Rome had not been built in a day. Although Luo Chong's planned construction was not even as grand as a colosseum, he could only take it one step at a time.
He had slept soundly through the night. At the first hint of dawn the next day, Luo Chong resumed his daily morning exercises. With enough salt and food now available, he trained even harder.
After experiencing the Cannibal Tribe incident, Luo Chong had gained a thorough understanding of this world. The threat from wild beasts was not the only danger here—the threat from other humans could not be ignored either.
Although there were no large-scale wars here, localized conflicts on a smaller scale were unavoidable. It was not a matter of ambition, but of survival and self-preservation.
Given the current state of the Han Tribe, even if Luo Chong had any ideas, he could not put them into practice.
When the morning exercises were over, the tribespeople emerged as well. There was a great deal to do today, and they needed so many things that they were short on manpower. Thus, Luo Chong halted all food-gathering work.
After everyone had eaten breakfast, they all gathered at the cave entrance to wait for Luo Chong to assign their tasks.
Lame was assigned to fire pottery. The children continued cutting grass, but according to Luo Chong's demonstration, they had to bundle it up, making it easier to store and transport.
Big Mouth, Monkey, Big Fur, and Second Fur went to the rear mountain to cut down all the Man-eating Tree saplings suitable for making spears.
The women were divided into two groups. The larger group went to the valley Luo Chong had visited before to gather sisal—the giant aloe-like plants. They had to cut down at least one hundred leaves from each plant. Those things would grow new leaves next year, so Luo Chong was not worried in the slightest.
It was only that the amount of sisal expected to be gathered would be enormous. Therefore, Luo Chong had Wooden Porpoise lead six Blue Antelopes, which carried several large baskets for transportation.
The smaller Gathering Team also went into the jungle, but their task was to scrape tree bark—the bark of White Ash Trees.
White Ash Trees were named for their ability to attract White Wax Insects. The insects fed on the trees' sap, then excreted a white secretion onto the bark. That was insect wax, the primary material ancient people used to make candles. That was why both characters in the Chinese word for "candle" used the insect radical.
Modern candles were made from paraffin, refined from petroleum. There had been no such thing in ancient times. Apart from beeswax, there had only been insect wax.
Luo Chong had them collect insect wax not to make candles, but to use it in making molds for casting bronze.
All the remaining men were laborers. Luo Chong sent them to cut trees. They had no chainsaw like Baldy Qiang, so chopping down trees with Stone Axes truly was backbreaking work.
They first cut down trees about as thick as a leg. The trunks were kept for building livestock sheds, while all the branches were split into firewood. Luo Chong needed a great deal of charcoal for smelting copper, so they had to stockpile plenty of firewood. Once copper smelting got on track, they would only ever lack charcoal; they would never run out of firewood.
The Blue Antelopes hauled the felled trees back. If they could not manage, the tribespeople were to find the Dinophant babies for help. They could not let them eat for nothing.
The tribespeople found this very confusing. They believed autumn was the season for storing food, but Luo Chong told them that the food already stored would not be eaten up by the beginning of spring next year. Fish in particular were abundant. Although one hundred people could not possibly eat all the fish in a river to extinction, even without reaching that extreme, it would probably take one or two months for the fish population to recover to its current size.
After all, many of the fish caught during this period had bellies full of roe. Those eggs had been caught before they could even hatch into fry, so the number of fish in Small River would be affected to some extent in the future. It was better to let the fish rest and recover for now.
Once all the tribespeople had gone out to work, Luo Chong got to work too—and he was busier than everyone else.
First, he burned charcoal. He made several large woodpiles, plastered mud over the outside, and left several air holes at the top and bottom. He lit the firewood through the holes on top. When the flames reached the holes below, he sealed every opening, allowing the wood to smolder in an oxygen-starved environment. Once the fire naturally went out and everything cooled, the wood had become charcoal.
