The Genius Construction Worker Who Moved to America - Chapter 16

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Episode 16

The Warmth Beneath

Rumble-rumble! Crash!

The roar of diesel engines echoed through the old quarter of Pasadena, down Elm Street. Dozens of heavy machines deployed by Blackwood Construction belched smoke without pause.

“Dump truck three, back up more! Clear space for the excavator to pivot!”
“Crane boom up! Get that angle straight, will you?”

Max’s voice, the site foreman from Blackwood, erupted through a megaphone.

Until yesterday, he’d treated Kang Joon and Leo like a pair of neighborhood contractors.
Now Max had become a capable foreman, translating the blueprints that lived in Kang Joon’s mind into concrete reality.

The devastation of the old quarter, seen in person, was far worse than any photograph could convey.

The second surge of the flood had toppled wooden houses that had barely survived the first.

Asphalt shingles that once crowned the roofs tore away like tissue paper, and brick walls battered by the wind crumbled just as easily.

The road itself told a more dire story. Where the ground had been scoured away, sinkholes—large and small—had cratered the asphalt.

Vehicles that hadn’t been evacuated in time sat mired in mud pits, a tableau of devastation that resembled a war zone.

“Begin demolition in Zone A—the most critical section. Crush the debris and load it into the dump trucks!”

Under Max’s direction, the full-scale demolition commenced.

Two 50-ton Crawler Cranes rolled their tracks into the muddy expanse.

From the towering boom high overhead hung Sling Belts capable of hoisting several tons. Beneath them stood four 30-ton Excavators in a row.

The excavators, tipped with sharp jaws, tore mercilessly at the collapsed roof trusses and main beams of wood.

Crack! Splinter!

White dust rose with the sound of splintering wood. Each time debris was compressed into a dump truck bed, the heavy vehicle’s frame shuddered side to side.

And there, in the heart of that chaos—
Kang Joon stood atop a collapsed wall, his sharp gaze surveying the scene.

[Skill Activated: Master’s Blueprint (Lv.1)]

Shimmer.

The frenzied work site transformed into a holographic schematic, spreading across his vision.

The dump trucks’ routes, the excavators’ operational radius, the volume of waste that would pour forth after demolition—

One hundred and fifty workers and machines interlocked like gears, turning in perfect synchrony.

Yet Kang Joon’s true purpose lay elsewhere.

Not that he would neglect the disaster recovery work—far from it. The reason he had earned the title of proxy for the god of architecture, his hunger for absolute perfection in construction, burned fiercer in him than in anyone else.

But his gaze swept not merely over the collapsed houses, but through them—to the land itself on which they stood.

‘Land ownership transfer upon 90% contribution achievement.’

A remarkable compensation clause embedded in the employment contract.
Kang Joon was searching for prime real estate in Pasadena, California.

When planting your first flag, you couldn’t simply accept any scrap of land that came your way.
He dropped to one knee in the mud-caked earth and stripped off his work gloves, pressing his bare palm against the ground.

[Skill activated: Pulse of the Earth (Lv.1)]

Thump.

A wave rippled outward from his palm, spiraling deep into the bedrock below.
At once the subsurface appeared on his retina—a twenty-meter radius, dozens of meters down—revealing the ground’s full composition.

‘Let’s see. Sand and gravel mixed in—drainage itself isn’t bad. But….’

His brow furrowed suddenly. What his enhanced perception caught as it traced downward through the strata was far from a positive sign.

The tremendous rainfall that had poured from the open sky had transformed the soil into complete liquefaction.

‘There might be nothing here worth salvaging.’

Kang Joon grimaced inwardly.

At roughly ten meters down lay a solid bedrock layer, but it lay within the influence zone of a fault line, fractured throughout with countless ruptures.

Worse, the chaotic web of underground hot spring veins posed a real risk of catastrophic sinkhole formation. The land was nothing but instability.

