"Your Excellency, please light the fire!" Tang Muyao handed Liu Cheng a steel chisel with a steel chisel soaked in clear oil hay wrapped at the top, with a flattering smile on his face.

Liu Cheng took the steel drill, but gave it to Min Min as soon as he changed his hand, and said with a smile: "Let's let you come!" Min Min glanced at Liu Cheng, her eyes were full of sweetness, she took the steel drill, Tang Muyao hurriedly and carefully lit the hay at the front end, and poked it into the furnace from the vent, the dry shavings in the furnace cavity immediately burned, and soon the shavings ignited the stacked dry firewood, and then the higher temperature generated by the burning of the dry firewood ignited the coke pasted on the inner wall of the furnace, and a black smoke rose from the mouth of the top of the blast furnace.

There was a commotion from the people around the blast furnace, and the civil officials and gentry who were usually pampered began to retreat, Liu Cheng explained to Chesang and Min Min with a smile: "This is dry firewood lit, don't panic!" Then he turned to Tang Muyao on the side and said, "You ask people to bring some matza and tea, so that everyone can sit down and rest!" “

Tang Muyao answered, and someone brought Mazha and tea soon, and the three of them sat down separately. Chesan had something on his mind, and he drank tea with his head down, and did not speak. It was Liu Cheng who said some flattering words, which made Min Minjiao laugh. The other onlookers slowly got bored, and they all found an excuse to leave, and after about a meal, in addition to the staff, there were only Liu Cheng, Qiesang, and Minmin left by the blast furnace. At this time, the smoke from the furnace mouth gradually turned white, which indicated that the dry wood in the furnace had almost burned, and according to the steps explained in advance, Tang Muyao ordered the huge hydraulic windmill to turn and start to deliver fresh air to the furnace. With the push of the water, the huge blades begin to rotate from slow to fast, sending a large amount of air into the furnace cavity, making a huge humming sound.

"What is this doing?" Chessan almost jumped up from his mazar, having thought that the huge blade next to him was just an ornament. Although he was more than thirty paces away, the strong wind still made his face ache.

"Bellows!" Liu Cheng smiled and said, "Master, don't you have bellows for iron smelting there?" This is the bellows. “

"Bellows?" Chesan couldn't connect the bellows pulled by a dozen or so people in his memory with the behemoth in front of him, I'm afraid that the gods and Buddhas in the sky would use such a big thing to blow the wind. He thought with some horror.

At this time, there was a sharp whistle, and Chesang saw Tang Muyao blowing the whistle vigorously. While shouting loudly: "Out of the ashes, out of the ashes!" Get out of the way, otherwise don't complain if it's hot! When he saw that no one was standing near the slag outlet at the bottom of the furnace, he blew two long and one short whistles vigorously, and several men with steel drills ran over and began to stir the bottom of the furnace with steel drills, and as they stirred, the violent air currents sprayed out with countless sparks and flew in the air. Splashing around, Chessan startled. After a long while, the ashes were almost exhausted, and Tang Muyao ordered his subordinates to reseal the slag mouth, and the blower began to blow with all its strength again.

As the blower feeds more and more fresh air into the furnace chamber, the temperature inside also begins to rise, which is manifested by the fact that the flame is getting lighter and closer to white. Chesan didn't understand the relationship between the color of the flame and the temperature. But he could still feel the temperature in the furnace chamber rising from the increasingly intense heat radiation. He saw Tang Muyao standing next to the blast furnace, observing the temperature inside. From time to time, workers were ordered to add some black objects to the furnace through a conveyor belt - Chessan did not know that they were coke. Under the scorching heat and boring torture, Chesan couldn't bear it anymore, but he didn't need to speak himself, he heard Min Min Jiao sneer, "When will the iron be produced?" ”

"Taplastic?" Liu Cheng said with a smile: "It's still early, the temperature in the furnace has not yet arrived, and the ore will be fed only when the temperature is reached." ”

"How long is it going to take?" Min Min had a look of embarrassment on her face. Liu Cheng hurriedly smiled and said, "Why don't you go back and rest first, use some tea, and then I'll send someone to inform you when the iron is ready?" “

"It's good!" Min Min nodded. Liu Cheng turned to Chesang and said with a smile: "Master, why don't you go down to rest as well?" “

