Chapter 10: Saltpeter

Qinghe Village is rich in resources; there is an open-pit sulfur mine nearby. Sulfur can repel mosquitoes and insects and has a wide range of uses, so the village has stored a lot of it, and Charcoal is even more ubiquitous.

However, there is no Saltpeter in the village, which is quite vexing. Without Saltpeter, how is Meng Yifan supposed to formulate Black Powder? And how is he to blow up the Flying Tiger Demon?

According to Meng Dayong, that Tiger Demon is a Third Grade Demon Beast, comparable to a Third Grade Martial Artist among humans. With just these forty or fifty people in Qinghe Village, they are but a small group of ants before the Flying Tiger Demon; it could trample them all to death just by lifting a leg.

Although Meng Dayong is a First Grade High-Level Martial Artist, in the eyes of the Flying Tiger Demon, he is nothing more than a slightly sturdier ant. A single Fireball of demon magic would be enough to burn Meng Dayong to ashes.

"What to do without Saltpeter? Relying only on that small barrel of Black Powder—not only is the quantity too small, but the ratio is impure, and the explosive power is limited; it will be very difficult to severely wound the Flying Tiger Demon."

"The village is surrounded by fog and cannot be left at all. Are we really just going to wait here for death?"

Meng Yifan frowned and fell into deep thought. Suddenly, he had a flash of inspiration. Thinking of something, he ran quickly to the outside of his family's latrine. Sure enough, he saw White Powder on the low earthen wall, which filled him with great joy; this White Powder was Earth Saltpeter.

Meng Yifan arranged for people to go to the latrines of every household to collect the White Powder. With many hands, the work was light, and soon they had collected over forty jin of White Powder.

The main component in the White Powder is Niter Alkali, but it contains too many impurities. If one were to formulate Black Powder according to the ratio of one part Sulfur, two parts Saltpeter, and three parts Charcoal, it could explode, but the power might not even be as good as the barrel of Black Powder they had already found.

"How should I purify the Earth Saltpeter?" Meng Yifan racked his brains. In his past life, he liked to read books whenever he was free, reading all sorts of miscellaneous books.

After crossing over, for some reason, his memory became extremely good; he could even recall books he had once flipped through casually. Perhaps this is the hidden benefit of crossing over.

One only regrets not having read enough when the time comes to use it. If he had known he would cross over, Meng Yifan would have studied military industrial manufacturing.

If he could build a Barrett Sniper Rifle and load it with Armor-Piercing Bullets, Meng Yifan would be confident in blowing the head off the Flying Tiger Demon from a thousand meters away; there would be no need for all this trouble.

It is a pity that even if Meng Yifan truly knew the technology to manufacture a Barrett Sniper Rifle, given the existing level of technology in this world and the lack of modern supporting facilities, it would be impossible to build a modern rifle or sniper rifle in the true sense.

"Haha, I remember now." Meng Yifan finally recalled a miscellaneous book he had once read, which recorded the method for purifying Earth Saltpeter.

Meng Dayong walked over, covering his nose as he looked at the foul-smelling White Powder, and asked, "Yifan, why did you have people collect this White Powder? It's too pungent."

Meng Yifan explained, "An old immortal taught me the method for making Black Powder in a dream. I can extract Saltpeter from this soil. I want to try it out and see how the effect is."

"This is an immortal secret art taught to Yifan by an old immortal." Meng Dayong was incredibly excited. In this world, immortals are high and mighty; anything they pass down is enough for mortals to benefit infinitely.

Meng Dayong felt a stir in his heart. The Saltpeter used by the Great Wu Heavenly Dynasty to make Black Powder is all mined from Saltpeter mines; he had never heard of being able to extract Saltpeter from the white earth on latrine walls.

"If one can truly extract Saltpeter from the ubiquitous White Powder, then this secret art has very high practical value."

One must know that the production of Saltpeter mines in the Great Wu Heavenly Dynasty has always been severely insufficient, which has led to Black Powder being very expensive. According to the official market price, one jin of Black Powder is worth one tael of silver.

However, purchasing Black Powder from the authorities requires registering one's identity information and stating its purpose; the procedures are very cumbersome, and ordinary people are subject to purchase limits. Those without connections simply cannot buy enough Black Powder, which has given rise to a black market for it.

