Chapter 3: Forging Swords

  After dinner, the three came to the forging room. Old blacksmith Yang quickly heated a metal bar over a meter long and put it on the anvil, swinging a large hammer to strike it violently. At this time, sparks flew everywhere, and debris flew around. Lei Meng and others stood by and saw this scene, silent, and the technological level here was indeed low. Lei Meng shouted loudly: "Old man, stop for a moment."

  Yang Pu wiped the sweat from his brow and stopped hammering, asking: "What's wrong, Lei Ming? Your sword is almost done."

  "Old man, do you have any better materials here?"

  "It's nothing, what's wrong? The iron used here is the material I made for the villagers to forge hoes later, which is much better than before."

  "Well, is there a higher temperature that can be used to burn off some of the waste on the sword?"

  "Huh? Really?" The old blacksmith was skeptical, and then he put the metal material on the charcoal fire again, squatting down to fan the flames vigorously.

  The two of them saw it and slapped their forehead, speechless.

  "Old man, you can change the way you fan the wind, so that the fire is bigger. If you change to coal and burn it, the firepower will be even better."

  Yang Tian continued to gesture by the stove, roughly describing the shape of the bellows. Yang Fu was taken aback for a moment, but after thinking about it, he felt that it seemed reasonable, so he stopped forging.

  Yang Fu's efficiency was high, and he got to work right away. That afternoon, he found wood and cowhide to make the bellows. Just as he was about to forge the sword while the iron was still hot, two little kids next to him started rumbling with hunger, suppressing his enthusiasm.

  After dinner, the sky had darkened, and the scattered clouds could not cover the starry sky. Yang Fu couldn't help but feel a surge of excitement in his heart, and he ran to the forging room again to test the effect of the bellows. Lei Ming and others also ran over to join in the fun, to see if there were any other places that could be improved.

  Yang Fu stirred the bellows, making a loud noise, and the charcoal fire in the furnace grew stronger. The metal strip on top of the charcoal fire changed from dark red to bright red, and after a while, it became so red that it was dazzling. He immediately stopped the bellows. Lei Meng hurriedly said: "Don't stop, old man! Let's see what else can be burned."

  Yang Fu stroked his chin whiskers and chuckled: "If the iron rod is heated again, it will melt away. This fire is indeed impressive."

  "No, old master, it would be even better if it were burnt to ashes." Lei Meng continued.

  "Little Thunder, how did you know all this?" Yang Fu was surprised. If the bellows weren't really useful, he would have just smiled it off.

  "Heh heh, I heard it from people at home before." Lei Meng rubbed the back of his head.

  "Hmm, let's install the bellows on the alchemy furnace and re-refine all of these." Yang Fu thought for a moment before making this decision, after all, his previous attempts at refining had cost him a lot of mental effort, and these metals were different from the iron materials he had used before.

  Yang Tian also chimed in, saying: "I heard that adding some slaked lime from the outside house construction to burn together has a good effect."

  Yang Pu was speechless, and considering the martial arts skills of these two little guys, he also felt that everything made sense. Although he didn't know what level their martial arts had reached or how they compared to others, a family that could teach such good martial arts to children wasn't simple.

  。

  So I had no choice but to call it a day and suppress my enthusiasm to get through another night.

  The next morning, Yang Fu had an early breakfast and installed a large bellows on the alchemy furnace. He also borrowed some quicklime from the surrounding villagers and poured all the farming tools in the yard and the previously stored ore into the furnace, adding the quicklime to burn. It seems that Yang Fu is also a radical, with a new method, he actually tried it so boldly, without fear of accidentally destroying everything. Lei Ming and Yang Tian came over early to help, although they were small in stature, Yang Fu thought about not agreeing, but couldn't resist their high martial arts skills and great strength, and since Yang Fu alone was busy, he let the two add charcoal to the alchemy furnace. After Yang Fu pulled the bellows for a while, the ore and metal bars all melted away, and the hot liquid flowed along the flow channel at the bottom of the furnace into those five narrow molds over a meter long. By noon, they had actually finished refining all the ore, which would have taken a whole day before.

