Chapter 111: The Bridge Across the Abyss
The two cars were loaded with one of the four main ropes for the bridge. These main ropes, each of which is two inches thick, more than 300 zhang long, and weighs more than 4,000 catties. The section between the two carts was tied with a piece of red cloth, which was probably the midpoint of the whole rope.
The two cars were dismantled, leaving only their floors and four wheels. Fuyaozi grabbed the end of the rope and slowly flew towards the other side of the abyss. Two people boarded the car and threw the hemp rope out at a constant speed round and round, so that the rope had a margin to drag out, so that it would not be pulled by the shaver to be tightened.
In a quarter of an hour, the two of them threw hundreds of laps, tired and sweaty, and finally finished the rope. Then the two of them climbed into the other car and did the same.
The people in the command car all stood aside to watch, and Long Ji Zhenren saw that it was almost time, and arched his hand at Avril, and said, "Miss Ai, let your friend make a move now." ”
Avril nodded at the man with short gray hair, who closed his eyes and chanted the incantation, and soon there was a surge of air around him. With his feet off the ground, he slowly rose up, grabbed the part of the rope with a red cloth, and flew over the abyss.
If this mage was alone, no matter how powerful his wind control technique was, he would not be able to handle it, because the huge rope was too heavy. It is estimated that Fuyaozi, who is involved in most of the weight of the giant rope, is very difficult to cultivate even if he has a holy realm.
At this time, others were removing the two stone piles and began to dig the earth with shovels, pickaxes, etc. The two piles of stones are nine feet apart, which means that the suspension bridge will be nine feet wide when it is built. When the pit is deep enough, two hard logs nearly three zhang long that have been prepared are inserted into it, and the soil is tamped and left outside, so that there is a strong tether stake.
On the other side of the abyss is a strange twin pine, and the distance between the two trunks of the same root is also nine feet, which is the end of the suspension bridge. This tree was found by Fuyaozi and others by chance before, and they felt that the tree had deep roots and thick stems, which was the most suitable as a natural bridge gate, and also avoided the trouble of building another fulcrum.
The shaman landed in front of the twin trees and wrapped the end of the rope around the root of one of the trunks a few times, tying it firmly. The Wind Mage was holding the middle of the rope in the middle of the abyss to prevent it from falling.
Longji Zhenren in the distance watched carefully, and after Fu Yaozi tied the rope and made a gesture to him, he ordered hundreds of people to pull the remaining ten-zhang long rope ends, and at the same time pulled back vigorously to make sure that the trunk at that end could withstand the huge force without moving a bit. Then just wait for the stakes on this side to be laid to connect the two ends together.
After more than an hour, the hemp ropes in the eight cars were all thrown off, and Fu Yaozi and the wind mage went back and forth several times, and finally pulled the four main ropes to the twin tree with great effort. Two of them are load-bearing cables and two are support cables.
The load-bearing rope was tied almost to the roots, and the rope was four and a half feet tall and tied to the trunk and driven into the tree with several large steel nails. This loop of steel nails just pins the tie between the cable and the tree trunk, so as to prevent the cable from sliding due to force.
The people on Longji's side had also laid two stakes, cut them off in a circle four and a half feet above the ground, and cut out a horizontal stripe with a thickness of two inches at a distance of half a palm diagonally above the head.
Two oak planks, which are exactly two inches thick, are embedded in the two horizontal stripes, and stand at an angle on the ground, holding two wooden stakes. Both planks have a two-inch square hole in the middle of the bottom, through which two load-bearing cables are tied to the bottom of the pile, and a square hole at a height of four and a half feet, through which two support cables are threaded and tied into the annular indentation of the pile.
After these things were done, the bridge began to take shape. Next, as long as the four main cables are connected and the bottom is covered with wooden planks, people can be walked. As the head of the bridge, the two man-planted trees are supported by inclined boards, and even if there is a mountain hanging in front of them, they will never collapse, so the safety is very high.
The bridge has a slight slope, and the tail of the bridge is a little higher than the head. The main ropes are not very tight, and at a glance they appear to be descending at first, then zigzagging to the center and then upward.
According to the bridge-laying strategy that had been uniformly explained and practiced before leaving Fangcheng, each team sent six people, each with two planks and three hemp ropes. The planks are taken from the arbor forests of Wuliang Mountain, all of which are more than one zhang long, slightly wider than a palm, and one of the three hemp ropes is one zhang long, and the other two are five feet long.
There was a cut indentation at each end of the plank about six or seven inches from the end, and the distance between the two dents was exactly nine feet. When laying the bridge, align the dents with the two load-bearing cables and cover the wooden planks. There is a gap between every two planks, leaving two load-bearing cables to tie horizontally with a long rope. For each horizontal rope, a five-foot rope will be tied vertically on each side to connect the support rope and the load-bearing cable. That's why each bridge-builder carries three ropes.
As soon as Team 1 laid the planks at the bridgehead, the members of Team 2 were dispatched, followed by Team 3 and Team 4...... Hundreds of teams come out according to the number of numbers, the bigger the number, the more front, but the first will be behind.
After each person tied their three pieces of hemp rope, they did not move in place, because they could not move forward, and if they went backward, they would hinder the progress of the subsequent bridge builders. Only after the entire bridge was laid, more than 1,800 people on the bridge crossed the bridge first, and the remaining 2,000 people crossed the bridge one after another with supplies. This is the strategy planned in advance by the top level of the sect.
