Although the blacksmith shop is already under construction, it is still too early to be fully completed—and in Gao Wen's plan, the current wooden house is actually not the same thing as the "blacksmith shop" that people in this world recognize, but In order to facilitate everyone's understanding, he temporarily called this place a blacksmith's shop.
According to what he meant, he planned to name this place "Cecil Iron Works"...
As the only blacksmith in the territory at present, Old Hammer is also quite confused about the "blacksmith shop" ordered by the Duke. In his opinion, this building occupies an unnecessary large area. In addition to the prefabricated house, it also includes an open space with a length and width of 100 meters and a wooden shed with only a few supports erected. It seems nondescript to call such a large facility a "blacksmith shop", but he And he dared not say that the famous founding prince was an outsider who didn't know how to pretend to know how to command—even though he really thought so in his heart, he absolutely didn't dare to say it.
After all, he is just a commoner, and the other party is a great nobleman who can sit on an equal footing with His Majesty the King.
And because of the astonishing footprint of this "blacksmith's shop", it could only be placed on the eastern edge of the camp, its "big yard" stretching out into the wasteland outside, like a piece protruding from the neat wooden fence It's so funny, and those guys brought from Tanzan Town seem to be a little pitiful in this giant blacksmith shop: they only occupy a corner of the wooden house, and the only iron-smelting furnace is still placed When we got to the open space outside, we used a simple wooden shed to protect it from wind and rain.
As far as Gao Wen is concerned, he arranged the reserved area of the blacksmith shop so large, and it is close to the edge of the territory, just considering the future production capacity needs and the convenience of expansion. A smithy with a few apprentices, a hut with a furnace, and clanging iron was not what he needed at all.
But he couldn't explain all this to the old blacksmith and his stupid apprentices now.
In addition to the consideration of production capacity and future expansion, Gao Wen did not intend to directly set up a pile of soil blast furnaces in this yard like the senior traversers in the past, although he did think so, But a few days ago, after seeing Hetty use magical power to help the raft land on the shore and help the camp strengthen the foundation, he temporarily suppressed this idea, and instead asked the only blacksmith in the territory, Hammer, to build one in the yard. Traditional furnace.
When he arrived at the blacksmith shop, Rebecca was already waiting here, as well as the old blacksmith Hammer with gray hair and beard, several of his apprentices, and several other leaders in short shirts standing in the yard, The large baskets under their feet contained the first batch of ore.
Gao Wen went straight to the traditional melting pot.
It was a crude-looking stove, about one meter high, divided into two distinct upper and lower parts. The lower part was an inflated hemispherical structure, and the upper part quickly shrank into a cylinder. On the lower hemispherical structure, You can also see two openings, one at the bottom, apparently where fuel is added, and the other near the cylindrical structure, where it should be possible to pour ore.
There is nothing unusual about these parts, just an ordinary furnace, but its special place is on the side.
There are three runes lined up there.
All three runes were engraved on a kind of pitch-black stone flake, and the three stone flakes had obviously been carefully polished and their positions carefully adjusted before being mounted on the furnace body to ensure that their spacing was exactly the same and their edges were parallel. The bottommost piece of stone is engraved with a triangular symbol, and there is a wavy line inside the symbol, which is the initial character representing the fire element in the magic book; the middle piece of stone is a square with a rhombus inside, it is the initial character of the earth element; on the upper stone piece is a group of swirl-shaped symbols, which are related to the wind element, but not the initial character.
In addition to these three stone flakes, some fine, shining dust can also be seen in the material of the furnace body. Gao Wen knew what it was: quartz sand, the quartz sand of "this world".
Quartz sand is a material with magical properties. Although its effect is extremely weak, it is widely used because it is cheap enough to be used by ordinary people.
Gao Wen raised his head and glanced at the old blacksmith: "You made this stove?"
"Yes, yes, sir..." the old blacksmith nervously grabbed the hat in his hand when he heard the lord's question to himself, and hurriedly lowered his head to answer, "Oh, half of it was made by me, and half of it was made by me directing the apprentices to make it. of… "
Gao Wen nodded, but didn't have any more questions.
Magic is an extraordinary power, and it does not belong to the field that "untouchables" can touch, but in this world full of magic power, even ordinary people who cannot cast spells actually have the shadow of magic power in their lives.
Some basic use of magic power does not require knowledge and ability to cast spells—everyone has magic power in their bodies, and as long as they use specific materials and engrave a simple symbol on a material of a specific shape, everyone can slightly arouse those nowhere The wonderful power of absence.
