Humans Shrunk 100 Times

Chapter 131: High-rise

With this large batch of supplies, everyone felt more at ease. Even if they didn't go out for a long time, they wouldn't have to worry about food. Moreover, once the planting was confirmed, future food supplies would be guaranteed. This was undoubtedly a powerful boost.

The first task in the morning was to organize the 36 wooden boxes.

"Perhaps we should plan the entire room in advance," Dong Junwei said, looking at the wooden boxes on the floor, contemplating where to stack them.

The storage area was still quite large for them. To put it in perspective, it was approximately the size of the entire school they used to attend, just more spacious without so many buildings.

"How should we plan it?" asked someone.

"The school originally had more than 2,000 people. I estimate that even if we add those from 'Yi Zhong' [likely referring to a school or institution], it won't exceed 500 people. So, let's plan for around 400 to 500 people," Dong Junwei suggested.

"That should be enough," He Ying looked around the entire room.

"Enough, yes, but not as spacious as one might imagine," Dong Junwei continued, "First of all, the shelves and goods take up a lot of space, and people don't just need a place to sleep."

"Yes, we need to consider supporting facilities," Lu Shanshan chimed in. After going on an errand outside with Chen Mu, she felt a stronger sense of belonging.

Dong Junwei nodded. "For housing 500 people, even if it's all on one level, it will still take up a considerable amount of space. Moreover, correspondingly, our dining area, washing area, and toilets will all need to be enlarged."

"In fact, the space below the shelves can also be utilized," He Ying suggested.

"That's right, it's about 10 centimeters high."

"But the lighting would be an issue. Considering the size of the windows and the angle of the sun, the residential area is not as spacious as we might imagine," Dong Junwei said, looking towards the window.

The houses that Qiming was currently building were located after Tang Jing considered maximizing sunlight. Currently, there weren't many people, so it wasn't a problem, but if the number of people surged to hundreds, as Dong Junwei said, it might not be able to accommodate everyone.

Sunlight is always an essential reference indicator for a residence, which is also one of the reasons why lower-level floors are more affordable.

"Can we build tall buildings? Like school dormitories?" someone asked, and all eyes turned to Chen Mu involuntarily.

"Leave me out of your plans," Chen Mu rolled his eyes.

"Haha..."

"But seriously, after we have more people, tall buildings could be considered," Tang Jing said.

"Is it difficult?"

"Compared to before, definitely easier."

"Why? Isn't it the same?"

"The difference is significant. The difficulty in constructing tall buildings lies in earthquake resistance and materials. As the height reaches a certain level, the weight of the building puts more strain on the foundation materials. In such cases, you can only continuously expand the base. Therefore, under the current technology, once tall buildings reach a certain height, the cost increases linearly, and the cost-effectiveness becomes lower.

"That's also why Gundam [referring to the famous mecha in anime] can only exist in animation. Because at that size, unless materials science makes tremendous progress, humanoid mecha's legs simply can't support their own weight, let alone running and jumping."

When Gundam and mecha were mentioned, several boys became interested. Zhu Hao immediately disagreed, "But it's possible to reduce weight using propulsion..."

However, Tang Jing didn't give them a chance to discuss it. Before he finished, she interrupted, "Reducing weight using propulsion to ease the burden on the legs? I can't believe you came up with that. Considering the fuel cost, what's the point of having humanoid mecha? Wouldn't using fighter jets be better?"

Zhu Hao was speechless.

Being defeated in this area by a girl was something he never expected.

Tang Jing continued, "But with our current proportions, this problem doesn't exist. As long as Chen Mu's abilities are powerful enough or the basic industries are improved in the future, we can definitely build thousands of floors tall buildings. At least structurally, there won't be any issues."

"A thousand floors..."

"Cyberpunk!"

"I want to live on the top floor."

"..."

"This seems a bit distant, can our generation live to see it?" Chang Junyan scratched his arm, looking weary.

"It's actually not that far off," Tang Jing smiled, "The school's teaching building has six floors, with each floor being 3.6 meters high, making a total height of 22 meters. If we consider the typical 3-meter floor height of residential buildings, it would already be enough to accommodate 700 floors. If we use the twelve-floor dormitories outside our school, a thousand floors would be more than enough. Of course, the interior transformation is a massive project that we can't imagine right now."

The scene suddenly quieted down. It seemed that everyone was imagining what it would be like if one teaching building were divided into 700 floors and then filled with the shrunken humans.

After a while, Dong Junwei suddenly laughed, "Let's first plan this place. Even if we transform the teaching building like that, we'd still need so many people to live here. I'm afraid even a whole city might not have enough population for that."

"Yes, that's something for the future," Tang Jing agreed with a smile. "As for this place, I suggest starting with an overall division of the area."

"How should we do it?"

"The residential area needs sunlight, so we must reserve the areas that can be exposed to the sun. Other places should be divided based on functions like dining, hygiene, exercise, entertainment, factories, warehouses, and agriculture."

"Additionally, we must make good use of the shelves, and we could even consider placing the cultivation area on top."

"Indeed, the shelves receive better sunlight than the ground."

"But isn't it difficult to transport soil up there?"

"Once we have a gantry crane, it might be feasible to consider."

"But what about watering the plants? Our water tanks are so low."

"The water tanks are for daily use. If it's for irrigation, we would definitely need to construct something else."

"Why does it feel like there's more and more to do..."

"..."

Originally, everyone thought that after having enough to eat and drink, life would be relatively straightforward. However, now they suddenly realized that there were still many things to be done.

Chen Mu, on the other hand, felt quite content. Being together with everyone, having a common goal and a direction, was much better than idle daydreaming with nothing to do.

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