Chapter Thirty-Five: Strum; Gwiel

  If it weren't for seeing it with your own eyes, probably no one would believe that such a thing could happen in this world. Looking at everything in front of you, it's really hard to believe, even though it's seen with your own eyes. Ye Wen knew that if he wasn't dreaming.

  "Want to go with me to see 94 years ago?"

  Looking at his stunned younger cousin, he thought that his own expression must have been the same back then. Sima did not regret revealing his deepest secret to his younger cousin, because he believed that his only brother would never betray him; if he knew the reason, he would instead do his best to help him, for they were brothers after all.

  "Ah! Oh!"

  Ye Wen followed his brother, Ye Fan, into the light circle, despite knowing that nothing unexpected would happen. However, he couldn't hide the underlying fear in his heart. To be honest, Ye Wen knew he was afraid, even more so than going down a well. If others were to find out about this, Ye Wen knew what kind of consequences he and his brother would face.

  "This... what is this?"

  As soon as he walked out of the "time-space anomaly point" in his brother's mouth, what entered his eyes was a large warehouse filled with all kinds of materials, which was obviously more than twice as large as that warehouse. The thick supporting pillars and windowless walls made it clear that this was not the original warehouse.

  "Brother... this is..."

  "Not bad, this is the space of 1916, when I first came to this space, it was just a desolate and barren land, this warehouse was built only a few months ago. All are made of stone, the lower wall is nearly one meter thick, the door is an electronic remote control door. Out of the warehouse is my factory."

  Simma feels that his emotions towards this time and space are getting deeper, and he no longer sees it as just a place to make money like in the past. More often than not, Simma thinks that perhaps this place is more like home.

  Even after the factory was built, Sima hastily had a residence built nearby. Originally planning to buy a house in the 21st century, Sima didn't know when he completely forgot about buying a house. If given the choice, Sima felt that this place was even harder to leave. After all, this factory built on the barren land had more of Sima's heart and blood, it was a proof of a man's career.

  "Brother! This is your factory!"

  As soon as he left the warehouse, he walked on the gravel road and looked at the dozens of factories lined up on both sides of the road. He couldn't believe that in just a few months, this piece of wasteland had been transformed into these rows of buildings. It was imaginable how much hard work his elder cousin had put in here from the beginning.

  "This is where watches are produced, that one manufactures flour mills, and those several factories will produce spinning machines in the future, which are still being tested now. Many masters here were invited from Tianjin and Shanghai at a high price."

  As he walked, Sima introduced his factory to his younger cousin, and his mood became much more comfortable. This feeling was completely different from the past when he introduced his factory to others, after all, his younger cousin understood his past.

  "In fact, these factories are actually just assembly plants and processing workshops. For example, the watch factory's movement is actually purchased from a Shanghai watch factory in modern times. At the earliest time, even the case was customized together, except for processing a strap, only assembly is left to itself."

  Until last month, after becoming a shell factory, it started to assemble movements from Shanghai Watch Factory. Some time ago, some masters were dug up from Tianjin and Shanghai's pocket watch shops, and they were given a copy of the early A581 drawings of Shanghai Watch Factory, asking them to try to make one, but it is unknown when it can be made.

  For some reason, Sima always felt that it was better to produce their own, and relying solely on purchasing from the 21st century and reassembling would not be a long-term plan. After a long time, they would inevitably attract attention in the 21st century, and by then, even if they regretted it, it would be too late.

  Like their own flour mill, initially except for the stone grinder being self-made, the steel frame was welded here, and the electric motor and belt were relied on from the 21st century. Now the electric motor can be completely self-made, although raw materials like copper wire, magnets, and silicon steel sheets still rely on transportation from the 21st century. If it weren't for the slightly higher price of custom orders here, ordering from foreign firms would be the same.

  Although the watch is a precision mechanical device, Sima really didn't believe that those 150 components could stump the master craftsmen who had spent half their lives making watches. The machinery they used was actually leftover equipment from the Chongqing Watch Group's bankruptcy auction, mostly old machines from the 1970s, but manufacturing A581 watches at a 1940s level shouldn't be a problem.

  "Brother! I really didn't expect you to build a factory and do business in this place."

  To be honest, Ye Wen never thought that his older cousin had the talent for doing business from a young age, but looking at this factory in front of him now, Ye Wen asked himself, even if he had gone through the same experiences as his older cousin, he probably wouldn't have been able to achieve all this. It's really hard to imagine how his older cousin was able to create this enterprise by himself back then. Sure, having money makes things easier, but it's still very difficult for one person to do all these things.