The morale of the people is high, the enthusiasm is full, the bridge-laying warriors go forward one after another, and the small two thousand people are busy together, believing that the bridge can be built at the beginning of the day.
And Fuyaozi and the mage, who had already flown over, were sitting under the twin trees waiting to pick up the people who crossed the bridge, and they also needed time to recover their exerted strength. Especially for Fuyaozi, the high-load operation of the physical energy caused the demonic qi in the body to run wildly, and at this time, it was necessary to meditate and exercise to suppress it.
About the tenth group was walking up the bridge when a scream was heard from ahead, and then the crowd rioted, and they stopped.
The visitor reported that a man had fallen, and it is said that the man who had fallen had just reached the bridge and told the people around him that he was dizzy and his legs were a little weak. No one else took it seriously, and he didn't flinch himself, and went with everyone. Unexpectedly, when the second board was laid, the body shook forward, and even the person with the board fell, and the people behind didn't have time to pull it.
One of the companions who came back with the reporter cried and cried, saying that he had comforted him at that time, and as long as he didn't look down, nothing would happen. As a result, something happened, and the person was gone.
Longji Zhenren immediately made a decision, and temporarily decided to make up five silver dollars for each person who paved the bridge, and distributed it on the spot when everyone crossed the bridge. The progress of the bridge laying was delayed for a while, and the candidates for the bridge were reselected in each team, and those who were not determined could not do it.
As for having everyone go up and cross the bridge while paving it, that's unrealistic. Because the bridge deck is so wide, it is easy to cause chaos when there are many people, which reduces efficiency, and everyone is afraid that the bridge will not be able to withstand it. Each person lays two planks, just enough for one person to span, and when the rope is knotted, it stands to the side, leaving room for the rest of the people to pass, which has been proven to be the best way.
On the side of the 296th squad, Huang Yunqing conveyed the words of Longji Zhenren to the members. The bridge pavers originally agreed by their team were Zhang Jiabao, Su Qijingli, Yu Man, Xu Fangle and Wu Yingcai, while Huang Yunqing took Xu Fat'er and his brother and Xue Chao's five-person group to wait in place, and then crossed the bridge with supplies when the bridge was completely erected.
Xue Chao, You Jin, the Wang brothers and others all expressed their interest in the reward of five silver dollars, but if anyone was afraid of going to the bridge, they could replace them, and Zhang Jiabao and these people were naturally not afraid.
"Well, go ahead with the plan. Huang Yunqing looked around, his gaze stayed on Wu Yingcai's face, "Old Wu, your internal injuries are not completely healed, let someone else replace you." ”
Wu Yingcai waved his hand and said, "My old Wu Tou is not greedy for life and afraid of death, and there is no need to fake his hands on others." ”
Huang Yunqing frowned, "It's better to let someone else do it, in case you can't bear it with your body bones." ”
"Boss Huang, I can handle it myself. I don't want to owe anyone else, and I don't want anyone to owe me. Wu Yingcai said with a straight face.
"Whatever you want. Huang Yunqing didn't say anything more, and led everyone to start packing up their "belongings". Wu Yingcai took advantage of the fact that no one was paying attention, and secretly took a small bottle from the storage table and hid it in his arms.
As the sun went down, the six-member team of the 296th squad went up the bridge with the last group of bridge-laying men. Each person carried two boards horizontally or vertically, and wrapped a long and two short ropes around his waist, Wu Yingcai seemed a little struggling, and no one paid attention to him in view of his strange temper.
The team of three slowly advanced in rows, and at night, torches were lit on both sides, and the whole bridge looked like an upside-down hundred-legged dragon. More than 1,000 monsters on the mountain in the distance are lying or standing, looking at the "fire dragon" as if they have wisdom.
The people in front warned the latecomers not to look down as much as possible, there were already a few people who fainted just because of a glance, but fortunately there were people around them to hold them, otherwise it would be a few lives.
Whether it is in the middle of the bridge or on both sides of the bridge, looking down is a palm-wide black mark that seems to be immovable, like a painting, and the slightest distraction will make you unable to control yourself and devote yourself to the painting.
When it was dark, there was nothing to see below, as if I was in a still river of ink, and I always felt that there were huge creatures watching silently under the black air. Having faced this abyss for a long time, it is not surprising that he has been thinking so much that he has gone insane.
After more than an hour, Zhang Jiabao finally squeezed to the front with the crowd, and the faces of the fuyao people meditating under the twin trees became clearer and clearer, and there were still dozens of steps to reach. He saw a few skilled bridge builders at the front of the line, and the newest ones had just put down the plank, and they could instantly feel the dents on the plank and press the hemp rope on both sides at the same time, which was swift and tacit and pleasing to the eye.
Zhang Jiabao secretly guessed that they would be able to get a lot of money after the incident.
"Brother Zhang. Xu Fat'er suddenly blew cool air in his ear, and said in a gloomy voice: "You say...... Could it be that a stick of fire will fall from someone's hand and a fire will turn the bridge into a bridge of Naihe?"
"you big-headed grandpa, don't learn how crows croak and croak more. Zhang Jiabao scolded.