Chapter 4: Wootz Steel, Marry A Wife?
He gently flicked the blade with his finger, instantly hearing a crisp echo.
“Ding ding ding~”
Li Xiao smiled with satisfaction, very pleased with this saber.
This was precisely the cavalry saber commonly used by cavalry units in later generations.
The blade was thick and heavy, narrow and long, with a large curve, a sharp tip suitable for wrist-powered strikes; there was a deep groove at the half-inch position on the blade back.
In his previous life, Li Xiao had collected one such cavalry saber and found it very handy to use.
In this era, the nomadic people’s armor rate was extremely low, basically just leather armor or even no armor.
The sharpness of the cavalry saber was enough to sever the enemy’s head.
As for facing heavy cavalry?
Which smart person would use a saber to chop at the enemy’s iron armor?
Even the sharpest industrialized tools of later generations could not cleave iron armor.
To deal with armored enemies, there were naturally other weapons.
This cavalry saber was enough to deal with that group of poor nomadic cavalry.
However, for cavalry, the war saber was ultimately just a secondary weapon.
In battles between cavalry, it was more about ranged shooting, with horse spears and spears during charges; the cavalry saber was mainly for pursuing and killing enemies and for close combat.
“It’s a pity that horse spear was taken away by the old man; I can only practice charges with a spear.” Li Xiao said to himself.
The Li Family ancestors were at least a military commander in the Western Liao army, and being able to establish Hexi Fort in Jin Prefecture with his retainers proved that the Li Family old master had some status.
Later, after much effort and money, they finally obtained a horse spear as the Li Family heirloom.
But this horse spear hadn’t been passed down to Li Xiao yet!
“The material for forging this saber is Wootz Steel, right?”
Just as Li Xiao was wielding the cavalry saber, he suddenly heard the old master’s calm voice.
Li Xiao nodded lightly and immediately praised, “Grandfather, you truly are the best artisan master in the Northern Frontier; you recognized Wootz Steel at a glance.”
“Impressive, impressive~”
Seeing Li Xiao give a thumbs-up with a cheeky expression, the old master snorted lightly, not buying it at all.
The structure of the cavalry saber was slightly different from other sabers, with a narrower and thinner blade.
When clashing blades with the enemy, the stress point of the cavalry saber differed from other blades, subjecting the cavalry saber to greater pressure.
If ordinary steel were used to forge a cavalry saber, the result would be a worthless blade that would break after just a few uses.
Therefore, the cavalry saber in Li Xiao’s hand was made of Wootz Steel.
Its strength and toughness were several times that of ordinary steel.
“I can still tell if it’s Wootz Steel. Forging this cavalry saber took me no small effort.”
The old master said calmly with his hands behind his back.
But in his heart, he was not as calm as he appeared on the surface.
About ten days ago, Li Xiao brought back a pile of hematite ore from the river, set up a furnace in the back courtyard, lit a fire, and with his two younger brothers, prepared to smelt this pile of hematite ore.
The old master knew about it but didn’t pay attention and didn’t stop them, thinking the three boys were just fooling around to vent their excess energy.
But what the old master never expected was that Li Xiao actually refined pure iron.
Moreover, after the old master forged it, he discovered it was not ordinary pure iron.
It was the legendary Wootz Steel.
The finest of steels.
The shock in the old master’s heart at that time was imaginable.
One must know that due to the rarity of Wootz Steel, it was completely unavailable in the Northern Frontier despite high demand, extremely scarce.
Every Wootz Steel ingot that appeared was immediately bought at high prices by the royal court’s magnates and forged into divine weapons and sharp tools passed down to descendants.
The old master couldn’t figure out how such precious Wootz Steel had been refined by his own grandson.
And it was refined right under his nose, so it absolutely couldn’t have been bought; the Li Family couldn’t afford Wootz Steel.
“This Wootz Steel is indeed hard to forge. Thank you for your hard work, Grandfather.” Li Xiao said gratefully.
“Hard work is one thing, but I just didn’t expect you to have found a method to forge Wootz Steel.” the old master said.
Finding a method to smelt Wootz Steel was the dream of every artisan.
The old master’s heart was also unsettled, but to maintain his usual steady persona, he forcibly suppressed any expression.
“I’ve watched you smelt iron many times since I was young, and it always looked very laborious and troublesome.”
“A few days ago, it occurred to me whether we could smelt iron by melting it into molten iron in a crucible.”
“With a try-it attitude, I didn’t expect it to actually work.” Li Xiao also timely showed a surprised and unexpected expression.
But in reality, in his previous life, Li Xiao often liked reading books, including many miscellaneous ones.
Geography magazines, historical records, and even many black technology compendiums.
All these things were memorized in Li Xiao’s mind, and perhaps because of the transmigration, his memory had become even more profound.
The method to make Wootz Steel was something Li Xiao had seen in a book.
The most important and mysterious step was using a crucible made of clay and graphite as the container for smelting iron.
Then adding coke and leaves from certain plants, sealing the crucible and heating it to one thousand two hundred degrees, cooling it after a day while maintaining around eight hundred degrees, and continuing to replace the carbon elements in the molten iron with iron filings.
