Chapter 126

  "Demolish and rebuild?" Gaofei Hu furrowed his brow and said: "Is it necessary? Aren't things fine as they are now?"

  "What's good? Everyone fights alone, can only be defeated one by one. Only when everyone unites together will the power be great and the fist be strong."

  "Why don't we all just move to Gadao Village?" asked Gaofei Hu.

  "The Toad's Village is too small."

  Cheng Dalai sighed. In fact, the idea of rebuilding the mountain stronghold had been on his mind for a long time. The terrain of Hamao Ridge had natural disadvantages and was not suitable for future development. At least 5,000 people would be moving in, but Hamao Ridge couldn't accommodate them. And Hamao Ridge was a mountainous area with too little arable land. To upgrade to a third-level stronghold, one condition must be met: the stronghold must have at least 1,000 mu of farmland.

  So looking for a place, rebuilding a stockade is an inevitable thing, like an arrow on the string, it will be shot eventually.

  Cheng Dali and Gao Feihu were discussing the location of the Shanzhai village, at least Gao Feihu was familiar with the local terrain.

  The new stronghold must meet several conditions: First, there must be a water source, as water is the source of life and without it everything else is nonsense; Second, the terrain should be easy to defend and difficult to attack, so as to ensure the safety of the stronghold; Third, transportation should be convenient, if the stronghold is built on a mountain top, it may be easy to defend but impossible to access even for a single horse, which would also be pointless; Fourth, there must be a large amount of arable land suitable for farming, in this era, agriculture still comes first and even Cheng Da Lei cannot conjure up food out of thin air.

  It's not easy to find a place that can satisfy all four of them at the same time in such a vast Qingniu Mountain. For several days, Cheng Darui didn't do anything else and visited more than 50 mountain strongholds in Qingniu Mountain. Everyone welcomed Cheng Darui warmly, and it could be said that they surrendered as soon as they saw him.

  Of course, eating Cheng Daren's food, how can you not respect Cheng Daren.

  The location of these shanties also cannot meet Cheng Dairen's requirements. It seems that when choosing a place, they didn't consider the geographical location either.

  The Qingniu Mountain is about fifty miles in circumference, can't find a suitable place?

  Cheng Dairen did not give up, he continued to take Lin Shaoyu and Xu Shenji around Qingniu Mountain. He had a topographic map of Qingniu Mountain, which was still a system reward, but following the map, he still couldn't find his ideal place.

  "Let's go back, Master. The heavy snow has blocked the mountain and one misstep could send us tumbling over the cliff."

  "Don't go back!" Cheng Dairen pointed with his hand: "We're going there!"

  "Go there, it's so high, if you're not careful, you'll fall and die."

  The place where Cheng Dalai pointed is the main peak of Qingniu Mountain, called Niujiao Peak, which is also the highest point in the whole Qingniu Mountain.

  Cheng Dali hadn't thought about climbing up on a normal day, but today was the first time. The road was icy and slippery, so Cheng Dali was being extra careful. However, since Xushenji had already gone through the reverse poisonous milk, Cheng Dali wasn't overly worried.

  After a lot of twists and turns, at the time when the sky was about to darken but not yet dark, the three people climbed up Niujiao Peak. Looking far into the distance from the high point, the afterglow of the setting sun shone slantingly, and the entire terrain of Qingniu Mountain was visible in its entirety before Cheng Darui's eyes.

  The entire Qingniu Mountain is like a reclining water buffalo, with its horns pointing east and its tail pointing west. A river flows gently past the side of the "buffalo".

  "The purple air comes from the east, looking south to the capital, four hooves in the water, seeing the wind then gasping." Xu Shenji sighed: "Qingniu Mountain really has good feng shui!"

  "Huh? General also understands Feng Shui?" Cheng Da Lei said in disbelief.

  "Hmm, I've studied astronomy and geography, and as for Feng Shui, I have a rough understanding of it." said Xu Shenji.

  "Wow!" Cheng Dairen couldn't help but give a thumbs up: "This wave of acting is full marks!"

  His gaze swept from east to west and finally came to rest on a mountain valley.

  "Found it!" Cheng Dairen threw out a stone and smiled, "The purple energy is coming from the east, that's the sign of Wang Xing. When we see the wind, we'll know it's time to stir up the storm in all directions. The place we need to go is right there!"

  Xu Shenqi gave a thumbs up: "Dad, you're perfect!"

  "It's so-so."

  ……

  The next morning, Cheng Dairen made an appointment with Gao Feihu, Xiao Bai Lang, Xu Shenji and others to come to the mountain valley.

  The whole valley is gourd-shaped, the entrance can hold eight horses side by side, and after entering, the space is extremely large, accommodating 5,000 people to move in, and reclaiming 1,000 acres of land is not a problem.

  In the valley, towering trees as big as a man can't wrap his arms around are everywhere. One good thing about this era is that the forest coverage rate is high, and tigers and black bears are not rare in the primeval forests at all.

  At the bottom of the valley is a river that runs through the mountains, but now it's frozen due to the weather. This year has been plagued by drought, and there isn't much water in the river either.

  Easy to defend and hard to attack, with water source, arable land that can be opened up for farming, but the transportation location is a bit biased, and it's quite far from the official road.

  However, there is no perfect thing in the world that can satisfy three conditions at the same time, and it's already very good if it can meet two of them.

  "Big boss, you can't build a stronghold here!" Xu Shenji suddenly ran over.

  "Why?" Cheng Dairen asked in surprise.

  "This year is dry, and there's not much water in the river." Xu Shenji said: "But next year may not be the same. After the spring snow melts and the heavens pour down a few more rains, the floodwaters will rush in and this place will be inundated."

  "However..." Cheng Dalai thought for a moment, then said: "It's not a big problem after all. Let's dig the river ditch deeper and let the water drain out. It will form a moat outside the valley, which is just right."

  The location has been decided, and the next step is to start building the mountain stronghold. The winter in Youzhou is very long, and these people are bored with nothing to do, so it's just right to let them do something to pass this long winter.

  First, a fire was thrown into the valley. Now it's winter, and it's dry everywhere. The big fire burned for ten days and nights, turning the forest into ashes. The wild beasts in the valley were smoked out and fled frantically to the outside. Everyone waited at the entrance of the valley, and they really caught a tiger.

  Cheng Darui still had his first taste of tiger meat, indeed... it didn't taste very good.

  Cheng Dali has the drawings of a third-rate shantytown, but they are only in his mind. Cheng Dali can't draw, and even if he had ideas in his head, he couldn't bring them out. However, he has Liu Zhi by his side, a girl from this era who is skilled at music, chess, calligraphy, and painting, making it all seem effortless.

  Cheng Dali said that after several revisions of Liu Zhi's painting, it was almost the same as the blueprint in his mind.

  Huang San Yuan was useful at this time, playing the role of commander-in-chief. Under his command, house after house rose from the ground: hospitals, granaries, armories, civilian residences...

  The materials needed were all stripped from other fake houses, 5,000 people were involved in this matter, and the construction progress was also fast.

  The points of Naturally Migratory Toad Village were moved here at the first time.

  The project is proceeding like wildfire, and it's not possible to thoroughly complete it in just one or two days. When everyone was busy, Cheng Dairen's fear value had accumulated to 100,000.