"It's okay!" Chessan shook his head. Of course, he was afraid of the heat, but he was even more afraid of missing some key links, so he held back the boredom in his chest and said with a smile: "Poor monks practice penance in the cave on weekdays, even if they don't eat or speak for a few days, it's not uncommon, not to mention the scorching heat?" “

"That's fine!" Liu Cheng smiled slightly, he had already seen the other party's intentions, but he didn't care, after all, the accumulation of knowledge and technology required in this blast furnace ironmaking is too much, not to mention anything else, just the blower and the heat cycle are the result of thousands of years of accumulation in ancient civilizations, if a lama who recites scriptures and reiterates Buddha on weekdays can learn it by sitting on the side and looking at it, then how many blacksmiths from ancient times to the present simply find a piece of tofu to kill themselves.

In the blink of an eye, it was already evening, and someone brought food for the two of them to use, and Chesang already regretted it a little, and was thinking about whether to find a reason to go back. Tang Muyao ran in front of Liu Cheng: "My lord, the temperature is enough, you can feed it!" ”

"Well, that's good, just according to the pre-set, put a small amount of material first!"

"Yes, sir!" Tang Muyao answered, turned around and ran to the blast furnace, Che Sang was already itching to watch from the side, so he smiled cheekily at Liu Cheng: "Lord Liu, I want to take a closer look, I don't know if it's okay?" “

"What's the matter?" Liu Cheng stood up with a smile: "If the master is not afraid of the heat, just come closer!" “

Chesang got Liu Cheng's permission, hurriedly trotted to the blast furnace, and saw that Tang Muyao was ordering the workers to transport the black coarse sand in the cart to the furnace mouth and pour it into the furnace cavity, so he asked a little strangely: "Are these the ore?" How is it different from what I've seen in Tibet? “

Tang Muyao turned around in surprise, he saw Liu Cheng behind him nodding slightly, and then replied: "Master, these ores have been crushed with a mill and sifted again, so that there is more iron and better iron!" “

Che Sang nodded suspiciously, and soon the first batch of ore was put in, and he and Liu Cheng returned to the original place, time passed quickly, and when it arrived, the first furnace of molten iron rushed out of the tap hole, rushed into the trench made of sand and gravel, and covered with yellow sand, and flowed into the mold made of pig iron. The hot molten iron came into contact with the icy air, making a high-pitched snort. As the molten iron ran out, the workers shouted a trumpet to reseal the taphole. The coke and new iron are then re-added into the furnace chamber to start the production of the next furnace iron.

"How's this iron?" Liu Cheng walked to Tang Muyao's side, he was really excited to hit a pig iron ingot that had not been completely cooled with a small iron hammer, and as the temperature dropped rapidly, the iron ingot changed from dark red to blue-black. Tang Muyao listened attentively to the sound of iron ingots, and finally raised his head excitedly. He cocked his thumb and said, "The best fine iron will definitely be able to make a good weapon." ”

"And how much iron is out of this furnace?" Liu Cheng asked.

Tang Muyao's gaze swept over the surrounding iron ingots, and he made a rough estimate: "There are always ten stones!" “

"Okay, I'll go back first, and I'll take care of you here, and change people every four hours, and iron every hour. Also, I had five sheep killed, and it was outside. Eat when you're hungry! It's just that you have to work harder, you have to keep a little more eyes on it at the beginning, bring out two capable ones earlier, and you will be more relaxed a day earlier! Also, you have two people send this ingot to the ordnance workshop, and I want to see how the iron is. ”

"Thank you, sir!" Tang Muyao hurriedly bowed down and thanked him. Liu Cheng nodded, then pulled Chesang and turned to leave, and soon the cheers of everyone came from behind the two. Compared with Liu Cheng's ambition. Chessan looked a little depressed, and it was obvious that the molten iron that had just flowed out had dealt him a considerable blow. There are ten stones of pig iron in one furnace. Every hour is a furnace, and at the end of that day, isn't there a hundred and twenty stone of pig iron? Even if it can't be rotated continuously, there are seventy or eighty stone pig iron. If he hadn't seen it with his own eyes, Chesang would have believed that the iron tower in front of him, called the blast furnace, could produce more iron than the whole of Tibet.

