Chapter 85: Iron Smelting
People are always more forgiving towards the sick; our Li King now suffers from both madness and physical disfigurement.
The Zheng family never expected that their extensive propaganda about Li King’s actions, deliberately omitting the Zheng family’s involvement, would backfire and make the common people sympathize with Li King.
Gu Changxiao’s mouth twitched as he listened. Little Daoist Ji, how many more false accusations are you going to pin on this King?
Moreover, Gu Changxiao found that he was no longer as angry when he heard the term ‘eunuch’.
The previous anger was a man’s instinct; any man would not want to be labeled with such a false accusation.
Even actual eunuchs in the palace hated being called that to their faces the most.
But now, he could calmly listen to people in the marketplace call him ‘Heavenly Eunuch’ and felt indifferent to the impact of this reputation spreading.
At most, he wouldn’t be able to marry, and no woman would be willing to marry him.
But, so what?
Women are the most untrustworthy!
His most respected maternal grandmother was a woman, his cousin who always called him ‘cousin’ sweetly was a woman, Lin Xuejiao, to whom he had been engaged for many years, was a woman, and even his respected Empress aunt…
These were all women, and it was these women who wanted him dead, who, at the palace gate, pried off his fingers one by one as he clung to it…
He took a deep breath, not allowing himself to fall into these painful memories, and turned to smile at Grandpa Ling:
“It can currently be confirmed that this Imperial Commissioner is ostensibly looking for Little Daoist Ji to request a prescription. The Imperial Physicians of the court have yet to find a good medicine for the plague in Luocheng.
The medicine Little Daoist Ji provided is an unprecedented good medicine.”
Grandpa Ling anxiously asked, “And what about the hidden agenda?”
If there’s an overt purpose, there must be a covert one. If they were purely seeking a prescription, they should have sent someone on horseback with an imperial edict to announce it.
Why would such an Imperial Commissioner delegation of nearly a hundred people be traveling slowly towards Yandi?
“As for the hidden agenda, according to my Secret Guards’ investigations, there are people from Prince Yu mixed in, as well as some Death Warriors acting under unknown orders.”
Grandpa Ling slapped his thigh, “It must all be Prince Yu’s doing! We need to find a way to send a message to Suisui so she isn’t completely unprepared.”
Gu Changxiao nodded, “Don’t worry, we will reach the Border City before the Imperial Commissioner.”
Of course, the message will be sent too.
Gu Changxiao had his Secret Guards go ahead to the Border City to inform ‘Li King’ about the Death Warriors mixed within the Imperial Commissioner’s entourage.
To alleviate Grandpa Ling’s worries, Gu Changxiao deliberately smiled and said:
“I wonder what our Little Daoist Ji is doing? Don’t let her do something earth-shattering by the time we arrive.”
Jinsui was instructing a blacksmith in forging iron. With a capital of one hundred thousand taels of silver, spending became much more generous.
She had originally intended to buy pig iron from surrounding cities, but Cheng Yu told her that pig iron was difficult to obtain, unlike grain which merchants sold.
It could only be traded privately with gentry families. Although Li King had only offended the Zheng family so far, he had actually made the gentry of Yandi afraid to trade with him.
Who knew if they would end up like the Zheng family? Cheng Yu did not hide his intentions and directly said:
“Instead of searching everywhere, it’s better to directly cooperate with the Yan Clan.”
Jinsui thought about the scenes of parting with Yan Shiyi Lang and Miss Yan. If she had to ask the Yan Clan for help again, she would lose face!
Although it was Li King’s people who lost face, asking for help in person would cost her her own dignity.
She truly didn’t want to go, but Cheng Yu had sent people to several Prefecture Cities and they hadn’t bought much pig iron. Han Xing took people into the mountains to find some iron sand to sift iron herself.
But that was like a drop in the bucket. Even if they found an iron mine now, it couldn’t be mined anytime soon.
Jinsui thought it over and made a decision—she would cast dignity aside!
First, she would use cochineal to make lip balm. With the laboratory’s help, this was simple. Once the raw materials were prepared—cochineal, beeswax, and almond oil—lip balm could be easily made.
She even made them in the style of modern lipstick, firing ceramic lipstick tubes and creating three colors: pink, peach, and scarlet red lipstick.
Then, using ingredients like red ginseng, pearl, clove, jasmine seeds, and snake oil, she made scented cream.
Yandi had long winters, and skin was easily frostbitten. Even peasant women would use oil to moisturize their skin.
The one she made was white and delicate, with good frost-resistant effects and a pleasant fragrance. It used precious ingredients, making it better than any imperial court product.
Then, using cochineal to make rouge and ingredients like fleeceflower root and mint to make a shampoo, a set of four women’s skincare gift boxes was completed.
She packed them in a pear wood box and specifically dried some flowers to lay inside as decoration.
This gift was valuable, but to those who didn’t appreciate it, it was just rouge and powder for women.
She then thought about it and added the makeup mirror she had sold to Young Master Jin for five thousand taels of silver.
With that, it became a truly significant gift! She didn’t go herself, sending Cheng Yu and Han Xing to deliver it.
Oh, and Hei Hu went along too. And for the first time, this young man showed some foresight and asked Jinsui for a box of that scented cream.
Jinsui chuckled. Scented cream, what a name! He was going to give it to the round-faced Miss Bai!
Good, our Hei Hu has finally started to understand women.
Jinsui was naturally not stingy and prepared a gift for Hei Hu as well.
“The gift is to apologize to Miss Yan, as I promised her before. The main point is to see Yan Jiu and buy pig iron from the Yan Clan; the price is negotiable.”
Actually, Cheng Yu knew the purpose of this trip without Jinsui needing to remind him.
After they left, Jinsui took the small amount of pig iron she had and watched the blacksmiths forge. When she saw that the blacksmiths forged swords one by one, requiring immense effort and refinement,
even if she knew nothing about metallurgy, she knew this forging method was ancient and inefficient.
After chatting with several blacksmiths, she learned that molds had not yet been invented in this era for mass-producing ironware with molten iron.
Even agricultural tools like hoes and kitchen knives were forged one by one.
Jinsui first returned to the laboratory to find books. Fortunately, the computer had documentaries and books on metallurgy, which she stayed up for two days to watch.
Then she worked with the blacksmiths to conduct experiments. When she discovered that the pig iron couldn’t be heated to the molten state shown in the documentaries, new problems arose.
The temperature of the firewood was insufficient. To mass-produce weapons, coal was necessary.
When you want to do something, this kind of situation always arises, with various new problems lining up to find you.
To give a simple analogy, in later life, if you’re hungry in the middle of the night, you can just open the refrigerator, take a few ingredients, and make a bowl of tomato and egg noodles.
But in this era, for noodles, you first have to soak wheat, grind it, sift it, and then knead the dough and roll the noodles yourself. For eggs, you have to raise chickens yourself, and as for tomatoes, they don’t exist at all.
What Jinsui is facing now isn’t just grinding wheat, but reclaiming land and planting wheat before she can eat a bowl of noodles!
But Jinsui, having lived two lives, fears trouble and difficulties the least. As someone who conducted experiments frequently in her previous life, she understood too well that difficulties are meant to be overcome, and troubles are meant to be solved.
Coal can be found in the mountains in the north. It’s a good opportunity to recruit refugees from the mountains. A notice will be posted, implementing a work point system. Anyone who carries coal out of the mountains will receive work points.
One basket of coal is one work point, and work points can be exchanged for food, salt, sugar, cloth, and other daily necessities at the Border City market.
