Chapter 38 - Chapter 32: The River That Worked

🌊Chapter 32: The River That Worked

🌍 May 20th, 98 BCE – Late Spring 🌼

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As the second winter faded and the first green shoots of spring pushed their way through thawing soil, the valley stirred not just with planting—but with plans. Ambitious ones.

The village had grown. With nearly 400 people, dozens of workshops, animals to feed, bread to bake, lumber to cut, textiles to weave, and ores to smelt, their hands alone weren't enough anymore. They needed power—real mechanical power. And in a place like this, hidden from the world, there was only one sensible place to begin: the river.

🌊 Harnessing the Flow

It had always been there—cutting quietly through the middle of the valley, winding its way out through the steep gap near the entrance where the stone wall now stood watch. And upstream, less than a half-mile from the center of the settlement, was a natural narrowing between two gentle slopes. Nano had spotted it on the earliest scans and bookmarked it with the label: Hydro Opportunity.

Now, it was time to cash in.

On May 23, crews cleared the banks and began blasting the stubbornest boulders with powder. Teams of oxen dragged stone, while masons laid the first foundation courses. Roman concrete sealed each seam, hardening even underwater. By June 24, the wall spanned the choke, six feet of steady water pressing behind it. The spillway poured clean through its arched gate into the first of several aqueducts.

From its lip, the water spilled down into carved buckets on overshot wheels, holding each drop longer, squeezing every bit of force from the river. To the villagers, it looked like genius.

"By the gods," one mason whispered, watching the first wheel turn. "The river itself has taken sides with us."

Junjie only smiled.

🌾 The First Mills

The very first wheel to turn was for grain. On July 6, flour dusted the floor of the Rivermouth Mill, and farmers cheered as the stones ground faster than a team of horses ever could.

Chengde scooped up a fistful of flour, letting it run through his fingers. "Half a day's grinding, done in an hour," he muttered. "If this keeps up, I might even learn to like bread again."

A week later, on July 15, the second overshot wheel turned in the new textile mill. They named it The Spindlehall—its clattering looms and drums weaving bolts of wool and flax in weeks instead of months. Children stacked finished cloth like treasure, carrying it proudly to the tailors.

Lianhua ran her hand over a length of fresh linen and gave Junjie a look. "You're going to spoil us. How are we supposed to go back to mending rags after this?"

On the western bank, masons extended a short spur aqueduct and set the great saw carriage in place. By July 18, the Twin Teeth Sawmill sang its rough, buzzing song. Beams slid out clean and true, leaving carpenters shaking their heads in disbelief at the speed.

One shook his head, laughing. "I'll be out of work at this rate."

"Or busier than ever," Junjie countered. "Now you'll build faster than we can cut."

🔨 The Forge That Breathed

While the mills sang with flour, cloth, and timber, a new sound joined them: iron striking iron. By July 24, the forge's trip hammers were crashing down on billets, sparks bursting in rhythm with the waterwheel's turn.

A second wheel pumped its bellows without rest, feeding steady air to the coals. For the first time, the smiths could keep the heat high all day. They christened it The Iron Lung, laughing through sweat and soot as the machine "breathed" for them.

One of the younger smiths shouted over the racket, "Feels like we've harnessed a giant and chained him to the anvil!"

Another spat into the coals. "As long as he doesn't break loose."

It was noisy, creaky, and always thirsty for oil—but it worked.

⚙️ The Gears That Turned the Future

The real challenge wasn't the wheels—it was the gearwork.

Junjie worked with blacksmiths and carpenters to forge toothed iron gears, fit shafts of laminated hardwood, and bind them in iron rings. The first assemblies split, jammed, or shrieked like tortured animals. But by early August, after weeks of repairs, they had a system that worked.

Clutches let them start and stop wheels without ripping the whole assembly apart—a detail that spared both lives and machines. The villagers marveled that Junjie had "improved the old undershot design."

A carpenter rubbed his bruised shoulder after a near miss. "Improved, you say? Then next time, let the machine throw you across the yard."

Junjie laughed, though he winced. "Fair point."

🏡 The Village Reacts

By August 20, all four mills were running together.

Farmers had flour without the grind. Carpenters shaped beams in days instead of weeks. Weavers clothed entire families in bolts of fresh cloth. And the forge roared like a dragon, spitting out nails, hinges, and blades in a flood.

The elders called for a naming ceremony.

⠀⠀⠀⠀• The Rivermouth Mill – the grain mill on the east bank.

⠀⠀⠀⠀• The Spindlehall – the textile mill, weaving the valley's cloth.

⠀⠀⠀⠀• The Twin Teeth Sawmill – the humming saw carriage on the west bank.

⠀⠀⠀⠀• The Iron Lung Forge – the hammer-and-bellows complex, breathing fire.

Children brought flatbreads baked from the mill's flour. Apprentices carved initials into beams. Even Chengde, the gruff carpenter, was caught smiling as he tested a fresh plank.

He knocked the wood with his knuckles. "That would've taken me a whole day before," he said, and for once, no one minded the pride in his voice.

🔮 Looking Ahead

The dam was only the beginning.

They had flour, lumber, cloth, and steel—each delivered not by aching backs or beasts of burden, but by water itself.

The age of machines had quietly begun in their hidden valley.

And it all started with the river that worked.