From a builder’s perspective, this was a site that demanded preparation for monumental difficulty.

“Well, you can’t have your fill on the first spoonful. Restoration work comes first, anyway.”

Kang Joon brushed off his hands and rose, launching into a systematic command of the site.

The heavy machinery of Blackwood Construction moved with steady purpose, yet to Kang Joon’s eye, the pace fell short of what it should be.

He watched as chunks of essential foundation piping and structural framework were carelessly demolished wholesale.

“Time to show what I can really do.”

Kang Joon made his way to the Mini Excavator parked at one side of the site.
The same machine he’d used to lever a stream embankment into place. Beside the towering excavators, it looked like a child’s toy.

Vroom!

He climbed into the cabin, fired the ignition, and gripped the levers.

Whining! Crack! Clatter-clatter!

Using the bucket’s teeth, he carved into the tangled wooden truss work of the roof. And then—with surgical precision—he extracted only the thick beams worth recycling, pulling them free without a single blemish.

A universe away from Blackwood’s brute-force approach.

“Oh, my God….”
“Is that really an excavator doing that work? It’s like using tweezers!”

Gasps of amazement burst from the workers laboring nearby.

Kang Joon’s excavator ranged across the site, taking on the most challenging tasks.

He scraped away only the protruding nails from the brick debris, cleaned the surroundings perfectly without touching the water pipes.

His skill alone at operating the excavator was enough to earn the workers’ trust.
What a construction site needs isn’t a manager who talks a big game—it’s someone who actually knows the craft.

Under Kang Joon’s command, the roof demolition on all forty-two houses was completed in barely a day and a half.
Bare skeletal frames remained. Now it was time to cover them with new material.

* * *

Around 2 p.m.
Kang Joon assembled Leo, Max, and about a dozen skilled carpenters known for their craftsmanship, heading somewhere—specifically, to 1242 Elm Street, Arthur’s residence.

“Here you are, you magician. And you’ve brought quite the crew today.”

Arthur greeted Kang Joon with a benevolent smile.

“Yes, sir. Would it be alright if I took a quick look around?”

Arthur nodded at Kang Joon’s polite request.

His residence cut a distinctly different figure from the surrounding homes.
Thousands of Wood Tiles, darkened by absorbed rainwater and sharpened in clarity, gleamed beneath the sunlight.

“Now, here is a sample of the roof you’ll all be covering going forward. Study it carefully.”

As soon as Kang Joon finished speaking, the carpenters—veterans in their own right—swarmed toward the eaves of the residence.

Thompson, a white carpenter who climbed the ladder to examine the roof’s seams, let out a gasp of wonder.

“Impossible…! The boards fit together perfectly! There isn’t a gap anywhere!”
“In all my years, I’ve never seen craftsmanship like this! How did you withstand the ravages of the weather?!”

While the carpenters, mouths agape, caressed the roofing material, Arthur leaned toward them with a knowing hint in his voice. Though his eyes were blind, his ears were sharp, and his shoulders rose with pride.

“Heh heh, gentlemen. Nothing to marvel at there. What you should truly be amazed by is something else entirely.”

Arthur gave a theatrical cough and lifted his chin.

“That roof right there—Kang Joon, standing over there—bent and laid every single board by hand alone. Not a pneumatic nailer, not a single nail used.”

“What?! You didn’t use nails?!”

“Don’t joke with us, sir! A project this size would need thousands of nail gun shots just to hold it. And it’s a roof that’s weathered the elements all this time!”

The carpenters’ skepticism lingered. Their experience simply couldn’t accept such a thing.

Facing their murmurs, Kang Joon spoke decisively.

“If you don’t believe it, feel free to pry it apart yourselves. Though whatever you tear out comes from your own wages.”

At Kang Joon’s half-joking, half-serious remark, the carpenters flinched and fell silent. He pulled a bundle of documents from his pocket and handed them to Max.

