I live in the Martian wilderness!

[Mars Day 12, 17:15]

"bite--"

A crisp beep broke the silence in the cockpit.

"Report to the colonel: Phase two of production is complete."

"The Divine Craftsmanship Module has completed the sintering of 80 'Mars Bricks'. It is currently undergoing final cooling and purging."

"It's finally done."

Gu Yu suddenly opened his eyes and started the Sky Patrol.

The Mars rover, filled with a sense of emptiness, turned around and roared out of the ground along the ramp.

When he returned to the surface, the setting sun was already close to the western horizon, turning the entire Utopia Plain into a desolate blood red.

In the open space in front of the shelter, next to the Tiansuo engineering vehicle, two stacks of freshly baked dark red bricks were neatly stacked.

Gu Yu jumped out of the car and walked to the pile of bricks.

These bricks do not have the rough texture of Earth's red bricks; their surfaces exhibit a semi-vitrified, dense luster, a result of the basalt being reconstituted at 1100 degrees Celsius.

Gu Yu gripped the grooves at both ends of a brick with both hands, took a deep breath, and exerted his strength—Up!

"Wow, that's heavy!"

Even under the 0.38G gravity on Mars, the brick still gave him a heavy feeling in his hand.

The mass of 54.3 kg, although equivalent to the feel of 20 kg in this case, cannot be eliminated due to the inertia inherent in high-density objects.

"This isn't a brick; it's clearly a solid, square-cut piece of granite!"

"This is the strength we need, Lieutenant Colonel. Only bricks of this weight can withstand the thrust of 10 tons of atmosphere in that vacuum, preserving the warmth of that room."

"Okay, Xuan. Open all the cargo hold covers on the Sky Patrol. We're going to start being porters."

He straightened up, looked at the Sky Patrol vehicle parked next to him, then at the pile of bricks weighing over 4 tons, and shook his head.

"Alright, let the Sky Patrol rest. This kind of heavy, arduous work should be done by the bigger guys."

"Xuan, activate the 'Mountain Moving' excavator arm of the Sky Shuttle and switch to 'Clamping and Transporting Mode'."

"Load all these bricks onto Tissot's own cargo platform. Make sure they are stacked neatly; we need to transport them all at once."

"Understood, Lieutenant Colonel. Planning the robotic arm's motion path..."

With a low hum from the hydraulic pump, the powerful mechanical arm on the roof of the Tiansuo car nimbly extended down.

The front-end engineering grippers open precisely, like a tireless hand, able to firmly grasp a brick in one go.

"Buzz—click."

The robotic arm operated efficiently, neatly stacking the heavy Martian bricks one by one on the wide metal platform at the rear of the vehicle.

Gu Yu watched from the side and couldn't help but marvel at the wonders of industrial automation.

In just ten minutes, the mountain of bricks that had been piled on the ground disappeared, replaced by the neatly arranged dark red square array on the back of the Sky Shuttle.

Loading complete. Goods secured.

"Alright, let's go, Xuan. Let's go build the wall!"

The massive tracks of the Sky Shuttle kicked up red dust as it steadily carried the heavy Martian bricks.

[Mars Day 12, 17:40]

Two more beams of light pierced the darkness, but this time they were Tianshuo construction vehicles fully loaded with building materials, parked in front of the construction site marked with red laser dots.

Gu Yu glanced at the time. "Although it's getting dark outside, this cave is practically perpetual night."

"Xuan, we don't need to wait until tomorrow morning. Let's tackle the toughest challenge while the equipment is warmed up!"

He pointed to the red markers marked with a theodolite above his head: "If we finish cutting the grooves and unloading the bricks tonight, we can start building the wall as soon as we wake up tomorrow morning."

"Understood, Lieutenant Colonel. Retrieving 3D laser scan coordinates."

Xuanjian skillfully raised the mechanical arm on the roof of the Sky Shuttle to unload the bricks.

They were sorted and stacked on both sides of the wall base to minimize the transport distance when building the wall tomorrow.

Then switch to the G-7 diamond milling head. The cylindrical end mill at the front end, covered with diamond particles, begins to rotate at high speed.

Although no sound can be heard in a vacuum, the high-frequency vibration of the motor is transmitted through the ground, causing Gu Yu's feet to feel slightly numb.

"Sizzle—!"

With sub-millimeter precision control, the milling cutter plunged deep into the hard basalt at the top of the cave.

There was no dazzling display of sparks flying everywhere, only countless tiny stone dust particles being thrown out like a fountain.

The robotic arm moved slowly along the irregular red dotted line from yesterday, forcibly smoothing out the jagged rocks in its path.

And a perfect groove, 55 cm wide and 15 cm deep, was left deep inside.

Next are the rock walls on both sides, and finally the ground.

What would normally be an extremely tedious and noisy task has now become a delightful sculpting performance on the deserted Mars.

An hour later, an embedded groove that encircled the entire cross-section was forcibly etched into the inner wall of the lava pipe.

While Tissot was cutting grooves, Gu Yu didn't sit idle either.

He moved the 80 pre-cut fluororubber sealing strips to the construction site and stacked them neatly.

After doing all this, it was exactly 20:00 PM.

Looking at the perfect groove and the pile of bricks ready to be used, Gu Yu patted the dust off his hands with satisfaction.

"Good, Xuan, go back to the shelter for food and sleep. Get plenty of rest, and we'll start building the wall first thing tomorrow morning!"

……

[Mars Day 13, 07:00 AM]

After a night's rest, Gu Yu stood before this "threshold" once again, full of energy.

Today's task is simple—to fill this wall, like building blocks.

"Xuan, activate the Tianshuo 'Mountain Moving' robotic arm and switch to micro-motion control mode. This kind of delicate work requires us to work together."

Gu Yu first walked to the edge of the groove on the ground and picked up a fluororubber sealing strip from the material basket.

He crouched down and pressed the sealing strip into the groove of the basalt in the ground, following the center line marked by the laser.

"The first layer, the foundation, is the most important. Lay the bricks."

As the command was given, the powerful mechanical arm of the Tissot lowered, and the gripper at the front firmly gripped a Martian brick.

Under Xuanjian's control, the robotic arm, carrying a 54-kilogram brick, descended slowly as if it were a sugar cube.

"Move two millimeters to the left... down!"

"Click".

A dull thud.

The bottom of the brick is in close contact with the sealing strip on the ground. Under the pressure of several tons of mechanical force, the highly elastic fluororubber is instantly squeezed and deformed.

It completely filled even the micron-sized gaps between the basalt base and the bricks.

"Perfect. Xuan, keep this pace, assembly line operation begins!"

Over the next few hours, the robotic arm picked up a new brick from the shelf and hovered above the wall. Gu Yu quickly picked up the sealing strip and skillfully placed it into the tenon joint on top of the lower brick.

The robotic arm then presses down, automatically aligning itself using a high-precision vision sensor.