"Mr. Fern, do you need help? I mean...... I know something about mechanical maintenance?" exclaimed Xia Zuo.

"You?" Fern looked at Xia Zuo with suspicious eyes, paused and said, "Come here, multiple helpers are fine!"

Fern took Shazo aboard the Liberty Sailor and headed straight for the steam power room on the ground floor.

In addition to the middle-aged man who had just called Fern to take a look, there was also a half-old child of about thirteen or fourteen years old, whose face was full of oil stains, and he should be an apprentice on this ship.

"This is Aiden, Jimmy!" Fern briefly introduced the two of them, and then said to the mechanic Aiden, "This is Uta, by the way, how did you get on that island?"

"Because of the shipwreck, I was going to take a passenger ship to France, but there was a storm nearby, just half a month ago, when I fell into the water, I woke up on that island, and I had some food on me, otherwise I would have starved to death!" Xia Zuo explained, and he had already thought of a reason.

"Hmm...... How's it going?" said Fern without asking, looking at Aiden again.

Aiden crouched in front of the massive steam engine, the lid had been removed, and the floor was littered with parts and spare parts, all looking dirty.

Aiden's hands were full of oil, and he knocked on the steam engine again with a wrench, and sighed when he turned around and sighed: "The third time, I checked the core power and replaced the lead shaft, but it still didn't work, as long as it started, the outlet valve would catch fire." ”

"Can't fix it?" Fern looked ugly.

"Nor is it, if you allow me to tear down the entire engine. I'm sure I'll be able to figure out the problem and fix it!"

"How long will it take to tear them all down?" asked Fern.

"Probably...... If you take it all apart, find out the problem, and put it back together, maybe a month?" Aiden replied.

The steam engine used in the ship is very huge, with more than 20,000 parts, in fact, Aiden's maintenance skills are good, at least he can disassemble the engine and put it back in confidence.

"Oh God, are you kidding me? We're still twenty days away from our delivery time, and the ship will only have a month of clean water. It took you a month to fix it. We're all going to die at sea, damn it, I've raised you for nothing, shit!damn it!" Fern suddenly became irritable. Scolded Aiden for a bloody head.

"Sir. Please be respectful. Aiden finally couldn't take it anymore. It may be because there are outsiders, which makes him feel embarrassed and stands up with a pout. He shouted to Fern, holding a wrench.

"Dog offal, it's against you!" Fern immediately blew up, grabbed Aiden's collar with both hands, and yelled at Aiden, "Tell me, who is the captain, tell me??" As he spoke, he shoved Aiden twice, swaying the glasses on Aiden's face.

"Fern, I think you'd better let me go, we can have a good talk!" Aiden suddenly weakened, but his tone was still tough.

"Mr. Fern, Mr. Aiden, don't ...... like that," little Jimmy cried out, looking panicked.

Fern's eyes widened and glared at Aiden, the beard on his angry face jumped and jumped, seeing Aiden's eyes dodging, he gave in and was afraid, snorted coldly, and pushed Aiden away.

Aiden stumbled and fell to the ground, rubbed his oily hands on his face, stood up without saying a word, and suddenly noticed that Xia Zuo walked to the inside of the steam power room, standing at the tail of the huge steam engine, because the tail of the engine blocked most of Xia Zuo's body, so he couldn't see what Xia Zuo was messing with.

"Oh, who, damn it, don't move!" Aiden yelled in a bit of frustration.

"Oh, no, just look!" Natsuzo flashed his body out of it and raised his hands.

"What are you doing, don't make trouble!" Captain Fern also looked at Xia Zuo with an unkind face and said.

"Just look at it, the steam engine of the Galleon III ship, it looks like it has been hit by seawater, I have only seen it in books before, and it is the first time I have seen the real thing. Xia Zuo looked harmless and walked out from behind.

"You'd better not touch it, you can't afford to pay for it!" Aiden yelled again, he was already bored, the engine was not repaired well, the boss kept scolding, and more importantly, if the engine was not working, it would be difficult for the ship to sail out of the whirlpool sea quickly after hitting the road, and if it encountered a storm, it would be completely hopeless.

"I'm sorry!" Natsuzo shrugged and apologized.

"Didn't you just say that you understand mechanical maintenance, do you see the problem?" Fern asked, he just asked casually, Xia Zuo seems to be just a young man, even if he knows how to repair, his skills can't be high, the main thing is that he expects Xia Zuo to have some different ideas.

"Hmm...... I think there's something wrong with the three-stage air duct at the rear of the engine!" said Xia Zuo.