In this way, Chesan followed Liu Cheng almost like a zombie to the door of another huge house. If he had not been in a special state of desolation, he would have discovered the peculiarity of this room - the span of the room was five zhang, and there was not a single pillar to support it except for the walls on either side, a phenomenon that was common in modern architecture but extremely rare in ancient times - the tensile strength of wood and stone, the two materials commonly used in ancient construction, was insufficient, so except for buildings such as churches, temples, and palaces, which did not cost anything. It is rare to see this kind of long-span, pillar-free style in ordinary buildings. To do this, red brick walls were used on both sides, iron frames were used on the roofs for support, and then light wood chips and oiled paper were laid - ancient rudimentary versions of modern I-beams and asbestos tiles. Liu Cheng's reason for adopting this style is very simple - there are a lot of machinery, materials, and tracks for carrying materials and vehicles in the factory, which all need enough space, and if it were not for the coming winter, Liu Cheng almost planned to build a thatched hut to work in the open air.

Bang Bang Bang!

The sound of the steel crashing woke Chesan from that state, and he instinctively reached out to cover his ears, and then he saw Liu Cheng's face with a mocking smile, so he subconsciously put his hand down again.

"Master, this workshop is a sloppy place, it can't compare to your monk's room, please forgive me!" In order to let the other party hear his voice, Liu Cheng raised his voice, he stretched out his right hand and made a gesture of invitation. Che Sang followed Liu Cheng into the door of the factory with a little dazed. As far as the eye could see, there were jet-black steel machines everywhere, and the air was filled with a loud roar and the sound of metal crashing, and the air was filled with a pungent and strong smell.

Chesang hesitated, he was suspicious that the place he had entered was the territory depicted in the Buddhist scriptures, and the superstition of the religious and the greed and curiosity of the politicians fought a fierce battle against him, and in the end the latter was victorious, and he followed Liu Cheng's footsteps. On both sides of the road, Chessan saw workers working with unknown machinery, the hard steel taking shape like dough under the blow of a huge hammer, the reddish parts being quenched in an unknown black liquid, noise and sparks everywhere, all the workers were dressed tightly, their faces were covered with towels, and only their eyes were exposed. For a moment, Chesang almost thought that these were not people, but the rakshasas depicted in the Buddhist scriptures.

Chesan had left the workshop almost as he had fled, and had just gone out and sat on the floor, his eardrums still buzzing after a while, the pungent smell still lingering on the tip of his nose, and his underwear was soaked with sweat. It took him a while before he came to his senses.

"Master, this is the forging workshop, and the firearms to be seen are still behind, do you want to continue watching or take a rest for a while?" Liu Cheng took a glass of water from Du Gu's hand and handed it to Chesang, who looked much better than Chesang. After all, he grew up in a steel mill and made a living on the construction site, and he is more familiar with and accustomed to these.

Chesan took two sips of water and shook his head. Liu Cheng smiled: "It's too noisy here, why don't you come and see it tomorrow." “

"No!" Chesang shook his head: "Lord Liu, I don't want to watch it. “

"Why is that?" Liu Cheng showed a look of surprise on his face, after all, this Chesang Lama paid such a big price, but he didn't look at it, couldn't it be that something went wrong?

A wry smile appeared on Qiesan's face: "Don't hide it from Lord Liu, the poor monk asked to visit the workshop earlier to see how the bird gun was made, and whether it could also be copied one or two. But look at it. The poor monk already knew that I couldn't make a decision, so why bother looking at it again? Speaking of this, Qiesang bowed respectfully to Liu Cheng, and said in a deep voice: "However, the poor monk still has one thing to ask for, and he also asks Lord Liu to agree." “

"Something to ask for? I don't know what it is? ”

"The Qing allowed the poor monks, like Batur Khan, to buy firearms from you."

"Wait, aren't you a subordinate of Batur Khan? Why are you asking me to buy firearms again? Liu Cheng was already a little confused when he heard this, in his opinion, Lama Chesang was just a courtier of Batur Khan, since he had already agreed to Batur Khan's sale of firearms, why did he make the same request? Is this guy trying to rebel? But he also saw his intimate relationship with Min Min, and it was too stupid to buy firearms from his future son-in-law to make his father-in-law rebel, right?

Seeing this, Chesang hurriedly clarified his origins, the relationship between the Gelug faction and the Karma Kagyu sect in Tibetan Buddhism, the contradiction between the Gelug sect and the Zangba Khan, and the contradictions in the beliefs of various tribes on the steppe. He hesitated for a moment: "This matter is very important, and I need to think about it carefully." (To be continued.) )