Chapter 160: Bathroom

After a whole day of hard work, everyone in Qiming loved to do one thing: soak in the newly finished bathtub to wash away the day's sweat and fatigue.

Since the bathroom was built, this place has become the most popular spot.

After living like savages for nearly two months, everyone finally achieved the freedom to bathe.

June's rainfall was fairly abundant, so the water reservoir remained almost always full; as of now, the water diversion system runs very smoothly, and Chen Mu is even considering adding another reservoir.

After the two cardboard boxes were completely tidied up, the room felt more spacious, with plenty of space.

When he first undertook this project, his ability wasn't that strong; if he did it now, a reservoir of this size would probably take only a few minutes to finish.

However, increasing the reservoir's capacity doesn't seem necessary for summer; Dong Junwei and the others mean to wait until after September to discuss it.

Chen Mu immersed himself in the wide bathtub; the cool water covered most of his body, leaving only his head resting on the metal tub's edge.

The stainless‑steel tub feels even icier to the touch, but since it's summer, Chen Mu and Wei Dalei wish the water were even colder.

Dong Junwei and the other girls are much more particular; before each bath, they insist the Class Monitor personally heat the whole tub.

Because they gave up the shower option, the metal coil previously considered was never installed; instead, Dong Junwei directly heats the tub.

Once the stainless‑steel tub is heated to a comfortable temperature for the body and water is added, one can enjoy the pleasure of a hot bath.

The bathroom is divided into two rooms, a men's bath and a women's bath.

Each room has ten bathtubs installed.

This way everyone gets their own dedicated bathtub, just like the squat toilets.

The reason it's so luxurious is not only hygiene but also that building the tubs is easy; Chen Mu accidentally made a few extra, simply because he felt like it.

Of course, hygiene is also a major factor.

Although called a bathtub, it's really more like a water tank, and its biggest drawback is the lack of drainage.

Given the current tub size, even if a drain were designed, water couldn't naturally flow out through such tiny pipes.

Most importantly, with so little water, any longer bath would soon evaporate dry, requiring constant refilling.

According to Tang Jing's design, a main pipe with a 10 mm diameter is led into the bathroom, laid exposed above the ceiling, and then twenty branch pipes hang down; these branches are conical, ending in a 2 mm diameter, and fitted with screw caps.

Chen Mu initially tried making a valve, similar to a faucet's principle, but he eventually found that, aside from needing somewhat high precision, controlling a faucet was even harder than simply installing a screw‑on cap.

This water supply is still rather primitive, but compared to before, it's already the difference between barbarism and civilization.

Of course, the feeling of bathing now is also not much like it used to be.

When filling the tub, there is no flow; what comes out of the tiny outlet is drop after drop, each droplet larger than half of one's body.

Just three or four drops are enough to fill the whole tub, and even then some water is wasted outside.

Bathing also has a rule: you cannot go together.

According to Tang Jing's bathroom regulations, at most one‑third of the people may bathe each time—that is, in three batches, with no more than three boys and three girls per batch.

The purpose is, of course, to avoid everyone going to bathe at once and then an emergency occurring outside.

But the girls' bathing time is far longer than the boys'.

On the boys' side, the third batch have already dressed, while He Ying, Dong Junwei, and the first batch of girls are still not finished washing.

……

Once the bathing issue was basically resolved, another major problem became increasingly apparent.

For a full two months, everyone has still been wearing the original clothes.

Basically they are short‑sleeve tops; some wear long pants, others short pants.

No matter what they wear, the clothes were already so dirty they couldn't get any dirtier.

Fortunately, with the bathroom and the ability to bathe, the laundry problem is barely considered solved.

While bathing, they also scrub their clothes and pants, then wring them dry; because the volume is tiny, moisture evaporates quickly, so after bathing, even if still a bit damp, wearing them and walking around a couple of times basically dries them.

Because everyone has had dormitory experience, aside from individuals like Zhu Hao who can save a week's worth of clothes to take home for his mother to wash, the rest have no trouble in this regard.

However, without detergent, oily grime can't be washed out; each time they can only rinse with clean water, at least the sweat smell is much better than before.

Even so, mishaps still happen often.

For example, Wei Dalei, while wringing out his clothes, accidentally used too much force and ripped his own T‑shirt.

In the end, Dong Junwei had Chen Mu make a sewing needle, pull cotton thread from the cotton yarn, and sew it up; however, the Class Monitor obviously had never done this before, his skill is a bit rusty, and the mended garment bears a huge scar that looks somewhat unfashionable at first glance.

Old Wei doesn't mind; in this weather he'd rather go shirtless.

However, Chen Mu and the others still saw the problem.

Even if the washing issue is solved, clothing lifespan is ultimately limited, especially when wearing the same piece every day, which obviously speeds up wear and tear.

In a few months, everyone's clothes will be ragged, no better than a beggar's.

Because Chen Mu's ability still has little effect on fabric, making a piece of clothing remains just a thought for now.

Of course, it's not completely hopeless.

Pulling cotton thread from towels and then weaving a garment like a sweater is not difficult in principle.

But the problem is that among the seventeen people present, including Tang Jing, nobody knows how to knit with needles; to be precise, Tang Xueshen knows the steps and various stitches for knitting a sweater, but his manual ability is limited and he has never actually knitted, so he cannot get started.

And even if they could produce something, the roughness would be like a sweater; while clothing and pants might be barely acceptable, woolen underwear would be overly stimulating.

Regarding this issue.

Dong Junwei's suggestion is to have Tang Jing teach everyone to knit sweaters; after a few months, they could certainly manage to make a few garments.

Although this matter isn't urgent right now, it's clear that once the weather turns cold, thinking about it later will be too late.

For now, it seems this is the only option.

Therefore, including Chang Junyan and a few other boys, they raised their hands to indicate they could learn.

However, when everyone's gaze gathered on Tang Jing, this study committee member seemed not to fully agree with the plan.

Because she has her own ideas.

It must be said that Tang Xueshen's way of thinking is completely different from that of ordinary people; his thoughts are not wildly unconventional, and a single sentence can silence everyone:

I think it would be better to directly make a weaving machine.