Chapter 165

At this moment, Seeing Ji Liuli was in Zhang Sheng's room, and the table in front of them was covered with parts of all sizes, while boxes of gunpowder were placed to the side.

The parts on the table were of various shapes; the large ones were like watermelons, while the small ones had to be tied together by the dozen to be as thick as a strand of hair. Wei Yuan didn't recognize a single one of these parts, let alone their purpose.

Zhang Sheng and Seeing Ji Liuli were each holding a piece of jade paper, reading intently; both of them had their brows tightly locked, pondering as they read.

Wei Yuan didn't dare to disturb them; he entered the room with light steps and swept his spiritual sense through the jade paper, discovering that it was actually the observations written by Xu Wenwu. Wei Yuan had long since read these things until he knew them by heart, and most of them had been classified as trash.

What was so difficult to understand about these things that it required the Senior Martial Sister and Master to ponder so bitterly?

Wei Yuan stood quietly to the side, waiting for the Senior Martial Sister to become free.

Seeing Ji Liuli suddenly shook her head vigorously and said, "Forget it, let's think about things we can realize right now first. Hmm, Little Wei Yuan, what is it?"

Wei Yuan explained his plan to redeem the Lei Lei Jingmu and ask the Senior Martial Sister to set up the formation. Seeing Ji Liuli said, "Then I'll go help Little Wei Yuan plant the tree first to change my train of thought. You keep thinking slowly."

Zhang Sheng nodded, his spiritual sense still not leaving the jade paper.

Wei Yuan naturally knew his teacher's nature; once he started studying something, he would forget to eat and sleep.

The two flew to the northeast of the domain and chose a small hill with mostly rocks, where Wei Yuan inserted the Lei Lei Jingmu seedling into the soil. As soon as the Lei Lei Jingmu entered the soil, a small electric arc instantly lit up inside the trunk, and then several thin roots extended from the bottom, beginning to grow deep into the earth.

Seeing Ji Liuli, on the other hand, determined the orientation, arranged the spiritual objects, and began to set up the formation to attract and bind thunder.

This kind of work was completely second nature to Seeing Ji Liuli; she didn't need to think at all. Wei Yuan took this opportunity to ask what Seeing Ji Liuli and Zhang Sheng had been studying just now.

Seeing Ji Liuli said, "We are studying the method of refining steel. The mortals of that world can refine thousands of shi of refined steel in a single furnace, without spiritual power or the assistance of formations; it is truly inconceivable. Oh, I'll demonstrate it for you, and you'll understand."

Seeing Ji Liuli casually picked up a few stones and grabbed them in the void; the stones instantly turned into powder, and then the different powders gathered into groups, and more than a dozen stone clusters appeared in the air, some large and some small.

"There are iron and copper veins under this ground, and these stones contain quite a bit of iron; I have already sifted out the raw iron."

Seeing Ji Liuli dispersed the other stone clusters, leaving only one iron cluster. Wei Yuan swept it with his spiritual sense and felt that it was almost entirely iron, with less than ten percent impurities.

The iron powder cluster floated above Seeing Ji Liuli's palm, and then a flame was seen erupting from her palm; in an instant, the iron powder cluster turned bright red, then melted, becoming a soft mass.

Seeing Ji Liuli flicked her left hand, and quite a few impurities were extracted from the melted iron mass, leaving only a mass of very pure molten iron, with one in a hundred impurities.

"This is iron. We cultivators identify the properties of objects and can directly adjust their properties with spiritual sense and Dao power."

Subsequently, several more types of powder appeared in Seeing Ji Liuli's left hand; with a light blow, the powder was sent into the molten iron mass, evenly distributed throughout, and then the flame color turned from red to blue, then to pure white, and the iron mass completely turned into molten iron, which was gathered into a ball by Dao power.

"This is steel." The temperature of the molten iron ball rose and fell sharply; Seeing Ji Liuli added a little more powder, and after repeating this several times, the temperature dropped straight to room temperature, turning into a steel ball shining with a faint blue light.