Then he ground the Kaolin Clay and Ant Nest Clay they had brought back into fine powder, mixed them evenly, and kneaded them into mud. He shaped several crucibles and ladles to purify and produce the alloy.
Next, he used the mixed refractory clay to make molds. Each mold was a flat board with rows of sunken little compartments. Every compartment was the same size, allowing him to cast copper and tin plates like chocolate bars.
When the time came, he could adjust the copper-to-tin ratio as needed to make tools for different purposes. Whenever he needed some, he could simply snap off a piece as though breaking a chocolate bar.
Bronze Alloy had been widely used since before recorded history. Its low melting point and ease of casting had made it the earliest metal mastered by humanity. Its use could be traced back to the Xia-Shang Period, and it had been widely used for weapons, farm implements, tools, cooking utensils, musical instruments, and ritual objects. Its development had peaked during the Late Qin-Early Han Period. It was not until the Han Dynasty developed mature Hundred Refined Steel technology that bronze was gradually eliminated on a large scale.
Bronze was an alloy of copper and tin. Lead was sometimes added as well, but Luo Chong would not use that stuff. For one thing, he did not have any. For another, lead was poisonous. It was fine for making tools, but not cooking utensils.
Different copper-to-tin ratios produced bronze with vastly different properties. Luo Chong did not need to experiment further, however. Ancient people had already brought bronze to dazzling heights thousands of years ago, and some of their techniques could not even be surpassed in modern times.
Different purposes called for different ratios. For casting bells and tripods, the copper-to-tin ratio was six to one. For casting axes or hammers, it was five to one. For casting halberds and ji, it was four to one. For Bronze Swords, it was three to one. Arrowheads used a ratio of five to two, while bronze mirrors used one to one.
In short, the higher the copper content, the softer the bronze, the more punishment it could take, and the yellower its color. That was why ancient poems spoke of "golden halberds and iron steeds": bronze was golden in color, and the ancients therefore called it gold.
In ancient times, emperors would sometimes reward ministers with tens of thousands of taels of gold at the drop of a hat. What they were actually giving them was copper.
The higher the tin content, the harder the bronze and the paler its color—even turning white. But such bronze also became more brittle. Under a heavy blow, or when two Bronze Swords clashed, it would shatter outright.
That was why bronze was never used to make chopping blades. It was only used for stabbing weapons such as spears, lances, swords, ji, and halberds. They could stab but not slash; one slash and they would break. So when films showed people hacking at each other with Bronze Swords, that was pure nonsense.
It was precisely this fatal flaw that caused bronze weapons to be completely replaced by steel weapons.
With charcoal and molds ready, Luo Chong finally began making the Smelting Furnaces. He mixed ordinary clay with pottery shards or brick dust, added some chopped grass, kneaded it all into mud, and built cylindrical earthen furnaces more than forty centimeters in diameter. They were nothing impressive, but for now they would have to do. After all, this was not large-scale smelting; there was no need to build a blast furnace.
Luo Chong made four such furnaces. When the time came, they could all be fired at once, saving quite a bit of time.
Since there were no metal tools yet, they could not make wooden push-pull bellows. Instead, he used python skin to make several simple press-operated leather-bag blowers. For now, they would make do with what they had. Once they obtained tools, he would upgrade the equipment.
Luo Chong took a blower and tested it beneath the Pottery Kiln. The results were quite good.
Lame did not know what Luo Chong was making, but just looking at the molds and blowers made him feel that they were something even more advanced than pottery. He was also rather eager to see what new thing the Chieftain would produce this time.
Once Luo Chong finished preparing everything, the world's first set of primitive smelting equipment was complete. All that remained was to wait for the charcoal to finish burning and the furnaces to dry tomorrow before work could begin.
Well, Qing Shu is here to ask everyone for a vote—or a collection. Comments would be welcome too. The new-book period before being put on the shelves is very important. Thank you all for your support.
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