This is not spellcasting at all, and its effect is so weak that it is almost ridiculous in the eyes of those real "supernatural beings". This kind of leverage is like picking up a stick on the ground as a crutch, and picking up a stone everywhere to smash walnuts. Without technical content, even illiterate civilians can remember how to draw a few symbols with weak effects, but it is this little power that determines that this world is completely different from the hometown that Gao Wen is familiar with. place.
It's like the one degree Celsius difference when water boils.
With those three runes, this "traditional furnace" only needs to use firewood as fuel, and it can smelt molten iron without the help of blowers and without optimizing the structure of the combustion chamber.
If the rune of the fire element is carved on a piece of mithril, this stove can even use straw as fuel!
However, it is precisely because of the existence of these ancient runes that humans in this world have not considered how to improve the efficiency of the furnace from the perspective of improving fuel combustion efficiency—they are only improving the materials used to write runes. And the format of the rune itself.
So Gao Wen didn't build any clay blast furnace, but first came to observe this primitive and backward traditional furnace.
The old blacksmith Hammer looked at the great noble in front of him more and more nervously. He didn't know what the purpose of the other party asking a question and then researching the stove again, and he didn't know if he had done something wrong. He only knew that the nobleman He is powerful and moody—although the lord, Miss Rebecca, and the previous lords are all benevolent and generous, but this one in front of him is the legendary pioneer hero, a complete warrior, and a duke, What would be the character of such a great nobleman
And just when the old blacksmith was feeling uneasy, Gao Wen finally straightened up and asked him the second question: "How much iron can you smelt in such a furnace every day under the condition that the supply of ore is sufficient? "
Hamilton breathed a sigh of relief: finally asked a normal question.
"If you use the ore over there, you can smelt fifty catties of iron every day." The old blacksmith said with some pride.
However, Gao Wen couldn't help frowning when he heard this answer: "So few?"
With the help of those runes, is the output so much
"That's not enough?" Hammer couldn't help but said something, and then he made up for it nervously, "I'm not questioning your judgment, sir, but..."
"It's okay, don't be nervous talking to me," Gao Wen comforted the old master, "I'm the lord who protects you, not a robber who comes to kill you."
"Yes... yes, sir," Hammer wiped his sweat nervously, and then explained, "But this is really the limit. The stove looks big from the outside, but the space inside is actually limited, and every time you finish the exercise After one furnace, you have to rest for an hour to let the runes on the outside of the furnace cool down. In this way, you must also cool down the furnace, and then re-ignite the fire... After such a back and forth, it is really the limit to be able to smelt fifty pounds of iron every day It's gone!"
"Let the runes cool down?" Gawain frowned.
"Yes," Hammer explained, "this is just a trick carved on black stones by our common people. It is incomparable with the real magic runes of those mages. It is easy to break, especially the fire runes. The element will crack after a long time of contact, even if it is replaced with a stronger material. Once the rune is cracked, the entire furnace will be useless, so it is absolutely impossible to burn continuously when making iron... "
"What if we make the stove bigger?" Gawain asked again.
"That can't be helped," Hammer said worriedly, thinking why the Duke asked such a difficult question, "The runes can only provide so much firepower, and if the furnace gets bigger, the firepower will not be enough, and the ore will not be smelted." Molten iron, and the earth rune will also lose its effect, and there will be more impurities in the refined iron ingot, which will be completely unusable... "
Gawain pinched his chin: "So it's all because of these runes that restrict production?"
The old blacksmith blinked. In fact, he didn't quite understand the meaning of restricting output, but he nodded quickly: "Yes, yes, it's the rune."
Gawain looked at Rebecca: "Do you think if the runes are replaced with... um, why not call Heidi over..."
Rebecca blushed immediately: "My lord ancestor, I also understand magic theory! It's just that I can't build a spell model..."
"Theoretical knowledge is not bad?" Gao Wen raised his eyebrows, "Then how do you think to solve this problem?"
Rebecca thought about it hard: "Since you just said that the rune is a shortcoming, then replace the rune?"
"Replace it with what?"
Rebecca continued to use her brain: "Actually, the functions of these runes are very simple. They are nothing more than raising temperature, controlling air flow, controlling impurities, etc., and they are of the type with extremely weak effects. If you use real magic circles instead , the efficiency can be increased many times—and the magic circle can channel energy by itself, and it won't self-destruct even if it runs continuously... "
Gao Wen raised his eyebrows: "Carve a set of magic circles on each iron furnace?"
"But it's not actually possible," Rebecca stuck out her tongue. "Aunt Hetty and I can help carve a few magic circles, but... blacksmiths and blacksmith apprentices can't use them!"