"This is refined steel."

Wei Yuan nodded. These principles were all learned in the Art Theory class back then, but at that time, the students' cultivation bases were still shallow, and they had to rely on furnace fires to raise the temperature, and could only process a little bit at a time when adjusting the properties. Wei Yuan had been busy for half a day back then and only refined two taels of refined steel, and the quality was average; how could he be like Seeing Ji Liuli, who could refine hundreds of catties of refined steel with a wave of her hand?

Refined steel is the pinnacle of mortal materials, but it is far from the end of this path.

If other immortal materials are added and nurtured and refined with Dao power, refined steel can turn into spiritual material, just like the difference between immortal silver and mortal silver.

Seeing Ji Liuli said, "With my cultivation base, I can only refine a thousand catties of refined steel at a time, which counts as less than ten shi. Yet the mortals of that world can refine thousands of shi of refined steel in one furnace; doesn't this mean that after many years of cultivation, I am not even as good as some mortals?"

"This... naturally cannot be compared like this," Wei Yuan said.

However, after Seeing Ji Liuli's demonstration, Wei Yuan gradually understood and pondered, "We all distinguish the properties of objects with spiritual sense, and then adjust the components inside the materials according to the properties with Dao power; there is also a limit to the materials we can process at one time. If there is more, we cannot guarantee that the materials are evenly distributed and the properties are balanced. Those mortals refine a thousand shi of refined steel in one furnace; wouldn't the various ores put into the furnace have to be two thousand shi? How do they ensure the balance of properties inside the materials?"

Seeing Ji Liuli said, "This is one point; the second is temperature. Mortal fire finds it difficult to melt iron, let alone refined steel. We use earth fire, sky fire, Dao fire, and spiritual fire for artifact refining; except for some special functions, many flames can naturally melt gold and stone, and refined steel is even less of a problem. But these flames all require spiritual sense control and Dao power support; those in that world are merely mortals, how do they control the fire temperature?"

The difficulty also varies depending on how much material is put into a furnace. Refining ten catties at a time and refining a thousand catties at a time are as different as heaven and earth, not to mention a thousand shi or even more in one furnace. Following this line of thought, the more Wei Yuan thought about it, the more shocked he became.

!.

Wei Yuan said slowly, "The mortals of that world can produce a thousand shi of refined steel in every furnace, with consistent quality. Looking at it this way, they should be able to precisely know the level of the furnace temperature, and have the means to ensure that the furnace temperature rises to or drops to a certain specific area, while at the same time ensuring that the temperature inside the furnace charge is constant everywhere, and the properties are balanced. The things involved in this are too many."

Seeing Ji Liuli nodded, "Hmm, if every item is broken down, I'm afraid each one is enough to become a field of research. That world must have reached the corresponding height in every aspect to have finally achieved this thousand shi of refined steel in one furnace."

Wei Yuan said, "Xu Wenwu is unlearned and unskilled in that world; I'm afraid there are many fields he hasn't even heard of."

Seeing Ji Liuli said, "No matter, we just need to know what the mortals of that world have achieved. Our spiritual sense operation speed is thousands of times faster than that of mortals; what mortals can do, we can naturally do as well."

Wei Yuan also felt it made sense. Just like a thousand shi of refined steel in one furnace, since he knows such a thing exists, then by studying it slowly, he will be able to do it sooner or later. Not to mention a thousand shi in one furnace, even ten thousand or a hundred thousand shi; if mortals can do it, there is no reason why cultivators cannot.

As the two chatted to this point, Wei Yuan remembered another thing: the Dao power required to raise a thousand shi of raw materials to the point of melting into molten iron is also extraordinary. And the mortals in that world seem to be using electricity for many things.

Speaking of this, Seeing Ji Liuli said, "We also have many means that are difficult for mortals to reach, such as Feng Shui and Qi luck. You already have Qi luck on you, plus the Feng Shui formation I set up, many things happen logically. Look, no one told you, didn't you just redeem a Thunder Wood and bring it back?"

(End of chapter)