let him off the hook.
It would place its mouth on the edge of the bed, pitifully looking at Chen Zhou's face, whining for food;
Then it would scratch the wooden box placed under the bed with its paws, making a constant scraping sound;
Then it would lean on the bed, extending its wet tongue to give Chen Zhou a face and head wash, annoying him to the point that he couldn't continue lying down, making him reluctantly get up and get dressed.
After putting on his shoes, he gave Lai Fu's dog head a vigorous rub, but instead of heading to the kitchen, Chen Zhou first took a walk around the bedroom.
He was checking to see if Xiao Huihui had brought home any small animals.
In the past few days, a foul smell kept coming from the house, and he had always thought it was the dried seal meat rotting, but after several checks, he couldn't find the source.
It was only when he dismantled the floor to make the load-bearing beam that he discovered a small snake between two wooden boards, so decayed that its head and tail were indistinguishable.
Only then did he realize that it was Hui Hui's prey, dropped here by Xiao Huihui, which had tortured him with its stench for so long.
Since then, every few days, Chen Zhou would check the corners of the room to see if there were any bizarre animal remains.
After a round of inspection, he didn't find anything suspicious.
He went to the kitchen to start a fire and cook.
After eating the lean meat porridge and feeding Lai Fu, Chen Zhou gazed at the somewhat gloomy sky outside the cave dwelling and picked up the Long-handled Axe, heading towards the woods at the base of the field slope.
...
The construction of the outer walls of the cave dwelling would have to wait until the dry season. For now, the tasks inside the cave were mostly concluded, and it was time for him to build an outdoor shelter to evade earthquakes.
Chen Zhou hoped to find a location on the edge of the woodland, with flat terrain, and far from the stone cliff at the mountain top.
The trees at the edge of the woodland were less affected by earthquakes.
During logging in the woods, he had once seen a dead tree as thick as a water barrel suddenly fall, snapping a few less sturdy small trees.
With countless trees in the subtropical forest and plants constantly being born and dying every second, such events became even more frequent during earthquakes, and staying away from the forest center was a good way to avoid such dangers.
As for the flat terrain, it was to facilitate construction.
Being far from the mountaintop stone cliff was to guard against rockfalls and landslides, which could pose life-threatening dangers.
He paced around the edge of the woodland repeatedly, both to burn off Lai Fu's energy and to check nearby rabbit snares for catches while selecting sturdy trees suitable for building the shelter.
Unknowingly, Chen Zhou had left the farmland and arrived at a meadow in the southern part of the woods.
Among a few sturdy trees, there suddenly appeared an oval patch of lush green grass.
The total area of the open space was about 500 square meters, high on the west side and low on the east, with rainwater collecting in a depression on the far east, surrounded by sandy soil.
The sandy soil isolated the grassland from the water pit, and upon closer inspection, tadpoles and small fish could be seen on the edge of the water pit.
Fortunately, there were fewer frogs here, so their noisy croaking was almost inaudible, otherwise Lai Fu would definitely be making a fuss.
The wild grass on this meadow reached up to a person's thighs, extremely dense, making it impossible to see inside the grass from outside the meadow.
Having seen giant pythons and other snakes and insects on the island, Chen Zhou dared not venture in, only circling the perimeter of the grass a few times to avoid getting bitten by venomous snakes.
Walking around the meadow to the other end of the open area, he spotted two large trees standing closely together from a distance.
They were pressed tightly against each other, with no gap in between due to the trunk compression, and their tree branches stretching outward, forming an excellent natural stent.
Six meters away from the two large trees stood another with a "Y" shaped trunk, perfectly positioned as the other end of a beam.
Furthermore, these three trees were near the open area, not quite at the edge of the woodland but satisfying the condition of being surrounded by open space and free of dead trees.
At the same time, this place was really far from the cliff wall, so even if an earthquake caused the entire hilltop to collapse, the rubble wouldn't scatter here.
Examining this place all around, the more Chen Zhou looked, the more satisfied he became, eager to head back to the cave dwelling right away to grab an Iron Blade and clear the wild grass here, then chop down trees to construct the frame.
Walking around the three trees again, there was nothing to fault in the natural stent formed by the trees.
But there was one problem — the distance between these three trees was too great, requiring at least a seven-meter long timber beam considering the length wedged between the branches.
Of course, trees seven meters long were everywhere in the forest, but he didn't have any plastic sheeting over six meters long and seven to eight meters wide. Once the frame was set up, waterproofing would be an issue.
After much hesitation, Chen Zhou couldn't give up on such a naturally blessed location.
He decided to cut up several empty cement bags from home to combine with the stitched waterproof cloth for covering half the roof, and as for the remaining half, he'd make do with thick canvas for now.
In addition to the waterproof cloth on the frame, he also planned to apply a layer of paint on the beams to improve their moisture and pest resistance.
If not for fearing the paint left at home would run out, Chen Zhou would've even considered pouring some seawater on the three large trees to kill them, strip off their bark, and paint them.