“Director Max. These contain the precise radius of curvature, length, and quantity of the Red Pine Wood supporting the roof. Submit the order immediately. There must not be even a millimeter of error.”

Max examined the blueprint and swallowed hard. The drawing was filled with complex yet meticulous figures.

Then Kang Joon pulled out a sample he’d prepared beforehand—a Roof Shingle Board about twenty centimeters wide and thirty centimeters tall.

Elongated grooves and ridges ran along both sides—the core material for this project.

“This is the Roof Shingle Board you’ll be processing yourselves. The thickness is exactly fifteen millimeters. The depth of the left groove is eight millimeters, and the protrusion of the right ridge is seven point five millimeters.”

He turned his sharp gaze across the carpenters.

“Listen carefully. You must shave it down without a single error. If you’re off by even one millimeter, the entire roof will come apart.”

Under Kang Joon’s warning, the carpenters nodded as if entranced. A craftsman’s spark had already kindled in their eyes.

After finishing his instructions, Kang Joon, Leo, and Max headed toward the site office set up nearby.

As they walked across the muddy ground, Kang Joon’s gaze caught on something without thought.

“……Huh?”

An old house with its roof torn away, only the skeleton remaining. On the surface it looked no different from the other houses, but to Kang Joon’s eyes, something was unmistakable.

The left side of the building had subsided by roughly one point five degrees.
It could have been ground subsidence from the heavy rains. But Kang Joon sensed instinctively something hidden beneath the surface.

He changed direction and approached the house.

“Kang Joon? Where are you going? The office is that way.”

Despite Leo’s call, Kang Joon didn’t break stride. He dropped to one knee in front of a puddle near the building.

Then he plunged his bare hand into the murky water.

[Skill Activated: Pulse of the Earth (Lv.1)]

Whoosh—!

The underground world spread before his eyes.

Five meters down, ten meters, twenty meters…. Kang Joon’s eyes widened with each depth.

‘This… this is incredible!’

Twenty meters below the surface, between layers of granite bedrock, seething energy roiled like a blazing inferno.
That heat, meeting groundwater that had seeped down through the heavy rains, had turned the earth into a liquefied state.

‘Geothermal energy…! And massive at that. There’s definitely a hot spring vein flowing beneath this land!’

Truly, this was land worth its weight in gold.

Kang Joon remained frozen, his hand still submerged in the murky water.
Sensing the extraordinary energy radiating from him, Leo spoke with concern.

“Kang Joon…? What’s wrong? Are you hurt?”

Even Max hesitated from behind, calling out.

“Is something the matter? Is the ground collapsing or something?”

After being called several times, Kang Joon came to himself and brushed the dirt from his hands as he stood.
His expression as he turned to Leo and Max was unremarkable as ever.

“No, it’s nothing. I thought it might be dangerous since there’s been a lot of erosion here, that’s all.”

Kang Joon waved it off as nothing, but the moment he turned away, a smile spread across his face—impossible to hide.

‘Alright, shall we get started on the design?’

His heart hammered wildly. Kang Joon sketched out in his mind the path to achieving ninety percent contribution.

He turned to Max, his voice sharp and decisive.

“Max.”

“Yes? Go ahead, sir.”

“I’m taking full responsibility for the demolition, repairs, and foundation reinforcement of this house.”

Max tilted his head, struggling to comprehend.

The site supervisor overseeing tens of millions of dollars worth of construction was personally committing himself to this one decrepit house?

Yet Kang Joon’s next instructions were cold—almost menacing in their intensity.

“Put up a no-entry barrier ten meters in all directions around this building. Until I give permission, no one crosses that line.”

“Understood, sir! I’ll get on it right away!”

Max grabbed his radio and hurried off, panic in every step.

As he watched the perimeter being cordoned off, Kang Joon placed his hand against the old house’s wooden post.
Through his fingertips, a warm, vital current flowed from the earth—intoxicating in its promise.

‘Well then. Shall we have a taste?’

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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