On the black market, one jin of Black Powder can sell for two taels of silver, directly double the official price, and even then, demand exceeds supply; as long as there is Black Powder, it will never fail to sell.

"If Yifan has truly mastered the technique of extracting Saltpeter from the white earth of latrines, that would be wonderful. This kind of secret art is simply comparable to turning stones into gold." Thinking of this, Meng Dayong was incredibly excited.

"Dad, find me three people who are clever and nimble-fingered. I need them to help me extract the Saltpeter," Meng Yifan said.

Meng Dayong's expression changed. If outsiders were allowed to participate in extracting Saltpeter, wouldn't those people learn the secret art taught by the immortal? Yifan is still too young; he doesn't yet know how important this secret art is to him.

This kind of secret art must certainly be kept secret; even within the family, it should be passed down to sons but not daughters. How could he let outsiders know?

"What outsiders? I'll be your assistant, Dad. Yifan, let me tell you, you must never pass on the secret art the old immortal taught you to anyone else," Meng Dayong said earnestly.

Meng Yifan was stunned for a moment. In his past life on Earth, knowledge of extracting Saltpeter could be found in abundance with a simple search on the internet. He truly hadn't realized that this common knowledge was also a precious treasure that needed to be kept secret.

Seeing Meng Dayong's solemn expression, Meng Yifan also realized the difference between the two worlds. Perhaps the method of extracting Saltpeter really is very important here.

Meng Yifan nodded and said, "Then there's no need for outsiders. We'll do it ourselves, father and son."

"That's right. Tell me, what should we do now?" Meng Dayong asked.

"First, move all this White Powder into our room."

Meng Dayong no longer minded the pungent smell; he hugged the jar containing the White Powder and ran toward the house. When villagers wanted to help, he chased them all away, which left the villagers very confused, not knowing what the Meng father and son were doing so secretively.

Meng Yifan went to find other useful utensils. Now, the Meng father and son have the final say in the entire Qinghe Village; as long as the village has something, he can take it and use it.

Soon, the utensils for extracting Saltpeter were mostly found. Meng Yifan and Meng Dayong set to work, grinding the Earth Saltpeter and plant ash into fine powder separately.

Then, they mixed them in an 8:1 ratio of Earth Saltpeter to plant ash and put them into a large pottery jar. Next, they added hot water heated to about 75 degrees, just enough to submerge the mixture, and Meng Yifan stirred it continuously with a wooden stick for fifteen minutes.

According to the records in the book, it is best to use a glass rod for stirring, but after searching the entire Qinghe Village, no glass products could be found, so they had to use a wooden stick instead.

After stirring evenly, they filtered it with fine cloth to obtain the filtrate, which was the Saltpeter water. Then, they poured the Saltpeter water into a clean pottery jar and heated it to evaporate. This step is called "boiling the saltpeter." During the heating process, Meng Yifan stirred constantly to prevent it from sticking to the bottom.

When three-quarters of the water had evaporated, Meng Yifan stopped heating. At this point, the solution was already very viscous, and many solid particles had already precipitated at the bottom of the pottery jar.

"Hey! Saltpeter really came out! Amazing, truly amazing! It is worthy of being an immortal secret art." Meng Dayong, who had never seen a chemical reaction, was dancing with excitement.

When he was a soldier in the Divine Machine Battalion, the Saltpeter he saw was always dark yellow in color, while the Saltpeter Meng Yifan had just extracted from the latrine soil was pure white and flawless; one could tell at a glance that the purity was very high.

"Dad, don't get excited. It's not finished yet." Meng Yifan was a bit speechless. The Meng Dayong in his memory had always been very stern; now, seeing him dancing about like a naughty child, the contrast was just too great.

"Oh, Dad's mistake. You continue, you continue." Meng Dayong was like a child who had made a mistake, covering his mouth and not daring to make another sound, afraid that his careless talk would cause the immortal secret art to fail.

Meng Yifan let the solution in the pottery jar cool naturally to about thirty degrees, and more white solid particles precipitated at the bottom of the jar.

In order to make the Black Powder more powerful, Meng Yifan repeated the above steps once more and obtained five jin of high-purity Saltpeter.

What followed was simple. Meng Yifan arranged for people to weigh out the Fire Saltpeter, Sulfur, and Charcoal separately and mix them in a 16:2:3 ratio, and the Black Powder was finished.