  Yang Pu panted heavily and wiped away his sweat, saying with satisfaction: "It's much faster than before, I don't know about the quality though."

  Yang Tian chuckled and said, "Old man, this must be better than before. You don't see who's saying this method. But don't try it first, I'm hungry." He patted his stomach which was growling with hunger.

  "Alright, alright. Let's go cook and eat now." Yang Fu laughed heartily.

  The thunder rumbled and patted the sweatless forehead, feeling a sense of wonder, this meridian has been opened, and it seems that I'm not so afraid of heat anymore, only a little fine sweat came out, and also followed behind to walk out.

  After lunch, Yang Fu came to the forging room again, heated the metal bar red, and after a while of clanging, he made a sword shape. After heating it in the furnace, he quenched it in water, and after a burst of white smoke, he pulled out a grayish-black sword with shallow hammer marks on its surface. Then, after a fierce grinding on the whetstone, he sharpened the edge of the sword, leaving a white blade. Yang Fu handed the sword to Lei Ming, saying: "Lei Ming, you have great strength, try it!" He looked at him with full expectation, because from the feeling of forging, these metals seemed to be tougher than before.

  Lei Meng's hand grasped the hilt of a short sword, about half a meter long and two fingers wide, and swung it casually, making a whooshing sound that felt pretty good. Lei Meng took a piece of tattered cloth and wiped the sword as he walked out.

  In the sunlight of the afternoon, the sword body was black and had nothing remarkable about it, except for a bit of grayish white on the blade that let people know it could still cut through pork. Lei Meng swept his eyes across the courtyard and saw only one pile of firewood placed in the corner of the wall. He walked over, picked out a piece of wood about half a meter long and as thick as an arm, stood it upright beside the firewood, and with a casual swing of the black sword, chopped into the wood, hearing only a "dang" sound, the sword chopping halfway through the wood, and with just a bit more force, pressed down, the wood splitting in two.

  Yang Fu and Yang Tian happened to see this scene, Yang Fu smiled comfortingly on the side, and Yang Tian exclaimed: "Wow, Leiming, your axe is so powerful, it even splits the wood!"

  Lei Meng ignored Yang Tian, swung the black sword again and struck it on the horizontal wooden log with a loud "slap". The sword got stuck in the wood. He stepped on the wood and pried the black sword upwards, dislodging it from the wood. Bringing the sword to his eyes for inspection, he thought it was fine - not a single notch had appeared, indicating that the alloy wasn't brittle. With some more refining techniques, this sword could be forged into something decent. For now, it would do. Lei Meng thought for a moment before turning to the two onlookers and saying: "Old man, this sword isn't bad. A bit of polishing and it'll look great."

  Yang Fu rubbed his chin and smiled: "As long as it can be used, let's go in and temper it again."

  Another burst of hot fire, the sun went down, and Yang Fu also forged a 60cm long black knife. Before he could test it, Yang Fu was busy with dinner again. Lei Ming and the two others were delighted to bring their knives and swords together to help - this was still their first time in contact with knives and swords, previously only seen on TV and movies.

  After eating a late dinner, Yang Fu lay down on his bed early and fell asleep happily.

  Lei Meng and Yang Tian, still undiminished in enthusiasm, began to dance with their swords under the starry night sky, familiarizing themselves with the weapons from another time and space - these were indeed excellent instruments for battle.

  In the following half month, Lei Meng and Yang Tian took to running into the woods, jumping up and down, destroying trees - this practice still needs actual chopping, can't chop people, so only the trees suffer. Often, the sound of chopping and hacking could be heard from within the trees, along with the snapping of branches hitting the ground, and the rustling sounds.

  Due to the lack of detection instruments, it is impossible to detect what the composition of this sword and knife are. It is only known that the hardness and toughness of the sword and knife are not bad. After chopping trees for so long, they just became a bit dull and were fine after sharpening. During this time, the two people still couldn't help but grind off the black color on the sword and knife, turning them into bright white short swords and knives.

