In the next half month, Qin Tiexin maintained an almost rigid routine.
Get up at the end of the day every day and go to the Wasted Equipment Pavilion before dawn. First, smelt the mortal artifacts and semi-Law Artifact that were sorted yesterday, and complete the casting of at least two baskets of fine iron before the others arrived at Chenshi. Then they started sorting the newly delivered scrapped artifacts, memorizing the traces of spiritual patterns on them while sorting.
At noon, he returned to the foot of the mountain and spent five spiritual crystals on his meal - since entering the tempered body, his food intake has been stable at four bowls of spiritual rice, and occasionally he has to add half a bowl of soup to barely fill his stomach. The handyman disciples in the dining hall have long been accustomed to this, and even privately gave him the nickname "Qin Rice Tong".
At the end of the day, I continued to work back at the Waste Equipment Pavilion. I completed the four hours of work before the time came, and went to the Shanggong Hall to hand in tasks and receive spiritual crystals.
He listened to the Dharma lecture hall in the evening - half of the month of free lectures had passed, and he did not dare to waste any of them.
Night is the time for real cultivation.
Refining Qi is still difficult.
"Qi-Entraining Technique" has been running for half a month, and the first cyclone in Dantian has only been completed 70%. At this speed, it will take at least ten days to truly step into Qi Refining First Layer. This is the slowest group among the new handyman disciples.
Just last night, Sun Daniu, who lived in the same room, successfully condensed the first cyclone and officially entered Qi Refining First Layer. The man was so excited that he didn't sleep well all night, and his back was straightened a little when he went out in the morning.
"Brother Qin, I went to the Shanggong Hall this morning, and the manager said that the daily wages of Qi Refining First Layer's handymen will be increased by two spiritual crystals!" Sun Daniu's face was red. "The people at the mine also said that with Law Power, you can learn to use the 'Stone Crushing Technique' in the future. You can work faster and have additional good deeds."
Qin Tiexin is really happy for him. "Congratulations."
"Hurry up." Sun Daniu patted him on the shoulder, "I heard that Senior Sister Li Yun, who is single Spirit Root in the inner sect, is already Qi Refining Third Layer, and will go out on a mission in the next two days. Tsk tsk, people are so infuriating when compared to each other."
Li Yun.
Qin Tiexin I thought of the radiant girl standing in front of the entrance test Spirit Stone. I also thought of another figure - if Lu Ming were here, what state would he be in now?
He shook his head to get rid of these distracting thoughts.
Compared with the slow pace of Qi refining, the progress of body refining is extremely fast.
Half a month, three levels of quenching body.
Late that night, Qin Tiexin tested it in a quiet place behind the wooden house - he punched the mountain wall with a punch, and the stone as big as his fist shattered with a sound, leaving only a light white mark on the surface of the fist, which disappeared in a moment. The strength was estimated to be two thousand kilograms, and upon closer inspection, his skin was covered with a very light film, but his skin was already dark, so it was difficult to detect it unless you looked closely.
According to the "Basic Body Tempering Technique", the skin membrane is first formed, the bluestone is broken by the punch, and the wound heals within an hour. This is the sign of the completion of the three levels of "skin-refining and flesh-refining" during the body tempering period.
The next step is the fourth level of "strengthening the muscles and bones."
But problems also arise.
The effect of the previous medicinal bath prescription on strengthening the muscles and bones has been greatly reduced. Several main ingredients need to be replaced, and the price will at least double. Moreover, the tearing effect of "Old Qin Household Body Tempering Method" on the muscles is also weakening - half a month ago, his skin and flesh would be torn after practicing for the eleventh time; now, he can hit it for the sixteenth time in one breath. Although it is still strenuous, there are no blood drops.
This means that if you want to continue to achieve rapid breakthroughs, you need stronger training methods and better prescriptions.
There is also a practical problem: Qi Refining First Layer is needed to barely activate the underground fire furnace in Waste Equipment Pavilion. Qin Tiexin can only smelt ordinary iron now, and the income is limited. If you want to reforge Edgeless and integrate that piece of red-hearted copper, you must have Law Power.
What troubled him even more was the weight of Edgeless.
One hundred and sixty-five kilograms, in his hands with the third level of tempering and the strength of two thousand kilograms, it is already a bit "light". It lacks the heavy texture when wielded, which naturally reduces the effect of tempering.
"Qi Refining First Layer has to come first." Qin Tiexin thought in his mind.
***
The work of the Waste Equipment Pavilion is as usual.
In the same group as Qin Tiexin, in addition to the round-faced young man, there is also a tall and thin man. Both of them are old handymen on the second and third floors of Qi Refining and have been in the Waste Equipment Pavilion for more than a year.
At first, the round-faced young man wanted to win over Qin Tiexin, suggesting that they could "make some money together." Seeing that Qin Tiexin showed no reaction, the two gradually changed their attitudes.
Privately, they inquired about the details of this newcomer: Five Spirit Root, with poor talent, and has not reached Qi Refining First Layer in half a month. In the Waste Equipment Pavilion, he only melts mortal iron and half Law Artifact, and never touches the utensils with a lot of spiritual materials. He goes out early and comes back late every day. In addition to working, he just listens to lectures, like a piece of wood.
"I don't know how to appreciate promotion." The round-faced young man once spat, "I don't want to give him any money, but he has to work as a coolie."
The tall and thin man had gloomy eyes. "This guy comes the earliest and leaves the last every day. He does his work meticulously. If one day he is not strict with his words..."
"What are you afraid of?" the round-faced young man sneered, "What kind of trouble can a five-year-old Spirit Root with no background or talent make in a place like Waste Equipment Pavilion? Besides, if he dares to talk nonsense, we will make it impossible for him to stay."