The steps were simple, but the requirements for details were very high; if any requirement wasn’t met, the whole pot of steel would be ruined.
Li Xiao and his two younger brothers experimented many times before finally successfully refining this Wootz Steel.
Its hardness and toughness, though not matching industrialized steel, far surpassed current steel.
And Li Xiao’s reason for producing Wootz Steel was not just to forge a cavalry saber.
The real purpose was to prepare for casting cannons in the future.
“Grandfather, tomorrow let’s use the crucible to smelt Wootz Steel again.”
“Last time we had no experience and fumbled many times, wasting a lot of iron ore.”
“This time with you watching, Grandfather, it will definitely succeed on the first try.”
Li Xiao said with a smile to the old master.
He had no intention of keeping the method to smelt Wootz Steel to himself.
After all, he wasn’t a professional artisan; hiding this technology was useless. Only by teaching it to professionals could it achieve maximum effect.
Of course, the method to refine Wootz Steel would only be told by Li Xiao to the old master and a few trustworthy artisans.
They would personally complete the refining of Wootz Steel.
In the future, this would be the Li Family’s closely guarded secret.
“Mm, alright. It’s late today, and it might rain; we’ll smelt tomorrow.”
The old master nodded lightly and said calmly.
Then he walked into the room with a relaxed appearance, sat in the main seat, and waited for the meal.
Li Xiao sat on his own stool, glancing at the old master with the corner of his mouth slightly upturned.
“Tsundere little old man.”
Clearly, he desperately wanted to know the method to refine Wootz Steel, but this old man was habitually tsundere and couldn’t bring himself to ask his grandson.
His heart must be itching like a cat’s claws.
And Li Xiao understood that the old master cared about face, so he didn’t make it difficult for him and proactively brought up refining Wootz Steel together tomorrow.
Indirectly teaching the old master the method to refine Wootz Steel.
Otherwise, if Li Xiao kept it from him, the old master definitely wouldn’t bring it up himself, and he wouldn’t be able to sleep tonight.
“Time to eat~”
Shortly after Li Xiao and the old master sat down, a shout came from the kitchen.
Immediately after, a middle-aged woman came out carrying a large wooden basin, followed by a little girl carrying a stack of bowls and chopsticks.
“Mother, you’re back?” Li Xiao said in surprise.
This woman appeared to be in her thirties, tall and slender, with a sallow complexion and faint crow’s feet around her eyes.
She had a turban on her head and an apron around her waist; whether speaking or acting, she gave a neat and tidy, swift and decisive impression.
This was Li Xiao’s mother, Qin Dani!
Early this morning, Qin Dani had gone to her maternal home thirty miles away to visit relatives; Li Xiao had thought she would stay there tonight!
Qin Dani plunked the wooden basin on the table, poked Li Xiao’s forehead as if angrily, and said, “You brat, you don’t want me back?”
“This is my home; I can come back if I want. What business is it of yours!”
Seeing Qin Dani like this, Er Hu and San Bao, who had just sat down to eat, instinctively shrank their heads.
Li Xiao also gave a wry smile, guessing in his heart that his mother had quarreled with his aunt at his grandfather’s house.
She was so angry she didn’t want to stay overnight at her maternal home.
So, Li Xiao exchanged a glance with his two younger brothers, took bowls full of noodles from his little sister, and the three silently lowered their heads to eat, not daring to say a word.
As for Qin Dani, she was too angry to eat and continued venting to the old lady, complaining about how things were at her maternal home and how her sister-in-law had upset her.
“I went to bring some things to my parents; what business was it of hers?”
“If she’s afraid of village gossip about her, then she should take good care of my parents herself!”
“She doesn’t like me? Well, I don’t like her either!”
While Qin Dani was venting, little sister San Feng mainly played the role of straight man in front of her, a complete little cotton-padded jacket; the old lady occasionally chimed in.
Meanwhile, Li Xiao and his two brothers, along with the old master, all silently ate with heads down, not saying a word.
“But it’s not just because of her that I came back. Your maternal grandmother saw it was about to rain and wanted me to stay overnight!”
“But for some reason, I felt uneasy all day today, afraid something might happen, so I hurried back.”
After saying this to her little cotton-padded jacket, Qin Dani turned with a serious face to look at Li Xiao and his brothers.
“Good thing you three little rascals didn’t cause me any trouble, or I’d skin you.”
Hearing this, Er Hu and San Bao both shook their heads.
Li Xiao gave a helpless smile: “Mother, rest assured; with me watching them, they won’t cause trouble.”
“It’s precisely because of you that I’m not reassured! Weren’t all those past messes led by you with these two fools?”
Li Xiao smiled wryly: “Mother, you said it yourself, that was in the past. Now I’ve grown up and know how to handle things properly.”
After Li Xiao spoke, instead of the expected scolding, Qin Dani didn’t say anything.
Instead, she sat across from Li Xiao, looking him up and down with a tempted expression.
Then she suddenly smiled and turned to the old lady: “Mother, Da Long is fifteen this year; he’s grown up. It’s time to find him a wife.”
Hearing Qin Dani’s words, Li Xiao nearly spat out his rice, barely holding it together.
Well then!
She had been waiting for him here!