When he entered the steam power room just now, he smelled a burst of scorched breath for the first time, and it can be judged by the smell that the rubber gasket of the outlet valve should be burned off by high temperature, generally in this case, it is caused by the three-stage steam engine air duct entering the dirty things, because the dirty things are accumulated, and they are close to the return air chamber, resulting in an increase in temperature at the same place, erupting flames, and burning the gas outlet valve rubber pad.

"Tertiary trachea?" Fern asked, and he looked back at Aiden.

Aiden's face changed, as a mature technician, after Xia Zuo's words, he immediately thought of that possibility.

At that time, the Liberty Mariner had been shattered when it ran aground, and the steam engine was flooded with water, and although the water inside had already been drained, it was likely that some dirt was left behind.

Without saying anything, Aiden lifted the wrench, hurriedly ran to the rear of the engine, crouched down and quickly disassembled.

Fern glanced at Xia Zuo, frowned suspiciously, and walked behind Aiden to watch.

Soon, Aiden removed the tail baffle of the steam engine, removed some messy parts, and finally saw rows of finger-thick air ducts, with the third stage of the air duct at the bottom, a total of ten. Three or four of them had changed color, looking as if they had been baked by flames, and there was a hint of blue in the jet black.

Aiden's face was pleased, and he reached out to touch the metal pipes.

"Don't touch it, it's hot!" Xia Zuo tilted his head to the side and reminded.

But it seemed to be too late, Aiden didn't react, and had already touched it.

"Oh shit!" he jumped to his feet, clutching his left hand and scolding.

Xia Zuo saw Fern looking at him again, and couldn't help but shrug his shoulders again. He has already reminded.

Little Jimmy, who was standing a little farther away, immediately ran away. Carrying a worn-out bag, he quickly ran back and squatted directly beside Aiden, digging out the scald potion and gauze from the bag.

The steam engine runs on steam, while running. The temperature of the whole machine is very high. So scalds are common for mechanics repairing steam engines. The burn potion is also a must, and originally, Aiden should have worn gloves. But he was just in a hurry, apparently forgetting.

"Mr. Aiden!" little Jimmy handed the potion.

Aiden let go of the right hand he was holding, and shook the scalded left hand again, only then did he stop and look, it was a serious burn, his three fingers had been rapidly blistering, the blister was elongated, from the fingers to the palm, he was obviously too anxious just now.

Little Jimmy helped Aiden quickly apply the potion and bandage, and Aiden's left hand was wrapped in a dumpling.

It's over, he's scrapped for the time being, he needs to recuperate for at least a day, and he can only use it with his left hand, and he can't fix the steam engine with his right hand alone.

"Boss......" Aiden shook his left hand and looked at the steam engine again, his face was very depressed, as if he didn't know what to say.

"Mr. Fern, maybe I can help?" said Xia Zuo, who was standing on the side.

Fern glared at Aiden, then looked at Xia Zuo, and said with a serious expression, "Can you fix it?"

"It should be possible, you can let me try, this engine is already like this, I can't fix it, and you have nothing to lose. Xia Zuo said.

"Well, well, let's try!" said Fern as he tilted his head, not much joy in his tone, but a bit of a dead horse being a live horse doctor.

"What a gentleman!"

Xia Zuo put the burden he had been carrying in the corner, brought gloves and put them on, and then carried the toolbox to the back of the engine and began to work quickly.

His movements are very skillful, not at all like a new hand, remove the air duct, he shook it, heard the sound of the sand and stones shaking inside, and directly threw away the old air duct, Xia Zuo replaced the steam engine with a new air duct, and then quickly installed the tail of the steam engine.

Xia Zuo came to the front of the engine again, scratched his head as he looked at the parts all over the ground, squatted down and began to assemble.

Xia Zuo's movements were fast, but it also took a full half an hour to install the front end of the engine.

"It's okay, let's try it!" Xia Zuo said, getting up.

Captain Fern was already out of the house, and he still needed to keep an eye on what was going on outside, and only Aiden and little Jimmy were in the steam power room at this time.

Aiden stood aside with a straight face, not moving, from the time Xia Zuo started to repair this engine, he felt that Xia Zuo had robbed his business, and his mood was very wrong.

Little Jimmy didn't think so much, and when he saw Xia Zuo speak, he hurriedly ran to the control room on the side and opened the engine valve.

Boom!

Steam was injected, and the engine was running, but there was an unusual noise.