The two discussed it for several days and finally decided on a plan.
***
At the end of Yin time on this day, it was still dark.
Qin Tiexin came to the Waste Equipment Pavilion as usual. After entering the third floor of Body Tempering, his need for sleep was reduced by nearly half. He only needed to sleep for two hours a day to feel full. This gave him more time to practice and work.
The valley was quiet except for the gurgling sound of distant mountain springs.
He walked to his workbench, checked the tools first, and then started to light the fire. The charcoal fire in the furnace grew stronger, and the orange-red light illuminated half of his face.
What will be melted today are the batch of mortal weapons that were sorted yesterday. Most of them are the remains of standard swords, made of fine iron, and they are easy to handle.
Qin Tiexin moved quickly, dismantling, throwing into the furnace, and melting each piece. The fine iron ingots were piled up beside him, glowing with a dull luster under the firelight.
An hour later, after the mortal artifacts were melted, he began to deal with the basket of "half-Law Artifact wreckage" next to him - these were scraps with severely damaged spiritual patterns and only the material value left.
He picked up a broken knife, weighed it, and threw it into the crucible.
He picked up another fragment of the shield and looked at the lines at the break - they were the remnants of "solid" spiritual lines, but they were blurry. He also threw them in.
The third piece is a broken sword.
Qin Tiexin reached out to pick it up, and when his fingertips touched the blade of the sword, his movements paused slightly.
It doesn't feel right.
He picked up the broken sword and looked at it carefully by the fire.
The sword was more than two feet long and was broken in the middle. The fractures were uneven, as if it had been smashed by a huge force. There were several deep scratches on the sword body, two of which happened to scratch the spiritual pattern area on the spine of the sword, destroying the original pattern and blurring it.
It seems that this is a very ordinary half-Law Artifact wreckage with damaged spiritual patterns.
But Qin Tiexin frowned.
He handles so many scrapped objects every day that each one leaves an impression in his mind - what material it is made of, how it was damaged, how many percent of the spirit pattern is left, and where problems usually occur with this material...
But he had no impression of this broken sword.
What's more...
Qin Tiexin Put the broken sword close to the fire and look carefully at the scratches.
The scratches are very deep, like those left by sharp claws of beasts. But the edges seem too "neat". The real claw marks vary in depth and have a natural pattern; and the depth and width of each scratch seem to be deliberately made with tools.
He felt suspicious and ran his fingers over the blade of the sword.
It feels cool to the touch and has a uniform texture. This is not ordinary refined iron, it has something mixed in it.
Qin Tiexin Held the broken sword flat and weighed it gently. The weight was heavier than it looked, and the center of gravity distribution... was perfect, not at all what a broken sword should look like.
An idea flashed through my mind.
He walked to the workbench and took out a small touchstone from the tool box - it was thrown to him by Old Wu a few days ago. It was said that it could be used to simply test the material when smelting artifacts with spiritual materials.
He lightly scratched the edge of the broken sword on the touchstone.
After the harsh friction sound, a deep mark was left on the surface of the touchstone, glowing with a faint black-gray luster.
Black iron sand.
And the content is not low, at least 10%.
Qin Tiexin's heart sank.
Refined iron mixed with black iron sand is one of the standard materials for refining low-grade Law Artifact. This material should never appear in the basket of "half-Law Artifact wreckage" - half-Law Artifact uses ordinary refined iron or low-level spiritual copper, and does not use 10% black iron sand at all.
He looked carefully at the "scratches" on the sword's spine again.
Under the light of the fire, you can vaguely see the metal texture under the scratches - the texture is fine and even, without any signs of breakage or distortion. As for the so-called "spiritual damage" area, if you look closely at a specific angle, you can find that the texture is actually intact, but the surface has been deliberately scratched.
This is not a half-Law Artifact wreckage.
This is a intact low-grade Law Artifact, which has been disguised as damaged.
Qin Tiexin The hand holding the sword tightened slightly.
If he had just thrown it into the furnace without looking carefully, then the intact Law Artifact would have been melted in the ordinary fire. Although it would not be completely destroyed, the entire sword would definitely be useless. And if someone comes to inquire and hold accountable afterwards...
The consequences are disastrous.
Cold sweat instantly soaked my back.
He slowly raised his head and looked toward the mouth of the valley. The sky was turning white, and it was still half an hour before the others arrived.
Who is it?
The answer is almost ready to come out.
In the past half month, he had only had contact with those two people in the Waste Equipment Pavilion. They hinted at "oil and water", but he ignored them; they inquired about his details and knew that he had poor talent and no background; they were worried that he, an "honest person", would do bad things and wanted to make him "unable to stay".
Qin Tiexin Take a deep breath and force yourself to calm down.
He gently placed the Law Artifact that was disguised as a broken sword in a secret compartment under the workbench, and from the scrap pile next to it, he picked out a half-Law Artifact fragment that actually contained a trace amount of black iron sand. This was something he had removed from a damaged goggles a few days ago. The quality was very poor, and the black iron sand content was less than half.
He threw the fragment into the crucible.
The furnace fire is blazing, and the fragments gradually turn red and soften under the high temperature. The trace amounts of black iron sand inside are heated and mixed with the molten iron, and a few wisps of faint black smoke are emitted during the smelting process - this is a unique phenomenon when black iron sand is smelted.
Qin Tiexin stared at the wisps of black smoke with cold eyes.
Since the other party has set up this bureau, they will definitely come to "accept the results."
He continued to work, his movements still steady, but his concentration was tense every time. His ears listened to the movement at the mouth of the valley, and his eyes paid attention to his surroundings with the corner of his eye.
About a quarter of an hour later, footsteps were heard.