Shi Wangfu didn't have the heart to listen to this, his hand with the hammer was already blistering with blood, and when he helped the hammer, he glanced at it, and his heart trembled.

In the first few days, Shi Wangfu had not lived in the iron shop, and when he came home at night, he walked to the door, although his mother's eyes could not see, but his ears were very sensitive, and he could hear a small sound. Now that she knew that the child had returned, she put down her cooking work for the time being, walked over, and met him: Wangfu. Wangfu stood in front of her: I'm here.

He was not at home all day, and his mother felt sorry for him, so she raised her hand and touched it, almost every day, from top to bottom, and touched it roughly all over his body, and finally held his hand and asked this and that.

At this moment, his mother touched his right hand, and Wangfu suddenly screamed in pain and pulled his hand out of his mother's palm. Mother asked: What's wrong? Child. Wangfu said: The iron hammer grinds the blood blisters.

Mother asked: I just touched your slap unevenly, and it doesn't feel right. But child, this is a process, slowly the palms of the hands are calloused, and there will be no blood blisters.

Mom, I don't want to do it anymore, it's too bitter. Wangfu whispered.

When his father, who was making a fire by the fire, heard this, he cut the fire, turned around, and shouted with his eyes full of gloom: "Wangfu, don't be too unsuccessful, you can't eat any bitterness." What is the matter if you have a blood blister on your hand, you can still succeed if you are afraid of hardship when you learn the craft?

The mother said in a soft tone: "Son, your father is right, don't be afraid of hardship, only those who can endure hardship will be successful." Your dad and I are counting on you to be a productive person.

Wangfu didn't want to do the errand of striking iron, but how dare he disobey his father's persuasion? Early the next morning, I had to rush to the blacksmith shop with a bitter face.

Blacksmith Liu Wu is a lonely old man, married in the early years, but never had a wedding, a woman who looks like a half-sister-in-law came from a neighboring county, the neighboring county was flooded, the woman fled from the famine, was introduced, and Liu Wu met, the same night was rounded, Liu Wu was happy for a night, enough to be a man, but the next day, the woman said goodbye.

Liu Wu began to feel uncomfortable, sullen, and after a while, he got better, he forgot about the woman, and he also understood the woman, the reason why she left was because you Liu Wu was too poor, and the family was surrounded by walls, so he couldn't keep her.

This matter, Wang Fu also knew that it was said by Shi Wen sitting by the fire at his house on that cold winter day, he was silent at the time, but he heard it clearly, but he had not seen Liu Wu.

At this time, as before, he helped the master to build the stove, the stove burned wet coal, non-flammable, and was lit with a blazing firewood, and a puff of choking white smoke made Wangfu, who was immersed in the fire, cough a few times from time to time. It was a long time coming, the fire was burning, and the smoke was less, but the room was filled with the smell of coal, and it still smelled a little.

Liu Wu put the iron into the furnace and burned it, and it would take a little time to burn red, so he said to Wangfu, who was sitting opposite the stove, and said: You stop what you are doing, and I will come. Saying that, Liu Wu handed him a small hammer: You can't do it well, you have to refine the hammer more.

Wangfu picked up the handle of the hammer, the blood blisters on the palm of his hand that had been beaten yesterday were not good, some were bulging, there was no broken skin, some were broken, and a puddle of water flowed out. Wangfu blinked his eyes, did not speak, and picked up the small hammer, holding a piece of scrap iron with a pair of fire scissors, and struck it on the anvil again and again to practice his hand strength.

Liu Wu let a piece of pig iron burn red in the hearth, only to call Wangfu to stop, he used fire scissors to hold the red-hot iron on the anvil and hammered alone, seeing Wangfu sweating on his forehead, did not ask him to help, Wangfu was about to help, has picked up the small hammer, Liu Wu said you rest for a while.

Wangfu sat on the side and pulled the stove, still panting in his nostrils. Although he did not help the hammer, his eyes looked at the iron that the master had forged on the anvil from time to time, and after several rounds of furnace and forging, the master used a pair of long-handled iron tongs to twist left and right when the iron was hot and red, and slowly took shape into a hoe.

Then, with the hoe that had just taken shape and had not yet subsided, he approached a pool of water in front of him, put it in, and a layer of white foam hissed and bubbled out. Let it soak in the sink for about a few minutes, and then the master will take it out again and throw it on the finished product.

When he saw Wangfu staring, he picked up the towel around his neck to wipe his sweat and said: This is called quenching. Wangfu didn't understand much, so he asked him: If you don't quench, can this hoe be used?

It can be used in pour, but it doesn't take two hits, especially if it hits a hard object, it will crack, that is, it is not durable and will break quickly. The master also used quenching as an analogy, saying that if a person wants to make a tool, the process of "quenching" is indispensable. Quenching is to heat to cold, if the heat is a superior environment, cold is a bad environment, a person must be able to calm down in the superior environment, but also to withstand the test of the harsh environment, otherwise it will not be able to become a tool.

Wangfu felt uncomfortable when he heard this, as if the master was criticizing him for learning to strike iron, and he couldn't withstand the painful tempering of blood blisters on his hands.

At noon, a teenager came from outside, approaching the iron shop, he suddenly called out to Wangfu who was buried in the furnace sideways, Wangfu turned his neck and recognized a familiar face, he was Qin Yue, a classmate who had been in the same class as Wangfu.

Qin Yue asked: Why don't you study? Wangfu dropped out of school because he was tired of school, of course, it was not easy to answer, and he made a slight "um" with his nose, and was about to say something. Liu Wu wiped the sweat from his forehead and asked Qin Yue: Little friend, is there something wrong?

Something. Qin Yue took out the banknote from his clothes: My dad asked me to buy a hoe, how much money?

Liu Wu said 5 yuan a handful, pointed to a few quenched hoes put together and asked him to come and choose, Qin Yue walked over, squatted down, picked for a while, made a ping pong sound, but couldn't make up his mind, which hoe to choose?

The child thinks that Wangfu is learning to strike iron, more than his own expert, so he asked him to help choose, Wangfu glanced at the master, saw that he was silent, and then suspended the work of pulling the furnace, in fact, he didn't know whether it was good or bad, and wanted the master to help pick it, but he had concerns: what should I do if the poor one can't be sold? He had no choice but to pick up a piece of hoe iron casually, pretend to understand very well and say: This piece is good.

He didn't say the good reason, Qin Yue didn't ask, but he was superstitious, so he took the hoe iron, and felt that it was good, so he threw away the piece he was touching, stood up and took out 5 yuan from his clothes and handed it to Wangfu, and Wangfu handed it to the master.

The master watched them choose hoes among the finished hoes, and secretly laughed, he made them himself, and he knew it in his heart, and the quality was comparable, otherwise, how could it be sold out? If there is really a defective product, it has to be returned to the furnace.

The master was hammering the iron, and the cutting board was shaken. Qin Yue didn't leave with the hoe, but approached Wangfu and whispered, and Wangfu asked the master to say: This classmate asked me to come back immediately if I had something to do outside the shop.

Liu Wu said "um", and Wangfu and Qin Yue walked out of the iron shop, and in front of the iron shop was a village road, which was dotted with villages dotted on the vast field.