"Turn it off, turn it off!" Xia Zuo shouted back, and little Jimmy immediately screwed the engine valve back.

Xia Zuo touched his chin with one hand, looked at the steam engine and fell into deep thought, there are many problems, not only the problem of the air duct before, although the engine can run now, but it will definitely not last long, if the problem is not clarified and repaired, the engine is likely to be completely burned out after a certain period of operation.

More extremely, there could be an explosion, and then the entire ship would be destroyed because of the explosion, and Xia Zuo definitely couldn't let that happen.

After thinking about it for a long time, Xia Zuo squatted down again and picked up the wrench......

At noon, the sky was dark, the clouds were gathering, the wind was getting stronger, it was already raining lightly, and a storm was coming.

"Tie things up, quick, let's get back to the boat first, and wait for the storm to pass!" cried Captain Fern from the beach.

There were thirty sailors busy on the beach, and at this time, they carried everything under the bow of the ship in the light rain and tied it with ropes, as Fern had commanded.

The ship was stranded on the beach, although part of it was still in the water, but the whole ship had been fixed, surrounded by arm-thick ropes, which tightened the boat on the shore, and the other end of the rope was buried in the sand, so it was impossible to blow the ship into the sea when the storm came, after all, it was a big guy weighing hundreds of tons, and it had been stranded, so it was not so easy to be blown away.

"Boss, come and see, that kid has dismantled the whole engine, and if you don't care about the engine, it'll be completely ruined!" Aiden appeared at the bow of the ship, shouting at Fern.

"What?" Fern was furious, "Damn it, I killed him!"

When Fern arrived at the steam power room, he found that things were not as exaggerated as Aiden had said, but Xia Zuo had indeed taken the steam engine apart a lot, and there were seven or eight places in total, and there were all parts underneath.

"Damn, what are you doing?" Fern angrily walked towards Xia Zuo, reaching out to grab Xia Zuo.

"Hey, Mr. Fern, what are you doing?" Xia Zuo jumped away all of a sudden, rubbing his oily hands on his face, and said in a daze: "I'm repairing the engine, how can I get on the road if I don't fix it?"

"Isn't this called repair? Didn't it already be repaired just now? This engine is worth 8,000 gold coins, and you dismantle Lao Tzu like this......"

"No, Fern, now, I tried it just now, it's not just the problem of the airpipe, there are many problems, if you don't fix it and force the engine to run, it will explode!" Xia Zuo said, a little alarmist, the explosion is only one of the possibilities, and it is the least likely.

"Explosion?" Fern's face changed, and he glanced back at Aiden, who had complained, Aiden hadn't said this before, and looked at Xia Zuo again, and Fern suppressed his anger and said in a deep voice: "Are you repairing well?"

"Of course!"

"How many days?"

"Two days!"

"Okay, fix the engine in two days, Lao Tzu will give you a hundred gold coins, if you can't fix it, don't blame Lao Tzu for throwing you into the sea to feed the sharks!" Fern said.

"Sir, don't worry, if I can't fix it, I'll jump into the sea and feed the sharks." Xia Zuo made an OK gesture to Fern, reassuring Fern.

Fern angrily walked away, leaving little Jimmy, who was a little overwhelmed by the words "feed the sharks", and Aiden, who had an ugly face.

The reason why his face was ugly was because of the hundred gold coins, a hundred gold coins! He was only eight gold coins a month on this ship, which was a very high salary, and a hundred gold coins was equivalent to his income for two years.

Xia Zuo's maintenance skills are better than him, he has just seen it on the side, if Xia Zuo really repairs the engine in two days, with Verne's temper, a hundred gold coins will definitely be given, and Xia Zuo will be treated as a guest, this money ...... This treatment ...... Imagine that Aiden's heart was gloomy, it should be his, he was the maintenance technician on the ship.

"You're all out of here!" Xia Zuo said very politely, already feeling that Aiden was the ghost, otherwise Fern would not have come back angrily.

"What did you say?" Aiden suddenly jumped up, his fingers propped up his glasses, and glared at Xia Zuo: "I'm the maintenance engineer on the ship, who do you let out?"

"It's okay if you don't go out, I didn't fix the engine in two days, can you jump into the sea with me? If you don't dare, don't get in the way here, I'll do it alone!" Xia Zuo replied, giving Aiden a defiant look.

"You...... Hello!I'll see how you'll die in two days!" The skin of his face was torn, and Aiden had no scruples about speaking, his fingers tapped Xia Zuo a few times, snorted heavily, and walked out. (To be continued......)