Chapter 59: The Shell Method
"It's a pity that we met too late. If we were in the imperial capital, you could have eaten at the restaurant for free just by listening to my name!"

Wang An's eyes almost rolled up to the sky when he heard Cao Yunmeng's words of promise.

It is really hard to imagine how a daughter of a hereditary duke could speak like a street thug.

"Cough cough..." Wang An coughed gently and then stepped into the yard.

When everyone looked back and saw that it was Wang An who came, their expressions changed.

Gao Ruyue snorted disdainfully, crossed her arms over her chest, raised her little face to the sky, as if Wang An didn't exist.

Xiao Zhao behind him just gave Wang An a kind smile and nodded slightly, and Wang An also nodded in return.

Gao Ruyue came directly to Wang An, bowed and thanked him, saying, "I am Gao Ruyue, thank you for saving me!"

Wang An reached out his hand to help Gao Ruyue up, and said gently: "Miss Gao, there is no need to be so polite. As the saying goes, it is the duty of young people like us to help those in need when we see injustice!"

Cao Yunmeng, who was standing at the side, didn't even bother looking at the sky when she heard this. She looked at Wang An in surprise and said, "You were the one who saved Sister Gao. What happened?"

Wang An said anxiously, "I see that you are about to become sworn brothers with her, but how come you don't even know what happened to her?"

Cao Yunmeng ignored Wang An and walked straight to Gao Ruyue and asked, "Sister Gao, what's going on?"

Gao Ruyue's eyes turned red when she heard this, and then she told him the whole story.

When Cao Yunmeng heard that Gao Ruyue's father had just passed away and the playboy Fang Yukun came to her house and threatened Gao Ruyue to marry him with the lives of all the old and young in the Gao family, she seemed to treat it as her own experience and her face puffed up with anger.

He kept clamoring to take Xiao Zhao to Qingzhou to seek justice for Gao Ruyue.

Xiao Zhao also frowned, obviously very disgusted with Fang Yukun's behavior, but did not agree with Cao Yunmeng's proposal to go to Qingzhou.

After all, sympathy is sympathy.

Xiao Zhao’s first priority is to protect Cao Yunmeng’s safety, so naturally she would not agree to Cao Yunmeng’s proposal to put himself in danger.

Wang An found it even more amusing and teased, "A pretty girl like you, aren't you afraid that Fang Yukun will be tempted by your beauty and force you to marry him?"

“How dare he!” Cao Yunmeng was furious when he heard this: “My father is the Grand Commander Cao Meng. Even if Fang Shan, the governor of Qingzhou, saw me, he would kneel down and kowtow to my father!”

Wang An chuckled and shook his head, too lazy to argue with Cao Yunmeng.

A young lady from aristocratic family like this will not wake up unless she suffers a little loss.

Gao Yunmeng wiped the tears from the corners of her eyes and invited Wang An to her room for tea. However, she felt a little embarrassed when she saw the room had not been cleaned up yet.

Wang An waved his hand and said, "You don't need to drink tea. I came to Miss Gao this time to ask for something."

Gao Ruyue was not surprised to hear this. She thought that the old servant of the Gao family had already mentioned to Gao Ruyue that Wang An had been looking for Master Gao.

Gao Ruyue asked, "But what about the city wall?"

"If that's the case, I'll have to go outside the city to see what the wall looks like."

Wang An naturally agreed and immediately raised his hand to invite Gao Ruyue to go with him. Cao Yunmeng wanted to go with him, but when she saw Wang An seemed to remember something, she raised her foot and retracted it.

Wang An brought Gao Ruyue to the city wall of Baicheng.

Walking around the city wall, Gao Ruyue shook her head as she walked. Wang An asked with some concern, "What do you think, Miss Gao? Is it difficult to build this new city?"

Gao Ruyue shook her head and said, "It's not difficult, but Your Highness, are you sure the construction period will be less than three months?"

Wang An nodded solemnly and confirmed: "At this point, there is nothing to hide from Miss Gao. Jizhou is invaded by foreign enemies every year after the autumn harvest. This is almost known to everyone. I wonder if Miss Gao has heard about it?"

Gao Ruyue pondered for a moment, then said, "I have heard of it, but I haven't heard of the rumor that Baicheng was breached, so I don't think Your Highness needs to rush to build the city wall."

Wang An sighed and said, "In the past, no one has heard of foreign tribes attacking Baicheng. That was because Jizhou was guarded by a large army sent by the imperial court. The Yi people only wanted to solve the problem of people, livestock and food. They were not willing to fight to the death with the Daliang army, so naturally they would not come to attack Baicheng."

"But now that I have established my kingdom in Jizhou, the imperial garrison troops will naturally withdraw in full force. This way, Baicheng is like a piece of undefended fat meat. How can those foreign races not be jealous?"

"That's why I'm in a hurry to build the city wall. I hope Miss Gao will forgive the difficulties and try to speed up the construction of the city wall."

Gao Ruyue was embarrassed when she heard this. After a long silence, she said, "We originally planned to build a solid city wall, so this old adobe city cannot be used anymore."

"But if we want to demolish the old city, or build a new one outside the old city, it will take more than two or three months to build it from scratch. Based on my experience, it will take at least three years to complete the project!"

"Three years?" Wang An couldn't help but be secretly shocked.

This is the result of specialization. Wang An never thought that building a star would take so long.

It now seems that even with the support of cement and rubble stone self-weight method, the new city will definitely not be completed within three months.

However, Wang An noticed Gao Ruyue's calm face and asked, "Miss Gao, do you have any tricks you can teach me?"

As expected, Gao Ruyue frowned, and after a moment she nodded gently and said, "I don't have one, but I once read about an experience my father had in his early years in his notes. Perhaps I can emulate it."

Wang An was immediately delighted and asked, "Please give me some advice, Miss Gao."

It turned out that more than ten years ago, Mr. Gao was ordered to repair a small border town located at a strategic location.

The situation in that small town at that time was as serious as that in White City, and the original city walls had already been damaged.

In order to meet the construction deadline, Gao Yuanwai decided to use the old city as the foundation and build a new city wall by wrapping the old city with bricks and stones.

Because of the foundation of the old city wall, the excavation of new foundations and a large amount of engineering work were omitted. In the end, it only took five months to build a brand new city wall.

Judging from the notes, the scale of the city wall at that time was similar to that of White City.

Although this is not the best construction method, it is the only feasible way to meet Wang An's scheduled construction period.

When Wang An heard this, his eyes lit up and he secretly admired Gao Yuanwai, whom he had never met before.

Simply put, it is to use bricks and stones and directly build another layer outside the old city.

(End of this chapter)