  "Wenzi, look at that house, it's mine, isn't it great?"

  In the distance, a white stone European-style villa appeared in a grove of trees. Sima pointed to the house he had never lived in before and said.

  For this house, Sima can be said to have devoted his heart and soul. To mention just one thing, the soil for the lawn near the house was transported from over 10 kilometers away to be laid down. Otherwise, it would be a dream to grow grass on this rocky land. The trees were also transplanted from elsewhere, and even the tree pits needed to be filled with soil. A special sprinkler system was even built just for this purpose. In the end, if Liu Jiyuan, who was in charge of the entire construction project, hadn't refused to continue serving Sima's luxurious private desires, things would have gone even further.

  Although he claimed to be just and upright, Liu Ji-yuan later built a smaller house for himself not far from Sima's residence, after all, being able to settle in this lush forest would make one's mood refreshing.

  Although this lush artificial forest was originally built by Sima for his own enjoyment, it did not stop expanding with the completion of the villa, but rather continued to grow slowly.

  To settle the teachers and their families from Tianjin and Shanghai, Sima prepared to build a batch of houses for them on the edge of this artificial forest in the future. Although these houses will not be as beautiful as Liu Jiuyuan's villa, nor have the same environment, compared with the ordinary workers' barrel houses planned, I don't know how many times stronger they are.

  Simas specially bought from the modern city the drawings of houses used for new rural construction, this kind of two-story connected small building has its own independent courtyard for each household, in the future it will become a symbol of identity for workers in the factory, and every master who is dug up from the big cities in Guan will move into such a small building soon.

  Of course, this is just Sima's own idea now, and there is not enough material to build such a house at present. The cement and steel needed to build this kind of building are not available in the current environment.

  "Sir! You can congratulate me now, we have successfully manufactured our first spinning machine."

  Staudinger had just left the white building where he worked, when he saw his boss, Mr. Geigy, walking by in front of the building. The previous day, Staudinger had been busy until after midnight, finally assembling all the parts of the spinning machine and testing it for several hours. After months of hard work on this machine, the German engineer had just left the factory and returned to his residence in the white building, only to see his boss walking by the door as he woke up from a nap. He immediately called out loudly to report his achievement to his boss.

  "Really!"

  This was the best news for Sima, originally thought that the spinning machine might not be able to be replicated until at least mid-year, but unexpectedly it only took a month and the spinning machine was actually made.

  "Sir! I told you, you won't regret your decision."

  Staudenmaier-Gwilt said with self-praise that as a mechanical expert, Staudenmaier-Gwilt indeed has something to be proud of.

  Originally, as a Mauser arms factory expert, Sturm-Gewehr arrived in China with the northern government's purchased arms machinery before the war. Unexpectedly, just as his work was about to end, the war broke out, and Sturm-Gewehr could not return to Germany. After completing his contractual work, he became unemployed.

  Generally, ordinary private factories do not want a military expert to come to their own factory. Who knows if he can handle it? Moreover, having a foreigner in the factory requires additional translation staff salaries, which is unbearable for ordinary small factories.

  And the arsenal was also unwilling to hire a German expert for itself under the government's widespread pro-British and French sentiment, so Strom-Gwill lingered in Tianjin with only a few hundred silver dollars left in his pocket for more than a year without finding a job.

  Later, after being kicked out by the landlord for failing to pay rent, he met Gao Chuanliang, who was looking for a high-paying job at various factories in Tianjin, and became the only foreign expert in the Sima factory.

  It was unexpected that Gao Chuanliang would bring back a foreign mechanical expert, Si Ma was obviously very excited at the time. Immediately threw the work of imitating spinning machines to this German mechanical expert, but Si Ma did not think that this expert was just an ordnance expert.

  Carrying the spinning machine drawings left by Mr. Slater, Samuel Slater-Guil also did not expect that his first job was to be responsible for imitating a very complex yarn machine. Although there were drawings, Samuel Slater-Guil still spent half a month studying the drawings. Who knows when the war will end?

  Who knows if I would fall back to the streets again if I lost my job, so in order to keep this job, during the trial production of parts later on, I even personally directed the technicians by their side, busy for half a month before finally manufacturing all the parts needed for one spinning machine, and it took two whole days just to assemble them!

  Watching the normally operating spinning machine, Stromwell-Gwilt knew he had succeeded in keeping his job and also proved his value to his new boss. He deserved to live in this European-style white building, and his boss obviously needed to increase his salary to make it worthwhile.