  One afternoon, Leiming and Yang Tian had just finished breakfast and ran to the woods to practice again. As soon as they approached the trees, they heard the sound of a pig oinking. Yang Tian exclaimed in surprise: "Whose pig has run here?" Leiming whispered: "This place is so remote, it's not a village pig, I'm afraid it's a wild boar that has come. Let's try to kill it, it tastes great!"

  Lao Yang's family wasn't short of money, but there really weren't many edible things in the village. They had been eating the same few dishes over and over again, and both of them were getting a bit tired of it. The two of them quietly slipped into the woods, where they saw a two-meter-long dark brown wild boar rubbing its body against an old pine tree, humming with apparent pleasure.

  It's unclear whether it was because of the two men's good technique after their meridians were unblocked, or because they were small and light, but the wild boar didn't take them seriously. The two of them managed to sneak up to within ten meters of the wild boar. Leiming made a slashing motion with his hand, indicating something to Yang Tian, who nodded in response and snuck around to the front of the wild boar. When the time seemed right, Leiming suddenly threw out the short sword in his hand through the gap in the trees. A flash of white light was seen, and the wild boar let out a pained cry as it fled, leaving behind a string of bright red blood droplets on the ground.

  All I heard was a rustling sound, and the wild boar actually rushed towards Yang Tian's ambush in a panic, but that was exactly where the grass was sparse. Yang Tian relied on his internal strength to jump out from behind the large pine tree, holding a short knife in his right hand and slashing it at the wild boar's head. The wild boar was injured and furious, and it didn't dodge or avoid, "Huff...huff..." rushing straight towards Yang Tian, who had a small build like a child.

  The blade and the boar's head came into contact, making a light "whooshing" sound. The boar's skin was sliced open, followed by a loud "thud", as the knife chopped into the boar's skull. Then, there was a crisp "cracking" sound, as the knife broke in two. Yang Tian initially felt great joy, thinking he had succeeded in killing the boar. But immediately, he was shocked to realize that his body was too small, and all he could feel was a surge of energy coursing through his right arm and shoulder. As he tried to muster his strength to counterattack, the short knife in his hand broke off and flew away, and his small body tumbled backwards, rolling onto some small tree branches. The boar's skull had been split open, and its spirit began to flee. It was seen crashing into the conjoined pine trees behind where Yang Tian had been hiding, leaving a patch of blood on the trunk. Then, it fell to the ground, thrashing its four legs wildly, letting out low grunts as it kicked up leaves and dust. By the time Yang Tian got up, rubbing his right arm, the boar was dead and motionless.

  At this time, Lei Meng also rushed over and saw Yang Tian rubbing his right arm with a gray head and dusty face. He anxiously asked: "How is it? Didn't get hurt?" Yang Tian's luck circulated on his right shoulder and arm for two laps, and he shook off saying: "It's okay, the meridians are all connected, otherwise just now when I was knocked flying by that one hit, my arm would have been broken. The knife was also cut off." Yang Tian looked gloomy. Lei Meng patted Yang Tian's shoulder and walked over to look at the wild boar. He saw a mess on the ground, the wild boar lying sideways under the pine tree, its head still facing the tree. A short sword was stuck in its right chest side, with blood seeping out from the wound; there was a knife stuck in its forehead, stained red - this was the fatal injury.

  Yang Tian followed over and stood with Lei Meng, excitedly saying: "There's wild boar meat to eat, the flavor is definitely good."

  Lei Meng rubbed his chin and said, "Take that knife back and have Old Grandpa temper it again. We'll find some time to try tempering ourselves and improve the design. I didn't expect the knife to break so easily. But with our small bodies, we can only use two sticks to carry the wild boar back."

  After finishing, Leimeng pulled out the short sword inserted in the pig's body, dodged the splashing blood, chopped two arm-thick and three-meter-long branches, tied the wild boar with rattan, picked up the broken knife, and carried the wild boar back with Yang Tian. However, the two were only 1.3 meters tall, and the wild boar kept rubbing against the ground, making them extremely frustrated.